by Robin Roseau
Galatzi Trade
Robin Roseau
Table of Contents
Meeting
Reception
Seaside Conversation
Unexpected Visitors
Travels
River Crossing
Altercation
Communication
Part Two
Détente Destroyed
Indartha
Baths
Prisoner
Indecision
Return
Winter
Vendart
Decisions
Visitors
Part Three
Three Years
Planetary Congress
Galatzi Offer
Confusion
Again
About the Author
Copyright
Meeting
I strained to understand the unfamiliar accent. It didn't help that the language spoken had never been heard on my home planet of Centos Four. Of course, I wasn't on Centos Four. I was the leader of a small diplomatic mission to a planetary system most of humanity didn't even recognize, not even with a number.
But the locals called it Talmon, which in their language meant simply Home.
Like virtually all of Earth's former colonies, Talmon had been cut off from interstellar contact for generations. Hundreds of years ago -- hundreds of years as measured on every planet mankind every colonized, actually -- space exploration and colonization were seen as the great savior for mankind.
Earth was struggling under quadruple threats. Global warming driven by unrestrained burning of fossil fuels was wreaking havoc through rising oceans, disappearing coastal cities, extreme weather, and draught conditions throughout many of Earth's former food producing regions.
That same unrestrained burning of fossil fuels had driven a hundred years of economic expansion; but dwindling supplies coupled with unquenchable thirst pushed the entire planet to the brink of global war while devastating the economies of much of the industrialized world.
At the same time, the Earth's population swelled and swelled, reaching nine billion by the middle of the twenty-first century. This drove a wide variety of ill effects, including global food shortages, global energy shortages, global clean water shortages, and global pandemics. All of these disasters drove social unrest, but not as much as...
The gap between the haves and the have-nots grew to intolerable extremes. When coupled with all the other issues, the resulting unrest threatened to explode into global utter chaos.
The worldwide extinction of man became a well-discussed threat, all due to greed and shortsighted policies throughout the entire world. The writing was on the wall.
But a solid investment strategy could also be a solid strategy for the continued existence of humanity: diversification. Man's eggs were all stored on one fragile world: Earth. And so, wise heads sent some of those eggs to distant lands, distant, distant lands.
It was a good plan, and it worked. Humanity survived.
Earth's society collapsed. Without the industrial might of a maturely exploited planet, the far-flung colonies were unable to maintain mutual contact. And thus, they all became isolated worlds.
Some maintained a technological society; on these planets, science advanced. And on most of the planets, the lessons from a spoiled earth were remembered. Planetary war was avoided; planetary ecological destruction was avoided, on most planets, anyway.
But not every colonized planet represented ready access to the sorts of natural resources that can drive technology. The advanced sciences of the times required access to rare elements; one does not build a spaceship out of iron, after all. And so, many of the colonies lost much of the science they once knew.
Talmon was one such planet.
In the scheme of things, my delegation to Talmon was freshly arrived; we'd been there for slightly longer than one local year. Our arrival had been, at least to me, quite strange. Everyone aboard our fast transport had stood at the observation port as we settled into orbit above the planet. From a distance, Talmon could be mistaken for any other human-friendly planet. It was a big, blue ball with small, rocky continents, white polar ice caps, and significant cloud coverage. When we arrived, a hurricane was clearly visible below us, set to make landfall on one of those small continents in anther two days. Our ship traveled eastward into the approaching night, and then below us, the main habited continent.
I had never looked down on a planet at night and seen no lights.
There were no lights. Not one.
We'd gotten the reports. We weren't the first visitors, but we were the first who would stay for as long as we would. We knew it wasn't an industrial planet. We knew it was an agrarian society.
But there was something about being in orbit above a planet and seeing not a single light that was, well, haunting. Especially as we knew there were people down there. There were cities down there. Okay, they weren't big cities, little more than glorified villages, but they were down there.
Not that we could tell from orbit, not at night.
It hadn't become any less eerie as we traveled further east, reaching daylight. We passed over one of the sparsely populated continents, seeing not a single evidence of mankind. Oh, they were down there, but we saw no cultivated squares of farmland. We saw no cities, no roads. If there were roads, I would have seen them. Yes, yes, from orbit, roads are very difficult to see with naked eyes.
Even naked, my eyes weren't entirely naked.
Technology is a marvelous thing.
We had known what to expect. We had known. But knowing in your head isn't the same as knowing in your gut.
But all that was now more than one local year ago. The language remained difficult. We could make ourselves understood, and when they spoke carefully for us, we could understand the Talmonese.
But it was a struggle.
* * * *
Our home on Talmon was the port town of Sudden, located on the southeast coast of the largest, most populated continent in the northern hemisphere of Talmon. Most populated was almost a joke. There was no official census, but as best we could tell, Sudden and the immediate region held a little over a thousand people. It was the only seat of real power on the planet, but it would be a mistake to call it the home of the central government.
There was no central government; there was hardly any government at all.
There were laws, and they were the same laws throughout the entire planet with local variations only as necessary for local conditions.
But the planet was comprised of small villages loosely collected into what could be described as isolated city-states. Sudden was one of those city-states.
The duty of our delegation: evaluate the planet's society, determine whether we would be offering membership in the Empire, and investigate the nature of that membership. I was already sure we would be offering membership. But how the planet would fit into the Empire wasn't clear.
We expected to be here for a number of years before making any offers at all. These things should not be rushed.
And thus, we were here, learning the language, learning the customs, and learning the power structures. While the planet may consist of isolated city-states, wherever humanity goes, there is always a power structure. While we did all that, I couldn't help but also look for opportunities for trade. If I were to invite Talmon into The Empire, I wouldn't want them to be at a complete economic disadvantage.
So far, I had found little that was worth interstellar transportation.
The power structure of Sudden was simple. There was a man named Baardorid. His title was Vendart, a sort of clan chieftain, although the Talmonese had both men and women as Vendart. He had a wife, Valtine, and three children. His eldest daughter wa
s Chaladine. Second was his only son, Rordano. And finally, eleven years younger than twenty-four-year-old Chaladine was Margotain. As the head of our delegation, I had spent time with all of them, but as the locals perceived me closest in age to Chaladine, I'd spent more time with her than anyone else.
We had become friends.
Today, Baardorid was meeting with some sort of diplomatic mission from another city-state, this one inland and far to the north. Chaladine had invited me to the discussions, assuring me I would find them interesting, but so far, I hadn't understood them at all.
Baardorid didn't have a throne room or anything resembling one. Instead, meetings of this nature were held in a large dining hall, the same room used to host other events. He and his people sat on one side of the table, and the people of Indartha on the other side. Valtine sat to Baardorid's left, then Chaladine, then me. On his other side were two of his advisors, and then past them, his two youngest children.
Opposite Baardorid was a woman of perhaps thirty years old. It was difficult for me to judge relative ages. Within the Empire, rejuvenation therapy kept most of us looking young, and we had long stopped judging ages based on appearance. To my eyes, she appeared young. She carried herself with a certain swagger, a cocky confidence, but I detected subtle hints she wasn't as confident as she appeared.
Give her fifty or seventy-five years, and I thought she'd grow into whatever power she would wield.
Her name was Sartine. The -ine ending indicated she was the eldest daughter of her parents.
I studied her as she talked, trying to understand what she was saying. She was a petite woman, with long, black hair, a round face, and dark, active eyes. She spoke with her hands as much her words, her gestures graceful.
She was dressed in the skins of animals, leather as black as her hair, with piping of red here and there. To my eyes, her leather appeared uncultured and crass, although perhaps also a little dashing. But there was a part of me that wanted to remove the leathers and expose the woman underneath.
She was deeply beautiful and would have made for a lovely conquest.
But I wasn't here for conquest. I knew I would be keeping my hands -- and other body parts -- to myself.
Still, it was hard to take my eyes from her.
Sartine was one of seven people on her side of the table, two older men, two older women, and a teenage boy and girl. I hadn't understood the introductions, and it was only because I'd asked Chaladine that I even knew Sartine's name. But from body language, I thought the older people were two couples. And the two teenagers were a mix of nervous and excited. The girl kept offering shy glances at Rordano, and the boy at Chaladine.
I thought it odd to bring two so young on a diplomatic mission, but maybe this was how they learned.
Ten minutes later, I still didn't understand what was being discussed. Finally I leaned to Chaladine and whispered into her ear, "I do not understand this discussion."
She leaned back to me, but she did not whisper. She knew I wouldn't understand if she whispered. "They are discussing a trade of galatzi."
I didn't know that word. "Gal- Um."
"Galatzi," she repeated. The accent was on the last syllable. "It is a trade, a tradition." Those words I knew. The Talmonese were big on their traditions. "She seeks an alliance."
I pulled out my tablet to take notes. I shouldn't have had to use it, but my implant had been acting up for weeks, and I had turned it off. I felt naked without it, but there was nowhere on Talmon to have it serviced.
"Your father doesn't seem to covet this alliance." He didn't, either. He had been speaking too quickly for me to follow, but it was clear he didn't like the terms that Sartine was offering.
"My father desires this alliance," Chaladine said, speaking carefully so I could understand. "Indartha is distant, but they are the only source of quint fur, and they offer us an exclusive trade."
I presumed quint was a type of animal, and I knew the Talmonese word for exclusive because it came up when discussing relationships. The Talmonese talked about a pair of people -- or sometimes even more than two -- as being in an exclusive or non-exclusive relationship. When it had come up over and over, I had asked if that meant they were married, but that wasn't a concept the Talmonese shared. Exclusive relationships lasted only as long as the participants desired. But the same word could be used for other agreements.
"Then what is the problem?"
"My father does not like the rest of Sartine's offer. As the leader of this group, she excludes herself from the trade. Instead, she offers Father the choice of her younger siblings. Or we may send a raiding party to Indartha and take whom we wish, but that is a joke; we do not travel so far north. Only the Indarthans know the routes through their mountains."
I stared full on at Chaladine. "Do they take someone here when they return?"
"Yes. That is the nature of galatzi."
"For marriage?" I used the English word, then shook my head. "Um. For an exclusive arrangement?"
"Permanently exclusive," she confirmed. "Yes. That is also the nature of galatzi. The agreement is only as lasting as both exclusive relationships."
I shouldn't have been shocked, but I was. Arranged marriages were not unknown in the Empire; neither were political marriages. But in my ninety-seven years, I had never visited a planet where either custom was practiced.
"Who do they want to take?"
"Sartine hasn't said," Chaladine replied. "They would leave Sudden, dress in the traditional clothes, and then perform a raid, taking their choice from those not in an exclusive relationship."
"A raid?" I didn't know that word, either.
"Yes. In early times, they would carry swords, but that is barbaric. And so they fight only with their hands, and we fight them only with our hands. But as this is an agreed galatzi, no one would oppose them."
I stared before asking my next question. "What if the person they try to take doesn't wish to go?"
"Then he may fight, but only with bare hands. No weapons."
"That is-" I broke off. I thought it was a horrible tradition. But the Empire was filled with traditions I found alien and frequently horrible. I'd heard of worse, far worse.
I took notes then asked, "So your father is unimpressed with the two children."
"They aren't children. Mordain is fourteen, and her brother, Hilopid is fifteen." On Talmon, a child of fourteen was considered an adult. That was another tradition I found barbaric.
I didn't know how we would resolve that when inviting them into the Empire.
"Father would accept Sartine for Rordano, and then when they take me, it would be an eldest daughter for an eldest daughter. That destroys his plans to make me Vendart, but Rordano would take my place."
"They would take you?"
"It would be the best galatzi they could take, so probably," she replied. "Or father could accept Hilopid for me, but knows how I feel about that. Of course, if they take me, Sartine would probably give me to Hilopid, anyway. But it is such an uneven match. I am an eldest daughter, and he is a third son."
She shook her head. "If I were already in an exclusive relationship, then father could select either Mordain or Hilopid, and they could take Rordano or Margotain, and it would be a good galatzi for both sides. Although Mother isn't ready to let Margotain go. Or they could seek elsewhere in the city, which would be even better for us."
"Elsewhere?"
"They may take anyone who calls father Vendart."
I hadn't been paying attention to the main conversation while I listened to Chaladine explain, taking notes. But it certainly grabbed my attention when Sartine slammed her open hand on the table loudly. She spoke rapidly -- and angrily -- while staring at Chaladine and me.
"I am sorry," Chaladine said immediately. "No offense was intended."
Sartine stood and stalked closer to our end of the table. She glared at me, and could that woman glare! My mother could have taken lessons from her, and my mother's glare was legendary.
>
I leaned into Chaladine. "What is she angry about?"
"We were talking," Chaladine replied.
"Oh." I paused. "Sartine, I am sorry. I did not understand about galatzi. Chaladine was explaining."
Again she spoke rapidly, but this time I could follow her. "How can anyone not know about galatzi?"
"I am still learning your language," I said. "I am sorry." I turned to Baardorid. "I am sorry, Vendart. I should go."
Everyone turned to Sartine, and I realized they had just made it her decision whether she would remain offended, or perhaps ask for additional explanation and apology.
Instead she was staring at my tablet. Finally she pointed. "What. Is. That?"
"It is my computer tablet," I said. I had to use English for the explanation. Talmonese had no words for the sort of technology we used. I turned it to face her. "I was taking notes to help me remember." I used my finger to scroll the display. She wouldn't be able to read the notes, but she would see the words. I knew from past history my tablet would be fascinating to her. She would eventually ask how it worked. I would offer to explain later, as best I could.
Sartine stared before asking, "Where did you get it?" I had to turn to Chaladine, and she repeated Sartine's words more carefully so I could understand.
"I brought it from home," I replied.
She looked back and forth between Chaladine and me then asked another rapid-fire question. Chaladine had to answer, as I didn't understand.
"Cecilia Grace is not from Talmon. She descends from the stars."
Sartine's eyes opened widely, and I realized she had no clue who I was. I had just assumed they would have told her. She stared at me, then at Chaladine, then at me. Then her eyes dropped to the tablet again, staring at it for a good fifteen seconds.
No one said a word.
Then she lifted her eyes back to me and said one word with a great deal of reverence, the clearest word I'd heard from her.
"Earth."
Reception
"No," I said. "Earth is not a pleasant place. I am from a planet called Centos Four."
