Part 13 (2/2)

A block away from Founders' Green, Binkie stopped. The black sunshades against his pale skin made him appear to be wearing a mask. He handed Dana one of the letters. ”That one's for the bank,” he said. ”It's about six blocks from here, the other side of the Boulevard.” He pointed to what looked like a bas- relief sculpture set into a piece of wall. A stylus swung beside it from a chain. ”I'll show you how to get there.” He picked up the stylus. Dana recognized a pressure-sensitive map. ”We're here. That's the Yago house on the other side of the park. The city is divided into quadrants by its two main streets: the north-south street, the Promenade, and this east-west street, the Boulevard. The ocean's west. Auction Place is in the center of the city, where the avenues cross.”

”The bank is -- ”

”There.”

”What's that square in the northwest quadrant?” Dana asked.

”Main Landingport.”

”I've got it. Thanks.” Binkie disappeared without a backward look into a gaggle of tourists. Dana looked in the other direction. Where Binkie went was his own business. He was not going to pry into anyone else's privacy, even in thought.

He went to the bank. The building was cool and filled with machines.

People shuffled through it; it echoed, like a vault. The pressure-sensitive maps were all over the city; there seemed to be one on every wall. It would be hard for a child to get lost in Abanat. He delivered the note. Taskless, he went out into the crowded street.

Perhaps the luck had turned; fickle fortune smiling at him, radiant and deadly as Chabad's sun, mocking him with this sudden and revocable gift of freedom. He glanced around the street. No one was looking at him. _”Take your time,”_ Rhani had said. He straightened his spine and lifted his head. He was a slave on an errand.

Mindful of the heat, he walked slowly north, toward Main Landingport.

Rhani listened as Dana and Binkie left the house. Like a cat waking, she shook herself. She was ashamed of her ill temper. She made herself pick up the topmost bank report. She worked through the first page. The second page blurred.

She could not seem to keep her attention on it.

Amri knocked. ”Shall I straighten the room for you, Rhani-ka?”

”Yes, go ahead.” She lifted the report. But the rustle of the sheets annoyed her. ”Leave it. Go away,” she snapped. Frightened, the girl scuttled off. Exasperated with herself, Rhani almost threw the paper to the floor. She laid it gently on the desk. She had not slept; she could not concentrate; none of this was Amri's fault.

It's Abanat, she thought. It distracts. She stood up. She could not be comfortable inside the grim old house. The park was close, a step. She would take a walk. Founders' Green was private and safe: the iron fence and the gates kept it cut off from idle traffic. Leaving her room, she went downstairs.

Corrios was in the hall. He grunted at her: it meant, ”_All right?_”

”I'm fine,” she said. Her sunshades hung from the hook. ”I'm going for a walk.”

Corrios stood in her path as she turned toward the door.

She had snapped at Amri; she would not snap at him. Gently, she said, ”What is it?”

His face was distressed. ”Don't.”

”Don't what?” she said with heavy patience.

He jerked a thumb at the door.

Her pulse thudded. She said, ”Did Zed tell you to lock me in?”

He shook his head.

”Then this is your own idea. It's a bad one.”

He folded his arms. In the dim hallway, he was immeasurably bigger than she, a mountain. Rhani glared at him. Her fists clenched. ”Corrios Rull, this is stupid. You are not going to keep me in if I want to leave.” Her raised voice echoed down the hall.

He said nothing.

Tense with fury, Rhani said, ”Very well. You've worked for Family Yago for fifty years. You'll lose that place in three seconds if you don't move from that door. One. Two.” She opened her mouth to say, ”Three.” Corrios stepped aside. Rhani slid the door open and slammed it behind her.

She ran down the steps to the street, ears ringing with rage. She couldn't remember the last time she'd slammed a door. Sunlight fell like a hand upon her shoulders. She slowed. She unclenched her fingers, knuckle by knuckle.

Anger was a waste of time. She dusted her palms together. There. She was no longer angry. She crossed the street to the Green and walked along it, tapping the fence. Shaded by thick tree trunks, the iron spikes were cool. She heard the voices of children quarreling in the park. She changed her mind. She walked south, to the broad, crowded Boulevard.

The entertainers were out: jugglers, dancers, musicians all competing vigorously for the attention of the tourists. At one street corner, an ebony- skinned acrobat performed a graceful backbend, muscles rippling. Rhani stood and watched her for a while. At last she went on. Her head began to feel hot. She touched her hair; it was dry as Chabadese gra.s.s. She had forgotten how the light in Abanat ricocheted off walkways and walls and clothing, and she thought: Stupid, you should have brought a parasol.

Oh, well. If she wanted one, she could buy one. She sauntered down the Boulevard. Suddenly, across the street, she saw Dana. She lifted a hand to wave him to her. But the person -- who, she realized, was in fact _not_ him -- did not see the gesture, and walked quickly by. The apparition was disquieting. She walked another block, and seeing where her feet had carried her, started to smile. She faced a gray house, much like her own. But someone had carved an axe, posed to strike, on the facade, in place of her own Yago ”Y.”

She went to it, knocked, and was admitted.

The Dur house smelled of wax, the wax of beeswax candles, imported from Belle. Domna Sam had burned them profligately, preferring them even to sunlight.

Over the years the smell had soaked into the walls and curtains and rugs of the house and even into the stone sh.e.l.l itself. A slave ran within to announce her; a second slave ushered her through the front hall to the parlor. Ferris Dur rose to greet her. He was taller than she, and bulky -- loose-fleshed, she thought.

He had the pale complexion of someone who has spent little time in the sun.

In that, Rhani thought, if in nothing else, he resembles his mother. He had brown eyes, too, like Domna Sam. She had not thought very much of him, Rhani knew. ”He plays with toys!” she had said once. ”Toys, from a Dur!” Rhani had no idea what she had meant. Ferris was reaching to grasp her hand. She pressed his briefly, and drew her fingers back. He seemed to want to hold on to them.

”Rhani Yago,” he said. ”I just received your message. This is a pleasant surprise. Please be seated.”

”Thank you,” Rhani said. She glanced around the parlor. It was not a room she knew; Domna Sam had always invited visitors upstairs to her bedroom. Ferris had turned the room into his office, with desk and com-unit. It was filled with dark, heavy furniture and portraits of long-dead Durs. It had to be the only room in the house that didn't smell of candles. She sat in a chair. A slave came in with a platter of food and a decanter of chilled wine.

Rhani said, ”I hope I haven't upset the workings of your household.” The slave poured the wine. She wore a broad dorazine smile.

”My household would be in poor straits if it could not accommodate itself to a visit from Rhani Yago.” Ferris snapped his fingers; the slave withdrew.

”Are you comfortable?”

”Yes, thank you,” Rhani said. She sipped the wine. ”This is delicious.”

Ferris flushed with pleasure. He was wearing a red robe, trimmed with kerit fur. He stroked the fur lightly. ”I hope all is well with Family Yago.”

Sweet mother, Rhani thought, is he always this stilted and formal? No wonder his mother couldn't bear to have him around! Let's see: I'm facing a dorazine shortage, the kerits are dying at Sovka, and people are trying to kill me. Matching Ferris' formal tone, she said, ”Quite well, thank you. I hope all is well with Family Dur.”

”Nothing's wrong that I can't handle,” he said sharply. He smoothed the robe again. The unconscious gesture seemed to calm him.

Rhani said, ”I admire your self-confidence.”

He peered at her, and she realized that he thought, or feared, that she was making fun of him. What a silly, awkward man! She said, ”Ferris, were you coming to see me this afternoon on a social visit?”

He shook his head. ”No. I rarely make social calls.”

<script>