“Is there a street address? Scanner code?”
“No, just use the scanner code for the planet and city. Once it gets that far, it’ll find him.”
Surely it would cost this man far more to ship this…object to a planet five wormhole jumps away than it was worth. She wondered if she was obliged to point this out. “Regular or premium service? There’s a stiff price difference, but I have to tell you, express won’t really get there much faster.” It all went on the same jumpship, after all.
“Is it more likely to arrive intact with premium?”
“No, sir, it will be packed just the same. There are regulations for anything that goes by jumpship.”
“Right-oh, regular it is.”
“Extra insurance?” she said doubtfully. “There’s a base coverage that comes with the service.” She named the amount, and he allowed as it would do. It was in truth considerably less than the shipping charges.
“You pack it yourself? Can I watch?”
She glanced at the digital hour display over the door. The task would run her past closing time, but customers were fussy about breakables. She sighed and turned to the foamer. He stood on tiptoe and watched over the counter as she carefully positioned the vase-a glimpse of its underside revealed a sale tag with four markdowns- closed the door, and turned on the machine. A brief hiss, a moment of watching the indicator lights wink hypnotically, and the door popped back open, releasing a pungent whiff that stunned her sense of smell and masked every other scent in the shop. She bent and removed the neat block of flexifoam. It was an aesthetic improvement.
Ivan Vorpatril, read the name on his credit chit. Also with a Vorbarr Sultana home address. Not just a Barrayaran, then, but one of those Vor-people, the conquerors’ arrogant privileged class. Even her father had been wary of-she cut the thought short.
“Do you wish to include a note?”
“Naw, I think it’ll be self-explanatory. His wife’s a gardener, see. She’s always looking for something to stuff her poisonous plants into.” He watched her slide the foam block into its outer container and affix the label, adding after a moment, “I’m new in town. Yourself?”
“I’ve been here a while,” she said neutrally.
“Really? I could do with a native guide.”
Dotte closed out the scanners and turned off the lights as a broad hint to the laggard customer. And, bless her, lingered by the door to see Tej safely free of the shop and him. Tej gestured him out ahead of her, and the door locked behind them all.
The oldest human habitation on the surface of Komarr, Solstice Dome had a peculiar layout, to Tej’s eye. The aging initial installations resembled the space stations she’d grown up in, with their labyrinths of corridors. The very latest sections were laid out with separate, street-linked buildings, but under vast, soaring, transparent domes that mimicked the open sky the residents hoped to have someday, when the atmospheric terraforming was complete. Middling areas, like this one, fell between, with much less technologically ambitious domes that still gave glimpses of an outside where no one ventured without a breath mask. The passage that Swift Shipping fronted was more street than corridor, anyway, too broad for the persistent customer to easily obstruct her.
“Off work now, huh?” he inquired ingenuously, with a boyish smile. He was a bit old for boyish smiles.
“Yes, I’m going home.” Tej wished she could go home, really home. Yet how much of what she’d known as home still existed, even if she could be magically transported there in a blink? No, don’t think those thoughts. The tension headache, and heartache, were too exhausting to bear.
“I wish I could go home,” said the man, Vorpatril, in unconscious echo of her thought. “But I’m stuck here for a while. Say, can I buy you a drink?”
“No, thank you.”
“Dinner?”
“No.”
He waggled his eyebrows, cheerfully. “Ice cream? All women like ice cream, in my experience.”
“No!”
“Walk you home? Or in the park. Or somewhere. I think they have rowboats to rent in that lake park I passed. That’d make a nice place to talk.”
“Certainly not!” Ought she to invent a waiting spouse or lover? She linked arms with Dotte, pinching her in silent warning. “Let’s go to the bubble car stop now, Dotte.”
Dotte gave her a surprised look, knowing perfectly well that Tej-Nanja, as she knew her-always walked home to her nearby flat. But she obediently turned away and led off. Vorpatril followed, not giving up. He slipped around in front, grinned some more, and tried, “What about a puppy?”
Dotte snorted a laugh, which didn’t help.
“A kitten?”
They were far enough from Swift Shipping now that customer politeness rules no longer applied, Tej decided. She snarled at him, “Go away. Or I’ll find a street patroller.”
He opened his hands in apparent surrender, watching with a doleful expression as they marched past. “A pony…?” he called after them, as if in one last spasm of hope.
Dotte looked back over her shoulder as they approached the bubble-car station. Tej looked straight ahead.
“I think you’re crazy, Nanja,” said Dotte, trudging with her up the pedestrian ramp. “I’d have taken him up on that drink in a heartbeat. Or any of the rest of the menu, though I supposed I’d have to draw the line at the pony. It wouldn’t fit in my flat.”
“I thought you were married.”
“Yes, but I’m not blind.”
“Dotte, customers try to pick me up at least twice a week.”
“But they aren’t usually that incredibly cute. Or taller than you.”
“What’s that have to do with anything?” said Tej, irritated. “My mother was a head taller than my father, and they did fine.” She clamped her jaw shut. Not so fine now.
She parted company with Dotte at the platform, but did board a bubble car. She rode to a random destination about ten minutes away, then disembarked and took another car back to a different stop on the other side of her neighborhood, just in case the man was still lingering out there, stalker-like, at the first one. She strode off briskly.
Almost home, she started to relax, until she look up and spotted Vorpatril lounging on the steps to her building entrance.
She slowed her steps to a dawdle, pretending not to have noticed him yet, raised her wristcom to her lips, and spoke a keyword. Rish’s voice answered at once.
“Tej? You’re late. I was getting worried.”
“I’m fine, I’m right outside, but I’m being followed.”
The voice went sharp. “Can you go roundabout and shake him off?”
“Already tried that. He got ahead of me somehow.”
“Oh. Not good.”
“Especially as I never gave him my address.”
A brief silence. “Very not good. Can you stall him a minute, then get him to follow you into the foyer?”
“Probably.”
“I’ll take care of him there. Don’t panic, sweetling.”
“I’m not.” She left the channel open on send-only, so that Rish could follow the play. She took her time closing the last few dozen meters, and came to a wary halt at the bottom of her steps.
“Hi, Nanja!” Vorpatril waved amiably, without getting up, looming, or lunging for her.
“How did you find this place?” she asked, not amiably.
“Would you believe dumb luck?”
“No.”
“Ah. Pity.” He scratched his chin in apparent thought. “We could go somewhere and talk about it. You can pick where, if you like.”
She simulated a long hesitation, while calculating the time needed for Rish to get downstairs. Just about…
