When she’d finished breakfast and complimented Cara on her way of searing cow, she strolled out and stood looking up at the clouds thickening overhead. The wind that plucked at her hair was heavy with the smell of brine.
“Lookin’ for rain, Shadow?
She turned. “Oh, good morning, Getto. No, just smelling the sea on the wind. Anybody got boats around here?”
He tugged at the flesh loop that had been an earlobe before he had it stretched to hold his dari-mirror; the mirror pulsed there when he played his drums at his pitch on an alley corner near The Tank. “No fishing here. No reason to spend tokens on boats. The Bellies go where the tokens heap highest.”
“Tsa! My da ran a fishboat, and when I light on a world with salt water I always go for a sail. And here I’m got some free time, and I was thinking I’d like to get out on the water a while.”
“Kemros the Tinkerman, he rents out your open top flier, you could take one of those down low ’nough to skim the waves, suck some skempt, and dream a day sailer.”
“Huh. That’s a good idea. Thanks, Getto. Owe you one.”
“Easy ’nough to get straight. Fetch you harp to m’ pitch when you get back, and we play duo an hour come two.”
“A’ right. Why not.”
She smiled with affection as she watched hiin ambling away, stopping every few steps to speak to a shopkeeper or a street player or just someone whiling away a moment or two staring at bugs on the pavement. Then she shook her head at her own obtuseness and went to find Kemros the Tinkerman.
Stupid not to grasp what an ocean full of poison water and poison fish would mean to the economy of a recently colonized world. And she knew about it, too; it was one of the warnings she had to thumbprint in the declaration of intent for temporary residence. I UNDERSTAND THAT ALL WATERLIFE AND A HIGH PERCENTAGE OF THE VEGETATION ON Hutsarte IS POISONOUS TO AIR BREATHERS WITH HEMOBASED BLOOD AND THAT ANY ATTEMPT TO LIVE
OFF THE NATIVE PRODUCTS OF Hutsarte COULD RESULT IN IN MY DEATH OR DISABILITY. No fishing industry, the colonists concentrated into one city and scattered ranches, not much heavy industry, the other landmasses of the world left untouched so there was no commuting to and from what they called the Wild Half. Result, no boats. “I wonder what else I’m missing. Focus, Shadow, focus.”
“Talking to yourself, Singer?” Berm leaned from the door of Meerti’s Dosser, his voice purring, his eyebrows humping up and down as if they had a life of their own. “You can come talk to me anytime.”
“My daddy always said, you want to talk to somebody smart, talk to yourself. No thanks, Berm.” She moved hastily on before he worked that one out. The Berms of the universe were one of the reasons she’d passed on making music a career. She sighed. So how is that different from what I’m doing now? Hm. No managers, I suppose. Hah, Shadow. How it’s different is you can get killed in this job. Killed on purpose, I mean. Five hours left before I’m due at The Tank. Should be plenty of time to get in a cruise and do my set with Getto. Move those feet, Shadow. You’ve wasted enough time setting up your cover.
Ahead of her Teri the Switch came from Rat’s Alley, patted a yawn, and leaned against a wall wafting for her next client. She’d gotten too old and too intermittently crazy for even the sleaziest Houses, but she was cheerful despite what seemed a miserable life and on those days when she was tracking, designed and sewed costumes that were artforms in themselves, absurd and enchanting. Tank paid her to make three changes for Shadith; he got two of them and seemed to be content with that. He was fond of her. He was not a sentimental man, so that surprised Shadith, but during the fittings she began to understand the woman’s daft charm.
That there was no way anyone could really make life easier for her was a part of it. Frustrating, but a liberation in a shaming sort of way. It let you enjoy her nonsense and share in the impossible pleasure she got out of being alive without your being pushed to do anythitig for her.
“Teri, I’m going for a sea cruise. You want to come along?”
Teri smiled; she always smiled when people spoke to her, but her eyes were empty. It was one of her bad days.
“Ah well, see you around.” Shadith hesitated a moment, made a note to tell Tank when she got back, and walked past the woman, more disturbed than before when Teri looked through her as if she didn’t exist. When she reached the next alley, she turned and looked back, squinting against the dazzle as the sun moved suddenly-from behind a cloud. A man was standing beside Teri,
4
Shadith took the open flit low, swooping just above the wave peaks. The air was brisk and briny, the sea out beyond the clouds a brilliant turquoise, several degrees brighter than the sky. She played with the flit for a while, swinging it back and forth as if she were tacking against the wind, then went nosing along the offshore islands, racing in and out, between and around them as if she played a game with herself using them as markers. At the same time she kept an eye on one of Digby’s specials, an asteroid miner’s detec that he’d had titivated by someone until it could smell out a ship even at the bottom of an ocean of sludge. Or so he swore to her.
Whether that was true or not, the watchlight turned green when she swung around the fourth and largest of the islands. She sighed. No proof it was Lylunda Elang’s ship, but she didn’t really need proof. She went scooting out to sea after that, chasing cloud shadows, and spent the next hour whipping back and forth along the coast. At the end of that time she set the flit on hover, stretched out, and just enjoyed the feel of-the wind and the smell of the ocean, layering impressions in her mind about the song she wanted to write.
Shadith nodded to Getto, played a phrase or two of the song to-let him get a feel for it. “This one’s for you, Gee, since you gave me the idea. It’s a song still working on, though I have enough for now.”
The mirrors on Getto’s drums shivered in the sunlight as he drew a whispering undersong from them, the mirror on his ear was a small sun itself.
“Briny winds,” she sang.
“Briny winds blow clouds away.
The sharded sea skips to their song.
I slide from peak to peak on sapphire waves
looking for answers in the sun.
Nothing but shadows in the shine
Sad shadows of friends that I left behind.
Briny winds blow clouds away
Spit fillips of foam into my face
Gust through the ghosts within my mind
Till even the dance of memory’s gone.
Briny winds blow clouds away.”
At the last word she segued into sweeping arpeggios meant to suggest sea winds, then took the sound back to let Getto reprise the verse with his drums. He could go wild on those drums, get your blood pounding till your feet moved on their own, but at times like these he had a precise yet lyrical touch that could make them sing until you could almost hear the words.