“NeuKass thinks it’s that bad, then?” one of the technicians asked, leaning forward on the starcrate %e was sharing with the mem, and the man nodded before he thought.
“We’re just taking precautions,” he corrected himself, and nodded toward the children.
“Sorry,” the tech said, and leaned back again.
Tatian looked toward the viewport—really more of a strip, a narrow band of armorglass set into the wall of the cargo compartment to let the loaders check the cargo—as the triphibian tilted. They were creeping up the long ramp that led to the port road’s elevated section, and he could see past Warreven’s shoulder into one of the markets. It was busier than he’d expected, the central area actually crowded, and then he saw the four-up parked beneath the mural of the spirits, and the mosstaas milling on the ground beside it. On the wall above them, Madansa poured her bounty from outstretched hands, but Agede and Cousin-Jack stood to either side, offering their blessings as well. Agede, unmistakably, had Warreven’s face, and a herm’s breasts had been sketched, crudely, on the painted chest. Tatian blinked, and saw a group of workers raise a ladder under the mosstaas’ supervision. One of them began to climb, dragging a scrubber and its hose, and then the triphibian lurched forward, cutting off his view.
“How the hell did they do that so quickly?” he said aloud, and Warreven looked at him.
“It’s easy enough to catch an image from the narrowcasts, use it to make a transfer. We used to do it for elections, things like that.”
The Haran technician glanced sideways at 3im, cleared %er throat. “Mir—serray, I mean?”
Warreven tilted 3er head. “Æ?”
“Will you come back?”
Warreven smiled, the same odd smile 3e’d worn the previous night. “Yes. Will you?”
The technician nodded, touching %er lips in automatic reverence, then blushed and looked hastily away. Warreven blinked, 3er smile changing again, becoming more human, and 3e resettled 3imself against the wall of the compartment.
They reached the port without incident, joined the lines of people hauling their baggage from the entrances to the boarding hall. All the gates were open, and the lines stretched back into the main lobby. Tatian glanced at the overhead screens, noting the extra ships—Perseus, converted from freight to passengers by its parent company; Djinni, due in orbit by midnight, diverted from Esperanza; and half a dozen others due in over the next few days—and wondered what Warreven had had to pay to get his berth. He himself would be sleeping in a port cubicle for the next two nights, until NAPD’s Polarity made orbit, but Warreven had managed to get a cabin on the Djinni.
“So—” he began, not knowing how, or whether he wanted, to say good-bye, and a voice called from across the crowd.
“Warreven!”
“Malemayn.” Warreven held out both hands to the approaching figure. “How’s—”
“Hal’s safe,” Malemayn said, almost in the same instant. “In the port hospital—Oddyny was right—and 3e’ll stay there as long as needed.”
Warreven’s unbandaged eye flickered closed, and Tatian heard 3im sigh deeply. “Thank the spirits.”
Malemayn nodded. “I brought what I could,” he said, and set an ordinary-looking carryall on the tiles at Warreven’s feet. “The mosstaas sealed your flat.”
“Tendlathe’s a petty bastard sometimes,” Warreven said.
“And I thought you might enjoy this.” Malemayn held out a quickprint sheet, another image of Warreven as Agede, firelit from the night before. Seeing it over 3er shoulder, Tatian had to repress a shudder, remembering what had followed. “These are all over the city.”
“Thanks.” Warreven took it, folded it carefully and tucked it into a pocket. “Will you be all right?”
Malemayn nodded. “For a while, anyway. There’s going to be hell to pay, Raven, there’s no way out now.”
“I know.” Warreven waved 3er hand, the gesture taking in the off-worlders filling the lobby and the boarding hall. “So do they.”
“You should get in line,” Tatian said. “It’s going to take a while to process everybody, and you’re going to have to pass the IDCA screening.”
Warreven nodded. “I— Thank you. I owe you—not least for being the only reasonable man in Bonemarche, these last few days. I won’t forget.” Ȝe hesitated, and Tatian held out both hands. After everything, it felt foolish to part with a mere clasp of hands. They embraced, cautiously because of Warreven’s bruises, and Tatian was startled again by the wiry strength of the body under his hands. Then Warreven released him, gave him one of 3er sudden smiles, genuinely amused this time, and turned and walked away across the lobby. Malemayn followed 3im, lifting his hand in farewell.
Tatian watched them go, wondering what he’d seen started. It wasn’t over, that much seemed obvious: Warreven’s Agede, the herm Agede, had caught people’s imagination, would become part of that spirit—would, in Warreven’s phrase, Hara’s phrase, open the door. If nothing else came of it, it was a beginning, and Warreven could claim that as a kind of victory, imperfect and uncertain as beginnings always were. And if in the Concord 3e could find the ways to translate the off-world concepts, the five sexes and the process of revolution, then 3e would be the person who remade Hara. Even now, he couldn’t entirely doubt that 3e might do it. One studied people like that at university, discussed motives and tactics and plans; one did not drag them out of riots, or ride with them to the starport, on the way to exile. Except that, this time, he had. Tatian shook himself then. He had done what he could—what he really had no choice but to do—and he had his own consequences to face. But at least he was going back where he belonged. He lifted his heavy carrycase, thinking of Jericho, of Kaysa, of all the sane, ordinary people, and began walking toward the gates that would lead to home.
GLOSSARY I: Concord Worlds
bi: one of the nine sexual preferences generally recognized by Concord culture; denotes a person who prefers to be intimate with persons of exactly the same and one of the two “opposite” genders.
Big Six: the six major pharmaceutical companies that dominate the Concord Worlds’ trade with Hara.
cd, concord dollar: standard monetary unit among the Concord Worlds; circulates in tandem with planetary currencies.
ColCom: Colonial Committee, agency that represents the Concord Worlds’ interests on former colonies.
creole: the official language of the Concord Worlds.
demi: one of the nine sexual preferences generally recognized by Concord culture; denotes a person who prefers to be intimate with persons of exactly the same and one of the two “like” genders.
di: one of the nine sexual preferences generally recognized by Concord culture; denotes a person who prefers to be intimate with persons of either of the two “opposite” genders.
end-of-season: shorthand for surplus harvest not included in existing contracts; also the period between the end of Hara’s biannual gathering cycles and the beginning of the next, not covered by contracts. Coincides with the Haran holiday periods of Midsummer and Midwinter.
fem: human being possessing testes, XY chromosomes, some aspects of female genitalia but not possessing ovaries; %e, %er, %er, %erself.
Fifty: generic term for the most important pharmaceutical companies that do business on Hara; analogous to the Haran use of “pharmaceuticals.”