Venus of Shadows (22 page)

"Have Theron and the other teachers found fault with you?"

He shook his head. "It isn't that — as far as I know, they think I'm doing reasonably well up to now. I think you're sorry I'm here."

She lifted her head. "What makes you think that?"

"We're sharing a house, yet even in these close quarters, you try to avoid me. Maybe you can tell me what I'm doing wrong so that I can remedy my faults."

"I've been busy," Risa replied. "As it is, I'm going to have to spend my day off settling another problem. I don't really have any complaints about you — we're just getting used to you, that's all. In fact, I think you've behaved quite well, under the circumstances."

"What circumstances are those?"

"You know." She should not be bringing this up. "You don't think we always have so many neighbors stopping by before and after dinner, do you?" Almost every young woman in the vicinity, or so it seemed, had found an excuse to visit lately. Even her friend Noella, with a pledge to Theron pending, had not been above flirting a little with Malik while hinting heavily that Theron would overlook any trysts before the ceremony. "About the only thing they haven't done is to throw themselves at your feet. You're very strong-willed to resist such temptations."

"You warned me the first night I was here. I have to live with these people." He sighed. "I'm not strong, Risa. Maybe I'm just tired of all that. Every time, I'd think maybe this one would be different, and I'd feel I was in love for a while, and then another woman would come along." He sounded bitter. "It gets to be a habit. There was always someone else — they'd make it so easy that I couldn't refuse. It's like being at a banquet where there's always some new delicacy to tempt you even when you've eaten enough, and then it's more like an addiction. The longer it goes on, the less satisfying it is, and in the end, I went to Tashkent alone."

She recalled what Nikolai had told her. "I doubt you were alone for long."

"There was someone. I didn't love her, but I needed her. She wasn't a beautiful woman, and what learning she had was limited to some screen lessons, but she had an inner strength I admired. I see something of that in you. I didn't see it in most of the women I knew. Maybe it was there and they simply had no need to develop it."

Risa pressed her back against the wall. He was sitting too close to her; she wanted to retreat from the tiny room.

"I still can't believe I'm here," he continued. "I keep thinking that I'll suddenly get a call telling me I've been forgiven, that I can be a Linker again and return to Earth — not that such unlikely good fortune could really befall me. Even if it did, I'd remember how precarious my position would always be."

"You have to forget your former life," she said. "People who get too nostalgic about Earth make others wonder how committed they are to this life. It's not as if you can't earn respect here."

"Have you more advice to give me?"

"You might see if some parents want additional tutoring for their children — you could earn extra credit that way. You may even find adults who'd like some tutoring or a few seminars and lectures — when people get a little more prosperous, they often like to take on a few airs."

"Anything else?"

"Try to learn a worker's skill. Your teaching counts as work for the Project as a whole, but we can always use mechanics and greenhouse gardeners. Or you could learn how to operate the robots, diggers, and crawlers. The more you can do, the more valuable you'll be."

"And what other advice can you offer?"

Was she supposed to tell him how to lead his life? Risa sighed impatiently, then noticed the earnest, almost desperate look in his brown eyes. She had known men who had the usual weaknesses of a quick temper, obstinacy, impatience, insensitivity, or pride, but she had never encountered one who seemed so unable to help himself.

"Why did you go to a camp, anyway?" she asked. "You could have stayed on Earth. Even in disgrace, someone with your training and connections shouldn't have had that hard a life."

"My family would have been embarrassed further if I'd remained, but that wasn't the only reason. I couldn't see any purpose in staying and hoping others would help me eventually. I had to do something for myself, however incapable of that I prove to be." 

He wanted to be stronger than he was; there was something to admire in that. "Don't dwell on your doubts," she said. "You won't feel the same way when you've been here a while, after you begin to see yourself as a Cytherian. You'll have your work and your new friends, and when you find a bondmate and have your own children, you'll understand why you're here, and know you're working for those who'll follow you."

She was about to rise when he took her hand. "Stay with me, Risa."

"I can't," she whispered.

"Why not?" He pressed her hand against his cheek, then released her. "But perhaps I'm not the sort of man you want. Someone like Kolya would undoubtedly be a better choice."

"For someone else, maybe. I don't think he could be more to me than a friend."

"Then why?"

"Maybe I'm simply too proud to be just another in what must be a long list by now."

"You wouldn't be saying that," he said, "if you didn't feel something for me. My past would hardly matter otherwise." He reached for her hand again. "I wanted you when I first saw you. That's natural enough — you're attractive and I was lonely, but oddly enough, I feel more for you now. I can't promise that anything will come of it, but it might if you give it a chance." His mouth twisted a little. "What trite words I can utter. I'm usually a bit more eloquent, but I want to be honest with you. Stay with me. At the very least, we could share —"

"You'd hurt me sooner or later."

"How can you be so sure?"

She lowered her eyes; his hand gripped hers more tightly. "I have a sense for things like that," she said. "It's useful when I give advice — I have to know what might be too much for someone. I wouldn't help people by giving them advice they can't follow."

"And what if you're wrong about me? You're willing to risk living here, where any number of mistakes could bring trouble, and yet you won't reach out to a man who wants you when there's no reason to hold back."

People had come to her with all sorts of problems, but never with troubles of the heart. Perhaps they sensed that she had no expertise in that area, that she was either incapable of love or afraid of it, that she was unwilling to take any risk that might bring her love.

I wouldn't be chancing that much, she thought; I'm free, and at worst I'd have a pleasant interlude to remember later. Malik would be kind as long as he was living in her house, and when he left, as he surely would one day, his absence would make it easier to forget him. She could even tell herself that she was helping him by keeping him from being tempted by more troublesome entanglements.

He stood up and drew her to him. As he embraced her, she forgot all of her rationalizations and thought only of him.

Nine

Sigurd Kristens-Vitos had made time to speak directly with Risa Liangharad, as he usually did, even though the matter she had raised hardly merited much discussion. Too many of his fellow Islanders, especially the other Administrators, did not take the trouble to maintain contacts with individual dome-dwellers. It was important to have the settlers feel that the Islanders were Cytherians, too, and not just people indifferently watching over the domes from above.

There were, he mused, still some Islanders who considered the domed communities a premature development. The work of terraforming might have gone on without them; settling the world below could have waited until the surface had cooled and a few of the Parasol's shades could be removed. A few Islanders might not even mind if the settlements were abandoned; the specialists here would still have their scientific work to occupy them, while knowing that their own descendants would be the ones to inherit Venus.

Sigurd, however, felt an obligation to the settlers. Whatever Earth's reasons were for wanting surface settlements, the people in them had committed their lives to this world.

Sigurd nodded at the image of Risa on his wall screen. "You handled the problem well enough," he said. "I'll have one of my aides deal with the matter of Andrew Dinel's whiskey, and we'll make it clear that anyone else producing such products will be expected to show some restraint in how they're distributed. Forbidding them altogether would only create more problems later — even the early Mukhtars, despite their devotion to the holy Koran, learned that."

"I'm sorry I had to bother you with this," Risa replied. "Sometimes I think Andy's getting a bit above himself. He'll probably be flattered that one of your aides will be paying such attention to him."

Sigurd tapped his fingers on the small table in front of his screen. Andrew Dinel deserved a reprimand for not being more responsible instead of additional credit from his enterprise. He smiled at that thought. He was an Administrator and had to use such people or work around them rather than forcing them to adhere to the Project's ideals.

He studied Risa's image. Often her face was taut with tension. Now she was almost glowing; her cheeks were rosier and her dark eyes sparkled.

He had met Risa Liangharad a few years earlier, when the Administrator whom Sigurd was assisting had sent him to the northern Bat; a workers' dispute had seemed to require a personal visit. Sigurd had been in his early twenties. Although he had grown up on the Islands, he had only recently returned from Earth's Cytherian Institute. He supposed that his visit to the Bat was a test of his ability to negotiate.

Risa was seventeen at the time, yet even then her fellow workers had been willing to have her present their complaints to Sigurd. Some respected her simply for being the daughter of Iris Angharads, but she had earned his respect with her reasonableness and her concern for those with whom she worked. He had spoken with her intermittently over the screen since then, and she had proven to be useful both in handling some problems the settlers faced and in giving him a closer glimpse at their day-to-day lives through her impressions.

"You ought to visit Island Two sometime soon, God willing," Sigurd said. "This was your home once."

"I've thought of it, but —" She shrugged. "I'd have to make the time."

"I've spoken to my colleagues," he continued. "We so rarely meet with your dome Councils, and we should do something about that. Maybe when you're elected to the Oberg Council, we can invite the Councils here, and you and I can meet again."

"If I'm elected."

"I'm sure you will be." Part of Risa's charm was that she did not seem interested in power for its own sake and saw whatever influence she had as a burden. Such modesty made her seem trustworthy, but he occasionally wondered if it was a pose. He knew that she visited Pavel Gvishiani fairly often and that their involvement was clearly not romantic. Pavel might still be dreaming of what he had lost and might see the young woman as a way to regain some influence.

"I made exactly one recorded message for people here to view if they like," Risa said, "and all I did was point to my record and say I'd serve with integrity. I haven't made any promises, and I've got better things to do than go in person from house to house asking for votes."

"That may strike many as refreshing," Sigurd said.

"Anyway, I don't know if I really want to be on the Council. It'll just demand more time, and I doubt that I'll be of much more use than I am now. Besides, I may want children before too long, and I should allow time for them."

This was something new from Risa. "The Council will give you more authority," Sigurd said. "Better you should have it than others who are not so wise. Your household and the nursery will help you care for any children, so they'd hardly be neglected."

"I suppose." She sounded more tentative than usual; her mind seemed to be elsewhere. She smiled suddenly. "Anyway, don't we all know that a Council member is only another Cytherian and really no better than anyone else?"

"Indeed," he replied. "By the way, how is the new settler in your household getting along?" He did not have to ask; he could have called up recent data about Malik Haddad through his Link, but he was curious about her impressions.

Risa reddened, then looked down for a moment. "He's fine. I haven't heard any complaints about his teaching, and he's settling in here." She seemed embarrassed; her eyelids fluttered. Could she be infatuated with the man? "I've taken up enough of your time, Administrator Sigurd." She was clearly anxious to cut the conversation short; he wondered why. "I'll let Andy know I've talked to you."

"Of course. Farewell."

The screen went blank. Sigurd considered the man who was now living in Risa's house. He had pitied Malik Haddad a little when he first heard about him; now he began to worry about the effect he might be having on Risa. She hardly needed the distraction of a man whose record implied that he was a skilled seducer, and Malik Haddad had to be a man with divided loyalties even now. Unlike the other settlers, he had not joined the Project willingly or gone to a camp in the hope of finding a better life; he was here as an exile.

Sigurd was certain that the Council of Mukhtars had various ways of watching the settlers, ways that were not shared with the Islands' Administrative Committees or even with the Project Council. A few among the dome-dwellers had to be their eyes and ears. Through his Link, Sigurd had studied the records of many settlers, looking for anything that seemed not to fit. It would be easy for the Mukhtars to plant spies in one of the camps where people waited for passage; if some obscure person vanished on his way to a camp and another took his place, that fact could be hidden. Identity bracelets could be altered and records changed.

Could Malik Haddad be such a spy? He was atypical enough to make that a possibility. His family apparently had enemies on the Council of Mukhtars, but Malik's disgrace could be part of a ruse.

Sigurd chided himself. In his position, he could see deviousness even in the most commonplace events. Many of the settlers would be curious about the former Linker; that was hardly the best position for an operative. Perhaps he was only what he seemed, a disgraced exile from Earth. Even so, he did not want the man to interfere with Risa's usefulness to him. If necessary, he might have to find an excuse to bring Malik to the Islands.