For information leading to any of the following persons:
George Paxon
Beryl Smith
Maryanne Fouquet
All wanted for lottery fraud.
Contact your nearest citycop or security station.
Underneath this was a notice saying:
FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS
$5,000
FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS
For information leading to the arrest of
Nicolet Foulard
A notorious ghost
murderer and thief
A rather rough sketch of a man’s face followed. And beneath this:
The Diamond Repertory Players
present
Henry IV
A Play in 5 Acts
by William Shakespeare
Now through Christmas at the Starhall Theater
Old version, subtitles provided, full refreshment bar
Naturally, I made a note of the theater. You know how I am about historicais, partic. with live actors. I’m not sure what they mean by “old version,” but I can’t wait to see what they do to it with their accents.
Meanwhile, did you catch that reference? “Christmas”! Isn’t this place a treasure-trove? The calendar here corresponds rigorously to Old Earth’s year—do you think that means I’ll soon see spring fertility rites? Garlands and May Queens and egg hunts? I do have hopes.
And the language, Seanie, the language! The Old Tongue is nothing to it, though they share a certain rough spirit. You don’t say, “I/me eat three apple yesterday”—that would be too easy. You say, “I, the subject, ate, in the past tense, three, apples, in the plural, yesterday.” So many gloriously unnecessary things! Articles and tenses thrown around with abandon, and logic a bare afterthought tapping on the windowpane.
I can do out my exile here standing on my head, I assure you. I’m in good spirits, I’m in no more danger than is to be expected, and of course I miss you all very much. I will not be writing to Father, so I trust you to fill him in. (I always imagine you standing over me, telling me to write myself. It was his decision, my love, as you well know.) Please tell him not to be alarmed that my contract-holder is a gathrid. It’s less than three hundred days, after all; how much can happen?
I will be leaving this letter with my official one to the Graykey Circle. I’m marking it “private,” and assume they will so honor it. It’s hard to write to you, watching the years go by, and never hear back. Do you know, I had to do some calculations to figure out what the season is there; if I’m right, it must almost be Year End Day. Tell Janny for me that she can wear my yellow gown and scarf to the Academy Ball. She must be quite the young lady now.
Your loving sister,
Keylinn
PS: There may be a bit of trouble-rousing over my letter to the Circle. You’ll be relieved to know I’ve finally gotten around to apologizing to Bantry, as Father wanted, a mere six years after the fact—but I don’t mention Perrin at all. I can see you shaking your head from here.
In truth, I always had paranoid thoughts before sending off one of my rare letters to Sean. I tried to make them as cheerful sounding as possible, but I’d think: Maybe Janny was killed six years ago in a hiking accident and every note they get from me is like salt in the wound. Maybe Father’s dead and I should have broken my silence to him long ago, regardless of what he’d said. Maybe Sean himself was dead and my letters were piling up, unread, at the Graykey Academy. Of course, there was no reason to believe any of them were dead.
But I had no way of knowing differently. Not even the Circle ever wrote back. Naturally, my letters to them were quite different.
To the Honored Dean
Chief Ranked of the Graykey Circle
The Academy
Sir:
This is to inform you that my contract has passed into the hands of a resident of the Three Cities. It may be some time before I can get this letter to our maildrop on Baret Station; I shall do so as soon as possible, of course.
Cyr Vesant declared herself satisfied with her contract and is returning to her native sector.
My present contract-holder has expressed a wish for anonymity, and as I do not want to bring up the matter of letter-writing with him, for fear he may misguidedly ask me to stop, I must interpret his ban on names as encompassing even the Circle.
Your obed. Servant,
Keylinn O’Malley Murtagh
PS: Please express my regrets to Instructor Bantry.
I wasn’t really capable of constructing a letter in hard copy without a postscript. Believe me, I tried. I tried because I read once that this was a sex-linked characteristic, and I resented any form of implied predestiny. But surely there was nothing wrong in itself with a friendly little postscript, a last wag of the tail, as it were?
I hoped my letters to Sean didn’t sound phoney. Anyway, all that would be over in just another year, when I’d come walking over the hill to his farm and test whether he’d lost the knack of noticing when people were sneaking up on him. Ah, but I knew he’d straighten up from his hoe and have his arms out when I was still leagues away. That’s why he has O’Malley blood.
Meanwhile, life in the present tense: When I could finally tear myself away from Mercati Boulevard, I made my way through the admin levels until I found A83C, an undistinguished door among acres of forgettable corridors, where I put my hand on the IDMat and announced myself.
The door slid open, showing a room with a sofa, chair, desk, and doorway to another room; and reclining there on the sofa, a plump, middle-aged man in a green uniform, who looked up and smiled the smile of one to mischief bom. He rose at once, bowed a charming bow, and said, “You must be Keylinn Gray. Tal told me you were coming.” He put out a hand, which I took automatically, and he bent and kissed it. “Stratton Hastings,” he added, “but call me Spider like all my other friends do.”
I didn’t
