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Authors: C. J. Cherryh
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Someone got
those papers fixed to get us here and gods-be if any of it was accident." She
gnawed a filthy hangnail. It tasted of fish and human. She spat in distaste and
clipped the papers into her data bin. "Tell Tirun and Geran get out cargo
unloaded. Get Chur on it. Fast."
"All of it?"
She turned a stare Haral's way. It was a question, for sure; but not the one
Haral asked aloud. "All of it. Call Mnesit. Tell them get an agent down here to
identify what's theirs. Tell Sito sell at market and bank what's ours."
"They'll rob us. Captain, we've got guarantees; we've got that Urtur shipment
promised -- We've got the first good run in a year. If we lose this now--"
"Gods rot it, Haral, what else can I do?" Embarrassed silence then. Haral's ears
sank and pricked up again desperately.
So they prepared to run. Prepared -- to lose cargo that meant all too much to
Chanur in its financial straits, trusting a mahen promise . . . for the second
time. And for the first time in memory Haral Araun disputed orders.
"I'm going for a bath," she said.
"Do what with the incoming cargo?" A faint, subdued voice.
"Offer it to Sito," she said. "Warehouse what he won't take. So maybe things
work out and we get back here." Likely the stsho would confiscate it at first
chance. She did not say what they both knew. She got out of the chair and headed
out of the bridge, no longer steady in the knees, wanting her person clean, her
world in order; wanting--
--gods knew what.
Youth, perhaps. Things less complicated.
There was one worry that wanted settling -- before baths, before any other thing
shunted it aside.
She buzzed the door of number one ten, down the corridor from her own quarters,
down the corridor from the bridge. No answer. She buzzed again, feeling a twinge
of guilt that set her nerves on edge.
"Khym?"
She buzzed a third time, beginning to think dire thoughts she had had half a
score of times on this year-long voyage -- like suicide. Like getting no answer
at all and opening the door and finding her husband had finally taken that
option that she had feared for months he would.
His death would solve things, repair her life; and his; and she knew that, and
knew he knew it, in one great guilty thought that laid her ears flat against her
skull.
"Khym, blast it!"
The door shot open. Khym towered there, his mane rumpled from recent sleep. He
had thrown a wrap about his waist, nothing more.
"Are you all right?" she asked.
"Sure. Fine." His pelt was crossed with angry seams of scratches plasmed
together. His ears, his poor ears that Gaohn Station medics had redone with such
inventive care and almost restored to normalcy -- the left one was ripped and
plasmed together again. He had been handsome once . . . still was, in a ruined,
fatal way. "You?"
"Good gods." She expelled her breath, brushed past him into his quarters, noting
with one sweep of her eye the disarray, the bedclothes of the sleeping-bowl
stained with small spots of blood from his scratches. Tapes and galley dishes
lay heaped in clutter on the desk. "You can't leave things lying." It was the
old, old shipboard safety lecture, delivered with tiresome patience. "Good gods,
Khym, don't . . . don't do these things."
"I'm sorry," he said, and meant it as he did all the other times.
She looked at him, at what he was, with the old rush of fondness turned to pain.
He was the father of her son and daughter, curse them both for fools. Khym
once-Mahn, lord Mahn, while he had had a place to belong to. Living in death,
when he should have, but for her, died decently at home, the way all old lords
died; and youngsters died, who failed to take themselves a place -- or wander
some male-only reserve like Sanctuary or Hermitage, hunting the hills, fighting
other males and dying when the odds got long. Churrau hanim. The betterment of
the race. Males were what they were, three quarters doomed and the survivors, if
briefly, estate lords, pampered
those papers fixed to get us here and gods-be if any of it was accident." She
gnawed a filthy hangnail. It tasted of fish and human. She spat in distaste and
clipped the papers into her data bin. "Tell Tirun and Geran get out cargo
unloaded. Get Chur on it. Fast."
"All of it?"
She turned a stare Haral's way. It was a question, for sure; but not the one
Haral asked aloud. "All of it. Call Mnesit. Tell them get an agent down here to
identify what's theirs. Tell Sito sell at market and bank what's ours."
"They'll rob us. Captain, we've got guarantees; we've got that Urtur shipment
promised -- We've got the first good run in a year. If we lose this now--"
"Gods rot it, Haral, what else can I do?" Embarrassed silence then. Haral's ears
sank and pricked up again desperately.
So they prepared to run. Prepared -- to lose cargo that meant all too much to
Chanur in its financial straits, trusting a mahen promise . . . for the second
time. And for the first time in memory Haral Araun disputed orders.
"I'm going for a bath," she said.
"Do what with the incoming cargo?" A faint, subdued voice.
"Offer it to Sito," she said. "Warehouse what he won't take. So maybe things
work out and we get back here." Likely the stsho would confiscate it at first
chance. She did not say what they both knew. She got out of the chair and headed
out of the bridge, no longer steady in the knees, wanting her person clean, her
world in order; wanting--
--gods knew what.
Youth, perhaps. Things less complicated.
There was one worry that wanted settling -- before baths, before any other thing
shunted it aside.
She buzzed the door of number one ten, down the corridor from her own quarters,
down the corridor from the bridge. No answer. She buzzed again, feeling a twinge
of guilt that set her nerves on edge.
"Khym?"
She buzzed a third time, beginning to think dire thoughts she had had half a
score of times on this year-long voyage -- like suicide. Like getting no answer
at all and opening the door and finding her husband had finally taken that
option that she had feared for months he would.
His death would solve things, repair her life; and his; and she knew that, and
knew he knew it, in one great guilty thought that laid her ears flat against her
skull.
"Khym, blast it!"
The door shot open. Khym towered there, his mane rumpled from recent sleep. He
had thrown a wrap about his waist, nothing more.
"Are you all right?" she asked.
"Sure. Fine." His pelt was crossed with angry seams of scratches plasmed
together. His ears, his poor ears that Gaohn Station medics had redone with such
inventive care and almost restored to normalcy -- the left one was ripped and
plasmed together again. He had been handsome once . . . still was, in a ruined,
fatal way. "You?"
"Good gods." She expelled her breath, brushed past him into his quarters, noting
with one sweep of her eye the disarray, the bedclothes of the sleeping-bowl
stained with small spots of blood from his scratches. Tapes and galley dishes
lay heaped in clutter on the desk. "You can't leave things lying." It was the
old, old shipboard safety lecture, delivered with tiresome patience. "Good gods,
Khym, don't . . . don't do these things."
"I'm sorry," he said, and meant it as he did all the other times.
She looked at him, at what he was, with the old rush of fondness turned to pain.
He was the father of her son and daughter, curse them both for fools. Khym
once-Mahn, lord Mahn, while he had had a place to belong to. Living in death,
when he should have, but for her, died decently at home, the way all old lords
died; and youngsters died, who failed to take themselves a place -- or wander
some male-only reserve like Sanctuary or Hermitage, hunting the hills, fighting
other males and dying when the odds got long. Churrau hanim. The betterment of
the race. Males were what they were, three quarters doomed and the survivors, if
briefly, estate lords, pampered
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