that introduction, Amber spoke. 'I am Amber the bead-maker, an artisan of Rain Wild Street. I look forward to meeting your ship.'
With no more ado, Captain Tenira led the way. Ophelia was obviously simmering with curiosity. She looked Amber up and down with a scandalized restraint that brought a grin to Althea's face despite herself. As soon as Amber's presence was explained, the ship showed no hesitation at turning to her and presenting her scorched hands for inspection. 'Do you think you can do anything for me?' she asked gravely.
It was the first time Althea had had a clear look at the damage. The tarry fireballs had clung to her fingers as they burned her. It had licked up the inside of Ophelia's left wrist. Her patrician hands looked like those of a scrub maid.
Amber took one of the ship's large hands in both her own. She ran her gloved fingertips over the scorched surface lightly, then rubbed at it more firmly. 'Tell me if I hurt you,' she added belatedly. Her brow was furrowed with concentration. 'A most peculiar wood,' she added to herself. She opened the tote of tools and selected one. She scraped lightly at one blackened fingertip. Ophelia gave a sharp intake of breath.
'That hurts?' Amber asked immediately.
'Not as humans hurt. It feels… wrong. Damaging.'
'I think there is sound wood just below the scorched surface. Working with my tools, I could remove what is blackened. I might have to reshape your hands a bit; you would end up with slimmer fingers than you have now. I could keep a good proportion, I believe, unless the damage goes much deeper than I think. However, you would have to endure that sense of damage, unflinching, while I did my work. I do not know how long it would take.'
'What do you think, Tomie?' the ship demanded of her captain.
'I think we have little to lose by trying,' he said gently. 'If the sensation becomes unbearable, then Mistress Amber will stop, I am sure.'
Ophelia smiled nervously. Then a wondering look came into her eyes. 'If your work on my hands is successful, then perhaps something could be done about my hair as well.' She lifted a hand to touch the long loose curls of her mane. 'This style is so dated. I have often thought that if I could contrive ringlets around my face and…'
'Oh, Ophelia.' Tomie groaned as the others laughed.
Amber had kept possession of one of Ophelia's hands. Her head was still bent over it, examining the damage. 'I may have great difficulty in matching the stain. Never have I seen stain that mimics so well the color of flesh without obscuring the grain of the wood. Someone told me that a liveship creates its own colors as it awakens.' She met Ophelia's eyes without self-consciousness as she asked, 'Will that happen again, if I have to plane so deep that I expose uncolored wood?'
'I do not know,' Ophelia replied quietly.
'This will not be the work of an afternoon,' Amber said decidedly. 'Captain, you will have to give your watch permission to let me come and go. I shall keep this same guise. Is that acceptable?'
'I suppose so,' the captain conceded grudgingly. 'Though it may be hard to explain to other Traders why such delicate work is entrusted to a slave, or why I use a slave's labor at all. I oppose all slavery, you know.'
'As do I,' Amber replied gravely. 'As do many, many folk in this town.'
'Do they?' Tomie replied bitterly. 'If there is any great public outcry about it, it has escaped me.'
Amber lightly tapped her fake tattoo. 'Were you to put on rags and one of these and stroll about Bingtown, you would hear the voices of those who oppose slavery most bitterly. In your efforts to waken Bingtown to its senses, do not ignore that pool of allies.' She selected a small block plane from her tote of tools and began to adjust the blade on it. 'If one were interested in, say, the inner workings of the household of the tariff minister, willing spies might easily be found among that pool. I believe the scribe who composes his correspondence to the Satrap is a slave, also.'
A little shiver walked up Althea's spine. How did Amber come to know such things, and why had she troubled to find them out?
'You speak as if you were knowledgeable about such things,' Captain Tenira pointed out gravely.
'Oh, I have known my share of intrigues and plotting. I find it all distasteful. And necessary. Just as pain is occasionally necessary.' She set the block to Ophelia's palm. 'Hold steady,' she warned her in a low voice. 'I'm going to take off the worst of the damage.'
There was a tiny silence followed by a dreadful scraping noise. Charred wood powdered away. The smell reminded Althea of scorched hair. Ophelia made a tiny noise then lifted her eyes to stare out over the water. Her jaw was set.
Captain Tenira's face was almost expressionless as he watched Amber work. As if inquiring about the weather, he asked Althea, 'Did you deliver my message to your mother?'
'I did.' Althea pushed aside an emotion that was close to shame. 'I'm sorry. I do not bring much that is of great comfort. My mother said she would speak to my sister Keffria. She is legally the Trader of the family now. Mother will urge her to attend the next Council meeting, and to vote in support of your actions.'
'I see,' Tenira replied. His voice was carefully empty.
'I wish my father were still alive,' Althea added miserably.
'I could wish that you were Trader for the Vestrits. Truly, you should have inherited your family's ship.'
Althea revealed her deepest wound. 'I do not know if Keffria can stand beside you at all.' A stunned silence followed her words. She kept her voice even as she added, 'I do not know how she can side with you, and still support her husband. The increased tariffs are based on the Satrap protecting trade from pirates, but we all know it is the slave trade he cares most about. He never bothered about the pirates until they began attacking slavers. So, if the issue comes down to slavery, and she must take a stance… She… Kyle is trading in slaves. Using Vivacia as a slave ship. I do not think she would oppose her husband in this. Even if she does not agree with him, she has never had the will to set herself against him in anything.'
Then, 'No-o-o,' Ophelia gasped. 'Oh, how could they do such a thing! Vivacia is so young. How will she withstand all that? What was your mother thinking to allow this to happen? How could they have done that to their own family's ship?'
Grag and Captain Tenira were both silent. A stony look of condemnation settled over the captain's face while Grag looked stricken. The question hung in the air, an accusation.
'I don't know,' Althea replied miserably. 'I don't know.'
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Judgment
'WHERE COULD SHE BE? WHAT COULD SHE BE DOING?' KEFFRIA WORRIED.
'I don't know.' Her mother replied testily.
Keffria looked down into the cup of tea she held. She forced her tongue to be still. She had nearly asked her mother if she was certain she had really seen Althea earlier. The last week had been so exhausting, she could have forgiven her mother for imagining the whole thing. That would be easier to forgive than her younger sister turning up and then abruptly vanishing again. It didn't help her temper that her mother seemed simply to accept Althea's outrageous behavior.
Her mother relented and added, 'She told me she would be back before morning. The sun has scarcely gone down.'
'Does it not seem odd to you that a young, unmarried woman of a good family should be out and about on her own at night, let alone on her first night home after she has been missing for nearly a year?'
'No doubt that is so. It seems very like Althea to me, however. I've come to accept that I can't change her.'
'No such leeway is allowed to me!' Malta interjected pointedly. 'I am scarcely allowed to walk around Bingtown by myself by day.'
'That's true,' Ronica Vestrit replied affably. Her needles ticked rhythmically against each other as she worked. She ignored Malta's noisy exhalation of frustration.
