The Night's Dawn Trilogy (57 page)

There was absolutely no way of judging scale, no reference points. Unless she consulted the flyer’s processors, Syrinx didn’t
know what their altitude was. The ocean rolled past below, seemingly without end.

After forty minutes Pernik Island appeared on the horizon. It was a circle of verdant green that was so obviously vegetation.
The islands which Edenists had used to colonize Atlantis were a variant of habitat bitek. They were circular disks, two kilometres
in diameter when they matured, made from polyp that was foamed like a sponge for buoyancy. A kilometre-wide park straddled
the centre, with five accommodation towers spaced equidistantly around it, along with a host of civic buildings and light
industry domes. The outer edge bristled with floating quays for the boats.

Like habitat starscrapers, the tower apartments had basic food-synthesis glands, though they were primarily for fruit juices
and milk—there simply wasn’t any need to supply food when you were floating on what was virtually a protein-packed soup. An
island had two sources of energy to power its biological functions. There was photosynthesis, from the thick moss which grew
over every outside surface including the tower walls, and triplicated digestive tracts which were fed from the tonnes of krill-analogues
captured by baleen scoops around the rim. The krill also provided the raw material for the polyp, as well as nutrient fluids.
Electricity for industry came from thermal potential cables; complex organic conductors trailing kilometres below the island,
exploiting the difference in temperature between the cool deep waters and the sun-heated surface layer to generate a current.

There was no propulsion system. Islands drifted where they would, carried by sluggish currents. So far six hundred and fifty
had been germinated. The chances of collision were minute; for two to approach within visible range of each other was an event.

Oxley circled Pernik once. The water in the immediate vicinity was host to a flotilla of boats. Pernik Island’s trawlers and
harvesters produced a crisscross of large V-shaped wakes as they departed for their fishing fields. Pleasure craft bobbed
about behind them, small dinghies and yachts with their verdant green membrane sails fully extended.

The flyer darted in towards one of the landing pads between the towers and the rim. Eysk himself and three members of his
family walked over as soon as the haze of ionized air around the flyer dissolved, grounding out through the metal grid.

Syrinx came down the stairs that had folded out of the airlock, breathing in a humid, salty, and strangely silent air. She
greeted the reception party, exchanging identity traits: Alto and Kilda, a married couple in their thirties who supervised
the preparation of the family’s catches, and Mosul, who was Eysk’s son, a broad-shouldered twenty-four-year-old with dark
hair curling gypsy-style below his shoulders, wearing a pair of blue canvas shorts. He skippered one of the fishing boats.

A fellow captain,
Syrinx said appreciatively.

It’s not quite the same,
he replied courteously as they all started to walk towards the nearest tower.
Our boats have a few bitek items grafted in, but they are basically mechanical. I sail across waves, you sail across light-years.

To each their own,
she replied playfully. There was an almost audible buzz as their thoughts meshed at a deeper, more intense, level. For a
moment she felt the sun on his bare torso, the strength in his figure, a sense of balance which was the equal to her spacial
orientation. And the physical admiration, which was mutual.

Do you mind if I go to bed with him?
she asked Ruben on singular engagement.
He is rather gorgeous.

I never stand in the way of the inevitable,
he replied, and winked.

Eysk had an apartment on the tower’s fifteenth floor, a large one which doubled as an entertainment suite for visiting traders.
He had chosen a rich style, combining modernist crystal furniture with a multi-ethnic, multi-era blend of artwork from across
the Confederation.

The reception room had a transparent wall with archways leading out onto a broad balcony. A long table of sculpted blue crystals
flecked with firefly sparks sat in the middle of the room, laid with a scrumptious buffet of Atlantean seafood.

Ruben glanced round at the collection of ornaments and pictures, pulling his lower lip thoughtfully.
The seafood trade must be pretty good.

Don’t let Eysk’s dragon hoard fool you,
Kilda said, bringing him a goblet of pale rose wine.
His grandfather, Gadra, started it a hundred and eighty years ago. Pernik
is one of the older islands. Our family could have its own island by now if we didn’t suffer from these “investments”. Pieces
lose their relevance so fast these days.

Ignore the woman, Ruben,
Gadra spoke out of the island’s multiplicity.
A lot of this stuff is worth double what it was bought for. And all of it retains its beauty providing you view it in context.
That’s the trouble with young people, they take no time to appreciate life’s finer qualities.

Syrinx allowed Eysk to lead her along the table. There was an enormous range of dishes arrayed, white meats arranged on leaves,
fish steaks in sauces, some wild-looking things that were all legs and antenna and didn’t even seem to have been cooked. He
handed her a silver fork and a goblet of carbonated water.

The art is to taste then flush the mouth with a sip,
he told her.

Like a wine tasting?

Yes, but with so much more to savour. Wines are simply variants on a theme. Here we have diversity that defies even the island
personalities to catalogue. We’ll start with unlin crab, you said you remembered it.

She pushed her fork into the pÂtÉ-like slab he indicated. It melted like fudge in her mouth.
Oh! This is just as good as I remember. How much do you have?

They started to discuss details as they moved round the table. Everybody joined in good-naturedly, advising and arguing over
individual dishes, but the final agreements were always between Syrinx and Eysk. The Jovian Bank segment of the island’s personality
was brought in to record the transactions as they were finalized.

They wound up with a complicated arrangement whereby Syrinx agreed to sell ten per cent of any cargo of Norfolk Tears back
to Eysk’s family in return for preferential treatment to obtain the seafood she wanted. The ten per cent would be sold at
just three per cent above the transport cost, to allow Eysk to make a decent profit distributing it to the rest of the island.
Syrinx wasn’t entirely happy, but she had come into the Norfolk run too late to make heavy demands to her only supplier. Besides,
ninety per cent was still a lot of
drink, and
Oenone
could transport it right across the Confederation. The price was always set in relation to the distance from Norfolk it had
travelled, and a voidhawk’s costs were minimal compared to an Adamist starship’s.

After two hours negotiating Syrinx stepped out onto the balcony with Serina and Mosul. Ruben, Tula, and Alto had gathered
on one of the reception room’s low settees to polish off some of the wine.

They were on a corner of the tower which gave them a view over both the park and the ocean. A gentle moist breeze ruffled
Syrinx’s hair as she leaned on the railing, a glass of honey wine held loosely in her hand.

I’m not going to eat for days after that,
she told the other two, giving away a sense of rumbling pressure inside her belly.
I’m bloated.

I often think we named this planet wrong,
Mosul said.
It should have been Bounty.

You’re right,
Serina said.
No Norfolk merchant is going to be able to resist this cargo.
She was twenty-two, the only crew-member younger than Syrinx, slightly shorter than the Edenist norm, with black skin and
a delicate face. She was watching Syrinx and Mosul with quiet amusement, enjoying the vaguely erotic overspill of their growing
rapport.

Syrinx was delighted with her company, it was nice to have someone so unashamedly girlish on board. She’d chosen her original
crew for their experience, and they were highly professional, but it was nice to have someone she could really let her hair
down with. Serina added a sparkle to shipboard life which had been absent before.

We’re a pretty common choice,
Mosul said.
But none the less successful for that. Nearly every first-time captain takes some of our produce. That’s if they’ve got any
sense. You know, even the Saldanas send a ship here every couple of months to supply the palace kitchens.

Does Ione Saldana send one as well?
Serina asked interestedly.

I don’t think so.

Tranquillity doesn’t own any starships,
Syrinx said.

Have you been there?
Mosul asked.

Certainly not, it’s a blackhawk base.

Ah.

Serina looked up suddenly, her head swivelling round.
At last! I’ve just worked out what’s missing.

What?
Syrinx asked.

Birds. There are always birds by the shore on normal terracompatible worlds. That’s why it’s so quiet here.

One of the larger cargo spaceplanes chose that moment to lift from its pad. The vertical-lift engines produced a strident
metallic whine until it was a hundred metres in the air. It banked to starboard and slid off over the ocean, picking up speed
rapidly.

Serina started laughing.
Almost quiet!

Be a friend,
Syrinx said in singular engagement.
Vanish!

She pulled a wry face, and drained her wineglass. “Refill time. I’ll leave you two alone for a moment.” She sauntered off
into the reception room with a suspicious wiggle.

Syrinx grinned.
My loyal crew,
she told Mosul in singular engagement.

Your attractive crew,
he replied on the same mode.

I’ll tell her you said that. Once we’re safely outsystem.

He came over and put his arm round her shoulder.

I have a small confession,
she said.
This isn’t all pleasure.

It looks that way to me.

I want to hire a boat and visit the whales. I’d also need someone who can navigate properly to take me. Is that possible?

Alone on a boat with you? That’s not merely possible, that’s a guaranteed certainty.

Are there any schools near here, or do we have to go from a different island? I’ve only got a week.

There was a school of blues a hundred kilometres south of here a day ago. Hang on, I’ll ask the dolphins if they’re still
there.

Dolphins?

Yes. We use dolphins to help with the fishing.

I didn’t know you had servitor dolphins.

We don’t. They’re just plain ordinary dolphins with an affinity gene spliced in.

She followed his mind as he called. The answer was strange, more of a tune than phrases or emotions. A gentle harmony that
quietened the soul. Accompanying senses flooded in. She was barrelling through solid greyness, seeing little, receiving sharp
outlines of sound. Shapes moved around her like a galaxy of dark stars. She reached the surface and flashed through the ephemeral
mirror into the dazzle and the emptiness where she hung with tingling skin stretched taut.

She felt her own body stretch luxuriously in tandem. The affinity link faded away, and she sighed in regret.

Dolphins are fun,
Oenone
said.
They make you feel good. And they rejoice in their freedom.

Like voidhawks in water, you mean?

No! Well, yes. A bit.

Happy with being able to tease
Oenone
successfully, Syrinx turned to Mosul.
It was very beautiful, but I didn’t understand any of it.

Roughly translated from the scherzo, it means the whales are still within range. It’ll take a day’s sailing if we use my boat.
Good enough?

Excellent. Can your family spare you?

Yes. This is a slow month coming up. We’ve been working our arses off for the last nine weeks preparing for the Norfolk trade,
I’m entitled to a rest.

So you think you’re going to get some rest on that boat, do you?

I sincerely hope not. Although you didn’t strike me as someone who’d do the tourist routine. Not that the whales aren’t worth
a look.

Syrinx turned to face the ocean again, squinting at the white cloud stripe where the sky merged with the water.
It’s a memory for someone else.
“My brother.”

Mosul sensed the pain integral with the thought, and didn’t pry.

Alkad Mzu walked up the stairs from her first-floor apartment in the StPelham starscraper, coming out into the circular foyer
with its high, wave-curved ceiling and tall transparent walls looking out across the habitat parkland. A dozen or so other
early risers were moving around the foyer, waiting for the lifts in the central pillar, or heading for the broad stairs around
the rim which led down to the starscraper’s tube stations. It was an hour after the axial light-tube had brought a timid rosy
dawn to Tranquillity’s interior; patches of fine mist were still lurking amid the deeper tracts of undergrowth. The parkland
around each of the starscraper foyers was maintained as open meadow dotted with small copses of ornate trees and clumps of
flowering bushes. She stepped out through the sliding doors into damp air flush with the perfume of midnight-blooming nicotiana.
Colourful birds arrowed through the air, trilling loudly.