To Trade the Stars (3 page)

No matter if ghost or unconscious state, the numberless Watchers were lightning-quick to sound the alarm to Council if Clan or alien transgressed borders or behaviors they themselves established—a territorial instinct ruling Clan Councils had found very useful indeed.

As part of his final testing to become a Scout, Barac had touched the thoughts of a Watcher, a process, he'd been told, of assessment and identification. Its strange, almost hollow questioning had left an intangible echo within his mind, as if dreamed rather than experienced.

He shook off the memory. “Sira believes Copelup. He claims the Watchers don't touch the M'hir in a way that lets them encounter the Drapsk or their machines.” Barac himself doubted anything could miss the metallic stench of Drapsk technology, including that surrounding the mind-deadeners they supplied the Enforcers.

“Proving only that all we know, Cousin,” Rael said sharply, “is what the Skeptics choose to tell us. Which is either insufficient, confusing, or completely incredible. And, don't forget, your Levertup is one of those who doesn't believe the Watchers exist.” Rael pursed her full lips in an impression of the little Drapsk, lacking the characteristic ring of fleshy tentacles but otherwise matching his scornful expression perfectly. “‘Figments of untrained imaginations. Proof, Mystic One. Show me proof!'”

Barac chuckled. “Visit me, Rael,” he coaxed. “I promise not to inflict Levertup on you. It's almost time for supper here. You must be as tired as I am of eating alone.”

That confession drew a smile from her. “Alone? Surely our kind hosts never leave you bereft of companionship.”

“You know what I mean.”

Rael's smile widened, and Barac felt a teasing sting of Power against his. “A First Scout, weary of the alien? Who'd have thought?”

“Then you'll come?”

He watched Rael's image stand, her feet on a floor he couldn't see.

“I'll be there. For supper only. Arrange it for two hours from now.” He tasted suspicion suddenly. “You promise—no Drapsk?”

Barac gave her his most sincere smile as he watched the Clanswoman vanish.

Almost immediately, a stem, high-pitched voice rang out from under the bed platform. “I am not pleased you are using falsehood to lure her here, Mystic One. Not pleased at all! What will her reaction be? Have you thought of that? She tends to highly emotional responses, you know.”

“My dear Copelup,” Barac said soothingly, hurrying to help the small being extricate himself. It had been a tight fit. “We agreed it was time to bring Rael back. Trust me. I know my cousin. She'll understand.”

Three of the Drapsk's distractingly red and mobile tentacles disappeared into his mouth, the rest forming what could be described as a stylized mustache over his upper lip. There were no other features on the round white globe that served the Drapsk for a face. Copelup's antennae, bright yellow and plumed, rose to a quivering height Barac thought might express determination. Or the Drapsk could be reading an olfactory message wafting through the room on one of the omnipresent drafts.

He could also, Barac decided glumly, simply be stretching, after being folded so long under the bed. After three months living with the species, the Clansman was only sure that Drapsk were never obvious.

The tentacles popped out again, a cue sometimes signifying the Skeptic had reached some decision, or had given up the effort. “I most certainly hope so, Mystic One,” the Drapsk stated primly. “And may I remind you, in any discord between our Mystic Ones, my esteemed colleagues—including Levertup—will have no hesitation in supporting the other Mystic One's position over yours. No matter who is right. I trust you will not be offended.”

Barac, unChosen and sud, lifted his shoulders and let them drop. “Why would I be, Copelup?” he said, tasting the bitter, accustomed truth. “Among my kind, who is right always depends on Power.”

“
W
E can always depend on Huido—and his need for truffles,” I offered, trying to hide a smile. One of the unexpected results of our time in the jungles of Pocular had been the introduction of the rare Merle truffle, a native edible fungus I found less appealing than C-rations, to the
Claws & Jaws
. Huido had somehow turned the black lumps into a must-have delicacy for several species on Plexis. Or so I was told. The Carasian certainly imported enough of them to keep Withren's people, the Fak-ad-sa'it, busy digging in their meadows, at a price that made it worth their time.

Morgan grunted something incomprehensible, keeping his attention firmly—or at least ostensibly so—on the display in front of us both. As this was an alarmingly symmetrical comparison between operating costs (rising) and our credit (dwindling), I found myself in the novel position of feeling I might know better than my Chosen, Master Trader or not. Ferrying dried fungi to Plexis wasn't glamorous, but if Morgan hadn't canceled that lucrative contract, we wouldn't be sitting here worrying about the critical refit suddenly needed by the
Fox
's aging translight drive—as if her ailing starboard thrusters hadn't been enough.

My amusement at this turn of events was likely rippling along our link despite my best efforts, but I couldn't help it. A routine cargo run was as new and exciting to me as everything else Morgan and I did together, with the bonus of being safe and profitable at the same time. What more could one want? Apparently, Morgan saw a lack in that life I could not. Or Humans were simply every bit as restless a species as I'd been told.

It's not...
“that, Sira.” Morgan's mind voice slipped into speech—a habit of which he was largely unconscious. It was a sign he was absorbing some of my Clan ways, even as I took on more of his Human ones. A fair trade, I thought, smiling to myself. Of course, among Clan, such slips were a sign of deliberate secrecy—it being supposedly easier to hide the truth out loud—or a disrespectful reversion to childhood ways. Being quite foolishly fond of the sound of my Human's voice, I chose not to correct him.

“It's not? Were you not the one who said you'd had enough of the—monotony—of running between Pocular and Plexis?”

Morgan turned to look up at me, an impish grin lighting his eyes. Endlessly fascinating, how their remarkable blue varied with his mood. “I believe I used somewhat stronger language.”

“So did Huido,” I remembered.

A raised brow. “Who had no problem finding another carrier the next day. Probably an entire fleet, by now, seeing how enthusiastically the Fak-ad-sa'it have embraced the concept of hunting prey that doesn't hunt back. We spent more than our share of time plying back and forth to fill Huido's menu, my Lady Witch.” Morgan's eyes grew solemn. “And more than enough findown on Pocular, don't you think?”

“Oh,” was all I managed, surprised again by his empathy. Nightmares visited me on that world, nightmares I couldn't stop. We'd never discussed it—I now understood there hadn't been any need. I drew my hand in the air to gently trace the lines of unseen tension around his head, neck, and shoulders, drawing them down and away with a touch of Power. “So, Master Trader,” I asked him, mouth close to his ear, “where do we find our next vastly profitable cargo?”

Morgan's hand slipped warm and strong behind my neck, his head turning so my last words brushed against his smiling lips.

My hair enclosed us both.

 

“So?”

“So ...?”

“So—what next?”

At Morgan's sudden smile, I took a firm step backward and finished fastening my coveralls. “You know perfectly well what I mean, Human. If we aren't reconsidering Huido's contract, what are we going to do?” I didn't bother saying what we both knew: that only Huido would chance a cargo with us, given the present state of the Fox.

Other opportunities had been as far apart as their star systems. We'd made some successful trades on our own, keeping afloat, but Morgan's former clients seemed to have vanished in the last couple of months. Certainly none appeared to have shipments needing the famed luck of the
Silver Fox
and her Captain.

Was it my presence? Gossip spread translight, especially among Traders. We hadn't bothered fabricating a life history for me, which meant that, so far as Morgan's business associates knew, the Human might have grown me in a tank. Morgan had shrugged when I'd voiced this suspicion. The
Silver Fox
would find new clients, if that was the case.

I walked over to the table, tracing its edge with my fingers as I let myself be frustrated. I might be the acknowledged leader of my entire race, but, to date, that lofty accomplishment had produced only visitors with complaints, most arriving when and where we least wanted them. Payment? The Clan, with the exception of the self-styled and unstable society on Acranam, existed as independent families; no one “paid” another of our kind for service. That was what Humans were for.

My House, di Sarc? It was wealthy, but its more portable riches had left with my father, the exiled Jarad di Sarc; no one on Council, including its newest Speaker, was inclined to invite him back for an accounting. I'd last seen his Chosen, my mother, Mirim sud Teerac, at the Clan gathering on Camos. She'd been compelled there, like all our kind, by the Watchers, but hadn't spoken to anyone, including her daughters, disappearing at the end to wherever she now chose to live. I presumed she had the where-withal to keep herself however she wished. If her lifestyle didn't involve replacement parts for starships, it didn't interest me.

There had been other assets, legitimately mine and so Morgan's as my Chosen. Property. Business interests. The sort of thing less than easily pilfered by someone disgraced and perhaps fearing reprisal, but now all gone, sold to pay a debt. My Human hadn't commented when I'd entrusted the substantial sum to Sector Chief Bowman. He knew how I felt about those twenty-two shattered lives. The Human telepaths had suffered because of an experiment I'd started without compassion or compunction—that they'd been victimized by others of my kind made no difference to my guilt. I'd been the one to put them on a list, ready for use; it was only just I help their families with the cost of caring for their mindless husks.

In that, the Clan way was cleaner. When the mind was lost in the M'hir, the body was sent to follow. But the Human med-techs refused to believe the Clan Healer, Cenebar di Teerac, that these individuals would never recover, that their personalities had been erased forever.

Courtesy of my father, who saw any mingling of Clan and Human as obscene. Especially mine with Morgan. My fingers became a fist.

Mind-speech, soft and familiar, wove peace into my troubled thoughts:
What's done's done, chit. Enough dark memories for one morning
.

I focused on the here and now, smiling up into Morgan's perceptive eyes. The Human hardly needed the invisible link binding us to read my mind. “My apologies, Captain. Where were we?”

He beckoned me to follow him out of our cabin. “I've had an idea. What do you think of setting course for—” The beginning of his announcement took us into the corridor; its abrupt end was ample forewarning all wasn't as it should be.

Although no warning could have prepared me to face what filled most of the right-hand corridor. Or, rather,
who.
A pulsating mass pressed against floor, wall, and ceiling, as though the being had forced itself to fit within our parameters. Five long, fibrous-appearing arms lay in parallel along the near wall, as if we'd surprised them reaching toward our cabin door. There were no other obvious features or body structures. With the exception of the arms, the whole seemed insubstantial, as if darkness had been poured into this shape and left without form, only a glistening, as if wet or coated in the finest possible scales.

Morgan's arm lifted into a valiant, if improbable, barrier between me and our latest uninvited guest. I put my hand on his wrist and gently brought it down.
Rugheran,
I sent to him, as tightly as my mind could focus.

Despite this care, the flesh—if that's what composed this being—quivered in response.

And more. A blurred mix of
/joy/satisfaction/~!~/ curiosity
/ flooded my mind, effortlessly breaching any shielding or defense I might believe I possessed, reaching Morgan through our link in the M'hir. For that was the rightful place of the Rugheran, the species owning a physical connection to the M'hir greater than any my kind had imagined possible, traveling inside it like birds through air. I'd met one once, at the Drapsk Festival. My hair lifted from my back and shoulders, as if the Rugheran's message instilled it with static. I grabbed it with both hands to keep it out of my eyes.

“I think it likes us,” I ventured hopefully, unsure of Morgan's reaction to this latest intrusion.

“It could learn to knock, too,” Morgan muttered under his breath, but I heard the growing wonder in his voice as he surveyed the being stuffed into his ship. “Rugheran. Sira. Do you realize what this means? First contact ...”

I opened my mouth to contradict his humanocentric view of things, given the Heerii Drapsk had found the Rugheran homeworld and I, another non-Human, had already had a more-or-less successful encounter with a member of the species. For all I knew, I thought with sudden suspicion, this one. Then I closed my mouth, alarmed to see Morgan on the move. He stopped closer to our latest guest, his hands low and held open in a gesture a smart primate might deduce was non-threatening, but of what use to greet an amorphous M'hir being I couldn't begin to guess. But he was a Master Trader and had dealt with aliens long before I'd ever left the Cloisters. I trusted his instincts.