“I don’t know much about crystal singers – ”
“What you don’t know won’t hurt you,” she said, waggling a finger under his nose. “But I’d very much like to know more about Corish, and if there is a missing uncle.”
“Why didn’t Corish recognize you on the beach?”
“The same reason you didn’t. And he didn’t know me all that well,” she added, a bit amused by Lars’s reaction. “He rather obviously, at least to me, cultivated the company of an innocuous and silly young music student. And one or two other anomalies alerted me.”
“I’d encountered a few of those creatures recently myself,” Lars remarked in a reproving drawl.
“I did the best I could with the background material I had.”
Lars pulled her as close to him as the tiller allowed. “Your only mistake, now that I think back on it, were your comments about singing. Everyone in the islands sings. But voice is not an instrument for real music . . . according to the Masters.”
Killashandra began to sputter indignantly. “That in itself proves how stupid they all are!”
Lars laughed in delight at her reaction and then drew his feet up as the water began slopping up their calves.
“Tanny!” he shouted. “On the deck, on the double.”
The hatch was opened so quickly in response to his call that Killashandra wondered how long the young man had had his ear to the wooden panels.
“Haven’t you found us something to eat yet? About time.” For Tanny held up two heavy soup mugs. “Give it over and start bailing.”
Chapter 15
It took quite a bit of persuading on Killashandra’s part to reassure Tanny that she intended no reprisals against him for his very minor part in her abduction. Lars explained that he had managed to sneak her on board the ocean jet with the help of another friend who merely thought Lars’s latest girl friend had had a shade too much new brew.
“One for the girls, are you, m’bucko?” Killashandra had asked in an arch tone.
Lars nodded at her garland. “Not any more, Sunny! I’ve made an honest woman of you!”
That exchange did more to reassure Tanny than any other argument Killashandra had presented. That and the fact that she was perfectly willing to help bail out the cockpit.
Bar Island was reached just before sunset, with enough time to unload the emergency supplies. The Bar Islanders had been directly in the hurricane’s path and suffered more damage than any of the other islands on their sweep. Two men, a woman and a young child had internal injuries which the medical facilities of the smaller settlement could not treat adequately. Lars immediately offered them passage on the Pearl Fisher, giving Killashandra a guarded and rueful grin of regret. Nor did they have a chance to be private that night. Everyone pitched in to finish constructing temporary communal shelters, and Killashandra found herself once again plaiting polly fronds, pleased that her deftness caused no questions. When a halt was called at midnight, Killashandra was far too tired to do more than curl up gratefully against Lars on the sand, her head pillowed on his arm, and fall asleep.
At first light of a sullen day, the injured were floated on bladder rafts to the Pearl, carefully hoisted aboard, then secured in the cabin bunks. Killashandra was given instructions by the medic for the administration of necessary drugs and care. The patients had been sedated for the voyage, so he expected no problems.
As soon as she could, Killashandra went up on deck. She found care of the sick and injured a distasteful necessity and the faint odor of antiseptics and medicine made her slightly nauseous. She said nothing about her disinclination, uncharacteristically wanting to sustain Lars’s good opinion of her. He was bent over the chart display on the small navigational terminal, plotting the most direct course for Angel Island’s North Harbor where the main medical facility was situated.
“Tide and wind are in our favor this morning, Killa,” he said, reaching his arm about her waist and drawing her in to him without taking his eyes from the display. He tapped for an overlay of the route he had chosen and she could see how it made use of the swift channels between the islands and the fuller morning tide. “We’ll be in North before we know it.” He made a Final correction and laid in the course. Now the display cleared to show him the compass headings and the minimum required tacking to slip into the swift current just beyond Bar Island’s western reef. “Is the spinnaker set, Tanny?”
“Aye, aye skipper,” the young man called from the bow as Killashandra watched the vivid red and orange sail bellying out briefly over the bowsprit before the wind caught it.
There’s an exhilaration to sailing a fast, trim ship, with a following wind and a current to assist smooth passage. The Pearl slipped into the flow as effortlessly as a slide down a greased pole. The sea was almost calm, and gunmetal green-gray, not quite the same color as the gray sky.
“Lucky it’s today instead of yesterday,” Killashandra said, settling herself in the cockpit beside Lars. He had the tiller on its upper setting so that he could see forward without the cabin blocking him.
“They’re all secure below?”
“Secure and asleep! I’ll check on the half hour.”
They sat together enjoying wind, sea, and sail while Tanny coiled lines and set all fair. Then he joined them in the cockpit, maintaining the companionable silence.
Just before noon, sailing smartly on the same westerly current that had nearly defeated Killashandra, they rounded the Toe and tacked eastward to sail right up to the large North Harbor pier at the elbow of the Angel. When Lars had been able to estimate his time of arrival, he had called it in, so medics and grav units were waiting for the injured. Killashandra, dutifully checking every half hour, had had no problems with her patients but it was an immense relief to turn them over to trained medical technicians.
“Father wants a word with us,” Lars said quietly in Killashandra’s ear as they watched their passengers being trundled away. “Tanny, anchor the Pearl at buoy twenty-seven, will you? And keep her ready. Don’t know where we’ll have to go next. Stay on the page, okay?”
Tanny nodded, his expression rather strained, as if he was relieved to stay on the Pearl, whose eccentricities he could cope with and understand.
If the Wing Harbor on the south side of Angel Island had appeared rustic and homely to Killashandra’s eyes, North Harbor was the antithesis: that is, within the framework of the Charter’s prohibition against raping “a natural world.” The colorful buildings set up above the harbor behind sturdy sea walls utilized manmade materials and modernistic surfaces in some sort of tough, textured plastic and a good deal of plasglas so no vista would be hidden from the occupiers. If the architecture lacked warmth or grace, it was also practical in a zone where wind speeds could make a dangerous missile out of a polly branch.
Lars guided Killashandra up a ramp that climbed to the top of the Elbow, where a dormered structure commanded views of the main harbor as well as the smaller curved bay that featured the old stratovolcano that was the Angel’s Head. A small sailing craft was tacking cautiously through the Fingerbone reefs at the end of the Hand. From the different colors in the sea, Killashandra could distinguish the safer, deeper channel, but she didn’t think she’d like to sail that in a ship as large as the Pearl.
To her surprise, the first person they saw as they entered the Harbor Master’s office was Nahia. She had been using the terminal and upon their entry she half rose, her expression eager for Lars’s news of the stranded crystal singer.
We needn’t have worried ourselves for a moment about out captive, Nahia.” Lars strode up to the empath and, before she could protest, kissed her hand.