Elizabeth Moon - Hunting Party

Petris chuckled. “I know that tone. All right, then—I think all of us will have the same problems. Those who don’t think so are welcome to go back, but as for me . . . no. D’you think your Lady Cecelia will hire more than one of us, and will we have to bow as she sweeps by?”

“Are you saying yes?”

“No . . . I’m saying yes, ma’am . . . since I believe that’s the correct civilian usage.” The end of that was smothered in a hug, out of which he said finally, “I gather the restriction on fraternization doesn’t apply either?”

“No,” Heris said firmly. “Not off the bridge.” Her thoughts raced, crashing into each other like fox hunters of two hunts in collision. What came out, at last, was the professional ship’s officer. “I’ve got to check in with Sirkin—the standing watch—and let her know there’s a sealed weapons cargo coming up to the ship. It’s a good thing we had a complete refitting at Takomin Roads. Did you know the sulfur cycle was off by two sigs?”

He released her with a roar of laughter. “Dear heart—Heris—Captain—your owner had better pull up her bloomers or whatever they call them on aristocrats. Weapons? Does she know?”

“Of course she knows; I used her credit line.” That had been—how long ago? And would Cecelia still authorize those weapons? Better get them aboard before she changed her mind. Somewhere the smugglers that had put that contraband aboard had to be wondering what had happened to it. The rich were no safer, if they didn’t bother to defend themselves, than someone on the docks. In the depths of her mind, the final door to her past shut, and she faced the future as a civilian without the old pain. It would return, she knew, as old pains always did, in the dark hours everyone faced . . . but the worst was over.

Discretion must be served. Two by two, the former prey, Heris’s former crew members, left for the mainland hospital, where (Heris was assured) Bunny’s excellent medical staff would check them out, and where they would live in privacy and luxury until they decided what they wanted to do. She had spoken to each one, but they were too dazed to talk much. She understood; she felt that way herself. Too many emotions, too much turmoil. Finally, with the lodge empty, it was her turn. She and Cecelia and Petris had a luxurious flitter, with Michaels himself at the controls, for the flight back. No more clouds. . . . The wrinkled ocean lay blank and blue under a clear sky until they reached the mainland. Heris stared at it until she felt the pattern was imprinted forever on her retinas. She wondered why Petris was traveling with them, then wondered why she wondered. And why couldn’t they talk? After that first night, she had not expected the awkwardness of the days and nights since, when they could cling together . . . but not complete a sentence.

The flitter delivered them to the wide courtyard before the Main House rather than the flitter hangars. Here it was cold, with low clouds racing across the sky before a sharp wind. Heris sealed the jacket she had not needed on the island and shivered. She was glad she wouldn’t have to walk up the hill from the other end of the village. Inside, Petris looked up the great staircase that first time with an odd expression that mingled delight and apprehension.

“This is exactly how I thought a great lord’s house would look, and I don’t trust it,” he said finally. “It’s too perfectly what it is, like an entertainment-cube version of a fleet cruiser.”

“It’s intimidating,” said Heris. Now she could admit that. “I couldn’t believe anyone actually lived in it. But they do.” She wondered where the servants were; usually two or three at least were in the hall at this hour. But the one who had opened the door had vanished, leaving it to Cecelia to lead the way upstairs.

Petris, she found, had the room next to hers, where she remembered someone else having been, but she did not raise her brows to Cecelia, who already looked entirely too smug. How had Cecelia known that?

“Don’t forget,” Cecelia said, “that Petris will need to check in with Neil. I’ll let him know you’re coming, shall I?”

Heris looked at Petris. He had not had the benefit of Cecelia’s riding simulator. But he grinned. “I can hardly wait to see Heris on horseback, chasing a fox,” he said. “Although I’m not looking forward to those early starts.”

“Nonetheless. And of course I needn’t warn either of you about discussing all this—”

“Not at all.” Petris raised and lowered his brows at her, a clear dismissal.

“Dinner at eight,” Cecelia said. She strode off down the corridor.

“Your employer—” Petris began.

“Our employer,” Heris said. “Unless you change your mind.”

“I never change my mind,” Petris said. “Come in here—” He led her into his room, a twin of her own. “I don’t believe this, either!” He was staring at the furniture, the gleaming expanse of the bathroom and its glittering toys. He walked around the room, opening and closing the doors of wardrobes, looking into drawers in tall polished chests. Heris could see the racks of clothes, and wondered. “I’m sure these all fit—Lady Cecelia would have seen to it. I always knew there was a good reason to leave the onion farm.” Then he looked into the bathroom again. “Plenty of room, and warm towels. Shall I scrub your back, my love, or will you scrub mine?”

Ronnie was sure they were all making too much fuss about his condition. George had been shot; George might die. He still had that nagging headache, and a collection of bruises and scrapes, but after a night in the hospital he was ready to go back to hunting. Or at least, back to living in the far more comfortable quarters he had enjoyed before.

“Time enough,” the nurse said. “You’re not leaving until the doctor agrees, and your scans aren’t normal yet.” It wasn’t the same nurse as before, he thought, and wondered how often their shifts changed.

“Nothing’s broken,” Ronnie said. “You let that fellow in the other bed leave just twenty-four hours after a broken leg—”

“Bones aren’t brains,” the nurse said. Ronnie closed his eyes, feigning sleep, and was surprised to find dark outside his windows when he opened them again. The next morning (which morning?) he woke without a trace of the headache, and the awareness that he had not been clearheaded before.

“And you’re not yet,” the doctor said, when she arrived to talk to him before he left. “You think you are, but it’s like climbing out of a hole: it’s lighter where you are, but you’re still in shadow. I know this will disappoint you, but I’ve already notified Lord Thornbuckle’s head groom: you are not to ride for at least ten days, and you’ll have to be reevaluated then.”

“But I didn’t—” Ronnie began, but the doctor smiled and patted his knee as if he were a child. Considering her white hair and wrinkles, she probably thought of him that way. I didn’t want to ride, he said silently. And now I don’t have to . “What about George?” he asked. They had told him nothing so far except soothing murmurs. He braced himself to hear that George had died.

“ That young man,” the doctor said. “Do I understand that everyone calls him the odious George?”

“Yes,” Ronnie said.

“I can see why,” she said. “He can have visitors—in fact, he has visitors all day, now. So if you want to know, just take the lift up one, and it’s the third door on the left. He’s still on the surgical floor, though really—” She shook her head without finishing that and left. Ronnie pulled on his clothes, hardly wondering where they’d come from, and went to see George.