The Reaches

above her left eye.

I closed my left hand over Alicia's on the gun. She relaxed with a great shudder, leaning against me and closing her eyes. 'Because the sergeant put it into me,' Alicia said softly. 'And she told me to be a good girl and stay quiet like Ducky wanted, or she'd shovel hot coals there instead.'

I dropped the revolver into my pocket. It was surprisingly heavy for something so small. Patten held Vantine by the shoulder and elbow, helping her stay upright. Alicia straightened and stepped to the side. She watched the proceedings regally.

'Strip,' I said to the soldiers. Lightbody looked at me oddly, Patten with fear.

'Oh, don't worry about your virtue, ladies, not from me,' I said. 'You'll strip to make sure you've no more toys hidden. We'll tie your hands with our belts, and then Lightbody'll march you to the Molt pen where you and your friends will stay until we lift.'

My voice caught repeatedly on images my mind threw up; Vantine and Patten, and the bound girl between them. Secretary Duquesne had acted quickly to keep his mistress safe when raiders landed. Safe in his terms, safe from other men.

The Fed soldiers only stared at me. I touched Vantine's tunic with the tip of my cutting bar, then triggered it. White fluff spun up from the whine.

'Don't worry about your virtue, ladies,' I repeated. My voice quivered like the cutting bar's blade. 'But your lives, now, that could very easily be a different matter.'

TREHINGA

Day 111

The Federation freighter C*, renamed the Iola after Salomon's mother and for the next few days a Venerian warship, lifted thunderously from New Troy. The freshly-cut gunports in her hold gaped like tooth cavities when the rest of the bare metal hull reflected sunlight. The Iola was 15° nose-down; she rotated slowly around her vertical axis because the thrusters weren't aligned squarely.

'I thought you said automated ships were safer on liftoff than landing?' I said to Piet, moderating my voice as the Iola climbed high enough to muffle her exhaust roar.

Piet quirked a smile at me. 'The concept of automation isn't a problem,' he said. 'Just the cheap execution. Besides, it's safe enough.'

'Or you'd be taking her up yourself,' Stephen said in a tone of mild reproof. Alicia heard enough in the gunman's voice to look sharply at him. She'd known a lot of men in her 25 standard years, but none like Piet or Stephen Gregg.

She'd known men like me. I didn't doubt that.

The Iola had risen to a dot of brilliant light in the stratosphere. The sound of saws and the rock crusher became loudly audible again, now that the thrusters were gone.

The Federation laser battery that hit us as we escaped from Templeton had crazed several hull laminations as well as taking out two attitude jets. The shock of repeated transits flaked the damaged sheathing off in a five- meter gouge.

The crew was sandblasting the fractured edges just as a surgeon would debride a wound in flesh before closing it. When they finished the prep, they'd flux the boundaries and layer on ceramic again. I suspected Piet would oversee that final process himself. Hawtry was right when he claimed Piet's father was a craftsman rather than a gentleman.

Another team removed attitude jets from the second Federation freighter, the Penobscot. We carried spare jets in the Oriflamme, but all the original nozzles were badly worn from the long voyage. Jets from the ships and stores here would replace our spares.

Dole had muttered to me that he'd rather use burnt-out ceramic than trust Fed metalwork, but Piet seemed to think the tungsten nozzles would be adequate. Sailors as a class were conservative: 'unfamiliar' was too often a synonym for 'lethal.' The general commander of an expedition through the Breach had to be able to assess options on the basis of fact, though, not tradition.

Alicia raised a slim hand toward where the Iola had vanished. 'But where are you sending the ship?' she asked.

It didn't seem to occur to her that anybody might think she was asking out of more than curiosity. Stephen and I exchanged glances: mine concerned, his clearly amused.

Piet, with an innocence as complete as I'm sure Alicia's was, answered, 'We're just putting her in orbit with two guns, Mistress Leeman. The Oriflamme can't lift while we're working on her hull, and there's the risk that a Federation warship will arrive while we're disabled.'

As he spoke, Piet began walking down Water Street. New Troy stretched along a broad estuary. It had a surfaced road along the water and a parallel road separating the buildings from the field where starships landed. A dozen barges were moored to quays behind the grain elevators.

'Warships here?' Alicia said. 'Don't worry about that. I haven't seen one in. .' She shivered. 'Nine months, I've been here. Earth months. I was born in Montreal.'

There was more to the last statement than information. I wasn't sure whether she meant it as a challenge or an admission, though.

'Still, it's better not to run a risk,' Piet said mildly. 'We'll reship the guns to the Oriflamme in orbit, I think. Since, as Jeremy points out, the C* is worse maintained than I'd thought from viewing her.'

He tipped me a nod.

'Dole takes a crew up in the cutter to replace Salomon tomorrow?' Stephen asked.

Piet shook his head. 'Guillermo tomorrow, Dole the following day. Stampfer asked for a watch, but I don't trust his shiphandling, even with automated systems.'

He glanced at me. 'I wouldn't put it so bluntly to Stampfer, you know, Jeremy,' he said.

I shrugged. 'He's a gunner,' I said. 'One man can't do everything.'

Though maybe Piet could. Being around him gave you the feeling that he walked on water when nobody was watching.

The pen for Molts being transshipped was adjacent to the Commandatura. There'd been a dozen aliens behind the strands of electrified razor ribbon when we landed. Neither the C* nor the Penobscot was a dedicated slaver, but both vessels carried a handful of Molts as part of their general cargo.

We'd turned the Molts loose. Half of them still wandered about New Troy, looking bewildered and clustering when we distributed rations from the Fed warehouse. Secretary Duquesne, his seven soldiers, and three of the officials who'd been cheeky enough to sound dangerous had replaced the slaves in the pen.

For the most part, the humans-residents as well as transients from the barges and two starships-seemed willing to do business on normal terms and otherwise keep out of our way. The local Molts were no problem without human leaders. Stephen, Piet, and a sailor who'd been to the Reaches with them had separately warned me that Molts would fight for human masters, even masters who treated them as badly as the Feds generally did. It was a matter of clan identification among the aliens.

Duquesne trembled with anger as he watched the four of us saunter by the pen. He touched the razor ribbon, forgetting that the metal was charged. A blue spark popped and threw him back. Patten and a male soldier heard the secretary bellow and ran to help.

'Run toward the wire,' I ordered Alicia in a low voice.

'Ducky!' she cried.

I let her go two steps and grabbed her roughly around the neck. 'Get back here or you'll be in there with him!' I shouted as I swung her between me and Piet.

Stephen faced the pen and raised the flashgun's butt toward-not quite to-his shoulder in warning. Duquesne and his henchmen scurried out of sight within the wooden shed meant to shelter slaves.

We walked on. 'That was a good thought, Jeremy,' Piet said.

I shrugged. 'Maybe it'll help,' I said. I didn't suggest we hang Duquesne and the two women who'd been so enthusiastic to carry out his orders. Piet wouldn't go along with the idea, and I've got better things to do than