A Break in the Sunlight

16. Queen's Gambit

Sain was true to his word. He returned just before eleven, and made only a brief stop in the kitchens before shooing Jaren into the hovercraft and pointing it toward the north.

"Where are we going?" she frowned, "We aren't going to the river?"

Sain only smiled and turned the ignition. "You'll see."

The drive took them first through the cane fields of Sain's plantation. The HC swept above the tall grass, the whoosh of wind parting it like a sea beneath them. Occasionally they would pass a group of workers moving among the rows, or sitting under a rest tent, who would turn their way, waving and calling as Sain blew the HC's horn. The cane went on forever. At every copse of trees or turn, Jaren expected the property to end, but it did not.

"Is all of this yours?"

"My family's, yes." Sain responded, gazing across the blanket of green and gold. "Though the running of it falls to me. We provide all of the sugar for this sector. More than twenty systems."

"How far does it go?"

"In this direction? Only to the Aram foothills. But to the south..." He gestured behind them. "For about five hundred miles."

"Christ. That's huge."

He smiled, "Yes, it is."

"Wait.. I don't get it." Jaren turned sideways in her seat, brushing flying blond hair back out of her eyes. "If you have to run all this... What are you doing in the GRC?"

He made a slight shift in their direction to get around an outcropping of trees.

"I am not in the GRC." he replied, "I am in the Arcadian Auxiliary Corps. Most of our security we commission from the GRC, but the Corps is our home force."

"Okay, then... what are you doing in the Auxiliary Corps?"

"That too is my responsibility." He glanced over at her and smiled again. "All Arcadians spend some time in the Corps. It is part of the Charter. My time was extended when the previous Colonel was murdered. I was asked by our governor to assume the command... It is a great honor."

"Oh, I'll bet. If you can get murdered and all... I'm sure people are fighting over the job," she murmured. "How much longer do you have to do it?"

"It is a lifetime commission," he answered, chuckling at her. "Though I have extensive leave, such as now, to attend to personal affairs. Generally I spend about half the galactic year in space."

"Shit. That sucks, Sain. No wonder you've never gotten married."

"I have never married," he said after a pause, "Because I have never found the right woman."

He turned the HC back toward the north and pushed forward the throttle as they shot around the trees and finally left the cane fields behind.

Not far from the cane's edge the terrain became suddenly rougher and more inclined. The dirt road they were now following began to pass into the trees, winding below cliffs of cascading lime green, and past darker hollows sheltering the thin trickles of late summer waterfalls.

The undergrowth around them was lush. Occasionally a branch would whap Jaren in the shoulder. She slid closer to Sain and his free hand reached to enfold one of hers.

"Where did you say we were going?" she asked.

"I didn't." Sain smiled. "And you aren't going to trick it out of me."