Gateway To Xanadu (9 page)

“Not me,” I said with a shake of my head, leaning back in my chair, swirling the brandy in my glass. “I grabbed a snack just before approach, and it’ll hold me for a while.”

“Syntho,” Val said with a grimace, obviously deciding to drop the discussion we’d been having out of deference to Ringer’s near-upset.

“Syntho has its place, but I prefer the real thing,” Ringer agreed with Val’s prejudice, looking around to see if he could spot the real drink-server. “Diana does too, when she isn’t feeling restless-or too lazy to do her own cooking.”

“What own cooking?” Val asked with a soft sound of ridicule, and suddenly the conversation took on a new interest for me. “Diana can’t cook.”

“Don’t tell me you did all the cooking during those two months,” Ringer growled disbelievingly at a Val who had begun to color somewhat. “Come on, Valdon, you didn’t really believe her? Haven’t you learned you can’t believe a word she says if it doesn’t involve an assignment?”

Without a sound Val started to get out of his chair, the fury in his eyes so strong that I got ready to drop my glass fast and kick the table into him as a delaying tactic until I could get clear of my own chair. One more inch upward and I would have done it, catching him where it hurts the most, but Ringer had moved too fast, clamping a hand around his arm and forcing him back down.

“This isn’t the place to settle private disagreements,” Ringer growled low to Val, tightening his grip, until Val looked away from me and focused on him. “Starting a brawl in a bar does nothing more than attract unwanted attention. And I thought you weren’t the kind to beat up on women?”

“So did I,” Val said, taking a deep breath. “Or, I never used to be. You can let go of my arm now. The urge to kill is passing. ”

“It only passes on a temporary basis,” Ringer told him with a very faint smile, taking his hand back while Val ran a calming hand through his black hair. “For someone who claims to know her, you got hotter than I thought you would.”

“The effect seems to be cumulative,” Val answered, leaning back in his chair to glance at me with an unreadable expression. “I seem to be able to take only so much from her before the explosion comes, and finding out about the cooking thing after her vanity table comments and what she did during docking put it together too fast. I don’t like being made to feel like a fool.”

“Not many of us do,” I put in before Ringer could comment. “That outrage of yours was spectacular, but I don’t think you can justify it. Whose idea was it to start cooking in the first place? Mine? Who was the one who decided he couldn’t eat syntho? Me? Who was the one who talked the other into sharing the first meal? Into continuing to share the meals? So I led you to believe I couldn’t cook. At what point did I twist your arm hard enough to force you into cooking for both of us?”

“Looks like she has you there, Valdon,” Ringer observed, My supposed partner was looking vexed, as though he didn’t quite agree with me. “Is she telling the truth this time?”

“As far as she goes,” Val grudged, shifting in annoyance in his chair. “She knew damned well I’d never sit down to a meal alone when I believed she couldn’t make the same meal for herself if she wanted it.

How could any man eat food, when the woman with him is forced to eat syntho?”

“Especially when he was planning on making a suggestion during that meal,” I said. “Syntho doesn’t set the mood very well, and it’s hard to decide what wine to serve with it.”

Ringer chuckled at the way Val flushed, which made Val even more uncomfortable, though why he should be uncomfortable was beyond me. Did he think Ringer believed we did nothing more than play twenty questions to while away the time of a two-month trip? If he did, I’d have to decide which bridge on Hidemite, the Federation’s capital world, to sell him.

“That was a low blow, but women are famous for it,” Ringer consoled Val, swallowing down the chuckling. “If you touch them even once, they can claim everything you did for them before that was with that one end in mind. She probably knows better than that, Valdon, but you’ll never get her to admit it, so arguing would be a waste of breath. Finish up your brandy instead, it’ll make you feel better.”

“There’s only one thing that would make me feel better right now, but you’re right about this not being the place,” Val came back with one of those glances for me before lifting his glass to swirl the liquid in it. “I think you and I are going to have to have a little talk later, Diana.”

“Sounds like he has something in mind, Diana,” Ringer was quick to notice. “What with the way you look now, he just might sit you on his knee to lecture you for a while, then send you to bed early without supper.”

“And then jump right in after me.” I laughed, finishing the last of my brandy. Then I looked at Val.

“You’ll have to give me a raincheck on that talk, partner. I’ll reschedule with you as soon as I get back from Faraway, and while I’m gone Ringer can show you the Station. I won’t be more than a couple of days.”

“You thinking about dropping in on Sellers?” Ringer asked as I pushed my chair back and stood, his eyes looking up at me. “I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”

“If this Sellers is down on that world we’re orbiting, I have to agree,” Val put in with a frown, his eyes joining Ringer’s. “You have no business running around on a frontier world all alone.”

“You think Sellers won’t know me?” I asked Ringer, ignoring Val’s absurdity entirely. “After the first five minutes he won’t have any doubts, and I really need his spirit after two months locked in a closet.

The papers you want are in that bag sitting near your left foot, and I think that takes care of everything.”

“Not quite,” Ringer denied, with only a glance for the peculiar expression Val had developed. “If you take two days off to hunt spirits on Faraway, you’ll miss your liner shuttle, which should be docking about three and a half hours from now. ”

“What liner?” I asked, only then noticing the hidden assessment in his eyes. “Wait a minute- You’ve located Radman. You know where he is.”

“We’ve known all along where he was,” Ringer said, watching me calmly. “We’ve been keeping an eye on him ever since you disappeared, and two days ago he boarded a liner for Xanadu. We don’t know whether the trip is business or pleasure, but that’s where he’ll be for a while. Still thinking about going spirit hunting?”

“No,” I answered, sitting down in my chair again. “I’ve found something better to hunt than a few harmless spirits. Is that warrant back in effect? Did you bring my knives? What about a replacement for my I.D.? Was there enough time?”

“Yes, yes, and no,” Ringer answered, making another stab at spotting the drink server. “I have the warrant and your knives, but there wasn’t enough time to culture another I.D. for you. What I do have is identity papers for you and Valdon, absolutely authentic and properly documented and sealed, but you’ll have to be careful with them. The ink’s still wet. ”

I snorted softly in amusement as I leaned back in my chair, knowing those identity papers would be a better job than what Ringer was trying to make me believe. They would not be perfect or in any way legitimate, but they’d be more than good enough to get us to Xanadu, right on Radman’s tail.

“I know I’m just a tourist around here,” Val broke into my thoughts and Ringer’s searching, “but would one of you mind telling me what spirits are? And why the name Xanadu sounds familiar? If it isn’t too much trouble.”

Ringer let the heavy sarcasm roll by without comment. Val was feeling left out, and he wanted us to know it.

“Spirits are the most aggressive carnivores Faraway has,” Ringer told him in the most off-hand tone he was capable of. “They’re big, catlike creatures that seem to materialize out of thin air in attack, then disappear the same way, which is why they’re called spirits. Anyone who has ever hunted them will swear they enjoy the hunt and there’s no reason why they shouldn’t. The minute you walk into their territory, your chances are no more than fifty-fifty of ever walking out again, which means they take as many trophies as we do.”

“And that’s what you were going to do to clear away cobwebs?” Val said to me, outraged. “I think you’d better take another look; that’s not cobwebs bothering you, it’s insanity. ”

“Some day I’ll explain an old saying about meat and poison,” I told him with a laugh. “Right now I’ll remind you where you heard about Xanadu. It was when you asked about what Radman had done to make the Council send me after him. Xanadu is the pleasure world Radman deals with on a regular basis, and . . . ”

“And is the place those children were sold into slavery,” he finished for me, his face suddenly going entirely expressionless, his eyes turning colder than
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. “And that’s where we’re going.”

“That’s where I’m going,” I corrected gently. “I started this assignment alone, and I don’t mind finishing it the same way. Ringer can show you the sights while I’m tied up, and I’ll take over later. Don’t think you have to come with me.”

“Try and stop me,” he said with a snort of scorn, abruptly going back to the brandy he’d just been holding. “Seeing that you don’t get tied up is one of the reasons I’ll be there, remember? It’s time you learned how much better teamwork is than going it alone.”

Ringer glanced at me as I sat back in my chair, but he didn’t say anything and neither did I. I was going to have company on my hunt, and the benefits or drawbacks of the arrangement remained to be seen.

Since the most important preliminaries had been taken care of, Ringer leaned back in his chair and thrust his hand into the right side of his coat as he looked at me.

“Here are your papers, liner reservations, and credit proofs,” he said, pulling out a double stack of the sort of official nonsense no one in the Federation could get along without. “Valdon is Valdon Carter and you’re Jennifer Kent, a precaution in case Radman was also given the name of the Special Agent sent after him. The renewed warrant is in the sealed compartment of your credit proof, handy in case you have to produce it, out of the way if you don’t. Just watch what you do with those credit proofs; they’re hooked into our discretionary fund by way of the usual blinds, and I’ll expect an accounting for every credit spent.”

“And you’ll get that accounting,” I agreed solemnly, quickly activating the credit proof handed to me with my thumb print in the activating square before Ringer could change his mind. “You know how creative I am. Just don’t expect any miracles. We’re going to Xanadu, not Faraway.”

“I know, I know,” Ringer grumbled, showing Val how to activate his proof. “All I’m asking is that you don’t get carried away and take an extended tour of the planet. I know you, Diana, and giving you a direct tie into departmental funds makes me nervous.”

“How many times have I offered to pay you back?” I demanded, trying not to laugh aloud. “If you were silly enough to let them set up an accounting program without provision for illegal procedures it’s not my fault, it’s yours. If I have to grease a few palms, or buy certain information, or happen to come across a special weapon that appeals to me, what am I supposed to do? Forget it?”

“You know the Council won’t acknowledge illegal procedures, ” he growled, the sharp look back in his dark eyes. “The more I have to camouflage them as something else, the more static I get. And since that fund is strictly for departmental expenditures, you can’t pay anything back without admitting you used it contra regs. I go through this with you every time I have to give you access to the fund, and I’m tired of wasting my breath. It’s not as if you don’t understand it as well as I do; you just enjoy giving me a hard time.”

“Me?” I protested in shocked disbelief. “I enjoy giving you a hard time? Ringer, how can you say that?”

“With no effort whatsoever,” he replied in his continuing rumble, then looked at Val. “Do me a favor, Valdon; see if you can keep her away from her usual nonsense this time. If it isn’t absolutely necessary, don’t let her do anything that costs credit. ”

“And I’ll be sure to let him know what’s absolutely necessary and what isn’t,” I put in, glancing at my papers and reservation slip before sliding them and the proof into a pocket of my ship’s suit. If it hadn’t been unwise, I would have laughed aloud.

“That’s a good point,” Ringer said immediately, seeing through my comment to the heart of the problem.

“Valdon doesn’t know enough about the Federation to get along on his own if you two get separated. I think you’d better let him learn as much as he can on the liner to Xanadu O.S., doing the ordering and paying and such. You can tell him what to expect, and by the time you get to Xanadu he’ll have had enough experience to get by on.”

“The ordering and paying and such,” I repeated with a half-hearted grin. “Anything you say, O chief, O

Fearless Leader, O Master of my Destiny. What about our clothes?”

“Yours are in your luggage waiting to be sent to the liner,” he answered, giving me one of those lowered-eyebrows looks for my wise-guying. “As far as Valdon is concerned, we’ll buy him what he needs here on the Station. There’s just enough time to have it made up before the shuttle docks. And before you bother me about it again, here.”

He reached into his jacket again, but what he came up with this time was my idea of a real welcome-home gift. It was one of the two matched, specially made throwing knives I usually carried, complete with sheath, and I took it even faster than I had activated the credit proof.

“Bless you, Ringer, you always know how to treat a girl right,” I told him with a glance and a grin, easing the blade out of its sheath to check it. Six inches of razor-sharp mirroring plus hilt gleamed back at me in the glow of a nearby chandelier, a sight I’d had occasion to miss once or twice in the last few months. “The other one’s in my luggage?”

“Other one?” Val asked, an interested appreciation in his eyes for the weapon I held. “You mean you have more than one like that?”

“This is one of a matched pair, and I don’t lend them out,” I said with finality in my voice, setting the blade back in its sheath as I looked at my partner. “If you want a set of your own, have them made the way I did.”