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.
"Mighty glad to know you. What's your name?" "Jeff Raven. I just got in from…" "Hey, Afra, want you to meet Jeff Raven. Here, have a coffee. A little raw on the walk up from the launch yard, isn't it? Been on any other Prime Stations?" "As a matter of fact…" Toglia and Loftus had looked around from their computers to inspect the recipient of such unusual cordiality. They found themselves as eager to welcome this charismatic stranger. Raven graciously accepted the coffee from Ackerman, who then proffered his special coveted ginger cakes which his wife excelled at making. The stationmaster had the feeling that he must give this wonderful guy something else, it had been such a pleasure to provide him with coffee.
Afra looked quietly at the stranger, his calm yellow eyes a little clouded. "Hello," he said in a rueful manner, his tone oddly accented.
Jeff Raven's grin altered imperceptibly. "Hello," he replied, and more was exchanged between the two men than a simple greeting.
Before anyone in the Station quite realized what was happening, everyone had left his post and gathered around the newcomer, chattering and grinning, using the simplest excuse to touch his hand or shoulder.
He was genuinely interested in everything said to him, and although there were twenty-three people anxiously vying to monopolize his attention, no-one felt slighted. His reception seemed to envelop them all.
What the hell is happening down there? asked the Rowan, with a tinge of her familiar irritation. Why Contrary to all her previously sacred rules, she appeared suddenly in the middle of the room, looking wildly about her. Raven stepped to her side and touched her hand gently.
"Reidinger said you needed me," he said.
"Deneb?" Her body arched over to project the astounded whisper.
"Deneb? But you're… you're here? You're here!" He smiled tenderly and slid his hand down her shining hair to grip her shoulder.
The Rowan's jaw dropped and she burst out laughing, the laughter of a supremely happy, carefree girl. Then her laughter broke off in a gasp of pure terror.
HOW did you get here?
Just came. You can, too, you know.
No! No. I can't! No T-1 is able to. The Rowan tried to free herself from his grasp, as if he were suddenly repulsive.
I did though. His gentle insistence was unequivocable.
You just jumped from the Tower to this level. If you can do that, why should it matter how far you go?
Oh, no! No!
"Did you know," Raven said conversationally, grinning about him, "that Siglen of Altair gets sick just going up and down stairs?" He looked straight at the Rowan. "You lived with her, you should know. All on the one level, not so much as a step anywhere? That long padded ramp to her tower which is so hemmed by thick-leaved trees any glimpse of the outside is obscured? I know she told you all about that hideous, grim, ghastly, nearly fatal trip she took from Earth to Altair on - of all torture mechanisms a spaceship? Especially when she had planned to stay on Earth as its Prime? Disappointment can have a weird effect on some personalities, you know." The girl shook her head, her eyes wonderingly wide.
"No-one ever asked why she had really rather unusual reactions to a deep space flight, did they? I did. Seemed damned silly to me when Reidinger "explained" the problem." He held his audience's attention as he paused, his grin turning malicious. "Siglen has a massive neural deterioration of the middle ear, a genuine enough disability which does make for travel difficulties. She was so miserably sick in her first space voyage, she went into a trauma about any sort of travel without discovering the real cause. The worst of it was that she then imposed that trauma on everyone else she trained. Of course, it never occurred to her, or anyone else, that this wasn't part of "the price the Talented must pay!" He dramatically placed his hand against his throat, mimicking Siglen so aptly that Afra had to choke back a laugh.
Then he shot a wicked grin at the appalled Rowan.
"Siglen… Oh, Deneb, no!" Raven laughed. "Oh, Callisto, yes. She passed on the trauma to every one of you. The T-2 doesn't have it. Siglen wouldn't be bothered with training an inferior Talent. The proof of the matter is that she didn't train me." He opened his arms wide. "And I, bigod, got here under my own steam. The Curse of Talent!" He mimicked Siglen's deep contralto voice again. "The Great Fear! The great bushwah! You've no middle ear imbalance: you only "think" you've got agoraphobia. Bad enough a thought to hold for long, I agree, but it's a rotten handicap for you to have, my love." Warmth and reassurance passed between them, and the Rowan's eyes began to shine. Her eyes shone.
Now, come live with me and be my love, Rowan. Reidinger says you can commute from here to Deneb every day.
"Commute?" She said it aloud in hollow astonishment.
And stared at him in wonder.
"Certainly," Jeff said encouragingly. "You're still a working T-1 under contract to FT amp;T." "And so, my love, I guess I do know my bosses, don't I?" she said with a little smile.
"Well, the terms were fair. Reidinger didn't haggle a second after I walked into his private office at eleven this morning." "But to commute from Deneb to Callisto?" the Rowan repeated dazedly.
"All finished here for the day?" Raven asked Ackerman, who shook his head after a glance at the launching racks.
"C'mon, gal. Take me to your ivory Tower and we'll finish up in a jiffy. Then we'll talk about it. I'm not pushing you, or anything, but I've got a planet to put to rights…" And a few million things to discuss with you.
Jeff Raven smiled wickedly at the Rowan and pressed her hand to his lips in the age-old gestures of courtliness.
The Rowan's smile answered his with blinding joy.
The others were respectfully silent as the two Talents made their way up the stairs to the once lonely Tower.
Afra broke the tableau by taking a cake from the box in Ackerman's motionless hand. There was nothing in the cake to cause his eyes to water so profusely.
"Not that that pair needs much of our help, people," he said, "but we can add a certain flourish and speed things up."
The whine of the generators sobbed away into silence, a silence which was at first pleasant as the two Primes let the tension of their labors drain from them.
Jeff Raven broke the silence, giving a low grunt as he pushed his chin down to his chest to stretch neck and shoulder muscles. He had been sitting in the swivel chair at the console, so he hadn't had the full body support of a couch like the Rowan's. He swiveled about to face her now.
"I know you," the Rowan said shyly, suddenly unnerved by his presence and the end of known routines, "and I don't." Gently then she felt the feathery touch of his mind in hers, withdrawn as gently but leaving behind it a sweet, spicy taste. That had never happened to the Rowan before in all her mental encounters, and she took a moment to absorb the sensation.
"There's a lot about each other that we're going to have to know," Jeff Raven began to smile, a smile that was also tinged with a shy uncertainty. He ran his fingers through his shock of black hair. "And Lord above, woman, we've got a lifetime to learn." His smile broadened, and he cocked his head slightly at her, looking at her with warmly affectionate eyes that hinted of deeper emotions kept in firm check.
"Look," he said in a totally different tone of voice and he leaned forward in the chair, elbows on his knees, "it's been a rough few weeks for me and now we've met, we don't have to rush anything. In point of fact," he said, with a huge yawn, "I'll be candidly unromantic and admit that I'm whacked. I've been on the stretch since those ETs arrived." He gave her an ingratiating smile. "That rather romantic gesture of mine, to launch us to Deneb, is totally beyond me. I'm starving, I need a bath, and about twenty years' sleep!" The Rowan began to laugh, more gurgle than chuckle, as practical considerations dissolved the moment of restraint and doubt. She rose and thrust out her hand to him. His was warm, calloused, and physical contact only reinforced mind and voice. "Then, tonight, you come home with me!" Gently Jeff pulled her to him. You're such a little thing!