lenois extended a moist hand to both of them. Lunzie gave it a hearty squeeze in spite of her revulsion and was rewarded by a tiny moue of amus.e.m.e.nt. "Can we count on seeing the two of you at our little party in five days time?" the merchant asked. "The Parchandri wish to reignite the flame of our regard in the hearts of our treasured friends and valued customers. Will you brighten our lives by attending?"
"Yes, of course," Coromell said graciously. "Thank you for extending the invitation."
The Parchandri was on his feet now, bowing elaborately. "Thank you. You restore face to this humble one." He made a deep obeisance and sat down.
"Must we go to the party of the unscrupulous Parchandri?" Lunzie asked in an undertone as they moved away.
Coromell seemed surprised. "We do have to maintain good relations. Why not?"
"That unscrup makes me think he"d sell his mother for ten shares of Progressive Galactic."
"He probably would. But come anyway. These dos are very dull without company."
"There"s something about him that makes me very nervous. He said "ambrosia." Did you see him stare at me when I reacted? He couldn"t have failed to notice it."
"He used the word in an acceptable context, Lunzie. You"re just sensitive to it. Not surprising after all you"ve been through. lenois is too indolent to be involved in anything as energetic as business." Coromell drew her arm through his and led her toward the next amba.s.sador.
"She lied," Quinada muttered to her employer as she bowed to present a lighter dress tunic. "I checked with the main office. According to our reports from Alpha Centauri covering those dates, no disabled vessel was towed in. However, numerous beings of civilian garb were observed disembarking from a military cruiser, the Ban Sidhe Ban Sidhe. One matches her description. That places her on Alpha at the correct time, and with a false covering story."
"Inconclusive," lenois said lightly, watching Lunzie and Coromell chatting with the Weftian amba.s.sador and another merchant lord. "I could not make a sale with so weak a provenance. I need more."
"There is more. The man in the restaurant to whom the dead spy reported had a female companion, whose description also matches our admiral"s lady in blue."
"Ah. Then there is no doubt." lenois continued to smile at anyone who glanced his way, though his eyes remained coldly half-lidded. "Our friends" plans may have to be ... altered." He pressed his lips together. "Kill her. But not here. There is no need to provoke an interplanetary incident over so simple a matter as the death of a spy. But see to it that she troubles us no further."
"As your will dictates." Quinada withdrew.
A live band in one comer struck up dance music. Lunzie listened longingly to the lively beat while Coromell exchanged endless stories with another officer and the representative from a colony which had just attained protected status. Coromell turned to ask her a question and found that her attention was focused on the dance floor. He caught her eye and made a formal bow.
"May I have the honour?" he asked and, excusing himself to his friends, swept her out among the swirling couples. He was an excellent dancer. Lunzie found it easy to follow his lead and let her body move to the beat of the music.
"Forgive me for boring you," Coromell apologised, as they sidestepped between two couples. "These parties are stamped out of a mould. It"s a boon when I find any friends attending with whom I can chat."
"Oh, you"re not boring me," Lunzie a.s.sured him. "I hope I wasn"t looking bored. That would be unforgivable."
"It won"t be too much longer before we may leave," Coromell promised. "I"m weary myself. The tradition is for the hosts giving the party to toast the guests with many compliments, and for the guests to return the honours. It should happen any time now."
The dance music ended, and the elderly Ryxi made his way to the front of the room with a beaker in one wingclaw. He raised the beaker to the a.s.sembled. At his signal, Lunzie and the others hastened to the refreshment table. Coromell poured them both gla.s.ses of French wine.
When everyone was ready, the amba.s.sador began to speak in his mellow tenor cheep. "To our honored guests! Long life! To our fellow members of the Federated Sentient Planets! Long life! To my old friend the Speaker for the Weft!"
Coromell sighed and leaned toward Lunzie. "This is going to take a long time. Your patience and forbearance are appreciated."
Lunzie stifled a giggle and raised her gla.s.s to the Ryxi.
"I can"t wear the same dress to two diplomatic functions in a row," Lunzie explained to Coromell over lunch the next day. "I"m going shopping for a second gown."
When she had arrived on Tau Ceti, Lunzie had marked down in her mind the new shopping center that adjoined the s.p.a.ceport. Originally the site had been a field used for large-vehicle repair and construction of housing modules, half hidden by a hill of mounded dirt suitable for sliding down by the local children.
The hill was still there, landscaped and clipped to the most stringent gardening standard. Behind it lay a beautifully constructed arcade of dark red brick and the local soft gray stone. In spite of the conservative appearance, the high atrium rang with the laughter of children, five generations descended from the ones Fiona had once played with. Lunzie overheard animated conversations echoing through the corridors as she strolled.
Most of the stores were devoted to oxygen-breathers, though at the ground level there were specialty shops with airlock hatches instead of doors to serve customers whose atmosphere differed from the norm. Lunzie window-shopped along one level and wound her way up the ramp to the next, mentally measuring dresses and outfits for herself. The variety for sale was impressive, perhaps too impressively large. She doubted whether there were three stores here which would have anything to suit her. Some of the fashions were very extreme. She stood back to peruse the show windows.
In the lexan panes, she caught a glimpse of something very large moving toward her from the left. Lunzie looked up. A party of heavyworld humans was stumping down the walkway, angling to get past her. She recognized the sombre male at the head of the group as the representative from Diplo, whom Coromell had pointed out to her at the Ryxi party. They took up so much of the ramp walking two abreast that Lunzie scooted into Finzer"s Fashions until they pa.s.sed.
"How may I a.s.sist you. Citizen?" A human male two-thirds of Lunzie"s height with elegantly frilled ears approached her, bowing and smiling. "I am Finzer, the proprietor of this fine outlet."
Lunzie glanced out into the atrium. The party was gone, all except for one female who had stopped to look into one shop window across the corridor. And she wasn"t one of the DipIo cortege. It was the Parchandri"s bodyguard, Quinada. The heavyworld female turned, and her dark eyes met Lunzie"s with a stupid, heavy gaze. Lunzie smiled at her, hoping a polite response was in order. Quinada stared back expressionlessly for a moment before walking away. Puzzled, Lunzie glanced back at the shopkeeper, who was still waiting by her side.
"I"m looking for evening wear," she told Finzer. "Do you have something cla.s.sic in a size ten?"
Finzer produced a cla.s.sic dress in dusty rose pink with a bodice that hugged Lunzie"s rib cage and a full evening skirt that swirled around her feet.
Two evenings later, she held the folds of the dress bunched up on her lap as she and Coromell rode toward the Parchandri"s residence.
"I"m not imagining it, Coromell," Lunzie said firmly. "Quinada"s been everywhere that I"ve gone these past two days. Every time I turned around, she was there. She"s following me."
"Coincidence," Coromell said blithely. "The area in which the Tau Ceti diplomatic set circulate is surprisingly small. You and Quinada had similar errands this week, that"s all."
"That"s not all. She stares at me, with a look I can only describe as hungry. I don"t trust that perverse unscrup she works for any further than I could toss him. Didn"t you see how his eyes glittered when I said I"d been s.p.a.cewrecked? He"s got nasty tastes in amus.e.m.e.nt."
"You"re making too much of coincidence," Coromell offered gently. "Certainly you"re safe from perversion here in Tau Ceti. Kidnapping is a serious breach of diplomatic immunity, one a man of lenois"s status and family position would hardly risk. As for that aide of his, you told me yourself that you have a deep-seated fear of heavyworlders."
"I do not have a persecution complex," Lunzie said in dead earnest. "Putting aside my deep-seated fear, once I got to thinking that Quinada might be following me, I tried to lose her. Tell me why she was in four different provisions stores without buying a thing! Or three different beauty salons! Not only that, she was waiting outside the FSP complex when I finished my Discipline lessons."
Coromell was thoughtful. "You"re convinced, aren"t you?"
"I am. And I think it probably has to do with ambrosia, even if you won"t enlighten me on that score." Coromell smiled slightly at the reference but said nothing, which further annoyed her in her circ.u.mstances. Ambrosia must be a cla.s.sified matter at the highest level, and she was only the envelope which had delivered the letter, not ent.i.tled to know more. Stubbornly, she continued. "I don"t think lenois"s reference was as casual as you do, despite his una.s.sailable diplomatic status. In any event, I find his aide"s surveillance sinister."
"On a personal level, there"s not much I can do to discourage that, Lunzie. However," and he c.o.c.ked his head at her, a sly gleam in his eyes, "enlist in Fleet Intelligence and you have the service to protect you."
Lunzie cast a long searching look at his handsome face to dispel the unworthy thought that popped into her head. "To what ends would you go. Admiral Coromell, to get me into Fleet Intelligence?"
"I do want you in FI - you"d be a great a.s.set, and frankly it would be wonderful having you around - but not at any cost. I can"t compromise Fleet regulations, not that you"d want me to, and I can"t give you any special consideration, not that you"d accept it anyway. The most important thing of all, Lunzie, is that you"re willing to join. Even if I could press you into service, that"s not the kind of recruit we want. I do know that you"d be ten times better as an operative than someone like Quinada ... if you do decide to volunteer."
Lunzie hesitated, then nodded. "All right. I"m in."
Coromell smiled and squeezed her arm. "Good. I"ll see to your credentials tomorrow morning. There will be a follow-up interview, but I have most of the details of your life on disk already. I hope you won"t regret it. I don"t think you will."
"I"m feeling more secure already," Lunzie said, sincerely.
"Good timing. We"ve arrived." The Parchandri mansion lay on the outskirts of the main Tau Ceti settlement. lenois and a group of Parchandri were waiting on the steps to greet their guests in the deepening twilight. Pots to either side of the wide doors swirled heavily scented and coloured smoke into the air. Two servants met each vehicle as it pulled up. One opened the door as the other ascertained who was inside and announced the names to the hosts. Lunzie caught a pa.s.sing glimpse of burning dark eyes in pasty-white faces and gulped. The unexpected appearance of representatives of the same race as the a.s.sa.s.sins in the Alpha Centauri restaurant was unsettling to say the least. The burning eyes, however, held no flicker of recognition. But then, why should they? She was getting overly sensitive to too many coincidences.
lenois greeted them warmly, introducing Coromell to members of his family. Each was dressed in garb of such understated elegance Lunzie found herself trying to estimate the value of their clothes. If her guess was correct, each Parchandri was wearing more than the value of the clothes on the entire party of diplomats. As the evening weather was fine, drinks were circulated under the portico by liveried servants.
"Admiral Coromell! And Lunzzie, how very niccce to sssee you again," said the Seti Amba.s.sador, wending his way ponderously up the front stairs from the welcoming committee. "Admiral, I had hoped to sssee you a few days ago, but I missssed my opportunity."
Knowing a hint for privacy when she heard one, Lunzie excused herself. "I"ll just find the ladies" lounge," she told Coromell, placing her drink on the tray of a pa.s.sing servant.
Asking directions from one of the Parchandri ladies, Lunzie made her way into the building. lenois had given her no more than a disinterested "Good evening," which rea.s.sured her. Maybe her a.s.sumption was only part of her heightened awareness since that disastrous evening with Aelock. She was pleased to have escaped his attention. Rumours she had heard since the Ryxi party confirmed her feelings about his proclivities and the reality was worse than she had imagined. Discounting half of what she"d heard, he was still far too sophisticated in his perversities.
Lunzie found herself in the Great Hall, a high-ceilinged chamber in an old-fashioned, elegant style. The ladies" lounge for humanoids was at the end of a pink marble corridor just to the right of the double winding staircase with gold-plated pillars which spiralled to the three upper floors. Several other corridors, all darkened, led away from the Hall on this level.
"How beautiful! They certainly do know how to live," Lunzie murmured. Her voice rang in the big, empty room. The lights were low, but there was enough illumination at the far end of the corridor for her to see another woman emerging from a swinging door. "Ah. There it is."
Lunzie readjusted her makeup in the mirror once more, straightened the skirt of her dress, and then sat down with a thump on the couch provided under the corner-mounted sconces which illuminated the room. No one else was making use of the facilities, so she was quite alone. There was only so much time she could waste in the ladies" room. It was a shame she didn"t know any of the other diplomats present. She hoped that Coromell had nearly finished his negotiations with the Seti.
Well, she couldn"t stay hidden in the lounge for the entire evening. She would have to circulate. Sighing, she pushed open the lounge door to return to the party. There, on the other side, was Quinada, ma.s.sively blocking the hallway. Startled, Lunzie stood aside to let her by, intending to squeeze out and return to Coromell. The heavyworlder female filled the doorway and came on. Lunzie backed a few paces and stepped to the left, angling to pa.s.s as soon as the door was clear. Quinada wrapped a burly hand around her upper arm and steered her, protesting, back into the lounge.
"Here you are," she said, bearing the lightweight woman back into a corner of the room. "I"ve been waiting for you."
"You have?" Lunzie asked in polite surprise. She braced herself and looked for a way around the heavyworlder"s ma.s.sive frame. "Why?"
Quinada"s heavy brow ridges lowered sullenly over her eyes. "My employer wants you disposed of. I must follow his orders. I don"t really want to, but I serve him."
Lunzie trembled. So her intuitions hadn"t erred. lenois suspected her. But to order her death on the strength of a recognized word? The heavyworlder pressed her back against the wall and eyed her smugly. Quinada could crush her to death by just bearing down.
Mastering her fear, Lunzie gazed into the other"s eyes. "You don"t want to kill me?" she asked simply, hoping she didn"t sound as if she was begging. That could arouse the s.a.d.i.s.tic side of the big female"s nature. Quinada was the type who would enjoy hurting her. And Lunzie needed just a little more time to muster Discipline. She had already made a tactical mistake, allowing herself to be put at a significant physical disadvantage. Quinada and her master must have been hoping for the opportunity. Quinada had seen her emerging from the FSP complex. Could they possibly know that she was an Adept?
"No, I don"t want to kill you," Quinada cooed in a lighter voice, charged with implications which alarmed Lunzie considerably more. "Not if I don"t have to. If you weren"t my enemy, I wouldn"t have to kill you at all."
"I"m not your enemy," Lunzie said soothingly.
"No? You smiled at me."
"I was trying to be friendly," Lunzie replied, disliking the intent and appraising fashion in which Quinada was staring at her.
"I wasn"t sure. In this city all the diplomats smile, in deference to the lightweights. Their smiles are phony."
"Well, I"m not a diplomat. When I smile, it"s genuine. I"m not paid to practice diplomacy." Lunzie rapidly a.s.sessed her chances of talking her way out of this tight spot. If she used Discipline but didn"t kill the heavyworlder, her secret would be out. The next attempt on her life wouldn"t be face to face. But if she used Discipline to kill, her ability would be revealed when Medical examination would show that a small female"s hands had delivered the death blows. And then she"d have an Adept tribunal to face.
"Good," Quinada said, narrowing her eyes to glinting lights under her thick brow ridges, and leaning closer. Lunzie could feel the heat of the big female"s skin almost against her own. "That pleases me. I want you to be friendly with me. My employer doesn"t like you but if we are friends, I can"t treat you like an enemy, can I? That"s such a pretty gown." Quinada stroked the fabric covering Lunzie"s shoulder with the back of one thick finger. "I saw you when you bought it. It suits you so well, brings out your colouring. You attract me. We don"t have to stay at this dull party. Come away with me now. Perhaps we can share warmth."
Lunzie was frightened, but now she had a tremendous urge to laugh. The heavyworlder was offering to trade Lunzie"s life for her favours! This scene would have been uproariously funny if it hadn"t been in deadly earnest. If she managed to live through it, she could look back on it and laugh.
"Come with me, we"ll be friends, and I"ll forget my instructions," Quinada offered, purring. Her stare had turned proprietary. Lunzie tried not to squirm with disgust.
Masking her revulsion at Quinada"s touch, Lunzie thought that even with the heavyworlder"s promised protection, she was likely to wind up dead. lenois was the sort of man whose orders were followed. How could Quinada fake her death? She had to get away, to warn Coromell. She found herself measuring her words carefully, injecting them with sufficient promise to seem compliant.
"Not now. The Admiral will be waiting for me. I"ll give him the slip and meet you later." Lunzie forced herself to give Quinada"s arm a soft caress, though her hand felt slimy as she completed the gesture. "It"s important to keep up appearances. You know that."
"A secret meeting," Quinada smiled, her lips twisting to one side. "Very well. It adds excitement. When?"
"When the toasting is over," Lunzie promised. "They"ll miss me if I"m not there to salute your master. But then I can meet you wherever you say."
"That"s true," Quinada agreed, backing away from her. "That is the custom. And your disappearance would be marked."
Lunzie nodded encouragingly and stepped toward the door. Before she had taken a second one, Quinada seized her bare arm and slapped her smartly across the cheek. Lunzie"s head snapped back on her neck, and she stared wide-eyed at the heavyworlder, who gripped her with steely fingertips, and then let go. Lunzie staggered back and leaned against the wall to steady herself.
"Where do we meet? You haven"t said that. If you are lying, I will kill you." Quinada"s voice was caressing and chilled Lunzie to the bone.
"But we meet here," she said as if that had been a foregone conclusion. "It"s the safest place. As soon as the toasting is done, I"ll come back here and wait for you. That conceited Admiral will think I wish to make myself pretty for him. See you then, Quinada, but I"ve been gone a long time. I must get back." With a dazzling smile, Lunzie ducked under her arm and out the door.
Whether Quinada would have followed or not became academic, for a group of five chattering humans were coming down the corridor towards the ladies" room, providing a safeguard.
When Lunzie found Coromell and his amba.s.sador, the Seti was expressing his grat.i.tude to Coromell. He bowed to Lunzie as he turned away. Lunzie managed an appropriate response even as she pulled the admiral to one side behind the smoking incense pots.
"I must talk to you," she hissed, casting around to see if Quinada had followed her. To her relief, the heavyworld woman was nowhere in sight.
"Where have you been?" he asked, then clucked his tongue in concern. "What happened? You"ve bruised your arm. And there"s another mark on your cheek."
"Darling Quinada, the Parchandri"s aide," Lunzie whispered, letting the revulsion she felt colour her words with bitter sarcasm, "followed me to the ladies" lounge and jumped me there." She took some satisfaction in the shock on Coromell"s face which he quickly controlled. "She"s under his orders to kill me! She didn"t only because I tentatively accepted an exchange for my life I have no intention of granting. I"m Fleet now, Coromell. Protect me. Get me out of here! Now!"
BOOK FOUR.
Chapter Eleven.
She went into hiding in a Fleet-owned safe house while Coromell arranged for a shuttle to take her off-planet. Except for the Discipline Master and Admiral Coromell Senior, there was no one to regret her abrupt departure - except perhaps Quinada. But Lunzie did want the Adept to realise that she had been unavoidably called away. That was Discipline courtesy. Her studies in the special course had progressed to a point where she didn"t need direct instruction although she had hoped to obtain permission to teach what she had learned. As it was, the powerful new techniques would take her years to perfect.
The next day a shuttle made a rendezvous in s.p.a.ce with the Exploration and Evaluation Corps ARCT-10 ARCT-10, a multi-generation, multi-environmental vessel that carried numerous exploration scouts and shuttlecraft. Lunzie was transferred aboard. Her files were edited so that her enlistment in Fleet Intelligence had been excised and a false employment record with the Tau Ceti medical center inserted. She was an ordinary doctor, joining the complement of the ARCT-10 ARCT-10 to explore and doc.u.ment new planets for colonisation. to explore and doc.u.ment new planets for colonisation.
"There are thousands of beings aboard," Coromell had a.s.sured her. "You"ll just be one of several hundred human specialists who sign on for three-year stints with the EEC. No one will have any reason to look twice at you. Once you"re settled in, you can be another remote sensor on that vessel for me. Keep an ear open."
"You mean, I"m not entirely safe on board?"
"Far safer than on Tau Ceti," he replied encouragingly. "Blend in but don"t call attention to yourself. You should be fine. You"ve got me slightly paranoid for your sake now." He ran restless fingers through his hair and gave her an exasperated look. "Think safe and you"ll be safe! Just be cautious."
"I"m totally rea.s.sured!"
Once her shuttle matched velocity with the ARCT-10 ARCT-10, it circled around the back of the long stem to the docking bay. The ship was built with a series of cylinders arranged in a ring with arcs joining each segment. Along the dorsal edge of the ship, Lunzie could see a partially shaded quartz dome which probably contained the hydroponics section. The drives, below and astern of the docking bay, could easily have swallowed the tiny shuttle up without a burp. The five exhaust cones arranged in a ring, rimed with a film of ice crystals, were almost a hundred feet across. The ARCT-10 was reputed to be 250 years old. It had an air of majestic dignity, instead of creaking old age. It was the oldest of the original EEC generation ships still in s.p.a.ce.
There was a Thek waiting in the docking bay as the shuttle doors cracked open. The meter-high specimen waited while Lunzie greeted the deck officer, then neatly blocked her path when she started to leave the deck without acknowledging it.
"I beg your pardon," she said, stopping short, and waited for the translator slung around the Thek"s peak to slow her words down enough for it to understand.