by David Duncan
Then Nnanji threw open the fo'c'sle door and came striding along the deck with a bag in his hand. Behind him, almost having to trot to keep up, came Katanji, wearing sword and kilt and boots. For once, he looked concerned, and there was obviously trouble in the air―so much trouble that Nnanji did not even notice Thana.
"I should be grateful if you would accompany us, my lord brother. I need speak with Mistress Brota."
Wallie was wearing his sword, but his feet were bare. "If you hold on a moment, I can get my boots," he said, but Nnanji was already bounding up the steps to the poop. Wallie glanced at Katanji, who brashly rolled his eyes in an attempt to appear less worried than he obviously was. They both followed.
Brota was sitting like a giant red puffball at the tiller and her moon face was totally expressionless as the deputation arrived. Wallie was not surprised to find that Thana and Honakura had come along also―they both liked to be in on any excitement mat was brewing. Thus there were five people who formed up in a semicircle in front of the helmsperson.
"You're blocking my view!" Brota barked. Nnanji growled, but all five sat down. First point to Brota, Wallie thought; now she was higher than they were, and being angry was harder when sitting than standing. She had no real need to see, anyway. Sapphire was heading up an empty River, with very few sails in sight―blue sky, blue water, golden fall hills against the smoke-colored ranges far to the northwest.
A moment later Tomiyano slid into view and stayed leaning against the rail, watching with cynical suspicion. Seven was the magic number, Wallie remembered. Could this be some divinely decreed event? They had as near a complete set of ranks as could be assembled on the ship, too―little, desiccated Honakura in his black, then the lithesome Thana in skimpy yellow... Next to her, Katanji was as dark-skinned as she, and looked darker because he was wearing a white kilt, unusually clean for him. Nnanji was a tangle of lanky and paler limbs protruding from an orange kilt, his anger making him seem more awkward even than he normally did. Brota loomed above them all in her wind-rippled crimson, Tomiyano was a silent audience on the fringes in a brown breechclout, and Wallie himself, huge in blue. Only a Sixth's green was missing.
Nnanji looked at Wallie. "The day you were wounded, brother, I took your money to look after. I gave mine to Novice Katanji, so they would not get mixed up. I gave him forty-three golds and some change. When I sold Cowie, I gave him another ten. He had five of his own. I asked for three back in Wo, but I haven't needed any more. Today I asked him for the rest of it."
Planning to buy a present for Thana, of course.
"Fifty-three of yours and five of his makes fifty-eight," Wallie said, knowing that mathematics was not his protégé's strong point. "Less three makes fifty he owes you?"
Nnanji nodded grimly. "He hasn't got it. All he has is this."
He tipped the bag he had been holding, spilling a glittering heap of rubies and emeralds and pearls. The circle of onlookers muttered in astonishment. Nnanji stirred the heap with a finger.
"Three golds and some silver," he said, picking out a few coins.
"Obviously the gems are worth more than fifty golds," Wallie said. "He can certainly repay you as soon as he gets to a free city."
Nnanji's eyes were icy. "But I want to know where he got them, brother. He denies stealing, but says he promised Mistress Brota that he would not tell. That's what concerns me!"
"I've never seen those before," Brota said hurriedly. She started scanning the horizon as if looking for landmarks. No one wanted to speak next. Wallie decided that this was a matter between Nnanji and his brother, but he was curious to see how Nnanji would handle it.
Getting no help from him, Nnanji took a deep breath and said, "Mistress, would you please explain how a protégé can keep anything secret from his mentor? Do you consider it seemly for another swordsman, like yourself, to suggest that he should?"
Point to Nnanji.
Brota grunted without looking down. "No! But I don't recall telling him to do that. As I remember, it was the other way. I promised him that I would not tell you."
Nnanji swung a triumphant gaze on Katanji, who was attempting to look like a very small boy confused by the affairs of adults. He was less convincing than he would have been once; the weeks on the River had lengthened him and filled him out. He would never be big, but he was visibly closer to manhood than he had been when Wallie first met him. He looked healthier, too, and he even had a stump of a ponytail now, although it curled up in a knot. "I bought some rugs, mentor," he said. "Brota helped me."
Thana was instantly overcome by a life-threatening attack of giggles. Brota glared at her in angry silence, but that merely made Thana's fit worse.
"Let me tell!" she said when she had recovered.
Out came a story of silk rugs and of negotiations in a gondola. Wallie was soon digging his nails into his palms to stop himself laughing aloud. He risked a glance at the old priest, who raised one eyebrow―Brota outwitted by a scratcher? Certainly a miracle!
Katanji had bought all the best rugs in the shop in Dri for sixty-two gold pieces, filling the gondola. Brota had gained nothing by her bargain. Indeed she had been out the costs of the ride and bribing the gondolier, out even the risk of smuggling, for the authorities might have seized her ship. Wallie knew that she would have felt bound by her handshake, but that did not explain how she had managed to resist drowning the brat.
"And how did you sell them?" he asked.
Katanji had recovered his confidence, but he was still somehow projecting an appearance of great youth and innocence as he took up the story. Now it was even better.
At the next port, Casr, he asked that his rugs be unloaded and placed on the docks next to Brota's. There was a fierce but whispered argument. He retorted that she had agreed to unload them where he wanted and if they were too close to hers, then she could have them moved, but he could not do that himself, and the crew would wonder why. He promised that the sailors would not discover his private trading as long as she kept them away, especially Diwa and Matarro. Wallie guessed that by this time Brota was too fascinated by his display of precocity to do more than cooperate and watch. So Katanji arranged his rugs in a heap and sat on top of it to play a solitaire game that involved moving pegs around a board.
When the traders came, Brota tried to sell her rugs, but the finest in sight were under Katanji. She could only refer the traders to the boy. He politely showed the goods, but explained that he was guarding the rugs for his father, who had gone into town. So they were not for sale? Well, his dad had said he could sell the whole pile for a hundred and twenty golds. When would his father be back? Katanji merely shrugged and returned to his solitaire game. He wore a rugmaker's fathermark, so the story seemed believable.
He had nothing else to do with the day; the ship could not sail without Brota; Brota could not leave without selling her goods―for the traders were interested―and Brota was not going to sell much with that pile of superlative rugs sitting there next to hers. The traders, baffled by having no one to haggle with, hung around, waiting for the imaginary father to return. After a couple of hours, when the waiting seemed likely to last until sunset, one of the traders confirmed with Brota that the boy had authority to sell and handed over the full amount. As Katanji went back on board, he placed the solitaire game on Brota's table...
That last piece of studied insolence was too much for Wallie. He leaned back on his arms and bellowed with laughter. Nnanji scowled and looked at Thana, who was equally helpless. Tears were pouring down Honakura's cheeks. Brota was smiling thinly―obviously it hurt too much to laugh. Then a raucous noise from the rail showed that Tomiyano, also, was overcome by the story. Outraged, Nnanji glared around at him, then turned back to his brother, who was very wide-eyed and hopeful... but this time he had gone too far. Nnanji was not going to see the joke. This was a matter of honor.
"Right," he said coldly, when calm had been restored. "So you spent sixty-two out of... how did you get to sixty-two?"
He looked in puzzlement at Wallie, who agreed that they had not accounted for sixty-two, even with Katanji's own five.
"You had nineteen silvers, mentor," Katanji said reluctantly. "And I had two..."
"That makes one more gold."
Katanji sighed. "When you tried to buy the pot from the captain? He didn't take the money. He kicked it away."
"And you picked it up afterward, of course!" Nnanji glared. "That is Lord Shonsu's money. No, it is the captain's."
"But he didn't want it!"
Even Wallie was having trouble keeping track by this time, but they eventually established that Katanji, after he had sold his rugs, should have had one hundred and twenty-two left, of which five were either Wallie's or Tomiyano's. Then they learned of two more that he had weaseled out of Brota in Wal ... one hundred and twenty-four.
"How much is all this worth?" Nnanji asked suddenly, peering at the heap of jewels. Thana bent forward and spread them out.
"At least five hundred golds," she said. Brota nodded in agreement.
Nnanji fixed his gaze on the sinner. "How much?"
Katanji pouted. "Between seven and eight hundred... nearer to eight."
The congregation exchanged glances.
"I bought some jewels in Casr. Look, see this ruby? I bought that and another for sixty, then I sold the other in Tau for fifty, but it was bigger. And I bought two amethysts and four topazes in Wo and sold them in Shan."
"How do you know about jewels?" Wallie demanded. There seemed to be no bottom to Katanji's hidden depths.
Nnanji turned pink. "Our grandfather was a silversmith. Katanji used to hang around his workshop, my lord brother, till he died. About four years ago," he added in a small voice, and Wallie then knew where the money had come from to bribe Nnanji's way into the temple guard.
"He was going to let me apprentice to him, my lord," Katanji said, eager to change the subject.
"How did you get from one hundred and twenty-odd to seven or eight hundred, though?" his brother demanded.
Katanji looked appealingly at Brota. "He did some work for me," she admitted, then grudgingly explained. Katanji's unique ability to extract information from slaves had not been used only in sorcerer cities. At Casr, Tau, Wo, and Shan, he had undertaken industrial espionage for Brota. His price had risen every time, until now he was charging ten golds. Brota had paid, because haggling was much easier when she knew her opponent's unit cost.
Nnanji looked disgusted. Even Wallie had lost track of the mathematics. "What did you have when you got to Gi?" he demanded.
"One ruby, two emeralds, and one hundred and eleven golds, my lord."
Three coins left... "You bought the rest of this with one hundred and eight golds?" Wallie asked and Katanji nodded guiltily.
Supply and demand―in a world without banks the ultimate store of value was land, but for movable property was gold or gems. The survivors of Gi would have saved their jewelry if nothing else, but they would have been in need of hard cash. Jewels had suddenly become cheap and money dear. Katanji had seen the opportunity of a lifetime. Wallie looked at Brota, and she was scowling ferociously. She had been wasting her time on bronze ingots, while Katanji had been working his way up into the senior class.
"That's horrible!" Nnanji said when it was explained to him in simple terms. "They were starving! Homeless! Don't you have any pity at all?"
He looked at Wallie in disgust. Wallie wondered if Nnanji would have felt such compassion when he was Katanji's age. Perhaps not, but he had changed and learned. Katanji never would.
"He probably regrets only that he didn't hold back enough cash to repay you," said Wallie. "Then you wouldn't have known. He got greedy."
"I was going to, my lord," Katanji said sadly, "until I saw the pearls." He reached into the heap and lifted out a glittering string of light. "I couldn't resist them. I got these for twenty―and they're worth at least two hundred."
No, he had no regrets.
"From now on," Nnanji said, "you will not go slaving without my permission! Is that clear?" His brother nodded glumly, and Brota pouted at the skyline. "Slaving may be honorable when it is done to aid the gods, but not for money! Now, how much could you get for... this?" He pulled out a brooch of gold and emeralds.
"Seventy or so," Katanji suggested cautiously.
Nnanji handed it to him. "Then take it, sell it, and pay back what you started with. Keep anything extra."
Katanji's eyes gleamed.
Then Nnanji looked doubtfully at the rest of the treasure, silently sought help from Wallie and then Honakura, and saw that they were leaving it up to him. "Who owns this?"
"It's mine!" But Katanji's voice lacked conviction.
"No it isn't!" Even sitting on the deck, Nnanji could look down on him like a wading heron eyeing a fish. "As a First you can own nothing. And even if you were a Second, this wouldn't be yours. If I told you to look after my cow, and she calved, then the calf would still be mine. That's the law." He glanced at the priest and got an amused nod.
He scowled in thought for a while, the others waited for his decision, and the ship glided through the morning sunlight.
"I think it's tainted," Nnanji said. "It ought to go to the Goddess at the next temple we reach."
Katanji and Brota exchanged looks of disgust.
"Just a minute," said Brota from her throne, a crimson Buddha about to impart enlightenment. "Shonsu, you've seen Katanji fence. What sort of a swordsman is he going to make?"
"A dead one."
She nodded. "Nnanji, you know this, too. The kid has no future in your business, but he's a natural trader, like my oldest, Tomiyarro, was, maybe even better. He will do very well on the River, even if he never does get more marks."
"He's not quite as bad as he makes out," Wallie said. "He fakes it."
Nnanji looked suspiciously at Katanji, whose face now wore a studied absence of expression.
"But," Wallie added, "he's never going to be a Third if he lives to a thousand. Nnanji," he said gently, "the lady has a good point."
"Let him swear to me," Brota suggested, "and be a water rat. It's his natural calling. One day he can marry a trader, and they can own their own ship. That's better than being dead, isn't it?" She gave Katanji a motherly smile and probably meant it.
Nnanji colored. "A swordsman engaging in trade?"
"Kindly explain what is wrong with that?" Thana asked in a voice dripping poisoned honey. "Mother and I need to know."
A silence grew, while Nnanji studied the jewels intently, and the sides of his neck turned as red as his cheeks. He had just dug his grave with his tongue, Wallie decided, and waited with interest to see if he could extricate himself.
"Is that what you want, protégé? To be a water rat? A trader?"
Katanji hesitated. "I think I would be a better trader than a swordsman, Nanj," he said quietly. "But I want to stay with you―for a few years, anyway."
"Well, if you do become a water rat, then I suppose you could use this," Nnanji said reluctantly.
"But my honor, mentor?" Katanji's eyes were very big and very innocent.
Nnanji glared. Then, choosing his words with great care, he said, "It is wrong for a garrison swordsman or a free sword to engage in trade, because it distracts him from his duty. But a water rat has obligations to his ship, so trade is permissible for him. Is that clear?"
Katanji sighed. "It's clever!" Then he looked up again at his brother. "But what would Aunt Gruza say?"
More silence... a sound like escaping steam... then Nnanji exploded into laughter at last, and Katanji joined him, and they howled in unison at some family in-joke that the others could not share. The onlookers watched in amused and puzzled silence.
Nnanji could not speak. He beat his fists on the deck. He wiped tears away a couple of times and tried... then he would catch his brother's eye again, and again the two of them would collapse into hysterical giggles. Whoever Aunt Gruza was, her name was a word of power.
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To Wallie it was a touching reminder that these two had shared childhood together―and not very long ago, either. He was trying to fight a war with very young assistants. And, in spite of their extreme differences, these brothers were actually very fond of each other.
At long last, the fit passed, and Nnanji regained control.
"All right, nipper," he said. "You can keep it... except for these." He reached into the hoard and lifted out the string of pearls, which writhed in his fingers like a captured sunbeam. "Mistress Brota, will you seal the rest of this in a bag and put it in a safe place for us? If anything happens to me, then it belongs to Katanji."
"Of course, adept," Brota said.
Nnanji studied the pearls for a moment. "And these... these are the most beautiful, and they are honest―they brought out the story. So I shall keep them in view, to remind us to be honest. But I shall hide their beauty by putting them against a greater beauty."
He rose, hung the pearls around Thana's neck, and walked quickly away.
Thana gasped and raised her hand to them: two hundred golds? She looked at her mother, then at Wallie. Then she jumped up and ran after Nnanji,
Katanji quietly muttered, "Oh, puke!" in unbounded disgust.
"Perhaps you would witness the sealing, old man?" Wallie asked. Honakura took the hint and led Katanji and his fortune away. Tomiyano followed, leaving only Wallie sitting on the deck, looking up at Brota.
"That should do the trick," Wallie said.
And Brota studied him in silence for a white. "You are a man of great honor, my lord. Very few men, of any rank, would have refused what has been offered."
"I think there were conditions attached," Wallie said. "But what of Nnanji? You know, sometimes I think of him as an egg, a great big egg that I found on a beach. Every now and again another piece of shell falls off, and I get another glimpse of what is going to hatch. Whatever it is, it will be remarkable. Who would have thought that he was capable of that gracious little speech just now?"
"What are you implying, my lord?"
