Trade Secret

by Sharon Lee

  “Why does it say crew member number three?” Jethri asked. “You haven’t added anyone to the roster, have you?” He hadn’t meant to make the question sound suspicious, but wasn’t sure he’d achieved neutrality.

  “Ah. Indeed, why? Particularly since none has been added to the roster since the flight began but yourself.”

  The Scout excused himself momentarily, spoke to ground control, returned his attention to Jethri. “May I assume you did not lend out your key to the ship?”

  “Always in my inner pocket, until I returned.”

  “As it should be. I then assure you, for good measure as you sit Second here, that I did not lend out my key to the ship, or offer a spare to another. In effect, my key was in an inner pocket the while I was on port.”

  The Scout sighed then, threw a long-distance scan of their small corner of the landing lot onto the screen. Jethri saw himself leave, judging by time—the rain and walls of the little tunnel made it difficult to see detail. He saw ter’Astin leave, recognizable in part by his pilot’s jacket, and in part by hair color. Then there was a motion coming up the tunnel, someone wearing green, and then the image went muzzy and that portion stopped, to be replaced with a view of a distant gray ship in distant gray rain on a distant launch spot

  “Crewman number three arrived on Keravath and utilized a key to the ship.”

  Jethri let that sink in—

  “But how?”

  “I suspect I know how, my friend. The answer is more than a little disturbing. The very first question now is why? So, let us compare notes on the opening and closing of various doors and entrances, and we’ll do a keystroke analysis, if we need to, on the rest of the ship. Once we’re positive we have no large-scale visitors on board, we’ll eat.”

  * * *

  As they ate, they pieced together a stealthy and knowing intruder, the ship’s normal routine a strange counterpoint to the mystery. The normal things: some screens showing ship movements as their own instruments received them, others showing trade relays and ordinary traffic, with the muted sounds of distant discussions in Terran.

  But the Scout ignored such things as Jethri tried to, the Scout leading the way in describing the invasion.

  The visitor had been on board for a very few moments, and had entered Jethri’s sleeping cubby, but not ter’Astin’s. If theft was the motive, there was no proof of it, for Jethri could find nothing missing, nor was anything obviously disturbed. The Scout’s handheld discovered no sign of a telltale, and the ship itself reported no odd transmissions. The course boards had been accessed and likely copied as they might from Jethri’s board, with access again noted to crewman number three.

  “Not into my sleeping area, for of course mine are Scout’s habits. If I have secrets they’ll be difficult to locate, or in well-guarded safe spots, and not to be discovered for the turning over of clothes or perusal of reading sticks. Since the safe spots are pilot-programmable it would be unwise to attempt them if secrecy was important, and if not we’d have overt evidence of damage or search in the ship.”

  The thought train waited while they both bit into some of the oil breads and then the Scout made an emphatic hand gesture, which encompassed himself, Jethri, and the ship at once.

  “You will remind me, as Second, that on every port we shall set full safeguards on arrival and we will check those safeguards, each, for every exit.”

  “Understood.” Jethri bowed a deep bow since it was a very emphatic hand motion he was agreeing to.

  “Good. And what other information might be of note, I wonder?”

  Jethri shrugged, then ventured an oddity. “The oxy and other gas uses. They’re not yours, according to the charts, and not mine, but they’re different somehow. Does it mean the intruder’s acclimated here?”

  “Ah, what an interesting question and observation. We shall both study on this as time permits.”

  Now, a sip of tea, and the tale continued.

  “And so, the ship was looked at, and neither my station nor my areas disturbed, a sign that the intruder, for we can see by the usage rates that there was only one, is a pilot—a Scout pilot.”

  Another sip of tea interrupted. “And since the key was to hand, it was either a Scout pilot who has flown aboard Keravath in the past who copied or kept a key, or one who had access to the key locker usually controlled by the Master of Keys.

  “As second seat you must know that an invasion of a pilot’s ship is forgivable only under extreme circumstances. That the visitor did not care to explain such circumstances indicates that, in fact, such were not in force. In your case, they have intruded on your space; they have violated your privacy, and they have disturbed your goods. There is Balance owing to me, to you, and to Keravath herself.

  “Additionally, there is Balance owing to the Scouts—but you see, we continue to cause you difficulty; so first, that is mine to solve, and the ship entry, that is ours to solve.” Here he bowed, comrade mode, to Jethri, adding “There is nuance here you may not have learned yet, but I will not let the nuance be lost, I swear it!”

  “The question is still why! Why did they steal my book in the first place? Why rummage through my clothes?” Jethri insisted.

  “It is that you are known to have used Old Tech with much effect, and only recently. You are of a family of traders thought to have long traded Old Tech. Indeed, the trail now runs through the very items you inherited, through the very pocket piece you played with as a child. And your face is very much the face of Arin Gobelyn, who died with secrets someone wants.

  “Understand, Second, that Arin Gobelyn was part of something larger than your ship, or your ship family: he’d been a commissioner of the Combine, and then, he was not a commissioner but he was not done with being part of something larger, because he had a plan or a vision, and he made a report on it that is now circulating.”

  “Circulating report? He’s gone!”

  The pilot’s face gave away exasperation.

  “Of course his report is circulating—else I’d not have heard of it. I would like to see a copy for myself, but it remains yet an object of interest for my agency.”

  An expression ghosted over the Scout’s face, turned to a smile, and then the bow of one making a request perhaps not quite covered by existing melant’i.

  “Perhaps the best path is for me to ask you outright—is it possible you own a copy of the manifesto called ‘Arin’s Envidaria of the Seventeen Worlds’?”

  Jethri sighed, shook his head Terran style, and finally said, “No. In fact I haven’t a copy, and what’s more, I haven’t heard of this thing before today. You call it a ‘manifesto’—is that a plan for all men to live by?”

  The Scout’s face went blank, as if he’d given something away, and he bowed, contrition being the lead note.

  “If I’d seen a copy,” the scout said, “I might tell you what it is, but what we know is that there have been some few—transmissions—gathered as Scouts travel. Where this information, this report, is mentioned, it appears guarded and secret, which seems odd of something related to trade. It has been growing of late, but only among certain ships. Oddly,”—here the Scout looked away for a few moments before looking back and continuing—“I say oddly, some of these ships are also often ships thought to be trading in the Old Tech or otherwise pushing the edge of permissible trading. If there were traders more like you, of course, we need not be concerned about messages that we cannot decipher . . .”

  The day had suddenly become very long.

  “I see.” Jethri made his comment and his face was as bland as it could get, but he was afraid his voice betrayed annoyance, given the Scout’s immediate reinforced bow of contrition.

  “I’m puzzled,” Jethri managed, “to say the least. If you’d like to know what I know about my father, perhaps we can talk on that. Do feel free to ask directly, so that we may both know how ignorant I am.”

  That sounded like pouting to Jethri, but he honestly continued in the same vein, feelin
g the force of ire behind his words.

  “I will tell you that of secret plans spread by Terran tradeships, I do not know. Iza kept me away from such news, if she knew of it herself, and now, Scout, I must ask what kind of conspiracy is being built here? Is it being built against me?”

  Jethri looked away this time, his heart skipping a beat as he heard “Balrog on final exit leg” from the low mutters of local traffic, his eyes scanning to locate—ah, exiting local orbit, not yet nearing Jump, Freza riding away with a copy of whatever the Envidaria was . . . His sigh was real, and informed his growing vehemence.

  “Your ship—our ship, if you will— is invaded because I am here. You tell me that Scouts are chasing my father’s words, and at the same time I must trust a Scout to act for me after Scouts have stolen from me, the word of Scouts not being universal . . .”

  Jethri’s ring flashed as he struck fist to palm in emphasis: “We have—I have—guidance from the lawjaw I spoke to. I don’t know who you consulted, but there’s plans I have here, depending on which world we go to, and which way your people want to act. A couple of the places—that’s the blue option—I’m just supposed to have them arrested for theft, if we can get them off-ship, ’cause Liadens don’t have particular notice there and I will, that is, I do. That Combine key, it marks me a trader, you see, on all of these seventeen worlds, Terran-based worlds every one.”

  “The red list, I need to go to the proctors on port, declare my name and my intent, and have the ships blocked to port and searched for my goods . . . and if I must, claim their ships forfeit.”

  Jethri laughed without mirth at that, shaking his head and staring down the Scout’s gaze.

  The Scout stiffened, and bowed permission to continue.

  “It seemed extreme to me, too.” Jethri shook his head, closed his eyes, opened them with determination, gathering energy.

  “I thought that was too much,” he said, “but now I’m not sure. We’d use something they call a Writ of Replevin, demanding my stuff back and holding theirs hostage for it. And since you’re here, or will be there, with me, you’re my witness against them. We’ll need your card and signature tomorrow, so we can get this in order and have it with us. That’s what you’ve got to do, if it comes to that.”

  Jethri waited, saw the scout waiting, wondered if he’d overstated something—

  The Scout nodded a small bow of assent, and then it turned into a bigger, more formal bow.

  “I have put myself in a position of being sworn to multiple masters. It is an exquisite melant’i play which my old delm—dead before I was first sent to the Scouts for training, alas—would have found amusing. And so I have told you, and I have told your clan, that having erred, I will support all efforts to return your lost items to you, though in the larger universe they might have little value.

  “Having said that,” he went on, “I must still do as much of my duty as possible to all of my masters; not only to my delm, but to those who do me the honor of calling me a Scout and giving me this ship to fly, and to those who have entrusted me with the will of their clan, and to you. Let us both speak to the point: we have a common goal and as for that common goal, we pursue it vigorously, and to some extent with the support of the Scouts.”

  The Scout stared vaguely into the screens, probably not seeing what Jethri was seeing—the tagged Balrog leaving the crowded close-control zone for the outer-limit free maneuvering zone—and then turned his dark eyes back to Jethri, his hands motioning an emphasis Jethri could not read.

  “Count me on your side, if you must have a side, to the point of returning you to Elthoria, whole. That is our conspiracy. The rest of it goes as necessity requires. As an honorable man, grant me that. And let us continue with our quest. I will go with you to this court tomorrow, and then we shall go forth.”

  Turmoil in his head, the trader in him wished to accept the offer at face value, while the Terran crewman, still discovering his father and his heritage, was not so sure. He stared at the scan of the system, the retreating Balrog reduced to small font and numbers, wishing he’d known to ask after his father’s paper when Freza mentioned it. The thing was deep, after all, layers of might know, could know, can’t know, should know and shouldn’t know. In truth, he couldn’t tell who was at the center of all that—Jethri or Arin? Arin being unavailable, and Grig and Paitor too far away to ask, the solving must be up to him.

  The solving was his.

  After several moments, Jethri bowed. He’d come on this mission, after all, so his throw had been made.

  “Yes,” he said. “We need to talk, then—I really do have information on how to proceed, as long as we can locate the . . . thieves . . . solidly in Terran space—on one of those places with these Joint Commercial Chancery Courts.”

  The Scout bowed now, with a hint of a smile.

  “I, too, have information to share. We have a destination! There is a message to the pair of us—I’ll shunt it to your board shortly—from your mother the trader, who advises us that it would be useful to Clan Ixin and to Elthoria if you were able to take advantage of an invitation to a trade meeting. It happens to be at a station around a Terran world already on our list. It is a Combine world, and has much to recommend it to us for our search. I’ll arrange for a lift-off after our morning duties!”

  * * *

  My son, said the letter, within a short while of your departure from Elthoria we had the honor of receipt of an invitation for myself and for yourself, as Elthoria, as Elthoria’s representatives or for yourself—that is for you in particular as the certified bearer of a ten-year Combine key—to take part in a regional trade meeting at Tradedesk Trade Platform, near Vincza, a new Terran trade center. The invitation is from the Carresens Coordinating Committee, and is signed by one D. Omron, of CEA. I know of this event—the meeting rotates among several worlds and venues over time and is shown in a number of trade publications; in general it is a meeting open to Terran traders of some repute. I have here as well a similar message requesting the attendance of Trader Jethri ven’Deelin’s associate Tan Sim, as well. These invitations are all enclosed within the accompanying files. In good faith, though I doubt the utility, I have forwarded to Tan Sim his own invitation in the hope that he might be able, by replying, to make at least useful contacts for himself and your own independent efforts form this.

  Having Vincza on the list of potential destinations left me by Scout ter’Astin, I ask that you make the best of the invitation if at all possible, and if not, that you certainly acknowledge it and that the contact and honor are not lost to yourself and to Elthoria. We shall all prosper by such expanded trade, I am sure.

  * * *

  The lift prep, when it came, was not as happy a time as Jethri had imagined. Not only was he out a good bit of cash—promised to be reimbursed by the Scout!—but the writ and the piece of paper and sealed order wand was paid for and in force here on Balfour. He’d never done anything quite so official in his life, and it had left him a little tight in the gut for making such a fuss. What they’d created, was called a Certified Templatable Action for a Writ of Replevin. With it, they could make a ship stick to port, or even take a whole ship if they had to!

  The writ was “propagating across cooperating political and social entities” right now. That meant a correspondent court could use their action here as an example and have proof that the order’d been paid for and seen before a law clerk twice and spoke over by a judge (even if by video from the other side of the world . . .) and that the witness was acceptable to the jurisdiction.

  So, after all the wait and fuss, it just meant unless they walked out the door and caught the man with the notebook right here, all they’d paid for with their time and delay was guidelines for someone else to follow if they wanted to.

  “In principle, Trader, you’ve got a four-step pattern to follow, and it ought to be good across all the signatory worlds. The thing is, though, that agreement is for all Terran worlds and for Terran-based ships and pil
ots. Come three Standards or so we’ll have the rules firmly propagated so it should mean any ships and people doing business across the jurisdiction, so it wouldn’t matter if someone’s Terran or Liaden—we caught that idea from the Liadens, you know!” Dorster said, nodding through the vidscreen toward the Scout standing beside Jethri. “But if you’re not sure where you’ll pin these thieves down, then I’m not going to promise you more than ‘ought to work.’”

  They’d arrived back at the ship after a silent walk: who wanted to talk legal stuff in the hallways? More, he needed to do research and history checking on the Combine, and on Arin’s business—what exactly had he done as commissioner, anyway?

  One more definition, Jethri promised himself, waiting for a new lift time since they’d been held for an incoming emergency.

  He’d started off looking for Arin’s Envidaria of the Seventeen Worlds in Keravath’s general information files to no avail, and he decided it was probably just as well, since the files he could easily access, aside piloting information and the like which the Scout was only too willing to share, were files generally available on Liad’s public infostreams. The Scout-specific reference lists—other than piloting—were not piped to his board.

  Still, the general files might have something, he’d thought, and plowed along. Since the Scout claimed that he was unsure, research showed . . . nothing clear.

  Envidaria by itself was available as a series of definitions, showing the word in related sentences . . . and in so many senses that it confused mightily. It appeared in general to refer to “things that work” or to more closely to the statement “this functions properly” or . . . well, it was confusing. He’d also tried the “Seventeen Worlds” and was offered screen after screen of information on a peculiar knot of worlds along the galactic arm that were mostly Terran, and constrained by the physics of dust clouds, particle jets, and gaseous remnants of a string of supernovas. The Jumps into and out of the region were extra long, and for the next few centuries, the easiest Jump locations would be fraught with hot magnetic bubbles, essentially doubling and tripling travel time into and out of the arm.