Captain Vorpatril's alliance

“You usually add butter, maple syrup, cheese, all sorts of things. There’s also a cold salad with mint and chopped tomatoes and what‑not. And they use them at weddings.”

The Greekie food, as he dished it out, looked more promising; her first bites delivered some quite wonderful aromas, flavors and textures. “How do they prepare your groats for weddings?”

“They don’t serve them. The grains get dyed different colors, and sprinkled on the ground for the wedding circle and what‑not. Some sort of old fertility or abundance symbol, I suppose.”

It also seemed the food least likely to be regretted in that sacrifice, a suspicion Tej kept to herself.

Ivan Xav seemed much more relaxed tonight, and she couldn’t figure out quite why, except for the lack of his strange friend Byerly to stir him up. She would have thought that the revelation of her true identity would have alarmed him more, but maybe he disliked mysteries more than bad news?

“This is all right,” he said, leaning back replete when they’d demolished the Greekie dinner. “When I rented this place to sample the Solstice nightlife, I’d forgotten just how short the nights were. There’s time to either party or recover before work, but not both. So staying in actually suits, though not on your ownsome. That would be dull.”

He rose to go rummage at the comconsole. “My cousin told me about this dance thing you and Rish might like to see, if I can find an example…”

“Do you have a lot of cousins?” Tej asked, leaning over his shoulder. “Or just a lot of one cousin?”

He laughed at that last. “Both, actually. On my father’s side, there’s only my cousin Miles‑not exactly a cousin, our grandmothers were sisters. That part of the family got pretty thinned out during Mad Yuri’s War, which came down soon after the end of the Occupation. I’ve half‑a‑dozen first cousins on my mother’s side, but they don’t live near the capital and I don’t see much of ’em. Ah, here we go!”

His search had turned up a recorded performance of the Minchenko Memorial Ballet Company, from a place called the Union of Free Habitats, or Quaddiespace. Tej had never heard of it, but as the vid started up Rish drifted in and said, “Oh! The gengineered four‑armed people. Baron Fell had a quaddie musician, once. I saw a vid of one of her gigs. Played a hammer dulcimer with all four hands at once. But she jumped her contract and left, and no one’s heard of her since. I didn’t know they could dance…” Her face screwed up. “ How do they dance, with no feet?”

“Free fall,” said Ivan Xav. “They live in it, work in it, dance in it…my cousin and his wife saw a live performance when they were out that way on, er, business last year‑told me all about it, later. Very impressive, they said.”

Dance the quaddies did, it seemed, in zero‑gee: hand to hand to hand to hand, singly, in pairs, but most amazingly, in groups, glittering colored costumes flashing through air. The Jewels gave the illusion of flying, at times‑these dancers really flew, wheeling like flocks of bright birds. Both Rish and Tej watched in rapt fascination, Rish putting in mutters of excited critique now and then, and bouncing on the edge of her chair at especially complex maneuvers, her arms waving in unconscious mimicry.

Tej shared the sofa with Ivan Xav. His arm, laid out along the back, crept nearer, easing down over her shoulders till she was quite snugged in by it. After a few moments of silent consideration, she declined to shrug it off. It threw her back into a memory of watching shows with Dada, in her childhood‑how patient he must have been with her choices, in retrospect‑snuggled into his warm side, a stouter one than Ivan Xav’s, but smelling equally, if rather differently, masculine. She wasn’t sure if the recollection helped or hurt, but there it was. For a little hour, some simulacrum of peace.

It ended soon enough, when Ivan Xav turned off the holovid at the close of the performance and Rish said, “So how long were you planning to stay on Komarr, Captain Vorpatril?”

“Mm? Oh.” He sat up, and Tej edged regretfully away. “This whole duty‑the annual inspections and conferences‑usually runs about ten days or so. I’ve been here, um, let me see…” His lips moved as he counted on his fingers. “Seven nights, so far, including this one. So not much longer. I trust that By will be done with his business sooner, though. Seemed like his pace was picking up.”

“So this safe house”‑a graceful blue hand spiraled‑“will go away when you do.”

“Uh…” he said. “I’m afraid so. Though I could book it an extra week for you, but…I figured to wait and see what By comes up with.”

Rish glanced significantly at Tej.

Ivan Xav cleared his throat. “Would you two consider making a deal with ImpSec? I mean, more than just with Byerly. I bet you know lots of things they’d like to share, for suitable considerations.”