Austin's smile grew as he saw Kea frown at the proposed changes to his life. Then he paid off the buildup. The reason Kea would have to start school late was passage time. Come September, he'd still be at the Bargeta family's vacation com-pound, the one they called Yarmouth. Near Ophir Chasm, now a freshwater ocean.
On Mars.
Kea felt, as Austin beamed, as if he'd suddenly entered free-fall aboard one of the early spaceships. School could wait, his career could wait. Space. It was the beginning of the end.
Her name was Tamara. She was seventeen. Tall. Dark-haired. A lean curving body. Pert breasts. Eyes that dared, and told Kea no dare was forbidden—if he had the courage to follow through. She was also Austin's sister.
She did not look more than passingly like him. She was perfect Perhaps Kea realized that what the gods had failed to give Tamara, the finest plas surgeons had. But he probably would not have cared. It was a measure of Kea's intoxication with other things that it took some time before he became aware of her.
His brain-drunk had begun as soon as the ship had lifted. A Mars trip was still a rich man's pleasure, costing, in real credits, about what a first cabin on an Earth ocean liner would have cost during the days of the Cunards. The suite he shared with Austin, and one of the family factotums burdened with reports, was one of the largest on the transport. It measured four meters wide by seven meters long. Austin told Kea that this was always the worst part of the passage—he felt trapped.
Kea never noticed. For one thing, the suite was not much larger than the cramped apartment he and Leong Suk had shared. And for another, the suite had a "port"—actually a vid screen linked to through-hull pickups mounted at various places around the transport. Mars grew in the forward pickup. As the transport closed on the wargod's world, Kea could pick out details. Valles Marineris. Tharsis. Olympus Mons. All spectacular—but what most riveted Kea's attention were the works of man. Not just the haze of Mars's new atmosphere, or the oceans and lakes, or the twinkled lights of the new cities, but the offplanet marvels, some of which had been allowed to remain, as reminders and memorials. A space station. The First Base on Deimos. One of the great mirrors, in a geosynchronous orbit over the north pole, that had helped melt Mars's ice caps.
That, he realized, wasn't a deliberate monument. It was the centerpiece of a junk heap. He cozened his way to the bridge, learned how to use the pickup's controls, and scanned the orbit-ing scrap, for reasons he was never sure of. There were dead deep-space ships he recognized from books, museums, or models he'd never been able to afford as a boy. A longliner that had never been completed or launched. A space station, peeled and shattered—Kea remembered reading about that disaster of a hundred years earlier.
And, to one side, by itself, a tiny ship. Another one of the starships. The second one he'd seen. He wondered why he seemed to be the only one who saw them as a mingle of triumph and defeat. Promise and tragedy. For want of a nail. Hell, for want of a goddamned energy source...
Kea went back to the "suite" and prepared for landing. Bargeta senior, Austin's father, was waiting for them. He was frightening. Kea wondered if he would have felt the same about the older man if he didn't know how much power he wielded. He decided yes, he would. It was Bargeta's face. Hard, measuring eyes. The thin lips of a martinet. And yet the jowls of a sybarite and the body of someone kept in shape only by highly paid trainers, not from physical labor. It was, Kea realized, the same face Austin would wear, if he was chosen to replace Bargeta, in forty years or so.
Mr. Bargeta was very friendly to Kea. He was grateful to the man who'd helped his boy out of that imbecilic school slump he'd fallen into. In his letters, Austin had mentioned Richards frequently, he said. Kea knew this to be a lie—Austin never communicated with his family except to plea, directly and briefly, for an advance on next period's allowance. The older man said that before Kea returned to Earth, they would have to talk. About the future. Kea's future.
Kea felt as if he were in the middle of a twentieth-century mafia vid and about to be made a member of a crime family. Perhaps, he thought, that wasn't just a piece of romantic foolishness. He put the thought aside.
There were ten or fifteen Bargetas—including cousins and relatives-by-marriage—resident in the compound. And the family retainers. He asked—and was told that thirty men or women were required for each "guest." More, for "special occasions." Kea was reminded that, truly, the very rich were not as common folk.
The Bargeta compound was only a hundred meters from the near-vertical cliff that led down to the sea that had been the Ophir Chasm. The compound had originally been one of the earliest bubbles; it had been acquired by the Bargetas and truly turned into a pleasure dome, even after the no-longer-needed plas was stripped away. There were main buildings and outcabins. Halls for drinking or playing tennis—even Kea became fascinated with what a ball could do in a low-g world. Lawns. Heated pools. A cabana had been recently built on the cliff-edge. From it, a round clear elevator shaft, with McLean plates, dropped down to a floating dock and the effervescent ocean.
That was where Tamara swam into his consciousness. Literally. He was perplexing over the sails and rigging of a trimaran tied up to the dock. Kea had done some sailing on Earth, but only on a monohull. He was trying to figure out, if he tacked sharply, whether the boat would spin out, a wing would shatter and he'd be trying to navigate a catamaran, or if the craft would just go into irons, when Tamara sealed out of the ocean onto the deck.
At first he thought she wasn't wearing anything—and then realized the color of the small one-piece suit was exactly matched to her deeply tanned skin. He wondered—after he'd begun recovering from the basic arrival, why she wasn't shivering. He himself was wearing a one-piece shorty wetsuit against the chilly breeze and cold water. Then he noticed the tiny heatpak in the suit, tucked at the base of her spine. Tamara padded forward, without saying anything. She eyed Kea intently. Kea turned slightly to the side. His suite was tight, and he would rather not embarrass himself.
"You are Austin's Saint George." Her voice was a purr.
"I am. I left my card in my other armor. Dragons rescued, virgins slain, my specialty."
Tamara laughed. "Well, there certainly aren't any dragons on Mars, either. So you can relax." She introduced herself, curled down beside him, shoulder touching his. "I guess the family owes you for helping my brother," she said.
Kea shrugged. "Not by my calcs. The scale's zeroed."
"Perhaps. You'll be staying with us all summer?"
"Right. My return ticket's an open booking. But Austin said we'd best take the... what is it, Copernicus. It's set to lift on... hell, I still haven't figured out the months here... Earthdate in the first week of September." Kea dimly realized he was babbling.
"A long time," she said. "We'll have to make sure you aren't bored. Won't we?"
"I, uh, don't think that—I mean, how can you be bored on Mars?"
‘That is not," Tamara announced conclusively, "the sort of boredom I was talking about." She ran her fingernail down Kea's arm, and it seared like a branding iron. Then she was standing. "You know," she said, "moonrise is special on Mars. The best place to see it is from the cabana. It's away from the compound so there's no lightspill."