Stellan wanted to choke on his. The last time a level-ten linesman had switched contracts, Lino Abeu had gone over to House of Sandhurst. Iwo Hurst had paid 10 million credits. Given Lambert’s reputation, Lyan should have offered somewhere between 2 and 5 million—enough to get Rigel interested. Lady Lyan wasn’t known for her largesse. She was looking for a quick solution.

  Stellan glanced over his shoulder, in time to see Rigel lick his lips and shake his head. “Paretsky will—”

  Neela said something Stellan didn’t catch.

  Rickenback said, “Does it matter what Paretsky thinks, Rigel? Can he offer you that sort of money?”

  “No one can offer that sort of money.”

  “You need to come with me,” Neela said.

  Stellan shook his head.

  “I’m still concerned about this deal,” Rickenback said. “That amount of money could almost be construed as a bribe. Regardless, Lambert is going to get something from this. Your portion is eighty percent, Lambert’s twenty percent. It’s up to you to agree.”

  Something sharp pricked Stellan’s side. He looked over at Neela.

  “Capraxis,” she said, still close to his ear. “On most people, it has no effect except to make them instantly drunk. If your stomach has been modified to convert alcohols to sugars, however, capraxis reacts with the contents of your stomach to make a nerve serum. You should start feeling the effects in about”—she looked at her comms—“four, three, seconds.”

  Stellan thumbed the emergency code into his comms. “You crazy—” He could already feel a numbing in his fingers. Or maybe that was psychosomatic. His finger muffed the last number. “What have you done?” except it came out unintelligibly, for he couldn’t move his mouth to form the words. He couldn’t feel his feet either.

  Two paramedics raced in with a stretcher. “Make way, make way.”

  It was too early for anyone to have called them.

  Neela caught Stellan as he fell, caught his comms with her free hand, and supported him until the paramedics reached them.

  “Why?” Stellan couldn’t articulate the word, but she seemed to understand. Or maybe she was guessing.

  “Perhaps you should have talked to me instead of listening in on lost causes. You might have found out.”

  The man who bundled Stellan onto the stretcher looked familiar. Stellan had last seen him the night someone had tried to snatch Lambert.

  Neela had to be the blue-haired woman who had been with them that night. Neela Cotterill.

  Rigel was still deep in conversation with Rickenback. He didn’t even notice them wheel the stretcher out.

  THIRTY

  EAN LAMBERT

  ABRAM SENT THROUGH a list of items that had been found on Professor Gerrard’s person. His comms had survived intact, and Ean breathed a sigh of relief at that. If the notes were anywhere, they’d be on his comms. Which was just as well, because Gerrard had kept a lot on his person. A chain he’d probably worn around his neck. It had a flat square plastic medallion hanging off it. At least three bracelets, four pieces of metal, two ceramic items, and a pair of pliers. Plus a tab of chocolimone, a pack of menthos, four cream biscuits, and a strip of jerky.

  Professor Gerrard had been fond of his snacks.

  “Can I see the comms?” Ean asked Abram. Or was the comms too obvious? “Could I see all of it?”

  “A dead man’s belongings,” Abram said. “Part of an investigation? You’d need a good reason, Ean.”

  He didn’t have a good reason. “I was trying to trace the ship Redmond found. I thought they might have found it through whatever Gerrard discovered. Gerrard might have kept a copy of whatever he gave Redmond. If he did, he probably kept it close; otherwise, Orsaya would have found it.”

  Abram blew out his breath. “Maybe. It’s worth a try. I’ll send someone up with the items.”

  He didn’t mention the obvious. Like, if they really wanted to know what Gerrard had found, they should just hand them over to Orsaya. If she thought there was something, she’d find it.

  Ean was grateful for that.

  * * *

  VEGA insisted on being present when Gerrard’s personal effects arrived.

  She pulled the knife out of her belt to pick through the contents. “The man liked his sweets sweet,” she said, pursing her mouth at the chocolimone. “And in quantity . . . hello, what have we got here?”

  She lifted the chain out of the box.

  “A neck chain,” Ean said. Would Vega mind if he took the comms now? Or should he wait until she gave the all clear.

  Vega put down her knife to hold the chain by the square that dangled from it. The black was faded in places, which meant the plastic was old. It was an ugly thing to wear around your neck, but who was Ean to talk? He didn’t wear jewelry.

  “I wonder.” Vega did something with both hands. The little square seemed to snap—or that’s what it looked like to Ean—then he realized it hadn’t snapped, she’d opened it.

  Vega’s voice held wonder. “I haven’t seen one of these outside a museum. Or my own collection.” She stood up and moved over to her collection of weapons. To one particular weapon that Sale had told him was pre-expansion. Beside the weapon, in a clear case fixed to the wall, were two items—a metal key and a small piece of plastic that looked a lot like the one Vega carried in her hand.

  “Gerrard carried part of an old weapon with him?” It didn’t make sense to Ean.

  “No.” Vega compared the two. “They’re storage devices. This particular one”—she tapped the plastic on the wall—“carried the instructions and codes for this.” She tapped the weapon. “This one.” She looked down at the square in her hand. “Who knows what this one might hold.”

  Ean knew, with a sudden, line-dizzying certainty. “Vega. You are a genius.”

  * * *

  THEY couldn’t read the records.

  Even though he knew it was preline, Ean tried to coax the lines into giving up the information to him. They didn’t understand what he wanted. To the lines, there were no records.

  When he left for line training the next day, the tiny storage device was still unread.

  He was halfway through line training when he realized who could help.

  “Favager,” he said to Radko, making the trainees look at him strangely. He was used to that, although he wasn’t getting as many strange looks as he had at the start. “You remember Clemence Favager. We met her on the way up to the Night Owl. She loves Old Earth. If anyone will know how we can read it, she will.”

  He called Favager as soon as he got back to the Lancastrian Princess.

  Favager looked at him with interest. “Linesman. What can I do for you?”

  “Do you have anything that can read preline databases?”

  “Depends. From where?”

  Did it matter?

  Favager might have been reading his mind. “Earth technology moved on, but new worlds didn’t. They were too busy trying to survive.”

  Gerrard had been from Ruon. Was it safe to assume the reading device was from there? “Ruon.” Then he added, “Maybe.”

  “Ruon. I might not have anything that old. Let me see what I’ve got.”

  * * *

  DESPITE her misgivings, Favager did have something. She delivered the reader personally. Vega accompanied her to the small meeting room and stayed while Favager set up the reader for Ean.

  “You need to be careful,” Favager said. “Use the wrong reader, and you can do untold damage. Even wipe the records.”

  “I appreciate your coming out this way to help,” Ean said.

  “Not a problem,” Favager said cheerfully. “Anyone who wants to read old records, I’m interested.”

  Most people would have used it as an excuse to talk to Michelle. Ean thought Favager genuinely meant what she said.

  “Provided I get to control the equipment, mind. They don’t make readers like this anymore.” She finished setting up. “Let’s look at your data.”

  Ean looked at Vega. He didn’t have the plastic knowledge store. She did. Vega silently handed it over.

  Favager made some adjustments. “First Wave.” She sounded impressed. She adjusted more. “It’s old, even by Earth standards.”

  Information scrolled onto the screen. Favager looked as pleased as if she’d performed a miracle by herself. “And here we have it.”

  Ean and Vega moved in to read over her shoulder.

  “Ship records,” Vega said. “No, wait. Metal. Scrap metal.”

  “It’s the records of a shipyard,” Favager said. “This is amazing. And they kept such meticulous detail. Every ship or piece of metal that passed through.”

  “He or she had a tidy mind,” Vega said.

  Ean would have called it obsessive, for the next record was for four screws, but both commodores nodded approvingly.

  How could they find if one of those ships was an alien ship? “Can we search?”

  Favager did something on the screen.

  “Let’s look for Havortian.”

  “Havortian,” Favager said. “This is getting interesting suddenly.”

  That search revealed nothing.

  Ean looked at the records in front of him. Metal, scrap. What did they know about alien ships?

  “Hexagonal shapes.” The composition. They tried them all.

  Nothing.

  What did he know about the Havortian from his line-training days? Havortian had bought his piece of alien ship from Red Javed, who had owned a scrap-metal business on one of the smaller planets in the Chamberley system. His clientele had been prospectors looking for minerals, and small cargo ships that traded between worlds. He was known for one thing. He’d sold the most famous piece of scrap metal in history to a man named Havortian.

  “Try Red Javed.”

  Favager added the search code. “No Red Javed,” she said, “but on landing date 82.189, some scrap metal was sold to a man named Kai Javed.”

  Vega tapped something into her comms and nodded at what was returned. “Kai Javed was Red Javed’s father.”

  “I’ll be—” Favager said. “Look at the manifest here.”

  And there it was. A piece of metal ten meters by six by six, sold to one Kai Javed. Part of a ship that had been broken down for scrap.

  “Let’s track this beastie down.” Favager’s fingers flew over the controls. “Here’s what he paid for it.”

  Ean read over her shoulder. “Received in return from Javed. One damaged cargo container, forty-five by ten by twenty. Steel-ceramic. Hull breached, obvious impact from multiple meteor storms. Internal chamber contained three percent oxygen, two percent nitrogen. Cargo of fifty Earth sheep, dead.” Even the composition of air had been documented. “I wonder.” He called up the specs of the Eleven on his own comms. “Search on this combination. Oxygen, nitrogen, xenon, and radon.”

  Those were the gases common to the alien ships before they changed them to suit human bodies.

  It took five minutes. When it came up they stared at it for twice that time. Every piece of scrap that came into the salvage yard had been documented in detail.

  Here, in front of them, were plans and vids and notes of the Havortian.

  “I don’t understand how they didn’t realize the ship was alien,” Ean said.

  “I do,” Favager said. “Now line ships are made by two factories, and they all look the same. But back in those days, everyone designed their own ships. They were unique. Furthermore, I’ve heard that if you’re not a linesman, you can’t hear the boards. You can’t even tell that half of them are boards.”

  “Admiral Galenos needs to see this,” Vega said. “Can you copy it?”

  “Sure.” Favager pulled a small device out of her bag and connected the reader to Vega’s comms. “Wouldn’t mind being there when you tell him.”

  She handed over the copy. It hadn’t taken long.

  Vega hesitated, then, “Why not do it now?” She looked at Radko, standing at ease close to the wall, and nodded at Radko’s comms. Radko handed it over. Vega handed it to Favager. “Spacer Radko can go back with you.”

  Favager copied the files again.

  “I’ll let Galenos know you’re coming,” Vega said.

  Ean went down with them to the shuttle.

  “Thank you,” he said to Favager.

  “My pleasure. Anytime you want old records deciphered, talk to me.”

  He would, too.

  It felt strange to see Radko go off in a shuttle without him. He watched the lights recycle back to green before he turned away.

  “Linesman Lambert,” Vega said, as he started toward his quarters. “Next time you invite all and sundry from other fleets to assist in your research, I want to know about it first. Understand?”

  “Understood,” Ean said.

  THIRTY-ONE

  EAN LAMBERT

  BY NOW, EAN knew what line each of the single-level linesmen was. Mael was the only nine. There were three eights, two sevens, ten sixes, nine fives, twelve fours, five threes and eight twos. Technically, Tinatin was a single-level line as well, the solitary one.

  It was time to introduce them to their ship.

  He traveled with them in the first shuttle, and used Fergus’s unclenched hands as a barometer to know when they should all be hearing the lines.

  “We should sing,” he said. “A greeting to the ship we’re going to. You know the Eleven.

  “All of you sing,” he said. “Sing to all the lines you know. Greet the ship. You don’t have to start at one.”

  Tinatin didn’t bother singing anything but one. Mael sang them all, but only became animated when he got to the sonorous song of nine. Ean sang them all, too, but gave lines ten and eleven a little more. After all, who else did they have to sing to?

  “We’re coming. I’m bringing your crew.”

  The lines made a happy chorus of pleasure back.

  “Next time maybe you should wait till we’re on the ship before you do that,” Radko said, after he was done. “Oxygen’s harder to get to on the shuttle. It’s in the suits.”

  There were oxygen canisters fastened to the wall, but there wouldn’t have been enough to go around.

  “Sorry.” Line eleven had been calm. It was trying not to break these fragile little lines but no one seemed to understand that except Ean. He sang a song of apologetic consolation. Eleven and the other lines swirled around in the song, reassuring him, telling him it was fine, and they would manage.

  He stopped singing when the safety chimed for landing, to find the whole shuttle silent, staring at him.

  “What did I do?” he asked Radko. He hadn’t had that kind of freak reaction for weeks. Except for Vega, and hers was monster, not freak.

  Radko shook her head. “I’m no linesman, but it sounded impressive. Harmonious.”

  “You’re a one-man choir,” Fergus said, unbuckling and standing up as the all clear came on. “To me it sounds as if you’re amplifying the lines, but a human larynx can’t do that. Not all those different sounds at once. I think you’re pushing the lines straight into here.” He tapped his head. “It’s a bit like telepathy.”

  “Telepathy isn’t like that,” Tinatin said as she followed them out. “Telepathy is useful. You can talk to each other. This is just singing.”

  “Ah, Tinatin. Maybe you should try listening to the words of the song.”

  “The Hello Song,” one of the sixes said as they followed them out. “I feel like I’m back at junior school. You know, where they make you learn the letters of the alphabet and numbers.”

  Ean hid his smile. That was exactly what it was.

  Sale and her crew waited for them on board.

  On ship, the strength of line eleven stopped most of the multilevel lines. Ean gave them time to recover.

  “Do you want to say anything?” he asked Kari Wang.

  She shook her head. “I want to observe their reactions.”

  Ean looked at Sale. She always had something to say.

  “Oxygen,” Sale said, and raised her voice to the new crew. “You all know the drill by now. Look around for the nearest oxygen cylinders. You’ll find there are plenty on board in the main compartments between here and the bridge, not so many in the lesser-used rooms. For the moment, stick together and don’t get lost. It’s a big ship. It could take us days to find you.”

  As a joke it fell flat, for Ean knew he could ask the lines where the crew were. He rubbed his nose and didn’t say anything.

  “Right,” said Sale. “They’re all yours, Ean.”

  They stopped in the main rec room, so the crew could look at the huge image on the wall.

  “There’s one on every ship,” Ean said. “Usually in a large room like this but not on the bridge.”

  He moved over to Tinatin while they looked at it. “How does this ship feel to you?”

  She looked at him as if wondering if he meant what he’d asked.

  “I mean it. I want to know how it feels to you.”

  Another soldier said, “Tinatin is all—”

  “T’Fika,” Kari Wang said sharply. “No negative comments.”

  T’Fika subsided, scowling.

  Ean saw the hint of an approving smile on Mael’s face. “What does the ship feel like?” he asked Tinatin.

  “You always ask me.” She crossed her arms and glared at them both. “What does it feel like to you, Mael?”

  He considered the question. “Itchy,” he said finally. “Like a band that likes to be stretched but isn’t.”

  At least half a dozen of his crewmates turned to look at him.

  “No it doesn’t,” Mikaelsson said. “It’s rusty, like a piece of metal on a planet that’s been exposed to oxygen, and it’s starting to rust.”

  “It’s resting.” Misty Dubicki was one of the single eights. “Waiting to be useful.”