Crystal Singer

“Not within my service,” Trag said, glancing at her keenly. “That is partly because the segments are separated and partly because their installation is handled by technicians of impeccable training and standard. Black does not suffer from bracket erosion or mishandling. Black crystal is too valuable.” He put the damaged blue into the brace, split side exposed. “This will require a slightly different technique with your blade. If you slice off the damaged portion entirely, you will have destroyed the symmetry of the form. Therefore, the entire piece must be reshaped, scaled down in the dodecahedron. Ordinarily, one goes from major to minor, minor to major down the scale. This time, you must drop at least a sixth to achieve a pure note. As blues are nearly as common as rose, error presents no great loss. Relax. Proceed.”

Killashandra had felt unequal to such an exercise, but Trag's inference that she could err with impunity stiffened her resolve. She heard the sixth below the moment she tapped the blue, set her cutter, and was slicing before he had time to step out of her way. She made the next two cuts without hesitation, listening to the change of pitch in the crystal. Curtly, she nodded for him to turn the dodecahedron in the vise and did three more passes. Only when she had completed the recutting did she turn off her device. Then she stared challengingly at Trag. Blandly, he placed the second crystal in the grips, tapped it and then the recut dodecahedron. They were in tune with each other.

“That is sufficient for one day, Trag.”

At the unexpected voice behind her, Killashandra whirled, the cutter again rising in automatic defense, as Lanzecki finished speaking. With the slightest movement of his lips, he eyed the blade turned broadside to him. Instantly, she lowered it and her eyes, embarrassed and agitated by her reaction, and utterly wearied by the morning's intense concentration.

“I'd always heard that Fuerte was a pacific planet,” Lanzechi said. “Nevertheless, you take to cutting well, Killashandra Ree.”

“Does that mean I can get into the ranges soon?”

She heard Trag's snort at her presumption, but Lanzecki did not reflect his chief assistant's attitude. The brown eyes held hers. Meeting that appraising stare, she wondered why Lanzecki was not a Crystal Singer: he seemed much more, so much more than Carrik or Borella or any of the other Crystal Singers she had met or seen.

«Soon enough not to jeopardize a promising career. Soon enough. Meanwhile, practice makes perfect. This exercise» – and Lanzecki gestured to the boxes of tuned crystal – «is but one of several in which you must excel before you challenge the ranges.»

He was gone in one of those fluid movements that was swift enough to make Killashandra wonder if Lanzecki had actually made his visit. Yet his brief appearance was undeniable by the effect he had on her and Trag.

The assistant Guild Master was regarding her with covert interest.

“Take a radiant bath when you reach your quarters.” Trag said. “You are scheduled for sled simulator practice this afternoon.” He turned away in dismissal.

The training pattern held until the next rest day, though she wished the two elements could have been reversed, with the sled simulation in the morning when her reflexes were fresher and the cutting in the afternoon so she could collapse. There proved to be a reason for that apparently irrational schedule. As she would invariably be flying the sled after she had cut crystal, she must learn to judge blunted reactions.

The radiant baths, the viscous liquid a gentle pressure on her tired body, its thick whirling like the most delicate of massages, did freshen after a morning's intense cutting drill. She checked with the computer and discovered that she was being paid a tuner's wage for her morning work but charged for the flight officer's instruction in the afternoon.

After six days of such an exhausting routine, she looked forward to a day of relaxation. A low-pressure ridge was moving in from the White Sea, so rest day might be cloudy with rain. She had begun to develop the Ballybraners' preoccupation with meteorology, encouraged by Trag's invariable questions about weather conditions at the start of each training session.

Her flight instructor also pressed heavily on weather wise acumen. His insistence made more sense than Trag's since a good deal of her simulation drill involved coping with turbulence of varying degrees and types. She began to distinguish among the tonal differences of the warning equipment with which the simulator was equipped. Sound could tell her as clearly as the met display the kind and scope of the gale her practice flights trained her to survive.

Privately, Killashandra decided the warnings were an over kill situation; after being banged at, rung out, and buzzed, your mind would turn off most of the noise. The nerve tingler, last of the series of cautionary devices, couldn't be ignored.

Meanwhile, her practice performance developed from merely adequate to perfect automatic reaction as she simulated flights over every sector of Ballybran, land, sea, and arctic ice. She learned to identify, within seconds of their being displayed on her plan board, the major air and sea currents everywhere on the planet.

As she practiced, so she learned confidence in her vehicle. The sled was highly maneuverable with VTOL capabilities and a variety of assists to the basic crystalline drive, which had been highly refined for Ballybran's unusual conditions.

Killashandra had had only glimpses of the other members of Class 895. Rimbol had waved cheerfully at her from a distance, and she saw Jezerey scooting across the hangar floor once, but Killashandra wouldn't count on her tolerance unless the girl's temper had markedly improved since the last time they'd met. Jezerey might be more amenable now that she and the others were in full training.

She saw Borton first as she wandered into the Commons hall of the Singers' level. It was an evening when most of the Guild's full members could relax. No storms were expected despite the low-pressure ridge, and Passover – the ominous conjunction of the three moons that produced the fiercest storms – was nine weeks away. Borton didn't see Killashandra, for he and the others in the lounge with him were on the far side. Augmented vision had advantages: see first; plan ahead.

She ordered Yarran beer, a beaker for herself and a pitcher for the group. She was a

Borton saw her coming when she was about twenty meters away. His expression was of mild surprise, and he beckoned to her, speaking to someone hidden from view by the high back of the seating unit. A stir, exclamations, and Rimbol emerged, meeting her with a wide grin. The sense of relief she felt caused the pitcher to wobble.

“Don't waste a drop of good Yarran,” he admonished, rescuing it. “Not everyone's down. Some are flaked out in radiant tanks. Shillawn has been transferred to the North Helton continent. That's where they do most of the pure research. Would you believe it, Killa? He doesn't stammer anymore.”

“No!”

“Antona said the symbiosis must have corrected the fault in his palate.” Rimbol was being determinedly affable, Killashandra thought as she took a place on the wide seating unit. Jezerey, seated in a corner of the unit, acknowledged Killashandra's arrival with a tight smile, Mistra nodded, and Celee and two other men whose names she couldn't call to mind greeted her. All of them looked tired.

“Well, I can't really say I'm sorry Shillawn didn't make it as a Singer because he certainly won't be wasted in research,” Killashandra said, raising her beaker in a circular toast to him.