Trader's Honour

by Patty Jansen

  But then she remembered Rehan's face, If she wants to be with us, she'll have to learn to take the heat.

  That was easy for him to say, with all his family's money behind him. He could have come in here, hired investigators and would find Iztho in no time. She had told him where she was going. He had offered no help.

  And she had not yet found a trace of Iztho.

  Mikandra spread her hands and looked at the small part of the sky she could see between the foliage. "Please, give me hint where you are."

  There was a small sound behind her somewhere in the shadows, a scuff of a foot on the paving. Mikandra whirled.

  The street behind her was empty. Lights burned in an upstairs window, but mostly the buildings were dark. When she walked on, the sound came again. Did she hear footsteps?

  She stopped, barely daring to breathe. "Who's there?"

  No answer.

  A couple of shapes—similar to but smaller than maramarang—flew across the display of reds and oranges in the sunset sky and disappeared behind the dome of the building.

  There was light in Market Street ahead. She could see people walking past carrying their purchases home from the markets.

  There was another sound behind her.

  She whirled around. A small figure ducked into the shadow of a tree trunk.

  Children playing a prank?

  "Stop following me. It's not funny."

  Nothing.

  Bushes against the rusty fence looked like ghostly fingers. There was no sign of movement. Had she imagined it?

  She turned around to keep walking, but a couple of small figures had come out from under the trees in front of her, blocking her path. She whirled around, but there were people behind her, too. They were Pengali with long matted locks of hair, not wearing shirts. The last of daylight made the white pigment in their skin patterns stand out. Several were spotted, others striped. A tail waved at waist height.

  "What? What do you want?"

  None of them said anything, but they came closer. Mikandra looked for ways to escape, but there were a lot of them, and they had her surrounded.

  The closest one had a head full of dreadlocks that hung to his waist. The pattern on his shoulders and chest was one of dark spots. He wore too-wide shorts held up with a piece of rope and did not have a tail.

  His voice was rough as he said in heavily accented Mirani, "Tell me where it is."

  Mikandra gasped. "Tell me where what is?"

  "You know what I'm talking about."

  "I don't. I don't have anything for you. Sorry, but you have the wrong person."

  He said something guttural tones that she presumed to be Pengali language. A few more men came out of the shadows. One carried a stick with a greenish glow bulb on the end, and by its light, Mikandra could make out at least six men, all of them Pengali with huge eyes, long hair adorned with beads that glittered in the light. Her heart thudded like crazy. Jocassa had said that the streets of Barresh safe except for groups of tailed Pengali. She should have taken this as a warning and stuck to the main streets.

  "You come from Miran, don't you?" The man with the long dreadlocks came closer.

  He held a knife in his hand, below the waist, the point directed backwards. Mikandra gagged with the smell of his sweat, a muddy, fishy scent. "You have the code word?"

  "I have no idea what you're talking about."

  "Rubbish." Something sharp poked her in the back and when she groped for whoever had sneaked up behind her, someone lashed a rope around her hands. "Your man is too much of a coward to come back here and now he sent you. Tell me where it is"

  "I don't know who you're talking about." She hated how her voice spilled over in a squeak.

  "Stop your acting. Your master sells the stuff. We have a lot of clients waiting and they're been impatient."

  The fungus. Damn, had the allegations been true?

  She straightened her back. "I have nothing for you."

  "We'll see about that."

  She struggled to pull her hands free. "Keep your hands off me!"

  The rope around her wrists tightened. Not a rope at all, but someone's tail.

  Her captor laughed. His hands were rough-skinned and felt hairy. He patted her belt and pockets. Then squeezed her breast. Mikandra held her breath. If they were going that way, she'd give them a fight. Someone else pulled her bag off her shoulder.

  "Hey, there is stuff in there I need."

  The man spoke to his mates in his rough and guttural language and started rummaging through the bag.

  Mikandra tried to yank her hands free.

  "Look what I found." He held up her pouch.

  Mikandra saw spots. Everything she needed was in there. Her account cards, her identity cards. Without it, she couldn't go home, she couldn't live.

  "No. Please."

  He opened the clip and rummaged through the contents, muttering in his language. Several others laughed. Then he closed the pouch and tossed it to one of his mates.

  "No, please! I can't get home without it." She couldn't go to Kedras without it.

  "Then you stay here." He laughed. "There are ways of making money, especially if you're a pretty girl."

  Someone at the back yelled. Heads turned. Ears pricked up and they all ran and jumped on top of the wall surrounding the council complex and then down the other side, tails held high. One of them had her bag on his shoulders.

  "Hey, stop!" She ran up to the wall, but it was too high for her to climb. "I'll go to the guards."

  The sound of laughter drifted from the yard beyond. Then they were gone and Mikandra stood at the wall, her head pounding.

  This was unbelievable. This couldn't be happening to her. She'd teach them. She'd get her things back. They might laugh, but she would set the guards on them.

  Angry, shivering, she walked as fast as she could around the block. Into the Exchange building. The building activity had wound down but the Damarcians were still at work under the light of a couple of glowing bulbs on stands. They didn't even raise their heads when she walked past.

  Mikandra went up the stairs, onto the landing and the metals doors that said Authorised personnel only.

  The glass door to the left slid open when she held her hand up to the panel. The corridor beyond was dimly lit with bluish light. A glass wall on the left-hand side allowed her to see into the Exchange control room. A couple of circular benches surrounded the hologram of the anpar lines, a blue web of constantly moving threads that represented the anpar energy lines as they snaked through the galaxy, zapping in and out of existence as the Exchange network created them. Some were semi-permanent communication lines, others represented the anchor lines of shuttles in the process of transfer.

  The room smelled brand new and the equipment more modern than any she had ever seen.

  According to the rumours in Miran, they had a new core, too. Someone obviously had money.

  On the other side of the Exchange room, she found the public desk. A young keihu woman with masses of curly hair sat behind it.

  "Can I help you?" she asked in decent Mirani.

  "Could you please tell me where to report a crime?"

  The woman frowned. "I can call the city guard for you. What happened?"

  Mikandra told her as much as she wanted to share.

  "In the alley behind the building? That is not very smart to walk there alone."

  "Please, I need to have my things back."

  "That's going to be hard. The Pengali are quick and will probably already have sold a lot of your possessions."

  "Please. I have no money. Nothing. I've got nowhere to go." Tears were awfully close to the surface.

  "Unfortunately, I can't help you with any of that. Do you have any relatives here?"

  "No."

  "Friends?"

  "No." Mikandra swallowed. "Please. What can I do?" In Miran, people like her came to the hospital, feigning illness. Or sometimes they just sat in the hall only to vanish again before the
ir turn came to see a healer. Sometimes kind-hearted people would feed them their leftovers.

  "You could go to the guard's office, but it doesn't open until tomorrow morning."

  "I have nowhere to sleep." All of a sudden, she was incredibly hungry.

  "You could ask someone for a loan."

  "Who can I ask?" Strangers? That was begging. Endri didn't beg. "I can do . . . things for you, here. Please. I have nothing."

  The woman gave her a strange look, and Mikandra sensed that she would probably call the guards soon. Jail was not a good place to end up in a strange city.

  So she left, muttering something about going to see the guards tomorrow morning. But while she went down the stairs, despair closed in on her.

  What was she going to do? She had no money to buy food, no money even to stay at the cheap guesthouses.

  Outside the building, she rounded the corner into Market Street and plonked down on one of the stone benches in the part of the street between the guesthouse and the shops. She buried her face in her hands, wanting to disappear and never come back. How could she have been so stupid?

  What was worse, it seemed that these thugs had been expecting a delivery from a Mirani Endri. What would they have delivered if it wasn't menisha, and who would it be from if not Iztho?

  She and his brothers had been wrong. He was guilty.

  There was no point to anything anymore. She'd die here without ever being able to go back home, let alone take up her position at Kedras. She'd be a beggar on the streets for the rest of her life. No one in Miran would ever know where she'd gone, except Rehan Andrahar, but he didn't care and wouldn't look for her. She did still have the number on her hand, but asking him for help would be the ultimate embarrassment.

  No, she would try to solve this herself.

  But how?

  Chapter 16

  Mikandra had no idea how long she'd been sitting there when a group of about twenty people came walking up the street. They were loud, yelling and laughing, pushing and jostling each other. One of the shop attendants started pulling baskets of clothes underneath the awning of the shop.

  Because they might steal or ruin their stock? Because they meant trouble?

  Mikandra rose and slipped into the safely-lit area outside the shops, where tables and baskets displayed wares for sale by the light of hundreds of glow bulbs strung up in the trees. She went into a fabric stall and feigned interest in the wares to let the group pass.

  "Can I assist the lady?" The shop's owner had come up to her. He was quite rotund and dressed in a robe of similar colourful design as the fabrics in the stall. Damn why did all these locals speak Mirani so well?

  "Uhm, I'm just . . ."

  Her stomach rumbled. She glanced over her shoulder. The men were all young, of Nikala descent, mostly male. Ex-soldiers. There were a number of girls with them, local keihu and Pengali and a Kedrasi girl with brilliant red hair. As they passed, her eyes met those of one of the group.

  Jocassa.

  His eyes widened. He called out, "Hey!"

  Please, no.

  "Eydrina!"

  Mikandra did her best to ignore him.

  On her other side, the fabric vendor continued, "Would the lady be interested to see our choice of quality fabrics?"

  "Uhm—no, thank you, I was just—"

  Jocassa yelled, "Come on, Eydrina, join us!"

  There was nothing for it. Mikandra didn't want to go back to telling him lies, but what was the alternative? Maybe he could lend her some money so that at least she could pay for somewhere to sleep. Maybe he could share some food.

  "I'm sorry, I just . . ." She fled the shop. The vendor muttered something about Mirani louts behind her back.

  She joined the group of young men and women. Jocassa clapped her on the shoulder. "Hey, I knew I'd see youz again. We were jus' having fun on th' town. What 'bout youz? How's yer cousin?"

  She shrugged, for want of a better response.

  "These are my mates."

  He gestured to the man next to him, a mountain of muscle a head taller than Jocassa. He wore a singlet shirt that accentuated his massive shoulders. An ugly scar ran down his cheek. His grin revealed several missing teeth.

  "This is Thasep."

  "Hi," the thug said and his grin widened. His hands were the size of a normal person's head.

  Compared to the giant, the next man looked like a midget. He was also Mirani, with too-long hair held back in a messy ponytail and the fringe hanging into his eyes. He was dressed in a local kaftan which was too wide for his thin frame. His hair was curly, but his face was narrow, and long-nosed.

  "This is Dalit."

  The man Dalit squinted at her. "Oh. Hallo." His eyes were dark blue and focused somewhere over her shoulder. "Nice to meet you."

  "Nice to meet you," Mikandra said, feeling uneasy. He didn't look like an ex-soldier. He didn't sound like an ex-soldier either.

  Jocassa raised his voice. "Everyone, this is Eydrina. We met on th' shuttle. She's visiting her cousin in Barresh."

  Mikandra cringed.

  There were mumbles of hello and how are you doing while the group started walking again.

  Jocassa said to her, "I thought you'd be staying in th' more fancy streets?"

  Mikandra felt like sinking through the ground. She had behaved like an idiot. "I was robbed. I have no money and nowhere to go."

  Tears pricked in her eyes. She was so tired.

  "What 'bout yer cousin?"

  Mikandra shrugged, not trusting herself to speak.

  "There was no cousin, right?"

  She shook her head.

  "'n yer here by yousself running away from some sort of marriage with an old guy. 'n' youz have never been here before. Never left Miran."

  She nodded. Close enough to the truth.

  "And th' scum that robbed youz were 'bout this high 'n' had tails, right?" He held his hand at shoulder height.

  She nodded again.

  "Man, I shoulda warned youz, but I thought youz had someone t' look after youz. This is no place t' roam th' streets alone at this time of th' day, specially not at th' alleys that connect th' streets. What'd they steal?"

  "Everything."

  "Money?"

  She nodded.

  "ID?"

  She nodded again. "My clothes, spare shoes, everything. I have nothing left." Her voice cracked. "What am I going to do? I can't even buy anything to eat."

  "Don' worry."

  "How can I not worry? I've lost everything."

  "Calm down, calm down. Youz will be fine. We's here t' help youz out. Fer starters, we's a large room in th' guesthouse. No one counts how many of us sleep there because we rent by th' room, 'n' we's regulars there. Youz can stay there."

  "Thank you. Can I borrow some money for food? I'll pay it back when they catch the thieves. I'm going to see the city guard tomorrow."

  He laughed. "Don' like yer chances there. Th' guard's not interested in arresting their own citizens. Th' Pengali gangs rule th' streets at night. You'll never see any of it back."

  Panic clawed at her heart. "But how am I going to go home?" Worse, how was she going to get to Kedras?

  "We'll solve that problem when we get to it. Mos' of us had ID stolen before. We's still travel when we want. There's way and means."

  "Illegal."

  "What d'youz think?" His eyes went wide.

  She couldn't work out if his shock reaction was in mockery or real. She guessed the former, but only because she couldn't imagine many legal things went on in this place.

  Jocassa said, "Don' worry about th' ID for now. Youz need money 'n' there's plenty of us t' chip in." He yelled, "Hey, guys!"

  The group of men and women gathered around him. The men were all ex-soldiers, and the women mostly locals, but one Kedrasi, one Damarcian. There was even a Coldi girl on the arm of one of the Mirani men. All their eyes, blue, sandy-coloured, brown and black with gold specks, were on her.

  "Eydrina here's new 'n
' she's been robbed already. She's got no money left."

  Mutters went around of fucking gangs and kill them all. Everyone in the group spoke Mirani, including the Coldi girl.

  Jocassa cupped his hands and went around the group. Men dug in their pockets and handed him donations.

  Jocassa came back with both hands full of coins, pearls and whatever else passed for small change in various currencies. She spotted triangular Mirani tirans—only used in Miran by the street vendors because all the families had accounts—a number of pearls of various sizes that Barresh used for small change and even some Asto chips, which travelling people carried because they were accepted form of payment at most airports.

  "Here. That should keep youz going fer a bit."

  "Thank you so much. I swear I'll pay it all back." The truth was on the tip of her tongue, that she was from an old Mirani Endri family and she'd reward them later, but that was stupid because she was no one and she wouldn't have much money for a long time. She had nothing to give.

  Jocassa shook his head. "Youz go 'n' find a job or do whatsever youz s'pposed t' do here. Next time someone else's in trouble, youz pay yer bit 'n' that's how it works. All of us fall on hard times every now 'n' then. Th' important thing about being one of us is that we's friends to help us out, not t' give us more debt 'n' we need."

  He dumped the whole bundle in Mikandra's hands with a chinking of coins. A few went rolling on the floor. He picked them up and added them to the weight in her hands.

  As Endri, Mikandra rarely handled physical money. She carried a chip with her wherever she went, and bought only at places that accepted payment by account. It was a long time since she handled Mirani tirans and she didn’t even know how much the other currency was worth.

  Mikandra worked the whole lot into her pocket, too ashamed to meet anyone's eyes. These were the people who, by contract of the Mirani Foundation, she was supposed to look after. The Endri were supposed to give the Nikala work and shelter, to look after education and health. Instead they patched up problems in the hospitals by treating the symptoms and never the cause, and neglected everything else.

  The Endri of Miran would never look after each other like this. They circled each other looking for an opportunity to pounce on each other's wealth and undermine each other's power, or profit from it if they couldn't undermine it.