Dragon Song
Dock A
Anthora had retired, leaving him to Ren Zel’s care in resolving the matter of the things they had brought for him.
“We were lent a pair of work jitneys, but they are presently at the unloading docks. Allow me to bring one, next shift, Cousin. There’s no need for you to exert yourself with unloading and carrying.”
Ren Zel smiled.
“Certainly, we have nothing perishable here. I feel, however, that Anthora would wish your own box to find you at once—and the wardrobe has wheels. How if you carry your box, and I pull the closet? That will show a good faith effort on the part of both.”
“There are lifts, but the halls are long,” Jen Sin said.
“A good walk is exactly what I’m wanting after so long at the board.”
Ren Zel stepped into the hold, loosed some netting, and turned, offering Jen Sin a box, closed with tape, his name written clearly on the top.
He cradled it in his arms, and stepped away to allow Ren Zel room to bring the closet out, and seal the hold.
“I feel that I must warn you,” Ren Zel said, as they got underway, “that there are several sets of formal clothing included in what we brought.” He turned his head, and gave Jen Sin a smile. “Anthora insisted.”
“Does she expect that I will be giving many balls?” Jen Sin asked before he could stop himself.
Ren Zel’s smile grew wider.
“In fact, she thinks that the light keeper might at some point be called upon to treat with representatives of Liaden interests, who will more likely be courteous to a formal coat than honest working leathers.”
Jen Sin sighed.
“I suppose there hasn’t been time enough to breed that out,” he said.
“Sadly not.”
They walked a few paces in silence, the wheels of the closet rattling on the decking.
“I wonder, Cousin—are you also a Healer?”
“I am not,” Ren Zel said with perfect good humor. “I have a very erratic sort of Far Sight, but that seems to be all, now that my primary gift has left me.”
Jen Sin glanced to him. “Left you?” he repeated. “I wasn’t aware that such things happened. Forgive me if I am inept—were you wounded?”
“Unto death, which I say in all seriousness. It would appear that I had been born for a particular purpose, and having accomplished it, had no more need to bear the burden.”
Well, that was a gift to a Scout-trained mind. Half a dozen questions spawned from two sentences. One scarcely knew which to ask first.
“I am the first to own that it sounds all too much like a romance,” Ren Zel went on. “Were it not for the delm’s decision to send me to the scene of my misdeeds, I shouldn’t believe it myself.” He paused, and gave Jen Sin a wry look.
And there, Jen Sin thought, was his first question.
“When were you at Tinsori Light?”
“This is my first time on-station. However, it fell to me to seal the breach through which the Light cycled.”
Jen Sin stopped. Ren Zel stopped, and turned to face him.
“How?” A short question, but telling. If his cousin Ren Zel was mad, it would be best to know it.
“There we reach a difficulty. I cannot tell you, my memory of the event having departed with my gift, and perhaps with my…first…life. I must depend on the assurances of my lifemate, the delm, and the Tree. Also, there is math. Have you seen the math, Cousin Jen Sin?”
“Which particular math?”
“Oh, given by the Uncle, no less! We have proof that space was canceled and remade. Which, if that is even remotely so, I am relieved that I have no memory of how the thing was done, and hope with all my heart that I am no longer able to do—whatever was done.”
“I have not,” Jen Sin said slowly, “seen that math. Might you share it with me?”
“I will, but be aware that it is everything that will offend a pilot. Even Val Con—”
He stopped abruptly, his expression arrested.
“Come, we should get these settled,” he murmured, adjusting his grip on the closet’s bar. He began to walk again, accompanied by the rattling of wheels.
Jen Sin stirred, moving after him, wondering what it was that even Val Con— But there was the lift, and he stretched his legs somewhat, to see it opened so that Ren Zel could tow the closet directly inside.
“It occurs to me,” Ren Zel said softly, as the lift began its ascent, “that the delm sent us not only to assist, but also to learn. I— My gift was nothing soft nor pure. As much good as I saw done, I also did ill. It has been my position that I am glad that I cannot remember what I had done, and that my memories of those other actions are fading.”
He took a breath. The lift stopped, the door opened and they exited.
“Down here,” Jen Sin murmured, moving to the right, Ren Zel at his side.
“In short, I wonder if it wasn’t in Val Con’s mind that you, having been here during the event, would be able to…tell me what happened. When the space at this location was…remade.”
Jen Sin hesitated, as they turned into the hall where his quarters were located.
“The space at Tinsori was…strange,” he said, slowly. “I had thought it an effect of the Light—something it created of itself, I mean to say. When it died, space…regularized. Our location became fixed, and we could be discovered. We no longer”—lay down to die until wanted again—“vanished off the instruments.”
They reached his door. He opened and stood aside so that Ren Zel might pull the closet inside. Following, he placed the box on the table, and turned to the other man.
“I may have more to say after I have looked at the Uncle’s math, as offensive as it may be,” he said. “In the meanwhile, Cousin, I can tell you that—if you assisted in any way, or if you alone slew Tinsori Light-that-was—you did only well. You harmed no innocent, and brought…much into Balance with the universe. I—later. Later, I will tell you how it was. For here and now, accept my thanks, whatever your part was.”
Ren Zel smiled, reached out and gripped his forearm.
“Thank you, Cousin. You ease my mind.”
“Good,” Jen Sin said. “Now let me return you to your ship.”
“I will be well enough,” Ren Zel said. “Take your rest.”
Jen Sin hesitated. It would be ill-done, to call Ren Zel’s competence into question. Surely, he had been on strange ports, and surely he had survived them.
But the fact remained that no port had ever been quite so strange as Tinsori Light.
“Strange things still do happen here,” he said slowly. “It would ease me, to see you safe to your docking.”
Ren Zel considered him, brown eyes narrowed.
“The equation is out of balance,” he said after a moment. “If you see me to my ship, who will see you to your quarters? Shall we stroll back and forth all night?”
“I will be well enough,” Jen Sin said.
Ren Zel laughed.
“And so the circle is complete!”
He touched Jen Sin lightly on the shoulder.
“These strange things—do they happen often in the halls we just traveled?”
Jen Sin sighed.
“Those—not so often, no.”
“I will therefore engage to go exactly as we came. And I will be well enough, Cousin. Rest now.”
Another smile, piercingly sweet, and Jen Sin was alone, staring at a closet that took up half his floor space, and a box with his name written on it.
Ren Zel walked alert down the quiet hall, as would any pilot on a strange port. So, there had been more than one reason for the delm to send Korval’s child Ren Zel to Tinsori Light. Well, of course, there had. Delms did not play on one board only, and Korval least of all.
Still, it was a comfort to know that he had, in the main, acted for…Balance in the universe.
Something moved in his peripheral vision—to the left and up. He turned his head, but saw nothing save shadows.
Ahead of him, the door to the lift slid open and a very large person emerged, face and form more shadow than solid with the lift’s lights at their back.
Ren Zel did not falter, nor did he check his weapon, though he took note of its weight on his belt.
The large shape, however, paused, and turned back to the lift, punching the button to hold it open, the wash of light making her face recognizable.
Ren Zel smiled.
“Hazenthull, well met.”
“Pilot,” she said gravely. “Station thought you might wish an escort to your ship.”
“That was thoughtful of Station, and indeed, I am glad of your company. My cousin Jen Sin was only just telling me that strange things happen here, still.”
“They do, yes.” She allowed him to step into the lift before coming aboard herself and releasing the lock. “Though we’ve been cutting back.”
He looked up into her face, seeing a glimmer of mischief, which was almost as strange as anything else Tinsori Light might provide.
“I’m pleased to hear it. Now, tell me all your news.”