Trade Secret

by Sharon Lee

“My opponent, be not afraid of random weapons! We shall ask for matched sets, and you may choose left hand or right hand as you need, for I’m proficient with either.”

  To the crowd, and particularly to the dusty, tired crew of Dulcimer, he said, “Please, quickly!”

  Turning to chel’Gaibin he said, “We shall duel to incapacity or death. Is that your understanding? You shall not withdraw?”

  “I shall not withdraw, upstart. As I am of Rinork, incapacity or death shall be sufficient.” There was no bow, not a courtesy.

  “As you will, Rinork!”

  Jethri was vibrating and near breathless with tension but he looked out toward the crowd, motioning them closer before turning and defiantly bowing a bow of sorrow before unleashing his plan.

  “Stink hammers and starbars, seven paces and closing! We shall have a smash to remember!”

  The crowd roared with approval, replacing guns and knives to their safe places, and eyes turning to Dulcimer’s rental rack of tools.

  Wynhael’s crew, from the least to Rinork, stood motionless.

  The Scout managed a very credible bow of approval, and turned to explain.

  * * *

  Having it to hand, Jethri swung the starbar, feeling the balance of it and the grip. It was a number seven, extending his arm by half, and by the looks of it was nearly new, the pry edges lustrous, the tip sharp enough to peel hull steel, the closer end a counterweight larger than his fist.

  It was the stinks hammer that was key, of course, for in a dock fight, one struck with the hammer and guarded and defended with the bar. A good stinks hammer had lots of mass in the head, and could—properly thrown—crush a skull or cave in a chest. Wielded in hand it might have the same results, but the tear edge could slice a face or a throat, the poll could be used as a grab to bring someone closer so that the starbar could be used to batter . . .

  All this Jethri knew by repute and from the careful jousting he’d seen Grig and his father play at in the back hold several trips—so long ago that whatever close-in technique delivered was long gone, the examples in his head only in awed memory. Once Arin was dead and gone, the only fighting Jethri’d heard about was Iza’s on-port fist-and-bottle work, and that only at a distance, since she’d been careful not to include him in any of her carousing, or for that matter, to let him carouse himself, though he’d hardly been of age for it.

  “Brawling is not a duel!” This was chel’Gaiban’s second, holding the items he’d chosen from the offerings, “how can you think so? The Code requires the first strike to be at a distance! Can you demonstrate this?”

  The Scout turned to Jethri, eyebrows a query.

  “He may have some point . . .”

  “He has none!”

  Jethri, hammer in hand, strode to the wine vendor in the corner, pointing to his wheeled bulk tank.

  “I’ll buy that—how much?”

  The startled man stood back from him, eying the tools warily . . .

  “Sir, I’d need to inventory . . .”

  Jethri reached into his pocket, finding only the “luck” cantra Norn ven’Deelin had given him when first he’d joined the clan—

  He threw it to the man, who recoiled and let it fall to the floor until he recognized it and then scooped it away.

  “Will that do?”

  Chel’Gaibin was yelling something but Jethri ignored him as the man nodded and retreated from Jethri, who strode to the tank with its neat Decade label the size of his head and at eye height—and put his back against it.

  Then Jethri called out—“I demonstrate!”

  “One, two, three . . .” He enumerated each footfall and stepped out seven quick paces, whirling with confidence, the hammer flashing over his head and leaving his hand cleanly, centered on the logo, the tank’s explosion into a shrapnel of plastic and metal and a cloud of red wine booming across the otherwise silent deck. The hammer’s clang against the outer metal wall echoed close behind, all joined by cheers from the boisterous audience.

  “Action at a distance!” Jethri’s voice carried over the din, and raising the starbar he still carried, he cried, “defensible, and with follow-up until the issue is decided!”

  Chel’Gaibin was hidden from Jethri’s view behind his tool-carrying second and the knot of Wynhael crew, and from that side there were voices, raised to each other in varying modes—including a mode of command so high Jethri doubted he’d heard it outside the training room—saying, “You will support me! We shall follow through, at any cost!”

  Chel’Gaibin’s second fell back from his master, bowing almost to the floor.

  “Sir, your hammer, sir. And your cantra, sir, it was beautiful! I’ll deliver an invoice for true cost. . . .”

  The vendor smelled a bit of his wares and was not entirely steady on his feet, wiping the hammer, handing it to him with the toweling, still rubbing it as if shining a precious object and the last moment, stepping between Jethri and the action across the way.

  Jethri absently took and pocketed the cantra, checking the hammer and finding nothing amiss. He restrained the vendor, who was Bah lo, according to his nametag, gently removing the still-admiring hand from the hammer, stepping toward the seconds, who were deep in an urgent conversation marked by the hand-signs they flung between themselves.

  The crowd parted before Jethri— who called out to the Scout, “The proctors will be here momentarily!”

  “There’s doubts,” said the Scout, “on the progress; were there an arbiter of Code nearby we’d need refer to them. There is not, and now . . .”

  Rinork’s heir appeared before them then, brushing the crew aside, glaring at all three of them, starbar and stink hammer clutched one to a hand.

  “I am acclimating myself to the weapons. We will not, in fact, be needing an arbiter of Code as the case is that I have agreed with the fine points as presented. If one may suggest crowd control, I shall be ready in a moment. Second, I leave him to you.”

  That bow was a command—and the hands of the pilots flashed.

  “I’ll take the crowd, Jeth. You get ready!”

  That was Freza, and she suited action to words, by raising her voice to an out-and-out shout.

  “This is a private affair of honor, so you’ll all have to stand away, get out of the way. Move back—you can watch, but you’re in the way.”

  Someone started yelling—“And who are you, stranger . . .” but Freza’d already pulled a ring from her pocket and put it on, waving it over her head.

  “I’m assistant sector commissioner for the Seventeen Worlds—anyone not involved will clear the space so we can continue, please.”

  Jethri saw a quick rush of hands and bodies then, while Freza named several names while pointing. “Right side, center, left, make a path! Clear the lane!”

  Freza looked into his face from five paces away, giving him a look as inscrutable as a Liaden trader’s before giving him a wry smile, saying more to him than anyone else “Brabham is the commissioner—took the job a ten-day ago. Now get this over!”

  She turned her back then, ter’Astin saying in an underbreath as he hurried Jethri toward the area still flooded by the pooling wine. “Things happen. The second would retire were he able, but he feels he cannot. The boy—”

  A clang and yell rang out—and there, Rinork’s heir had thrown the starbar to the decking where it slid into a line of startled spectators, the hammer following with dangerous bounces and caroms, scattering all.

  “Ixin! Ixin, you shall fight properly or die where you are! Pull your weapon!”

  In one glance Jethri took in the charging chel’Gaibin, gun in hand, rushing away from his own pursuing second, saw that gun arm coming to point . . .

  Jethri saw the Scout was turning, gun coming to hand, but he, sensing motion behind him, ducked . . .

  Jethri’s throw was desperate and full strength, his carry-through bending and turning him, knocking him off balance so that all he heard were shots and a thud and saw a flash of light and a str
ange whine while he rolled, grabbing for his pocket gun to—

  A huddled pile of of clothes and blood lay on the deck, writhing, as someone dared to kick the fallen gun away. The yelling gave way to silence other than the crying, and then another kind of roar as the crowd rushed toward the fallen Jethri and he couldn’t see—

  “You’re hit,” said Freza as he pulled himself to his feet, while the Scout was snatching at pockets and pouch, pulling something out . . .

  “Let me see,” demanded Jethri. “Please, out of my way . . .”

  The man lay, shivering, face blooded, arm at an impossible angle, huddled against himself as best he might, watching Jethri approach, a semicircle of observers standing away.

  A Liaden it was who bowed, quite carefully, to Jethri, to the wronged, to the victor, presenting the hammer as if it were a precious gift, while the eyes of the downed man were wide and unblinking.

  Jethri wiped the sweat away from his left eye, took the hammer, saw the man on the floor shiver, a spasm going through him as he tried to move his arm, blood and flesh tangled in the sleeve, bone splinter—

  Jethri flinched, realized he was breathing hard, free of anger but full of tension . . .

  “Jeth, you’re bleeding!”

  Freza, beside him, the Scout, too, tearing something, the while saying to Freza, “He must choose, he must choose!”

  Jethri shook his head, Terran-style, hand to the side of his face again, feeling the sweat but unsurprised, now that throbbing had set in, to see that it was blood.

  The still-shocked second stood away from chel’Gaiban and when Jethri’s gaze fell on him he bowed submission, he bowed error, he bowed—

  “It was not the plan, I swear—sir.”

  “Acceptance,” Jethri said as he recalled that bow, accepting the word of one of another clan.

  “I hear you, Pilot, and believe you. Call for medics, call for proctors. This man has had an accident, do you understand? He is incapacitated. Take him away!”

  “An accident?”

  “Yes, an accident!”

  The second bowed fervently, ordered cleanup, ordered others around the fallen man—

  Jethri’s view was blocked now, and Freza was by his side, her work vest showing sudden pockets. For his part he stared as Wynhael’s crew did what first aid they might for Rinork’s git. An alarm went off, signifying medical emergency.

  From the crowd then, a woman called out, “I’m a medic, and have another coming, let me through!”

  A ship medic that was and . . .

  “Hold still!” A hand was on his cheek then, Freza’s voice in his ear. He stood as rooted already, no need to order him . . .

  “Sting coming. Close your eyes.”

  It did sting, and by the time the bleeding at his hairline had been wiped and spray-sealed, the first-aid efforts of Wynhael’s crew were taken over by uniformed professionals.

  * * *

  “And what happened—can you give me that again?”

  Jethri sighed. “I knew the man—we’ve met before. He’s traded on some of the same ports I have. He was showing me his gun and there was an accident.”

  The proctor got a distant look in his face—brushed the plate that said Detective but Jethri didn’t know if that meant he’d turned the recorder on or off.

  “Wonderful strong accident, wasn’t it? Got you blooded? Got him smashed near to finders?”

  “But that was it, you know, he was showing me that fancy pistol of his and he had that armor on, and when the gun discharged—why, I bet it was heard all over the port—that armor had to dump energy from a couple of shots. Fellow panicked . . .”

  The proctor held the stinks hammer out to him. “And this?”

  “Borrowed that from the Dulcimer, you know. I saw you talking with them and it isn’t any of their fault, other than now you’ve got that listed as evidence about the time they’ll be needing it. It’s just a stinks hammer and . . .”

  “I know what it is—and this?”

  Here he pointed to the chipped face edge where the shot had grazed the hammer, sending shrapnel into Jethri and a couple other folks as well.

  “Yeah, I’m not so good with those things anymore, I’ve been trading! When the gun started going off, it was the only thing I had, so I held it in front of me . . . I took the angle wrong and . . .”

  “And that’s how you got wine and blood on it?”

  “No, the wine was because I was testing the hammer. The blood was from the accident . . .”

  “Ga hod, boy, but you’ve got a silver tongue. A wrong answer for everything, and all of it possible.”

  Jethri shrugged.

  “So you’re ship-bred, are you? Terran ship-bred?”

  “My mother’s line is old, and my father’s. Raised on Gobelyn’s Market . . .”

  “And was you? Now—I’ve seen that ship name recent, really recent . . .”

  He turned to his associate, a stern-faced woman reminding Jethri a lot of Iza, from the hard smug look in her face to the clip of her hair.

  “Gobelyn’s Market?” the detective said again, and she pulled her comm unit from its hanger on her belt and threw fingertips at the screen, but even as she did she was saying, “Right, wasn’t that the one was in face-off with a Liaden ship and got throwed off-port somewhere?”

  Jethri kept his face Liaden bland at that news—thrown off-port was not something they’d been doing when he was with the Market, and must have made Paitor’s trading heart bleed!

  She looked up, grimly.

  “Therinfel, it was, not Wynhael. Wynhael is the ship the hurt boy’s from. We didn’t have a warning for them, but for the Gobelyn’s Market, Pilot Captain Iza Gobelyn, and First Mate Khat Gobelyn. Liadens laid charges of smuggling, of interfering with clan business—dunno that’s a crime here, money-changing fraud—heck, that’d be hard to prove, too, wouldn’t it?”

  “I’m not on the Market, am I? Haven’t been for over a Standard. Look at the old record and you’re going to see pure as can be . . .” He was not so pleased to hear the Market named this way, but Khat’s new spot was good. . . .

  The woman with the comm scrunched her nose up. “A warning or two on that first pilot, but ship clean as can be for thirty Standards.”

  “Humph . . .” was the lead proctor’s reaction.

  “So you know, the boy with the bad arm, he’s still to sickbay. Got his—what’s that man called? His helper with him.”

  “A valet. Gentlemen have valets. That’s what he says he is—”

  The proctor shook his head, “Not any place for a gentleman here, right?” He looked up, coloring, toward Jethri.

  “That Scout tells me you’re accounted a Liaden gentleman these days. How you worked it I don’t want to hear. He tried to tell me your melant’i is appreciable, whatever it means. He sets quite some store by it though, says you’re substantial and appreciable . . .”

  What to answer? Was his melant’i considerable? Yes, then, here it was, with his public victory . . .

  “Everyone has melant’i,” Jethri explained in as downport Terran as he could. “Part of who you are. Me, I’m adopted to a clan, so once the clan’s important, I get some of that, and since I carry myself well, I get some of that. If I screw up, that falls to the clan too . . .”

  The proctor looked long and hard at him.

  “That means it won’t help us if I go check all the cameras and see if any one of them was actually working, because what you did was right?”

  Jethri bowed: “I have acted with as much honor as I might today. That anyone was injured was an accident of the day . . .”

  The proctor leaned close and said, pulling out a small instrument, “Right. I need you to breathe into here, so we can tell you wasn’t drinking that wine that’s on the deck and you ought to just let me press this against the flesh of your palm . . .”

  Jethri sighed, breathed into the tube, and then held his hand out as directed.

  “Be it noted that the subject
has complied with testing and that neither breath or blood shows signs of intoxicants or inebriants.”

  The associate played fingers over the face of the comm, and the proctor nodded.

  “So now, since I’m told that the young man in sickbay isn’t talking anything but Liaden right now, I’ll need you to translate and help identify him, if you will. That guy that’s with him has about half a word of Trade and nothing of Terran. I’ll also need you to sign in the line for the rescue fees and for the crew we scrambled to stop a fight that never happened, since he’s not talking. If someone else is at fault, they’ll pay. You being a substantial fellow, we won’t need to check the cameras. I think that’s what you was trying for, Pilot. Always is better to keep things in the health system instead of the judicial system, don’t you think?”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Port Chavvy

  The patient was in the portside infirmary, where the waiting room had a proctor flirting with a medic. The proctor that had come with Jethri and the Scout stopped with his uniform mates and wordlessly waved toward the room with the green light on outside it. The voices there were quiet, almost soothing.

  “Been in space, not a spacer, is what I think I got so far. His muscle mass is a bit low, I’d say, but that could be . . .”

  There were three medics, one checking straps and connections to a wall of lights and readouts, two others examining the stark white and wrong-looking arm of the man on the table.

  Jethri knocked on the door as he walked in, took the simple Liaden “You!” from the examination table as an expletive.

  “I’m Jethri ven’Deelin,” he told the medics in Trade. “I speak Liaden, Terran, and Trade.”

  “A moment, champ,” said one, “you’re what we’ve been needing. We’re going to need some permissions real soon, and this fellow’s on relaxants.”

  Standing near Bar Jan’s head was a man in Rinork’s house livery. It sounded as if he’d been singing a low distracting song to Bar Jan. He looked up, serious eyes and grim face.

  “Trader ven’Deelin?” The accent was heavy in Liad’s homeworld breathlessness. He didn’t wait for an answer, though, straightening to his full spare height and making his livery straight as well.