Part 13 (1/2)

When he heard Zed's name, his shoulders hunched.

Rhani chose her next sentence carefully. ”I enjoyed walking through Abanat with you today.”

That brought no reaction. d.a.m.n it, she _hated_ it when he looked like that. One of the things she valued in him was his free spirit. With him, she had broken her careful rule, never to ask a slave about the past. Even with Tuli she had kept that rule. But it didn't seem to bother Dana to talk about Pellin, or his family. Maybe the ease with which he talked about his past meant he had reconciled himself to his future.

”Are you tired?” she said. ”Does your head hurt?”

”No, Rhani-ka.”

Rhani abandoned subtlety. ”What's the matter?” she asked.

Dana said, ”Does Zed really want me to sleep outside your door?”

”Oh, Zed.” Rhani made a throw-away sweep of her hands. ”He's getting on my nerves. Probably he does. But I don't want you to sleep outside my door. That would be uncomfortable.”

Dana bowed his head. His hands knotted together. He said softly, ”I will, though.”

Rhani's temper flared. ”Not if I tell you not to.”

”If your brother tells me to, yes, Rhani-ka, I must.”

”You forget,” Rhani said icily. ”_I own you_.”

His yellow-ivory face grew automatonlike. Distantly, he answered, ”Yes, Rhani-ka.”

Oh no, Rhani thought, suddenly ashamed, I didn't want this. Her ill temper vanished. She laid a hand on Dana's forearm. ”I'm sorry. That was ill- mannered of me. I know what an intolerable position you are in. You will not have to sleep outside my door. Don't worry about it. I'll speak to Zed.” The rigidity of his muscles lessened. She was inordinately pleased that he did not flinch from her touch. He needed to be distracted. She beckoned him to the tall bedroom windows, holding the curtain aside. ”Look.”

The windows looked west, at the turquoise ocean and at the s.h.i.+ning bulk of the Abanat icebergs. They gleamed like crystal mountains in the sun.

Rhani felt Dana's tension leave him, as perceptibly as if the room temperature suddenly dropped. His hands lifted; his lips parted. He swayed toward the window in a graceful, unconscious gesture of flight.

He was not looking at the city, or at the sea, or at the ice.

He stared up, into the untrammeled depths of Chabad's sky.

Dana Ikoro slept badly that night.

He dreamed of Pellin, and then, a nightmare from which he woke crying, he dreamed about the Net. He had been on Chabad long enough to attune himself to its cycles, and his sense of temporal orientation told him that it was just after midnight. He turned the light on to drive the shadows from his mind. He felt restless, and also desperately tired. His body, less easy to discipline, was rebelling against the stern control he had put on his conscious mind: to wait, to watch, and above all not to fight. The luck would turn his way. A chance would come.

A hundred desperate schemes ran through his mind: to steal a bubble, to hide away on a shuttles.h.i.+p, to somehow get to _Zipper_. He told himself that every slave on Chabad had such thoughts. He turned off the light.

At breakfast, Amri, happily chattering, mentioned that Zed was not in the house. ”He went back to the landingport to find that bag the porters lost.”

Good, Dana thought. I hope it takes them hours to find it. It seemed to him that whole household breathed more easily when Zed was out of the house. He did. He could deal with Rhani; saving her life had earned him her trust. But Zed -- he s.h.i.+vered inwardly. He knew d.a.m.n well that Zed did not trust him.

He knew that Zed was right.

Amri stared at him, troubled by his sudden silence. He grinned and crossed his eyes. Amri laughed. He took another piece of fruit from the bowl.

Suddenly, he had an appet.i.te. Corrios came into the kitchen from the hall, his big hands filled with paper. ”Mail,” he said. He gestured upwards with a jerk of his thumb.

”I'll take it,” Dana said.

Approaching her room, he heard Rhani talking to Binkie. She sounded out of sorts. He knocked and stepped into the bedroom. Rhani was pacing the length of the s.p.a.ce. She turned to glare at him. ”Mail, Rhani-ka.”

She riffled through it. ”More party invitations,” she said with contempt.

”All they do in Abanat is go to parties. Do something with this junk.”

Binkie took the pile out of her hands. In a noncommittal voice, he said, ”There's a letter here from Dur house.”

”Let me see it.” She read it swiftly. ”Ferris Dur requests permission to call upon me this afternoon. Thank you very much. I suppose I must say yes. Am I supposed to do something else this afternoon?”

”The manager of the Yago Bank respectfully asks to see you at your convenience.”

”So he can waste time telling me he's making a profit? That's what I employ him for, to make a profit.” Binkie said nothing. Rhani sighed. ”Ah, well.

I will send him a personal note fixing a time.” She went to her desk. ”And I should write to Ferris. There is paper here but no pen. Binkie, give me something with which I can write!”

Binkie handed her a pen. She scribbled two letters, and sealed them with a blue stamp bearing the Yago ”Y.” Suddenly she glanced at Dana, and smiled a rueful, deprecating smile. ”I have the disposition of a kerit today. Binkie has been listening to me all morning. It's Abanat. I hate Abanat. I miss my garden.”

The printer whirred: the same soft sound as in her bedroom at the estate: a soothing noise. ”I hope you slept better than I did. Have you been outside the house?”

”Not since yesterday, Rhani-ka.”

”How are you going to escort me around a city you don't know anything about?”

This seemed to have no answer.

”What have you been doing this morning?”

”I ate breakfast, Rhani-ka.”

She gazed at him, her head c.o.c.ked a fraction to one side. ”And now what will you do? Make beds?” She rubbed her chin. In a softer voice she said, ”Binkie, let me have copies of the last four bank reports.”

”Yes, Rhani-ka.”

”And when you have done that, go outside. Take Dana with you. Show him how to use the city maps, and then you may separate to deliver these notes. Take your time. You work very hard, and you don't get holidays, or time to be alone, very much.”

Binkie said, ”Thank you, Rhani-ka.” His tone was even, but his face blazed with joy. As he leaned over the computer keyboard, his hands shook.

Dana pictured Zed returning to find Rhani alone, her bodyguard out.

”Rhani-ka, perhaps I should -- ”

”Perhaps you should both do as you are told,” she said. Binkie handed her a stack of records. ”Thank you, Bink. I have work to do, if you don't mind.” It was clearly a dismissal. Dana shrugged, and walked out. He waited for Binkie to join him in the hall.

Downstairs, he remembered to pluck his sunshades from their hook. Corrios let them out. Heat rose from the pavement as he followed Binkie around the fenced-in park. The air was clean, dry, motionless, and very hot. Abanat streets were closed to all but foot traffic and the occasional emergency truck; travelers in a hurry rode the movalongs, which glided at the standard pace of ten kilometers per hour. The movalongs were jammed with gossamer-robed tourists.

Morning was market time in Abanat.