Honor Among Thieves (The Honors #1)(37)

I wasn’t sure exactly what Marko was talking about, but it was sad to consider Nadim setting off on the Journey unhappy. He had a real yearning to bond with people, or at least, that was what I sensed in him. He was lonely. More lonely than anybody I’d ever met.

It occurred to me that this was pretty rude, listening to Marko talk about Nadim and his shortcomings when Nadim was bound to have heard all of it. Marko, after all, had made a point of asking Nadim not to listen when he was recording. Leaning back in my chair, I said, “Um, Nadim?”

No answer. I had an awful thought that he was so bothered by Marko’s observations that he didn’t want to talk to me at all . . . but then I reached out and touched the wall and tried again. “Nadim?”

“I’m here,” he said.

“Were you listening?”

“No,” he said. “It was a private record. I don’t listen to those. It isn’t polite.” There was a certain precision to his response that made me smile.

“Let me guess. Somebody yelled at you before for spying on them.”

“I’ve had dozens of Honors aboard. Most of them have yelled at me when they became frustrated or felt they had no privacy. I don’t take that personally, most of the time.”

Most of the time. That got me curious, made me want to ask.

I didn’t.





From a transcript of a research interview between Dr. Elacio Camacho and Leviathan Moira, conducted aboard the Leviathan, 2112

CAMACHO: May I play you a sample of how we interpret the sounds that stars make, Moira?

MOIRA: I would like that.

CAMACHO plays a recording.

MOIRA: That is a very limited interpretation, Dr. Camacho. It is only sound. There is no life in it.

CAMACHO: It’s only a digital interpolation based on the shifts of light frequencies. We find it useful for various calculations.

MOIRA: It makes the stars sound very stupid.

CAMACHO: [pause] Are . . . you saying that the stars are intelligent?

MOIRA: Creatures of your planet sing. I sing. The stars sing. Who am I to believe they are not singing on purpose?





CHAPTER EIGHT


Breaking the Peace


THE SILENCE THAT followed as I hovered near the data console might have been awkward. I supposed that our connection let him sense my lingering curiosity. “Did you . . . want something else?” Nadim asked me. “There are more recordings. I could leave you to play them in private.”

“No, I’m done.” I yawned. “Maybe I should just go to bed.”

“If you prefer. Or you could proceed to the media room. Beatriz is singing.”

“She’s what?”

“Singing. She is quite accomplished, though I believe she underestimates her talent.”

“Did she say it’s okay to listen?”

Instead of answering, Nadim lit up a pulse on the corridor wall for me to follow.

Halfway there, I heard her, a quiet voice, then louder, stronger. I didn’t know the song. I didn’t go into the media room, but I peeked in and saw Bea standing on the stage, her eyes shut, her face lit with transcendent joy as she sang and sang, the notes soaring with pure and perfect beauty.

It was like the starlight. Like the dizzying black beauty of space. It was free and fierce and full of longing. It was so far beyond me I felt lifted on it, taken out of myself.

Nadim said, in a whisper meant just for me, “It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard. Other Honors played music or sang, but she . . . she’s different.” There was awe in his voice. Awe all around me, like a cool, shifting fog.

Beatriz sang a long time before she paused. Since this wasn’t a concert, I got up and headed over to her. Following my impulses had gotten me into more trouble than I could list, but I hugged her anyway—the kind of hug you give when somebody surprises you with a gift so special you never even knew you wanted it until you opened it.

She let out a little squeak, and then she squeezed me back. “My vó would be pleased with me. For bringing her music to the stars.”

“Your vó?”

“My grandma. She was an opera singer at the Teatro Real,” Beatriz said. “Very famous, in her day. She sang to me all the time, and I studied music as well—but I was always afraid of being onstage. So I’ve always sung just for her. And for me.”

“Nadim should broadcast you. The whole universe should hear that gorgeous voice.”

She gave me a smile so radiant that I understood at once how different she must be back home in Rio. “I don’t know about that, but thank you. The acoustics in here are so perfect, I might not sound so wonderful somewhere else—”

“Don’t even,” I cut in. “You’re special. Get used to it.”

“She’s right, Beatriz. Thank you.” Nadim sounded soft, warm, almost shy. “I’ve never heard anything like it.”

Beatriz, I noticed, raised her head when she was talking to Nadim. “You built a pool for your last Honor. Did you design this place for me?”

“Not specifically. Marko played piano here. I altered the space a little for you.”

“Yeah, about that,” I said. “You made a pool. You made a concert hall. How, exactly?”

“The pool was easy. I can grow or shrink open chambers within my body, and the filtering of water was just a special organ I grew for that purpose. Like creating and filtering the air you breathe.”