The Agent Gambit (54 page)

Undecided, she fidgeted with the key; then, with a sharp head-shake, she clenched her fingers, her hand moving toward the pocket of her apron.

Behind her she heard a noise.

She jerked around-and there was Meri, gray eyes huge in her pointed face, one hand tentatively extended. "Zhena Trelu, please. Cory play yes."

It was said in the mildest possible tone, but the old woman clutched at the spark of resentment the words ignited, using that warmth to chase away the cold confusion.

"Why in wind should he?" she demanded, knowing it was unreasonable, but not caring.
Hers
was the loss, and how should that-that
child,
her husband standing healthy at her side, presume to judge . . ."You two are supposed to be working for me, not taking over my house! Telling me what to do. That's Jerry's piano! Nobody ever touched it but him.
Nobody.
And I should just hand it over to some-
foreigner
I first laid eyes on three weeks ago? Why? Like as not, the pair of you're only out to rob me-"

No!" The girl's voice cut passionately across the stream of nonsense. "Good Cory!
Patient
Cory! Works hard-fixes-helps. Helps you. Helps me. Who helps Cory?" She flung her hands out, and Zhena Trelu saw the shine of tears in the gray eyes. "Zhena Trelu.
Please.
Cory play yes."

And what good, the old woman thought suddenly, sanely, was a piano to a dead man? She closed her eyes, feeling suddenly close to tears herself. Jerrel Trelu had been a kind man; no one should go hungry for music in his zhena's house.

Slowly she opened her fingers around the key, turned back, and fumbled a moment with the lock before twisting the knob and pushing the door wide.

"Thank you, Zhena Trelu," Meri whispered behind her; but when she turned back, the girl was gone.

The piano was badly
in need of tuning. Hakan worked carefully, Cory at his elbow, watching everything he did. On the doublechair to the right of the instrument, Miri and Kem had their heads together over a book. Kem's cool voice occasionally reached Hakan-she seemed to be teaching Miri the alphabet.

Zhena Trelu sat in the single chair on the other side of the lamp, ostensibly reading, but Cory, looking at her now and then from under long lashes, thought she had not turned a page since sitting down.

The tuning finally done, Hakan closed the case and waved Cory toward the keyboard, grinning. But the slighter man hesitated, then drifted soundlessly over to stand before the old woman and her book.

"Zhena Trelu," he said softly, and she looked up, frowning.

Slowly, with full pomp, he made her the bow of one who acknowledges an unpayable debt. "Thank you, Zhena Trelu. Very."

She sniffed. "Just don't you let me find you shirking your work and coming in here to play, hear me? Work comes first."

"Yes, Zhena Trelu." He smiled. "I will work."

She sniffed again, mindful of three pairs of young eyes on her. "Well, what're you waiting for?
You
were the one who wanted to play." She flicked her hand toward the piano. "So,
play."

He grinned and moved back to the instrument, slid onto the bench, and ran his fingers up and down the keys. Then he began to play, straightly and without flourish, the main line of the piece Hakan had been running through his guitar, three days past.

Hakan gave a shout and grabbed his guitar, taking up the weaving minor thread.

In the doublechair, Miri and Kem set aside the book to listen to the music. In the single chair, Zhena Trelu sat rapt.

In the manner of such things,
one song led to another. At some point during the evening, wine was opened and poured; and, in the manner of
those
things, was found too soon to be gone. A little time later Zhena Trelu excused herself with a yawn and went upstairs to her bedroom, waving aside an offer of an escort from Kem and Meri.

Her departure brought Hakan to an awareness of the hour, and he and Kem bundled themselves together, eliciting promises from their new friends to come to supper on Marin evening and making arrangements for Hakan to pick them up.

When the taillights of Hakan's car had finally faded, Miri leaned back against Val Con with a sigh. "Boss, I think I'm drunk."

She heard him laugh softly and felt his fingers tighten where they rested on her shoulders. "I am afraid that I am also drunk, cha'trez."

"Couple of saps," she judged, turning around and grinning up at him.
"One
of us is supposed to stay sober to carry the other one home and get 'em in bed. Now what?"

He appeared to consider the problem while he laid his arm about her waist and drew her into the hallway. "I suppose," he said, locking the door with great care, "that we must then carry each other."

"Okay," Miri agreed, sliding her arm around his waist.

Leaning on each other, they gained their bedroom without mishap.

It was not yet dawn
when Val Con drifted awake. He kept his eyes closed, feeling Miri pressed tightly against his side, her head on his shoulder, one arm flung across his chest. He was conscious first of a warm contentment; then he heard the song.

Though "heard" was not precisely the correct word; nor was "song." Cautiously, eyes still closed, he sought the song that was heard only within his head and found it, a thing of surpassing brightness and warmth, singing blithely to itself-and tasting strongly of hunch.

He regarded it for some time, remembering the old tales, knowing what it must be, joy building within him.

The gods make you a gift, he told himself gently.

And the part of him that was Korval replied: As it should be. The gods owe much.

Alive-and-well,
sang the song-that-was-not-a-song from its joylit corner of his self.
Miri-alive. Miri-well.

Fear surfaced for a moment as he recalled the man he now was. But then he recalled that his lifemate had shown no wizardly skills at all, so might not be able to hear him-and the fear was vanquished.

He moved a little in the predawn, curling around the woman beside him, burying his face in the cloud of her hair. Warm within, warm without, Val Con slid back into sleep.

VANDAR:
Springbreeze Farm

Val Con sat at the piano,
letting his fingers roam randomly over the keys. The sound of Zhena Trelu's radio reached him from down the hall, and somewhere close by Borril groaned and shifted. He wondered where Miri was and moved his attention for the briefest of instants to the song of her and its joyous message:
Alive-and-well, alive-and-well . . .

Lips relaxing into a smile, Val Con turned his attention to the notes he played, ear snagging on a series of three that recalled the piece he and Hakan had been working on the previous night. Shaking his head, he ran lightly through the song, then returned to the beginning, playing in earnest.

Best you practice, he told himself with mock sternness. If Hakan succeeds in getting the two of us a job playing music, you must be ready and able.

He was unsure of the likelihood of such work, but Hakan hardly spoke of anything else. It seemed there was a fair of some type looming, and Hakan's heart was set upon the two of them playing in one of the exhibition halls. The wages, in Hakan's estimation, were barely less than a joke-in fact, he had suggested that Cory keep the whole sum himself, since Zhena Trelu did not see fit to provide either of her charges with pocketpaper. No, one was given to understand that the sole reason for playing-besides the playing itself-was the
exposure.
All the world, in Hakan's eyes, attended the Winterfair at Gylles.

A soundless something called him from his reflections, and he glanced up to see Miri hesitating in the doorway. He let his fingers slow on the keys and smiled at her. "Hello, Miri."

"Hi." Her answering smile was apologetic. "I didn't mean to bother you. Left my book."

"It's no bother," he said, watching her go gracefully across the room to the doublechair. She had taken to wearing her hair loose of late, which he found pleased him greatly. It seemed they both considered this world-this place-a sanctuary.

Miri had found her book and was turning to go.

"You might stay," he said, wishing she would. "Unless my playing will disturb you?"

She grinned. "Naw. Thought
I'd
bother
you."

"It's no bother," he repeated gently. "I would be pleased if you'd stay."

"Rather listen to you than Zhena Trelu's radio stories any day," she said, curling promptly into the doublechair and opening the book.

"High praise," he murmured, and grinned when she laughed. His fingers touched the keys, and he began to play once more.

He moved from song to song, working through the list of eleven that made up their scanty repertoire. The music had his whole attention, though now and then he heard a small sound as Miri turned a page.

The last of the eleven was a slippery thing requiring sharply curtailed ripples from the keyboard, as well as a jagged staircase of mismatched notes reaching toward an impossible crescendo. Such a line would have been bad enough on an omnichora, yet some demented creativity had thought it suitable for an instrument as clumsy as the piano . . .

Sighing at his failure yet again to realize the line's potential, he glanced up and saw Miri curled in the chair, head bent over her book, lamplight glittering over the red wealth of her hair.

Unbidden, his fingers moved on the keys, building a line like laughter, like something lovely and wild half-seen, poised to fly away. His other hand shifted and found the undercurrent of strength, of constancy and surprising courage. The two lines melded, became one, separated for a time, and rejoined, each making the other whole. His fingers found an end of it too soon, and he glanced up, aware that the volume of his playing had increased.

Miri was smiling. "That was pretty," she said. "What was it?"

He returned her smile. "You."

"Me?" Her disbelief was apparent.

"Certainly, you," he returned matter-of-factly. "Listen." He moved his hands again, picking out a limping, aged phrase, frail without fragility, predictable and obstinate.

"Zhena Trelu," he murmured, aware that Miri had left her chair and was drawing closer.

Shifting again, he played a bump-and-tumble bass line, and she immediately laughed and cried out, "Borril!"

"None other," he said, grinning, caught up in the game. Gods, it had been years since he had indulged in such foolery!

Fingers touched keys, and Miri stirred. "Kem."

"Correct again," he said, sliding down the bench to make room for her to sit beside him. Hands at the top of the scale, he ran through a chaos of high-pitched chords, sharps and flats mixed indiscriminately. "And Hakan, of course . . ."

She chuckled and sat on the edge of the bench, careful, it seemed, not to touch him.

He tipped his head and began a foghorn melody, running a not-quite-correct underline interspersed here and there with a hasty flutter of sound from the higher end of the board.

"Edger," Miri said, and he nodded.

Her ear was excellent: He ran through the short list of their mutual acquaintances, and she named each unfailingly, though one made her crow with laughter even as she protested, "Oh, no! Poor Jason!"

His hands shifted again, building a solidly balanced, stately top-line, the undermelody as uncompromising as stone, except-did Miri detect the faintest hint of laughter? Of-informality? If it existed, it was a very ghost. Val Con's fingers had stopped, and the last note vibrated into stillness before she shook her head.

"Got me there. Don't think I know him."

"Her," he corrected. "My sister Nova."

"Pleasure, I'm sure," Miri said with a certain lack of enthusiasm. "Hope I never do anything to make her mad."

He laughed softly and began another line, this one gentle, relaxed, almost absurdly good-natured-until one heard the steel beneath the surface, sharp as any blade. "Shan," he murmured, then moved his hands once more.

The new tune was like a glitter of dark snowflakes seen briefly in the glare of a lightning bolt, like kittens giving each other chase upon waking. "Anthora," he said.

He sat back and inclined his head slightly. "Clan Korval," he told her. He reached to cover the keyboard.

Miri's hand on his sleeve stopped him. "Somebody missing, ain't there?"

He lifted an eyebrow.

"Val Con?" Miri asked. "Seems to me I heard he was Second Speaker."

"Ah, well," he said. "Val Con." His fingers dropped carelessly to the keys, playing a quick ripple of sound in the midrange that was merely an echo of his murmuring voice; then his hands lifted and brought the cover gently down into place.

"Oh," Miri said.

He turned to look at her and noticing the tension in the small muscles around her eyes. "Cha'trez? What is wrong?"

She frowned and moved her shoulders slightly, as if to shrug the problem away. "I-it's stupid, I guess. Just seems like you try to hide yourself from me, or something."

"Do I?" He turned on the bench to face her fully. "I am your friend. And your partner. And your lifemate. Do I not please you, Miri?"

"Please?" She looked surprised, then shifted sharply to sit astride the bench and looked him fully in the face. Her own was wide open, so that he knew the answer before she spoke it.

"I love you so much it hurts. So much I try not to think about it, 'cause I get scared." She clamped her jaw.

He extended a hand and stroked her cheek. "Such a large present, cha'trez, for someone you do not know." He tipped his head. "And you knew me well enough, did you not, to intercede with Zhena Trelu so I might have use of this piano?"

"How'd you know that?" She was regarding him with some suspicion. He stroked her cheek again, moving his fingers to trace the curve of her brows.

"Zhena Trelu told me; so I would know for certain how well I was loved." He ran his fingers down the line of her jaw. "You are so beautiful . . ." There was an ache of wonder in his voice.

She reached up to brush the hair from his eyes. "Val Con?" There was a pause while she searched his face and eyes; he felt as if she were searching his soul and held his breath, afraid. "You love me," she said finally and very softly, as if the discovery were a new one.