The Garden - Melissa Scott [59]
CHAPTER
6
PARIS LEANED FORWARD AGAINST THE SAFETY STRAPS,
peered past Grayrose's right wing at the green and gold patchwork that unreeled beneath the shuttle. By his best estimate, they were maybe thirty kilometers from the citadel, though the placement of the shuttle's windows made it impossible to see back the way they'd come. The lake that Grayrose had mentioned was clearly visible, a narrow arc that was either spring-fed and -drained or completely artificial, and even as he thought that, Grayrose threw the shuttl e into a steep bank. She straightened only when they were flying parallel to the shore, and Paris released his grip on the edge of his chair. He had always counted himself a good pilot, but Grayrose was something else. Either she's physically immune to g-force blackout, he thought, or I should be thinking about walking home. He smiled at that. Before he'd joined Voyager's crew, the word "home" had had too many connota-
tions, too many bad memories-too many reminders, if he was honest with himself, of all the ways he'd screwed up. But now, it had a relatively simple meaning "home" was Voyager, nothing more, and nothing less. Home is where your species is, he thought, and let his grin widen. But I do wonder where Revek thinks his home is.
"Enjoying the ride?" Revek called, raising his voice to be heard over the noise of the shuttle's triple engines, and Paris nodded.
"Sure. Do we get a repeat performance on the way back?"
Grayrose's wings twitched at that, but she said nothing.
"What do you expect from a native flyer?" Revek asked in return, and Paris blinked. He hadn't thought of the winged Kirse as flying under their own power, had somehow assumed that the mass/wing ratio was too great-and it still looks heavy to me, he thought, slanting a wary glance at Grayrose. But if the Kirse were significantly lighter than she looked-hollow-boned, maybe, like terrestrial birds-and if the wing-span was larger than it seemed from the folded membranes, then he supposed it was possible.
"I didn't know you could fly," he said, to Grayrose, and felt instantly foolish. "I mean, yourself, without power," he added, and felt even less intelligent as the Kirse tilted her head to look back at him.
"It's a convenience of the form," she said. "I was designed for it."
"Designed?" Paris repeated, his attention sharpening, and Revek smiled.
"Bred for it, I think you mean, Gray."
"Bred for it, yes," Grayrose repeated, and turned her attention to her controls. Paris watched her, knowing better than to pursue the question, but
unable to shake his conviction that the Kirse had meant what she had said. Designed, not bred, had been her first choice, and that could be important information later. Grayrose leaned comfortably against a padded cylinder that ran from floor to ceiling, her safety harness running around shoulders, hips, and thighs, leaving her wings and arms free. Looking more closely, Paris could see the wing membranes shiver faintly with each adjustment Grayrose made to her primary controls, and realized that she was flying the shuttle as much by inbred instinct, her sense of balance and placement, as by the instrumentation that flickered on the panels in front of her. It was a disconcerting realization, and he couldn't say whether it reassured or alarmed him.
Before he could decide, Revek leaned forward to touch Grayrose on the back of the neck, well above the massive muscles that powered her wings-the equivalent of a tap on the shoulder, Paris guessed, watching Grayrose's head tilt in response.
"Set down at the blue beach, why don't you?"
"Ah. A good idea." Grayrose touched her control yoke, and the shuttle yawed sharply, nearly throwing Revek back into his seat. He made a face, tightening his harness, and Paris was glad his own webbing was secure. He straightened cautiously, and Grayrose glanced over her shoulder, a faint smile on her face. Revek smiled back, the expression wry, and Paris realized that the Kirse had done it on purpose.