The Lily and the Crown Page 5

  Ari smiled at Assistant, who’d drawn up within hearing range. “Oh, she never lets me go hungry.”

  Assistant only raised her eyebrows and did not look the slightest bit deferential in the presence of the stationmaster.

  “Good,” her father said. He added to Assistant, “Don’t let her run herself into the ground.”

  Assistant did not reply. Ari patted his arm awkwardly, wishing she could say as much to the slaves who cared for him. Maybe he didn’t talk to Ari or see her all that much, but he was her father. It was reassuring to know that he was out there doing his work, taking care of things like he always had. Hopefully he’d feel better soon. He worked so hard.

  Ari and Assistant left the room, and Ari managed not to make eye contact with anyone, especially the man who’d tried to touch Assistant. Neither she nor Assistant spoke until they reached their quarters. Then, when the door shut behind them, Assistant exhaled a long, hissing breath.

  Ari saw that she was shaking with the fury she had been containing for the past hour. Her fists were clenched and her jaw was tightly set. Worse than any of that, though, was the fire in her eyes. Just the sight of it made Ari’s stomach roll over with what little food it had inside.

  “I-I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I’m sorry about—”

  Assistant turned her look on Ari, then, and it was impossible not to cower a little bit at the sight. “Do you remember what you told me?” Assistant said softly. “That nobody here was like those horrible, nasty pirates? That you would never treat your slaves like that?”

  “I…”

  “How often do I need whipping, anyway?” Assistant said. “Tell me that. I’m interested to hear your opinion.”

  “No!” Ari said, appalled. “You know I’d never do that. Don’t you?” she added hesitantly.

  “Not you, perhaps,” Assistant said, and began to prowl the room. “You’re unusual. I’ll give you that.” She glanced at Ari. “Why?”

  “What?”

  “Do you know how I felt, when they told me I was a gift for the stationmaster’s only daughter?” Assistant said. “What I envisioned you to be?”

  “No,” Ari said in a small voice.

  “A pampered brat. Rolling around in wealth and luxury, never having known a hard day’s work, utterly ignorant of the realities of life—” She paused and looked Ari up and down. “Well. One out of three isn’t bad, I suppose.” Before Ari could offer any kind of protest, she continued, “But you are not. You’re… I don’t know what you are. I’ve never seen anything like you.”

  Ari hoped that was meant in a nice way.

  “How is it,” Assistant added, “how is it even possible that a girl like you has grown up in a world like your father’s…and you have no idea how to treat a slave? That you react with such surprise when a fool tells you to beat me?”

  “Well, you know I don’t go out much,” Ari offered feebly. It took all of one second to see that Assistant would not be satisfied with that. So, Ari swallowed hard and continued, “My mother died when I was about seven years old. And my father never had much to do with me. Like I said.”

  Assistant nodded.

  “So, I was raised by, you know, servants. And slaves. They took care of me. I was used to doing what they said.”

  “Not to ordering them around,” Assistant said, her eyes going wider with sudden understanding.

  “Right, exactly,” Ari said, relieved that she’d caught on. “I mean, I never thought of them as, as slaves. They were the people who helped me grow up and told me what to do. And—it never seemed right.”

  Suddenly, it was hard to meet Assistant’s gaze. She looked longingly toward the shelter of her trees. “I don’t know much about politics, but when I was learning about history as a kid, I kept asking questions about why we had slaves at all. If the Empire’s so rich, why can’t we pay them, or let them come and go when they want to? I guess I asked too many times, because later Father sat me down and told me to stop. When he found out I’d been speaking to our own slaves about it, that’s…”

  She shivered. “It’s the only time I can remember him getting angry at me. He said it was dangerous to talk that way. I’d already started getting attention, so he pulled me out of school and put me with tutors, and I liked that better anyway.” No bullies. No laughter.

  “You, a rabble-rouser? Somehow I can’t picture it.”

  Assistant’s voice wasn’t scornful or cruel—it held that slight edge of amusement that Ari had come to recognize as something both rare and precious. That made it a little easier to say, “I wasn’t trying to cause trouble. I was little. I didn’t understand.”

  “Stop using the past tense. You still don’t understand. As you ably demonstrated tonight.”

  Wherever Assistant had learned about table manners, she’d learned about sarcasm, too. But this particular topic was one where Ari wasn’t ashamed of her ignorance. It wasn’t a bad thing that she didn’t “know enough” to treat a slave—a person—cruelly. She sidestepped that and said, “We moved around a lot, and we never took anyone with us. So, when I was fifteen I told my father I didn’t want any more slaves or servants. I figured I was old enough. I just wanted to be left alone and tend my garden.”

  “Which you’ve done,” Assistant said. “You’re not like your father. I knew that right away, when I saw him.”

  “My father doesn’t beat his slaves, either,” Ari offered.

  “Oh,” Assistant said. “Well, good for him.”

  Ari gulped and wished she could think of something helpful to say.

  “Your Empire,” Assistant said suddenly, “is the most useless power structure in all of creation.”

  Ari stared at her. “What?” Where in the stars had that come from?

  “You heard me.” Assistant clasped her hands behind her back. “Perhaps it was great once. Generations ago. But what has your Emperor achieved lately, hmm? You tell me. Why has he left the defense of the Empire to the outposts—to men like your father?”

  “Nothing’s wrong with my father!” Ari said at once. “Everyone respects him. He’s here because he told the Emperor he wanted the post!”

  Assistant rolled her eyes. “Oh, yes. Believe me, I’ve heard all about the great Lord Geiker. I meant, why is the Emperor so disengaged, so uninterested, when it’s getting easier and easier for pirates to breach your defenses out here? Why did your father have to request that a capable commander protect a valuable planet? The Empire is only as strong as its weakest point. Any half-decent strategist knows that from birth.”

  “Well…I guess.” That made sense, even to a non-half-decent strategist.

  “And it’s rotting from the inside out. Do you think pirates are the only threat?” Assistant continued. “Or the threat of the Kazir, only a system away… Have they told you those are only children’s stories, too? Like the wicked pirate queen?”

  Ari blinked. “The Kazir? But they’re not a threat. They haven’t made an attack in ages. Everybody says so. The holos—”

  “The holos.” Assistant snorted. “There is one military force out there that is capable of withstanding an attack from beyond the Empire’s perimeter. And that is the pirate fleet. The rest of you are sitting ducks.”

  “But they’ve been quiet lately. The pirates, I mean. Like everybody was saying at dinner.”

  A muscle jumped in Assistant’s cheek. “Yes.”

  “So maybe there’s nothing to worry about.” Ari hesitated. “Why are you so upset?”

  Assistant stiffened.

  Ari added, “It’s because of what that man said at dinner, isn’t it? I’m sorry. He was a creep.”

  Assistant’s shoulders remained rigid for a moment—then they relaxed, and she gave a rueful chuckle. “On that we agree.”

  “We don’t have to go to another banquet for a while,” Ari said. “Maybe next time you can pretend to be sick and I can leave you here.”

  “Maybe so,” Assistant said. Then she frowned at the door. “Was
n’t someone meant to be bringing us dinner?”

  “Oh!” Ari smacked herself on the forehead. “I forgot to stop and send someone to the kitchen—”

  Assistant glared at her and stalked to the intercom. “You don’t need a slave,” she said. “You need a keeper.”

  “You’re doing a good job of that,” Ari said, suddenly shy. “I mean, I really appreciate… Not that you have a choice, and you haven’t been here that long, but…”

  Assistant looked at her with that flat, guarded expression.

  “I can’t even remember what it was like without you,” Ari finished in a rush. “That’s all I wanted to… Sorry. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome, I’m sure,” Assistant said. Her voice was as dry as ever, but there was something Ari couldn’t read in her eyes.

  CHAPTER 4

  The chime went off at the fourth hour. Time to monitor Cambrensium. Ari pried her eyes open with a groan. She loved her work, she really did, but every once in a while it was tempting to sleep through an alarm.

  Not this time, though. Cambrensium deserved just as much attention as everyone else, and if he didn’t get his nutrient infusion, his grafts weren’t going to come out well next week. Too bad Ari couldn’t do this herself. This was an ambitious project that she’d only undertaken now that she had a second pair of hands. And she hated to wake Assistant up in the middle of the night, but it couldn’t be helped. Oh well. It was just this once, and they could sleep in later.

  She rose from her cot and stumbled sleepily over to Assistant’s alcove. Assistant was wrapped up in her bedcovers, her brow puckered fiercely. She was mumbling a little. Evidently her dreams were not pleasant tonight. Well, maybe she wouldn’t mind getting up after all.

  Ari reached out and then hesitated. She didn’t, as a rule, touch Assistant. Not deliberately. Oh, sometimes when she was passing her a tool, or that one time she’d grabbed her in the Observatory, but that was rare. There was something about Assistant that said, “Hands off,” and Ari tried to respect it.

  Even if sometimes she maybe kind of wanted to touch Assistant. For reasons she didn’t really understand. Assistant probably wouldn’t like it, and the idea made Ari’s skin prickle with heat, which must be a sign that it was a bad idea.

  Well, that was all the more reason to say “Assistant?” in a soft voice instead. But Assistant didn’t wake up. “Assistant,” Ari said more loudly, feeling very foolish. Also as a rule, she didn’t call Assistant “Assistant” very much, because it sounded silly. But what else was she supposed to call her? Assistant didn’t have a name. And Assistant still wasn’t waking up.

  No help for it, then. Ari sighed, reached out, and shook Assistant by the shoulder. “Assist—”

  Then she was on her back, the breath driving out of her lungs as Assistant flew out of the bed like a thing possessed and shoved her to the ground.

  “Wha—” Ari began, but couldn’t manage anything else because Assistant’s left hand was around her throat while the right had clenched into a fist and was swinging toward Ari’s face. It stopped about an inch from Ari’s nose and froze. Ari, who had stopped breathing entirely, stared in pure shock into Assistant’s wide, wild eyes.

  “Urk,” she managed.

  Assistant let go of her at once and sat back on her heels, breathing quickly. Her eyes glittered and color sat high on her cheeks.

  “What,” Ari wheezed. “What was—”

  “Don’t wake me up. Don’t do that.”

  Ari raised one shaking hand to touch her throat. “You…I…”

  “I could have hurt you,” Assistant said, her eyes no less wild, although she was wide awake now. “I could ha… Do not do that again, do you understand?”

  “I,” Ari managed, “I didn’t, at first. I tried to call you, but you wouldn’t…”

  “Do. Not. Do. That. Again.”

  “I’m sorry,” Ari whispered. She was. And scared. She’d had no idea that Assistant was so strong. Or so fast. Or, apparently, so lethal.

  But that was obviously what you had to be, to survive among pirates. What must Assistant’s life have been like, if those were the reflexes she’d developed—if her response to being woken up was to attack somebody?

  “What did you want?” The wild look had left her eyes, and her face was already reassuming its usual guarded placidity.

  “W-what did I what?”

  “You woke me for something, didn’t you?”

  She had, hadn’t she? Ari tried very hard to remember. Her head was spinning and her throat hurt. “Cambrensium,” she managed. “Infusion. Nutrient infusion. It’s…it’s almost past the hour—”

  “Oh,” Assistant said, and stood. “I…you mentioned that last evening. I’d forgotten.” She glanced down at Ari. “Shall we, then?” she added, as if they were going for a stroll, and turned as if to go into the garden. Then she paused and looked back down at Ari, who still lay in the dirt.

  “Y-yeah.” Ari sat up carefully. No pain, nothing was broken, she’d just had the wind knocked out of her. Well, that was a relief. She prepared to get to her feet.

  Before she could, two strong hands took hold of her beneath her biceps and hauled her upward, so fast that she stumbled and almost fell right back down again. But instead of falling, she bumped into Assistant, who took a very quick step back and kept her hands on Ari’s arms while she looked her up and down.

  “Well,” she said briskly. She did not meet Ari’s eyes. “You seem to be in one piece.”

  Ari’s arms were burning where Assistant touched her. “Uh-huh,” she croaked.

  “Glad to see it.” Assistant let go of Ari, whose arms suddenly felt chilled, and turned to walk into the garden.

  It took a few more seconds before Ari was able to follow.

  So that was what it felt like to touch Assistant. Maybe she’d been better off not knowing. Who knew when it would happen again?

  It wasn’t until Assistant was perched gracefully on a high limb pruning off a branch for a sample, while Ari took the readings at the roots that Ari felt comfortable enough to say, “So…it looked like you were, uh…having a bad dream. Maybe?” She looked up and realized that from here she could almost see up the skirt of Assistant’s night tunic, which was nearly identical to her day tunic—just a little shorter. Ari couldn’t see much under there, nothing too, nothing too, but anyway she could see her calves, both slender and muscular, and the paleness of one thigh.

  “I was,” Assistant said in a clipped tone that recaptured Ari’s attention immediately.

  “Do you, um.” Ari licked her lips. “Do you want to tal—”

  “How are the readings coming along?”

  “Oh.” Ari kept her gaze very, very carefully on the monitor. “They’re fine.”

  ~ ~ ~

  They never referred to the incident again, but Ari made very sure never to wake Assistant up personally. She got Assistant her own alarm chime for when they had work to do in the middle of the night. And if something unexpected ever came up, then…well, Ari didn’t have a contingency plan in place for that, because really, nothing unexpected ever did come up in her life. Except for Assistant.

  Ari gave her a wary look as she potted a bulb and decided, in that unlikely event, she’d just chuck a pine cone at her head or something. From a safe distance.

  In the meantime, though, Ari had noticed something rather disturbing. Something else involving safe distances, and keeping them from Assistant. And how maybe she possibly didn’t want to.

  Assistant might not be “pretty,” as Ari had known all along, but she was beautiful. Really beautiful. Okay, so she had a big nose and was kind of a lot older than Ari. (Ari still had not dared to ask her how much older.) And even besides the nose, her features were…sharp. But she never made a move that wasn’t graceful, and she looked more naturally regal than any of the women who’d ever attended Ari’s father’s banquets. Once or twice she’d even smiled, and Ari had seen her perfect teeth.

  And her eyes
were so very blue. Mostly they were cold and watchful, but every once in a while, they could light up with warmth, however fleeting. Like when Ari had realized that the cross-strain of the new pea was working, and, about to pop with excitement, had hurried to tell Assistant, who was re-potting a freniumis. She’d babbled on for whole minutes without stopping, occasionally even hopping up and down, until Assistant had risen to her feet, gently taken away the trowel Ari had been waving wildly, and told her to take a deep breath and wash her face before they had dinner. Which, far from being a let-down, had made Ari feel bubbly inside because of the warmth, yes, the real warmth she had seen in Assistant’s blue eyes.

  She had lovely arms and shoulders. And, from what Ari could tell, shapely legs. Those thoughts made Ari’s face burn, though, and the rest of her skin, too, and sometimes her hands shook and she almost dropped things. But really, it wasn’t Ari’s fault that no matter how old she was, Assistant looked good enough to—

  “Eat,” Assistant commanded, tapping Ari firmly on the shoulder.

  Ari gasped and looked up at Assistant before she could stop herself, even though she knew her own face was red. Could Assistant, did Assistant know what Ari often thought about? She seemed to have the uncanny gift of reading minds. But, as always, her face gave nothing away.

  “I let you skip breakfast,” Assistant said, and Ari realized she hadn’t even noticed that she’d been working straight through morning. “But I called for lunch. It’s on the table. Come along.”

  “Oh. Thanks.” Ari rose shakily to her feet, following Assistant out of the garden.

  “Wash first,” Assistant ordered.

  Ari twitched guiltily. She had learned very quickly that Assistant tolerated dirt and slovenliness in the garden just fine, but that beyond the garden, people were meant to both presentable and hygienic. She hurried to the bathroom.

  They ate in silence for a few moments. Then Assistant said, “Why does no one ever come here?”

  Ari swallowed—Assistant also hated it when she talked with her mouth full—and said, eloquently, “Huh?”