"So what you got have?"
"In trade? First off, not to have that stsho contract hanging over my head. I've got to have trade agreements with the new government, including trade agreements for Vikktakkht's interests. I've got to have Chanur's friends out of here: we're not leaving any hostages in anybody's hands."
"What friend you talk about?"
"No'shto-shti-stlen."
"No, no, no good deal."
"What no good deal? What threat is gtst to anybody if he's not the governor?"
A few rapid puffs of smoke. The whole dockside was unnaturally silent. "You give oji, I present deal to stsho."
"No. You give me No'shto-shti-stlen, or no oji.'"
"You no damn position to bluff, hani. You want see Chanur take bad damage, you go ahead. Meetpoint dock get blow to hell, all you fault, you bring kif in. Look damn bad. We throw out kif guard for stsho, you bring back, blow up dock…"
"I could destroy the oji. So nobody gets it."
Brows went up. "Not good. Holy antiquity. Belong big stsho fam'ly."
"So somebody gets badly upset if anything happens to this oji, huh?"
"Stop play game! We talk about you trade agreement. We get damn kif leave this system!"
"Agreements with the kif too."
"We talk."
"You want him out of here, right you talk. You talk damn serious. No doublecross."
"First give oji."
"First give No'shto-shti-stlen."
"Simul-taneous."
"All right. You bring No'shto-shti-stlen, I bring the oji."
"Maybe so you got Atli-lyen-tlas. Maybe you think pull trick. I tell you, we see stsho, that stsho dead before foot touch this deck. Same hani."
Nowthe masks were off. Now they knew the players. She stared at the mahe as eye to eye a hani could, at a species head and shoulders taller. "I've said what we have to have. Simultaneous transfer. Then we start talking — and talking seriously, mahe, no damn tricks on your side either."
"You got pocket com? You crew follow all this?"
What's he up to? she wondered; and said aloud: "They're listening, damned right."
"Same mine. Same stsho. We stand here, you crew bring oji, stsho bring No'shto-shti-stlen. All fine."
"Fine." She folded her arms. "Tiar?"
"Aye, captain,"the answer came back.
"When I see No'shto-shti-stlen on the dock, I'll advise you. Nothing leaves the ship before then."
"Aye, captain. "
"Advise the hakkikt we're in negotiation and we'll keep him posted."
"/'// do that, captain. "
She gave a wave of the hand. "Your turn."
A casual puff of smoke. Haisi rattled off a string of mahendi language she didn't follow that well. But it contained words like No'shto-shti-stlen, gtst, and stsho.
There was argument.
Haisi said, "Stsho want know no guns."
"No guns." She switched to stshoshi, figuring on Haisi's bug to pick it up. "I wish to establish friendly relations with the most distinguished representatives from Llyene. I should in no wise wish to perform a tasteless act of violence or to endanger them in any way."
Haisi didn't understand all of that, either. It was not altogether Trade-tongue.
Haisi looked just a little uneasy. So the stsho weren't prisoners. And, being stsho, they were probably treating No'shto-shti-stlen tolerably well, so long as events were uncertain, so long as there was the remotest chance, of anything going contrary to their plans.
Probably too, No'shto-shti-stlen, the canny old fellow, had held out hope, so long as he had a throw of the dice left. Haisi had said gtst, and maybe it was the standard, safe term, and maybe it was something else. Some stsho might have Phased under such stress. But she fully expected to see gtst in possession of gtst name, gtst dignity, and gtst claim to the oji.
And the stsho would not be safe from gtst until they had the oji, that seemed likely from the persistence with which Haisi wanted to lay hands on it.
When that went into hostile hands, this emblem of whatever gender it was, evidently No'shto-shti-stlen posed no threat. And she wished she knew she was doing the right thing.
But time passed, and passed, here in the dockside cold with, she was sure, a good many eyes on every breath they took. Haisi smoked one smoke-stick down to a stub, extinguished it with a pinch and put it in the pouch of his kilt, from which he took out another and lit it with a good deal of fuss.
"That can't be good for you," she said, and Haisi let out the breath he had been drawing in while lighting it, put the lighter away and laughed.
"Not good," he said. "Keep want quit. How you? Got no bad habit?"
"Husbands," she said. "Just got my second."
Another laugh. "You marry! Heard same. Maybe you cheat on husband, we get together next port. Big party."
"With you? No thanks. I have some taste."
Haisi grinned wide. "I bet you good."
"Number one right I'm good. Ask me again sometime, oh, three, four years. I might be in the mood for a pirate."
"Honest citizen. I tell you, Hilfy Chanur, you got learn tell difference, quit lie down with kif."
She'd heard about every nasty comment on that topic there was. She put on a perfect smile. "What is the difference? Hah?"
"Cute hani. Pretty nose. Pretty eyes."
"You are a bastard, Haisi. A charming bastard. But you are a bastard." There had been movement just then, across the dock, on the merchant strip, a pale-robed shadow, and another, now. "Looks like stsho."
Haisi didn't turn his head to look. He angled his whole body, to watch her and Tarras up by the gate; and to see what was happening.
"They bring No'shto-shti-stlen. Where oji?"
"So how do we do this? Meet halfway?"
Haisi stretched out his arm to the left. "Halfway there, you bring oji." And to the right: "Same halfway there, No'shto-shti-stlen. We take, you take, all fine."
"Fair," she decided, and touched the pocket com. "Tiar, they're coming. Did you follow that? We're to bring the oji out and put it down on the dock at about the same pace they bring No'shto-shti-stlen to a similar place some little removed. You can bring it as far as the gate, now."
Haisi was talking to his own crew, and then, apparently to the stsho, saying much the same thing.
There was the chance of a switch. But it was not a time to argue. It was highly unlikely one stsho would place gtstself in jeopardy by posing as another and it was unlikely the stsho with gtst would risk their lives by bringing a substitute. And if she slowed down the proceedings Haisi would do exactly the same, at which point everything could come unraveled. People could get shot. Including No'shto-shti-stlen.
Which was still a possibility, once Haisi had the oji, which was one reason Tarras was up there, in a high position relative to the dockside.
One thing she would bet on: no one in the han could read stsho signatures. She couldn't, with any certainty. It was within the realm of possibility they would have shown the marriage document to stsho, to Haisi's stsho, for verification… so it was within possibility that the Llyene stsho knew that Atli-lyen-tlas was a holiness: signatures did indicate Mode, Phase, and Gender, among other Life Events of significance. It was within possibility that the Llyene stsho recognized the identities of Tlisi-tlas-tin and Dlimas-lyi, and their relationship. And the negotiations had still gone as they had gone, which didn't prove one way or the other that the stsho had told everything they knew to Ana-kehnandian… but by all she knew of stsho, Tahaisimandi Ana-kehnandian was in their estimation not to be confided in. Nor wholly in power over the situation: therefore not to be confided in.
Perfectly logical stsho reasoning, who held self-preservation and tasteful behavior paramount.
She knew just enough to know how much she didn't know. But there was no choice, absolutely no choice. She'd done the best trading she could with the goods she had. She thought she'd come away as best she could — but she never thought that Ana-ke
hnandian was going to play fair.
Not by the gods likely, Haisi.
Haisi gave her a nod and walked off to stand at the appointed spot to receive the oji, where others of his crew showed up, armed… of course: they replaced the kif as station police.
Shewalked off toward the stsho, to receive No'shto-shti-stlen. And she said, into com, which doubtless was being monitored on Ha'domaren, by electronics the mahendo'sat had had time to install around the dock, "Is it in position?"
"Aye, captain."Tiar said.
"Everything's on schedule. Bring it on out, down to the dock. They start walking, we start walking, that's the way it works. I'm going out onto the dock to wait for No'shto-shti-stlen. When you carry it out, go toward Ana-kehnandian and his crew at the same rate you see No'shto-shti-stlen going toward me.
When gtst reaches me, you set down the case and go back to the lock."
"Got that,"Tiar said. The instructions were for Fala. But Tiar understood. "She's coming out now.
You'd better see them moving, captain. "
She didn't turn to see. She had her attention divided between the stsho, who did begin tentatively to move, and Haisi and his lot, and the possibility of snipers somewhere about the dock — which was a fearful lot of real estate to monitor. At a certain point one just hoped to the gods.
"They're moving," she said.
Stsho were not going to dash into possible danger. It was a nervous, sometimes halting advance. She could see Fala now, doing almost pace for pace the same thing as the stsho, with the black case within her arms. And she could pick out the one she thought must be No'shto-shti-stlen, among the gleaming gossamer of the others, a figure no less richly dressed, no less adorned and painted, but less interested in the surroundings than looking toward her, only toward her, as if she were the destination of hope.
Closer and closer.
"Your excellency?" she asked. "No'shto-shti-stlen?"
There were bows, a deep one from the one stsho, nervous ones from the others.
"Wai, most gracious hani," said the one, in stshoshi, which the others might not know she understood. It was the only proof she could look to have… gtst looked right. Gtst sounded right.
"Please accompany me with all tasteful speed," she said, and added, for the others, "Please abandon this exposed place. There is danger."
No'shto-shti-stlen was willing. She struck out for the Legacy's dock at a fair pace, the others were dithering, and of a sudden alt the stsho were bolting with her.
Herd-mind, Vikktakkht had said, My gods! She didn't know what to do but run, all the stsho were running, and Fala sprinted for the ramp, but no shots came. Hilfy stopped there, a momentary pause, in the middle of a lot of stsho who were probably wishing they had bolted the completely opposite direction.
"Get gtst into the ship!" she ordered Fala. "Your excellency, go with her!"
As she saw Haisi with the box on the decking, yonder, saw the stsho with her begin to go uncertainly in that direction. But Haisi was bound to check out the goods — to be sure of them.
Haisi opened the box. A silver spheroid rolled out— a small one. And if their wiring worked right—
Haisi dived for the cover of a station girder, right behind his men. The stsho shrieked with one voice and retreated the only direction they could, toward the Legacy. A moment later the silver ball exploded with a fearsome shock, a ball of upward-wafting fire, and a huge cloud of smoke.
Stsho yelped into silence, Haisi was sprawled flat not quite into cover, and just then apparently realizing the explosion behind him had not done major damage. Thank the gods of space.
Haisi was getting up, beginning to figure it, and glared at her. She laughed and laughed harder, in spite of the fact snipers were possible. The smoke was beginning to clear and a shape to appear out of it, a pale, twisted structure tall as he was, twice as wide, lacy, white, with subtle ochers.
"Exploding rocks," she said, and shouted it, she couldn't resist it. "Exploding rocks, Haisi, you son of an earless mother!''
She herded the stsho for the Legacy's rampway, just a little out of the way of snipers, or a direct shot from Haisi, who was just standing there, probably with his brain rattled from the shockwave, and maybe adding up the fact that that hadn't been the oji, which was still on the Legacy, and that she had, presumably, No'shto-shti-stlen, and that, thanks to stsho instincts, she had the Llyene officials uncertainly sheltering in the shadow of the Legacy's access. And she had a lot of kif allies out there. "Pray go inside,"
she said to the stsho, "where your excellencies will find more safety. This mahe is of uncertain mood and possibly tastelessly violent behavior."
"What is this object?" a stsho asked. She hadn't exactly decided what to call it. But she threw it another look, standing there wreathed in the smoke of its birth, and said, considerately, "An… artwork, actually, most excellent, and never of any hazard to the station."
"An artwork," one said, and something she couldn't catch. "An artwork," another said, or a variant on that. There was a sound among them she'd never heard the species make, with waving of hands and bobbing of heads, and a general milling about.
Then a mass "liiii," of uncertainty, but not a thing more, as she and Fala together urged them into the rampway chill, away from snipers, please the gods, away from imminent attack.
"Advance to the airlock," she advised them above their murmuring and hesitations. "All will be well." She certainly hoped so.
Tarras had the gun discreetly out of view behind the gate: "Tiar," she said to the pocket com, once they were through, with Tarras still keeping a careful eye on the docks, "Tiar, shut that gate and open the airlock, we're in, we're all in, we're clear."
She was breathlessly glad when that gate slid shut: no way to lock it against somebody stationside with a key or a master control, but she heard the lock open, out of sight around the curve of the tube — safety and their own deck was that close, and if nobody started an interstellar war while they were traversing this very fragile tube she vowed she would turn religious.
Then just as the foremost of the flock of stsho rounded the curve of the tube toward the airlock, they stopped dead in their tracks and exclaimed in startlement, refusing to budge as the back ranks crowded up against them.
A totally naked stsho was walking down the tube, bearing the Preciousness in gtsta hands, as inane and as happy an expression on gtsta face as she had ever seen on a stsho.
"No'shto-shti-stlen!" gtsta exclaimed delightedly. "Blessed be the receiver of the gift, blessed be the bearer of young, blessed be you, O most excellent of excellences!"
No'shto-shti-stlen-it was gtst— came and took the Preciousness in gtst arms, and bowed and bowed-there being nothing the captain, walled away from the proceedings by a phalanx of murmuring and bobbing stsho, could do to object to the situation.
Gtstathen walked, naked as the day gtsta was born, through the yielding wall of stsho, and past them…
since the stsho did not stop gtsta, it hardly seemed safe for a hani captain to do so: she held Fala with a press of her hand, as gtsta walked blithely past them and on down the yellow-ribbed shadow of the rampway.
"Better open the outer gate again," Hilfy said to Tiar. "Gtsta wants to go out there, and we've got no right to argue."
"But—" cried No'shto-shti-stlen, standing the other side of the parted stsho, "but, Holiness, who have I married?"
Gtstaswung about, walking backwards, and waved gtsta spindly arms. "Tlisi-tlas-tin and Dlimas-lyi, my Dlima-lyen-lyi, my egg, my loveliest, most favored, most blessed—"
Gtstawas out of sight, then, warbling something to gteraself, and the stsho around them were apparently congratulating No'shto-shti-stlen, No'shto-shti-stlen bowing and bowing, and holding the Preciousness.
It was time to get the whole party out of this tube, Hilfy said to herself, to get them somewhere safe, like the passenger quarters, if that was tasteful… at this point a hani was definitely out of her social depth and proceedin
g on guess and luck.
She worked her way through the crowd with a great deal of bowing and apologies for tasteless dutiful necessities… "Including your excellencies' personal safety. Please urge everyone toward the ship, please make some decorous haste. There are infelicitous persons outside and the gate is open." Tarras and Fala, thank the gods, had taken up guard at the rear and one of them had disappeared, probably to see if gtsta was clear of the gate. Evidently gtsta was. She heard it shut.
"We're sealed," Tiar said, breathing a sigh, and looked around to her crewmates. Who were congratulating each other, and probably not listening.
She gave her attention back to the dockside camera hook-up, which was operating, of a sudden, stsho officials having seemingly decided that it should. There was not a notable lot going on, except a completely naked stsho who was walking around and around the object that, reacting with the station's oxygen, had expanded into a pillar of lace.
Gtstaseemed delighted with it. Gtsta ran ringers over it, gtsta examined it high and low and from every angle. Eventually another couple of stsho showed up, fully dressed, bowing repeatedly, and likewise admiring the accident.
Not a sign of Haisi and his crew. Not a transmission out of Ha'domaren, which was at dock, tightly sealed.
Of a sudden, though, they were getting real station information, real system information. She contacted her opposite number aboard Tiraskhti, and found herself in direct communication with Vikktakkht.
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