C. Cherryh - Cyteen

It was riding with Amy that afternoon—herself on the Filly, Amy on the horse they called Bayard—Amy had found that in a story, so the third filly had a name, unlike goats and pigs who were usually just numbers, except a few who were exceptional.

Filly's just the Filly, Ari had said. And the Mare's Daughter they called the Daughter, or Filly Two, and Filly Two was Florian's even if he couldn't own her: no CIT was ever to ride her. But the third was Bayard, and that was Amy Carnath's horse; and the fourth and fifth and sixth belonged to Maddy and Sam and 'Stasi, what time they were not doing little runs into the fields, doing work, delivering items out where trucks would crush the plants and a human walking was too slow.

There was going to be a stable and an arena just for the horses someday, Ari had decided. Space in the safe zones was always at a premium and uncle Denys called it extravagant and refused to allow it.

But she had notions of exporting to Novgorod, animals just to look at and watch for a few years, but someday to sell use of, the way the skill tapes of riding and of handling animals sold as fast as they could turn them out—to people who wanted to know what pigs and goats and horses were like and how they moved, and what riding a horse felt like. Spacers bought those skill tapes, marketed as entertainment Sensatape. Stationers did. People from one end of space to the other knew how to ride, who had never laid eye or hand on a horse.

That more than paid for the stable and the arena, she had argued; and the earth-moving and the widening of Reseune's flat-space: the horses did not need the depth of soil that agriculture did, and the manure meant good ground.

They eat their weight in gold, Denys had objected, with no, no, and no.

Grain is a renewable resource, she had said, nastily. It likes manure.

No, said Denys. We're not undertaking any expansions; we're not making any headlines with any extravagance in this political atmosphere; it's not prudent, Ari.

Someday, she had said, defeated.

Meanwhile the horses were theirs, unique, and did their small amount of work.

While out in the riding pen was the best place in Reseune besides her apartment to go to have a talk without worrying about security; and it had its own benefits, when it came to being casual and getting Amy Carnath to relax and talk about really sensitive things.

Because Amy was not happy lately. Sam had taken up with Maria Cortez-Campbell, who was a nice girl; Stef was back with Yvgenia; and Amy—rode a lot and spent a lot of time studying and tending the export business, which had sort of drawn her into a full sub-manager rating in the whole huge Reseune Exports division and a provisional project supervisor's rating in the Genetics Research division.

Amy was always the brightest. Amy was getting a figure, finally, at seventeen, at least something of a figure. She was getting pretty in a kind of long-boned way, not because she was pretty, but because she was just interesting-looking, and might get more so.

And Amy was too damned smart to be happy, because there just happened to be a shortage of equally smart boys in her generation. Tommy was the only one who came close, and Tommy was Amy's cousin, not interested in the same field, and mostly interested in Maddy Strassen anyway. That pair was getting halfway serious, on both sides.

"How are things?" she asked Amy when they were out and away from everyone, under a tranquil sky. And prepared herself for a long story.

"All right," Amy said, and sighed. That was all.

Not like Amy at all. Usually it was damn Stef Dietrich, and a long list of grievances.

She didn't know this Amy. Ari looked at her across the moving gap between the horses, and said: "It doesn't sound all right."

"Just the same old stuff," Amy said. "Stef. Mama. That's the condensed report."

"You'll be legal this month. You can do anything you damn please. And you've got a slot in my wing, I always told you that."

"I can't do any damn thing," Amy said. "Justin—he's real. I've got a pack of stuff in Exports. Merchandising stuff is all I do. That's all I use my psych for. That's not your kind of business. I don't know what you'd want me for."

"You've got a clean Security clearance, cleanest of all my friends. You're good at business. You'd be a good Super, you'd be good at most anything you wanted to take on, that's your trouble. You get small-focused into doing it instead of learning it; and I want you learning for a while. Remember when I snagged you into the tunnels and we started off the whole gang? That's why I asked you out here before I talked to anybody. You were always first."

"What are you talking about?" Amy suddenly looked scared. "First at what?"

"That this time it's for real. That this time I'm not talking about kid pranks, this time I'm talking about getting a position in the House. Things are shifting, they're shifting real fast. So I'm starting with you, the same way I did back then. Will you work for me, Amy?"

"Doing what?"

"Genetics. Whatever project you want to come up with for a cover. A real one. A put-together till you can make up your mind. I don't care. You go on salary, you get your share of your own profits—all that." Amy's eyes were very large.

"I want you and Maddy in two different divisions," Ari said, "because I'm not going to put you two one over the other. That'd never work. But between you and me, you're smarter than she is, you're steadier, and you're the one I'd trust with the bad stuff. And there could be. Giraud is on the end of his rejuv. That's secret. A very few people know, but probably more and more will guess. When he dies, that's an election in Science. That's also about the time the Paxers and the rest of the people who want me dead—for real, Amy."

"I know it's real."

"You know why they made me and how they taught me, and you know what I am. And you know my predecessor had enemies who wanted her dead, and one who killed her. The closer I get to what she was, the more scared people get—because I'm kind of spooky, Amy, I'm real spooky to a lot of people who weren't half as afraid of my predecessor– Are you scared of me? Tell me the truth, Amy."

"Not– scared of you. Not really. Spooky is a good word for it. Because you're not—not the age you are; and you are, with us. Maddy and I have talked about it, sometimes. How we—sometimes just want to do something stupid, just for relief sometimes. Like sometimes—" Amy rode in silence a moment, patting Bayard's shoulder. "My mama gets so mad at me because I do spooky things, like she thinks I'm a kid and she worries about me, and she treats me like a kid. One time she yelled at me: Amy, I don't care what Ari Emory does or what Ari Emory says, you're my daughter—don't you look at me like that and don't you tell me how to bring you up. And she slapped me in the face. And I just stood there. I—didn't know what to do. I couldn't hit her. I couldn't run away crying or throw things. I just—stood there. So she cried. And then I cried, but not because she hit me, —just because I knew I wasn't what she wanted me to be." Amy looked up at the sky. There was a glitter of tears in the sunlight. "So, well, mama's got the notion I'm going to leave when I can, and she's sorry. We had a talk about it, finally. She's the one who's scared of you. She doesn't understand me and she thinks you're all to blame for me not having a childhood. That's what she says. You never got a chance to be a child. I don't know, I thought I had a childhood. We had a hell of a good time. Stuff mama doesn't know. But I don't like it anymore. I'm tired of little games, Ari, you know what I mean. I'm tired of Stef Dietrich, I'm tired of fighting with mama, I'm tired of going to classes and playing guessing-games with Windy Peterson on his damn trick questions and eetee rules and catch-you's. I think Maddy's about the same."