The Gripping Hand

"No. It was the Khanate's main base, including all their wealth. They offered it all as bribes to their allies, and the allies have turned it all over to Medina. Victor, did your people find any surprises?"

"Not to us. We'll make holos, Kevin. Their Engineers are ingenious; you'll see some interesting i

Joyce considered the nuances. She turned the camera on Victor.

"Then it's over? The Khanate didn't just surrender, they meant it."

Kevin caught Glenda Ruth Blaine's semaphore wave, halfway up the Great Hall's curved roof, and her all-too-knowing smile. Kevin gri

"We control all of what was Khanate wealth," Victor answered. "The families have returned from hiding at Bury's Star, and all of them now carry the worm. I see no way in which they could harm us or you, ever again. Their line is at an end, unless we choose differently; would not that satisfy Horace Bury's anger?"

Joyce answered carefully. "As much as I came to know Bury, I think he had no anger left for Moties. This was his last corporate war. I believe he enjoyed it very much."

The Motie smiled and moved on. Kevin felt his eyes begin to sting. He said, "That was wonderfully well said."

"Thank you. I actually miss him, Kevin. Not like you, I expect. Almost thirty years."

"Yeah. But he did go out a wi

"What was the smirk about?"

"Smirk?" Joyce's black eyebrows came together and he said, "It's a secret. There are still secrets. Dammit, Joyce, is every woman going to go around reading my mind for the rest of my life?"

"This isn't any diplomatic secret, Kevin. And it isn't a scandal because you'd never be stupid enough ... you wouldn't."

"Joyce, there is a secret you should not hear. Just like last time, when Eudoxus read your feet."

She swallowed her first answer. "Maybe, but I have to have it."

"Okay." Kevin Re

I

On the afternoon of the sixth day he found Glenda Ruth perched on the arm of his chair with a tray in her hand. He settled in with his lunch and said, "Talk."

She didn't seem able to.

"Freddy," he said. "Aristocrat. Just a touch lazy by my admittedly rigorous standards. Didn't want to join the Navy. He'll have precious little choice now. They'll hit him with major medals and a Reserve commission."

"Good motivation," Glenda Ruth said. "Put him in charge of avoiding a war so he won't have to work."

"He tenses up when you're around. What's he afraid of? You're too sensitive?"

"Squeamish," she said. "Whoever gets hurt around me, child or adult or cat or Motie, I feel it. But I had as much to do with saving us as he did. More. Kevin-"

"Glenda Ruth."

"Oh. Sorry." She shifted to the navigator's empty chair and slumped a little and smiled at him.

"I was going to say... oh." That wide, her smile looked a little vacuous. "You got it."

Glenda Ruth said, "Please turn down the sex appeal because it makes me uncomfortable."

"Yeah. And I don't doubt you could turn it up again if I need to remember what gender I am."

"Maybe not. Kevin, you've stopped thinking of me as not quite human."

"Don't test that out, okay?" Unless you mean it ....o, dammit, seducing Lord Blaine's daughter is one of the many things I'm going to skip in this life. "Sure you're human. You may be a great many humans. Every child does a lot of role-playing. You and Chris would do it better than most. What kind of role have you been playing with Freddy?"

"I haven't been playing! Uncle Kevin, I was ru

"You could get him back. He can't drop you, he's got obligations, and if you work on him for an hour, he'll never want to again. So what's really bothering you, Glenda Ruth? Turn it off!"

She shifted in her chair. The blood was thundering in Re

"Get frivolous!"

"You're so wary of rubbing up against a lord's daughter. I can talk anyone into anything, Kevin. I can make mistakes and damage people, and I've done it, and so's Chris. You'd think I was a real fool, wouldn't you, if I weren't testing my limits?"

Kevin considered retreating to his own cabin and locking his door. But first he said, "I'm not just your randomly chosen dirty old man. I'm the junior officer who ordered Lady Sally Fowler to Captain Roderick Blaine's room when I felt it necessary to their survival. You're my responsibility."

She stared, then burst out laughing. That was better. He asked, "What do I have to do to get you to turn off?"

She was off. She said, "I'm sorry."

"I'm human. You don't need proof."

"I've been in Freddy's bed. He'd have gone crazy... well, antisocial, at least, if I hadn't. But I've only just got some freedom. What I think I want to do is turn Freddy loose with the option to marry him later. But he saw me do something he didn't like, and now I could lose him."

"Let's see. He'd marry you-"

"Because he'd have to."

"You're a nineteen-year-old girl. Being confused is part of the game. But look: he thinks he'd like to avoid you for a while. Let him. You free him of all obligation, you make it clear you mean it, and you're not mad. He'll be meeting you for years, lady! You're the heroes of the Mote Conquest! When you want him back, flash him. Agh! Not me!"

"Yes, Uncle."

"I think you'll want him. Good genes, good attitude, your families will approve, and in a pinch you're both survivors. Finding that out can be very expensive."

"Still breeding Blaines, are we, Uncle?" And she'd gone away. And Kevin Re

"So I went for a nap. And two hours later you were at my door-"

"Horny as hell."

"Suddenly taken horny, and curious, too. You wouldn't let me get back to sleep after-"

"We didn't just talk."

"No."

"And nobody smirked when I moved into your cabin."

"They were much relieved. Two extra cubic inches for everyone aboard Sinbad. Luxury beyond your wildest dreams. But-"

"I can't think what took me so long," Joyce Mei-Ling said. "I guess I was still mad at Chris. No, he didn't lie to me, I guess-"

"Sure he-"

"But this is no secret, Kevin! You and Glenda Ruth know something."

"But do you remember what I asked you?"

Her brow furrowed. She said, "Where did I just come from? I was in the galley with a tea bulb. Where was Glenda Ruth Blaine? Having tea with me. You laughed. Then I rubbed up against you and the conversation went all to hell."

"She sent you. She was grateful, so she sent me a gift."

"Oh, the hell she did! Kevin, all we talked about..."

He waited for her to finish. Presently he said, "All I had to ask was, ‘Who were you talking to a moment ago?"

"But I just... came to realize. You're the quintessence of availability. No visible ties, wealth, heroism, and you know more about current Mote affairs than any other human being in the Empire of Man! Glenda Ruth didn't ... we only talked about ... dammit."

"I don't really know if you'll ever want to see me again, Joyce. But if you do, there are secrets that you should not know, and by God I will keep the next one."