Free Hidden in Sight by Julie E. Czerneda Page A

myself, would be a new set of matched luggage. Ready-to-fill luggage.
    Apparently Paul didn’t share my enthusiasm. His grin faded and a look of growing suspicion was wiping any remaining humor from his eyes. “Let me get this straight, Esen,” he said in that voice. “You asked Joel to not only find you a ship to Picco’s Moon, but arrange a stopover—there of all places? How did you manage that?”
    â€œI said you’d been working very hard,” I said defensively. “You needed a vacation. Joel agreed with me. That’s all.”
    My Human sat down on the couch. His eyes didn’t leave mine for an instant. “What else did he say?”
    My third stomach lurched slightly as I perceived I may have been a little quick to assume Human responses would match my own in this instance.
    As I hesitated, Paul added firmly: “Exactly.”
    Exactly? I cleared the contents of the unruly stomach, shunting them into my fourth with a gulp I was reasonably sure even a Human could hear, and sat as well. “Which ‘exactly’ do you mean? We talked about a few things.” Relationships between ephemerals were such complex and tricky things. I’d had some problems in this area before. But I really couldn’t see what I’d done wrong this time. Joel was our friend.
    And more. Joel Largas was the recently retired founder of Largas Freight, which owned most of the starships worth using on Minas XII or anywhere in this part of the Fringe. By any reasonable measure, he still ran the company—it just looked as though his plentiful offspring were in charge. In practical terms, this made Joel Largas almost a partner in Cameron & Ki Exports, since we relied on his ships above all others. A powerful being, by Minas XII thinking. It was a fairly common belief that what Joel Largas didn’t know wasn’t worth knowing.
    As that included the truth about us, I heartily agreed. Joel Largas, his family, and friends had escaped the destruction of their homeworld only to be attacked by Death, a web-being with a taste for intelligent flesh. Their survival and new life here owed everything to Joel’s grim determination to make them a new, safer home.
    That his daughter, Char Largas, had found Paul Cameron in that home, and together they’d added two grandchildren to the Largas’ dynasty, simply reinforced the need for secrecy. Easily done—refugees understood a desire to look ahead rather than to the past. Joel had welcomed Paul into his extended family with a keen appreciation of my Human’s sterling qualities, taking me as part of the package. Over the years, we’d come to enjoy one another’s company in the way of old friends who find the rest of the universe occasionally perplexing. He was the one being I could talk to when Paul and I disagreed. To Joel, I was never so much in trouble as troubled—a refreshing attitude I valued highly.
    â€œEsen. What did Joel say about our leaving, now, during all these negotiations?”
    I hunted for something neutral. “He was sure you knew what you were doing.”
    Paul ran both hands through his hair, leaving it more disheveled than usual. “Dare I ask what you told him that was?”
    â€œWell, I couldn’t, could I?” I said primly. “You were the one making the excuses at the office.”
    â€œSo what did you say?”
    I noticed the edge to his voice, but for some reason I went on happily, much the way migrating tendren once plunged over the walls of the Assansi Valley: “Oh, you know Joel. He agreed family always comes first.”
    â€œPardon?” Paul, like Ersh, could instill one word with a positive wealth of consequences. Negative consequences.
    I cycled before my stomachs could embarrass me completely, leaving warm damp spots on the furniture and floor as I shed both excess heat and mass. Better than the alternative. “I might have hinted you planned