In Ashes Born (A Seeker's Tale From The Golden Age Of The Solar Clipper Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

Annex I need to find and you’re waiting for me?” He grabbed me in a bear hug and pounded my back.
    I hugged and pounded him back.
    “When Alys told me you were coming, I almost lost it,” I said.
    “You’ve caught up with her then?” He snagged his carry-on bag and nodded toward the terminal entrance. “Come on. I need to get settled in, and we need to talk.”
    “Oh, yeah. We had lunch at the O Club a couple of days ago.”
    “You’ve seen Cookie, then.”
    I nodded. “Old home week here, isn’t it?”
    He bulled through the doors and trundled toward the cottages. “Well, Bev is off somewhere with her hubby. They’re doing a nice fast-packet trade out of St. Cloud last I heard. Forget what they called it. Epiphany ? Eridani ? Ephemeral . That was it.”
    “I thought she was going off to work the family ship.”
    He shrugged. “Opportunities are everywhere, but berths are always in demand. Maybe she outgrew them.”
    “Heard from Bril?”
    He shook his head.
    “I’ve not heard from anybody since I left here,” I said. “How do you stay in the loop?”
    He waved a hand as if swatting at a fly. “I’ve been in and out of Port Newmar a dozen times or more since we left. Gossip always comes home to roost.”
    “Any scuttlebutt on Mr. Maxwell? Mr. von Ickles?”
    “Captain Maxwell retired and works for the CPJCT now. He’s the orbital manager up there.” He pointed up.
    “No.”
    “Yep.”
    “What are the odds?”
    “Well, he’s married to Alys Giggone. I’d say the odds were pretty good he wouldn’t be too far away.”
    “What?”
    “You didn’t know?” he asked, stopping to look at me as if I were some kind of odd flower beside the path. “Seriously?”
    “I didn’t know she was even married, let alone to him.”
    “Second hub for her, I think. She’s got a kid or two stashed out in Dunsany Roads somewhere if I remember.”
    “Do you have files on everybody?”
    “Oh, no.” He shook his head and resumed his march toward campus. “Only the important people.”
    “Von Ickles?” I asked.
    “Captain von Ickles commands one of the new Manchester Eighty-Eights for Federated Freight. He’s on the Lois’s old route over in Dunsany.”
    “He stayed?”
    “They treated him well. Moved him up as he made grade. Why wouldn’t he?” He turned into the path that led to the cottage across from mine. “They pay a nice seniority bonus, you know?”
    “What happened to the Lois ?”
    “They retired her from active service about a decade back. Not sure where her hull is now. Probably melted down and recast.”
    That thought made me sad but everything has a life span. Especially ships subjected to the rigors of the Deep Dark.
    “Where’d they put you?” he asked.
    I jerked a thumb at the cottage across the way.
    “Handy.” He nodded toward his own. “Come in. They should have stocked my fridge for me. We can catch up.”
    “Stocked your fridge?”
    “Yeah. I come here often enough that I leave a standing order for supplies.”
    I shook my head. “I don’t get out enough.”
    “You got stars,” he said, nodding at my collar. He looked me in the eye. “Scars, too, I’d guess.”
    That might have been the first time I’d ever seen Pip serious.
    “You got an earring,” I said. “Makes you look like a pirate.”
    He grinned and flicked the small silver hoop in his left ear with a fingertip. “Lost a bet. Best bet I ever lost.” He turned to the cottage, resettling the strap of his bag. “Come on. Let’s get out of this harmful radiation and under cover.”
    “Harmful radiation?”
    He pointed at the system’s primary hanging over the treetops to the south west. “You have any idea how much damage that thing can do?”
    I chuckled and followed him inside. The day had become warm but the clouds forming just offshore promised an evening light show when they came inland.
    Pip stashed his bag in the bedroom, tossed his coat over the back of a chair, and went face first into