The Rowan
- Автор: Маккефри Энн
- Серия: Tower and the Hive #1
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «The Rowan». Краткое содержание книги:
The kinetically gifted, trained in mind/machine gestalt, are the most valued citizens of the Nine Star League. Using mental powers alone, these few Prime Talents transport ships, cargo and people between Earth's Moon, Mars' Demos and Jupiter's Callisto.
An orphaned young girl, simply called The Rowan, is discovered to have superior telepathic potential and is trained to become Prime Talent on Callisto. After years of self-sacrificing dedication to her position, The Rowan intercepts an urgent mental call from Jeff Raven, a young Prime Talent on distant Deneb. She convinces the other Primes to merge their powers with hers to help fight off an attack by invading aliens. Her growing relationship with Jeff gives her the courage to break her status-imposed isolation, and choose the more rewarding world of love and family.
When they finished their meal, he insisted on adding "alters" to her tab with him: a half melon full of fresh spring soft fruits and a cup of the local infusion. Then he asked her to arrive by 7.00 so they'd finish the heavy part before the sun was high and gave her a courteous farewell.
He went off, talking himself out of making any passes at such a young thing. He had the summer before him and he usually had many options.
Somewhat piqued, the Rowan cycled back wondering how to prove to him that she wasn't as young as all that!
He was a good person, honorable and sensible, a capable seaman, and an interesting guide.
Back in the cottage, she decided to study tomorrow's tasks. She accessed information on sail-rigging, on seamanship in general, pausing long enough on the sections of refitting a ship that had been stored over the winter period to assimilate all the information available.
Primes were generally blessed with photographic memories as perfect recall was a boon for the sometimes split-second decisions which their duties often required them to make.
Not all those with the same basic Talents the Rowan possessed would be suitable as Primes.
She also checked with the Maritime Commission Records concerning the credentials of one Turian Negayon Salik and, using her Station password, looked over his personal records, fending nothing untoward.
Turian was thirty-two years Standard. Sun creases made him look a few years older. (From comments made by some of the females on the various courses, older men were apt to be more considerate.) He was single, had never even filed an intent to marry, let alone a short-term parental contract. He did have a large number of siblings and immediate relatives, most of them involved in the sea enterprises.
Aware of a curious absence in the documentation of himself and other members of his family, the Rowan had to sit and think what was missing. Then it dawned on her: neither he nor any of his relations had ever taken a Talent test. This was most unusual since most families ardently looked for signs of such abilities, minor or major, in their progeny. Recognizable, measurable Talent meant preferential schooling, and often grants-in-aid for the entire family. Not, perhaps, as necessary on a rich, fertile, mainly unsettled planet as Altair, but generally comfortable additions to incomes. There was no law requiring registration at a Talent testing center but it was an odd enough omission.
She checked on his ship, the Miraki, and had its voyages for the past four years graphed out so that she knew where he had sailed, anchored, and who his passengers had been.
She learned that when he had finished his apprenticeship with a maternal uncle, he had been granted part of the credit needed to purchase the sloop, worked for the balance, and now owned her free and clear. The Miraki was licensed for charter, for trawling and for exploration, and in the eight years since her commissioning, had done about every job her size permitted. Her seaworthiness records had been scrupulously kept up to date and she had acquired no fines, penalties, or damages.
The Rowan woke at six, ate a hearty breakfast and was nearly late at Cender's Boat Yard because she spent so much time choosing appropriate clothing. That is, clothing appropriate for the end result she now wished. She was about to leave at fifteen minutes before the hour - the boat yard being downhill from the house - when she realized that Turian had been evading, or avoiding, the stalkings of many girls far more adept at this sort of flirting than she.
He thought her a nice young girl, a bit too thin. Well, she'd start right there. And elaborate.
So she appeared at the boat yard, promptly at the tone of seven on the tri-d blaring from the boat yard office window, in workmanlike gear, and a change tied on to the handlebars of the cycle. Her review last night indicated she was likely to get wet and dirty. She also had a hefty handful of credits stuffed into her spare-pants pocket.
"Have you ever rigged sail before?" Turian asked halfway through the morning as yet again, she anticipated an instruction.
"Well, yes and no. Sailing's always fascinated me so I boned up on re-rigging sails. A good tertiary education teaches you how to fend out what you don't know." "I'll give you this: you're deft at putting theory into practice. Intelligent helpers are hard to get in any line of work. What do you do?" "Oh, boring stuff, expediting imports and exports," and she added a diffident shrug. "But the pay's decent and the perks aren't bad. I'd need off-world training for any decent advancement. I'm being a good company person until they notice that I'm keen to advance." This one has her head screwed on right, was Turian's thought. He wasn't a devious person so it wasn't as if she was invading his privacy: everything was right up front, like an unvoiced monologue.
As the sun reached its zenith in the brilliant cloudless skies, he called a halt and suggested they take a quick dip at the end of the boat yard wharf to cool off here lunch.
She peeled to swim briefs and was into the water before him, laughing and splashing at him. He still had a finely made, strong body, enhanced by the deep bronze of his skin.
Refreshed after the swim, they climbed back on to the wharf and sat in the shadow of drying trawl nets.
"You're such a good worker, I'll spot you lunch," he said gratefully.
"One meal you may buy: two within twenty-fours is not on. I brought enough for both of us." His sea-light eyes crinkled into the sun creases as he stood, dripping wet, hands on his hips and looked down at her.
"You're a smarty, aren't you?" "Fair's fair. You helped me out of a spot: I paid my way out of the debt. Now I want to make it one up on you and the price is a sail when the Miraki is back in the water. Done?" They shook on it, Turian laughing while his mind admired her independence. She wished he wouldn't think quite so loud: it gave her an unfair advantage over him.
And yet, she seemed to be making all the right moves to prove that she was not as young as she might look.
It took them three more days to be sure the Miraki was seaworthy, with the Rowan working right beside him, trying not to anticipate pre-vocal orders too frequently. In the cool of the evening, as he checked off completed chores on his master list, he'd tell her what they'd be doing the next day. If she had to study up on something varnishing required no mental effort at all, but she found the physical effort, especially through her shoulders rather a remarkable experience - she would access the proper authority before she went to bed. She was sleeping much better than she had in many months.
When Turian had every inch of the Miraki, hull, deck, bilge, boom, mast, sheets, rigging, engines, cockpit, galley, and living quarters shipshape, he had the Favor Bay Marine Engineer come to recertify her seaworthiness.
She passed and the Rowan could not restrain the shout of triumph at what she considered a personal achievement.
"Now, do I get my sail?" she demanded when Turian returned from escorting the Engineer back to the wharf.
"Weather report says tomorrow's going to be clear, with a fifteen-knot breeze nor'-nor'-east." Turian chuckled and reached out to ruffle her curls. She squashed the sudden surge of keen sexual awareness of him that his casual caress elicited. She mustn't overreact to a friendly touch. But his affectionate, half-fooling gesture had not surprised her as much because he had extended the caress as because physical touching was rare between Talents, and reserved for moments to reinforce mental bridgings. She didn't wish to prematurely give away her designs on one Captain Turian who still considered her as a "young" girl despite her attempts to educate him.
"Yes, you get your sail. Can you take a full day of it?" "I've sailed before, Captain Turian," she said archly, "and I've a cast-iron stomach." "I'll provision her if you'll take charge of the galley," he offered. "And bring a change of clothing and a stout windbreaker." He looked appraisingly up at the sky, squinting at its brilliance, his eyes narrowed. "I make it we'll have a change in the weather before the day's out." "Really?" She laughed at his assurance. "Meteorology's pretty advanced these days." Parting his lips in a wise smile that showed her white but slightly crooked teeth, he nodded. "Can you be down here at 4.00 a.m. to catch the turn of the tide?" "Aye, aye, Captain," and she flicked an impudent salute at him before mounting her cycle and treadling off the wharf.