between her hands. She faced all of them. But Tully most directly.
“You’ll know,” she said, “we never did fix that thing at Urtur. Shut up, Khym–”
before Khym could quite get his mouth open. “Tully, there wasn’t a way to fix
it. Hear? So we made it in. One vane is gone. Takes time to fix. Understand? Now
we got a little trouble. There’s a hani here wants to take you on her ship. You
understand? Hani authority.”
The pale eyes flickered with — perhaps — understanding. One was never sure.
Fright: that, certainly. “Go from you?” he asked. “I go? Go new ship?”
“No. Now listen to me. I don’t want them to take you. This is a mahen station.
Mahendo’sat, understand? Mahendo’sat take you to the center of the station, keep
you safe, fix the ship. Twenty hours. You understand? They’re going to take you
with them into the center of the station.”
“Kif. Kif here–”
“I know. It’s all right. They won’t get near you. The mahendo’sat will bring you
back when we’re ready to move. This way we keep the other hani from taking you
to their ship. We keep you safe, understand?”
“Yes,” he agreed. He held the cup in front of him, in both his hands, looking as
if he had lost his appetite and his thirst.
“Got to move fast, Tully. Get down below. Take whatever you need. Clothes. A car
is coming.”
“Car.”
“No nonsense this time. You’ll be under guard all the way. Not like the stsho.
Not like Meet-point. Mahendo’sat have teeth.”
“One of us,” Hilfy said quietly, “one of us could ride along. Make sure they
understand him.”
There were a lot of unspoken questions around the table, a lot of worried looks
from hands who knew what damage existed in the vane. No one was questioning.
“Listen,” Pyanfar said, moving the cup on the table out of her way. “Truth:
twenty hours. We’re going for a first-class job. Whole new assembly back there.”
“Gods,” Geran breathed in reverence. Chur blinked; and Hilfy stared.
“They say twenty hours. They want us headed out of here for their own reasons.
Now move it. We’ve got to have him down at the dock in ten minutes, packed and
out.”
“One of us ride along?” Chur asked.
“You and Hilfy.” So the two of them had always fussed over Tully. Keep them both
happy. “Armed. This is Kshshti.”
“I’ll go,” Khym said.
She glanced his way with a furrowing of the brow. Honest offer. Feckless lunacy.
“If there was trouble,” he said.
“No.”
“If–”
“No.” She stood up and tossed the cup into the disposal. “Get it moving. Nine
minutes.”
Crew hurried. Haral took Tully in tow, her hand hooked about his elbow, and
headed for the bridge.
“Pyanfar,” Khym said, working his own way out from between bench and table.
“Pyanfar, listen to me.”
“If you want to sulk go to your quarters and get out of the way.”
“Is it Ehrran?”
“I haven’t time.” She brushed past his arm and headed for the bridge, spun on
one foot as she heard him following and brought him up short. “Use some
judgment, Khym.”
“I’m trying to help!”
She gave him one long desperate look, and watched his expression go from anger
to desperation too. Anguish. She sorted a dozen jobs. All of them took skill.
“You want to help, I want Kshshti data pulled from comp. Go do that.” She spun
about again and headed bridge-ward, for the papers she had under security.
That had to go. It was all one package, Tully and that envelope. If Ehrran knew
about Tully she likely knew he came with documents. And all of it had to go into
mahen custody. Fast. She could keep the deputy off the bridge: the law gave her
that.
But since the kif hit Gaohn, since a great many changes had happened in the
han–
One took no chances. Gods knew what Prosperity would swear to. It had gotten to
that. Distrust of foreigners. Distrust of hani who defied the conventions.
Foreign ways, they said. Hani males outside Anuurn: the keepers of the home,
learning there were things outside the hon, friends stauncher than other hani,