But not on a kifish ship.
And: "Tully," she said. "Be careful of that. Hakkikt, I don't know if he can drink."
"Kkkt. Indeed. Can you, na Tully?"
"Yes," Tully said in perfect hani. And answered the hakkikt face to face, after all his evasions and his stratagems. He sipped a bit from his cup, and what went on behind those strange, shyly down-glancing eyes was anyone's guess.
So with Jik, who drank his own cup, carefully. And if there was raw hate inside him, if there was shock and a still-raw wound, it did not surface. Kesurinan sat beside him, at this different, jointed table with the hollow center, in which a kifish servant squatted ungainly with a serving-flask and waited for someone's cup to empty. Harun and Tauran, Vrossaru and Pauran and Shaurnurn, Faha and Kesurinan and Jik and scar-faced Dur Tahar; Tully and Skkukuk side by side; and the captain of Ikkhoitr, if she had not lost track of the kif in the shuffle, sitting by his (her?) prince's elbow.
Gods save them all from the Ikkhoitr captain's talebearing. The long-snouted bastard had indeed been whispering and clicking away, nose to Sikkukkut's hooded ear.
"Kkkkt," Sikkukkut said then, and looked at his senior captain with-it might be-curiosity. "Indeed." He turned then and extended a thin tongue briefly into the metal-studded cup which rested like a silver ball in his black hand. "Is there unanimity among you?"
"Enough," Pyanfar said; and in coldest blood: "Hani methods, hakkikt. Hani will always dispute. Even when they agree. A sfik-thing. Mine and theirs. It's satisfied and they're here. In fact they're glad to see you."
"Kkkkt. Are they?"
"We weren't fond of Akkhtimakt," Harun said in a low voice, before Pyanfar could mull it over.
Gods, be careful. Speak for yourself and you become a Power, Harun. He may ask what you don't know how to answer. Watch it, for godssakes watch it, you don't know what that sounds like in kifish.
"Hani understatement," Pyanfar said. "Akkhtimakt, a curse on his name, moved in here and dealt with the stsho. That was one thing. He disturbed hani interests. That was another."
"There were, of course, the mahendo'sat. And this other group of ships. Humans? Were those humans?"
"Yes," Harun said.
"Interesting." Another sip at the cup, a glance Tully's way and back again. "Close but not close enough. The mahendo'sat have pulled off, doubtless to try again. Hence my watchers about the system. A fool would linger on these docks. We might have another Kefk here. In an emergency. There might even be sabotage, kkkt? Did the mahendo'sat touch here?"
"No," Harun said.
"Who is this captain?"
"Harun of Harun's Industry," Pyanfar said.
"Ah. Your cousin."
Cold went through her nerves. "Distant," Pyanfar said. "Our clans have a distant tie." O gods, I hope he doesn't have our kinships in library. "Ceremonial." The lie wove itself wider and wider. "Hani place sfik on kinships. And blood-debts. Harun has ties to some of these. I have ties to Harun and Faha, there. It's really quite simple. And blood-debt to Jik and Kesurinan." Not to forget that business. Add it in. Secure Jik much as I can. "We can have that even to non-hani." Change the subject. Hold out possibilities to the bastard. "There's sfik-value on that too."
And if hani around the table did not know now that every other word she said to the kif was a lie, they were deaf and blind.
"Has he talked to you?"
"Somewhat." She took a chance, reached and took a sip of parini. "I'm going to keep him on my ship as advisor. I'm sure Kesurinan understands, ummn? But he misses the smokes, hakkikt. He truly does."
"The smokes," Sikkukkut repeated in a flat tone, as if she had gone quite mad. "Do we still have such a thing?"
The skku in the center of the tables searched anxiously among its robes. Efficient, by the gods. Foresight covering all sorts of hospitality. It brought out the little sack, eyes aglitter with triumph.
"Your skku is amazing," Pyanfar murmured, making a low-status kif very happy in its neurotic zeal; and took another minuscule sip of parini.
"I might bestow you another gift," Sikkukkut said. And scared two kif and a hani at the same time.
"Huh." She kept her calm. With difficulty. "We hardly have formalities enough to keep another skku occupied- Nothing so splendid, hakkikt."
"But you want another gift."
Bluff called. She looked up, lowered her ears and got them up again, heart hammering. "Is the hakkikt disposed to talk policy?''
"Ah." Sikkukkut set down his cup, hands in his lap as he sat crosslegged in the insect-chair. "Shikki," he said sharply; and the skku eeled its way over to lay the smoke-pouch on the table in front of Jik.
Jik picked it up carefully, felt of it and carefully extracted a smokestick and a lighter. "You mind?"
Sikkukkut gave a wave of his hand and Jik put the stick in his mouth and carefully lit it. His hands were shaking, but only a little, limned in the fire that lit his face. The light died. He drew a long breath of smoke in as if it was life itself.
"Foul habit," Sikkukkut said as the smoke went up to mingle with the ammonia-stink and the incense. He rested an elbow on the raised insect-leg of his chair and leaned his chin on that hand. "But you and I remain friends. Kkkt. Good. That is very well. Kotgokkt kotok shotokkiffik ngik thakkur."
-prisoners?
All round the table backs stiffened. Except Jik's, to look at him; he sat there concentrating on his smoke, with a cloud of it round his head.
"Sit still," Pyanfar said in hani; and Haurnar Vrossaru and Vaury Shaurnurn turned their heads to look toward their escorts, the only two who did.
But maybe they knew their crew.
"Is the hakkikt disposed?" Pyanfar repeated.
"The hani captain may push too far," Ikkhoitr's captain said out of his silence. "Be careful of it."
"Makes me nervous," Pyanfar said. "This place. We're exposed sitting here at station. If I were Akkhtimakt-" She rested her elbow on her knee, easy pose, though her heart was hammering away fit to take her breath: thank gods for the incense that masked the sweat. Her nose itched and ran. She ignored it. "This place smells of trap, hakkikt."
"In what way?"
"I'm an old trader, hakkikt. And stsho may cheat you one way and five more, but I never knew them to plot violence." Phrase it so the bastard has salve for his pride. A trader can know merchant-things. He isn't expected to understand grasseaters, is he? "But they'll buy violence, without understanding what they've bought. They've made mistakes before. This is a big one. They've involved the han. Technically, hani are allied with Akkhtimakt, because of the stsho treaty, which gave him what he never would have had. Support on the far side of the Compact. All of a sudden you don't hold the majority of Akkhtimakt's territory. He's just quadrupled his holdings. And he's on the other side of an uncrossable gulf. No jump points, hakkikt, no bridge between hani space and here. It's a narrow neck and one where he can interdict you if hani abide by that treaty."
There was deathly quiet in the room. No kif moved. Then a nervous shift from the Faha. Ears were flat, all in that section of the table.
And Jik shot her a carefully frowning glance. Sucked in a great deal of smoke and let it go. "A." Drawing Sikkukkut's attention to himself.
"Is it so."
"He go Urtur. Damn sure not go Kita."
"You have ships at Kita."
Another slow draw at the smoke. "I don't swear. Good guess. We send message Maing Tol. My Personage make move on Kita. Where he go? Here? Got no cross-jump but Tt’a’va’o, damn bad choice. Methane-breather, human, lot mahendo'sat. Damn bad choice. You no do. He no do."
"Should I wonder that that is then precisely what I should do?"
Go off toward Tt’a’va’o and possible ambush, and involve himself with everything Jik had listed? Go home to Akkht and consolidate his hold? Or to Llyene and terrorize the stsho in a raid every kifish pirate must have dreamed of?
They were all good choices for the Compact as a whole. If they cast themselves tot
ally on hope of rescue from the mahendo'sat.
Who had their hands full already, saving their own hides.
"Masheo-to," Jik said. And something more involving Akkhtimakt and ship IDs, rapidly. While Sikkukkut's black eyes fixed on him.
"Kkkt," Sikkukkut said. "Interesting thought. Do you follow that? No? Keia proposes that Akkhtimakt may have faked identification in his ship ID. That he may not be among that group we dispersed, but already at Urtur. We will both have taken precautions: my ships will reach all the jump-points that lead out from here in time to prevent escape from insystem or to prevent any ships not already launched from arriving here. But Keia favors us with another interesting proposal. I tell you I value you both."
Gods, he means it. The absolute, thorough-going bastard. He's dead inside. He doesn't know what he's done. He doesn't know Jik's his enemy. Or if he knows it he doesn't know it, from the gut. He hasn't got the equipment. He theorizes. You can revise a theory, but never gut-knowledge, never instinct.
He's naive as Skkukuk in some ways. He mimics our ways. Even friendship. And he can't feel it. He can't ever understand us: just logic his way through our motives; and that won't always work for him.
''Not know where he be," Jik said. Another puff of smoke. "Maybe even hani space."
Hani bodies all about the table stiffened.
"Maybe already there, a?"
Gods look on us all. Let it go. Let him think his way into it. Slowly, slowly.
"Kkkkt. Kkkkt." Sikkukkut's tongue flicked in the gap of his teeth.
Can we go too far? Make him lose sfik in front of his servants?
And beside the hakkikt the captain of Ikkhoitr leaned over and spoke rapidly and quietly. Sikkukkut answered a word or two back.
Gods rot him. That one's no good news.
Worse and worse.
Ikkhoitr's captain got up from table. And left. While Sikkukkut looked their way again. "You will have noticed the dispatch of certain ships. They are not the first. From Meetpoint, from Kshshti, from Mkks and Kefk. Continually my messengers have gone to inform my ships. And ships have moved. You have never seen all I have. Nor is this all of Akkhtimakt's company. You are quite correct. Kkkkt. From you, Keia, I expect a certain astuteness in such matters. But the hani are also hunters. And you've talked to them, have you, Keia?"
Jik frowned. And said nothing at all.
"Not quite by his wish," Pyanfar said. "Say that friendship has other uses. He was confused when we got him. He talked rather too much to us. That simple." We're lying, Kesurinan. Trust me. Sit still. "It's what I said. Nothing Jik wants. He knows something Goldtooth doesn't. That made the difference. Tully doesn't know what the humans are up to, but a thought occurs to me that I don't like, hakkikt. That the trouble inside the Compact is weakening us as a whole. That the humans may not wait until the trouble's settled. Just delay their attack till the most advantageous moment. Because they will push at us."
"Is this so, Tully?"
Tully made an uncomfortable shift of position. A shrug. Turned a worried look Sikkukkut's direction, hers.
"He has trouble understanding sometimes. Tully. The hakkikt asked: will the humans fight the mahendo’sat?"
"Not know." Tully's eyes fixed on hers, shifting minutely as if they hoped to read a clue.
"You told me. Tell him what you told me. Do it, Tully."
"Human-" He looked back toward Sikkukkut. Toward this kif who was more than all others his personal enemy. "Come. Got three-" He held up fingers. "Three human-"
"Governments,' Pyanfar said.
"Three," Tully said. "Fight. Push one humanity to here."
"Kkkkt"
"I belong The Pride. Crew-man!"
Keep your hands off me, you bastard.
And implicit in a glance her way: Captain, don't let them take me.
"He doesn't know much more than he's said, mekt-hakkikt. But he understands methane-breathers. I don't think the rest of his people do. He had no importance among his people. They got what information from him they wanted to hear and they shoved him aside without listening to the rest of what he had to say. They didn't want him to say the rest. We think. Gods know he might not understand as much as I think. We might not understand him. I think he's tried to tell the truth, but I don't think he was in on the planning. Just a crewman. That's all he ever was. That's what he still is." Her hands wanted to shake. If the kif took him, there was nothing she could do to stop it. / got their attention on him. Gods, get it off!
"But," Sikkukkut said, "we have other sources to question. The stsho will not hold back information. They bend to any wind. And I have sufficient of them to gain an excellent picture of what happened here-they will lie to a mahendo'sat, they will lie to a hani, but they will not lie to a kif. And they have very large eyes. Two of my least skkukun are on the station at this moment; and so are three hundred thousand stsho." Again Sikkukkut lifted the cup and drank, a quick dart of his dark tongue. "They are apprised of the possibility that I will decide to remove this station. And that they will not be allowed to leave-''
My gods.
"I have told my skkukun the same. They will find information. They will cause the stsho to find it. We have already identified responsible individuals. My enemy destroyed the station datafiles. After doubtless sucking them into his own records. So there is nothing to learn there: I expected as much. But we have direct resources. Ksksi kakt."
A servant moved. Fast. Hani shifted anxiously as an inner door opened, as kif rearranged themselves, a rustle like leaves in a midnight forest.
"Sit still," Pyanfar said again. In case any of them forgot. Her ears were flat, her muscles had a chill like fever in them that was going to start her shivering. She reached, ears flat and scowling, and picked up her cup and drank.
The parini went down like fire. And held her caught in that minor, eye-watering misery when a gibbering outcry rang out from the opened door.
A gleam of white showed in the doorway, where kif parted, where dark-robed kif shoved stsho forward, through the shadowed rows of their own kind. Stsho white, stained with sodium-light, marked with darker smears, their pitiful, spindly limbs all bruised from kifish handling.
So fragile. A breath could break such limbs.
Jik turned his face in that direction, slowly. The smoke curled up from the stick in his hand. He did not move, himself, beyond that; the other captains turned in their chairs; and Tully-on her other side-she had no way to observe. She guessed.
"Now," said Sikkukkut, "let us ask some questions.''
"Translator's not making sense of it," Hilfy murmured, gnawing her mustaches and monitoring kifish transmissions. Harukk was talking to its minions off-station. Talking a great deal. "I don't like it, gods, I don't like this."
"Takes a decision somewhere," Geran said, "to get that ship that talkative. You'd think Sikkukkut'd be busy. You'd hope he'd be."
"Calling more of them in?" Khym said.
"They got a worry about something," Geran said. "No. They won't pull ships in while there's a chance of something coming in and catching them nose to station. That's some kind of bulletin. Instruction. Gods know what."
"Still talking," Hilfy muttered. And remembered Harukk's dark bowels. The transmission went on at some length.
Likely Haral remembered Harukk, too. She had seen it, when they pulled the Tahar crew out of there.
"Hostages," Hilfy said. "That's what he's got Gods-foe, Haral, I could make a routine query over there, take the temperature."
"Just sit still," Haral said. "Captain's got enough trouble. Let it be."
They flung the larger of the two stsho at the table, between Pyanfar's chair and Haroury Pauran's. Gtst collapsed all in a nodding huddle of white, delicate limbs, of swirling pearlescent draperies at the table edge. Gtst shuddered and shivered and bubbled.
While Pyanfar looked at the designs of pastel paints on gtst brow and her heart thudded in shock.
It was Stle stles stlen. Or it had been. Gods knew
what personality the wretch had fragmented to when the second wave of kif invaded gtst station.
"You recognize this creature?" Sikkukkut asked. "Or do they still look alike to you?"
"I know gtst."
Gtst-or gstisi: it might well be Phasing-wrung gtst hands und wailed something about noble kif and noble hani. Moonstone eyes looked her way, liquid with pleading, and Pyanfar's stomach turned over. Gtst stank of oil and perfume and
something indefinable, doubled when the kif flung the other stsho down beside it.
"Talk," Sikkukkut said to the stsho. "Or we begin to hurt something, perhaps one of these others; perhaps your translator. And then if you don't, we will hurt you. Do you understand, creature?"
The stsho bubbled and babbled at each other; the one clung to the person which had been Stle sties stlen, fingers locked in gtst robes. Do it, do it, the translator was crying, and the erstwhile Stle sties stlen poured out a sudden flood of wails and words.
"-The Director is not responsible," the translator cried then. "Gtst was another person-"
"That's very well. We don't care which of you we skin."
"-But! But! noble, esteemed friend-this wretch Akkhtimakt-"
"You begin already to make a lie. Tell us about the treaty and about what happened here."
More babble. The translator turned gtst face about again, moonstone eyes wide, gtst mouth a tiny, trembling o. "It was a mistake, it was-"
"Report what you did!"
"We are not a violent people, we had need-"
"This translator is useless. We can send for another."
"-but! but! in our foolishness we listened to agents of the other hakkikt, we had need of ships to defend us and in our foolishness-"
"What of your bargains with mahendo'sat; with hani; with the methane-folk; with humans?''
"Mahendo'sat are with these creatures, these-" The translator looked Tully's way with a visible shiver that made all gtst plumes tremble. "Creatures! We ejected them. We sought accommodation with the hani. But hani have no great ships. What can we do now but shelter with the most powerful? We were fools to think this was Akkhtimakt: we see very well now: we will make treaty with you, at once, at once, estimable! Defend us!"
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