The Pride of Chanur

Six hours; nine; twelve; thirteen. The day passed in meals-at-station, in checks and counterchecks; in enforced rest and secure-for-jump procedures and most of all in monitoring scan and com. Pyanfar reached the stage of pacing and fretting by the twelfth hour, fed and napped beyond endurance—wore off claw-tips on the flooring and disguised the anxiety when any of the crew came near on errands.

  But Hilfy managed not to come. Stayed below, in what frame of mind or what understanding Pyanfar could not find a way to ask.

  “Courier’s here.” Chur’s voice cracked out of the silence on the bridge, com from lowerdeck. “Asking the tape, captain.”

  “Ask the courier,” Pyanfar said, “the finish time on the repair.”

  A delay.

  “The courier says within the hour, captain.”

  “Understood.” Pyanfar caught her breath, looked left where she had laid the tape she had prepared, reached and pocketed the cassette and headed out for the lift, in such a fever that it was not till she had started the lift downward that she had thought again what it was she went down to trade: away from this place was all the thought; and the tape was a means to get free; and the shedding of the whole ugly necessity something she was only too glad to have done, to get The Pride free of mahendo’sat and loose and on her way.

  But Hilfy was down there. That recollection hit her. The lift stopped, the door opened, and she hesitated half a heartbeat in walking out, sucked up a breath she wanted all too much to spend on the mahe for the delay, and strode out quite bereft of the breath and the anger she wanted to loose.

  Tully. Ye gods, Tully was in ops too, off the corridor where any visitor to the ship not confined to the airlock would be brought as a matter of course.

  She rounded the corner and found a gathering indeed—a dignified-looking mahe in a jeweled collar and kilt; a mahe attendant; Haral, Tirun and Hilfy. She walked into the group suddenly conscious of her own informal attire, scowled and drew herself up to all her stature—none too tall in mahendo’sat reckoning.

  “Bad mess,” the ranking mahe spat at her. “Big trouble you cause, hani. All same we fix ship.”

  The Voice of the stationmaster, primed with accusations and bluster. The Voice looked her up and down, with grand hauteur. Jeweled and perfumed. Pyanfar flexed her claws, pointedly and with grander coolness turned her shoulder and looked toward her own. “Tully. Where’s Tully? Is he still in op?”

  “You endanger the station,” the Voice railed on her dutifully. “Big trouble with tc’a; knnn bastard kidnap and extortion. You want take with you the eva-pod the knnn bring for trade for good tc’a citizen, hah? Got your name on it, hani Pride of Chanur, clear letters.”

  “Tully! Get your rotted self out here. Now!”

  “They don’t come into station now, the knnn, no, make navigation hazard all this system. All disturb. Mining stop. Trade stop. All business stand dead still. You use knnn signal, a? Upset the knnn; take kif property, upset the kif; get tc’a kidnap, tc’a upset; get fight stsho station, stsho make charge; hani don’t speak to you—what for we deal with you, hani, a?”

  Tully came out of ops, Chur attending him. He had on his new stsho-made shirt, white silk and blue borders—looked immaculately civilized and no little upset in the shouting. “The papers, Tully,” Pyanfar. said. “Show them to this kind mahe.”

  He fished in his pocket for the folder, pale eyes anxious.

  “I got no need cursed papers,” the Voice snapped. Tully had them all the same, held them open in front of the mahe, who waved them aside.

  “You issued them,” Pyanfar said. “Property of the kif. Property of the kif, you say. You look at this fine, this honest, this documented member of an intelligent and civilized space-faring species and you talk about him with words like property of the kif? I call down shame on you; I ask you explain to him, you, in your own words, explain this property.”

  The Voice flattened her ears, looked aside at her attendant, who proffered a scent bottle. In elaborate indirection the Voice unstopped it and inhaled, recollecting herself in retreat. Her face when next she looked down at them was tolerably mild.

  “The tapes,” the Voice said. “The tapes you make deal cover some damage.”

  “All the damages. No fines. No charges. No complaints.”

  “Starchaser rescue.”

  “A separate matter. Chanur and Faha together will stand good for it when we reach home. As for the captain of the rescue ship, he has my guarantee, which is worth more than his losses. It’s settled.”

  The Voice considered a moment, nodded. “The tape,” she said, holding out her hand. “This give, repair finish. Give you safe escort. Fair deal, Chanur.”

  Pyanfar took it from her pocket, an uncommon warmth about her ears—looked aside at Tully. She thrust it at him. “You give it. Yours.”

  Hilfy opened her mouth to say something, and shut it. Tully looked down at the cassette, looked up at the Voice and hesitantly handed the tape toward her. “Friend,” he said in the hani tongue. “Friend to mahe.”

  The dark-furred hand closed on the cassette. The Voice laid back her ears and pursed her mouth in thoughtful consideration. Tully still had his hand out—his own kind of gesture, who was always touching; kept it out. Slowly the mahe reached out, alien protocol being her calling, and gamely suffered Tully to clasp her hand, took it back without visible flinching. . . but with a subdued quiet unlike herself. She bowed her head that slightest degree of courtesy. “I carry your word,” she said.

  And with a scowl and a glance at Pyanfar: “Undock one hour, firm. Kirdu Station give you all possible help. Urge you give us location of this good fellow homeworld—danger to lose you, him, all, this trip.”

  “Beyond the kif is the location we presently suspect. Haven’t had the time to learn, honorable.”

  “Stupid,” the Voice said with her professional license.

  “Our unfortunate friend was dragged through miserable circumstances with the kif; hurt, not stupid—too wise to talk without understanding. Now there’s too little time. You help us get out of here and we’ll settle the kif sooner or later.”

  “This hakkikt. . . . Akukkakk. We know this one. Bad trouble, Chanur captain.”

  “What do you know?” Pyanfar asked, suddenly and not for the first time suspicious of every mahe at Kirdu. “What do you know about this kif?”

  “You undock one hour. Skimmers go now. You make good quick voyage, Chanur captain.”

  “What do you know about the kif?”

  “Good voyage,” the Voice pronounced, and bowed once and generally, collected her attendant and walked for the airlock.

  “Hai,” Pyanfar said in vexation, and with a wave of her hand sent Haral striding after the Voice and her companion. She looked about at Hilfy, whose ears were somewhat down; and at Tirun and Chur and Tully. Tully looked disquieted. “Good,” Pyanfar said to him, clapping him on the arm. “Good touch, that ‘friend.’ You laid the burden on her, you know that? That’s the Voice that speaks to and for the Personage himself, the stationmaster of Kirdu; and by the gods you did it, my clever, my mannerly Outsider, you threw that one right in the stationmaster’s lap.”

  Tully glanced down, made a small shrug, no less troubled-looking. She was not wearing the translator plug. “An hour, hear?” she said to the others, to Tirun and Hilfy and Chur—and Geran, who would be keeping watch in the ops room with strangers running in and out of the ship: no way it was unattended. “An hour and we’re underway, out of here. Home.”

  “How are we doing it?” Geran called from out of the room. “Stringing the jumps like before?”

  “Close as we can cut it,” Pyanfar said, and looked left as movement caught her eye, Haral’s return from the lock, as far as the beginning of the corridor.

  “Seal us up, captain?” Haral shouted down the corridor.

  “Seal us up,” Pyanfar confirmed, and stopped in mid-wave as a tall dark figure appeared in the corridor behind Haral. “Ware!”

  Mahendo’sa
t. Haral had already spun about, and the lanky, dark-furred mahe walked on in as if he belonged, flashing a gilt-edged grin.

  “Ismehanan—” Pyanfar shouted. “—Goldtooth, gods rot you, slinking into my corridors without a by your leave—who let you in?”

  The grin in no wise diminished. The mahe gave a sweeping bow and straightened as she strode up to him. “Got sudden business, Chanur, maybe same you course.”

  “Whose business?”

  “Maybe same you business.”

  She swelled up with a breath and looked up at him, hands in the back of her waistband. “Maybe you talk straight, captain. Once.”

  “Where you go?”

  “Maybe I should broadcast it on the dock. For the kif.”

  “Home, maybe? Ajir route?”

  “Guess as you like.”

  “Got Mahijiru weapons first rate; friend mine make port today, also got number-one rig. Wait over, Chanur.”

  “Bastard!”

  He stepped back, held a hand up, blunt-nailed; hers, lifted, was not. He grinned with the fending gesture. “Necessity, time mahe shed cargo.”

  “You egg-sucking liars. Where I’m going has nothing to do with you; hani business, you hear that? Private business. You want a quarrel with the kif you go find your own.”

  “Go home, do you?”

  “Private business, I’m telling you.”

  “Warn you,” Goldtooth said. “Once, Maybe now go make deal hani port; lots trade. You talk for your good friend there, yes?”

  “Goldtooth, what game are you playing?”

  He grinned and turned on his heel, walked off toward the lock, where Haral stood in scowling indignation.

  “Goldtooth!”

  He paused to wave. “Mahijiru you escort, captain. You got number one best.”

  “Rot your hide, I’m not playing decoy in some mahen game with the kif!”

  He was gone while the echoes were still ringing. Haral, lacking orders, looked back at her, and Pyanfar slung her arms to her sides, not reckoning on giving any. It was the mahe’s terms and there was nothing they could do to stop him from following. “Seal that lock,” she said. “Gods know what else might get in.” Haral went on the run. Pyanfar looked about at the others, at Tully, and Chur and Hilfy and Tirun; and Geran, who had stepped out of ops.

  “Mahijiru’s on,” Geran said. “Someone’s just hooked up a shielded line and we’re getting transmission. They claim they’ve got orders and they’re asking data.”

  “We’re going home,” Pyanfar said shortly. “Home, by the gods. They’ve cost us time. If Stasteburana’s got notions of using us, rot him, two can play that game. I’ll give them our course; I’ll give them a leadin inside the. Anuurn perimeter.”

  “Chanur—” Tirun objected quietly.

  “More than Chanur’s got a stake in this. Maybe Anuurn needs to see that. We’ve got ourselves trouble. Widespread trouble. We don’t know how far it stretches. There ought to be hani here, do you mark that? Lots of hani ships coming and going here, not just Tahar. Here we are at one of the prime stops on our rivals’ route. . . and no hani ships but that one. Homebound. I’ll lay you odds, cousins, they’ve been staying home when they’ve come to port. That’s what’s vacated the track we’ve been on. Starchaser knew; word’s been passing, at every port, every contact.”

  “Aye,” Chur murmured. “Aye. Gods. Six months they could have had at this—”

  “I’m going to the bridge. Bridge crew this passage—Haral, Geran, Chur. The rest of you take ops station; and get Tully his sedative, now, before someone forgets.”

  “Aunt!” Hilfy called after her. Pyanfar stopped and turned. “Captain,” Hilfy said in a quieter voice.

  “Question?” Pyanfar asked, scowling. Hilfy’s chin went up. “No, captain,” Hilfy said quite steadily. Pyanfar nodded, with a small tightening of the mouth, looked satisfaction into Hilfy’s clear eyes, then turned again and strode off to the lift.

  Down the corridor, the lock boomed shut. The Pride had begun her separation.

  Chapter 10

  “Getting pickup on the companion,” Chur said, snugged in com station. “They swear it’s a secure line.”

  “Huh.” Pyanfar finished up the checks and reached for the contact flashing on her com module. “Chanur here.”

  “Introduce you,” Goldtooth’s voice came back to her. “Captain Pyanfar Chanur, got link to Aja Jin. Captain Nomesteturjai.”

  “Chanur,” a voice rumbled back. “Name Jik, here.”

  “Number one fellow, Jik,” Goldtooth said. “Honest same you, Pyanfar Chanur.”

  “Honest like stall me off; like delay me. Chanur’s fighting for its life, you rag-eared bastard, does that get through your head? Challenge; and I’m not there. In your spying about, do you know what that means?”

  “Ah,” Goldtooth said. “Know this trouble. Yes.”

  Pyanfar said nothing, forced the claws back in.

  “Know where this Akkukkak too,” Goldtooth said. “Interested, hani captain?”

  “After I’ve settled my own business.”

  “Same place.”

  “Anuurn?”

  “Keep you alive, hani. We make slow maybe, but you make deal we want. More big than pearls and welders, a, hani?”

  “You follow, rot you.” She keyed through the course and the graph on comp. “There’s the way.”

  A mahen hiss came back, throaty and rueful. “You steer by luck, hani? You crazy mad, that course?”

  “Do it all the time, mahe. Scare you?”

  “Hani joke, a?”

  “Got two kif docked down there. We go, they’ll go. You got that patrol alerted?”

  “Got,” came that second voice.

  “Ha,” Pyanfar muttered. “You got your data; got all you want. Enough. We’re getting out of here.”

  “A.”

  Assent. Pyanfar flung a glance toward Haral, across the separating console, and the contact went out. Chur flicked signals to the dock crew. “Got us prioritied out,” Chur reported. “No problem.” The lines were coming loose. Telltales began to flash, wanting ports sealed. Haral put the seals in function, straight down the sequence. Screens in front of number one post livened, Geran routing through the station scan image. The airlock grapple clanged into unlock, and the last of the seal-ports was firm. “Moving out,” Pyanfar warned over allship, and cleared The Pride’s own grapples, her grip on station independent of the station’s grip on her: those boomed into the housing, and undocking jets eased them clear.

  It was a smooth parting, an easy push clear and a nosing toward an untrafficked nadir as g started up, a whine of the rotational engines. Comp flashed them their lane, and scan showed Mahijiru and Aja Jin moving down below the station rim off portside. The Pride gathered momentum, a solid g and a half now, outbound.

  “Kif are breaking free,” Chur said, com monitor. “Station advises.”

  “No scan confirmation,” Geran said.

  Pyanfar was already reaching for the shielded weapons switch, uncapped it and flicked it on: a ripple of lights advised the gunports were clearing. “Stay on that,” she told Haral without taking her eyes off her own business. “No comp synch, not with the mahe in the way. Can’t be taking one of them by mistake.”

  “Hope they’re as considerate,” Haral muttered.

  “Huh.”

  “Kif are moving out,” Geran said. “Number two screen.”

  “Where’s our escort?” Pyanfar wondered glumly. “—Op deck, stay braced. Listen in and take your cues.”

  “Escort moving,” Chur said. “They’re on intercept; station’s got them scan-blanked.”

  “Understood.” She darted a look at station-sent scan, on which they themselves showed as an oversized wedge, massed blip of ships in synch. Geran sent another image. G continued, dragging at the gut, straining her arm back against the elbow brace. The kif were not gaining, were maintaining a sedate acceleration in their wake.

  Goldtooth and this strang
er Jik: escort. She did not, she admitted to herself, understand the mahen order of things, no more than outsiders understood the stsho. Trading with them was one thing. Figuring out the limits of a mahe like Stasteburana was another. Goldtooth and this mahe friend of his, this ship which had come kiting into system in the hour of Tahar’s exit—merchanters, maybe; but what she saw of Mahijiru and Aja Jin on vid was ominously lean, ominously trim with their cargo holds stripped off; a lot of space given to the power assembly on those two, a profligate lot of jump capacity masked by those missing holds, odd-shaped cores swelling in such fashion that they would cut into any reasonable geometry of tanks which had been strapped on. Vanes with strange dark interstices, like folding joints, vanes larger than ships of their mass ought to carry. It was a curious thing, that ships never saw each other; that they nosed up to station and stayed invisible behind station walls; that they existed as blips and dots and figures in comp, moving too fast for vid to pick up. Only now that they were in synch, a package moving at the same velocity and in sight of each other—

  “Runner ships,” Pyanfar muttered to Haral. “Look at our escort, cousin.”

  “Got that,” Haral said quietly. “Got that, captain.”

  Something new among the mahendo’sat. Something which had to have been very quiet for a long time. Ships like the kif runners. Hunter ships. Her mustache-hairs drew taut as if her nose had picked up something. Gods: Mahijiru, out prowling about Meetpoint, out on the fringes of stsho space—

  Hunting rumors? A crew lounging on the dock, loud and visible with repair they could have done inside as well. Two sets of hunters on the docks besides the kif themselves, and they had come sniffing round each other, each so cleverly assaying the other, she and the mahe—

  “That goldtoothed bastard knew something,” Pyanfar said. “From the very start he knew. Knew this Akukkakk; knew those kif ships; knew what was stirring out here.”

  Haral shot her a disquieted look.

  “Knnn,” Geran said suddenly; and vid went off and another image came in, sectorized on the mass of knnn ships, which were no longer stationary.

  “Gods,” Chur muttered, “here we go.”