“Sale. Katida’s a friend.”
“Sale is doing her job.” Katida handed over her blaster. Her lines were stronger today, more in tune with Confluence Station.
“You’re listening to the lines,” Ean said. She hadn’t come to him for training, but her lines skill had improved. Hernandez? “Why didn’t you come to me?” Ean had offered. Plenty of times.
“Lancia cannot be seen to favor Balian, Ean. Balian cannot be seen to be too close to Lancia.” It was what she had always said. “But I am exceptionally happy I chose Hernandez for that first group of line training. She was my strongest linesman although at the time I wondered if I should have chosen someone with more stability.”
Hernandez had certified as a level-seven linesman. She was, in fact, a ten.
“How long has she been training you?” Ean couldn’t imagine Hernandez with the patience to teach anyone. Especially not an admiral of the fleet.
“Since you started training her. With time out when she was on the Gruen.”
Ean spent dinner quizzing Katida about her training and how she was doing. He made her sing to the lines and listened critically, gently nudging her lines straight when they needed it.
“Not bad,” he conceded eventually.
If Hernandez could teach Katida, she was certainly ready to train others. And if she could, then so could Rossi. Their plan of combined initial training until the linesmen could hear the lines, then splitting them into groups, should work well.
“High praise indeed. But how have you been, Ean? Without Radko when you need the support?”
Was she getting that from the lines?
“I’ll be glad when she’s back,” he admitted. He could speak honestly to Katida. “Sometimes I want to—” He stopped. Admitting the urge to do harm to another person wasn’t something one should say aloud. “The other part of it doesn’t help.”
“Other part?” Katida’s voice was sharp suddenly.
Sale came to stand in the archway again.
“The Worlds of the Lesser Gods and Yu.”
Katida’s eyebrows rose at that.
“It’s not really part of it, it just happened at the same time.” It would be forever ingrained in Ean’s mind as one thing, not two. “And while no one knows for certain, everyone thinks Yu told Radko she was to marry Sattur Dow in exchange for the mine Yu is going to give the Worlds of the Lesser Gods. Sattur Dow’s mine, I mean.”
Sale sighed.
Let her sigh. Katida would already know this. Abram and Radko both said she ran the best covert ops of any world.
“And everyone is telling me how foolish the whole thing is and how it could have been handled better. Abram and Michelle already know this.”
“They come to you because they see the three of you as representing Lancia here at the New Alliance. If, as they fear, Lancia is moving to strengthen its power base and become de facto leader of the New Alliance, then saying it to Galenos or Lady Lyan will weaken their own position in the future.”
“It wasn’t Michelle’s idea.”
The song that was Katida’s lines drooped and slowed. “Ean, that’s the last thing anyone needs to hear.”
“Why?”
“Because that means Emperor Yu is behind it, and Lady Lyan can’t stop him.”
“She is trying,” Ean said.
“Perhaps if someone shared her problem, she’d get more support.”
He didn’t need Sale’s, “Ean,” to know not to say any more. He shook his head.
Katida sighed. “I’ll be around if you need to talk, Ean,” and moved on to discuss the line training that was to commence the following day.
As they arrived on the Gruen, the antagonism of the first batch of trainees hit Ean like a wall of sound. It was a rancid taste at the back of his throat, a dizzying buzz that kept trying to pull the lines out of tune.
“Phwagh,” Hernandez said. Ean had Hernandez and Sale with him but was without the support of Fergus, who was running experiments on the Wendell, and Rossi, performing emergency line repairs on a badly damaged warship. Right now, Ean would have preferred to be doing the repairs, leaving Rossi here with the mob.
Captain Hilda Gruen accosted Ean as soon as he stepped out of the shuttle. “I don’t want these people on my ship.”
Bhaksir and her team moved in to surround him. He was grateful for the protection.
“They’re linesmen,” Ean said. “This is the training ship.”
“They’re breaking my ship lines.”
They certainly were. There were strong linesmen in the group, and some of them really didn’t want to be here. What had they been told? “I’ll do what I can.” He sang line one as straight as he could. “As soon as these people know who you are, they’ll be better.”
Sale set the pace to the large cargo hold that was the de facto training area. “I’ll talk to them first.”
Ean nodded. Sale would give the usual pretraining spiel. “These are the oxygen tanks, here’s what to do if someone is overcome by the lines. Oh, and by the way, if the person next to you isn’t looking at me, nudge them,” for some multilevel linesmen got caught up in the ecstasy of line eleven and stopped thinking about anything else.
The first time he’d run line training, a Gate Union ship had tried to destroy the fleet. Today, at least, should be quieter.
He moved in to stand quietly behind the group while Sale gave her talk. He nudged one of the linesmen caught up in the ecstasy of line eleven and found it was Lina Vang. All four of the Xanto linesmen were together, Nadia Kentish looking as if she wished she weren’t, the others looking just as aggressive.
He couldn’t have familiar trainers at his back all the time, but today he wished for Fergus Burns and Jordan Rossi. And Radko, of course.
Sale followed the regular spiel with an extra talk. “I remind you that this program is top secret. The penalty for giving away these secrets is death. You have all signed agreements to this effect.” She looked toward Ean. “Linesman Lambert. All yours.”
He moved up to stand on the podium after Sale stepped down. Sale shouldn’t be here either. Normally, she’d be out at the Confluence, and he could hear that the Confluence wasn’t happy about her and her team not being there.
Nobody was happy today, it seemed.
“I’m going to sing a greeting to the lines,” Ean said. “I want you to sing back, exactly the same tune. Don’t be surprised if the lines answer back.”
“Why is Lambert training us?” one of the linesmen demanded.
Ean hadn’t been introduced to him via admiralty, but he knew him anyway. Arnold Peters had trained at House of Rigel. He’d made the first five years of Ean’s stay there miserable. Or tried to, but Ean had been too happy just to be training.
“Lambert’s not a linesman,” Peters said. “He does everything wrong.”
Sale moved back to stand on the podium beside Ean. “What’s your name? Peters? Lambert is the leading linesman for the New Alliance. He is your senior. Treat him as such. Continue with the attitude you have now, and you will be kicked off the program.”
Not a good start at all.
Not for him, and definitely not for Peters, for the lines could feel the animosity, and the music was starting to change.
“Gently,” Ean sang. “They’re new. They’re not sure what they’re doing.” Then he said to the trainees, “Introducing you to the ships, one line at a time. I’ll name the line and the ship first, then I’ll sing hello to them, then you sing back. Match my tune exactly.”