Balance of Trade (39 page)

"Do we know that they didn't?" he countered.

She said nothing.

"Grigory," Uncle said, talking soft, like maybe Grig needed calming down. "Where, exactly, is Arin's brother?"

"Arin's
son
," Grig snapped, and closed his eyes. "He's 'prenticed to Master Trader Norn ven'Deelin. Jethri's good at the trade—got a real flair for it. Wouldn't surprise me if Master Trader ven'Deelin sets him up as the first trader fully licensed by Terra and by Liad, both. It's sure how I'd work it, given what we're seeing at trade level."

"And where," Uncle continued, "are Arin's notes?"

Grig shrugged. "Jeth's got 'em, if anybody does. Understand, Iza went a little crazy when Arin died, spaced a lot stuff right off. Cris talked her into stowing the rest til she was cooler. That's what went after Jethri—the rest. His by right." He grinned. "Which you can't dispute."

"Of course not." Uncle put his hands flat on the desk and pushed down, though he didn't quite stand up.

"Grigory, it is time for you to return to the bosom of your family. We have need of your talents and your . . . particular. . .  viewpoint."

"No."

Uncle blinked. "I beg your pardon?"

"I said," Grig explained, and not daring to look at Raisy. "No. I'm staying with the
Market
."

"Grig. . . " Raisy began, but he shook his head without looking at her yet, and rose to his full, gangly height.

"Sorry to leave so soon, sir," he said to Uncle, real polite. "But, like I said, I've got business elsewhere." At last he looked at his sister.

"Favor, Raisy."

"You got it," she answered, which he'd known she would.

"Keep that headcase you got working for you away from Seeli. He wants to talk to Paitor, that's your business, I guess. But you oughta know he was asking for duplicating units."

She nodded. "I'll take care of it."

"Good," he said and smiled, warmed, and feeling a little gone in the guts. Uncle allowed deviance, but there was always a price.

"Grigory, if you leave this room, you no longer have any call on us." Uncle's voice was cool, spelling exactly out how much this was gonna cost. Grig nodded.

"I can afford that, sir," he said, his own voice just as cool. "Good-bye, now."

He walked out and neither one stopped him, down the long hall, to where the lift stood, door open, waiting.

"HEALER HALL IS SENDING one of the masters," Miandra said, her voice a little stronger, and her hair neatly combed behind her ears. "I wonder who will arrive first?"

They were sitting in the parlor where Jethri had first met Lady Maarilex, in company with Norn ven'Deelin—and wouldn't he give a can full of canaries to see her walk through the door right now! Jethri had changed his sliced shirt for a whole one, taking a moment to marvel at the pale pink lines down his chest, each of which matched a cut in the ruined shirt. There hadn't been much time to wonder about it, though, and he'd hurried into the fresh shirt, hauled a brush over his hair, which mostly stayed flat, for a wonder, and run downstairs, to this very parlor, to find Miandra ahead of him, seated in the precise center of the white couch, one hand a fist around her ruby, and her face outright gloomy.

"Maybe," Jethri offered, deliberately trying to lighten her gloom, "the Healer and the Scout will arrive together and will entertain each other, leaving us free for other endeavors."

She didn't smile. He thought she clenched the ruby tighter.

The silence grew. Jethri shifted in his chair, looked around the room, and back at Miandra. She was staring, with great intensity, at a spot he calculated to be some ten feet beneath the vermillion floorboards.

Jethri cleared his throat. "An . . . unusual. . .  thing," he said. "When I took my shirt off, there were these pink stripes—like brand-new scars—down my chest. I had expected, because there was blood, you know, to have found fresh cuts."

Miandra looked up. "Flinx was frightened," she said, as she had in the winery. "He is a very strong cat, and I am afraid he clawed you rather badly. The adrenaline masked the pain, but you would have felt it soon enough, so Meicha Healed you."

Sitting in the chair, he heard the words, blinked, listened to them again in his mind's ear, and then repeated the phrase, with the inflection that signaled a query: "Meicha Healed me?"

Miandra's mouth tightened. "Indeed. It is what we train to be—Healers. Meicha is—more skilled than I."

"Oh." He considered that, running his hand absently down his chest. No pain. He looked, tucking his chin in order to stare down his own front. No blood on the fresh shirt. Beyond dispute, he was patched, but—

"She—you—can make fresh wounds into new scars? In moments? How?"

Miandra moved her shoulders. "It is a talent, much like a talent for music, perhaps—or trade. For those of us with the particular talent to Heal, the . . . physics. . .  and the methods are obvious. Intuitive." She smiled, very faintly. "Control is what must be taught, and . . . efficient use of one's energy."

Right. He had the idea she was simplifying things in order to save his feelings and almost laughed, considering what he carried around in his pocket.

"What else do Healers do?" he asked, to keep her talking, mostly. Talking, she seemed less gloom-filled, more like her usual self.

"Heal afflictions of the spirit. That is why a Healer is most often called. Someone is—sick at heart, or frightened. Perhaps they see things which are not there, or refuse to see those things which are directly before them. Those sorts of things. Physical Healing—there are not many Healers who can do that." Her face lightened a little—with pride, he thought. "Meicha will be a Healer to behold."

Well, that wasn't too unlikely, he allowed, given Meicha. But, wait—

"So it was—you or Meicha—who calmed me down that first day, when the curtains were open and I had the widespaces panic?"

"Yes," she said. "I calmed you and Meicha closed the curtains. It was not very difficult—you project a very solid . . . pattern, we call it. You are extremely easy to work with."

He didn't know as he particularly liked the sound of that, but before he could pursue the matter the door to the parlor opened and Lady Maarilex entered, leaning heavily on her cane and followed by a ginger-haired man whose thinness was accentuated by his black leather clothing.

"Scout Lieutenant Fel Dyn yo'Shomin," said the old woman. "Here is Jethri Gobelyn, foster son of ven'Deelin. Jethri, if you please, make your bow to the Lieutenant."

Cautiously, Jethri rose, and Lieutenant yo'Shomin's ginger-colored eyes followed his progress. There was something in the man's stance that irritated Jethri straight off. A little bit of a thrust in the shoulder, maybe, or an attitude with respect to the hips—a subtle something that said Scout Lieutenant yo'Shomin was the better of most men alive, and infinitely superior to grimy Terran 'prentice traders, no matter whose foster son they claimed to be.

That being his reading of the man, in between the time it took to start to rise and reach his full height, he made short shrift of the bow—crisp and brief, it was, and it could be that it would have given Master tel'Ondor pleasure. Certainly, its recipient took the point, and his sharp face got even sharper, the narrow mouth thinning 'til the lips all but disappeared.

The return bow was hardly more than a heavyish tip of the head, which was arrogant, but, then, Jethri thought, wasn't that what he had expected?

"It has been reported that you have in your possession a piece of forbidden technology," the lieutenant said, not even trying to sound polite. "You will surrender it at once."

"No." It had been his intention to hand the device over to the Scout. It was possible, after all, that the thing
had
somehow called the big wind, and if that was so, then it was better off in the keeping of folks who knew its treacheries. Too bad for him, the Scout had shown him reason to doubt. He'd rather take his own chances with the device than meekly hand it over to this . . . incompetent.

Jethri crossed his arms over his chest like Uncle Paitor did to show there was no joking going on, and added an out-and-out frown, for good measure.

The ginger-haired Scout drew himself up as tall as he could and delivered a respectable glare.

"The Scouts have jurisdiction in this. You will relinquish the dangerous device to me immediately."

Jethri kept the frown in place. "Prove it," he said.

The ginger eyebrows pulled together. "What?"

"Prove that the device is dangerous," Jethri said.

The Scout stared.

"Well," Lady Maarilex said, still leaning on her cane across next to the door. "I see that this may be amusing, after all. Miandra, child, help me to the chair, of your goodness. If you please, gentlemen—a moment."

"Yes, Aunt Stafeli." Miandra leapt up and moved to the old lady's side, solicitously guiding her the first of the blue chairs, and seeing her seated.

"Yes—ah. A pillow for my back, child—my thanks." Lady Maarilex leaned back in the chair and put her cane by. Miandra took a step toward the couch—"Bide," Lady Maarilex murmured, and Miandra drifted back to stand at the side of the chair, hands folded demurely, her pendant—Jethri blinked. There was something odd about her pendant, like it was—

"Now," said Lady Maarilex, "the play may continue. The line is yours, Lieutenant. You have been challenged to prove that the device is dangerous. How will you answer?"

For a heartbeat, the Scout said nothing, then he bowed, very slightly, to the old woman in the chair, and glared up into Jethri's face.

"The device described by Lord Ren Lar Maarilex as being in the possession of the Terran Jethri Gobelyn, is unquestionably of the forbidden technology. The form and appearance of such things are well known to the Scouts, and, indeed, to Lord Maarilex, who has attended several seminars offered by the Scouts on the subject of the Old War and its leavings."

"Adequate," commented Lady Maarilex, "but will it compel your opponent?"

Jethri shrugged. "I admit that the device is old technology," he told Lieutenant yo'Shomin. "You, sir, stated that it is
dangerous
, an assertion you have not yet proved."

The Scout smiled. "It called the wind-twist, did it not? I think we may all agree that wind-twists are dangerous."

"Undoubtedly, wind-twists are dangerous," Jethri said. "But you merely put yourself in the position of needing to prove that the device created the wind-twist—and I do not believe you can do that, sir."

"No?" The Scout's smiled widened. "The weather charts describe a most unusual wind pattern, spontaneously forming from conditions antithetical to those required to birth a wind-twist—and yet a wind-twist visited the Maarilex vineyard, a very short time after you were seen experimenting with the forbidden technology."

"I was the one," Miandra said, quietly, from the side of the chair, "who touched the icon for 'wind-twist'."

"And yet," Jethri countered, keeping his eyes on the Scout's face, "wind-twists do sometimes arrive out of season. I wonder if the same weather pattern anomaly was present on those past occasions, as well."

"Well played!" Lady Maarilex applauded from the blue chair. "Bravo!"

The Scout glowered. "Certainly, they would be," he snapped. "Out of season wind-twists must obey the same rule that forms all wind-twists."

"Then you agree," Jethri pursued, "that, unless it was proven in the case of all out-of-season wind-twists that they were every one created by grubby Terrans playing with old technology, it is as least just as likely—if not more likely—that the device which I own, and which was given me by a kinsman, is a
predictor
, rather than an agent to form weather."

Not bad, he congratulated himself, though, truth told, he didn't quite buy in to his own argument. . . 

"This is a waste of my time," the Scout snarled. "You may well have possession of a device that cures blindness, restores lost youth, and everything else that is wholly beneficial—and
still
it would be forfeit! Forbidden technology is
forbidden
, in all its manifestations."

So much for that
, Jethri thought.
You didn't really think this was gonna work, did you kid?

Truth told, he hadn't. On the other hand, it was a poor trader who admitted defeat so easily. What was it Uncle Paitor had said? About keeping your opposite in a trade uncertain on his feet, to your best profit?

Jethri inclined his head and changed the ground.

"I am a Terran citizen," he said.

"Ah," Lady Maarilex murmured.

"As anyone can see," the Scout replied, nastily. "However, the point is unimportant. You are currently in Liaden space and are subject to Liaden law and regulations."

"Hah!" said Lady Maarilex.

Jethri raised a hand. "I am a Terran citizen and the device you wish to confiscate is a gift from a kinsman. Thus far, I have only your assertion that the confiscation of old technology falls into the duty of the Scouts. I will see the regulation in question before I relinquish what is mine." He lowered his hand. "Nor will I relinquish it to you, sir."

"You. . . " the lieutenant breathed and Jethri could see him tally up the insult and store it away for later Balancing. Much luck to him.

"I will relinquish the device—if it is proved that I must relinquish it at all—to Scout Captain Jan Rek ter'Astin."

There was a long moment of silence, strongly tinged with disbelief.

"Scout Captain ter'Astin is a field Scout," the lieutenant said, with a slight edge of distaste on the word
field
. "It will take some time to locate him, during which time the device will remain a danger to us all."

"Scout Captain ter'Astin was seen as soon as Day sixty-six at Kailipso Station, and I am persuaded that you will find him there still, for he had just recently been transferred," Jethri countered.

"Send for him," Miandra said, sharp and unexpected. "Jethri will swear not to use the device until the captain comes to claim it. And it will be better to give it over into the hands of a field Scout than a man who prefers the comforts of the regulations and his own bed—and who cares not to associate with
beastly Terrans
."