The Crystal Singer

CHAPTER 6

It was bad enough to be whisked away as if she'd committed a crime, but the meditechs kept asking if she felt faint or hot or cold, as if she was negligent when she denied any physical discomfort. Therefore, she could scarcely admit to a sense of vitality she had never previously experienced, to the fact that everything about her, even their plain green tunics, had taken on a new luster, that her fingers twitched to touch, her ears vibrated to minute sounds. Most of all, she wanted to shout her exultation in octaves previously impossible for the human voice.

The extreme anticlimax came when the chief meditech, a graceful woman with dark hair braided into an elaborate crown, wanted Killashandra to submit to the physical scanner.

“I don't need a scanner. I have never felt so well!”

“The symbiont can be devious, my dear Killashandra, and only the scanner can tell us that. Do please lie down. You know it doesn't take long, and we really need an accurate picture of your present physical well-being.”

Killashandra stifled her sudden wish to scream and submitted. She was in such euphoria that the claustrophobic feel of the helmet didn't bother her, nor did the pain threshold nerve jab do more than make her giggle.

“Well, Killashandra Ree,” Antona said, absently smoothing a strand into her coronet, “you are the lucky one.” Her smile as she assisted Killashandra to her feet was the warmest the young woman had seen from a full Guild member. “We'll just make certain this progress has no set backs. Come with me and I'll show you your room.”

“I'm all right? I thought there'd be some fever.”

“There may be fever in your future,” Antona said, smiling encouragingly as she guided Killashandra down a wide hall.

Killashandra hesitated, wrinkling her nose against the odors that assailed her now: dank sweat, urine, feces, vomit, and as palpable as the other stenches, fear.

“Yes,” Antona said, observing her pause, “I expect it'll take time for you to become accustomed to augmented olfactory senses. Fortunately, that's not been one of my adaptations. I can still smell, would have to in my profession, but odors don't overwhelm me. I've put you at the back, away from the others, Killashandra. You can program the air conditioner to mask all this.”

Noises, too, assaulted Killashandra. Despite thick sound deadening walls, she recognized one voice.

“Rimbol!” She twisted to the right and was opening the door before Antona could stop her.

The young Scartine, his back arched in a convulsion, was being held to the bed by two strong meditechs. A third was administering a spray to Rimbol's chest. In the two days since she had seen him, he had lost weight, turned an odd shade of soft yellow, and his face was contorted by the frenzy that gripped his body.

“Not all have an easy time,” Antona said, taking her by the arm.

“Easy time!” Killashandra resisted Antona's attempt to draw her from the room. “The fax said satisfactory. Is this condition considered satisfactory?”

Antona regarded Killashandra. «Yes, in one respect, his condition is satisfactory – he's maintaining his own integrity with the symbiont. A massive change is occurring physically: an instinctive rejection on his part, a mutation of the symbiont's. The computers prognosis gives Rimbol an excellent chance of making a satisfactory adjustment.»

“But . . .” Killashandra couldn't drag her eyes from Rimbol's writhing body. “Will I go like that, too?”

Antona ducked her head, hiding her expression, an evasion that irritated Killashandra.

“I don't think that you will, Killashandra, so don't fret. The results of the latest scan must be analyzed, but my initial reading indicates a smooth adaptation. You'll be the first to know otherwise. Scant consolation, perhaps, but you would barge in here.”

Killashandra ignored the rebuke. “Have you computed how long he'll be like that?”

“Yes, another day should see him over the worst of the penetration.”

“And Jezerey?”

Antona looked blankly at Killashandra. «Oh, the girl who collapsed in the hangar yesterday? She's fine – I amend that.» Antona smiled conciliatorily. «She is suffering from a predictable bout of hyperthermia at the moment and is as comfortable as we can make her.»

“Satisfactory, in fact?” Killashandra was consumed by bitterness for that misleading category but allowed Antona to lead her out of Rimbol's room.

“Satisfactory in our terms and experience, yes. There are degrees, you must understand, of severity with which the symbiont affects the host and with which the host rejects the symbiont.” Antona shrugged. “If we knew all the ramifications and deviations, it would be simple to recruit only those candidates with the requisite chromosomes. It isn't that simple, though our continuous research gets closer and closer to defining exact parameters.” She gave Killashandra another of her warm smiles. “We're much better at selection than we used to be.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Long enough to know how lucky you are. And to hope that you'll continue so fortunate. I work generally with self treating patients, since I find the helpless depress me. Here we are.”

Antona opened a door at the end of the corridor and started to retrace her steps. Killashandra caught her arm.

“But Rimbol? I could see him?”

Another expressive shrug. “If you wish. Your belongings will be along shortly. Go settle in,” she said more kindly. “Program the air conditioner and rest. There's nothing more to be done now. I'll inform you of the analysis as soon as I have the results.”

“Or I'll inform you,” Killashandra said with wry humor.

“Don't dwell on the possibility,” Antona advised her.

Killashandra didn't. The room, the third she'd had in as many weeks, was designed for ease in dealing with patients, though all paraphernalia was absent. The lingering odors of illness seeped in from the hall, and the room seemed to generate antiseptic maskers. It took Killashandra nearly an hour to find a pleasant counter odor with which to refresh her room. In the process, she learned how to intercept fax updates on the conditions of the other patients. Never having been ill or had occasion to visit a sick friend, she didn't have much idea of what the print out meant, but as the patients were designated by room number, she could isolate Rimbol's. His monitor showed more activity than the person in the next room, but she couldn't bring herself to find out who his neighbor was.

That evening, Antona visited her room, head at a jaunty angle, the warm smile on her face.

“The prognosis is excellent. There'll be no fever. We are keeping you on a few days just to be on the safe side. An easy transition is not always a safe one.” A chime wiped the smile from her face. “Ah, another patient. Excuse me.”

As soon as the door closed, Killashandra turned on the medical display. At the bottom, a winking green line warned of a new admission. That was how Killashandra came to see Borton being wheeled into the facility. The following day, Shillawn was admitted. The fax continued to display “satisfactory” after everyone's condition. She supposed she agreed, having become fascinated with the life-signal graphs until the one on Rimbol's neighbor unexpectedly registered nothing at all.

Killashandra ran down the hall. The door of the room was open, and half a dozen technicians could be seen bent over the bed. Antona wasn't among them, but Killashandra caught a glimpse of Carigana's wide-eyed face.

Whirling, she stormed into the chief medic's office. Antona was hunching over an elaborate console, her hands graceful even in rapid motion on the keys.

“Why did Carigana die?” Killashandra demanded.

Without looking up from the shifting lights of the display, Antona spoke. “You have privileges in this Guild, Killashandra Ree, but not one gives you the right to disturb a chief of any rank. Nor me at this time. I want to know why she died more than you possibly could!”

Rightly abashed, Killashandra left the office. She hurried back to her room, averting her eyes as she passed the open door to Carigana's. She was ashamed of herself, for she didn't genuinely care that Carigana was dead, only that she had died. The space worker had really been an irritant, Killashandra thought candidly. Death had been a concept dealt with dramatically in the Music Center, but Carigana was Killashandra's first contact with that reality. Death could also happen to her, to Rimbol, and she would be very upset if he died. Even if Shillawn died.

How long Killashandra sat watching the life-signs' graphs, trying to ignore the discontinued one, she did not know. A courteous rap on the door was immediately followed by Antona's entrance, and her weary expression told Killashandra that quite a few hours must have passed. Antona leaned against the door frame, expelling a long sigh.

"To answer your question – ''

"I apologize for my behavior – "

“We don't know why Carigana died,” Antona went on, inclining her head to accept the apology. “I have a private theory with no fact to support it. An intuition, if you will that the desire to be acceptable, to surrender to the symbiont is as necessary to the process of adjustment as the physical stamina, which Carigana had, and those chromosomes which we have established as most liable to produce a favorable adaptation. You did want to become a Crystal Singer very much, didn't you?”

“Yes, but so do the others.”

“Do they? Do they really?” Antona's tone was curiously wistful.

Killashandra hesitated, only too aware of the inception of her own desire to become a Crystal Singer. If Antona's theory held any merit, Killashandra should also be dead, certainly not so blatantly healthy.

“Carigana didn't like anything. She questioned everything,” Killashandra said, drawn to give Antona what comfort she could. “She didn't have to become a Crystal Singer.”

«No, she could have stayed in space.» Antona smiled thinly, pushed herself away from the wall, and then saw the graphs on the display. «So that's how you knew. Well» – and she tapped the active graph in the left-hand corner – «that's your friend, Rimbol. He's more than just satisfactory now. The others are proceeding nicely. You can pack your things. I've no medical reason to keep you here longer. You'll be far better off learning the techniques of staying alive in your profession, my dear, than sitting death watch here. Officially, you're Lanzecki's problem now. Someone's coming for you.»

“I'm not going to get sick?”

“Not you. You've had what's known as a Milekey transition. Practically no physical discomfort and the maximum adjustment. I wish you luck, Killashandra Ree. You'll need it.” Antona was not smiling. Just then, the door opened wider. “Trag?” The chief meditech was surprised, but her affability returned, that moment of severity so brief that Killashandra wondered if she had imagined it. “I shall undoubtedly be seeing you again, Killashandra.”

She slipped out of the room as an unsmiling man of medium build entered. His first look at her was intent, but she'd survived the scrutiny of too many conductors to be daunted.

“I don't have much to pack,” she said, unsmiling. She slid off the bed and swiftly gathered her belongings. He saw the lute before she picked it up, and something flickered across his face. Had he once played one? She stood before him, carisak over her shoulder, aware that her heart was thumping. She glanced at the screen, her eyes going to Rimbol's graph. How much longer before he was released? She nodded to Trag and followed him from the room.

Killashandra was soon to learn that Trag was reticent by nature, but as they made their way down the infirmary corridors, she was relieved to be conducted in silence. Too much had happened to her too fast. She realized now that she had feared her own life-signs would suddenly appear on the medical display. The sudden reprieve from that worry and her promotion out of the infirmary dazed her. She did not appreciate until later that Trag, chief assistant to the Guild Master in charge of training Crystal Singers, did not normally escort them.

As the lift panel closed an the infirmary level, Trag took her right hand and fastened a thin metal band around her wrist

“You must wear this to identify you until you've been in the ranges.”

“Identify me?” The band fitted without hindering wrist movement, but the alloy felt oddly harsh on her skin. The sensation disappeared in seconds, so that Killashandra wondered if she had imagined the roughness.

“Identify you to your colleagues. And admit you to Singer privacies.”

Some inflection in his voice made the blood run hot to her cheeks but his expression was diffident. At that point, the lift panels opened.

“And it permits you to enter the Singer levels. There are three. This is the main one with all the general facilities.” She stepped with him into the vast, vaulted, subtly lit lobby. She felt nerves that had been strung taut in the infirmary begin to relax in moments. Massive pillars separated the level into sections and hallways. “The lift shaft,” Trag continued, “is the center of these levels of the complex Catering, large-screen viewing, private dining, and assembly rooms are immediately about the shaft. Individual apartments are arranged in color quadrants, with additional smaller lifts to all other levels at convenient points on the outer arc. Your rooms are in the blue quadrant. This way.” He turned to the left and she followed.

“Are these my permanent quarters?” she asked, thinking how many she had had since meeting Carrik.

“With the Guild, yes.”

Once again, she caught the odd inflection in his voice. She supposed it must have something to do with her being out of the infirmary before any of the others of her class. She was curiously disjointed. She had experienced that phenomenon before, at the Music Center, on days when no one could remember lines or entrances or sing in correct tempi. One simply got through such times as best one could. And on this, certainly a momentous one in her life, acquiescence was difficult to achieve.

She nearly ran into Trag, who had halted before a door on the right-hand side of the hall. She was belatedly aware that they had passed recesses at intervals.

“This apartment is assigned to you.” Trag pointed to the lock plate.

Killashandra pressed her thumb to the sensitized area. The panel slid back.

“Use what is left of the morning to settle in and initiate your personal program. Use whatever code you wish: personal data is always voice coded. At 1400 hours, Concera will escort you to the cutter technician. He'll have no excuse not to outfit you quickly.”

Killashandra noted the cryptic remark and wondered if everyone would address her comments she couldn't understand yet apparently ought to. As she mused on what “ought to” had accomplished for her, Trag was striding back down the hall.

She closed the panel, flicked on the privacy light, and surveyed her permanent Guild quarters. Size might denote rank here as on other worlds. The main room here was twice the size of her ample recruit accommodation. To one side was a sleeping chamber that was apparently all bed. A door on one wall was open to a mirrored dressing area that, in turn, led into a hygiene unit with a sunken tank sprouting an unusual number of taps and dials. On the other side of the main room was a storage closet larger than her student room on Fuerte and a compact dining and self-catering area.

“Yarran beer, please.” She spoke more to make noise in the sterile and ringingly quiet place. The catering slot opened to present a beaker of the distinctive ruddy beer.

She took the drink to the main room, sipping as she frowned at the utilitarian furnishings. Laying her lute carefully on a chair, she let her carisak slip off her shoulder and onto the floor, seized by an urge to throw her possessions around the stark apartment, just to make it look lived in.

Here she was, Killashandra Ree, installed in spacious grandeur, achieving status as a Crystal Singer, that fearsome and awful being, a silicate spider, a crystal cuckoo with a luxurious nest. This very afternoon, she was to be tuned to a Cutter that would permit her to slice Ballybran crystal, earn stunning totals of galactic credits, and she would cheerfully have traded the whole mess for the sound of a friendly voice.

“Not that I'm certain I have a friend anywhere,” she said.

“Recording?”

The impersonal voice, neither tenor nor contralto, startled her. The full beaker of beer trembled in her hand.

“Personal program.” That was what Trag had meant. She was to record those facts of her life that she wished to remember in those future times when singing crystal would have scrambled her memory circuits.

“Recording?”

“Yes, record and store to voice print only.”

As she gave such facts as her date and place of birth, the names of her parents, grandparents, sisters, and brothers, the extent and scope of her education, she stalked about the main room, trying to find exactly the right spot in which to display her lute.

“On being awarded a grant, I entered the Music Center.” She paused to laugh. How soon did one begin to forget what one wished to forget?

“Right now!”

“Recording?”

“End of recording. Store.” And that was that. She knew she could reconsider, but she didn't want to remember those ten years. She could now wipe them out. She would. As far as she would be ever after, hence forth, and forever more concerned, nothing of moment happened after the grant award until she encountered Carrik. Those ten years of unremitting labor and dedication to ambition had never occurred to Killashandra Ree, Cutter in the Heptite Guild.

To celebrate her emancipation from an inglorious past, Killashandra dialed another beer. The digital indicated an hour remained before Concera was to take her to the appointment. She ordered what was described as a hearty, nourishing soup of assorted legumes. She checked her credit, something she must not forget to do regularly, and found herself still in the black. If she were to enter the rest of the Guild voucher and her open ticket, she would have quite a healthy balance. To be consumed by the equipment of a Crystal Singer. She'd keep those credits free.

That reminded her of Shillawn, and of other credit-debit discussions. She keyed the Guild's commissary, ordered additional furnishings, rugs of the Ghni weavers, and by 1400, when Concera touched her door chime, Killashandra had wall-screens that mixed the most unlikely elements from an ice-world to the raving flora of the voracious Eobaron planets. Startling, but a complete change from sterility.

Concera, a woman of medium height and slender build, glided into the main room, exclaimed at the sight of the wall-screens, and looked questioningly at Killashandra.

"Oh, aren't you clever? I would never have thought of combining different worlds." Do come right along. He has such a temper at the best of times, but without his skill, we, the Singers I mean, would be in a terrible way. He is a superior craftsman, which is why one humors his odd temper. This way."

Concera covered quite a bit of ground with her gliding gait, and Killashandra had to stretch her legs to keep pace.

«You'll get to know where everything is very soon. It's nice to be by oneself, I feel, instead of in a pack, but then different people have different tastes,» and Concera peered sideways at Killashandra to see if she agreed. «Of course, we come from all over the galaxy, so one is bound to find someone compatible. This is the eighth level where most of the technical work is done – naturally the cutters are made here, as they are the most technical of all. Here we are.»

Concera paused at the open entrance and, with what seemed unexpected courtesy, pushed Killashandra ahead of her into a small office with a counter across the back third and a door leading into a workshop. Her entry must have triggered an alarm in the workroom, for a man, his sun reddened face set in sour lines, appeared in the doorway.

“You're this Killashandra?” he demanded. He beckoned to her and then saw Concera following. “You, I told you you'd have to wait, Concera. There's no point, no point at all, in making you a handle for three fingers. You'll only outgrow it, and there's all that work could be put to better use.”

"I thought it might be a challenge for you – "

“I've all the challenges I need, Concera.” He replied with such vehemence that when he returned his stare to Killashandra, she wondered if his disagreement with the woman would spill over on to her. “Let me see your hands.”

Killashandra held them, palm up, over the counter. He raised his eyebrows as he felt with strong impersonal fingers across the palm, spread her fingers to see the lack of webbing from constant practice, the hard muscle along the flat of the hand and thumb pad.

“Used your hands right, you have.” He shot another glance at Concera.

It was only then that Killashandra noticed that the first two fingers on Concera's left hand had been sheared off. The stumps were pinkish white, healed flesh but oddly shaped. It occurred to Killashandra in a rush that made her stomach queasy that the two missing digits were regenerating.

«If you stay, you be quiet. If you go, you won't be tempted. This'll take two – three hours.»

Concera elected to leave, which had no positive effect on the morose technician. Killashandra had naively assumed that tuning a cutter would be a simple matter, but it was a tedious process, taking several days. She had to read aloud for a voice print from boring printout on the history and development of the cutting devices. She learned more than she needed to know – some of the more complicated mechanisms proved unreliable in extremes of weather; a once-popular model was blamed for the high-voltage discharge which had carbonized the corpse Killashandra saw on Shankill. The most effective and reliable cutter, refined from Barry Milekey's crude original, required that the user have perfect pitch. It was a piezoelectric device that converted the Crystal Singer's vocal note and rhythm into high frequency shock waves on an infrasonic carrier. The cutting edge of the shock wave was pitched by the Singer to the dominant tone of the «struck» crystal face.

Once set to a voice pattern, the infrasonic device could not be altered. Manufacture of such cutters was restricted to the Guild and safeguarded yet again by computer assembly, the program coding known only by the Guild Master and his executive assistant.

As Concera had mentioned, the technician was a temperamental man. When Killashandra was reading aloud, he was complaining about various grievances with the Guild and its members. Concera and her request for a three fingered handle was currently his favorite gripe – «Concera is cack-handed, anyway, and always splitting her grips.» Another was that he ought to have had another three weeks fishing before returning to work. The fish had just started to bite, and would she now sing an octave in C.

"She sang quite a few octaves in various keys and decided that there were worse audiences than apparently receptive audition judges. She hadn't used her voice since the day she met Carrik; she was sore in the gut from supporting tone and aware the sound was harsh.

When Concera glided into the room, Killashandra was overwhelmingly relieved.

“Back tomorrow, same time. I'll do casts of your good ten fingers.” And the man sent an arch glance at Concera.

Concera hurried Killashandra out of the workshop and the office.

«He does like his little jokes,» she said, leading the way down one corridor and left at the next. «I only wanted a little favor so I could go back into the ranges without wasting so much time.» She entered a room labeled «Training,» sighing as she closed the door and flicked on the privacy light. «Still» – and she gave Killashandra a bright smile, her eyes sliding from a direct contact – «we have your training to take in hand.» She waved Killashandra to one of the half-dozen chairs in the room facing a large hologram projector. She picked up a remote control unit from a shelf, darkening the room and activating the projector. The outsized lettering of the Guild's rules, regulations, and precepts hovered before them. «You may have had a Milekey transition, but there's no easy way to get over this.»

"Tukolom – "

“Tukolom handles only basic information, suitable for anyone joining the Guild in any capacity.” Concera's voice had a note of rancor. “Now you must specialize and repeat and repeat.” Concera sighed. “We all have to,” she added, her voice expressing patient resignation. “If it's any consolation to you, I'd be doing this by myself and I've always found it much easier to explain than memorize.” Her voice lightened. “You'll hear even the oldest singers muttering regs and restricts any night in the Commons Hall. Of course, you'll never appreciate this drill until it's vital! When you reach that point, you won't remember how you know what you do. Because that's when you really know nothing else.”

Despite Concera's persuasive tone, Killashandra found the reasoning specious. Having no choice in study program or teacher, Killashandra set herself to memorize regulations about working claims, claiming faces, interference with claims, reparations and retributions, fines and a clutter of other rules for which she could see no need since they were obvious to anyone with any sense.

When she returned to the privacy of her quarters and the anomalies of her wall-screens, she checked with the infirmary and was told that Rimbol was weak but had retained all his senses. Shillawn, Borton, and Jezerey were satisfactory, in the proper use of that word. Killashandra also managed to extract from data retrieval the fact that injured Singers like Concera and Borella undertook the role of preceptor because of the bonus involved. That explained the spiteful remarks and ambivalent poses.

The next morning, when Concera drilled her on her understanding of each section of the previous day's subjects, Killashandra had the notion that Concera silently recited paragraph and section just one step ahead of her pupil.

The afternoon was spent uncomfortably, in the workshop of the fisherman, where casts were made of her hands. The Fisher maundered on about having to make hundreds of casts during a Singer's lifetime. He told her she wasn't to complain to him about blisters from hand grips an affliction that he alleged was really caused by a muscling up that wasn't any fault of his. Killashandra spent that evening redecorating her room.

She had a morning drill with Concera, spent a half hour with the Fisher, who grumbled incessantly about a bad morning's fishing, the inferiority of the plastic he had to work with, and the privileges of rank. Killashandra decided that if she were to ruffle at every cryptic remark tossed her way, she'd be in a state of constant agitation. The remainder of the afternoon, Concera reviewed her on crystal shapes, tones, and the combinations that were marketable at the moment: black crystals in any form always having the highest value. Killashandra was to review the catalog, commit to memory which shape was used for what end product, the range in price, and the parameters of value variation in each color. She was taken through the research departments, which sought new uses for Ballybran crystal. There she noticed several people with the eye adjustment of Enthor.

In the days that followed, she was given instruction in the sled-simulator, “flying” against mach storm winds. By the end of the first lesson, she was as battered, sweaty, and trembling as if the flight had been genuine.

“You'll have to do better than that,” the instructor commented unsympathetically as she reeled out of the simulator. “Take a half hour in the tank and come back this afternoon.”

“Tank?”

“Yeah, the tank. The radiant fluid. Left-hand taps. Go on! I'll expect you back at 1500.”

Killashandra muttered the terse instructions all the way back to her rooms, shedding her clothes as she made her way to the tank. She turned on the left-hand taps, and a viscous liquid oozed out. She got the temperature she wanted and dubiously lowered herself into the tank. In minutes, tension and stress left her muscles, and she lay, buoyed by the radiant bath, until the stuff cooled. That afternoon, her instructor grudgingly admitted that she had improved.

A few days later, half a morning through a solo training flight across the White Sea where thermal patterns made good practice, every visual warning device on the controls turned red, and a variety of sirens, klaxons, bells, and nerve-tinglers was activated. Killashandra immediately veered northeast to the Guild Complex and was relieved when half the monitors desisted. The rest blared or blinked until she had landed the sled on its rack and turned off the power. When she complained to her instructor about the warning overload, he gave her a long, scathing look.

“You can't be warned too often about the approach of turbulence,” he said. “You Singers might be as deaf as some of us no matter how we rig cautions. While you remember advice, remember this: a mach storm won't give you a second chance. We do our fardling best to insure that you have at least one. Now change your gear for cargo handling. A blow's on the way!”

He strode off, waving to attract attention from a cluster of hangar personnel.

The storm was not rated Severe and only the southeast section of the continent had been alerted. Forty Singers had logged out in that general area, and thirty-nine straggled in. The flight and hangar officers were conferring together as Killashandra passed them.

“Keborgen's missing. He'll get himself killed!”

“He's been bragging he was out for black. If he managed to remember where the claim is . . .”

Killashandra had no excuse to linger near the two at that point, but when the other ships had been cleared and racked, she stayed on after the rest of the unloaders had been dismissed.

The wind was not strong enough at the complex to require the erection of the baffles, so Killashandra stationed herself where she could watch the southern quadrant. She also kept an eye on the two officers and saw them abandon their watch with a shrug of shoulders and shakes of the head.

If Keborgen had actually cut black crystal, she would've liked to have unloaded it. She wasn't needed on the sorting floor. She consoled herself with the knowledge that she had racked up some danger credit already, and wasn't much in the red for decorating her room and days of uncredited instruction. Being a recruit had had advantages.

She was crossing the hangar to return to her quarters when she heard the sound, or rather felt it, like a thread dragged across exposed nerve ends. She wasn't yet accustomed to her improved vision, so she shook her head and blinked, expecting to clear the spot on the right retina. It stayed in position in the lower right-hand quadrant, dipping and swaying. Not a shadow in her own eye but a sled, obviously on course for the complex. She was wondering if she should inform anyone when wrecker personnel began to scramble for the heavy hoist sled. In the hustle, no one noticed that Killashandra had joined the team.

The wrecker didn't have far to go for the sled plowed into the hills forty klicks from the complex. The comtech could get no response from the sled's pilot.

"Bloody fool waited too long," the flight officer said, nervously slapping his fingers against his thigh. "Warned him when he went out, not to wait too long. But they never listen. He repeated variations of those sentiments becoming more agitated as the wrecker neared the sled and the damage was visible.

The wrecker pilot set his craft down four long strides from the Singer's sled.

“You others get the crystal,” the flight officer shouted as he plunged toward the crumbled bow of the sled, which was half buried in loose dirt.

As Killashandra obeyed his order, she glanced back on the sled's path. She could see, in the distance, two other slide marks before the crashing sled had bounced to a stop.

The storage compartment had withstood impact. Killashandra watched with interest as the three men released the nearest hatch. As soon as they emerged with cartons, she darted in. Then she heard the moans of the injured Crystal Singer and the drone of curses from the flight officer and medic attending him.

The moment she touched the nearest carton, she forgot the injured man, for a shock, mild but definite, ran along her bones from head to heel to head. She gripped the carrier firmly, but the sensation dissipated.

“Move along. Gotta get that guy back to the infirmary,” she was told by returning crewmen.

She picked the carton up, minding her steps, ignoring the exhortation of the crewmen who passed her out. She crouched by the carton as the cocoon of the injured Singer was deftly angled into the wrecker.

During the short trip back to the complex, she wondered why there was such a fuss. Surely the symbiont would repair the man's injuries, given the time to do so. She supposed that the symbiont relieved pain. Borella hadn't appeared uncomfortable with her awful thigh wound, and Concera, given to complaints, had said nothing about pain in her regenerating fingers.

As soon as the wrecker landed, the Singer was hurried to waiting meditechs. Hugging the carton that she devoutly hoped contained black crystal, Killashandra walked straight through the storage area into the sorting room. She had no problem finding Enthor, for the man almost bumped into her.

“Enthor,” she said, planting herself and pushing the carton at him, “I think this has black crystal.”

"Black crystal?" Enthor was startled; he blinked and peered frowningly at her. "Oh, it's you. You?" His lensed eyes widened in surprise. "You? What are you doing here?" He half turned in the direction of the infirmary and then up to the recruits' level. "No one's been cutting black crystal – "

“Keborgen might have been. He crashed. This is from his sled.” She gave the carton an urgent shove against his chest. “The flight officer said he had been out to cut blacks.”

Out of habit, Enthor took hold of the carton, quite unable to assimilate either her explanation or her sudden appearance. Killashandra was impatient with Enthor's hesitation. She did not want to admit to the contact shock she had felt in Keborgen's sled. Deftly, she propelled Enthor at his table, and though still perplexed, he presented the ident to the scan. His hands hovered briefly but dropped away as he twisted toward Killashandra.

“Go on,” she said, annoyed by his dithering. “Look at them.”

“I know what they are. How did you?” Enthor's indecision was gone, and he stared, almost accusingly, into her eyes.

“I felt them. Open it. What did Keborgen cut?”

His unearthly eyes still on hers, Enthor opened the box and lifted out a crystal. Killashandra caught her breath at the sight of the dull, irregular 15 centimeter segment. Consciously, she had to make her lungs expel air as Enthor reverently unpacked two additional pieces that fit against the first.

“He cut well,” Enthor said, scrutinizing the trio keenly. “He cut very well. Just missing flaw. That would account for the shapes.”

“He has cut his last,” the deep voice of the Guild Master said.

Startled, Killashandra whirled and realized that Lanzecki must have arrived moments before. He nodded to her and then beckoned to someone in the storage area.

“Bring the rest of Keborgen's cut.”

“Is there more black in it?” Enthor asked Killashandra as he felt carefully about in the plaspacking.

Killashandra was vibrantly aware of Lanzecki's intense gaze.

“In that box or the cargo?”

“Either,” Lanzecki said, his eyes flickering at her attempt to temporize.

“Not in the box,” she said even as she ran her hand along the plasfoam side. She swallowed nervously, glancing sideways at Lanzecki's imposing figure. His clothing, which she had once thought dull, glinted in a richness of thread and subtle design very much in keeping with his rank. She swallowed a second time as he gave a brief nod of his head and the six cartons from Keborgen's sled were deposited on Enthor's table.

“Any more black crystal?” Enthor asked.

She swallowed a third time, remembered that the habit had irritated her in Shillawn, and ran her hands over the cartons. She frowned, for a curious prickle rippled across her palms.

“Nothing like the first one,” she said, puzzled.

Enthor raised his eyebrows, and she could only have imagined his eyes twinkling. He opened a box at random and removed, carefully, a handful of cloudy slivers, displaying them to Lanzecki and Killashandra. The other boxes held similar slivers.

“Did he cut the triad first or last?” Lanzecki spoke softly as he picked up a finger-long splinter, examining its irregularities.

“He didn't say?” Enthor ventured quietly.

Lanzecki's sigh and the brief movement of his head answered that question.

"I thought the precious symbiont healed – " Killashandra blurted out before she knew she was going to speak.

Lanzecki's eyes halted her outburst.

«The symbiont has few limitations: deliberate and constant abuse is one. The age of its host is another. Add the third factor – Keborgen stayed too long in the range, despite storm warnings.» He turned back to look at the three pieces of black crystal on the weighplate and at the credit valuation blinking on the display.

If Keborgen was dead, who inherited the credit? She jumped as Lanzecki spoke again.

“So, Killashandra Ree, you are sensitive to the blacks, and you have enjoyed a Milekey transition.”

Killashandra could not avoid the Guild Master's disconcerting appraisal. He seemed neither as remote nor detached as he had the day she had; arrived at Shankill with Carrik. His eyes, especially, were intensely alive. A nearly imperceptible upward movement of his lips brought her restless gaze to his mouth. Wide, well-shaped lips evidently reflected his thoughts more than eye, face, or body. Did she amuse him? No, probably not. The Guild Master was not known for his humor; he was held in great respect and some awe by men and women who were awed by little and respected nothing but credit. She felt her shoulders and back stiffen in automatic reaction to the flick of amusement.

“Thank you, Killashandra Ree, for your prompt discovery of that triad,” Lanzecki said with a slight inclination of his head that reinforced his gratitude. Then he turned and was gone, as quickly as he had arrived.

Exhaling, Killashandra leaned against Enthor's table.

“Always good to know black when it's near you.” Enthor paused as he gingerly unpacked shards. He blinked his eyes to focus on the weight display. “Trouble is finding it in the first place.”

“What's the second place?” she asked impudently.

Enthor blinked his lens into place and gave her a shrewd look. “Remembering where the first place was!”

She left him, walking back through Sorting to Storage and out onto the hangar deck, the shortest way back to an arc lift down to her quarters. Hangar personnel were busy dismantling Keborgen's wreck She grimaced. So a damaged ship was repaired as long and as often as necessary during its owner's lifetime – and then stripped. Had Carrik's sled been dismembered?

She halted at a sudden notion, wheeled and stared out at the hills in the direction of Keborgen's erratic last flight. She half ran to the Hangar Ready Room for a look at the met printout, continuously displayed and updated by the minute.

That storm to the southeast? It's dissipating?

The weather officer glanced up, a frown on his face. Forestalling rejection, Killashandra held up her wrist-band. He immediately tapped out a replay of the satellite recording, which showed the formation of the storm and its turbulent progress along the coast of the main continent and the Milekey Ranges. The gale had blown up quickly and, as unpredictably as most Ballybran storms, caressed one large sector of the range and then roiled seaward across the edge of the Long Plain where warm air had met its colder mass.

“I was on the wrecker which brought Keborgen in, but I must have dropped my wrist-unit there. Can I use a skimmer?”

The met officer shrugged. “For all of me you can have a skimmer. No weather to speak of in our zone. Check with Flight.”

Flight thought her cack-handed to have dropped equipment and assigned her a battered vehicle. She paused long enough to note that the recovery pattern of the wrecker was still displayed on the emergency screen. Once she left the office, she made notes on her wrist unit.

She unracked the skimmer and left the hangar at a sedate pace entirely consistent with a routine errand, then flew to the crash site. She was increasingly possessed by the thought that Keborgen, trying to out run the storm, surely must have come back to the complex by the most direct route. Though Concera had maundered on and on about how careful Singers were to protect their claims by using devious routes to and from, Keborgen might just as easily have flown straight in the hope of reaching safety. His sled had come in well behind the others from the same area.

Given that possibility, she could establish from data retrieval the exact second when the storm warning had been broadcast, compute the maximum speed of his sled, the direction of flight at the time of his crash, and deduce in what general area he had cut black crystal. She might even do a probability computation on the length of time Keborgen had delayed at his claim by the span of time it had taken the other thirty-nine Singers to return.

She hovered the skimmer over the crash site. The sharp mounds were beginning to soften as a brisk breeze shifted the soil. Skewing the skimmer, she located the next skid mark and two more before she spotted the raw scrape across the bare rock of a higher slope. She landed to examine the marks closely. The scar was deeper on the north side, as if the sled had been deflected by the contact. She stood in the mark and took bearings through her wrist unit. Then she returned to the skimmer and quartered the sector, looking for any other evidence of Keborgen's faltering, bumping last flight.

Shadows and sunset made it inadvisable for her to continue her search. Killashandra checked her bearings and then returned to the complex.