Leno that Illini had also gone dark. Bokojin’s brothers were fighting over the succession. The Uranian Patrol held most of the city. Paula stayed in Tanuojin’s library.
While she was going to her room again, after a watch reading novels, David met her in the hall. He turned to walk beside her.
“How is Ketac?”
“I don’t know, I haven’t seen him for eight hours,” she said.
He lagged behind her to let a man coming the other way pass by. “Tajin should have killed him.”
“Don’t encourage it. Do you like Tanuojin?” They crossed the main hall to her room. At the door she stopped and looked up at him.
“He’s taught me a lot,” David said. “Once I started listening.”
“What, for example?”
He shrugged. He was filling out through his chest and shoulders, and his upper arms packed his sleeves. He said, “I’m not going to work for him for the rest of my life, you know.”
His solemn look made her smile. “Oh, really?”
“Someday I’ll get my own ship. Junna and I. We’ve talked about it. Actually, we’ve been talking about going to Neptune. Maybe even beyond.”
She thought, He’s like me. She unlocked her door and went into the white room beyond.
The sled was empty. She looked around, startled, and saw Ketac sitting on the window sill. “Oh,” she said. “Do you feel better?”
He wore no shirt. The purpling half-healed wounds ran like a flag across his chest. David was behind her on the threshold, and he and his brother paid each other a long fierce look. She bent over the empty sled.
“Help me get this out of here.” She picked up one end of the sled.
David took the other end and they carried it out to the hall. He propped it up against the wall, out of the way, for a slave to take. He said, “Now he’s going to sleep with you, is that it?”
“That’s right.”
At the end of the hall, the outside door opened, and Junna came in. He was tall and thin, and for an instant she thought he was Tanuojin. David called to him. She went into her room again.
Ketac was still sitting on the window sill, looking out at Yekka. Paula shut the door and latched it. He said, “Why am I here?”
“Because you’re a stupid ignorant idiot.” She took the chair from her desk to sit beside him.
“You were there, weren’t you? At my house. I found your dress. How much did you hear?”
“Enough.”
He was avoiding looking at her. On his chest the puckered wounds ran from his right shoulder to his navel. She said, “You thought that was your plot, didn’t you? That was Tanuojin’s plot, Ketac, he has been waiting for this chance since before Saba died.” She leaned toward him and said into his face, “You did this.”
He shed a rising heat. His hands pressed against the window sill. Turned away from her, he said out toward Yekka, “Why didn’t he kill me?”
“He needs
He made a sound in his throat. She looked around the little room. The white walls made it bright. Tanuojin could hear her; he knew everything she did and thought, so there was no use trying to surprise him.
“Are you done tongue-whipping me?” Ketac said.
“Bah.”
“Will you help me escape?”
“No.”
“Come on, Paula, we’ve been friends for a long time.” He swiveled to face her and took hold of her hand. “Tell me what to do.”
With her free hand she took his fingers from her wrist and held them. “Not escape. You have to make him do what you want.” She laced her fingers with his. “I’ll help you do that.”
The Akopra was dark. She stood still a moment, blinking her eyes clear. On the round lit stage, four dancers climbed on each other. She looked around the back benches until she found Tanuojin and went along the curved wall toward him.
“Shut up,” he said. “I’m watching this.”
Obediently she watched while they moved through the third design from
Tanuojin thumbed his mustaches down, his eyes on the stage. “Leave him to me.”
“What are you going to do?”
He raised his hand and made a gesture, and the young man at the edge of the stage went into the middle and took the place of another dancer. Tanuojin settled down again. He said, “The same thing I did with Dr. Savenia.”
“He’s not like Cam,” she said. “And you haven’t got the time to do it right. You’ll kill him.”
He made a sound in his chest. Slowly the four men on the stage began the same design over, this time with the new dancer as Capricornus. Paula watched, her attention caught by the young man’s fiery gestures.
“He’s going to be good,” Tanuojin muttered.
“He’s going too fast.”
“I’ll teach him better.”
The young man stood on his hands on the hands of the stocky dancer. She watched the muscles flex under his tight black sleeves. Tanuojin said, “What’s your idea about Ketac?”
“Do it through me,” she said. “He’ll accept it from me.”
Spinning, the young dancer flipped up onto his feet on the floor-man’s shoulders. He lost his balance for an instant and wobbled and the floor-man caught his ankles. Paula leaned back against the wall behind her. Tanuojin was watching her, his fingers entwined in his mustaches.
“In the low watch,” she said. “He’s still a little weak. He’ll be easier to handle. I’ll take him to bed with me, and when he’s asleep, you take him through me.”
He nodded. On the stage, the dancers had finished. He waved to them, and they left the stage and came toward him.
Paula said, “I’ll be there to get you out if anything goes wrong.”
Tanuojin nodded again, watching her. The dancers stood in the aisle on his far side. He turned his head. “What’s your name?”
“Kapsin,” the new dancer said.
“You can stay for fifty-one watches on trial. Don’t try that flip again until you know what you’re doing. You could have killed him.” He faced Paula again. “Do you know, Paula, I think you have a good idea.”
Paula settled back against the wall. He had jumped at it. She had expected him to. She listened to him lecture the dancers on the art of Akopra.
Ketac went to bed with her. The ruts in his chest and belly were like seams under her hands. When he was asleep, she rose from the bed and opened the door. Tanuojin came in. He left his body in the chair by the desk, and she took him to Ketac.
In his sleep, Ketac knew her kiss; he stirred, his mouth soft under hers, willing. She took his hands. He did not waken, even when she drew back, sitting beside him, her eyes on his face.
Tanuojin said, in Ketac’s voice, “Be careful. I’ll wake him up.”
She held Ketac’s hands. He stiffened, and his eyes opened, shining with terror. His mouth moved but said nothing. His chest heaved.
“Ketac,” she said. “I’m here. It’s all right, you’ll be all right.”
His hands closed painfully over her fingers. She bit her lip. “Just relax. It won’t be for long.”
Ketac’s lips moved again. His long body flexed under the blanket, and his eyes shut. She pulled her throbbing hand free of his grip and worked her fingers and gasped at the pain in her knuckle.
