The Dragon Variation (54 page)

There were the equations flowing to him, cold and pure, to be verified and fed in. There were the scans. There was the sense of the ship around him. There was the background chatter along the open line.

"When you feel the sling lock," he said, hardly hearing his own voice through the wall of his concentration, "you will cut the gyros. Immediately."

The small portion of his mind not urgently concerned with equations, scan and ship expected an outcry, for to cut the gyros was to be immediately and irrefutably within the talons of gravity. Cutting the gyros meant the ship would
fall . . .

"Yes," said Aelliana Caylon and said no more.

He picked up the next sequence, noting that it was the set-up—the final equation. He scrutinized, verified and locked it, leaning back slightly in the web of safety straps.

"Twelve seconds. Mind the sling-lock, Pilot . . ."

It came, a distinct sensation of ship's progress halted, of plate metal and blast glass grasped tightly in the jaws of an inconceivable monster . . .

Aelliana cut the gyros.

The stomach twisted, the inner ear protested, the heart clutched as for an instant it seemed that the monster's jaw had slackened, and the ship sliding free to—

"Caught," Daav announced quietly. "And retained. A difficult task, executed well.
Ge'shada
, pilot."

"No need for congratulation," she said. "You were correct, after all. I shall need this skill." She threw him a glance, eyes brilliantly green in a pale golden face. "What is the procedure for clearing the sling?"

"Jon sends a workhorse and hauls the ship to its berthing—heading out now, your two-screen."

"I see. And the pilots?"

"In this case, I believe the pilots should make haste to Master dea'Cort. The luck was in it, you caught that error in time."

Once again, that brilliant green glance. "I know regs demand the navcomp be running—but I find it distracting. Doubtless it is my inexperience and I do expect to learn better, s—" She paused, lips tightening. "I cannot help but keep checking the equations, and when it started giving me bad numbers . . ."

"It was even more distracting," Daav concluded amiably. "Perfectly understandable. Point of information: Normal procedure in such circumstance includes engaging the secondary comp."

She looked abashed, the brilliancy of her eyes dimming a fraction. "I had no notion there was a back-up navcomp, sir."

"Daav. Ships of this class carry a primary navcomp and one back-up as standard. Most pilots will install a second back-up. Some prefer more. It is wise to check before dropping to manual, especially if you are running solo."

She bowed her head. "I will remember."

"Good," he said and retracted the webbing. "Lessons being done for the moment, I suggest we wait upon Jon."

"A BEAUTIFUL LANDING!"
Jon dea'Cort announced, raising a large, heavy-looking tea mug. "Not at all like some I've seen, where the ship comes in upside down and backward, eh, Daav?"

Clonak, the pudgy Scout with hair on his face—"A
mustache
," Pilot Daav had murmured in Aelliana's ear, at her initial start of surprise—laughed aloud and made an ironic, seated bow. "You shall never outlive it, Captain."

"So it seems," Pilot Daav returned placidly and looked back to Master dea'Cort. "What about that navcomp, Jon?"

The older man took a hearty swig from his mug. "I'd say replace it."

"Replace—Oh. Oh, no." Aelliana slid off the stool Jon had insisted she take and stood, hands knotted before her. "Navcomps are—Master dea'Cort,
Ride the Luck
is not a wealthy ship. I intend to work her, but until work can be found, expenses must be held to a minimum. You have been very helpful—indeed, generous, in the refitting, but I—" She stumbled to a halt.

A pair of humorous amber eyes considered her. "Spit it out, math teacher. We're all comrades here."

She drew in a breath, trembling as she met that gaze. "I cannot afford to replace the navcomp."

"Well." Master dea'Cort took counsel of the ceiling.

"Regs are pretty clear," he said eventually. "Navcomp's got to be online while the ship is in use within Port-controlled space. Unless you can afford fines and temporary suspension easier than a replacement comp?"

"It—it needn't be off-line for an instant!" Aelliana cried, the plan taking shape even as she spoke. She leaned forward, cold hands twisted into a cramped knot, eyes on Jon dea'Cort's face.

"I'll engage the navcomp, sir, I swear it! It will be—I can learn to ignore it, use override and merely run manual, as I did today. Then, when there has been sufficient work—" Something moved in the man's face and she stopped, gulping.

Clonak broke the small silence, voice hushed.

"Daav, I'm in love."

"What, again?"

The sound of his calm, deep voice recalled her to a sense of duty left undone and she spun, not quite meeting his eyes.

"I am remiss. You did very well, Pilot, to keep the pace. I am—I am grateful for your assistance and the gift of your expertise."

Trilla, seated beside Clonak, gave a shout of laughter. Jon grinned. Clonak popped off his stool and bowed full honor.

"We shall make a pilot of you yet, oh Captain!"

Aelliana gasped in dismay. She had not meant to hold him up to ridicule before his comrades, but to thank him sincerely for his aid. She felt her cheeks heat.

"No, I—"

But Daav was already making an answering bow toward Clonak.

It was a pure marvel, this bow, swept as if the work leathers were the most costly of High House evening dress. One long arm curved aside and up, holding the imaginary cloak gracefully away as the sleek dark head brushed one elegant, out-thrust leg.

"You do me too much honor."

"Well, that's certainly likely," Jon declared, and shot a glance aside. "Clonak, sit down or go away. In either case, be quiet. Daav, descend from the high branches, if you please. Math teacher, pay attention."

She turned to face him, hands clasped tightly before her.

"Yes, sir," she said humbly.

"Huh." He glanced to the ceiling once more, then back, eyes and face serious.

"Nobody here says you can't run the board by hand forever without a mistake. But there's nobody here who hasn't at least once made a mistake, and been glad there was a double-check to save 'em. We're master class, each one of us." He used his chin to point: Trilla, Clonak, Daav, and tapped himself on the chest with a broad forefinger.

"Master class. The ship don't fly us, which is the case with the chel'Mara. We fly the ship. But blood and bone gets tired, math teacher—even Scouts have to sleep. Say you were hurt and needed time in the 'doc—do you leave the ship to a glitched comp, or do you sit that board and hope you don't pass out?"

She licked her lips. "Surely, in Solcintra. In local space—"

"The luck is everywhere—for good or for ill—and it's best not to spit in its face." Jon leaned forward on his stool, one arm across a powerful thigh.

"We're not talking regs, child. We all agree the regs are expendable—given sufficient cause. What we're talking is common sense. Survival. You understand survival."

"Yes," she whispered and swallowed hard in a tight throat. "Master dea'Cort, I cannot afford a replacement navcomp. I cannot afford to be grounded.
Ride the Luck
is a working ship and I intend that we—that we earn our way."

"That being the case," Daav said from behind her, "commission Binjali Repair Shop to replace the navcomp and drop in two back-ups. Jon holds the note and you pay as work becomes profit."

Jon looked at her seriously. "That's sound advice, math teacher."

"Daav has very sound judgment," Clonak chimed in, irrepressible as Var Mon, "though I grant you wouldn't think so, to look at him."

"I—I can't ask—hold a note for a replacement—for
three
replacements? Master—"

"No choice in the matter," Trilla said in her blunt, Outworld way. "Need a working comp to lift. Need work to finance the comp." She grinned. "You might take a loan against the ship, of—"

"No!"

"Huh." Jon again. "Sounds settled to me. I'll hold the note for my cost, plus labor. You'll pay me as able. In the meantime, if I have something to lift, you take it at your cost and we'll call that the interest. Agreed?"

There was, as Trilla said, no choice. Still, Aelliana struggled with necessity a moment longer. A debt of such magnitude would surely increase the time she must stay upon Liad, thus increasing the chance of discovery. And yet, it was required that the ship be able, if work was to be gained.

She inclined her head, vowing to pay this debt as quickly as she might.

"Agreed, Master dea'Cort."

"Good enough. When's your shift end, Daav?"

"Midnight."

"Glutton. Take Clonak and go pull that comp. I'll find the replacements." He smiled at Aelliana. "We'll have you up to spec by tomorrow mid-day, math teacher. I'll leave a complete accounting in your ship's in-bank."

"Thank you," she said, feeling tears prick her eyes. She ducked her head. "I am grateful."

Jon slid off his stool and stretched. "Same as we'd do for any of our own—no gratitude demanded."

"Clonak, old friend, your skills are in demand!" Daav had a tool belt over one shoulder and was holding out another.

"And I with a thought to dinner," the pudgy Scout sighed. He turned as he passed Aelliana and performed an absurdly ornate bow.

"For you, Goddess, I forgo even food!"

"Nor like to starve of it," Daav commented.

"Cruel, Captain."

"Merely honest. Come along, dear." Black eyes found hers, though she made an effort to avoid the glance.

"Pilot Caylon, it was a rare lift. I hope to sit second for you again."

"Thank you," she stammered and felt she should say more.

But Daav was gone.

"NAVCOMP PULLED,
sealed and dispatched to the port master via Pilot ter'Meulen, who swears he's for a sup and a glass, lest he die of starvation."

"Well enough," Jon allowed, pouring the dregs from the pot to his mug. He glanced over his shoulder at the slender man perched on the green stool, Patch sitting tall on his knee.

"Pastry?"

"Thank you, no."

"Not stale enough for you?" Jon speared a iced dough-ring for himself and carried tea and snack over to his accustomed stool.

"Too stale, alas. My
cha'leket
insists upon fresh pastries for his table, and you see how his decadence affects me."

Jon snorted and had a bite, followed by a swallow of tea.

"I wonder," Daav said pensively, rubbing the cat's ears. "Who certified that navcomp at refitting?"

"Checked it myself," Jon said, somewhat indistinctly. "Sang sweet and true." He paused for more tea, and pointed a finger.

"Occur to you to wonder how it is the chel'Mara, who never piloted anything other than a groundcar on manual in all his life, isn't splattered from here to the inland sea, running automatic with an insane navcomp?"

"It did." Daav sighed. "I spent an hour looking for a meddle, but if it was there, it was very cleverly tucked away."

"Don't have to be there now," Jon pointed out. "I checked the log—suspicious old man that I am—and you looking to become another such, if I may say so." He finished off the dough-ring in two bites.

"Log says that on the night he played pikit with our math teacher and lost his ship by way of it, Vin Sin chel'Mara—that's
Lord
chel'Mara to you—stopped by the shop and entered his once-was ship, to clear out his personal effects. Didn't take him long. In fact, turns out he left quite a number of very expensive—and portable—items behind."

Daav said something impolite in a language native to a certain savage tribe some fourteen zig-zagged light-years out from Liad. Jon grinned.

"No proof. Not that I don't favor it myself, for personal reasons. The chel'Mara's very careful of his
melant'i
. Doesn't do a man's
melant'i
any good to lose his ship, true enough. But you might be able to recoup something from the debacle, if she were straightaway seen to crash it."

"Which she might have done," Daav said, so heatedly Patch jumped to the floor. "If she had been
any
second class provisional, making her first sling-shot when that comp went bad—" He took a hard breath. "Your pardon."

"Nothing to it." Jon grinned. "A rare wonder, our math teacher, eh?"

Daav moved his shoulders. "I'd like to know who beats her."

"I'd welcome news of that, myself. At least they didn't send her here battered and bruised-up today, small grace." He finished his tea and looked up into the younger man's eyes.

"Good idea of yours, me holding the note."

"I can guarantee the loan, if you like it," Daav returned quietly. "Or tell me the account and the price and I'll make the transfer now."

"Don't be an idiot. She intends to work that ship, and I'll tell you what I think. I think what our math teacher puts her mind to do is good as done. I'll hold her note."

"If it becomes a burden, old friend, only tell me. There's the Pilots Fund, after all."

"So there is. Well." He bounced to his feet and stretched with a mighty groan. Daav slid lightly from the stool and stood looking down at him, affection plain in his sharp, clever face.

"Hah." Jon smiled up at him. "You coming in tomorrow?"

"Perhaps the day after."

"All right, then. Glad you were to hand today. Matters could have gone ill, even if she is a wizard at the board."

"She wouldn't have attempted the sling if I hadn't suggested—demanded—it." He hesitated. "She's a natural, Jon."

"Is she?" the older man said, with vast unsurprise.

Daav laughed and bowed. "Good-night, Master."

"Good-night, lad. Convey my highest regards to your
cha'leket
."

A Dragon does not forget. Nor does it remember wrongly.

—From
The Liaden Book of Dragons
 

"MASTER DEA'CORT
sends you his best regards, brother." Daav and his
cha'leket
were strolling arm-in-arm across Trealla Fantrol's wide lawn, angling more-or-less toward the wild garden and the river.