She was on level 2. On her right, a row of shops and services for merchant crews, from bars to message services to beds-by—the-hour, with or without partners. On her left, at intervals, were the dockside facilities for ships in station. Each had space for a temporary office, decorated in as lavish a style as the ships’ owners found desirable. Boros Consortium seemed to have made their occupancy permanent in 32, 33, and 34, with a continuous office: customer, service, and crew entrances, with uniformed but unarmed Boros guards watching passersby. Number 35 was bare-bones, an obvious prefab folding “office” in the middle of the bare alloted space, and a small sign that declared it was for the Mercedes R., owner/captain Caleb Montoya. Number 36 was another independent, but one with more resources: Ganeshi Shipping Company had a status board displayed, which informed passersby that the office was now open.
Number 37 looked to be about the same level, simple but moderately prosperous. Clan Orange had put orange stripes on the doorframe and windows of the office, and hung out a fabric banner as well as showing a status board that included the percent of the ship still available to shippers. Passengers 0, she noticed.
Number 38 carried self-expression to an art form; Esmay didn’t know whether to laugh or gasp in admiration when she came to the multicolored carpet in exuberant floral designs, the drapes hung from pipe frames, the potted palm in a vast basket. A sign declared “Terakian & Sons, Ltd., General and Express Shipping” and a very dramatic painted hand pointed to the office. Unlike the others, it was not a simple box in shape, but constructed with peaks and swooping curves, and painted in a pattern that made the carpet seem tame.
Esmay stepped under the pointed arch of the entrance, and found herself in a surprisingly quiet space before the little office. Was it just the draped fabric, or had the Terakians installed some sound shielding? She shrugged mentally and went up to the office. The door slid aside before she touched it. Inside was what looked like a luxury sitting room: another floral design on the carpet, only slightly subdued, with large, plump leather seats grouped around it. Along one wall was a counter, and behind it a bright-eyed young man.
“Sera Suiza?” he said. Esmay nodded. “I’ll just tell Basil—” the young man said, and murmured into a throatmic.
At once a door opened, and two men came through. One she had seen on the screen in the combooth—he was as dramatic in person as on vid. The other was older, far less vivid to look at, but clearly in authority.
“I’m Goonar Terakian,” the older man said, extending his hand. Esmay shook it. “Captain of Terakian Fortune, and junior partner in Terakian and Sons, Ltd. Basil here is my cousin, second in command on my ship, and the cargomaster. You’re Esmay Suiza, formerly of Fleet, is that right?”
“Yes. Until this morning—” A lump rose in her throat. She hadn’t let herself feel the loss yet, and she wasn’t going to now. She swallowed hard.
“Sera, Basil told me that you wanted transport off this station with some urgency?”
“I wouldn’t say urgency,” Esmay said. “I just don’t want to wait for the next direct passenger transport to Castle Rock.”
“Sera, I have to tell you up front, and despite our gratitude for your part in rescuing Hazel Takeris, if you’re a fugitive from Fleet, we can’t help you.”
“I’m not,” Esmay said. She could feel the wave of heat rising up her face. “I—they discharged me this morning, and I still don’t completely understand why. But they want me off this station—threatened to space me, in fact—and I want to get somewhere that I can figure out what’s going on and fight it.”
“Um. Yet we know you’re being followed.”
“I am?” Esmay thought of the man back at the tram station. “But—maybe the admiral just wants to know that I’m leaving.”
“Or maybe he wants to know who you meet, and it’ll put us under suspicion.” That from the young man at the counter. Goonar shot him a sharp look.
“Flaci, were you asked?”
“No, I only—”
“Go make some coffee,” Goonar ordered. The young man withdrew through the door behind the counter. Basil pulled out a cylinder that looked just like the ones used in Fleet to foil scans of a conversational area, twisted it, and laid it on the table.
“Have a seat, sera,” Goonar offered. Esmay sank into the cushions and wondered if she would be able to climb out again. The little status light on the security cylinder glowed: they were supposedly screened from scan. Goonar took the seat to her right; Basil was across from her.
“Kids,” Basil said, with a wave at the counter. “They never know when to keep quiet.”
“And you do?” Goonar asked, but with a grin that took most of the sting out of it. He turned to Esmay. “Sera, do you have any idea at all why Fleet tossed you out, when there’s a mutiny on and I’d think they’d want every loyal officer?”
“Well . . . sort of.” Esmay felt her blush going hotter. “Admiral Serrano—Vida Serrano that is—is angry with my family, and . . . and . . . her grandson and I just got married.”
“You what?” asked Basil. Goonar made a sort of choked noise, which Esmay recognized as suppressed laughter.
“I married her grandson—or he married me—anyway we’re married. He—we—we’d been trying to talk to our families for a long time, and finally he and I had figured out a time we could meet with his parents. Only all the Serranos were there, it seemed like, and his grandmother—Admiral Vida—came out with a story about my family’s history . . . and she was wrong.” Esmay caught her breath; she was suddenly on the edge of tears. “That wasn’t what happened; it can’t have been. But she believed it. And she said we could never marry, and then the mutiny came, and we all had to go back to duty, and . . . and . . .”
“You and he sneaked off to get married,” Basil said.
“We didn’t sneak,” Esmay said. “But we didn’t—we couldn’t, there wasn’t time—tell anyone beforehand.”
“Such as your family and his,” Goonar said. He had most of his face under control, but a twitch in the corner of his mouth said he was still finding this funny.
Basil wasn’t; he was scowling now. “They ditched you for marrying the Serrano kid? When you’re a hero?”
“I’m also a Landbride back on Altiplano—”
“You have two husbands?” Basil looked at Goonar. “I guess that would do it. A boy in every port?”
“No, it’s not like that.” Esmay glared at him. “I’m not that sort of person. Landbride is a . . . a sort of family thing, and religious. It’s the woman in the family who is responsible for the land—for seeing that it’s cared for.”
“Oh. And this bothered them? Were you going to go back there and take him with you?”
“No . . . I was going to resign as Landbride—give it to my cousin Luci—and stay in Fleet. But then things happened—”
“They always do.” That was Goonar, the quiet one, not as handsome as Basil but steadier. He had sad eyes, Esmay thought.
“So—after the news of the mutiny—we were traveling together back to our assignments, and . . . we just got married. We’d waited so long, and so much was going on—”
“Without the right paperwork, I’m guessing,” Goonar said. “And without family permission?”
Esmay felt herself reddening. “Definitely without.”
“That would annoy them,” Basil said. He leaned back and one eyebrow rose. Theatrical.
“Stop it, Bas,” said Goonar. “You’re learning bad habits from our passengers.”
“I need to find a way home,” Esmay said. “I thought maybe, if I could talk to Hazel—I thought maybe she was on this ship—she’d help me.”
“Why not contact the Thornbuckle girl? She’s rich enough to buy you a ship of your own.”