decks blinked in panels of red and green. Ketac and Sril packed the next doorway, watching.
“How is he?”
Tanuojin came out of the bedroom. “He’s good. He’s better than I thought.” He put his back to them, facing Paula. “There’s too much going on here. I can’t take it, I’m spinning my wheels, I have to get away. Can you take care of him?”
“I’ll take him back to Matuko,” she said.
“Keep him quiet. Don’t let him do anything at all.” His head turned slightly toward the men in the doorway. The strange joy swelled in her again, so close to him. She put her hand on his chest.
“Go back to Yekka. I’ll call you when we’re in Matuko.”
“Don’t bother. I’ll keep track of you.” He turned and walked out of the room.
“I could fly my own ship.”
Paula kept hold of the grip in the wall of the compartment. The bus bounced and swayed along in its course toward Matuko. Saba walked in two steps the length of the compartment. “Why can’t I fly my own ship?”
Sril coughed into his rolled hand. “The Creep said—”
“What is he, my mother?”
Sril and Bakan, sitting opposite each other, passed weighted looks across the compartment. Saba dropped down on the bench next to Bakan. To Paula, he said, “When are you going to ask me about Illy?”
She glanced at Sril. “Will you bring me a drink of water?”
“Yes, Mendoz’.” He and Bakan filed out the door. The bus lurched and the door shut with a crash.
“I divorced her,” Saba said. “I sent her back to Merkhiz. First I whipped her backside so bad she probably stood the whole way.”
“Did you enjoy it?”
“Enjoy it. How could you do that to me? I’d never catch her in bed with Tanuojin.”
She tightened her fingers around the grip. Her stomach heaved with the motion of the bus. “How is David?”
“He’s fine. Boltiko has care of him.” He put one foot against the side of the bench to brace himself. “That doesn’t bother you? About Illy.”
“I’m glad she’s gone. I was going to end it anyway.”
“How long were you lovers?”
Her throat was sweet with nausea. She stiffened against his curiosity. “I’m going to be sick.” She staggered onto her feet. He called Sril to take her down to the slave toilet in the back of the bus.
MATUKO
Without Pedasen she had to do all the work in her house by herself. She hated the other slaves, who hated her, and would not let them inside her door. If something broke, Sril or Bakan fixed it for her, but usually the floor was crunchy with grit and cobwebs hung from the ceiling.
She was going around the front room wiping the dust off the flat surfaces when David came in. His upper lip was split and swollen; he had been fighting again. Her chest tightened with short temper and she threw the rag down.
“You know, I’m beginning to forget what you really look like.”
He climbed onto the swing couch. His narrow slanted eyes were stony. “Maybe I just won’t come back ever again, maybe you’d like that better.”
“I’d like you to broaden your interests.”
“It’s your fault.”
“My fault.”
“Because you’re a dirty nigger.”
She started down to her heels. Her son leaned toward her, his head stuck forward. “You aren’t my mother. You’re just a dirty old slave. My real mother was a Styth, like everybody else’s mother.”
Her face flushed with heat. Her hands were trembling and she chafed them together hard. “Your mother is me, whether you appreciate it or not, and if it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t be here living this easy life with the leisure to beat people up.” His hostile eyes shifted. Now he was staring over her shoulder. She said, “If it hadn’t been for your dirty nigger mother, your clean Styth father would have sold us both for slaves long ago.”
“That isn’t true!”
He flew out of the couch toward her, his fist raised. She swiped his hand aside. “Don’t you touch me, you little brat—” He was not small; he was already nearly her height. “All you can do is fight.”
“I hate you. And you aren’t my mother.” He raced down the hallway. The back door slammed.
She took her notebook to the kitchen, where it was warm. Too jittery to work, she sat at the table drawing on the scarred white top with her stylus.
“Paula?” Saba shouted, in the front of the house.
She raised her head. He came heavy-footed down the hall and tramped across the kitchen to the far side of the table from her. “What’s the matter with you? Why did you tell him I’m going to sell him?”
David lingered in the doorway behind him. She laid her hands flat on the table. “The shining knight to the rescue.”
“Look.” Saba gestured toward the boy behind him. “The other boys tease him. Maybe he should live with Boltiko.”
“No.” She rushed up onto her feet. “No.”
“You dirty nigger kundra,” David said.
Saba let out a half-spoken oath. He got the boy by the arm, whirled him around, and spanked him. David squawked. Paula’s wobbling legs put her down hard on the bench. Saba dropped him, and David threw a furious glance at him and bolted.
“That was edifying,” Paula said. Her throat was tight.
“I hope so. That’s what you’re supposed to do, not threaten to sell him.” He sat on the end of the bench and reached for her notebook. “He has to learn to fight sometime. Look how small he is. He’ll never get anything without fighting for it.”
“He says—” She cleared her throat. “I’m not his real mother.”
He laughed. The notebook was open before him; the pages were covered with the cursive script of the Middle Planets, which he could not read. He tapped the lone Styth symbol on the page: the major Sa she used short for his name. “What’s this?”
“Notes. For a new treaty with the Committee.”
“What makes you think I’ll want a new treaty?” He looked her curiously in the face. “You can’t take Vida with you, if you go back to live in the Earth.”
“Item,” she said. “You need money. As usual. Item. The quickest way to get money is to go to the Middle Planets. Therefore. You’ll get a new treaty.”
“Item.” Saba shut the notebook. “If you go back to the Earth, you’ll be just little Paula Mendoza again, but here, you do what nobody else can.” He leaned on his elbows over the table, his black eyes at her. “Stop scaring Vida. If he didn’t love you, you wouldn’t matter to him.” He went out the hall to the front door.
YBIX
Watch logs L19, 271—M19, 469
Sril played the ulugong with his eyes shut, beating out the round mellow notes with the heels of his hands. Paula turned around. Some of the pornographic posters on the walls of the Tank had been there since her first voyage. One woman, life-sized, her legs spread wide, had been chewed by darts into gaping holes that finally made
