C. J. Cherryh - Chanur 1 - The Pride Of Chanur

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Map of Compact Space by David A. Cherry. Cover art by Michael Whelan.

For color prints of Michael Whelan paintings, please contact:

Glass Onion Graphics, P.O. Box 88 Brookfield, CT 06804

DAW Book Collectors No. 464.

There had been something loose about the station dock all morning, skulking in

amongst the gantries and the lines and the canisters which were waiting to be

moved, lurking wherever shadows fell among the rampway accesses of the many

ships at dock at Meetpoint. It was pale, naked, starved-looking in what

fleeting glimpse anyone on The Pride of Chanur had had of it. Evidently no one

had reported it to station authorities, nor did The Pride. Involving oneself

in others' concerns at Meetpoint Station, where several species came to trade

and provision, was ill-advised -- at least until one was personally bothered.

Whatever it was, it was bipedal, brachiate, and quick at making itself unseen.

It had surely gotten away from someone, and likeliest were the kif, who had a

thieving finger in everything, and who were not above kidnapping. Or it might

be some large, bizarre animal: the mahendo'sat were inclined to the keeping

and trade of strange pets, and Station had been displeased with them in that

respect on more than one occasion. So far it had done nothing. Stolen nothing.

No one wanted to get involved in question and answer between original owners

and station authorities; and so far no official statement had come down from

those station authorities and no notice of its loss had been posted by any

ship, which itself argued that a wise person should not ask questions. The

crew reported it only to the captain and chased it, twice, from The Pride's

loading area. Then the crew got to work on necessary duties, having settled

the annoyance to their satisfaction.

It was the last matter on the mind of the noble, the distinguished captain

Pyanfar Chanur, who was setting out down her own rampway for the docks. She

was hani, this captain, splendidly maned and bearded in red-gold, which

reached in silken curls to the middle of her bare, sleek-pelted chest, and she

was dressed as befitted a hani of captain's rank, blousing scarlet breeches

tucked up at her waist with a broad gold belt, with silk cords of every shade

of red and orange wrapping that about, each knotted cord with a pendant jewel

on its dangling end. Gold finished the breeches at her knees. Gold filigree

was her armlet. And a row of fine gold rings and a large pendant pearl

decorated the tufted sweep of her left ear. She strode down her own rampway in

the security of ownership, still high-blooded from a quarrel with her niece --

and yelled and bared claws as the intruder came bearing down on her.

She landed one raking, startled blow which would have held a hani in the

encounter, but the hairless skin tore and it hurtled past her, taller than she

was. It skidded round the bending of the curved ramp tube and bounded right

into the ship, trailing blood all the way and leaving a bloody handprint on

the rampway's white plastic wall.

Pyanfar gaped in outrage and pelted after, claws scrabbling for traction on

the flooring plates. "Hilfy!" she shouted ahead; her niece had been in the

lower corridor. Pyanfar made it into the airlock, hit the bar of the com panel

there and punched all-ship. "Alert! Hilfy! Call the crew in! Something's

gotten aboard. Seal yourself into the nearest compartment and call the crew."

She flung open the locker next the com unit, grubbed a pistol and scrambled in

pursuit of the intruder. No trouble at all tracking it, with the dotted red

trail on the white decking. The track led left at the first cross-corridor,

which was deserted -- the intruder must have gone left again, starting to box

the square round the lift shafts. Pyanfar ran, heard a shout from that

intersecting corridor and scrambled for it: Hilfy! She rounded the corner at a

slide and came up short on a tableau, the intruder's hairless, red-running

back and young Hilfy Chanur holding the corridor beyond with nothing but bared

claws and adolescent bluster.

"Idiot!" Pyanfar spat at Hilfy, and the intruder turned on her of a sudden,

much closer. It brought up short in a staggered crouch, seeing the gun aimed

two-handed at itself. It might have sense not to rush a weapon; might . . .

but that would turn it right back at Hilfy, who stood unarmed behind. Pyanfar

braced to fire on the least movement.

It stood rigidly still in its crouch, panting from its running and its wound.

"Get out of there," Pyanfar said to Hilfy. "Get back." The intruder knew about

hani claws now; and guns; but it might do anything, and Hilfy, an

indistinction in her vision which was tunneled wholly on the intruder, stayed

stubbornly still. "Move!" Pyanfar shouted.

The intruder shouted too, a snarl which almost got it shot; and drew itself

upright and gestured to the center of its chest, twice, defiant. Go on and

shoot, it seemed to invite her.

That intrigued Pyanfar. The intruder was not attractive. It had a bedraggled

gold mane and beard, and its chest fur, almost invisible, narrowed in a line

down its heaving belly to vanish into what was, legitimately, clothing, a rag

almost nonexistent in its tatters and obscured by the dirt which matched the

rest of its hairless hide. Its smell was rank. But a straight carriage and a

wild-eyed invitation to its enemies . . . that deserved a second thought. It

knew guns; it wore at least a token of clothing; it drew its line and meant to

hold its territory. Male, maybe. It had that over-the-brink look in its eyes.

"Who are you?" Pyanfar asked slowly, in several languages one after the other,

including kif. The intruder gave no sign of understanding any of them. "Who?"

she repeated.

It crouched slowly, with a sullen scowl, all the way to the deck, and extended

a blunt-nailed finger and wrote in its own blood which was liberally puddled

about its bare feet. It made a precise row of symbols, ten of them, and a

second row which began with the first symbol prefaced by the second, second

with second, second with third . . . patiently, with increasing concentration

despite the growing tremors of its hand, dipping its finger and writing, mad

fixation on its task.

"What's it doing?" asked Hilfy, who could not see from her side.

"A writing system, probably numerical notation. It's no animal, niece."

The intruder looked up at the exchange, -- stood up, an abrupt move which

proved injudicious after its loss of blood. A glassy, desperate look came into

its eyes, and it sprawled in the puddle and the writing, slipping in its own

blood in trying to get up again.

"Call the crew," Pyanfar said levelly, and this time Hilfy scurried off in

great haste. Pyanfar stood where she was, pistol in hand, until Hilfy was out

of sight down another corridor, then, assured that there was no one to see her

lapse of dignity, she squatted down with the gun in both hands and loosely

between her knees. The intruder still struggled, propped itself up with its

bloody back against the wall, elbow pressed against that deeper starting-point

of the scratches on its side, which was the source of most of the blood. Its

pale blue eyes, for all their glassiness, seemed to have sense in them. It

looked back at her warily, with seeming mad cynicism.

"You speak kif?" Pyanfar asked again. A flicker of those eyes, which might

mean anything. Not a word from it. It started shivering, which was shock

setting in. Sweat had broken out on its naked skin. It never ceased to look at

her.

Running broke into the corridors. Pyanfar stood up quickly, not to be caught

thus engaged with the creature. Hilfy came hurrying back from her direction,

the crew arriving from the other, and Pyanfar stepped aside as they arrived

and the intruder tried to scramble off in retreat. The crew laid hands on it

and jerked it skidding along the bloody puddle. It cried out and tried to

grapple with them, but they had it on its belly in the first rush and a blow

dazed it. "Gently!" Pyanfar yelled at them, but they had it then, got its arms

lashed at its back with one of their belts, tied its ankles together and got

off it, their fur as bloody as the intruder, who continued a feeble movement.

"Do it no more damage," Pyanfar said. "I'll have it clean, thank you, watered,

fed, and healthy, but keep it restrained. Prepare me explanations how it got

face to face with me in the rampway, and if one of you bleats a word of this

outside the ship I'll sell you to the kif."

"Captain," they murmured, down-eared in deference. They were second and third

cousins of hers, two sets of sisters, one set large and one small, and equally

chagrined.

"Out," she said. They snatched the intruder up by the binding of its arms and

prepared to drag it. "Careful!" Pyanfar hissed, reminding them, and they were

gentler in pulling it along.

"You," Pyanfar said then to Hilfy, her brother's daughter, who lowered her

ears and turned her face aside -- short-maned, with an adolescent's beginning

beard, Hilfy Chanur presently and with a air of martyrdom. I'll send you back

shaved if you disobey another order. Understand me?"

Hilfy made a bow facing her, duly contrite. "Aunt," she said, and

straightened, contriving to make it all thoughtfully graceful; -- looked her

straight in the eyes with offended worship.

"Huh," Pyanfar said. Hilfy bowed a second time and padded past as softly as

possible. In common blue breeches like the crew, was Hilfy, but the swagger

was all Chanur, and not quite ludicrous on so young a woman. Pyanfar snorted,

fingered the silk of her beard into order, looked down in sober thought at the

wallowed smear where the Outsider had fallen, obliterating all the writing

from the eyes of the crew.

So, so, so.

Pyanfar postponed her trip to station offices, walked back to the lower-deck

operations center, sat down at the com board amid all the telltales of cargo

status and lines and grapples and the routine operations The Pride carried on

automatically. She keyed in the current messages, sorted through those and

found nothing, then delved into The Pride's recording of all messages received

since docking, and all which had flowed through station communications aimed

at others. She searched first for anything kif-sent, a rapid flicker of lines

on the screen in front of her, all operational chatter in transcription -- a

very great deal of it. Then she queried for notice of anything lost, and after

that, for anything escaped.

Mahendo'sat? she queried then, staying constantly to her own ship's records of

incoming messages, of the sort which flowed constantly in a busy station, and

in no wise sending any inquiry into the station's comp system. She recycled

the whole record last of all, ran it past at eye-blurring speed, looking for

any key word about escapes or warnings of alien presence at Meetpoint.

So indeed. No one was going to say a word on the topic. The owners still did

not want to acknowledge publicly that they had lost this item. The Chanur were

not lack-witted, to announce publicly that they had found it. Or to trust that

the kif or whoever had lost it were not at this moment turning the station

inside out with a surreptitious search.

Pyanfar turned off the machine, flicked her ears so that the rings on the left

one jangled soothingly. She got up and paced the center, thrust her hands into

her belt and thought about alternatives, and possible gains. It would be a

dark day indeed when a Chanur went to the kif to hand back an acquisition. She

could justifiably make a claim on it regarding legal liabilities and the

invasion of a hani ship. Public hazard, it was called. But there were no

outside witnesses to the intrusion, and the kif, almost certainly to blame,

would not yield without a wrangle; which meant court;, and prolonged proximity

to kif, whose gray, wrinkle-hided persons she loathed; whose naturally

dolorous faces she loathed; whose jeremiad of miseries and wrongs done them

was constant and unendurable. A Chanur, in station court with a howling mob of

kif ... and it would go to that extreme if kif came claiming this intruder.

The whole business was unpalatable, in all its ramifications.

Whatever it was and wherever it came from, the creature was educated. That

hinted in turn at other things, at cogent reasons why the kif might indeed be

upset at the loss of this item and why they wished so little publicity in the

search. She punched in intraship. "Hilfy." "Aunt?" Hilfy responded after a

moment. "Find out the intruder's condition." "I'm watching them treat it now.

Aunt, I think it's he, if there's any analogy of form and -- " "Never mind

zoology. How badly is it hurt?" "It's in shock, but it seems stronger than it

was a moment ago. It -- he -- got quiet when we managed to get an anesthetic

on the scratches. I think he figured then we were trying to help, and he quit

fighting. We thought the drug had got him. But he's breathing better now."

"It's probably just waiting its chance. When you get it safely locked up, you

take your turn at dockwork, since you were so eager to have a look outside.

The others will show you what to do. Tell Haral to get herself to lowerdeck

op. Now." "Yes, aunt." Hilfy had no sulking in her tone. The last reprimand

must not have worn off. Pyanfar shut down the contact and listened to station

chatter in the interim, wishing in vain for something to clarify the matter.

Haral showed up on the run, soaking wet, blood-spattered and breathless. She

bowed shortly in the doorway, straightened. She was oldest of the crew, was

Haral, tall, with a dark scar across her broad nose and another across the

belly, but those were from her rash youth. "Clean up," Pyanfar said. "Take

cash and go marketing, cousin. Shop the second-hand markets as if you were on

your own. The item I want may be difficult to locate, but not impossible, I

think, in such a place as Meetpoint. Some books, if you will: a mahendo'sat

lexicon; a mahendo'sat version of their holy writings. The philosopher

Kohboranua or another of that ilk, I'm completely indifferent. And a

mahendo'sat symbol translator, its modules and manuals, from elementary up, as

many levels as you can find . . . above all that item. The rest is all cover.

If questioned -- a client's taken a religious interest."

Haral's, eyes flickered, but she bowed in acceptance of the order and asked

nothing. Pyanfar put her hand deep into her pocket and came up with a motley

assortment of large-denomination coinage, a whole stack of it.

"And four gold rings," Pyanfar added.

"Captain?"

"To remind you all that The Pride minds its own business. Say so when you give

them. It'll salve your feelings, I hope, if we have to miss taking a liberty

here, as well we may. But talk and rouse suspicion about those items, Haral

Araun, and you won't have an ear to wear it on."

Haral grinned and bowed a third time.

"Go," said Pyanfar, and Haral darted out in zealous application.

So. It was a risk, but a minor one. Pyanfar considered matters for a moment,

finally walked outside the op room and down the corridor, took the lift up to

central level, where her own quarters were, out of the stench and the reek of

disinfectant which filled the lower deck.

She closed the door behind her with a sigh, went to the bath and washed her

hands, seeing that there remained no shred of flesh in the undercurve of her

claws -- checked over her fine silk breeches to be sure no spatter of blood

had gotten on them. She applied a dash of cologne to clear the memory from her

nostrils.

Stupidity. She was getting dull as the stsho, to have missed a grip on the

intruder in the first place: old was not a word she preferred to think about.

Slow of mind, woolgathering, that she struck like a youngster on her first

forage. Lazy. That was more like it. She patted her flat belly and decided

that the year-old complacent outletting of her belt had to be taken in again.

She was losing her edge. Her brother Kohan was still fit enough, planet-bound

as he was and not gifted with the time-stretch of jump: he managed. Inter-male

bickering and a couple of sons to throw out of the domicile kept his blood

circulating, and there was usually a trio of mates in the house at any one

time, with offspring to chastise. About time, she thought, that she put The

Pride into home dock at Anuurn for a thorough refitting, and spend a layover

with her own mate Khym, high in the Kahin hills, in the Mahn estates. Get the

smell of the homeworld wind in her nostrils for a few months. Do a little

hunting, run off that extra notch on the belt. Check on her daughter Tahy and

see whether that son of hers was still roving about or whether someone had

finally broken his neck for him. Surely the lad would have had the common

courtesy to send a message through Khym or Kohan if he had settled somewhere;

and above all to her daughter, who was, gods knew, grown and getting soft

hanging about her father's house, among a dozen other daughters, mostly

brotherless. Son Kara should settle himself with some unpropertied wife and

give his sister some gainful employment making him rich -- above all, settle

and take himself out of his father's and his uncle's way. Ambitious, that was

Kara. Let the young rake try to move in on his uncle Kohan and that would be

the last of him. Pyanfar flexed claws at the thought and recalled why all her

shoreleaves were short ones.

But this now, this business with this bit of live contraband which had strayed

aboard, which might be kif-owned . . . the honorable lord Kohan Chanur her

brother was going to have a word to say about his ship's carelessness in

letting such an incident reach their deck. And there was going to be a major

rearrangement in the household if Hilfy got hurt -- brotherless ; Hilfy, who

had gotten to be too much Chanur to go following after a brother if ever her

mother gave her one. Hilfy Chanur par Faha, who wanted the stars more than she

wanted anything; and who clung to her father as the one who could give them to

her. It was Hilfy's lifelong waited chance, this voyage, this apprenticeship

on The Pride. It had torn Kohan's doting soul to part from his favorite; that

was clear in the letter which had come with Hilfy.

Pyanfar shook her head and fretted. Depriving those four rag-eared crew of

hers of a shoreleave in the pursuit of this matter was one thing, but taking

Hilfy home to Anuurn while she sorted out a major quarrel with the kif was

another. It was expensive, curtailing their homeward routing. More, Hilfy's

pride would die a death, if she were the cause of that rerouting, if she were

made to face her sisters in her sudden return to the household; and Pyanfar

confessed herself attached to the imp, who wanted what she had wanted at such

an age, who most likely would come to command a Chanur ship someday, perhaps

even -- gods postpone the hour -- The Pride itself. Pyanfar thought of such a

legacy . . . someday, someday that Kohan passed his prime and she did. Others

in the house of Chanur were jealous of Hilfy, waiting for some chance to use

their jealousy. But Hilfy was the best. The brightest and best, like herself

and like Kohan, and no one so far could prove otherwise. Whatever young male

one day won the Chanur holding from Kohan in his decline had best walk warily

and please Hilfy, or Hilfy might take herself a mate who would tear the ears

off the interloper. That was the kind Hilfy was, loyal to her father and to

the house.

And ruining that spirit or risking her life over that draggled Outsider was

not worth it. Maybe, Pyanfar thought, she should swallow the bitter mouthful

and go dump the creature on the nearest kif ship. She seriously considered it.

Choosing the wrong kif ship might afford some lively amusement: there would be

riot among the kif and consternation on the station. But yielding was still,

at bottom, distasteful.

Gods! so that was how she proposed teaching young Hilfy to handle

difficulties. That was the example she set... yielding up what she had,

because she thought it might be dangerous to hold it.

She was getting soft. She patted her belly again, decided against shoreleave

at voyage's end, another lying-up and another Mahn offspring to muddle things

up. Decided against retreat. She drew in a great breath and put on a grim

smile. Age came and the young grew old, but not too old, the gods grant. This

voyage, young Hilfy Chanur was going to learn to justify that swagger she cut

through the corridors of the ship; so, indeed she was.

There was no leaving the ship with matters aboard still in flux. Pyanfar went

to the small central galley, up the starboard curve from her quarters and the

bridge, stirred about to take a cup of gfi from the dispenser and sat down at

the counter by the oven to enjoy it at leisure, waiting until her crew should

have had ample time to have dealt with the Outsider. She gave them a bit more,

finally tossed the empty cup in the sterilizer and got up and wandered

belowdecks again, where the corridors stank strongly of antiseptic and Tirun

was lounging about, leaning against the wall by the lowerdeck washroom door.

"Well?" Pyanfar asked.

"We put it in there, captain. Easiest to clean, by your leave. Haral left.

Chur and Geran and ker Hilfy are out doing the loading. Thought someone ought

to stay awhile by the door and listen, to be sure the creature's all right."

Pyanfar laid her hand on the switch, looked back at Tirun -- Haral's sister

and as broad and solid, with the scars of youth well-weathered, the gold of

successful voyages winking from her left ear. The two of them together could

handle the Outsider, she reckoned, in any condition. "Does it show any sign of

coming out of its shock?"

"It's quiet; shallow breathing, staring somewhere else -- but aware what's

going on. Scared us a moment; we thought it'd gone into shock with the

medicine, but I think it just quieted down when the pain stopped. We tried

with the way we handled it, to make it understand we didn't want to hurt it.

Maybe it has that figured. We carried it in here and it settled down and lay

still . . . moved when made to move, but not surly, more like it's stopped

thinking, like it's stopped doing anything it doesn't have to do. Worn out,

I'd say."

"Huh." Pyanfar pressed the bar. The dark interior of the washroom smelled of

antiseptic too, the strongest they had. The lights were dimmed. The air was

stiflingly warm and carried an odd scent under the antiseptic reek. Her eyes

missed the creature a moment, searched anxiously and located it in the corner,

a heap of blankets between the shower stall and the laundry . . . asleep or

awake she could not tell with its head tucked down in its forearms. A large

container of water and a plastic dish with a few meat chips and crumbs left

rested beside it on the tiles. Well, again. It was then carnivorous and not so

delicate after all, to have an appetite left. So much for its collapse. "Is it

restrained?"

"It has chain enough to get to the head if it understands what it's for."

Pyanfar stepped back outside and closed the door on it again. "Very likely it

understands. Tirun, it is sapient or I'm blind. Don't assume it can't

manipulate switches. No one is to go in there alone and no one's to carry

firearms near it. Pass that order to the others personally, Hilfy too. --

Especially Hilfy."

"Yes, captain." Tirun's broad face was innocent of opinions. Gods knew what

they were going to do with the creature if they kept it. Tirun did not ask.

Pyanfar strolled off, meditating on the scene behind the washroom door, the

heap of deceptive blankets, the food so healthily consumed, the avowed

collapse ... no lackwit, this creature who had twice tried her ship's security

and on the third attempt, .succeeded in getting through. Why The Pride? she

wondered. Why her ship, out of all the others at dock? Because they were last

in the section, before the bulkhead of the dock seal might force the creature

to have left cover somewhat, and it was the last available choice? Or was

there some other reason?

She walked the corridor to the airlock and the rampway, and out its curving

ribbed length into the chill air of the docks. She looked left as she came

out, and there was Hilfy, canister-loading with Chur and Geran, rolling the

big cargo containers off the stationside dolly and onto the moving belt which

would take the goods into The Pride's holds, paid freight on its way to Urtur

and Kura and Touin and Anuurn itself, stsho cargo, commodities and textiles

and medicines, ordinary stuff. Hilfy paused at the sight of her, panting with

her efforts and already looking close to collapse -- stood up straight with

her hands at her sides and her ears back, belly heaving. It was hard work,

shifting those cans about, especially for the unskilled and unaccustomed. Chur

and Geran worked on, small of stature and wiry, knowing the points of balance

to an exactitude. Pyanfar affected not to notice her niece and walked on with

wide steps and nonchalant, smiling to herself the while. Hilfy had been

mightily indignant, barred from rushing out to station market, to roam about

unescorted, sightseeing on this her first call at Meetpoint, where species

docked which never called at homeworld . . . sights she had missed at Urtur

and Kura, likewise pent aboard ship or held close to The Pride's berth. The

imp had too much enthusiasm for her own good. So she got the look at

Meetpoint's famous docks she had argued to have, now, this very day -- but not

the sightseeing tour of her young imaginings.

Next station-call, Pyanfar thought, next station-call her niece might have

learned enough to let loose unescorted, when the wild-eyed eagerness had worn

off, when she had learned from this incident that there were hazards on

dockside and that a little caution was in order when prowling the friendliest

of ports.

Herself, she took the direct route, not without watching her surroundings.

A call on Meetpoint Station officials was usually a leisurely and pleasant

affair. The stsho, placid and graceful, ran the station offices and bureaus on

this side of the station, where oxygen breathers docked. Methodical to a

fault, the stsho, tedious and full of endless subtle meanings in their pastel

ornament and the tattooings on their pearly hides. They were another hairless

species -- stalk-thin, tri-sexed and hanilike only by the wildest stretch of

the imagination, if eyes, nose, and mouth in biologically convenient order was

similarity. Their manners were bizarre among themselves. But stsho had learned

to suit their methodical plodding and their ceremoniousness to hani taste,

which was to have a soft chair, a ready cup of herbal tea, a plate of exotic

edibles and an individual as pleasant as possible about the forms and the

statistics, who could make it all like a social chat.

This stsho was unfamiliar. Stsho changed officials more readily than they

changed ornament -- either a different individual had come into control of

Meetpoint Station, Pyanfar reckoned, or a stsho she had once known had entered

a New Phase, -- new doings? Pyanfar wondered, at the nudge of a small and

prickly instinct -- new doings? Loose Outsiders and stsho power shuffles? All

changes were suspect when something was out of pocket. If it was the same as

the previous stationmaster, it had changed the pattern of all the elaborate

silver filigree and plumes -- azure and lime now, not azure and mint; and if

it were the case, it was not at all polite to recognize the refurbished

person, even if a hani suspected identity.

The stsho proffered delicacies and tea, bowed, folded up gtst stalklike limbs

-- he, she, or even it, hardly applied with stsho -- and seated gtst-self in

gtst bowlchair, a cushioned indentation in the office floor. The necessary

table rose on a pedestal before it. Pyanfar occupied the facing depression,

lounged on an elbow to reach for the smoked fish the stsho's lesser-status

servant had placed on a similar table at her left. The servant, ornamentless

and no one, sat against the wall, knees tucked higher than gtst head, arms

about bony ankles, waiting usefulness. The stsho official likewise took a

sample of the fish, poured tea, graceful gestures of stsho elegance and

hospitality. Plumed and cosmetically augmented brows nodded delicately over

moonstone eyes as gtst looked up -- white brows shading to lilac and azure;

azure tracings on the domed brow shaded to lime over the hairless skull.

Another stsho, of course, might read the patterns with exactitude, the station

in life, the chosen Mood for this Phase of gtst existence, the affiliations

and modes and thereby, gtst approachability. Non-stsho were forgiven their

trespasses; and stsho in Retiring mode were not likely filling public offices.

Pyanfar made one attempt on the Outsider topic, delicately: "Things have been

quiet hereabouts?"

"Oh, assuredly." The stsho beamed, smiled with narrow mouth and narrow eyes, a

carnivore habit, though the stsho were not aggressive. "Assuredly."

"Also on my world," Pyanfar said, and sipped her tea, an aroma of spices which

delighted all her sinuses. "Herbal. But what?"

The stsho smiled with still more breadth. "Ah. Imported from my world. We

introduce it here, in our offices. Duty free. New cultivation techniques make

it available for export. The first time, you understand. The very first

shipment offered. Very rare, a taste of my very distant world."

"Cost?"

They discussed it. It was outrageous. But the stsho came down, predictably,

particularly when tempted with a case of hani delicacies promised to be carted

up from dockside to the offices. Pyanfar left the necessary interview in high

spirits. Barter was as good to her as breathing.

She took the lift down to dock level, straight down, without going the several

corridors over in lateral which she could have taken. She walked the long way

back toward The Pride's berth, strolled casually along the dockside which

horizoned upward before and behind, unfurling as she moved, offices and

businesses on the one hand and the tall mobile gantries on the other, towers

which aimed their tops toward the distant axis of Meetpoint, so that the most

distant appeared insanely atilt on the curving horizon. Display boards at

periodic intervals gave information of arrivals, departures, and ships in

dock, from what port and bearing what sort of cargo, and she scanned them as

she walked.

A car shot past her on the dock, from behind: globular and sealed, it wove

along avoiding canisters and passers-by and lines with greater speed than an

automated vehicle would use. That was a methane-breather, more than likely,

some official from beyond the dividing line which separated the incompatible

realities of Meetpoint. Tc'a ran that side of the station, sinuous beings and

leathery gold, utterly alien in their multipartite brains -- they traded with

the knnn and the chi, kept generally to themselves and had little to say or to

do with hani or even with the stsho, with whom they shared the building and

operation of Meetpoint. Tc'a had nothing in common with this side of the line,

not even ambitions; and the knnn and the chi were stranger still, even less

participant within the worlds and governments and territories of the Compact.

Pyanfar watched the vehicle kite along, up the horizon of Meetpoint's docks,

and the section seal curtained it from view as it jittered along in zigzag

haste which itself argued a tc'a mind at the controls. There was no trouble

from them ... no way that they could have dealt with the Outsider: their

brains were as unlike as their breathing apparatus. She paused, stared up at

the nearby registry boards with a wrinkling of her nose and a stroking of her

beard, sorting through the improbable and untranslatable methane-breather

names for more familiar registrations -- for potential trouble, and for

possible allies of use in a crisis. There was scant picking among the latter

at this apogee of The Pride's rambling course.

There was one other hani ship in dock, Handur's Voyager. She knew a few of the

Handur family, remotely. They were from Anuurn's other hemisphere, neither

rivals nor close allies, since they shared nothing on Anuurn's surface. There

were a lot of stsho ships, which was to be expected on this verge of stsho

space. A lot of mahendo'sat, through whose territory The Pride had lately

come.

And on the side of trouble, there were four kif, one of which she knew: Kut,

captained by one Ikkkukkt, an aging scoundrel whose style was more to allow

another ship's canisters to edge up against and among his on dockside; and to

bluff down any easily confused owners who might protest. He was only small

trouble, alone. Kif in groups could be different, and she did not know about

the others.

"Hai," she called, passing a mahendo'sat docking area, at a ship called

Mahijiru, where some of that tall, dark-furred kind were minding their own

business, cursing and scratching their heads over some difficulty with a

connection collar, a lock-ring disassembled in order all over the deck among

their waiting canisters. "You fare well this trip, mahe?"

"Ah, captain." The centermost scrambled up and others did the same as this one

stepped toward her, treading carefully among the pieces of the collar. Any

well-dressed hani was captain to a mahendo'sat, who had rather err by

compliment than otherwise. But this one by his gilt teeth was likely the

captain of his own freighter. "You trade?"

"Trade what?"

"What got?"

"Hai, mahe, what need?"

The mahendo'sat grinned, a brilliant golden flash, sharp-edged. No one of

course began trade by admitting to necessity.

"Need a few less kif onstation." Pyanfar answered her own question, and the

mahendo'sat whistled laughter and bobbed agreement.

"True, true," Goldtooth said somewhere between humor and outrage, as if he had

a personal tale to tell. "Whining kif we wish you end of dock, good captain,

honest captain. Kut no good. Hukan more no good; and Lukkur same. But Hinukku

make new kind deal no good. Wait at station, wait no get same you course with

Hinukku, good captain."

"What, armed?"

"Like hani, maybe." Goldtooth grinned when he said it, and Pyanfar laughed,

pretended it a fine joke.

"When do hani ever have weapons?" she asked.

The mahe thought that a fine joke too.

"Trade you two hundredweight silk," Pyanfar offered.

"Station duty take all my profit."

"Ah. Too bad. -- Hard work, that." She scuffed a foot toward the ailing

collar. "I can lend you very good hani tools, fine steel, two very good hani

welders, Faha House make."

"I lend you good quality artwork."

"Artwork!"

"Maybe someday great mahen artist, captain."

"Then come to me; I'll keep my silk."

"Ah, ah, I make you favor with artwork, captain, but no, I ask you take no

chance. I have instead small number very fine pearl like you wear."

"Ah."

"Make you security for lend tools and welders. My man he come by you soon

borrow tools. Show you pearl same time."

"Five pearls."

"We see tools you see two pearls."

"You bring four."

"Fine. You pick best three."

"All four if they're not of the best, my good, my great mahe captain."

"You see," he vowed. "Absolute best. Three."

"Good." She grinned cheerfully, touched hand to hand with the thick-nailed

mahe and strolled off, grinning still for all passersby to see; but the grin

faded when she was past the ring of their canisters and crossing the next

berth.

So. Kif trouble had docked. There were kif and kif, and in that hierarchy of

thieves, there were a few ship captains who tended to serve as ringleaders for

highstakes mischief; and some elect who were very great trouble indeed.

Mahendo'sat translation always had its difficulties, but it sounded

uncomfortably like one of the latter. Stay in dock, the mahendo'sat had

advised; don't chance putting out till it leaves. That was mahendo'sat

strategy. It did not always work. She could keep The Pride at dock and run up

a monstrous bill, and still have no guarantee of a safe course out; or she

could pull out early and hope that the kif would not suspect what they had

aboard -- hope that the kif, at minimum, were waiting for something easier to

chew than a mouthful of hani.

Hilfy. That worry rode her mind. Ten quiet voyages, ten voyages of aching,

bone-weary tranquility . . . and now this one. The docks looked all quiet

ahead, up where The Pride had docked, her people working out by the loading

belt as they should be doing, taking aboard the mail and the freight. Haral

was back, working among them; she was relieved to see that. That was Tirun

outside now, and Hilfy must have gone in: the other two were Geran and Chur,

slight figures next to Haral and Tirun. She found no cause to hurry. Hilfy had

probably had enough by now, retreated inside to guard duty over the Outsider,

gods grant that she stayed outside the door and refrained from meddling.

But the crew caught sight of her as she came, and of a sudden expressions took

on desperate relief and ears pricked up, so that her heart clenched with

foreknowledge of something direly wrong. "Hilfy," she asked first, as Haral

came walking out to meet her: the other three stayed at their loading, all too

busy for those looks of anxiety, playing the part of workers thoroughly

occupied.

"Ker Hilfy's safe inside," Haral said quickly. "Captain, I got the things you

ordered, put them in lowerdeck op, all of it; but there were kif everywhere I

went, captain, when I was off in the market. They were prowling about the

aisles, staring at everyone, buying nothing. I finished my business and walked

on back and they were still prowling about. So I ordered ker Hilfy to go on in

and send Tirun out here. There are kif nosing about here of a sudden."

"Doing what?"

"Look beyond my shoulder, captain."

Pyanfar took a quick look, a shift of her eyes. "Nothing," she said. But

canisters were piled there at the section seal, twenty, thirty of them, each

as tall as a hani and double-stacked, cover enough. She set her hand on

Haral's shoulder, walked her companionably back to the others. "Haral, there's

going to be a small stsho delivery and a mahendo'sat with a three-pearl deal;

both are true . . . watch them both. But no others. There's one other hani

ship docked far around the rim, next the methane docks. I've not spoken with

them. It's Handur's Voyager."

"Small ship."

"And vulnerable. We're going to take The Pride out, with all decent haste. I

think it can only get worse here. Tirun: a small task; get to Voyager. I don't

want to discuss the situation with them over com. Warn them that there's a

ship in dock named Hinukku and the word is out among the mahendo'sat that this

one is uncommonly bad trouble. And then get yourself back here fast -- No,

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CopyrightO1981,1982,byC.J.Cherryh.AllRightsReserved.MapofCompactSpacebyDavidA.Cherry.CoverartbyMichaelWhelan.ForcolorprintsofMichaelWhelanpaintings,pleasecontact:GlassOnionGraphics,P.O.Box88Brookfield,CT06804DAWBookCollectorsNo.464.ITherehadbeensomethinglooseaboutthestationdockallmorning,skulkingina...

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