Heris Serrano Read online

  "Captain Serrano, Sweet Delight." There. She'd said it, officially, to another vessel . . . and the stars did not fall.

  "Station Tug 34," came the matter-of-fact reply. "Permission to grapple."

  "Permission to grapple." Despite the bustle, she was sure she felt the yacht flinch as the tug caught hold. A perfect match of relative motion was rare, even now. Her status lights switched through red, orange, and yellow to green.

  "All fast," the tug captain said. "On your signal."

  On the other channel of her com, the on-watch Stationmaster waited for her signal. "Captain Serrano of Sweet Delight, permission to undock, on your signal. . . ."

  "All clear on Station," the voice came back. "Confirm all clear aboard?"

  The boards spread emerald before her. "All clear aboard." Fifteen seconds. She, the Stationmaster, and the tug captain all counted together, but the coordinated computers actually broke the yacht's connection with the Station. The tug dragged the yacht—still inert, her drives passive—safely away from the Station and its crowded traffic lanes. Heris used this time to check the accuracy of the yacht's external sensors against Station and tug reports of other traffic. Everything seemed to work as it should. She felt very odd, being towed without even the insystem drive powered up, but civilian vessels routinely launched "cold" and the tug companies preferred it that way. According to them, some idiot was likely to put his finger on the wrong button if he had power.

  When they reached their assigned burn sector several hours later, the tug captain called again. "Confirm safe sector Blue Tango 34; permission to release."

  "Permission to release grapples," Heris said, with a nod to the pilot and Gavin. The tug retracted its grapples and boosted slowly away. "Mr. Gavin: insystem drive." The pilot, she noticed, was retracting the bustle, and checking with visuals that the lockdown mechanisms secured properly.

  "Insystem drive." The yacht's sublight drive lit its own set of boards. "Normal powerup . . ." Heris could see that; she let out the breath she'd been holding. They'd done a powerup as part of the systems check, but that didn't mean it would powerup again as smoothly.

  "Engage," she said. The artificial gravity seemed to shiver as the yacht's drive began a determined shove, much stronger than the tug's. Then it adjusted, and the yacht might have been sitting locked onplanet somewhere. "Mr. Plisson, she's yours." The pilot would have the helm until they made the first jump, and during jump sequences thereafter. Heris called back to the tug: "Sweet Delight, confirmed powerup, confirmed engagement, confirmed oncourse."

  "Yo, Sweetie—" The tug captain's formality broke down. "Come and see us again sometime. Tug 34 out." Heris seethed, then, at the pilot's amiable response, realized that "Sweetie" was probably this yacht's nickname, not an insult. After all, even Service tug captains called the Yorktowne "Yorkie."

  So, she thought, here I go. Off to someplace I've never been so my employer can chase foxes over the ground on horseback, and I can spend a month at Hospitality Bay making friends with other captains in the Guild. Somehow the thought did not appeal.

  * * *

  Heris had heard about cruise captains: unlike the captains of scheduled passenger ships, they were expected to hobnob with guests, flattering and charming them. She would not cooperate if that's what Lady Cecelia had in mind. She would make it clear that she was a captain, not an entertainer. She would eat decent spacefaring meals in her own quarters, since the ship offered no separate wardroom for ship's officers.

  Cecelia had heard about spacefleet captains from her sisters: cold, mechanical, brutal, insensitive (which meant they had not worshipped at the shrine of her sister Berenice's beauty, she thought). She enjoyed her meals too much to invite a boor to share them.

  * * *

  That first evening of the voyage proper, Heris ate in her cabin, working her way through a stack of maintenance and fitness logs. The crew cook provided a surprisingly tasty meal; she had been prepared for bland reconstituted food, but the crisp greens of her salad had never seen a freeze-dry unit, she was sure. She missed having a proper wardroom for the officers' mess, but the officers on Sweet Delight, such as they were, were not likely to become rewarding dinner companions.

  At least Lady Cecelia had not stinted on fresh food or on the quality of maintenance. Heris nodded at the screenful of data. Not one back-alley refitter in the lot; if the lady was bent on hiring incompetents, as Heris had begun to suspect, she did so from some other motive than mere economy. The bills would have paid for refitting a larger and more dangerous ship than the yacht, but Heris supposed part of it went into cosmetics, like the decor. Which reminded her, she must explain to Lady Cecelia the need for tearing out that plush covering the umbilicals.

  She ignored the gooey dessert for another stalk of mint-flavored celery, slid her tray into the return bin, and called up data from the next refitting. So far—she refused to let herself contemplate all the future days—nothing had gone very wrong. This life might be bearable after all.

  * * *

  "I suppose you want us to dress," Ronnie said. He lay sprawled in the massage lounger, his admittedly handsome body still dripping sweat from his workout on the gym equipment. Cecelia eyed him sourly; she wanted a massage herself, but not on the clammy cushions he would leave behind. When she'd chosen the luxurious zaur-leather upholstery she'd assumed she'd never have to share it. The saleswoman had mentioned the potential problem, and she had shrugged it off. Now she felt aggrieved, as if it were anyone's fault but hers.

  "Yes," she said. "I do. And be prompt; good food doesn't improve by sitting."

  "Thank you, Lady Cecelia," said Raffaele. She appeared to be George's companion, slight and dark—though not as dark as Captain Serrano. "These young men would never dress if you didn't make them, and we can't if they don't."

  "Why not?" She was in no mood to honor custom; she watched the girls share a glance, then Raffaele tipped her head to one side.

  "I feel silly, that's all. My red dress, and the boys in skimps?"

  Cecelia chuckled in spite of herself. "If you're going to feel silly just because some lummox doesn't live up to your expectations, you'll have a miserable life. Wear what you want and ignore them."

  Another shared glance. One of the girls might have been more tactful, but Ronnie burst out first. "That's what you do—and that's why you never married and live by yourself in a miserable little ship!"

  Cecelia stared him down. "That's why I have the money and position I do—independent of any alliance—to do what I want—and that's why I was available to help you when you got yourself into this mess. Or perhaps you don't know that the first suggestion given your father was that you be packed off on an ore-hauler to Versteen?"

  "They wouldn't have!" Ronnie looked almost horrified enough.

  Cecelia shrugged. "They didn't, but largely because I was available, and could be talked into it. If your mother—well, never mind. But my point is, that if I had been a conventional member of this family, and married to some appropriate spouse, I would hardly have been free to take you on. You persist in regarding this as some kind of lark, but I assure you that most men—grown men, such as your father and his friends—consider your breach of the lady's confidence a disgrace, even apart from its political implications." Ronnie reddened. "Now," she went on. "Go make yourself fit for civilized company at dinner, all of you. That includes you young women. I do not consider the sort of clothes you wear to parties with your own set adequate." She actually had very little idea what kind of clothes they wore to parties with their own set, but had a clear memory of herself at nineteen to twenty-three.

  When they had left, Cecelia felt the cushions of the massage lounger and shuddered. Entirely too clammy; she aimed a blow-dryer at it, and decided on a short swim. The pool's privacy screen, a liquid crystal switchable only from within, closed her into a frosted dome, onto which she projected a visual of overhanging forest. She set the pool's sound system, and eased over the edge to the opening bars of Del
isande's Moon Tide. A choice others would consider trite, but she needed those long rolling phrases, those delicate shadings of strings to ease her tension. The water enfolded her; she let her body and mind merge with water and music, swimming languidly to the music's rhythm, just enough to counter the gentle current.

  Just as she felt herself relaxing, the pool's timer beeped, and Myrtis's voice reminded her that it was time to dress.

  "Bad words, bad words, bad words." She had gotten away with that in childhood, even before she learned any. Her stomach burned. . . . If it hadn't been for Ronnie and his gang, she could have had dinner held until she was ready—and she'd have been ready, because she wouldn't have been interrupted. And her massage lounger wouldn't have been sweaty. She hauled herself out of the pool with a great splash, hit the privacy control without thinking—and only then realized that with guests aboard she would have to be more careful. Luckily they were all off dressing—none of them had straggled back to ask a stupid question. Not that they didn't swim bare, but she had no desire to have them compare her body to their young ones.

  She walked into the warmed towelling robe that Myrtis held, and stood still while Myrtis rubbed her hair almost dry. Then she stepped into the warm fleece slippers, took another warmed towel, and headed for her own suite still rubbing at her damp hair. It dried faster these days, being thinner; she hated the blow-dryers and would rather go to dinner a bit damp than use one.

  In her cabin, Myrtis had laid out her favorite dinner dress, a rich golden-brown shi-silk accented with ivory lace. Cecelia let herself be dried, oiled, powdered, and helped into the clothes without thinking about it. Myrtis, unlike Aublice, her first maid, had never seen her young body; she treated Cecelia with professional correctness and the mild affection of someone who has worked for the same employer fifteen years and hopes to retire in the same position. Cecelia sat, allowed Myrtis to fluff her short hair, with its odd spatchings of red and gray, and fastened on the elaborate necklace of amber and enamelled copper that made the lace look even more delicate. Those girls might be fifty years younger, but they would know a Marice Limited design when they saw it, and it would have its effect. They would not know it had been designed for her, by the original Marice, or why—but that didn't matter.

  * * *

  The plump roast fowl sent up a fragrance that made Cecelia's stomach subside from its tension. She glanced around the table and nodded to Bates. Service proceeded, a blend of human and robotic. A human handed her breast slices of roast, and the gravy boat, but crumbs vanished without the need of a crumb-brush.

  "Do you eat like this all the time, Lady Cecelia?" asked Bubbles. Sober, cured of her hangover, she was reasonably pretty, Cecelia thought, except that her gown looked as if it would burst with her next mouthful. She was not so plump; the gown was that tight. She wore a warm bright green; it showed off her white skin and blonde curls although it clashed with the dark Raffaele's red dress. The other girl, Sarah, wore a blue that would have been plain had it not been silk brocade, a design of fishes: d'Albinian work.

  "Yes," said Cecelia. "Why not? Cook is a genius, and I can afford it, so . . ."

  "Tell us about your new captain. Why'd you choose a spacefleet officer?"

  "Why was she available?" added the odious George. Less handsome than Ronnie, which Cecelia might have approved, but he had the sort of gloss she distrusted, as if he'd been coated with varnish.

  "I wasn't satisfied with my former captain's performance," Cecelia said, as if they had a right to ask. She knew she mellowed with good food; it was one reason she made sure to have it. She wasn't going to admit that if Captain Olin had held to her schedule, she'd have been safely distant and unavailable when Ronnie was exiled. Why waste good ammunition? "I wanted more efficiency," she said between bites, making them wait for it. "Better leadership. Before, they were always coming to me complaining about this and that, or getting crossways with staff. I thought an officer from the Regular Space Service"—she made the emphasis very distinct—"would know how to maintain discipline and follow my orders."

  "The Regs are crazy for discipline," George said, in the tone of someone who found that ridiculous. "Remember when Currier transferred, Ronnie? He didn't last six weeks. It was all nonsense—it's not as if all that spit and polish and saluting accomplishes anything."

  "I don't know . . ." Buttons, Bunny's middle son, looked surprisingly like his father as he ran a thumb down the side of his nose. Gesture, decided Cecelia, and not features; he had his mother's narrow beaky nose and her caramel-colored hair. "You can't get along with no discipline. . . ." And his mother's penchant for taking the other side of any argument, Cecelia told herself. In the girl, it had been fun to watch, but as Bunny's wife she had caused any number of social ruptures by choosing exactly the wrong moment to point out that not everyone agreed. The incident of the fish knives still rankled in Cecelia's memory. She wondered which parent Bubbles took after.

  "We're not talking about no discipline." George interrupted as if he had the right, and Buttons shrugged as if he were used to it. "We're talking about the ridiculous iron-fisted excuse for discipline in the Regs. I don't mind fitness tests and qualifying exams—even with modern techniques, the best family can throw an occasional brainless wonder." Cecelia thought that he himself could furnish proof of that. "But," George went on, in blissful ignorance of his hostess' opinion, she being too polite to express it, "I really do not see any reason for archaic forms of military courtesy that have no relevance to modern warfare."

  This time Buttons shrugged without looking up from his food. He had the blissful expression most of Cecelia's guests wore when they first encountered the products of Cook's genius. George looked around for another source of conversation, and found the others all engaged in their meal; with the faintest echo of Buttons's shrug, he too began to eat.

  The rest of the meal passed in relative silence. The roast fowl had been followed by a salad of fresh diced vegetables in an iced sauce strongly flavored with parsley: Cecelia's favorite eccentricity, and one which never failed to startle guests. It awoke, she contended, the sleepy palates which the roast had soothed and satisfied. Crisp rounds of a distant descendant of potato followed, each centered with a rosette of pureed prawns. The trick, which no one but her own cook seemed to manage, was to have the slices of potato boiled slightly before roasting, so that the outer surfaces were almost crunchy but the inside mealy. The young people, she noted, took additional servings of potato as they had of the roast fowl. Finally, Bates brought in tiny flaky pastries stuffed with finely diced fruit in chocolate and cinnamon sauce. One each, although Cecelia knew that a few would be waiting for her later, safely hidden from the young people.

  Satiety slowed them down, she noticed, nibbling her own pastry with deliberate care. They looked as if they wanted to throw themselves back in deep chairs and lounge. Not in my dining room, she thought, and smiled. The elegant but uncomfortable chairs that Berenice's designer had foisted on her had their purpose after all.

  Cecelia neither knew nor cared about the current social fashions of the young. In her young days, the great families had revived (or continued) the custom of a separate withdrawal of each sex with itself for a time after dinner, the women moving to one room and the men to another. She had resented it, and in her own yacht ignored it; either she invited guests (all of them) to continue their discussion in the lounge, or she excused herself and let them do what they would.

  Tonight, with a good meal behind her, she felt mellow enough to grant them more of her time. Perhaps well fed, with hangovers behind them, they would be amusing; at least she might hear some interesting gossip, since none of them seemed to have the slightest reticence. "Let's move to the lounge," she said, rising. The young people stood, as they ought, but Ronnie frowned.

  "If it's all the same to you, Aunt Cece, I'd rather watch a show. We brought our own cubes." The dark girl, Raffaele, opened her mouth as if to protest, but then shut it.

  "Very well." Ce
celia could hear the ice in her own voice. Snub her, would they? On her own yacht? She would not stoop to equal their discourtesy, but she would not forget it, either. Buttons again tried to intervene.

  "Wait, Ronnie . . . we really should—"

  "Never mind," Cecelia said, with a flip of her hand. The quick temper that she'd always blamed on her red hair slipped control. "I'm sure you're quite right, you would only be bored talking with an old lady." She turned on her heel and stalked out, leaving them to find their own way. At least she didn't have to spend more time in that disgusting lavender and teal lounge the designer had left her. She toyed with the idea of having the yacht redone, and charging it to her sister, but the quick humor that always followed her quick temper reminded her how ridiculous that would be. Like the time she and Berenice had quarrelled, only to discover that her brothers had taped the row for the amusement of an entire gang of little boys. A snort escaped her, and she shook her head. This time she was justified in her anger; she wasn't ready to laugh.