In Arcadia (Touchstone Book 5) Read online

  "What?"

  "Do you have any idea the number of people who've propositioned me purely because I'm 'Kaszandra's' aunt? Talk about a mood-killer. I've hooked up in the past for any number of reasons, but faint family resemblance is a step too far. Anyway, you don't exactly have the same relationship to geekdom here because you're living the sci-fi fantasy. If Serious Soldier is actually capable of taking on the concept of 'fun', then roll with it." She drained the second mug and set it down. "Enough. Instead of sitting around coming up with silly roadblocks because you're starting to think the guy's a keeper, you can come into the city with me and Inika. It's all arranged: Mara's going to be our mandatory security, and we're doing lunch and then getting smuggled into the back of an exclusive salon, and we'll catch the school shuttle back with the kids. You could even get a trim yourself, Ms I-Like-Ponytails."

  "I suppose I could get the split ends cut out. Are you going as Pikachu? Where did you get that anyway? I thought there was no room in your backpack for anything but chocolate and coffee."

  "I had one made up for each of the kids—and me—as a cheer Maddy up exercise. I anticipated much breakfast hilarity, but haven't yet managed to get up in time for breakfast. Did you know Nick and Alyssa have actually started jogging?"

  "Part of their KOTIS preparation?"

  "They're very serious about it. After dropping off Maddy for her first day of school, they're going on a KOTIS orientation tour today. I'm not a thousand percent convinced the military life is what they want, but can understand the attraction of exploring other planets. Presuming KOTIS doesn't just station them somewhere harmless and dull."

  "Have they told Cass yet?"

  "Have you told Cass you're starting a little crafting empire?"

  "I might if I ever sold anything." Laura glanced automatically at her mail as she did so, and said: "And it looks like that particular conversation's upon me. That dragon quartet."

  "Nice! At the original price, or did you drop them?"

  "I put them up, actually, in a fit of stubbornness. Art gallery prices." Laura found her cheeks had gone hot, and shook her head. "I'll go package it up while you reassemble your humanity."

  "That went years ago, darling. Just don't ask me questions about turtles in deserts—or was it a tortoise? Anyway, pack, dress, lunch, go."

  Chapter Nine

  Muinan hair technology had moved well beyond dyes, and while Laura had truly not intended to have anything done, she hadn't been able to resist a simple treatment that changed how her hair reflected light—but only when there was a static build-up. Which meant that when she brushed her hair it turned a deep hunter green, and then slowly faded back to its usual mid-brown. She loved it.

  "I wonder if we could use you as a storm detector," Sue mused. "Laura's looking pea-green: better bring an umbrella."

  "I'd enjoy that," Laura said. "A useful talent with no negative impacts so long as no-one strings me up to use as a weathervane."

  "I'm more inclined to decorate you at Christmas. Does Cass do a tree here, do you know?"

  "I think she said something about Year's Turning?" Laura glanced over at Inika and Mara Senez, returning from a treatment that would make their riotous curls more manageable, and then at their second Setari escort, the truly spectacular Zee Annan, who had not felt the need to have anything done to the long, silky braid she wore down her back. "That's the right name, yes? Year's Turning, for the celebration at mid-winter?"

  "Yes," Zee smiled and lifted a long, elegant hand. "It's not something we track on Tare or Kolar, since there is not such a marked seasonal shift, but we've commemorated mid-winter and mid-summer these last two years."

  "And because Cassandra decorates a tree in winter, much of Muina now does the same," Mara said, plopping down on the nearest chair. "In summer we give gifts of fruit and flowers. The years are so long here, so these mid-points are good to mark, and the small rituals make us feel we are honouring Muina."

  The Muinans believed their home planet was a living being, and Laura was about to delicately delve into the question of whether they honoured Tare and Kolar similarly, but was distracted by an instant message.

  Sue: Check this out.

  Laura followed the link accompanying the message, and found herself watching the World Figure Skating Championships, with muted English commentary overlaid by a man excitedly speaking in Muinan.

  "I wasn't expecting Serious Soldier to share it around," Sue said.

  "I expect Gidds attached it to a report," Laura said. "And from there the world, it seems."

  In the periphery of her vision Laura noticed Mara and Zee lift their heads and then exchange a brief but significant glance. Laura felt caught out, and then shook the reaction off. Gossip was inevitable. Gidds' first stay had probably been dismissed due to the weather, but there was no way he could have himself delivered to Arcadia before midnight and picked up the next day without someone putting two and two together. And whichever Setari had been assigned guard duty that night surely would have done so.

  Laura would absolutely not be happy if her sex life was the next thing to show up on Muinan news channels.

  "What is it shared around?" Inika asked.

  Sue provided the link and, while the three Muinan women gazed into the middle distance, settled back to allow the hairdresser to make some final adjustments.

  "Is it good?" the hairdresser—a man named Teffin—asked, tweaking a last stray hair into place.

  "It's brilliant," Sue said positively, eyeing herself with satisfaction.

  "Blue lemonade," Laura said. "With silver cachous floating in it."

  "Yes!" Sue ran her fingers through what had been her blond-brown hair, and was now deep blue at the scalp, gradually lightening to a white-aqua. Whenever she moved, tiny white motes shimmered and faded. "Or stars reflected in the surf running up a beach at night, which is what I was aiming for. I love it."

  "I do not at all understand what these people are doing," Anika commented. "They look like they're dancing on knives."

  "Is this common on Earth?" Mara asked. "It looks very difficult."

  "More common in colder countries than Australia," Sue said. "There's only a couple of ice skating rinks in Sydney."

  "The floor really is ice? You walk on ice with knives?"

  Sue explained as they finished up at the hairdressers.

  "You can do this?" Zee asked, sounding fascinated.

  "Me?" Sue laughed. "You won't ever catch me doing anything so athletic. I can stay upright on skates, but stopping is enough of a challenge."

  "I've never tried," Laura said. "Alyssa's quite good, though I suppose she's out of condition at the moment. She never reached elite competition level, but her younger sister is trying to qualify. For ladies' singles, though, not ice dancing, which is what they're showing at the moment."

  "If Cassandra had told us that Earth people dance on knives, I wouldn't have believed her," Mara said. "Although most of the other things she said turned out to be true. The 'volcano' and the 'tsunami'."

  "We ended up believing her about the psychics and the Ionoth, too," Laura said, amused.

  "Ignore her if she starts talking about drop-bears, though," Sue said, but then her eyes widened and she said: "I wonder if drop-bears would turn up as Ionoth on Earth, if there were tears into the Ena there."

  "I'm not sure it would be the highest-priority nightmare. Though, who knows?" Laura remembered all too well the single Ionoth she'd seen 'in person': a thing that looked like it had been made of nails and old tyres, attacking Cass and Kaoren.

  "Only a small number of the Ionoth that come through have any relation to the local environment," Mara said. "Shall we get going?"

  "Can we walk to the school?" Laura asked. "It's not far."

  Mara paused, eyes going distant, and then nodded.

  Laura: I will never be comfortable with the fact that they have to ask permission for us to take a ten-minute walk.

  Sue: A twenty-minute walk, Long Legs. Bu
t yes, they're over-the-top. The vast majority of people here love Cass, or are at least grateful to her, and have no reason to attack us. And kidnapping us to try to get hold of a Touchstone just isn't going to work. The most that they'd achieve is upsetting Cass if we got killed.

  Laura: Which is exactly why KOTIS guards us. What a quelling thought.

  Sue: Worst of all, having hot bodyguards involves far less sexytimes than the movies would have me believe.

  Laura just managed to keep herself from laughing aloud as she followed their hot bodyguards out of the building and onto Moon Piazza, which was the ritzy section of Pandora, rimmed with buildings that could well have been modelled on the Royal Crescent in Bath—and featuring a statue of Laura's daughter, sitting at the feet of Muina, which was never not going to fill Laura with complicated feelings.

  Pandora was a wonderful city to walk through. The Tarens and Kolarens had approached building their first city on their home planet by constructing an extensive subway system at the outset: a simple matter when reinforced tunnels could be directed to grow themselves. Most of the residential buildings were submerged into the hills, so that the 'suburbs' were miles of landscaped slopes with windows, and since air and hover transport was in common use, there was no need for paved roads. Instead the city featured walking paths alongside winding 'roads' of grass and flowers.

  Since walking through fields of flowers—especially flowers she'd never seen before—ranked high on Laura's list of favourite things, she enjoyed herself thoroughly, the trip only mildly marred by the small but increasing number of people who trailed along behind them. Fans of Mara and Zee, Sue blithely informed them, and repeated a few choice pieces of the running commentary that was apparently lighting up the interface.

  "It's difficult now that there are so many devices that do not have the same restrictions regarding image capture," Zee said. "The interest has always been there, and we knew it would inevitably include our children, but the spread of scans makes it feel more invasive."

  "Speaking of which," Inika said, with barely a glance behind them, "do you have any more scans from the water picnic, Sue?"

  They descended into an agreeable exchange of pictures as they walked through the most built-up section of Pandora, directly south of Moon Piazza. Here were large, blockish buildings, their stark white mass softened only a little by decorative patterning and the curving shapes of balconies. Pandora University, segueing into KOTIS headquarters, and then, at the edge of the lake, Pandora Shore School.

  The school grounds were surrounded by a high, patterned wall, and it was necessary to pass through a checkpoint to enter, which at least rid them of their travelling audience.

  "Nicely timed," Inika commented, as they strolled between playing fields and an auditorium. "The shoreline is lovely and peaceful here when the children are still in class."

  These were words to inevitably summon trouble, and were rewarded so splendidly that, as their route took them to an unbroken view of the lake, Laura could barely take in what was happening.

  Rocks. Boulders. Perhaps a dozen of them, ranging from the size of a suitcase to a small car. They spun in a wobbling double circle around the crouching figure of a young teenaged boy, and seemed to be picking up speed. A group of children on the far side of the scene broke and ran, but one boy—Laura recognised him as Shar, the older of Mara's two adopted sons—stepped neatly between the circling rocks and knelt beside the central figure, even as one of the larger stones spun out of formation and tumbled toward the scattering children.

  Knowing who stood a foot to her right, Laura only half-choked, and then let out a relieved sigh as the stone lifted directly up, and then planted itself gently away from anything. In rapid order, the other rocks were similarly dealt with, four at a time. Zee was an extremely strong Telekinetic.

  As soon as all the floating stone had been dealt with, Mara strode forward, not looking particularly surprised by the incident, and knelt beside her son, who was still talking gently to the apparent cause of the scene.

  "I don't understand why, if he lost control, the rocks didn't just all fall down," Laura said to Zee, before realising that the second member of their Setari escort had moved a few feet away, and was gazing into the distance with the abstract expression Muinans adopted when talking over the interface.

  "Because the stones were held up by Levitation, not Telekinesis," said a young, female voice helpfully. "Levitation is a manipulation of mass and gravity, and if that mass returns unevenly the result can be dangerous."

  Laura turned to find at least two dozen children in the brown and black uniforms of Kalrani—trainee Setari—crowding out of the door of the auditorium to stare interestedly at the scene...and Sue and Laura.

  "Thank you," Laura said, not sure which of the Kalrani had spoken. But then, meeting a pair of steady eyes, she was quite certain.

  It was the modelling of the skull around the temples that gave it away. That very morning she'd traced a mirror of those delicate hollows. The girl was regarding her with complete calm, and offered her the faintest of nods in apparent acknowledgement of Laura's recognition. Then she turned away in response to a teacher's summons, and Laura was left blinking after her.

  Since she had learned by this stage that Allidi was nearly thirteen, while Haelin had just turned nine, it was easy to guess identity, but Laura still confirmed by activating the interface function that allowed her to see people's names. Allidi Selkie.

  Sight Sight talents. That added a daunting layer of complexity to the whole 'he has kids' situation. Laura doubted Gidds had told them that he'd embarked upon an affair, but that brief nod of Allidi's had been an outright signal of awareness. And children, no matter how self-assured, or psychically talented, or how much of the year they spent in military boarding schools, deserved care and consideration. Even if what Laura and Gidds had started faded away after a few more weeks, the relationship could be confronting or upsetting for Allidi and Haelin—and Julian and Cass, Laura supposed, though being older she expected them to be more sanguine.

  Wondering if the girls' mother had also moved to Pandora, Laura trailed Inika and Sue down to where a small crowd of adults had descended from the air to take charge of the still-trembling Levitation talent—and a rather grey-in-the-aftermath Shar Annan.

  "I know well enough that you won't have been encouraging that scene, Shar," Mara was saying. "But what possessed you to do anything but evacuate those nearby?"

  "I was hoping I could keep him calm until there was a response to my alert," Shar said, rubbing his forehead. He was a deeply reserved boy, nearly sixteen by Earth metrics, and a rare survivor of Nuri's ruling class: a fact that—much to Mara's dismay—led many Nurans to treat him as an authority.

  "Do you mind if I stay with Dezar a while longer?" he asked Mara now. "I can catch the next shuttle."

  "So long as you're back in time for dinner," Mara told him, and watched with an expression caught between pride and exasperation as her son returned to the younger boy.

  "Send him to Tare," Inika said, unexpectedly.

  "What?"

  "You're never going to get them to stop turning to him to settle disputes, and he's the kind of boy that will step forward if he sees someone in need. Bringing him out to the islands means he has some time away from it, but he's still too in reach of the Nuran community. Send him to Tare."

  "I want him to have some peace, not exile him," Mara said, frowning after her son.

  "There's that seniority gap on Tare," Zee said, coming up for the last of the conversation. "They were looking for some of us to rotate back there. If you and Lohn transferred for every second Taren year, Shar would have a few months at a time free to be himself, instead of the heir-presumptive of a destroyed world. And if he follows the science stream, well Tare's an excellent place for higher studies."

  Mara looked irresolute, and further discussion was forestalled by the end of lessons for the day, and streams of students emerging—most heading past the audit
orium to the security gates, but several handfuls drifting down to the waiting island shuttles.

  "Unna!"

  Sen, head of a small crowd of her age group, raced down for a hug, and then caught sight of Sue's hair and squeaked with delight.

  "Looks awesome," Nick said, following in Sen's wake. "Like the ocean."

  Sue beamed approvingly at him, and then lifted her eyebrows as Maddy came up, looking a little drawn, and obviously engaged in some sort of argument with Alyssa.

  "Mrs Devlin," Maddy said to Laura, "Cass could make me a pair of skates, couldn't she? She can make anything."

  "And everything she makes like that goes poof," Alyssa said, firmly. "Not to mention there's no rink."

  "Ice is easy," Maddy said definitely. "Half the people I've met here can make ice. And Cass' projections don't vanish right away. I only need ten minutes to show them all I really can skate."

  "If Cassandra creates a projection of one of those bladed boots, we can scan it and have a stable copy manufactured," Zee pointed out helpfully. "So you can dance on blades, Maddy?"

  "It's easy."

  "You haven't recovered enough," Alyssa said.

  This, naturally, descended into a mild squabble. Maddy when healthy was headstrong and adventurous, and not at all inclined to treat her older sister as an authority. Sue did not technically have any more standing, but as head of household stepped in…and came down firmly on Maddy's side.

  "With the proviso that there's no attempts at any jumps," Sue said. "Spinning in a circle, and zooming backward with your leg stuck out is surely impressive enough for any disbelieving crowd. Though where this little demonstration is going to take place, who is going to produce the ice and manufacture your boots, I leave to wiser heads." She sent a conspiratorial glance in Zee's direction. "You'd like to try it yourself, I suspect."