Finally, he said, "Is something wrong, Rhani-ka?"

"I don't think so," she said. She gestured at the com-unit. "I should like you, please, to call Christina Wu's office. Ask her to come and see me, soon. Within a week, if that's possible." Christina Wu was chief of Family Yago's legal staff.

"Yes, Rhani-ka." He sat in the com-unit chair. Rhani watched his fingers tap the keys. She wondered what it was like for him, knowing all her business, privy to information which no other single person, except Zed, had. He was always obedient, meticulous, even detached.

He consulted her schedule before speaking with Christina Wu's appointments' clerk. They spoke for a few moments, and then Binkie swung the chair around. "Rhani-ka, will an appointment the morning of the party be convenient?"

"Yes," she said. He made the appointment, thumbed the line silent, and rose again.

"Thank you, Binkie," she said gravely. Sitting on the bed, she motioned him to the footstool. "Tell me now about the party preparations." As he recounted the details -- two hundred invitations had been sent out (hand- delivered by hired messenger), one hundred seventy of them had been accepted, the food, drink, and service would be catered, a theater troupe had been hired to perform a popular Chabadese comedy -- which one piece of her mind heard and absorbed. She thought, when I marry Ferris Dur I should make some gesture, some symbolic reference to a change of state. What? Buy something, sell something, endow something?

She suddenly knew, and grinned. Of course, that was it.

She would free her house slaves.

*Chapter Fourteen*

Dana Ikoro sat at a table in The Green Dancer, waiting for Tori Lamonica.

His right shoulder brushed a window. He breathed on it, and rubbed the moist patch with his sleeve. He could see, through the gla.s.s, the lights of Abanat, and beyond them, the reflection of that light off the icebergs in the bay. The bergs, remote, frosted with fog, seemed like bits off another world.

Between him and the bay the noise and hubbub of the landingport stirred. Under his left elbow, someone had scratched in the neowood tabletop, "KILROY WAS A NARC.".

He had been waiting for an hour. He could wait three hours more. Across the room, Amber saw his expression and grinned at him. The bar was crowded. At the largest table, which was round and two meters in diameter, ten people were playing a game with seven counters, all different colors, and strange six-sided dice.

Four of the ten were pilots; the loudest of them was a woman in a diaphanous robe. That was Juno Kouris, Seminole's pilot. The slender, quiet woman next to her was navigator Lyn Cowan, also off _Seminole_. They wore matching torques on their necks. The name of the game was "Triple"; Dana had heard of it but never seen it. He wondered if Lamonica played it, too, and if it was anything like "Go."

Rose, the girl in glitterstick -- today it was red -- slung her tray in his direction. "How you doing?" she shouted.

"Fine," Dana said, holding his hand over the mouth of his gla.s.s.

"Good." In a softer tone, she said, "Amber says, watch the door." Dana's stomach muscles cramped. He shifted in his seat, stretching his legs into the aisle and then pulling them back as a man in a ragged thermal suit stumbled toward him. The door opened; a wave of cold air swept in. So did four people, two human, two Verdian. One of the humans was Tori Lamonica. She was wearing green, a deep green that looked almost black. Her medallion hung around her neck. She walked to the bar and leaned on it to talk with Amber. She accepted a drink, and strolled in his direction, halting at the tableful of gamesters. "Hey, Tori, man, how's tricks?" said Juno, rising to kiss her on the mouth. "Want to play?"

Dana could not hear Lamonica's reply. She shook her head, punched Juno's shoulder with the hand that did not hold the drink, and continued down the aisle. She sat opposite him. Good evening," she said. Her clothing was undecorated, which was uncharacteristic for a Hyper, but she was wearing gold hoops in her ears, and she had dyed her left eyebrow green, and her right one white.

Her drink was green, with a froth of cream on top. Dana lifted his wine gla.s.s. "To the luck," he said. His voice was not quite steady.

She lifted her own gla.s.s and let it clink against his. "I'll always drink to the luck."

Dana waited until she set the gla.s.s down again. Cream dappled her upper lip, and she wiped her mouth with one hand. "How've you been?" he said.

"Well enough," she answered. "You?"

"It's been better."

From the round table came a shout. "Hey, you can't make that move; it's illegal!" A gla.s.s shattered.

Juno rose. "Who said I can't?"

"Shut up," said Lyn Cowan. "Roll it again."

"But I like what I just rolled." Protesting, Juno sat. Lyn kicked the gla.s.s under the table. The overhead lights flickered, then came back on.

Lamonica said, "I was surprised when I heard you'd followed me. I figured you would turn around, maybe go back to Nexus."

I should have, Dana thought. But I didn't know. How could I know? "So you heard," he said.

She nodded. "I'm sorry." She rubbed her thumb along the side of her gla.s.s.

"Leave it," Dana said. He didn't need apologies. At the table to his left, someone lit a dopestick. He took a deep breath. The man saw him and, grinning, pa.s.sed him the stick. He took the smoke into his lungs.

Careful, he told himself. Remember, you can't stay out all night. He offered the stick to Lamonica; she shook her head. "It makes me cough," she explained. "So does tobacco. How did you find out that I was still on Chabad?"

"I saw you," Dana said. "The day of the Auction you walked by the Yago house."

She looked startled. "So I did. I was just walking. I like Abanat; it's a beautiful city." She lifted her gla.s.s, and he sensed her embarra.s.sment. "Maybe you don't think so."

"It'll do," he said. "I was surprised to see you. I thought _you'd_ gone."

She said, "I wanted to. But I had some trouble selling my cargo."

Dana said lightly, "Your dealer left town?"

Her left eyebrow, the green one, twitched. "Now, how the h.e.l.l did you hear that?"

He grinned. It was all falling into place. Truly luck had turned for him.... The man at the next table held the dopestick under his nose. He breathed in.

"Thanks." Dana smiled. "Let's talk business, Starcaptain."

Both Lamonica's eyebrows went up. But she turned in her chair and signaled to Rose. The girl waved a hand. Lamonica turned back to him. "Talk,"

she said. Dana sipped his wine. It went like water down his throat. "You know," he began, "that I work for Family Yago." She nodded. "Family Yago buys dorazine."

He watched her face. "The name of Family Yago's dealer in Abanat is -- " he paused -- "Sherrix Esbah."

Lamonica leaned forward in her chair. "Go on," she said.

"Sherrix Esbah has left Chabad. The name of the person who has taken her place is Loras U-Ellen."

If anything, Lamonica's bland face grew more impa.s.sive. But her left eyebrow twitched again. "So?" she said.

"Here," said Rose, leaning over the table, drink in hand.

Lamonica dug out a credit disc and slapped it on the table. "You want another?" she said to Dana. He shook his head. Rose made a face at him.

Glitterstick lines striped her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, hips, and back. Her nipples were lightly touched with rouge. "Sure?" Lamonica pressed.

"I'm sure," Dana said. Rose shrugged and stalked off. "So," he said, "Family Yago has an interest in this man."

He was pleased with the choice of words. An interest. That was something Rhani might choose to say. "In fact," he said, "Rhani Yago would like to meet him."

"So?" Lamonica said.

"Have you met him?"

"I might have."

"Could you reach him again?"

"I might."

"Family Yago would be grateful if you could pa.s.s that message on to him."

Lamonica smiled. "How grateful?" she asked dryly.

"Fifty credits," Dana said.

"One hundred."

"Seventy-five." He did not have one hundred credits left on the credit disc.

"Ninety."

"Eighty-five," he said.

"Done." She grinned. "A good night's work." She raised her gla.s.s, drank.

"How do I tell U-Ellen to respond?"

Dana scowled. Rhani had not told him that.... She would not want U-Ellen to use the com-lines, that was certain. He remembered the responses to the party invitations lying strewn about the room, piles and piles of them. "Tell him to write her a letter," he said.

Lamonica nodded. "They do that a lot in Sardonyx Sector." She stretched; the gold hoops glinted in her ears. "Pay me, man."

Dana fished his credit disc from his pocket. The transaction unit, he guessed, was at the bar. He started to stand -- "No need," Lamonica said. She put two fingers in her mouth and gave a piercing whistle. Amber and Rose looked around. No one else moved. Lamonica made a signal, two-handed this time, and Rose picked up her tray. She halted at the gaming table to take drink orders, and then moved on to them. On the tray was a squat gray metal box: a PCTU, a portable credit transaction unit.

He was surprised to see it; most bars did not trouble to provide them, unless in addition to selling liquor and drugs they sold other things -- stronger drugs, or s.e.x. But then he remembered the gamesters. Rose set the box on the table. "I didn't know you were playing," she said.

"We weren't," said Lamonica. "I won a bet." Her green brow lifted. "And you've got my disc."

"Oh! Sorry." The girl brought it from the pouch around her waist. She laid the black plastic token in Lamonica's palm. Their fingers touched just a little longer than necessary. Lamonica smiled. She pressed a b.u.t.ton on the unit and thumbed her disc into the alpha slot. Dana found the beta slot and inserted his.

Swiftly, Lamonica instructed the PCTU to transfer eighty-five credits from the disc in the beta to the disc in the alpha slot. The machine burped.

TRANSACTION COMPLETE, it printed on its display line. The green letters burned in the shadows and then winked out. The discs fell from the slots. "Is that really all?" said Rose.

Lamonica picked up the unit and laid it on the girl's tray. "For now,"

she said. The back of her hand stroked Rose's glitter-streaked thigh. "For now."

Rose made a musical noise in the back of her throat, held the tray up, and glided softly away.

Dana began to sweat. His throat felt tight. He told himself it was the effect of the dope, no more. Lamonica was watching the girl at the bar. He coughed. She flicked a glance at him. He lowered his voice. "I have a second deal to propose to you."

"Hmm." The Starcaptain sipped her drink. "That's the fourth proposition I've had tonight." She gazed at him across the rim of the gla.s.s. "Go on."

"It's private, it has nothing to do with the Yagos, and you can name your own price, within limits."

"I like it already," she said, and yawned.

Someone tapped Dana's left shoulder. His muscles spasmed, and his throat soured. For an instant, he was sure, _sure_ that the person who had tapped him - - who had moved so silently up to him that he had not even heard the footsteps - - was a cop, or worse, was someone wearing a Net uniform...."Hey," said the man at the table to his left, "want more?" He leaned forward, brandishing a smoking dopestick. He wore a shirt with a landingport insignia on it, and his narrow head had been shaved bald. "You know, you're cute. How come I haven't seen you before in here?"

Dana sighed. "Not now, friend. I'm busy," he said.

"Oh." The man jerked his hand back. "Oh, sorry." He sounded wistful.

Lamonica chuckled. "You were saying?"

Dana wiped his hands on his knees. "You'd have to pick up a cargo on Chabad and deliver it out of sector undetected."

From her nod, he knew that she had caught the minute stress he had put on the final word. "A legitimate cargo?" she murmured.

"No."

"We're talking smuggling. What size and type of cargo -- drugs, furs, gold, jewelry?"

Dana swallowed. "Me," he said. Locking his fingers around each other, he watched them shake.

He had practically memorized the relevant pa.s.sages in Nakamura's _History_. Softly he explained to Lamonica, "By Federation law, a slave's credit is frozen until his time of servitude is up. He can't touch it, but neither can anyone else. That means I can't pay you until we get out of Sardonyx Sector. But I can pay you."

"Don't you still own _Zipper_?"

He shook his head. "'_The offended state has the right to confiscate any real property_,'" he quoted.

"What does that mean?"

"It means that Chabad -- in fact, Family Yago -- owns _Zipper_." He sipped his drink. He was still shaking. He remembered another sentence from the _History_: "_In the last two hundred years, there have been eight hundred forty- two known attempts at escape_; _of these, twenty-three succeeded_."

"How could it be done?" she said.

"I can't get into Main Landingport," he said. "You'd have to come and get me."

"Where?" "The Yago estate. It's about one hundred kilometers east of here."