Sharon Lee - Adventures in the Liaden Universe

Audrey laughed. “Wish I could say it was all my idea! Miri was the one put the seed in my head, if you want the truth. Said she had too much energy and no place to spend it, which I’ll say between the three of us ain’t the usual complaint of new-birthed mothers.”

“Miri is an example to us all,” Pat Rin murmured, which pleasantry Audrey greeted with another laugh.

“Ain’t she just—and your brother’s another one! When I invite a man to a dance and I don’t expect him to bring his keyboard and set up with the band. That’s just what he’s done, though—take a look!” She pointed down the room, where was collected a fiddle, a guitar, a drum set, a portable omnichora — and several musicians wearing what passed for stage finery on Surebleak, clustered about a slender man in a ruffled white shirt and formal slacks that would have been unexceptional at any evening gather in Solcintra.

It had been ...disconcerting... to find that Audrey, with the rest of Pat Rin’s acquaintance on Surebleak, assumed that Val Con, his cousin and his Delm, was in fact his younger brother, brought in to care for the transplanted family business while the Boss undertook the important task of putting the streets in order.

As the misapprehension only amused Miri, and Val Con’s sole comment on the matter was a slightly elevated eyebrow, Pat Rin gave over attempting to explain their actual relationship and resigned himself to having at his advanced age acquired a sibling.

“For a time, he and Miri sang for their suppers,” he said now to Audrey. “Perhaps he misses the work.”

“Could be,” she answered, as the sound of footsteps and voices grew louder in the hall behind them. She sent a look over his shoulder, extended a hand and patted his sleeve lightly.

“The two of you go on in and circulate. Dancing ought to be starting up soon.”

Thus dismissed, Pat Rin followed Natesa deeper into the parlor.

Ms. Audrey’s big parlor, already crowded, grew more so. Deep in a discussion with Etienne Borden and Andy Mack, which involved freestanding solar batteries, and the benefits of light level meters over mechanical timers, Pat Rin still registered an abrupt lowering of the ambient noise and looked around, thinking that the promised music was at last about to begin. But no.

It was his mother entering the room, on the arm of no one less than Scout Commander ter’Meulen, dressed for the occasion in High House best, his face oh-so-politely bland, and his mustache positively noncommittal.

Pat Rin, who had all his life known Scout ter’Meulen, could only wonder at the reasons behind such a display—not to mention the why and wherefore of Lady Kareen accepting his arm for anything at all. They were neither one a friend of the other, though it had always seemed to Pat Rin that the greater amusement was on Clonak’s side and the greater dislike on his mother’s. Surely—

Audrey bustled forward to welcome these newest arrivals, her high, sweet voice easily rising above the other conversations in the room.

“I knew you’d turn the trick, Mister Clonak!” she said gaily, patting him kindly on the shoulder. This was apparently a dismissal, as Clonak adroitly disengaged himself from the lady’s arm, took two steps into the parlor and was lost in the general crush.

Audrey turned to face Kareen squarely, and Pat Rin’s stomach tightened, as he contemplated disaster. Even had he not counted Audrey a friend, he thought, it was surely no more than his duty to stand between her and Lady Kareen yos’Phelium, in the same way that it was his duty as Boss to stand between the residents of his streets and mayhem.

He murmured something quick and doubtless unintelligible to the Colonel and the assistant portmaster, and slipped through the press of bodies, moving as quickly as he was able.

“Lady Kareen,” Audrey said clearly. “Be welcome in my house.”

It was the proper sentiment, properly expressed, thought Pat Rin, working his way forward. Though what—and from whom—his mother might exact as Balance for being made welcome at a whorehouse—

“Well met, cousin!” Val Con murmured, astonishingly slipping his arm through Pat Rin’s. “Where to in such a rush?”

“If you would not see a murder done—or worse—” Pat Rin hissed into the frigid silence that followed Audrey’s greeting—”let me tend to this!”

“Nay I think you wrong both our host and your lady mother,” Val Con said tranquilly, his grip on Pat Rin’s arm tightening. “Besides, the hand is dealt.”

“You know what my mother is capable—”

“Peace,” his cousin interrupted. “My aunt is about to play her first card.”

“Who speaks?” Lady Kareen’s Terran was heavily accented, but perfectly intelligible; her tone as frigid as the wind in high winter.

It was of course quite mad to even consider that he might extricate himself from the brotherly embrace of one who was both a pilot and a Scout. Nonetheless, Pat Rin took a careful breath to camouflage his shift of weight—and felt warm fingers around his unencumbered hand. He looked down, equally dismayed and unsurprised to see Miri grinning up at him, grey eyes glinting.

“Take it easy, Boss,” she whispered. “Audrey’s good for this.”

He began to answer, then closed his mouth tightly. The fact that this had been planned—that Audrey had been coached on form and manner...

“That’s right,” their host was saying equitably to his mother. “You won’t know that. I’m Audrey Breckstone, boss of this house. I’m happy to see you.”

Not for nothing did Lady Kareen stand foremost among the scholars of the Liaden Code of Proper Conduct. She not only knew her Code, but she practiced it, meticulously Rather too meticulously, as some might think. But there was perhaps, Pat Rin thought now, an advantage—to Audrey, to the house, and to Kareen herself—in an extremely nice reading of Code in regard to this particular circumstance.

It was not for a mere son to say what weights and measures were called into consideration as his mother stood there, head tipped politely to one side, face smooth and emotionless, but surely the unworthy scholar who had studied Code at her feet might make certain shrewd and informed guesses.

Whether Audrey possessed the native genius to have added that guileless, “I’m happy to see you,” to her introduction, or whether she had been coached in what she was to say mattered not at all. That she had uttered the phrase in apparent sincerity placed her melant’i somewhat in regard to the melant’i of Kareen yos’Phelium. Here was, in fact, a delm—at most—or a head of Line—at least—so secure in her own worth and the worth of her house that she not only welcomed, but was happy to receive, the burden of a visit from a high stickler who might ruin her and hers with a word.

Or, to phrase the matter in the parlance of Sunbleak, Audrey had in essence said to Kareen: I see that you’re armed, and I’m your equal.

“I am pleased to accept the greeting of the house,” Lady Kareen stated, and bowed—Expert to Expert—which allowed a certain limited equality between herself and her host, and placed a finer measuring into the future, after more data had been gathered and weighed.

To her credit—or that of her tutor—Audrey did not attempt to answer the bow. Instead, she smiled, and offered her arm.

“There’s going to be music and dancing for the youngers in just a bit, now,” she said. “But I’m betting that a woman of good sense would like to have a glass of wine in her hand.”

There was a slight hesitation as Kareen performed the mental gymnastics necessary to untangle this, then she stepped forward and placed her hand lightly on Audrey’s sleeve.