Kohan Chanur ruled at home. On the last edge of adolescence. Fearfully proud.
Once and silently she wished Hilfy safe at home, but she did not say that. Home
was a long, long way away and Chanur interests were at stake.
“I want a watch on com,” she said. “I want scan set to alarm if something comes
in, if something budges from this station. I don’t care what it is. I want to
know.”
“Aye,” said Haral.
“Tally’s back.”
Ears went up. Eyes went wide. Hilfy sat down.
“Good gods,” Chur said.
“Mahijiru’s here. Was here. Goldtooth’s cut loose and run.” There were other
things to break to them, like being backed into agreements, like a fool of an
aging captain who had believed for one moment in a way out of what she had
gotten Chanur into, a way into human trade and all it meant. “He was going to
slip us a canister with a special cargo. Don’t blame me–” She waved a hand.
“Goldtooth’s originality, gods help us. But the stsho are playing power games.
That can’s tied up in red tape in customs. I think I’ve got it fixed.”
Chur and Tirun sank into seats where they were, ears back.
“Sorry,” Pyanfar said tautly. “Sorry, cousins.”
“Got a chance?” Haral asked. Meaning lost trade. Lost chances. A whole variety
of things, in loyalty too old to be completely blind. “The mahendo’sat’ve come
through?”
“Don’t know. They just headed out and left us the package. There’s worse news.
The kif are onto it.”
“Gods.” Geran leaned onto the back of Chur’s couch. “And the bar fight–”
“Set up. Absolutely it was a set-up.” She recalled with chagrin the kif watcher
while she had been on the docks. “Maximum confusion. Goldtooth kited out. Under
what circumstances- gods know. Messages were going up and down that dock like
chi in a fire drill. Maybe it was a kifish smash-and-grab. Maybe not. Likely it
was targeted at the stsho. They’ve sure got the pressure on.”
“The kif know about that can?” Tirun asked.
“Gods-rotted mahe shoved a shipment out in the middle of bolting dock like their
tail was afire — what else could they guess? Gods know who’s been bribed. Gods
know how long the bribes will hold. –Khym all right, is he?”
Silence for a moment. Haral shrugged uncomfortably. “Guess he is,” Haral said.
“He have anything to say?”
“Not much.”
“Huh.”
“Said he’d be in his quarters.”
“Fine.” She bit it off. They were blood kin, she and the crew. All Chanur. All
with the same at stake, excepting Khym, Mahn-clan, male, past his prime and his
reason for living and belonging anywhere. Her brother Kohan Chanur relied on
her, back home. Meetpoint in ruins. Kif on the loose. Stsho facing her down. The
Pride nose-deep in it again. She had gone softheaded as well as softhearted.
Hani everywhere muttered to that effect. Only her long-suffering crew would not
say it, even yet. And Hilfy, of course Hilfy. Worship shone undimmed in those
young eyes.
Fool kid, she thought. And to the crew at large: “What happened with our cargo
out there?”
“Cans on the dock were gone when we got back,” Tirun said. “We filed a theft
report with station. Cans still inside are safe.”
“Kif are fast. Power her up. We go on using station’s hookups, but we keep our
own online. Look sharp, hear? Don’t ask me how long this goes on. I don’t know.
Contact customs. I want to know where that incoming shipment is.”
No one mentioned costs or what the stsho might do. No one mentioned licenses,
and the docking rights and routes it had cost too much to regain. No one
mentioned Khym, a private folly that had long since become a public one. Not a
backward look. No protests. Just a quiet moving toward stations, the whine of
chairs receiving bodies all about her as she powered her own chair about and
keyed in the old com messages.
From a mahendo’sat, unidentified: “I leave paperwork, leave cans same station
office. Good voyage. Got go quick. Same you.”
She drew one long, quivering breath.
From Ayhar’s Prosperity: “Banafy Ayhar to Pyanfar Chanur: We have a matter