Sharon Lee - Adventures in the Liaden Universe

“Boss Conrad and his kin, they learned round dancin’ because where they come from it’s what polite people learn to dance. Me, I learned in a piloting seminar because we was bored and needed some legal way to work it off. That being the case, the cues are a little different.

“So, what we’re gonna do is show you a round dance like Boss Conrad learned it, and then a cue dance like I did.”

“Where’d Miri learn how?” somebody—Pat Rin didn’t recognize the voice—called from the back.

“From the Boss’ brother,” Miri sang back. “You?”

The drummer hit the block twice and struck the cymbal hard, to general laughter.

“Any more questions?” Cheever called, and continued without taking a breath. “Fine. We’re ready whenever the band gets around to it.”

Immediately, the omnichora launched six bright notes, like skyrockets, toward the hidden winter sky, the fiddle player spun clear around and enthusiastically put her bow across the strings, the guitarist plucked out a quick pattern of sound and the drummer beat the rim, counting out three, six, twelve.

The music shifted, twisted, slowed...

“Bow to your partner,” Cheever directed, against the mannerly rising of “Tiordia’s Stroll.”

Pat Rin received Nova’s bow, bowing to her in turn. At Cheever’s instruction, they joined hands, crossed, turned, and slid two steps forward, two steps right, three steps backward, three left, crossed, turned, and changed partners. Pat Rin’s left hand slipped out of Nova’s as his right hand met Priscilla’s. He and his new partner stepped together, then apart, changed sides and danced four steps left and five steps back, six steps forward, four steps right...

Relaxed and smiling, Pat Rin performed his part in the dance with ease, warmed and oddly comforted by the familiar movements. He did, in that portion of his mind neither attentive to nor lulled by the dance, own himself astonished to find Cheever McFarland so able a dance master. Truly, he thought, as he and Priscilla crossed and turned; there is no end to the good pilot’s talents....

The dance continued its pleasant course, until each dancer had partnered with every other dancer in the set. Perfectly on-cue, he left Luken’s side, his hand finding Nova’s precisely on the beat. They turned, crossed, and dropped hands to the caller’s commands, and bowed, holding it for twelve beats, and straightening just as the last note from the ‘chora trembled into silence.

The room was entirely quiet as they straightened, and in that moment, Pat Rin saw his mother, attended now by no one less than Portmaster Liu. Her face was calm, perhaps even relaxed, as if the dance had soothed her as well. She inclined her head slightly in his direction, then turned to address the Portmaster.

A wholly unexceptional procedure, Pat Rin thought, and not at all too much effort to expend for the pleasure of one’s host. He was slightly warm, but nothing that another glass of cider couldn’t put—

“All right,” Cheever McFarland was saying, his big voice shattering the quiet. “That’s what a round dance looks in Boss Conrad’s old turf. Now we’re gonna show you how I learned it. First thing you’ll notice is different, is the cues. Pilots, they can’t leave anything alone if there’s a way to maybe tweak it. Next thing you’ll notice is there’s some extra bits added in, ‘cause pilots tend toward boredom and makin’ trouble if they don’t have six things to do at the same time.”

Pat Rin frowned and turned to cock an eyebrow at Nova, who replied with a bland glance that would have done justice to his mother.

“Last thing,” Cheever was saying, “is that pilots? They’re competitive. So this dance, it’s a kind of a contest, too.”

Contest? thought Pat Rin, feeling his stomach tighten. He looked across the circle for Natesa, but she was turned away, watching something in the room beyond.

“Just as soon as the band’s ready,” Cheever said.

The drummer snapped out a twelve-count, then the guitar came in, followed by the fiddle, the omnichora singing softly in support. The tune was somewhat brisker than “Tiordia’s Stroll”—and completely unfamiliar.

“Acknowledge your co-pilot,” Cheever instructed, and Pat Rin turned to exchange bows with Nova, who smiled at him.

“Comp—” he began, but—

“Check your board,” Cheever called, which Pat Rin’s feet somehow knew to be a glide and change sides. “Bring up the screens!”

Warned by the set of Nova’s hip, Pat Rin managed to spin as instructed, though raggedly.

“Strap in,” Cheever instructed. Nova’s hand moved, Pat Rin caught it in his; they turned, separated—

“Lift!”—each danced six steps to their right—”Establish orbit!”—a half turn, so Pat Rin was looking over Nova’s shoulder at the starry rug that had covered the floor in Luken’s small private parlor in their quarters above the warehouse—

“Outer ring adjust,” Cheever said. Pat Rin kept his place while Nova slid three steps to left. His view of the rug was now unimpeded.

“Lay in coords!” Cheever called.

Lay in —

But Cheever was giving the coordinates. Rapidly. Pat Rin focused on the rug—on the map —found the first coord, slid forward two steps, located the second, slipped to the left three steps, the third—the third? There!—and forward again, four steps.

“Roll starboard!” came the instruction, and Pat Rin spun to the right with the rest, noting in a sort of mental gasp that the music was moving quicker now, that the ‘chora’s voice was louder, and the fiddle’s entirely gone.

“Lay in coords!”

This time, it wasn’t a complete shock; Pat Rin had time to face the map—the less familiar rug that had graced the schoolroom floor at Trealla Fantrol—and focus before Cheever intoned the first coord, then another, and another—a set of six full coordinates this time, and Pat Rin slipped, spun, circled, and lunged as directed, finishing the sequence damp and limp, but oddly triumphant. He hadn’t missed a step!

Luken, however, had not had the same good fortune. Pat Rin spied him walking away from the circle, Andy Mack leaving the crowd at the edge of the rug to meet him—then Cheever called them to roll once more and he was facing the map from Jelaza Kazone.

The music was much too quick now, Pat Rin thought, tucking up his lace, and shaking his hair out of his eyes. More a jig than a round dance, which the ‘chora gave shape in a continuing twisty flow of brilliantine notes.

Val Con must be ready to drop, he thought—and there was another thought, linked to that—but it was lost in the need to accept the coordinates, and he plotted his course with his feet and his hips, barely registering when Miri dropped out at the eighth coord—and Priscilla, at the twelfth.

The next round came and as he glimpsed the nearest celestial rug, he all but felt the controls beneath his hands; in truth he missed the cabin of Fortune’s Reward, as he missed the thrust against his back, and the comfort of sitting First Board. The rug was before him, and another as he danced, and the calculations went thus and so and turn and step, and by rights now there should be Jump glare and stars on the screens ahead, and stars behind, with stars underfoot, and a planet to find.

But the dance—

“Orient!” Cheever called, and the four remaining dancers came together in the center, joined hands, ran— too fast! Pat Rin thought, with a sudden spike of panic—’round, three times, six—

“Establish orbit!”

As one, they dropped hands, each spinning away from every, two-four-six revolutions, and came to rest, facing—the entranced spectators.