If it was a long time since he had seen that crest, it was equally long since he had been waited on by servants, electronic or otherwise, and Pernatte’s estate had one of the most sophisticated household systems he had had the pleasure of experiencing. Even so, after all this time offending for himself, it made him uncomfortable, at first; but he reminded himself that this was, after all, only a series of servomechs, sophisticated programming. The highest and lowest classes on Kharemough were not even permitted to speak to one another without a formal interpreter; the highborns got around the servant problem by building their own. These were not his fellow human beings treating him as if he were a god—or staring with any interest whatsoever at his bloodshot eyes and unsightly stubble of beard, at the state of his disheveled hair and rumpled worker’s coveralls.
He unsealed his coveralls with one hand, scratching his side, wrinkling his nose. He began to move more eagerly toward the bath that was waiting for him in the next room, which he knew would be exactly the temperature and consistency he wanted. The scent of steaming herbs would clear out his head, the massage jets would know just where and how to touch his aching-muscled, travel-weary body to leave him relaxed and energized….
Across the room, the silverwood doors opened suddenly, briefly, letting in a rush of bright noise.
Gundhalinu turned, startled. Someone had closed the doors again, with unseemly haste. And he was no longer alone. The intruder was standing across the room, staring back at him. The glowspot pasted to the palm of her uplifted hand abruptly illuminated the space that had grown almost dark around him without his really noticing it—illuminated the face of the stranger who now shared it with him.
“Oh—” She stared back at him, a momentary reaction of startled dismay fading as she took in the details of his appearance. Her gaze was level and almost painfully open, but there was no recognition in it. He did not know who she was, either. Her features were more striking than classical, but he saw strength and humor there, and intelligence, and unexpected beauty. He broke the gaze of her golden-brown eyes, vvhich seemed to find him so transparent; took in the headdress of pearls that framed her face in luminous strands shifting gently with her motion. She wore a long gown of night-black velvet, its high neckline a collar of pearls, the pearls flowing into the blackness like stars expanding though space until they were lost in night.
“You aren’t supposed to be here,” she said, with such calm conviction that for a moment he found himself wondering if it was true.
“Why not?” he asked, disconcerted and amused. He was glad that she had not caught him handling the very expensive and very old piece of sculpture he had been admiring earlier; she would have had him feeling like a thief.
“Because I’m not, either.” She smiled suddenly, her eyes shining with conspiratorial excitement. “I need a place to be unobtrusive, until enough guests arrive so that I can lose myself among them. You won’t give me away, will you—?” It almost wasn’t a question; as if she had made some judgment about him on sight.
“Should I?” he asked, uncertainly. He bent his head, inviting her with the gesture to explain.
“I’m quite harmless,” she answered, her smile filling with gentle irony. “Truly. I’m only here because I wanted so badly to meet the famous hero Commander Gundhalinu.”
Gundhalinu stopped the sudden laugh of disbelief that almost got away from him, keeping his expression neutral. If she was playing a game, it wasn’t with him; he was sure that she did not recognize him. “Well,” he said, mildly, almost surprised at himself, “you’ll have some time to kill until then. Would you like a drink?” He gestured at the clean-lined cabinet beside him; he had been informed that it contained a fully stocked bar.
“Will you join me?” Her smile made him smile with a sense of shared truancy. He nodded. “Something innocuous please,” she said. “My senses are quite overstimulated as it is.”
Gundhalinu touched the spot on the seemingly solid surface of the tabletop that had been indicated to him earlier. The smooth grain of the wood vanished under his touch as the bar obediently listed its contents for his consideration. “Do you prefer to drink, inhale, or absorb?” The Pernattes had an impressive assortment of mind-altering substances available, all of them perfectly legal.
“To drink, I think.” There was laughter in her voice as she crossed the room toward him. “The act is not too active that way, and not too passive.”
“Good point.” He glanced up at her. “They have the water of life—?”
He saw her face register the same play of emotions that had filled his mind: Not the real thing… but even the imitation was rare enough. “Oh, yes,” she murmured. “Yes.”
He spoke an order, looking at her where she stood leaning casually against the cabinet beside him. She smelled of something exotic and heady; he realized that he probably stank of sweat. But she smiled that strangely appealing smile at him, meeting his gaze with unnerving directness. He glanced down, lifting his hand to meet her proffered one in a polite greeting. “How do you do?”
She touched his palm almost playfully with her own glowlit hand. Light and shadows danced as the glowspot flickered. But as he would have let his hand drop she took it in both of hers, keeping it there as she turned it over; illuminating it, running her fingers unselfconsciously across his palm, like a blind woman trying to see. The touch against the sensitive skin made him shiver. “You have calluses. Hands were made to do things. I like real hands.” She turned his hand over, studying its shape, the length and form of his fingers. “You have beautiful hands.”
He took his hand from hers as the drinks appeared, surprised and slightly embarrassed, relieved to have an excuse to free himself. He offered her a goblet grown of synthetic sapphire, with the heavy silver liquid lying restlessly in its convolutions. She took it as he lifted his own in acknowledgment.
“To adventures,” she said, with a sudden, glinting grin. The light in her palm shone through the goblet in her hand, illuminating it like some uncanny magic.
“No,” he said softly, and shook his head. “Adventures are only tragedies that didn’t happen.”
She glanced down, considering. “Then to life—” she said, looking at him again.
He nodded. “To life.” He sipped the silver liquid they called the water of life, feeling it fill his head with the bittersweet taste of memories. The last time he had drunk it he had been hardly more than a boy, still living in his father’s house, on the ancestral estates. … He remembered his home, the beauty and peace of the land, his father’s voice. He took another sip, and remembered the future—remembering Tiamat, the source of the genuine water of life, and suddenly, vividly, Moon, her face as pale as the endless fields of snow, her body warm with life against his own. … He took another sip, and forced his mind back into the present, forced his eyes to register the astonished pleasure on the face of the elegant stranger standing beside him now.
She sighed. “Oh, this is well-named.”
He smiled, and nodded again. They shared a space of silence, savoring the guilty pleasure of each other’s company. At last, moved by his own curiosity, he asked, “You truly weren’t invited to this party?” He could see nothing about her that would make her an unwelcome guest. He thought, rather surprised at himself, that if anyone consulted him right now, he would put her high on the list of people he would like to share the evening with. He blinked, forcing his eyes away from her face.