by Andre Norton
Jellico nodded. "I'll do that," he said. "I'd intended waiting a bit longer before giving it a walk-through, but it won't hurt and might help to look the place over at once."
12
Ali Kamil quickened his pace until he came up beside Rael.
"I'm sorry," he told her quietly. "I was navigating right off the charts in there."
"So was I," she replied' bitterly. "Firing off my mouth like that was inexcusable. I knew what you all had been through."
"It was no more than you had."
He frowned and stepped aside to allow Dane and Rip to pass. Sometimes, he thought sourly, finding a place to have a private conversation aboard a starship was about as easy as netting an asteroid made of pure platinum, at least for lowly apprentices lacking the luxury of a private office or work cabin.
The Medic sensed that something more was weighing on him, but Kamil was the last person to broach it in the busy corridor. "I want to check on some seedlings," she said.
"You could lift out the germination trays for me if you've got the time and don't mind."
"I'm happy to assist, Doctor Cofort."
Hael breathed deeply of the rich air in the hydro. It was her favorite place here, even as the one on the Roving Star had been when she had been serving under her brother's command. All it needed was some lavender ...
The Engineer-apprentice walked over to the tall bank of germination trays. "Which one?" he inquired.
"The top two. You've got enough inches on me that we won't have to get out the ladder."
It took only a few seconds to carefully remove the trays and set them on the nearby work bench.
He peered at the closely spaced, neat rows of minute plants, each of which bore two leaves. "What are they?" he asked curiously. "There are a couple of different kinds, I think, though it's hard to be sure. They're so small."
"Most just put their heads up this morning, the others yesterday afternoon. They won't be readily identifiable for a while yet. — One box contains tarragon, the other gray pepper. Mr. Mura wants them for the galley. He'll be trying some new spices as well for more variety."
"That's always welcome."
Both fell silent while Rael checked the moisture and nutrient content of the growth medium and examined the seedlings themselves. The time to catch trouble was early, at the first sign, before it could develop into a full-blown problem that might sweep the whole little crop.
At last she stood up. "All our infants are doing well," she announced. "You may return them to their cradles, Mr. Kamil."
The man complied. When he was finished, he leaned back against the bank and studied her speculatively. "How is it that you're so good at everything. Doctor. Or so many things?" he amended. His own chief did not sing her praises the way Tau and Mura did, but then Johan Stotz rarely praised anyone. Just keeping one's position without having one's head verbally removed on a daily basis was compliment enough coming from him.
"I just sort of picked things up along the way. I was interested, of course, and I wanted to be of real use and not just so much inert cargo until I finally managed to officially qualify for something."
"Ah, yes. You were raised and trained in the comforting bosom of your clan."
"I was lucky," she agreed seriously, "especially since I love Trade." Her face clouded suddenly. "But, Alt, I've never been on my own, never once had the chance to see if I could pull it by myself. I was never even physically at Training Pool. All my classes, even my medical courses, were taped, with clinical experience gained at accredited hospitals wherever we planeted."
The apprentice gave her a sharp look. "That's allowed?"
"Aye, of course. The ongoing testing is stringent, with a ten percent higher grade required for passing."
"Which I presume was never a problem."
"No, not really. Don't forget, I had a shipload of captive tutors all eager to help out."
"What about the Psycho?"
"I never asked for a ship assignment since I was staying with my own clan, but classification was compulsory, of course. — Free Trader all the way."
"Not even a shot at the Companies?" he teased.
Rael laughed. "I wouldn't last twenty-four hours on a Company ship!"
Her expression darkened again, not pleasantly. "I didn't manage so marvelously on the Mermaid, did I?"
"You cut your losses and ran, which was as much as anyone could have done under the circumstances." His voice softened. She had not concealed that her failure to secure the berth cut her. "You'll make out. You know Trade work and don't mind doing it."
It was a new role for Kamil, offering comfort and support. He stopped speaking for a moment, not quite knowing where else to go with it.
Unless . . . Cofort had picked up on that incredible murder plot.
"Doctor," he said suddenly, before he could give himself a chance to back down, "can you keep your mouth shut?"
"I'm a Medic. That comes with the job. — I don't expect you to fasmit our recent conversation to the universe at large, either, you know."
"I won't." He eyed her gravely. "What do you think of Canuche of Halio?"
"I detest her," the woman replied in complete surprise.
"I like gloriously wild planets or else beautifully civilized ones with powerful conservation and anticruelty laws, all full of furry, feathered, and scaled creatures, not malodorous chemical stews."
"Maybe there's a galaxy more wrong with Canuche than that."
Rael Cofort's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, Alt?" she asked quietly. She had never seen him deadly serious before, but he was now with that softly voiced suggestion.
The Engineer-apprentice did not respond for almost a full minute. "Maybe I don't know," he said at the end of that time. "I just don't want to wind up in the clutches of the psychomedics as straight Whisperer bait or worse."
"I'm no psychomedic, and I have been around the star- lanes long enough to be aware of some pretty odd things, odd enough not to dismiss an unlikely-sounding theory outright."
Kamil turned away from her. "A number of people have wondered how I managed to survive the Crater War given the fact that I'd only just started school when our community got hit."
When she made no answer, he steeled himself and went on. "I woke up that night, a bit after midnight, terrified, in a cold-sweat panic. If I'd been older, better able to think, I'd have awakened my parents, but that would've ended me.
I'd have been soothed, put back to bed, and been blown to bits with the rest. As it was, I simply ran. The fire ladder was outside my window. I went down it, took to my heels, and so great was my fear that I kept going until I was outside the town limits before it eased up enough to let exhaustion take over. By that time, the bombs were already falling. I was the sole survivor out of thirty thousand and some odd people.
"No one discovered that for some time to come. I was usually hungry and always cold, but I scrounged enough to get by and spent most of my time in hiding for the next couple of years. Something inside me told me to keep away from people. They'd try to help, maybe, but they'd stop me from running if I had to get out fast again.
"I did, too, twice more from air raids and twice from those butchering... When they advanced through our area and when they were being whipped back at last.
"After that, things got quieter. There were still dangers to be faced, but they weren't on the same scale, and I'd learned to look out for those on my own. I didn't get the same kind of warning against them."
Alt began pacing, as if the act of movement helped him to clarify his thoughts. "When I reached puberty, something else started, and that's continued. Whenever I come onto a site where something really bad or some enormous tragedy occurred, no matter how far back, I feel this great weight, this sorrow, settle, not on my shoulders, my body, but on my spirit, my soul as it were. I didn't feel it in that alley—it's got to have a bigger scope than that, I think—but I felt it where the Heaven's Hope crashed, killing all those people. I felt it in the r
uins on Limbo and in the Big Burn on Terra, though I made damn sure I kept quiet about it.
Besides, we were in too much trouble of our own at the time to be worrying about the problems of the past."
He risked a look at the Medic. She was standing spear straight, her attention fixed on him as if by compulsion.
The woman drew a deep breath. "You sense the same about Canuche?"
Kamil gave her a grim, bleak smile. "Doctor, I have to actually be on site to feel anything. Aye, I feel it now. I felt it at the moment we entered the outer atmosphere of this accursed planet. Worse, for the first time since those days in the Crater War, the panic's back. — It's with me all the time. Sometimes it's all I can do not to storm the bridge and set the Queen's controls to lift for anywhere as long as it's not here."
He gripped himself. "Canuche of Halio's one big disaster, one huge tragedy. Her past reeks of it, and her future's shadowed by more of the same. This is a true jinx world, and, Doctor Rael Cofort, there's not a thing either of us can do about it, because no one, on-world or off, is going to believe one word I've said, not to the extent of taking any action to get the Solar Queen away from it. Business will be conducted as usual in the usual amount of time, and I just pray to every god in the Federation that the inevitable does not happen before we do finally lift."
13
It took time to shake the chill Ali's dark prediction had put on her, but Canuche Town's huge outdoor market proved to be an effective antidote. Rael Cofort's eyes were bright as she surveyed the long aisles of booths and less permanent stands and open tables filled with items being offered for sale or exchange. The capital boasted enclosed facilities as , well, of course, but those were not designed to draw small Free Traders seeking to supply themselves for a venture among the primitive planets and struggling colonies of the rim.
There was more than enough out here to meet their needs and give delight. She loved prowling around a big market, and this time she was going to be allowed to do some buying for stock, albeit under discreet but definite supervision.
She would look over the gems, certainly, she decided at once, but so much else was available that she resolved to do a quick inspection to see precisely just what was being shown. The mix of goods here had never been the same on any visit she had made to Canuche of Halio. She smiled again. Besides, it was fun to look.
Canuche was a thoroughly civilized industrial planet, and so the din, the intriguing, not always entirely pleasant odors, the basic strangenesSyof an alien or primitive mart were missing here, but it was an interesting place for all
that.
Findings and setters were settled beside the long rows of loose gems, and next to them stood the stands of those selling finished jewelry. Fabrics and the trimmings, tools, and machines required to turn them into completed products were in another area along with clothing. Food supplies and the equipment to prepare them formed yet another section, and large industrial products, chiefly represented by salespeople supplied with illustrative samples, tapes, and literature, formed a major portion of the complex. Only the prepared food stalls broke the pattern of grouping like with like. They Were scattered throughout the huge field so that patrons would not be forced to leave their areas of interest to find refreshment.
Rael drew in and held a deep breath. The aroma of cooking was everywhere, wonderfully tempting although she had eaten only half an hour before. She wondered how Dane Thorson was responding to those beckoning fingers of scent. He could stow food as if he had cargo holds in both of his legs, and this stuff was real. That alone made even the worst of it infinitely desirable to a space hound.
"Let's cut past the cloth booths," she suggested since the lead had been given to her. She had no interest in the finished clothing; Van Rycke already had a full stock of such goods. The fabrics were another matter. Brocades and faux gold and silver cloth rarely failed to interest the wealthier classes and individuals among primitive buyers, and good quality, attractive material could be counted upon to attract attention and customers on most Federation planets, especially when it was blessed with the added allure of being an import. The Queen already had a good supply, but Canuche's market had been particularly good for textiles on each of her previous visits, and they might well run across something. There were other freighters in port, and some of them might be trying to sell off part of such a cargo.
"Rael! Rael Cofort!"
The woman turned quickly. "Deke!" Her voice dropped.
"Deke Tatarcoff of the Black Hole," she explained to her companions. "He's been a rival and a damn good friend of Teague's for years. Do you mind ..."
"Space, no!" Jellico told her. "A Free Trader does not- ignore his friends or fail to make the acquaintance of a potential ally." He also did not neglect an opportunity to size up potential competition.
The Solar Queen party walked over to the covered stand the other spacer had rented to display his wares.
Miceal studied the other Trader. Tatarcoff was short and stocky with a breadth of chest that bespoke some Martian ancestry. His eyes were brown, sharp and steady in their expression. His features were pleasant but well schooled;
they would betray little he did not want to have read.
He was doing well, the Solar Queen's Captain judged by the quality of his uniform and accoutrements and by the thick, three-inch-wide gold luck band circling his left wrist. Just the fact that he had rented an enclosed stall, and a large one at that, was evidence of prosperity.
"What's Trade's brightest star doing on Canuche?" Ta- tarcoff asked when they were in comfortable speaking range.
She laughed. "Put it on freeze, Deke," she told him. "I'm on my own. The Roving Star's not here. I'm serving with the Solar Queen. — This is Jellico, Van Rycke, and Thorson. Captain, Cargo-Master, and Cargo-apprentice respectively."
Even as the introductions were being made, Rael was studying the Trader's stock. It was mostly amotton, she observed, nicely woven in a variety of pastel solids and stripes well suited to the extremely light fabric.
"You folks interested?" Deke inquired. "I'll make you a good deal."
She shook her head. "Sorry, Deke. We've got all we need.
This is lovely, though. It'll move well here."
Well and quickly, she judged. The fabric, a natural fiber from Amon, breathed like a second skin and felt as if it had no weight at all. Those were highly desirable characteristics on a world with summers as blisteringly hot as most of Canuche of Halio had to endure. These bolts were sure to catch the eye of the big garment manufacturers. In point of fact, she was more than certain that a few of their reps were even now evaluating Deke's store from a discreet distance.
Her eyes drifted over the carefully stacked bolts at the rear of the stand. She fixed suddenly on a patch of intense blue. "Oh," she breathed unconsciously in pure delight.
Tatarcoff looked at what had caught her attention and smiled. "Leave it to you to spot that. It's worthy of you, too," he added as he fetched down the examination length for her party to see. "It suits you considerably better than it probably will whoever finally takes it."
She nodded her thanks. That was a compliment and a statement of the fabric's value, not a sales lure. Tatarcoff knew that no Free Trader could afford the likes of this, not for personal use. Even her brother could not have justified that expense.
Rael found herself gazing down at an incredible, seemingly infinite mingling of blues and blue-violets in a shimmering field as soft as a cloud might seem to be in a dream of wonder. "Thornen silk?"
"Aye. One of my tubes gave out, and I had to planet there. I managed to pick this up in exchange for the finest sunstone I've ever seen come honestly on a rim market."
There was no regret in his tone. He would make that expense good twice over when he did sell the bolt. It was breathtakingly beautiful, and if was rare.
Thorne of Brandine had given rise to a highly advanced human population independently ofTerran seeding. Their planet-wide society had been pre-s
pace when discovered and was still basically anti-mech, but it was complex, well developed, and heavily oriented toward their version of Trade. As befitted such a populace, they were ruled by a network of hereditary merchant princes owing ultimate allegiance to an official they called the Doge.
They also had very little liking for the presence of off- worlders and less still for alien ways. They permitted the existence of a full spaceport to serve as a refuge for ships coming into trouble in the nearby starlanes, but they had only minimal intercourse with spacers, visitors or those running the complex. The planet was completely self-sufficient and preferred to remain so.
The rulers had a good eye for business, that notwithstanding, and they fully appreciated the value of their luxury goods, particularly their textiles. They would permit no steady trade that might grow too important, too essential to their economy, but they made occasional sales to keep Federation markets aware of their products and hungry for them. Always, they worked with individual Free Traders rather than Company ships and absolutely refused to accept any off-world agreements that would limit their choice of markets. Because their decision whether to trade among the stars or sell to their own kind was completely free and because their products were so eminently desirable, they had the power to dictate their will in the matter.
Neither Deke nor any other independent freighter Captain complained about that even if it did mean that the surplanetary merchants held a fully charged blaster in their dealings with off-worlders. Without that liberty of action, no Free Trader would ever get a crack at any of those prize cargoes. The Companies would have Thorne of Brandine locked in tighter than any space seal.
The woman sighed with regret as Tatarcoff started to fold the length again. She stole a glance at Van Rycke and saw the same hunger on him. He, too, longed to have the beautiful cloth and had no love for the reason that decreed that the Queen could not afford to sink that much capital into what was in actuality a single item, one that, given their current plans, would be singularly hard for them to place if they did acquire it.