Free In the Courts of the Crimson Kings by S.M. Stirling Page B

nomads, God knows what. Keep in close touch. Even the atmosphere plant dies out there sometimes.”
    Jeremy and Sally nodded soberly. That low-growing, waxy-leaved plant was the Martian equivalent of grass . . . and also, ecologically, of oceanic plankton; it kept the oxygen content of the air. It had a fantastically efficient version of photosynthesis, flourished nearly everywhere, and stood at the bottom of nearly every food chain. An area too hostile for it was likely to be bleak indeed, even by this dying planet’s standards.
    Holmgard poured essence into their cups. The purple liquid glowed faintly as it made a graceful low-gravity arc, with motes moving within it. Stars shone many and very bright through the dome above, making the mild springlike temperature—tropical warmth to Martians—seem like the small bubble of life it was, in a universe coldly inimical. The gasbags of floatlights shone as well, a light cooler than electrics and tinged with red, circling the building as they sculled themselves along with feathered limbs. Things rustled and clicked in the dense groves and gardens that separated the mansions and palaces of Zar-tu-Kan’s inner zone.
    “And on that cheerful note . . .”

    Teyud za-Zhalt finished her last inspection of the Intrepid Traveler as the sun rose eastward behind the highlands. The air was slightly cool, just enough to leave a rime of frost on exposed stone, and the din and clatter of the port sounded sharp through it.
    The landship was a sixty-footer with a central hold and two internal decks fore and aft; a hundred fifty tons burden, which made her medium sized. Old but sound, with a single hundred-foot mast and an auxiliary engine that could supply enough hydraulic pressure to the rear axle motors to move the craft at better than walking pace in a pinch. The layout was standard for a vessel of her size, with one fixed axle at the rear, another amidships, and a longer pivoting one forward. Axles, mast, and spars were single-crystal growths; unfortunately there was no way of telling how old they were—the slight yellowish tinge to the clear flexible material meant only that they weren’t new.
    They could be a hundred years from the plantations and good for another thousand, or a thousand and likely to go to dust at any moment. Bearings, cables, and sails all looked reliable, and there was a good ring-mounted darter on the quarterdeck.
    The crew . . .
    She grimaced very slightly at the score of them: a collection of scar-faced toughs, tokmar addicts with a faint quiver to their hands, and obvious lowbreeds. One was nearly noseless, with nasal slits that closed and opened nervously, and he had a russet brown hue to his skin—some sort of hybrid from the deep deserts. They stood waiting, a few working on their personal gear or playing atanj , while De’ming trotted from the stone wharf across the boarding rams to stow bundles of dried meat and asu -fruit, ceramic casks of pickled eggs, ammunition and gun-food, spare cable, and stores of a dozen kinds, down to glow-rods and blood-builders. Half a dozen of the little subsapient laborers went and squatted on the foredeck when the loading was finished; she’d bought those for the usual tasks. Ordinary workers attached a hose to fill the tanks; this district had a water tower and pressure in the mains.
    Several of the crew came more erect as they felt her gaze. She knew that a yellow-eyed stare was disconcerting. Old legendsspoke of it. Others remained dully indifferent, and one kept chewing on a kevaut on a stick he’d bought from a vendor with a portable grill, spitting out bits of carapace as he sucked out the last shreds of flesh.
    “What do you think of the engine?” she said to the hireling who had an engineer’s hairdo.
    “Middle-aged, and the temperature is just a little higher than I’d like, so I would advise not straining it,” the hatchet-faced woman said. She was short, a full foot shorter than Teyud’s seven-two.