The streets transform when the sun goes down. Fashions shift, becoming more eye catching, more esoteric, until it becomes clear why this is the destination for the fashionable elite. Giggling model-celebutantes cluster in the tourist areas, letting themselves be posed with tourists for a few credits, letting themselves be seen as more important than they are. Speeders fill the air, their running lights adding a shifting quality to everything below. The walkways and moving stairs are packed with a shimmering selection of who’s who and who wants to be, all of them moving with casual lack of purpose, as if none of them have any reason to do anything so common as hurry.
The ones who needed to hurry have already long since passed, the beautiful, impoverished faces that will smile from host stands and from behind bars, the less intentionally attractive ones who will conceal themselves behind the scenes, preparing meals, cleaning floors, keeping the vast, complicated mechanism of the city operational. Each of them has a story, a secret, a dream they hope to one day render real. Most of them will fail, but this is the city for dreaming, and so they endure.
They endure.
“There is a call for you, Miss Gheal.”
“Is there?” Ubialla allows herself a moment of quiet before she rises, moving smoothly through the gathering crowd to the privacy of her office. From the windows, she can see the entire room. She shuts the door before she positions herself in front of the holoscreen.
The face that flashes into visibility is familiar, as familiar as her own. She meets his eyes, straight backed and unflinching. She’s proud of herself for that. There are so few who can look the councilor in the eye.
How she ever thought she could walk these streets unscathed, she no longer understands. She has not been so young, nor so innocent, in a very long time. She was a fool to have ever been that young in the first place.
“Ubialla,” he says, “I understand my property is set to enter your establishment.”
She doesn’t bother asking how he knows. It would insult them both, and he does not care to be insulted. “I will do my best to obtain it.”
“You will obtain it, for me, or we will have words. I have a gathering coming up. My guests require the best. Provide it.”
The holo winks out: She has been dismissed.
Her chest aches with the stirrings of panic as she looks around the office. Subtlety is no longer an option. There is a blaster in the desk drawer. She grabs it. If she cannot be subtle, she will be direct: There is elegance, at times, in directness. Most of all, she will not lose.
She can’t.
—
Derla Pidys moves through the crowd with head high, valise, as ever, by her side. She grips the handle like a woman who would sooner die than release her burden. It is a clever pose; she carries nothing of value. The valise contains a small device built to her specifications, capable of modifying its density within a narrow range. There will be no change to her mass or gait when she returns to her room; no thieves watching her come will find anything unusual about her when she goes. It is a small protection. It is enough to lend her an additional layer of security.
She does not look around herself; she does not need to. Creatures with binocular vision often forget that those with additional eyes can see more than they can; they plan their approaches and attacks as if everyone shared the same field of vision. She knows precisely where her followers are located, can see the way they measure her steps and study her valise. This, too, is a natural consequence of her legend. They know her presence means, or can mean, profit. She carries wonders.
“Not tonight, my friends,” she murmurs, and watches with amusement as the nearest of them fade back into the crowd, trying to look like they were completely unaware of her presence. “I carry nothing worth stealing, and I will not place myself where you can have me. Go about your business.”
Some of them do. Others, too far back to hear her, do not. It matters little, for there is the entrance to Ubialla’s palace of wonders, and she will be safe there. It would have been safer, she knows, to have taken a speeder from her room and never dangled herself in front of these street toughs like a prize to be won or stolen, but there is—always—the legend to be considered. Derla Pidys is humble, they say, because she walks when she can, keeps her feet on the ground. She is simple, they say, because she does not ornament herself, allowing her wines to speak for themselves. She can be trusted. She will not lie to you.
It is pleasing when a lie takes on such weight that it begins to out-mass the truth, which must be sipped in small and careful doses, like the poison it is. With back straight and chin high, she approaches Ubialla’s place. The bouncers step aside to let her pass. One of them, a Wookiee she has known for many years, shoots her what she might read as a sympathetic look.
There isn’t time to wonder about it, not without stopping where she is, which would attract more attention than she wants to risk, and which might make her late for her appointment. She continues onward, past the threshold, into the cool air of Ubialla’s domain, where the only law is that of the owner’s whim. She takes another step.
The muzzle of a blaster digs into her spine, just below her ribs, where a single shot would be enough to kill her before a medic could reach them.
“Ah,” says Derla, disappointed all out of proportion with the likelihood of this moment. “You have decided to interfere with my business.”
“All business in this place is my business,” Ubialla replies. She leans close, her breath warm against Derla’s skin. “You were holding out on me. You know I don’t care to be left in the dark.”
“I have conducted private business here in the past.”
“Not involving people who have something I want. Or were you planning to turn around and hand your prize to me? Was this all an elaborate attempt at granting me a present? Tell me it was. Make me believe you, and I’ll allow you to broker this deal between the twins and myself. I’ll let you walk away. We may even do business again, you and I, and have no bad blood between us.”
Derla closes her upper eyes, a sign of true regret, scanning the club for signs of the sisters with her lower pair. They have not arrived, or have not chosen to show themselves. She might yet be able to salvage something from this dire mistake.
She should have pressed them harder to meet her in private, to come to her rooms and not to this dangerous feeding ground. She does not blame Ubialla for her betrayal. There is no point in blaming a sarlacc for its hunger. All it knows is wanting. Ubialla is the same. All she knows is wanting, and when she is not satisfied, she could devour the world in her eagerness and greed. Derla blames herself. She should have found a way to move the meeting.
“I apologize for misleading you, although I provided exactly as much information as I have on earlier occasions, and you did not draw a weapon on me then,” says Derla. “I am meeting with the Grammus sisters, yes. They tell me they have a bottle of wine available for purchase, and I am keen to acquire it. I did not come to yield my prize to you, nor do I have any intention of doing so. The wine needs to be tested. It needs to be analyzed, so we can determine who may drink it without harm. If I were to give it to you, and it were to prove incompatible with your biology—”
“Liar,” says Ubialla fondly. “You wouldn’t be here merely to test the stuff. You have a buyer in mind. Who is it?”
This time Derla closes her lower set of eyes as well. Only for a moment. Only long enough to feel the depth of her regret. “He is offworld. Very far offworld. He has had the wine before, and he craves it, dreams of it. He has agreed to my decanting a measure for my own purposes, if I will bring him the remainder. It is a fair exchange, given the price he is willing to pay for even a partial bottle, and I will reach him in plenty of time to guarantee its potency. Nothing will sour in my hands.”
“Nothing will enter your hands,” says Ubialla. “This is my place. These are my walls. Any treasures to be found in this night will belong to me, only me, and entirely me. Do you understand?”
&
nbsp; “I understand that your greed will be your undoing,” says Derla, opening all four of her eyes. “Do you have a buyer chosen already? No…not a buyer. You love a profit, but so do we all. You have someone who craves this wine, even as my client does, but who is less inclined to sharing. What pots have you placed your fingers in this time? A torn web catches no flies.”
The muzzle of the blaster digs in deeper. Derla does not cry out. To cry out would be to reward Ubialla, and to shame her family line. Even if none of them ever heard of what happened here, they would know, somewhere deep and aching, that she had died without dignity.
“When are they meeting you?” Ubialla spits.
“Please, milady, but they are here already.” The voice is female, human, unfamiliar. Ubialla and Derla both turn toward it, the one furious, the other relieved. Anything that breaks the moment is worthwhile.
The woman is dressed plainly in one of the interchangeable resort uniforms, her hair styled in the polite fashion. Such a terrible, bestial thing, hair. Derla finds it difficult to understand how the humans can bear it.
The human woman raises her chin in defiance and says, “My mistresses have sent me to inform you they have seated themselves in the booth prepared for their use, and that while it is perfectly pleasing, you should have reserved a second as well, for symmetry. They would each like a glass of water and a glass of your finest candied ice wine. They understand they will not be billed for this evening’s libations, as you are currently engaged in a fight for their favor, and look forward to the both of you joining them.” She pauses, clearly all too aware of the blaster Ubialla holds, and swallows before she adds, “If either of you chooses not to come, they will leave immediately, and no business will be conducted tonight.”
“Why?” asks Derla. “They were originally meeting only with me.”
“That’s why they brought me,” says the woman. “Their culture requires that all important conversations be balanced on each side. Had you not brought a second for your side, I would have filled the role.”
“I’m not her second,” snarls Ubialla.
The woman looks at her anxiously. “I am only relaying what my mistresses have requested. If you will excuse me, I have to tell them that their message has been given, and then I’m to return to our resort to prepare their room for the night.”
She turns then, and walks away. The look on Ubialla’s face—horrified disbelief, as if she has never in her life borne such an insult—would almost be enough to make the moment worthwhile, if not for the blaster still digging into Derla’s back.
“I have a suggestion,” the sommelier says politely.
“I shoot you here and now, and let the stones fall as they will?” says Ubialla, in a voice like ice.
“While that might be very satisfying for you, I doubt it would be enjoyable for me,” says Derla. “As the sisters have seen fit to indicate that we are both expected at the bargaining table, perhaps we should do as they have requested. Let them decide how the wine is to be portioned. I will promise to abide by their decision if you will.”
“Or I could shoot all three of you,” says Ubialla.
“Then there will be no more wine, ever,” says Derla. She pauses before she adds, with careful venom in her voice, “Although perhaps it will not matter, if their home dimension takes umbrage at your arrogance.”
“That’s a lie,” says Ubialla.
“You sound uncertain.”
After a moment of silence, Ubialla gives the blaster a twist. “You will let me have the wine.”
“I believe the sisters will decide that. Should we really keep them waiting?”
Ubialla pulls the gun away with a snarl. Derla does not smile. That would be taunting a woman near the edge of her endurance, and she is smarter, by far, than that mistake.
Perhaps she can survive this after all.
“CALLA HAS DELIVERED OUR MESSAGE,” says Rhomby, caressing the leather of the booth’s seat with one hand. “She’s scampering home as I speak, to take her little drugs and dream her little dreams. Do you think she’ll sleep in my bed while I’m away? Will I return to the room to find it smelling of dismay?”
“She’ll sleep on the floor if she sleeps at all,” says Parallela. “We terrify her.”
Rhomby gives her a chiding look. “You’re the one who chose to keep her.”
“Yes,” says Parallela. She folds one hand across the top of the valise that sits on the seat between them, latched and sealed and waiting. “It’s good to keep frightened things. It makes them calmer in the long run. You’ll see.”
“I will not.”
“You will not,” agrees Parallela. “Here they come.”
Rhomby turns to watch, gravely, as the two women in white approach. To an outside observer, it must look as if they planned their attire to complement the twins’ sense of symmetry: Ubialla and Derla will never pass as sisters, are too clearly the evolutionary outcomes of two different worlds, circling two different suns, but their dresses are similar enough in cut, style, and color to seem an intentional choice. Sometimes the galaxy is generous with its coincidences. Rhomby sits a little straighter, and sees out of the corner of her eye as Parallela does the same, both of them settling into the solemn silence that has served them so well, on so many worlds.
People do enjoy the opportunity to fill a silence. It is an art, quieting, calming, allowing others to betray themselves with their inability to hold their tongues. The sisters have been the speakers, on more than one occasion, but when they babble, they do so from a careful script, playing the flighty fool, playing the part set for them by their unwitting hosts.
Tonight that part is superseded by something far greater and more exciting. A true piece of art. Something this world has never seen before. They trade a glance, dipping their chins downward in place of the smile they dare not sport. Mystery thrives in shadow and all too often dies in the light.
Derla is the first to reach the booth. She does smile, closing her lower eyes in greeting, and it is a credit to her professionalism that the strain only shows around the corners of her mouth and in the tightness of her lids. Her life has been endangered once already, and still she spreads her hands on the table’s edge, fingers splayed to show their emptiness.
“What a mercy and delight to finally be in your presence direct,” she says, voice formal and carefully cadenced, so that each word is clear and ready for inspection. “Was the journey difficult?”
“Hyperspace is a veil through which only the most beautiful fish may swim,” says Rhomby, her voice serious, as if she were imparting the deepest secrets of the universe. “Their fins weep rainbows as they pass. It is no small thing, to cross a veil. To cross it twice is something only fools aspire to do, and yet here we are, beautiful still, with all our rainbows bled away.”
“We asked our souvenir to find us libations,” says Parallela, her voice pitched to be identical to her sister’s. “We told her our desires, made them clear and plain and perfectly balanced, and we released her into the world to fulfill them. Has she failed us, or has she succeeded? Shall she be coated in glory or smothered in shame?”
“Your drinks are coming,” says Ubialla, her years of social grace coming to the front before they fade again before the reality of the moment. “On the house, of course. Under the circumstances, it seems the least I can do.”
“What circumstances?” asks Rhomby. She tilts her head very slightly to the side. “Do you mean your forcing your way into our negotiation, which was intended to be private, in order to demand that we give to you what we brought with the intention of giving to her?”
Ubialla’s smile is slow and languid, the expression of a predator preparing to close its jaws. “Yes. That is precisely what I mean. My name is Ubialla Gheal, and I—”
“This is your place: You own it, and you have built it, not brick by brick, but rumor by rumor, until it seems unassailable,” says Parallela. “It is a fine palace of artifice. You should be very proud. We are Rhomby.
We are Parallela.”
“You can’t both be both,” says Ubialla.
“Perhaps not here, but where we come from, all things come in duplicate, so that if one is destroyed, the other may endure, and continue. Lessened, yes, and sorrowing until the end of all things, but alive. So we are Rhomby, and we are Parallela, and we mourn for you, that you should be singular and alone from the beginning of your days, never to know the security of a shadow who will live on in your absence.” Rhomby folds her hands in her lap. “We did not come here to give you our wine, Ubialla Gheal, but as you are to stand as Derla Pidys’s second in this discussion, we will allow the chance that it will be you who walks away with it. Please. Sit. Both of you. We must all be present, or no business can be done.”
Derla folds herself onto a seat while Ubialla is still gaping. Derla has bargained for wines that are never meant to leave their homeworlds, for liquors considered to be religious relics and politically unwise brews. She can follow the discussion where it takes her. “It is a pleasure to finally meet you, even under these circumstances. I have been following your journeys for some time.”
“Have you?” Parallela is the one to tilt her head this time, becoming her sister’s mirror image once again. “And what have you concluded?”
“That if your wine is as good as people claim, I don’t care where you come from. Be from another dimension. Be from the bottom of the Cantonican sea. I want what you have to offer me, and as there is no one else to make that offer, I would be a fool to question you. Whether you speak truth or lies is of absolutely no consequence. All that matters is the wine.”
Ubialla finally sits, concealing the blaster in her lap as she watches the others with wary eyes.
“We have tasted so many marvelous things since arriving on your side of space,” says Rhomby. “Why do you call what we offer wine?”
Canto Bight [Star Wars] Page 9