I considered Five. She stood there outwardly impassive, but wanting me to see something, impatient I hadn’t yet. Her announcement had, from her point of view, been heavy with suggestion. “It’s customary to pay for such services?” I asked Station Administrator Celar.
“Often,” she agreed, still with a wry smile. “Though I’m sure Fosyf is just being generous.”
And self-serving. It would not surprise me if Fosyf had realized, one way or another, what part her own daughter had played in the episode that had led to Translator Dlique’s death. Hoped, perhaps, that hosting me during the mourning period would be, if not a bribe, at least a gesture toward remorse for what her daughter had done. But it might well be useful. “Raughd could come downwell with us, of course,” I observed. “And stay after. For quite some time.”
“I’ll see to it,” said Station Administrator Celar, with a small, bitter smile that, had I been Raughd Denche, would have made me shiver.
12
Athoek’s sky was a clear cerulean, shot here and there with bright streaks—the visible parts of the planet’s weather control grid. For some hours we’d flown over water, blue-gray and flat, but now mountains loomed, brown and green below, black and gray and streaked with ice at their tops. “Another hour or so, Fleet Captain, Citizens,” said the pilot. We had been met, at the base of the elevator, by two fliers. Between one thing and another—including maneuvering on the part of Kalr Five—Fosyf and Raughd had ended up in the other one, along with Captain Hetnys and the Sword of Atagaris ancillary who accompanied her. Both Captain Hetnys and I were in full mourning—the hair we’d shaved off barely beginning to grow back, no cosmetics but a broad white stripe painted diagonally across our faces. Once full mourning was over, Translator Dlique’s memorial token would join Lieutenant Awn’s plain gold tag on my jacket: a two-centimeter opal, Translator Dlique Zeiat Presger engraved large and clear on the silver setting. They were the only names we knew to use.
In the seat beside me, silent the entire trip so far—an impressive two days of not saying a word beyond the absolutely necessary—sat Sirix Odela. My request that she accompany me would leave the Gardens shorthanded, and theoretically she could have refused. Very little choice was actually involved. I guessed her anger had made her unable to speak without violating the terms of her reeducation, that attempting to do so would make her extremely uncomfortable, and so I did not press the issue, not even when it stretched into the second day.
“Fleet Captain,” Sirix said. Finally. Voice pitched to reach my ear over the noise of the flier, but not carry up front to where the pilot sat. “Why am I here?” Her tone was very, very carefully controlled, a control I didn’t doubt was hard-won.
“You are here,” I said, in an even, reasonable voice, as though I was unaware of the resentment and distress behind the question, “to tell me what Citizen Fosyf isn’t telling me.”
“Why do you think I would be willing or able to tell you anything, Fleet Captain?” Sirix’s voice took on just the slightest edge, skirting what she would be able to say without discomfort.
I turned my head to look at her. She stared straight ahead, as though my reaction didn’t concern her at all. “Is there family you’d like to visit?” She’d come from downwell, had relatives who’d worked on tea plantations. “I’m sure I could arrange for it.”
“I am…” She hesitated. Swallowed. I had pushed too hard, somehow. “Without family. For any practical purpose.”
“Ah.” She did have a house name, and so was not legally houseless. “Actually throwing you out of the family would have been too much disgrace for them to bear. But perhaps you’re still in discreet contact with someone? A mother, a sibling?” And children generally had parents from more than one house. Parents or siblings from other houses might not be considered terribly close relatives, might or might not be required to lend any sort of support, but those ties were there, could be drawn on in a crisis.
“To be entirely honest, Fleet Captain,” said Sirix, as though it was an answer to my question, “I really don’t want to spend two weeks in the company of Citizen Raughd Denche.”
“I don’t think she realizes,” I said. Citizen Raughd had been oblivious, or at least seemingly so. Oblivious to the seriousness of what she’d done, to the fact that anyone at all might be aware she’d done it. “Why do you live in the Undergarden, citizen?”
“I didn’t like my assigned quarters. I think, Fleet Captain, that you appreciate directness.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “It would be hypocritical of me not to.”
She acknowledged that with a bitter quirk of her mouth. “I would like to be left alone now.”
“Of course, Citizen. Please don’t hesitate to tell me or either of my Kalrs”—Kalr Five and Kalr Eight sat behind us—“if you need anything.” I turned forward again. Closed my eyes and thought of Lieutenant Tisarwat.
Who stood in the garden, on the bridge stretching across the lake. The fish roiled the water below her, purple and green, orange and blue, gold and red, gaping as Tisarwat dropped food pellets into the water. Celar’s daughter Piat stood beside her, leaning on the rail. She had just said something that had surprised and dismayed Lieutenant Tisarwat. I didn’t query, but waited to hear Tisarwat’s answer.
“That’s ridiculous,” Tisarwat said, indignant. “First assistant to the chief of Horticulture of the entire station, that’s not nothing. If it weren’t for Horticulture no one on this station could eat or breathe. You don’t seriously think you’re doing some unimportant, useless job.”
“What, making tea for the chief of Horticulture?”
“And managing her appointments, and communicating her orders, and learning how the Gardens are organized. I bet if she stayed home for the next week, no one would even notice, you’d have everything running smoothly as normal.”
“That’s because everyone else knows their jobs.”
“You included.” Devious Tisarwat! I’d told her to stay away from Basnaaid, which would mean staying away from the Gardens, but she knew well enough I had to approve of a friendship with Station Administrator Celar’s daughter, if only on political grounds. But I couldn’t find it in myself to be too angry—her horrified astonishment at Piat’s dismissal of her own worth was obvious and sincere. And she’d clearly made short work of getting behind Piat’s defenses.
Citizen Piat folded her arms, turned around, her back to the rail, face turned away from Tisarwat. “I’m only here because the chief of Horticulture is in love with my mother.”
“Hardly surprising if she is,” acknowledged Lieutenant Tisarwat. “Your mother is gorgeous.” I was seeing through Tisarwat’s eyes, so I couldn’t see Piat’s expression. I could guess, though. So could Tisarwat, I saw. “And frankly, you take after her. If someone’s been telling you otherwise…” She stopped, unsure for a moment, I thought, if this was the best angle of attack. “Anyone who’s been telling you that you’ve got a shiny-but-useless assignment just to keep your mother happy, or that you’ll never be as beautiful or as competent as she is, well, they’ve been lying to you.” She dropped the whole handful of fish pellets into the water, which boiled with bright-colored scales. “Probably jealous.”