Who was backing Hart, and why? Will had heard the rumors on the Diamond that Hart was some kind of left-hand-born Mercati. But he discounted that; there no Mercatis on Opal—not one.
So what was Hart’s story?
He liked to watch Lysette when she didn’t know he was there. She was a good singer; straight bar stuff, no heartsinging or anything over die line. She just did the old songs the way her singing master had taught her. That was enough.
She stood in the singer’s spot in the Bloodshed and finished up “I Know Where I’m Going.” Her brown hair was straight and pulled back on top, long in back. Her eyes, her expression, and her songs were all very clear and direct. Will smiled in the back of the dark bar, knowing that Lysette belonged to him. If she hadn’t, she would have made that very clear, too.
Sometimes, as a joke, she finished with “Bonnie Ship the Opal.” But that depended on the audience, and apparently she wasn’t going to do it tonight. When the light around her faded, Will stood up so she could see him.
She smiled at once and came over to the table.
“Want anything?” he asked. He meant water or sweet drinks; Lysette never went near alcohol.
“You, sugar.” She leaned over and kissed him before they sat down.
God, this was just what he needed after a sorry night. If only she would follow through on this, he thought wistfully. But she was very firm—the banns hadn’t been read, they still couldn’t even call themselves husband and wife, even prematurely. And that sort of thing was saved for marriage. Somehow, he thought, he and his sister had both fallen in with real sticklers for form. It would be hard to find personalities farther from their childhood experience.
“I brought you something,” he said, and he handed her the diamond and ruby ring that Adrian had given him the day he pulled Iolanthe out of the pit.
“Willie!” She held it between two fingers, gazing in awe. “Where did you get it?”
“Diamonds from the Diamond,” he said, pleased. “Like it?”
She leaned over the table as far as she could go, and Will got another kiss. “I’ve missed you so much,” she said, and his smile vanished.
“I’m going back tomorrow night.”
She put down the ring and he saw the glow leave her face. “That soon?”
“Right after Bernadette’s wedding. That’s the only reason I got off at all.”
She sat back in her chair and looked around the bar. She tapped her shoes against the floor. Then her gaze returned to him and she said, “Why can’t you ask for a transfer back?”
“Sergeants go where they’re told, Lyse.”
“Just what do you do on the Diamond, anyway?”
“Whatever I’m told. Look, sweetheart—”
“If you hadn’t gone into the Guard—”
“I’d be dead, and we wouldn’t be sitting here!”
They glared at each other for a moment in silence. Finally she said, “You’d better go home and get a little sleep. You’ve got wedding preparations to make.”
“Yeah, I’d better.”
They sat there a while longer, still not speaking.
He said, “We’re still engaged, right?”
“Maybe.”
“You’re not going to forget me while I’m gone?”
“You won’t be gone long.”
“Look, I told you, I don’t know when this assignment will end.”
“Never mind,” she said, and kissed him for the third and final time. He smelled her hair and her breath and a faint flowery perfume. She said, “I’ll be looking at the moon, but I’ll be seeing you.”
He left the bar in a daze. It had been a long night. There were no moons over Sangaree, of course, but the moon was an old legacy, handed down in a thousand songs and poems. By now it no longer conveyed a barren satellite, any more than the word “heart” in the same poems meant a chamber for pumping blood. In Sangaree more than anywhere else, the old songs were still sung, and Will found himself humming as he walked home.
It was, he realized, from the song she’d quoted. What was the rest of it? I’ll be looking at the moon, but I’ll be seeing you. Then he started to laugh. I’ll be seeing you, in all the old familiar places. Well, she’d said he’d be back.
You had to love a girl with that much confidence.
Chapter 20
The perfection of simplicity. The perfection of stones. The perfection of art. The perfection of death.
Graykey Exercise 2: The Flash of Birds
in Forest Branches
Keylinn:
I knew that in this case I was a long way from the place where understanding and action were one.
Nevertheless I booked passage on the Kestrel— somewhat surprised at my own methodical efficiency— boarded, and took my stateroom. I ate briefly in the ship’s dining area, unable to keep from noting the faces of the doomed as I did. The food went down like lumps; three bites and I was in danger of nausea.
I’m only a cadet, dammit.
From the table, I went immediately to reconnoiter the area around the drive station; we could not afford to be very far from Baret Station when the explosion was triggered.
It was easy. I felt a distant sense of amazement at how easy it was. My instructors at the academy delighted in presenting every possible scenario of doom; I was, I discovered, overprepared. These people believed they had been through the crisis for this voyage. Some of them were still recovering mentally from the panic that ensued onboard when Tal’s smoke bombs had gone off. The response to that crisis might have been to beef up security, but it was not. For one thing, there was little to beef up. With the absence of the Captain there was one fewer crewmember on a ship not plentifully equipped with crew. And for another, the spy
