Part 50 (1/2)

”Do you want to keep on staying there?” he said.

”No!” she said, astonished. ”No, of course not. The surgeon told me that you'd be released in four days. I thought I'd lease a house.”

He smiled. ”I'd like that, Rhani-ka.”

She wondered what he did when he itched, or needed to sneeze. ”Shall I tell you about Loras U-Ellen?” she said.

”Please do.”

She rubbed her chin. ”You won't believe this, Zed-ka. He came to Chabad to sell me the dorazine formula.”

”Has he got it?” Zed asked.

”No. But he knows someone who has.” She explained the historic relations.h.i.+p between Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and The Pharmacy.

Zed was incredulous. ”You mean a company based on Enchanter and a criminal consortium based wherever the h.e.l.l they're based, Sector Vermillion or somewhere, is responsible for the dorazine trade?” He exhaled. ”Has been, for fifty years?”

She nodded.

He said softly, ”And our mother never knew.”

”No,” Rhani said.

”They want fifteen million credits -- do we have it?”

He had said ”we.” Rhani smiled. ”We have it, Zed-ka. Just.” She hesitated, and then said, ”Of course, our finances have been complicated by the destruction of the Net.”

He said tonelessly, ”It must have been insured. Isobel would never have neglected that.”

”It was,” Rhani said. ”But insurance means nothing in the case of uncontrollable accident, malice, fraud, insurrection, or act of G.o.d, and the destruction of the Net is three and possibly all five of these.”

”What will you do?” he said. ”Rebuild the Net?”

”With what?” she said. ”No. I have a factory to build. What capital I can obtain will go to that.”

His throat worked. ”Rhani, I -- ”

She could not let him say it. ”Zed-ka.... I will need your help.”

”Help?” He glanced at his hands. ”I don't know what use I can be to you, Rhani-ka. I've traded my medical skills for climbing.”

She said, ”You can only climb so many icebergs, Zed-ka. Our plant, or factory, or farm, is going to need a manager. I thought of you.”

”To run a farm?”

”You have experience,” she said. ”You know how to handle problems. You can give orders. And you know a great deal about drugs.”

He looked past her. She wondered what he was seeing. He said, ”Will there be slaves at this factory?”

”Of course,” she said.

He drew a breath that seemed to drag from the depths of his lungs. ”I'll do it,” he said.

Rhani wondered what he would have done if she had not offered him this refuge. Looked for victims elsewhere: in the streets, or at the Hyper bar, or in the Abanat houses where s.e.x might be bought. Once she had hoped he would change, but if there had been any chance he might, Darien Riis had destroyed it. She pressed a hand on her abdomen. I should tell him about the child. But not yet; not until I'm sure that Dana's gone. He said, ”If we must pay The Pharmacy fifteen million credits, where will we get the capital to build this plant?”

Rhani grinned. ”Guess,” she said.

He frowned. ”Borrow?”

She shook her head. ”No. Try again.”

He shook his head. ”Tell me.”

Rhani said, ”From the Federation.”

”What?”

”It was Christina's suggestion,” she said. ”She says that the Council should make a formal request of the Federation that it pay reparations to Family Yago for the destruction of the Net.”

He half smiled. ”That's clever.”

”Christina's clever,” she agreed. ”She says there's legal precedent for it.” She did not, she knew, have to underscore the irony inherent in the request. Instead, she said, ”Have you heard, Zed-ka? All flights from Main Landingport have been canceled until Michel A-Rae is found.”

”I heard,” Zed said. ”Stars, I wish I could leave,” he said. ”I hate this room. It's too much like a cell.”

”The door opens,” she said.

”Yes, but they won't let me leave the wing.”

A silence fell. Rhani thought of Binkie, drugged and hating in the Abanat Police Station. She said, ”Zed-ka, I never told you, I think, that when I still thought I was going to marry Ferris Dur, I planned to celebrate the occasion by freeing my house slaves.”

”No,” he said, ”you never told me.”

She gazed at her hands. ”I never told Binkie, either. I told him so much else. If I had -- ”

”He might not have burned the house.”

”Exactly.”

Gently he said, ”You can't know that, Rhani-ka. 'If you had done -- if I had done' -- it doesn't work.”

And if Michel A-Rae had never been born, she thought, your hands might be whole. She said aloud, ”I don't want to live at the estate any more. I think I'd like to stay in Abanat.”

”I don't want to go back there,” he said.

The door opened. A round man, wearing surgical green, came in. ”Excuse me,” he said, ”but it's time for your medication, Senior, and the Clinic doors are about to be shut. Perhaps your visitor would be willing to come back tomorrow?”

Zed glared, and Rhani saw him transformed into Senior Zed Yago, dealing with an importunate subordinate. Gratingly he said, ”This is my sister, Rhani Yago. Rhani, meet my orderly and keeper, Haldane Ku.”

Ku inclined his head. ”A pleasure to meet you, Domna.” His face was cherubic. He seemed unfazed by Zed's tone. ”Your brother heals faster than anyone I've ever seen, which is fortunate, because he is an utterly abominable patient.”