This Gulf of Time and Stars Read online

  A balloon full of Lemmick-breath met a hanging cleaver.

  Pop.

  Noses twitching, the current master chef—a Zingy—stared mournfully into the pot she/he was stirring. I kept walking, hoping she/he wasn’t the sort to jump to conclusions—

  She/he was. “Ruined!!” The pot sailed across the countertops, its creamy contents erupting outward in globules, strings, and thick bits. The others avoided being struck with a fine economy of motion, obviously well practiced. “My TRUFFLES—!” The word rose to a shriek. Hom M’Tisri slowed, his instinct as host to soothe matters. The chef brandished a gooey spoon in his direction and shrieked again, eyes popping.

  The Vilix wisely picked up the pace. “This way, please!” he shouted.

  I followed, watching where I stepped. Why did it have to be truffles? The credits now burning on stovetops or splatted on the floor could have provisioned the Silver Fox for a standard year—longer, if we were careful. We’d be heading back to Pocular at this rate.

  It might not have been our balloon. Not that I wanted Huido to fire another chef, but better that than we spent another season digging fungi in the jungle. And that’s what would happen, I thought gloomily. We were traders, good ones, but the lucrative truffle market was saturated with company ships. Could we still rely on our contacts among the locals and—

  Words formed in my mind. Don’t worry about what hasn’t happened yet, chit. We’ll deal. Under the words, a hint of amusement.

  If my captain chose to ignore the ramifications of balloons and truffles on our meager budget, I decided with relief, so could I.

  Swinging doors led into the main restaurant; traffic in both directions was brisk and argumentative. The Claws & Jaws prided itself on living servers and kitchen staff. I’d thought this was to cater to the idiosyncrasies of the wealthy, but Morgan admitted Huido had broken all of his servos within a week of opening, almost going out of business as a result.

  “Through here, please.” Hom M’Tisri opened the rightmost of a pair of less obvious doors and ushered us—and the balloons—into another, wider hallway. “With your kind indulgence,” at a significant rise in volume from the kitchen, “I’ll rejoin you momentarily.”

  “We know the way,” Morgan assured him, balloons orbiting his head again.

  I eyed my Chosen as we walked along the thick carpeting of the living quarters portion of the Claws & Jaws. The private dining room had a perfectly good entrance from the restaurant. If we were using Huido’s own access?

  It meant the Carasian was part of a conspiracy to surprise Barac and Ruti, something patently crucial to the success of the “baby-rainshower-occasion.”

  I abandoned any notion of warning the pair what to expect. I’d no idea anyway, except my Human was happy.

  Much as I loved them, I thought with growing amusement, did the aliens in my life have to be so—alien?

  Interlude

  DEALING WITH ALIENS, you never saw it coming, Morgan thought ruefully. That unforeseen consequence.

  Who knew Lemmicks exhaled into their balloons? Now someone would miss a ridiculously overpriced supper, for which they should rightly thank him. More importantly, Lemmick-breath had Sira worrying about truffles and provisioning the ship, of all things.

  Like any spacer worth the air.

  Which she was, he thought proudly, and more. Born Sira di Sarc, she was the most powerful individual of her kind, the secretive humanoid Clan. Before he’d come into her life—rather, when she’d arrived at his air lock—Sira had been in self-imposed exile, for no unChosen male had the strength to survive the instinctive Power-of-Choice within her. She’d spent decades locked in the physiological adolescence of a Chooser, studying her personal curse and that of the Clan.

  Her solution had been—him.

  A lock of red-gold rose from the mass tumbling down Sira’s back, curling toward him like a languid finger. Warm and sensual, that hair, strangely willful, and the mark of a fully mature Clanswoman. She’d become that by being near him. By being attracted.

  By falling—that unforeseen consequence—in love with an alien.

  As had he. For he wasn’t, Morgan thought, the simple trader he seemed either.

  When he’d met Sira he’d been a telepath of respectable skill, for a Human, with enough potential to make him uncomfortable around the noisy minds of others and wary of the Clan, who disapproved of such power in others. Since?

  Suffice to say, he no longer noticed crowds. Sira had honed his abilities, trained and tested them to Clan standards, wanting above all else to protect him from herself. For Clan thoughts and bodies moved outside the known universe, through a dimensionless space they called the M’hir. It was real. He’d almost died there, when she’d lost the fight with her own instinct.

  Almost. Instead, he and Sira had managed the formerly inconceivable. Not only had her body matured into its natural—and glorious—adult state before Choice could take place, but their minds and hearts had forged the permanent Clan pair-bond called a Joining.

  While he remained wary of the rest of her kind, even the most xenophobic of Clan couldn’t argue with that.

  Not that he cared. What mattered? He was no longer alone, no longer empty and courseless. The clear brilliant sanity of Sira’s thoughts, her passion and goodness, filled him. Each shipday he woke to the joy of discovering the universe with her. And when they made love—

  Her head half turned, hair lifting to reveal the sweet curve of her jaw, the blue of the air tag adhered to her skin, and, yes, a coy dimple. We could leave, you know.

  He came close to tripping over his own feet. Witchling.

  You started it. With distracting warmth.

  The Human tightened the mental shields she’d taught him, restoring privacy, and found his voice. “First things—”

  He paused, the hall echoing with the bang and clank of carapace and claws in violent motion. A massive black Carasian scampered around the corner—itself worthy of silent contemplation, if not immediate flight—to come to a crashing stop by the dining room door.

  In a blur of motion, the being arranged himself into a tidy, a little too obviously bored demeanor, his great handling claws tipped to the floor, lesser claws folded. Surely, that posture said, he’d been here the entire time instead of standing longingly at the door to someone else’s pool.

  A door unlikely to be breached by longing—or high explosive. Since the “incident” in the restaurant—during which plumbing and beams underneath had mysteriously been damaged, improvements had been made. Between the door security codes Morgan had upgraded and some additional, illicit, construction, the station itself could crack open and the chamber housing Huido’s wives be unaffected. The wives could, of course, open the door from inside, making immediate flight by other species advisable. Their needs well satisfied, the prospect was unlikely.

  The Carasian longing to introduce himself was Huido’s so-called nephew, Tayno Boormataa’kk, a would-be rival Huido tolerated because no one in authority on Plexis could tell the two apart, a confusion as useful as it was entertaining. Tayno happened to be working off a significant portion of the construction costs, not that he’d admit it.

  “Greetings, Tayno,” Morgan said.

  The Carasian pretended to see him for the first time. “Welcome, Captain Morgan!” he boomed. Within the pulsing disks of his head carapace, a row of gleaming black eyes suddenly tangled in their effort to stare at the balloons. “Who’s this?”

  Morgan sighed inwardly. New to life offworld, the young male tended to panic at the unexpected and there was a great deal of him to panic. “It’s all right, Tayno,” he said soothingly, “these are—”

  “More guests?!” Claws rose, snapping in agitation. “I wasn’t prepared for more guests, esteemed Captain Morgan. I wasn’t notified. There aren’t more settings. There aren’t more portions!” An eye swiveled. “Ho
m M’Tisri! About time you arrived. This is your responsibility. You’re fired!”

  “You can’t fire me.” The Vilix’s mouth cilia bent in a rare display of temper. The host had, Morgan conceded, been sorely tried in the past few minutes. “Only Hom Huido can.”

  Eyes untangled. Glared. “I am Huido!”

  “No, you’re not.”

  Sira covered her mouth with her hand, eyes shining. Oh, dear.

  Tayno let out a bell-like sound of distress. “How did you know? How could you? I’ve molted! I’ve grown!”

  “So,” the Vilix observed, cilia rising, “has your uncle.”

  Tayno collapsed in defeat, his body clattering like pots dropped in a sink. “He’ll fire me,” he said in a woe-filled whisper.

  “He won’t. These aren’t more guests, Tayno,” Morgan assured him. “They’re balloons. A type of decoration.” He waved one lower. Eyes followed it warily. “See?” He batted the balloon away.

  “A Human custom,” Sira explained, batting it back.

  “Fem Morgan.” The giant alien visibly settled as his eyes rested on the Clanswoman. Sira—or more truthfully her grist, as they called it—elicited outright devotion from Carasians.

  Those they’d met, Morgan reminded himself, careful of assumptions.

  “If you say so, of course,” Tayno continued, growing cheerful. “My apologies for the misunderstanding. Would you care to be seated? May I?”

  “Hom Huido will attend to his honored guests. You watch the door—” Hom M’Tisri pointed. “—this door—as ordered.”

  Caught, the Carasian gave a rattling sigh. “Very well.”

  The Vilix saw them into the room and then took his leave, closing the door behind him. Morgan looked around with interest and some concern, for the elegant dining area, newly refurbished with rare wood and costly light fixtures, had been transformed again. A glittering web covered the ceiling and draped the walls, more hanging from the lights. At every delicate junction hung a cluster of small purple globes, dusted with silver. Pretty.

  If you didn’t look too closely.

  “Are those . . .” Sira’s voice trailed away.

  “I don’t think we should ask.” Little doubt they were Retian eggs; hopefully empty of young Retians, but there was no telling. “If he offers any, just say no.” Morgan waved the balloons to hover over the long and ornately set table. The low rest Huido preferred was at the head, for he’d host this gathering. The old romantic had insisted.

  The remaining seats were chairs suited to humanoid anatomy. A slender crystal tank of water, lit from beneath and filled with, yes, more purple eggs, acted as a centerpiece.

  Trust Huido to take the concept of a baby shower literally.

  “Look.” Sira went to the second table, set against a wall. Boxes of various sizes covered its surface, all but one wrapped in rich black material and topped with a neat bow, also black, of issa-silk. “This is—this is too extravagant.” Her nose wrinkled. “Unless . . . they won’t be more . . . you know . . . ?” With a gesture to the eggs.

  “I’m sure they’re not edible,” Morgan reassured her, hoping he was right. The Carasian should know better, but he wasn’t beyond a joke at Barac’s expense. Never at Ruti’s, though. His confidence restored, the Human nodded at the lone red box. Words chased each other over its surface: “Happy 150th Anniversary!” “Condolences.” and “Congratulations!” The Lemmick party-favor dealer had been busy.

  “Oh, my.” She grinned. “From Tayno?”

  “That’d be my guess.” Morgan chuckled. He shrugged off his pack and set it under the table. “I didn’t think to wrap ours.”

  Her hand rested on his arm. “You thought of this, Jason. It’ll be a wonderful surprise, this baby rainshower.”

  “No rain. Just shower.” Through her touch, he sensed the faintest trace of worry and realized it wasn’t just the truffles. “It’s what families do,” he said gently.

  The corners of her lips deepened adorably. “We’re a family?”

  It had come to him one morning, waiting for her to wake and see him, his heart overflowing. That this joy of theirs, wasn’t only theirs.

  “Yes. A family. You. Me. Huido. Tayno, but don’t tell him,” he suggested. “Our Clan heart-kin.” Beginning with her sister Rael and Barac.

  Add the few he’d trusted with her life and his: Thel Masim, who managed Auord’s shipcity; Rees, tending bar at Big Bob’s; maybe—he stopped there, then finished with, “Copelup.”

  Her hair drifted up in surprise, then settled over her shoulders. “Who isn’t coming,” she guessed with a flicker of disappointment. “Or we wouldn’t be in this room.” Drapsk traveled in such numbers they’d have filled the entire restaurant.

  Not to mention they caused an administrative flurry every time they docked their massive and powerful ship at Plexis; word would have spread. “Copelup apologized for the better part of an hour,” Morgan confirmed. “He said there was ‘something in the air.’ Repeatedly.” Given the Drapsk were an olfaction-dependent species, the phrase could mean anything from something in the station air to an odorous message from home.

  “I hope he wasn’t too upset.” She paused delicately. “Could you tell?”

  Drapsk, they’d discovered, reacted to adverse stimulation in dramatic fashion, from rolling into balls to chemically exchanging occupations. “No gripsta,” Morgan told her, then grinned. “He promised to send gifts.”

  “As if we could stop him.” Sira looked pleased. “They’ll be perfect, too.”

  The expression: “Drapsk know what you want before you do,” being apt. The little aliens prided themselves on their knowledge of customer needs and preferences; best not to ask how they obtained it.

  “Human, Clan, Carasians, and Drapsk,” she mused aloud. “At a baby shower.”

  Morgan grimaced.

  “What?”

  “It sounds like the start of a joke,” he admitted.

  Denial! Sharp enough to make him wince. “It sounds, my dear Chosen, like more family than I’d ever thought to have in my life.” Her gray eyes glistened. “Thank you.”

  Morgan took her hand and pressed the palm to his lips, letting her feel his smile. Her mouth twitched, then smiled back. “Our family,” she whispered as if tasting the words.

  “My brother!” With a clatter like a malfunctioning servo, Huido Maarmatoo’kk edged sideways through the door.

  Post-molt, he was not only resplendent but changed, his gleaming shell free of the dents and battle scrapes Morgan remembered all too well. The fasteners shed with the old shell had been refitted into the new with, the Human noted with misgiving, substantial additions. The Carasian’s notion of useful armament tended to weaponry on the shadowy side of legal, or so far beyond it wasn’t worth mentioning, but there were those watching. Unwise to provoke their attention—

  —impossible to avoid his. Adapted as they were for the slick rock of tidal pools, Huido’s sponge-feet and thick legs worked admirably on station flooring. “My brother!”

  Morgan braced himself.

  Chapter 2

  AN IMMENSE CLAW seized Morgan around the waist and hoisted him to the ceiling, my Human pounding on what shell he could reach in protest. It wouldn’t work. Huido’s bruising gesture of affection was as inescapable as it was touching. Thankfully, I wasn’t entitled to it, despite Morgan’s inclusive notion of “family.”

  Eyes parted to allow twin needle-like jaws to protrude. I froze with Morgan as the tips of those jaws touched his cheeks with exquisite care.

  Ritual complete, Huido dropped him with a hearty, “Ah! The lovely Sira Morgan! You’ve left the pool so soon? What a shame! Morgan, you disappoint us both.”

  The “pool” being where the Carasian’s many wives awaited his attention—impatiently, by all accounts—I blushed. Huido boomed with pleased laughter and all was right i
n the universe. Even the balloons remained where they’d been sent.

  So far.

  Hom M’Tisri had followed Huido with a beverage cart. Having placed that to his satisfaction, he turned to his employer. “If there’s nothing else, Hom, I’ll return to my post.”

  A claw waved in agreement. “Yes, yes. Let us know when our special guests arrive. I’ll want them brought here at once. Wait.” That same claw closed slowly. “A pretense. I have it! My nephew’s stuck in a compactor or some such. Feel free to arrange it.”

  “Leave it to me, Hom Huido,” the Vilix replied with ominous enthusiasm.

  Once the door closed, the Carasian lowered his voice to an aggrieved mutter. “My nephew’s been full of himself since the molt. Should have cracked him while he was soft. Too kindhearted for my own good, that’s me.”

  Not to mention too soft himself. I smiled to myself. Pheromones encouraged simultaneous molts, Morgan had assured me, making it less likely one Carasian would have the advantage at that vulnerable time. The restaurant had closed for several days to accommodate this biological necessity. I wouldn’t have been surprised if Huido had locked his nephew in a storeroom for the duration, rather than take any chances with their timing.

  Timing being a factor today. “How are you managing to get Barac and Ruti here?” A point of keen curiosity Morgan had refused to satisfy.

  “My invention: Yipping Prawlies,” Huido announced proudly. “Fresh from the grills. Ruti’s favorite! She has excellent taste, you know.”

  What I knew was a menu item wouldn’t counter my cousin’s suspicious nature. “And prawlies help how?”

  “They’re served the same day each station cycle.” A grand wave. “Barac and Ruti share a plate every time. Trust me, Sira. They’ll be here.”

  To share an appetizer? It made as little sense as a baby shower for Clan, unless—

  They couldn’t afford a full meal.

  All at once, I understood. If there was a common factor among my individualistic kind, it was personal wealth. Mine as a di Sarc was gone, spent to redress at least some of the harm done to Humans by the Clan. I was happier without it, but I had the Silver Fox and a livelihood.