Halfling Moon by Steve Miller, Sharon Lee Read Free Book Online Page B

flickerless in the breeze
when he woke, more proof that the wind had turned and came now from
the northwest rather than the southwest -- none of the road's smoke
and smudge in the sky now, none of whatever latent heat the city
and its spaceport might contribute to shimmer the sky.
    This sleeping outdoors would have to stop,
should have stopped now that Rollie was gone -- no one to remind
him of the dangers of sleeping himself to death in the cold. And it
was cold … or at least cool, despite his shirt and jacket; pulling
himself to his feet using the rock he'd sheltered against. He'd
managed last winter though, him and the cats. He'd get through.
Boss Sherton told him when she'd walked up with some butter just a
a few days back that he was a good neighbor, and besides, he traded
her fresh coffee, and she told him the news.
    This last time, she'd tried to get him to walk to town and
trade direct, but Rollie'd got caught up in all that and never come
back. And him, Yulie, he'd never been down to pick up the stuff
Miss Audrey had. If he'd have really needed it, he would have known
Rollie'd taken it. But trading direct was supposed to be better and
safer now, said Melina. There was a new boss -- a Boss of Bosses!
Not only was he a Boss, but he
had
brought ships to port, which had to be
good for business. This Boss Conrad was a man who was making
changes.
    Changes -- Yulie didn't like changes all that much.
Didn't
trust
changes, all that much.
    Frost well before dawn then, that was his
prediction, and the skittering he could hear in the leaves more
evidence of the season and the weather. The wind on his face would
quiet sometime before -- ah!
    The flash of a meteor: a momentary
scintillation fading into a green line fading into the gathered
darkness, the light a comfort rather than a threat.
    Rollie'd thought he spent too much time with
Grandpa watching the sky, and Yulie wondered if he spent too much
time now, on account of he knew the sky. Most of the changes in it
were cyclical -- the sky would look much the same this time next
year, aside from the barely perceptible flight of the double stars.
His full panic came on him easily in the open day, but not as often
in the night. Under the stars it was as if he sat more firmly in
the universe, as wild as the universe was.
    A flash -- meteor?
    No, what had caught his eye was -- what? It
clearly moved at an orbital speed, low to the horizon, but if he
read it right it was easily as large as the largest ship he'd ever
seen orbit Surebleak, maybe larger. There was more going on in the
sky; it was as if a swarm of ships had arrived nearly at once -- a
host of ships, orbiting almost in a stream or a ring, there were so
many. He felt a flutter of energy, pushed the panic back. Boss
Sherton had explained that the Boss of Bosses was busy, and that
she trusted what Conrad was doing, and that there were ships. The
big one that caught his eye was in a polar orbit crossing that
stream; a small halo of other ships about it -- it might even be
one of the legendary Korval trade ships Grampa'd always talked
about.
    Changes!
    Yulie shivered, unsure if it was the weather or the times.
Grampa had taught him to be wary of change. Change had taken away
his ship, and then the Settlement Agreement he'd made with the
company had turned into a debacle as the whole organization
evaporated shortly after he'd set down to take over his property,
prepared to lease out . . . well, a regional depression did nothing
to make
that
work.
    Yeah, change was difficult. Certainly
Rollie'd never helped, always managing to take an advantage when
something new did happen, from taking the newer bed when Mom left
to pulling a muscle right at the time Grampa was setting work
schedules so it ended up Rollie on perpetual light-duty, it
seemed.
    Started down that thought road Yulie rolled on, right up to
Rollie helping him choose a nettle-vined hideaway for one of his
few forays into hunting oversized feral Cachura pigs --