The guard frowned slightly. "She can fight," she admitted.
"I never hire Center people," Blaisse said.
"How do you know? Nobody ever asked you before."
"How do you think you know that?"
"They didn't, did they?"
"It doesn't matter. I won't hire anyone from Center."
"That's stupid."
Blaisse glared at her like a resentful child, straightened up, and spoke very softly. "Do you know who you're addressing?"
"Yes."
Blaisse drew his dark eyebrows together and watched Mischa in silence. She could feel the extension of a tentacle of curiosity from him; she allowed herself to hope. Behind her, the young guard felt surprise above her pain and the slave woman revealed nothing.
"What is the meaning of this?"
The curiosity snapped back; the guard's pain dissolved in dislike and contempt.
The Lady Clarissa, standing framed in the doorway as though aware of the frame, using it, glared at them from the opposite end of the room. She had the high forehead and cheekbones, deep widow's peak, and wide, narrow-lipped mouth characteristic of her Family, which controlled the access of Center to the outside, as Blaisse controlled access to the Sphere. Clarissa's hair was bright brick-red and her eyes glittered like jewels, changing color as she moved. "Has it become impossible for one to sleep?" Her tone was petulant. She moved out of the doorway, slowly, carefully, gliding. As she neared them, Mischa caught a scatter of her feelings: not anger, or fear, or even annoyance; simply boredom.
The slave woman inclined her head. "I regret the disturbance, my Lady."
Clarissa's attendant followed her into the room. He was a large man, dark, with dark curly hair and curiously pale eyes. He wore a loincloth of gold and rubies, a wide jeweled collar, heavy bracelets on his upper arms, a ruby in his navel. A chain jingled gently on his ankle.
"It's taken care of, Clarissa," Blaisse said. He addressed the steward. "Madame, throw the girl out of here." He seemed to use the steward's title from habit, not regard or respect.
"It's taken care of for now," Clarissa said. "But what about later, when they find out they can get in here?"
"No one else will come in to disturb your sleep."
"As if you wouldn't rather be in bed," she said. "With that awful alien."
"I won't discuss it!" he cried. Mischa closed her eyes and wished he would not slide off into unpredictable irrationality.
Clarissa sighed and made a gesture of dismissal. "I don't care if everyone thinks you're in love with a slave." She acted bored now, but no longer was; a current of interest and pleasure flowed from her. She leaned against the big slave, tilting her head so her long hair tickled him. Mischa clenched her jaws and by force of will shut them all out: Blaisse and his anger, Clarissa and her taunting enjoyment, the guard and her pain, the attendant and his dull, quivering control, the alien girl and her fear and innocence. And the slave steward, so withdrawn that Mischa could not touch her.
"Madame, do as you were told." He glanced at the guard. "You're on duty until twenty-four hundred?"
"Yes, sir," she said, her tone just short of surly.
"You comb your hair with your feet," Mischa said.
Madame slapped her. Mischa took it without reaction, but glared at Blaisse. "You're actually rather lucky," he finally said. He turned on his heel and left the room. The alien slave slipped out of his way, then followed him.
"I am surprised, Madame," the Lady Clarissa said, smiling cruelly, speaking in a tone one would use with a small errant child.
"It will not happen again, my Lady."
"I should hope not. Have her taken over to my cousins' dome and given twenty lashes as an example."
"The Lord wished—"
"Do as I say or I'll have them take a whip to your pretty skin." She blinked; her eyes flashed scarlet.
"Yes, my Lady."
"That's better." Leading her attendant, she left them, walking carefully in her affected regal manner.
Long nails sank into Mischa's shoulder; Madame propelled her out and past the pool. Mischa remained tractable. The guard followed, more slowly, and in the library sat down and put her head between her knees.
"Someone will relieve you," Madame said.
The guard shook her head without looking up. "Not till Kaz gets here at twenty-four hundred."
"Then I will send the paramedic."
"Thanks. and tell Kaz he better not be late today." She sat up, leaned back in the chair, and looked at Mischa. "You know," she said, "I almost thought he was going to let you stay." She shrugged. "You must be pretty crazy to come in here like that."
"He's crazier," Mischa said.
The guard glanced sharply toward the doorway, but then she grinned. "You're right. But he's allowed." She gestured with her uninjured hand toward a recessed speaker grill in the wall. "Make someone from the dome come get her, Madame." She cradled her broken wrist. "You really hit me. I'm sorry we have to do this. But you must have known—"
"I did," Mischa said shortly. The guard gazed at her a moment longer, shrugged, and returned her attention to her injuries. Madame's back was turned as she spoke into the transceiver. Mischa bolted.
The guard cried out; Madame flung herself after Mischa, clawing at her. Mischa thought she might escape, but the slave dug her fingernails into her ankle and hung on. Mischa was hit hard from behind and went down, twisting. Then the guard was above her, raising her hand in a fist.
Jan Hikaru's Journaclass="underline"
The day came when I felt that my friend would leave; when she awakened, she confirmed my fears. The most recent ship to land was captained by a man she trained twenty years ago. His ship was headed along a chord, almost a diameter, of the Sphere. My poet wants the abandoned center; that ship would take her closer. We sat together until almost midnight, then she stood up and started away, alone. She was slow, and frail, yet sure of her way. Even blind. Then she turned around and seemed to look straight at me, though I know the most she sees is a pearl-white refraction of light and shadow. She smiled, very slightly, and said, "Are you coming?"
I followed her, without needing to say a word. Since then we have embarked on four ships, and stopped at seven planets. I am her eyes. Our journey has been rapid and erratic, but always in one direction, toward a part of this galaxy used up and forsaken by people, before we learned better: the core of our civilization, now abandoned and decaying.
My poet is ill, though she pretends not to be. I'm concerned about her, but she refuses to stop and rest. She is determined to see earth again before she dies. I am apprehensive about what we may encounter; I'm afraid she will not find comfort, but pain. I could almost betray her and take her somewhere else, to some world of beauty and peace. I could take her to Koen, to the Scarlet Forest where the insects always sing. But she would know. So, for now, we drift through a society of quasi- or extra-legality, as welcomed and as cherished as when we traveled on luxury liners and Sphere ships.
My poet has begun to depend on me more. I used to forget her age, her infirmities, even her blindness. I can't now, and neither can she. Sometimes at night she can't keep from whimpering, though admitting pain seems to shame her. I hold her in the darkness until she can sleep, but in daylight, she tries not to lean on my arm.
Disorientation caught Mischa and shook her. Her eyes were closed and she could not open them. The darkness was the scarlet of her body heat, veined with the images of capillaries in her eyelids, holding nothing but fog beyond. She floated in an environment that lacked gravity, pressure, and light, surrounded by something that soaked up everything she could see or hear or touch or smell. She tried to move, and it seemed she might be able to, in slow, slow motion, through an amorphous, yielding substance, but she strained her arm against it until the muscles ached, and when she finally relaxed she was in the same position from which she had started.