Eidolon (2 page)

"Ale, over here!" a woman shouted in Trade
from one of the tables. From the corner of her eye, Ceola saw
Shadow move toward her, shoulders squared and step firm.

The woman looked up at him from her chair,
then 'round at her mates. "Ale, 'tender,"she said, in more moderate
tones. "My team an' me 're parched."

Shadow nodded, and it came to Ceola as she
slipped behind the counter that he would know the difference, too,
between good coin and bad; and between exuberance and mischief.

The door opened and more tall, rough bodies
pushed in, calling greetings to comrades already in place.

She worked her way down the bar, taking
orders, then worked her way up, filling each. Shadow came and went,
drawing ale, pouring wine, dropping coins and occasionally port
scrip into the till.

Their throats slaked, the freight-crews took
themselves off in clumps and clusters, in search of food or other
entertainment. Some lingered, while a few of the regulars came in,
drank their dram and left. Ceola sighed and stepped into the little
space behind the casks. She wiped her face with a sleeve, and
looked up suddenly, warned perhaps, by a movement in the air.

"All's well?" Shadow asked. If he was weary,
it colored neither his voice nor his face.

"All's well," she confirmed and inclined her
head. "Thank you, for staying."

"No need to thank me," he answered lightly.
"I like to be busy."

"Well, I hope you can find some rest before
duty calls you," she said frankly. She scraped her hair back off of
her face. "I can finish up here. It can't be long until--"

A long yodel cut her off. Already? She spun
out of her alcove to check the clock over the bar.

The yodel came again, signaling the end of
Night Port and the beginning of Day.

Closing time.

*

The alarm sounded. Ceola came up onto a
reluctant elbow and groped in the general direction of the tea
maker. Her fingers connected and she brought the cup to her lips,
sipping the hot, bitter beverage and recruiting her determination.
She pushed the coverlet back and eventually came to her feet. Her
back hurt, a little, and she eyed the clock grumpily, sipping.

Don Sin would be around within the hour to
change out empty kegs for full. She ought to snatch a quick shower
and a quicker sandwich before going down to open the back door. It
was her regular chore, to oversee the exchange and sign the
chit.

But really, she thought
with a return of the previous evening's temper, why shouldn't Min
take that duty today?
She
had not worked an overfull house last night--and
thank the gods Shadow had offered his help, while
the owner
was out on the
port, frolicking--or who knew where it might have ended?

Tea cup refilled and temper high, Ceola
walked down to the hall to her sister's room. The door was closed,
which might mean that Min had company, but Ceola found that she
didn't care. Let dramatic Captain Elby be roused from his doubtless
well-deserved slumber, and sent scrambling for his trousers! It
might teach him something about how bills were paid.

She rapped, sharply, waited for the count of
twelve, then pressed the button next to the speaker.

"Min?" she said, her voice sounding raspy
and sharp, like a weary kitchen knife; "I need you to take the
delivery today."

There was no answer, not even a moan of
sleepy protest.

Ceola frowned, pressed the button again, and
repeated herself, at a slightly increased volume.

No answer.

Well, then. She pushed down on the latch,
expecting it to be locked. It gave, and she danced two steps into
the bright blare of her sister's room, tea sloshing over the rim of
her cup and onto her hand.

Muttering, she sucked her fingers--and only
then noted that the bed was empty, untumbled; and that the curtains
across the window looking out over the service alley were open.

Min had not come home last night.

Ceola stared at the bed,
trying to sort her feelings. She identified dismay, certainly; and
an additional flare of anger--
stuck with
all the work again
!--but of worry, there
was very little. Min, Ceola thought, could take care of herself.
Indeed, had she been in a slightly more charitable mood, she might
have found it in her to spare some concern for Captain Elby's
well-being.

Her eye struck the clock then, and she
cursed again. The deliveries!

She quit her sister's room at a run.

Min had not returned by opening time, and
Ceola, hair still damp from a hasty shower, owned to herself that
she was . . . beginning . . . to become concerned.

While it was true that this was not the
first time that Min had stayed away all night and into the next
day, such complete disregard for kin and the business that fed them
both was . . . more unusual than not.

She wondered if she ought to register a Lost
Person claim with the Port Proctors--and immediately decided
against. The less the Proctors had to do with The Friendly Glass,
the better for all. If one of the Scouts came in tonight, she told
herself, she'd ask them to inquire along those special routes known
to Scouts. She sighed then, knowing that she had very little hope
of that Scout being Shadow.

Ceola shook her head. Kindness was owed kin,
surely, and the greater portion of one's affections. But sometimes,
it was difficult not to think hard of her sister.

The door opened and she looked up, putting
her hands flat on the bar to indicate her willingness to serve.

Two men in the rough, grease-stained
coveralls of dock workers entered, walking quickly, as if they had
a task in hand. Ceola's foot, hidden behind the bar, moved on its
own wisdom, touching the switch that would summon aid from the
security company.

The men came on, one slightly in the lead.
Ceola turned, too slow; he lunged, grabbed her arm and dragged her
toward him across the counter.

She snatched at the underside of the bar
with her free hand, screaming, while his partner raced past to the
back of the counter. It was the till they were after, much good it
would do them. She'd made the deposit--

Her captor yanked cruelly on her arm, the
edge of the bar cut into her frantic fingers; her grip held--and
the other man bent to snatch the box from its shelf beside her.

"Here!" he called

His voice was--oddly familiar. Ceola had no
time to chase the memory though. She twisted and kicked, her foot
in its sturdy shoe unfortunately missing the unkempt head, though
it did connect with his shoulder.

"Clanless bitch!" He came up, box in hand,
and drove an elbow violently into her ribs.

Breath left her lungs in a thin cry.
Weakness roared through her, and ribbons of color distorted her
vision. Where was the security team? She couldn't breathe! Her grip
loosened, her captor's fingers crushed her arm and she flew across
the bar into a rough embrace, face pressed against fabric reeking
of filth and engine fluids.

"Go!" He shouted, and she heard hasty
footsteps making for the door.

The man holding her twisted his fingers in
her hair, releasing her as he yanked her head back, his free hand
whipping 'round to strike her, hard, across the face.

Pain exploded; she spun, thoughts spangled
into chaos, and fell heavily, stools scattering like
twelve-pins.

Through the blare of pain, she head the door
slam shut.

*

"What do you mean, the tariff hasn't been
paid?" She heard her voice keying upward, and swallowed. The
security rep averted her eyes, making a show of checking her
screens. She had taken one horrified look at Ceola's face when they
were first connected, and thereafter found reasons to keep her eyes
averted.

"Our records are clear," she said, not
looking up. "We have received no payment from The Friendly Glass
these last three relumma."

"My records,"Ceola said, her voice shaking,
"are also clear, ma'am. The fee has been transferred on the day set
forth in our contract, never once missed, in more than a half-dozen
years."

The security rep looked up, slowly, and met
her eyes in the monitor.

"Our records then being so misaligned, I
suggest that we commission an audit."

An audit! Out of the monitor's field, Ceola
clenched her fists, then bit her lip when abused fingers protested.
Her head hurt and her ribs, and--gods abound, an audit? She could
no more afford an audit, than--

Behind her, the door opened, and she spoke
quickly to the rep, even as her heart-rate increased and her blood
chilled.

"Hold a moment,"she said breathlessly, and
left the screen on as she forced herself to turn.

I should have locked the
door
, she thought, her palms wet now with
panic.
At the least, I should have--but
surely, it is only a regular, come in for her
usual
!

But it was neither her attackers returning,
nor a regular who stood in the center of the room, hands tucked
cozily in the pockets of his jacket, surveying the tumbled stools
and disordered bar.

It was Shadow.

Relief brought tears to her eyes. She
blinked them away as she spun back to the screen.

"I have customers. May I speak to you again
tomorrow?"

"If you call on my off-shift, any of my
colleagues will assist you, ma'am. I will leave complete notes in
your file."

Of course you
will
, Ceola thought wearily, though she
inclined her head courteously.

"My thanks. Good evening to you."

She touched the disconnect, and turned into
a speculative green gaze. "Shall I fetch the Proctors, Ceola?"

"No!" Her hand rose, torn and reddened
fingers spread wide. "I want--" She stumbled, words melting off her
tongue like ice. Her eyes stung, and that would be too much, to
weep and show helpless before him. Min might employ such
stratagems, but she . . .

She . . .

"I don't know what I should do,"she said,
her voice low. "I-- Please, Shadow--what should I do?"

He seemed to become even taller, though he
stood there exactly as before, hands in pockets and head tipped
slightly to one side.

"You should place yourself entirely in my
hands,"he said, soft voice decisive. "One moment."

He spun, returning, silent and quick, to the
door, which he locked with a snap of his wrist. Ceola began to
protest, then bit her lip. She had asked him to solve this for her,
after all.

"We will discommode your customers as little
as possible,"he said briskly, striding back down the room and
coming 'round the counter. "But if you will not have the Proctors,
then we still must find who did this."

He took her gently by the shoulders, and
turned her face toward the brighter light over the back bar.

"That wants some attention,"he murmured. "Is
there any other damage done?"

"My--" She lifted her hand, showing him torn
fingers already beginning to purple. "He--He struck me in the ribs,
and I couldn't--but I can breathe now," she said hastily, as his
lips tightened. "So that's naught, really."

"I see. Ceola, attend me:
Is there
any other
damage?"

"I--" He was being delicate, she realized,
and laughed, the sound high and unsettled in her own ears. "They
were after the till, Shadow. It was their whole focus." The tears
rose again, and she looked away, misery cramping her chest. "They
took what they wanted and ran."

"I see," he said again, and sighed. "Have
you a first aid kit?"

"No," she answered, and did not add that the
ancient unit that had served to patch such minor bruises and
contusions as might sometimes occur on a busy night had failed two
relumma back, and they had not had enough extra to see it repaired.
There were so many things that they had not been able to
afford--the news feed, a part-time worker, a-- "Very well,"Shadow
said, interrupting these increasingly tangled thoughts. "Now, these
--people, who were so focused on the till. Have you seen them
before?"

"No--no, wait." She frowned, which made her
face hurt worse. "The voice--last night, the door opened, then
closed--you recall it! I thought it only that someone had looked in
and failed to find a comrade, but the voice--it was the same."

"The room was too full for them last night,
so they looked for easier game," Shadow murmured, perhaps to
himself. He released her shoulders, and fished the handheld from
its inner pocket.

"Ah, good, you are about,"
he said into the device. "Bring whomever else you can find and come
down to The Friendly Glass, there's been some unpleasantness. . . .
a first aid kit and the forensic . . . Yes. I've locked the door;
ping me when you've arrived." He paused, then grinned. "Oh, by all
means,
quickly
."

*

Scouts appeared, three of them, one bearing
a first aid kit, and another a different sort of kit which he
immediately unfolded onto a deserted table, with assistance from
the third.

Shadow brought the Scout with the first aid
kit behind the bar, standing half-a-step before her. Ceola looked
up at him from her seat on the cold-box. He had, over her
objections, tucked his jacket around her shoulders. She held it
close, her injured hand tucked against the plush lining. It wasn't
cold--she knew that it wasn't cold--yet she couldn't seem to stop
shivering.

"Ceola, this is Tonith," he said, "the best
medic among what is admittedly a disreputable crew. Will you allow
her to tend to your injuries?"

She did very much, Ceola thought, want
someone to tend to her injuries. Her face felt as if she'd scrubbed
it with gravel and rinsed it with red wine. Even though she could
breathe, her ribs hurt where the thief had struck her, and her arm
was throbbing. Those were her major complaints, though there was a
growing litany of bruises and minor pains.