Time was fast running out. They must either depend upon these others who had the wide-flung organization which could locate a man off-world, or they must admit defeat. And to do that was to perhaps open a future which would—
Zarn shook his head. He went back to the low table, dropped down to the mat seat behind it, his fingers scrabbling among a number of small sticks littered there. Each was notched in a different pattern, one which could be read by touch, even in the dark. But he had no need to try to sort out again those orders, threats, demands.
There was a muted sound, hardly louder than his own labored breathing. Zarn's head came up, he was on his feet at once, to pass through a concealed doorway into that narrow room where there was a panel high in the wall open to the night sky. Through this his awaited messenger had come to perch on the desk table. It uttered two plaintive squawks as the merchant reached it.
His hands went out to stroke and gentle the flyer. Then met those avian eyes with his own compelling gaze. This was one of the best trained of the shrine flyers. At least they had accepted that the task demanded the very best weapons they could bring to the field.
Zarn plucked the message from brain to brain. His tongue tip swept dry lips. His life—well, he had known in the end it would come to this—his life in the balance against victory. But they were giving in, if reluctantly; they were agreeing that his suggestion could now be the only way.
So—in hope he had already made certain moves; now it was time to follow those up. He gave the flyer its reward and left it squatting on the desk top, the opening in the roof unclosed. There would be no message he could send now—that he wanted to send. What he would do needed no interference from those at a distance who had never encountered the players he must draw into the game.
Dawn was smoky pale in the sky as he began to set into action the plan he had labored on. He sent another messenger, this one two-legged and from his household, with a very ambiguous report that he had lately obtained certain wares from the north which might interest that particular buyer.
Down in the larger chamber devoted to business he oversaw the unpacking of two bags, the setting out of his bait—star stones worked by Hemcreft himself. The High Shagga had parted with those as easily as if they had been implanted toothwise in his jaws—but they were unique enough to hold this Xantan.
He had time to compose himself fully, to practice the Six Exercises of Quiet and Preparation. So it was with his usual composure that he faced the woman who answered his summons.
She was clearly an off-worlder, a thin-bodied figure with elongated arms and overlarge hands. Her dark skin had a metallic sheen and looked very smooth, almost as if she were indeed encased in some hard coating. A great deal of it was exposed by her scanty clothing which consisted mainly of strips of shaggy material which might be the fur of some strange beast and was of a violently vivid flame color, showing even brighter against the grey-black of the body it wreathed around. Her head was swathed in a large turban that flashed a border of jewels, the seeing of which gave Zarn a hidden satisfaction. It was plain that this envoy of the Guild had a liking for gems, so that what he had to offer should prove tempting.
"Gentlefem"—he bowed and escorted her to a pile of seat mats well raised above the floor to accommodate her longer limbs—"you honor this house of trade."
She raised her first set of eyelids and opened the inner ones halfway. Her narrow, almost snoutlike, mouth was not meant to shape a humanoid smile but it twisted somewhat in what might just be the equivalent of such.
"The wares of Ras Zarn," her trade tongue had a rasp as suggestive of metal as her body, "are well known to produce treasures. It was spoken to me of a special shipment—"
She had not glanced once at the display on the table. However, Zarn believed that she had not only surveyed it but at the same instant had been able to value it.
"As you see, Gentlefem." He waved a hand toward the gems set out skillfully on a darkened strip of leather which enhanced their incandescent silver and gold natural coloring.
Now she did turn a little on the mat seat, that exercise twisting her long neck (looking far too slender to support a large head made even more bulky by the turban). Both her outer and inner eyelids were fully open. She made no move to lean forward a little farther to touch the gems, merely regarded them. Zarn did not doubt in the least that she knew to a quarter star credit their value.
"A showing, Merchant Zarn, a showing. But—"
"A buying—no?" he said quietly. "Ah, well, it was the Gentlefem I considered first when these came to me, knowing how great is her ability to pick the best and make the finest use of such. But if they do not suit your taste, then I am most sorry to have troubled you."
Her mouth worked again and those second inner eyelids half closed, surveying him now, rather than the display of stones.
"We buy and sell, both of us, merchant. If I buy, what then is the price?"
Inwardly Zarn relaxed a fraction. She was willing—at least enough to discuss matters. But any deal with the Guild was tricky, very tricky.
"There is a story to be told, Gentlefem."
She made a sound which might either have been a sigh of boredom or one of impatience. "There always is when one of you wishes to deal with us." She was frank enough anyway.
"We seek a man, a traitor, one who has betrayed us blood and bond."
The woman raised a hand as if to straighten the mound of her turban.
"Your world is wide, but I do not doubt that you have the means for tracking him—Shagga!" She mouthed that last word almost as if it were an accusation, but Zarn was not taken unawares. No one could deny that the Guild had their own seekers of knowledge, that they kept account and learned all they could of any they might have future dealings with.
"Unfortunately he is off-world. Before we could put hand on him he blasphemously used the code which had been stripped from him and oathed with an off-worlder— a Zacathan."
"Ah, yes." Now the woman did reach out, and, with one of her long equal-length six fingers, tapped the table below the first jewel in line.
"That lizard skin is one I have heard that your own people have an interest in." Zarn ventured the first push. He must assume more authority or else be defeated before he began.
"We have an interest—slight. Not one that moves us particularly at present," she said.
"We are ready to award interest with payment—" His very slight gesture indicated the array of jewels.
"That could be taken under consideration." She arose from the pile of mat cushions. "Word will be sent before nightfall."
He was forced to be content with that, but he was hopeful. The rumor which had reached his own well-enlisted spies was that the Zacathan was of particular interest to the Guild. They could already be laying a web for that one. However, any company their prey might have at the time might then be summarily disposed of unless a neat profit would change that part of their program.
Had he been able to use his own eyes and ears as well as he wanted to, his relief would have been the greater. The woman made her way directly to the spaceport and there in the lounge where those who waited for a ship to take off she had taken a seat and sat as if only idly interested in what was about her. She did not wait long before a man in spacer suiting but obviously of her own species came to stand before her. She greeted him with the slightest of nods and he sat down at the empty seat facing her.
"That mud-based toadling," the language she spoke was not trade and it was a murmur of words run together until they seemed to be a single sound, "offers a respectable amount—the Shagga must have combed out their private treasure boxes."
"For what?"
"The Zacathan oathed a renegade of their tamed killing order. They want him back—they are highly primitive in their thought processes. This traitor of theirs went off-world with the Zacathan."
"They want him dead?"
"No, I believe that the death dealing is something they desire to be strictly thei
r business—they want him."
"As an oathed guard he will defend the Zacathan."
"Yes. However, there are ways and means— The main point remains that the Zacathan be allowed to proceed as he himself wishes until the proper time. I understand that there has already been some difficulty on that point—"
"The Tssekians were not in the picture as we knew it then. We have to sort that out."
Her mouth moved in that twist of a smile. "Doubtless there has already been set in motion a plan to deal with that. But—do we accept this other offer—the renegade to be taken and returned here? The price they offer is tempting."
"And this Shagga can be depended upon to come through when the deal is properly completed?"
"He is no fool. Guild bargains are kept, as he and all the stars well know. This can be done I am sure—and the extra bit of sweetening he is ready to offer will please the Council. They just must be sure our merchandise is not harmed in any future action."
"Very well, make what arrangements may be demanded." He stood up. "We lift at the fourth moon hour. Shall I see you aboard?"
"Of a certainty, yes, and with some interesting baggage. These star stones, Talor, are worth even perhaps a fourth grade organizer's ransom—should some sum as that ever be asked."
Zarn had made his first move; he did not linger before following through on the second. Once more he sorted out the rune-inscribed sticks, setting them first in one pattern and then another as if striving to find one which suited him best. There was no possible other choice. Yes, one of the Shadows had gone off-world as bodyguard to that young lordling. He was not of top grade, nor experienced, and the reports on the renegade had been clear.
Outlaw that he was, he was well trained, though he had never been sent on a mission. But that mind-twisted Master of his had given him special instructions—some the Shagga on station in that Lair did not even know; he could only suspect. He was certainly a fool also—the renegade should have been assigned another Lair and quietly disposed of there. But instead he had been loosed—
Luckily that brain-empty skull of a priest had had him monitored when he crossed the mountains or they would never have known what happened in the dead Lair. But that Shagga was now busily repenting his first stupidity and would be for some time to come; no one need worry about HIM.
However, they must accept that their prey had training well past novice grade, perhaps approaching that of a Hand, young as he was. And with what he carried— No, they could not, even if the oath law permitted it, detach the young lord's guard.
Nor must they depend solely upon the Guild, even if the latter were willing to seal a bargain. The Guild wanted the Zacathan—or rather what they hoped to wring out of him. While the renegade was oathed and would defend his charge to the death. Not even the Shagga who loathed him would deny that he was truly issha-trained and firmly set in their pattern.
Also— Zarn tapped his fingers on the tabletop inches away from the sticks. What if the renegade began to understand what he had taken out of Qaw-en-itter? What if he would become—a Master? Assha strength might defeat even the Guild entrapment.
Who—? It must not be left to the Guild. What if they (and he had the greatest respect for their Veeps and experts) also did a little delving and discovered that taken from the dead? They might even strike a bargain with the renegade— his life for his find—taking as an excuse for such dealing that the Brothers had deceived them in not mentioning the prime reason for their hiring.
Zarn shivered. Were that to happen— He would envy for the days of life still left to him the fate of the Shagga who had first loosed this blot upon the Shadows. To dispatch another issha—one of greater training and experience— off-world? He had no time to wrangle with the Shagga Over Heads for that. The longer the renegade remained loose off-world—and only the Foul Three of Trusk knew what he was doing besides guarding the Zacathan's back— the more chance of his becoming greater than they could hope to handle. He might even be able to give the Guild a surprise or two.
Which left only one choice and he had already been denied that. However, under the circumstances this time she would have to agree. Her oath could be dissolved with the permission of the Sister of the Inner Silences. Such action had been taken several times in the past—need must overreach custom when there was demand.
But how then was he to reach her—off-world? There would be only one organization—outside of, of course, the ever-present Patrol—which could bear such a command along the star lanes after having first located her to whom it was to be given. The Guild again—
Zarn sighed. He poked at a roll of leather. Wealth beyond the raising of any one Lair—at least four of the richest had been stripped to gather that. And the Guild were no unpaid benefactors—they would demand more for such a task. Still—deep in him he was certain of only one thing: he could not trust the Guild to the point of blood oath— the Sister who had already gone starward would carry out any true order to the death.
Get her free from her present bond—and he had only until the Guild Veep returned to do so. He swept the sticks together and rolled them into a bag he thrust into a concealed holder under the low table. This he must do himself.
The roll containing the jewels he took to the wall behind the seat mats and touched several places there to open a small cavity. But before he stowed his packet inside he surveyed the present contents of that hiding place. With a sigh he flicked another box into place beside the packet, and then closed the cavity.
For him to approach the House of Jewels openly in daylight and be sighted, would cause talk—and not the kind of talk his position in the old city welcomed. But there was no help for it. He could only depend on a hooded cloak, such as one of the mountain priests wore, or a disguise— a very flimsy one.
The Mistress of Jewels received him in her own chamber and listened to his terse outline of what had to be done and why. She frowned.
"This you ask casts a stain on honor. We are also issha, and we live by the Five Oaths! Once a mission has been honorably taken and the Shadow oathed, only a successful completion—or death—releases the Sister. You ask much— too much!"
"This is a threat to us all." Zarn dared not tell her the truth; only a handful knew it and if he spoke without permission he would be word-broke—disgraced until he could not even redeem himself with his own life taking.
"In what way, Shagga?" She was not going to give in easily. He could feel the sweat beads gather at his hairline in spite of all his inner effort to appear above emotion.
"I cannot be word-broke," he decided that he could be this frank with her, "but it is such a danger that we have not known since the Refusal of Gortor." The mention of that portentous action which had nearly wiped out all the Shadow breed was never uttered idly. Surely that would impress her!
Her eyes had widened slightly and now her fingers sketched Ward-off-Perils-of-the-Far-Night.
"You swear this?" she asked.
Zarn's knife was in plain sight. Deliberately he extended his heart-finger and pressed the tip of that sharp narrow blade into the flesh, until a bead of red showed. Withdrawing the knife he held out his hand where the drop of blood welled larger. The woman looked straight into his eyes and then down at that finger. With her own heart-finger she touched his and Zarn knew inwardly a great relief. She had accepted, she would do it!
"The oathed one has gone off-world, there is no way a Shadow message can reach her—" the woman continued.
Zarn shook his head. "There is a way, that I also oath swear."
For a moment she looked dubious. But the promise he had just given her was so binding she had to accept that he believed he could carry it out.
"Very well. The word is Flow Cloud."
The word which would trigger oath release—Zarn almost shivered. That was something sacred, by custom used only by a Lair Master to release one from a mission accomplished. To pass such to another was a perilous thing, but in this he had no choice.
Once again in his own chamber, the packet and box from the cavity prominently ranged before him on the table, he busied himself with another small twiglet of stick, this of a dull black in color and no longer than his heart-finger. With a very small tool, such as one who set gems would use, he made his scratches on the stick. First the release word and then the second oathing—one which would bind the Sister to her second and most important mission. He was barely finished in time, for one of his household came to announce the return of the Veep. If she agreed—but she must! He called on that inner way which, it was said, one truly in difficulty could use as an inducement—holding to it like body armor as the off-world woman came in.
YOU UNDERSTAND THAT UNDER THE CODE 1732X you must be held." Patrol Captain Ilan Sandor eyed his listeners coldly. "If the Tssekian government demands that you be turned over to answer charges of fomenting riot, of plotting, you cannot claim sanctuary here."
"We are escaped prisoners." Zurzal's return was as evenly voiced. "We were brought to Tssek against our will and in defiance of interstellar law. I have not yet heard that kidnapping is a legal form of obtaining immigrants."
"You have one story—"
"Backed by a truth reader," Zurzal interrupted. His neck frill was stirring. "We had no voice in our coming here; we were kept prisoner by the then recognized government— forced to accede to certain demands made upon us."
"And you precipitated a revolution!" the captain snapped.
For the first time the port officer spoke. "As you have seen, Captain"—he motioned to a number of reader discs lying on the desk between the two parties—"there was preparation for such a rising long in the making before the arrival of this Learned One."
"With"—the captain showed no softening—"this infernal machine of his! That at least we can take care of—"
Zurzal's frill flamed a violent yellow-red. "It is under the seal of the Zacathan explorative service, Captain. I do not think that even your all-powerful organization is going to dispute ownership."
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