Free The Sorceress of Karres by Eric Flint, Dave Freer Page A

Pausert had to admit.
    Vezzarn shuddered. "In the Chaladoor it always feels like it is out to get you, Captain. But even the Agandar would have struggled to organize something like this. I think this must be more witchy stuff, Captain. I reckon we better cut and run."
    "It would take us just as much time by now to go back as it would to go on," Pausert pointed out. "But I don't like playing their game for them. We might try a little extra speed."
    Vezzarn coughed. "Uh, I'm feeling really tired, Captain. I think I'll go and take a sleep now." Vezzarn strongly resisted seeing "witchy stuff" in action. He really did not like to be around when they worked the Sheewash drive. It was quite an eerie thing to watch, Pausert had to admit. The more he thought about it, the more he decided it wasn't a "drive" at all. The Venture did not gain momentum in the process. It just traversed vast amounts of space. He wanted to understand how, but not right now. Right now, he needed to get away from the harassment and get some rest.
    Soon, in the control room of the Venture, a cone of strangely twisted wires had a ball of orange energy dancing above it, as the captain and the Leewit worked the klatha pattern that produced the Sheewash drive. They did not keep it up for very long. Captain Pausert found that he did not mesh nearly as well with the Leewit on her own as he had with Goth and her sister. Besides, right now they had nothing to run from, except a feeling that the captain had that they ought to follow a course of their own choosing, rather than being steered down one. Using the Sheewash drive took it out of him. Captain Pausert was not particularly experienced at using it. And the Leewit was still quite young for doing so. They really couldn't afford to push it too hard or far. For all they knew, they might be needing it soon in earnest.
    "You'd better go and rest, brat," said the captain afterwards, as the Leewit wolfed down a double batch of pancakes and Wintenberry jelly.
    The Leewit nodded. "Need to bathe first," she said.
    The captain smiled to himself. She was growing up. Imagine her suggesting washing herself! Times changed. But what he said was: "See you wash behind your ears." It was by now a traditional thing for him to say. He wasn't prepared for the Leewit to hug him. "Miss Goth," she said thickly, before hastily walking away towards her stateroom.
    He went back to his chair in front of the control panels and viewscreens. Watching.
    He didn't have long to watch before trouble came looking for them.
     

Chapter 8
    Goth had always been around while the captain was organizing things, but until now she hadn't realized just how useful the experience would be. At least she had some idea of the actual mechanisms of renting a house, which was not a custom on Karres. She decided that it would be easier than trying to find a safe spot in the circus lattice ship—which would be leaving anyway, pretty soon.
    On the other hand, she also began to appreciate Karres's habit of simply ignoring bureaucracy when you could. The Karres people never made waves deliberately among societies of the Empire and the other worlds they visited. Their work was far too important to waste time causing trouble for mere entertainment. But fussy, meticulous bureaucracies that seem to like paperwork for its own sake were a real temptation, Goth had to admit.
    Before you could rent a house on Nikkeldepain you had to provide a whole lot of paperwork, most of which would be easy for a criminal to fake, but was guaranteed to cause maximum inconvenience for an honest citizen. And, unfortunately, documents posed a problem for her. Goth could very easily appear to be an adult. Light-shifts could provide the appearance of most things—but every use of klatha drained some energy that could only be restored by sleep and food. If she pushed herself too much in any one day, she ran the risk of being exposed or having something else go wrong. Multiple klatha tasks were