The item under discussion was sitting on the floor against his leg. He glanced down thoughtfully. “That might, after all be—”
“Nay, nay! The case and its contents must go, and also the noisy empath! You, my lady mathematician, are just the woman to take them both in hand!”
A thin man with a well-lined face and fading ginger-colored hair swept into the parlor, pale robes trembling about him.
“I beg your pardon?” Aelliana stammered. “We are here in aid of another pilot, and—”
“Yes, yes! It was well that you brought him to us; we can assist—but not until that creature is well away, and you!” He spun to stare up into Daav's face. “You are disrupting every Healer in the Hall!”
“My apologies to the Hall,” Daav murmured.
He took a breath, closed his eyes, and seemed to—to step away from himself. Aelliana gasped, for truly he burned less vividly inside the dingy little room. He opened his eyes, and her heart cramped; his gaze was remote, as if he looked across a distance too great to bear interest, or humor, or love.
“Daav . . . ”
She stepped forward, hand rising—her wrist was caught by the Healer, his bony fingers surprisingly strong.
“Yes, that is well done and I thank you!” he said snappishly, apparently to Daav. “Maintain yourself thus, and give respite to those who shielded themselves in time to avoid a headache! Pilot—”
He turned to Aelliana, releasing her with a small bow. “As improbable as it seems, this man will do as you tell him. Tell him, I implore you, to take up the norbear and go away with you, back to your ship and off of Avontai, immediately!”
“We had thought,” Daav said, in a too-calm voice, “to leave the norbear in the care of the house. The Healers on Liad often take charge of such strays.”
“This is not the homeworld!” the Healer snapped, and sighed. “Forgive me—you are not informed. We dare not keep the creature here, Pilots. Avontai has a horror of such things as mind control—we are barely tolerated—and only if we are careful not to interfere too much! To hold a norbear in-house would be to destroy the Hall. We cannot allow even such limited aid as we may offer to falter on one life—any life. You have interfered in an alleyway brawl, which you surely know better than—and now you must pay the price. Remove yourselves to a place of safety greater than Avontai. We have summoned a cab—go now!”
Aelliana met Daav's remote black gaze and shivered.
“What is your name?” she asked the Healer.
“I am Hall Master Ver Sev. Feel free to use my name with the Portmaster. Now, will you go? Every moment those two linger here is a moment that those in pain are without surcease.”
She could, Aelliana thought, scarcely be so coldhearted as to remain in the face of such distress. She cleared her throat.
“Daav?”
“Aelliana, it is well,” he told her in that too-calm voice.
She doubted it, but there again, if departing this place won him wholly back to her, then she wished to tarry not one heartbeat longer.
“If you please,” she said, her voice hoarse. “Bring the . . . norbear and let us go.”
Calmly, he bent and picked up the case.
The Master Healer sighed, noisily. “Just through there, Pilot. The cab awaits.”
Carrying the case, Daav left the parlor first. As Aelliana followed him out into the foyer, she heard Master Ver Sev say, softly, “Thank you, Pilot.”
The Luck's hatch sealed securely behind them, and Aelliana spun, fright and confusion flaring into anger.
“Daav yos'Phelium, stand forth and tell me what has happened!”
He tipped an eyebrow; she thought his gaze was sharper now, but he maintained a reserve that was both unfamiliar and unwelcome.
“What would you know, Pilot?”
“What is that—that norbear? Why must we take it off-world? Is it dangerous? Where are we to take it? What happened to you?”
“A comprehensive beginning list,” he murmured, and his eyes were sharper; his expression sardonic, his whole self coming back into focus.
“As for the norbear . . . ” He dropped to one knee and opened the bag wide.
“Come out now, rogue, and show yourself to the pilot. Understand, I can do nothing if she decides to space you, or to bake you and serve you up for tea. She is the final authority here, and it is she whose patronage you must win.”
As before, a small, furry hand rose to grip the side of the case. The hand rested for a moment, was joined by a second, and then a pair of round ears, a round head and large, liquid eyes. It paused with its nose level with the case, as if giving her a moment to accommodate herself.
“It understands?” she asked Daav.
“To a certain point. The questions being—which point, and whether he also misunderstands or only ignores one.”
She frowned at the creature, knelt, and tapped the deck before her with a forefinger.
“Come here, norbear.”
It blinked, as if considering the request, then all at once it was scrambling out of the case, sliding and hitting the deck firmly on its rounded rump. Undeterred, it performed a graceless somersault, got all four feet oriented and bumbled toward her. It tried to stop on the spot she had indicated, but its claws got no purchase on the decking and it slid the last distance, bumped into her hand, skittered a little, and sat, one paw braced on the deck and the other on her knee.
She stared down at it. A less offensive creature would be difficult to imagine, yet neither the crowd's horror nor the Healer's fear had been feigned. It bore her scrutiny with the good humor that seemed its chiefest characteristic; not so large as a cat, nor yet so small as a mouse, its brown fur was shot with ripples of orange. Aelliana bit her lip, fighting a desire to laugh—and another, to gather it up and rub her cheek against its plush fur.
Instead, she raised her head and looked to her copilot, who was watching the proceedings with interest.
“This is a creature so dangerous that it must be put to death on sight, and all of its kind are banned from Avontai Port?”
“From Avontai entire, if I understood the Master Healer correctly. As for dangerous—there are some humans who are susceptible, and some of norbear kind, I expect, who are rather loud—”
The norbear turned its round head to regard him, as if wounded.
Daav grinned and inclined his head. “As one who is also loud may say without prejudice. The pilot we found was, I expect, extremely susceptible, and our rogue there has already admitted to loud.”
“But—mind control?”
“Norbears are natural empaths. If you are melancholy, a norbear may help you feel . . . better. If you are frightened, a norbear may leach your fear. Someone who is in . . . a great deal of pain—as I suspect our rescued pilot was—might quickly become addicted. After all,” he added softly, “there are few delights more poignant than the absence of pain.”
Aelliana looked at him sharply, felt the discrete prick of claws through the fabric of her trousers and looked down.
The norbear met her eyes, and stood up on its hind legs, reaching one hand high.
Barely considering, Aelliana picked the creature up and brought it up to her shoulder, where it settled itself as if it were the most natural thing in all the worlds. It caught a disordered lock of hair in its hand and leaned companionably against her ear. There came a contented buzzing, growing slightly louder.
Aelliana looked to Daav.
“It's purring.”
“Apparently he does not wish to be served up for tea.”
“That's all very well, but where are we to take it? Liad?”
Daav frowned slightly.
“I think not,” he said eventually. “But I may know better, later.”
“Oh? And how will that be?”
“I propose to retire with our guest to the acceleration couch, to make sure of his comfort while you lift us to an outer orbit. It may be that two loud empaths will share dreams during such a time. At the very least, we may all rest once we are safely off-world, and be able to make better plans on the morrow.”