Melissa Scott - Shadow Man

“Do you know anything about a tech named Starli?” he asked, and saw Reiss’s shoulders slump fractionally. “She’s a Massingberd, I’m told.”

“Yeah, I know her.” In spite of himself, Reiss sounded surprised, and Tatian hoped whatever trouble he was in wouldn’t come home to the company.

“Is she any good? Good enough to work on my implants, I mean.” Tatian touched his wrist. He had been complaining about the bad connection for a month now.

Reiss tilted his head to one side, an indigene’s gesture. “Starli’s very good, but she is local. She’s not licensed to work on the full suite, just on the stuff the kittereen drivers carry.”

“Would she work on mine?” Tatian asked. They all knew, and Reiss better than most, as involved as he was in the jet-car races, how expensive it could be to get the necessary certifications. A lot of indigene techs just didn’t bother to get the higher-level, more costly papers, but still had the necessary skills to handle the implants. The trick was finding the ones who were genuinely competent.

“She might,” Reiss said. “She doesn’t have a lot of use for off-worlders. But if she agreed, she’d do a good job. Where’d you hear about her, anyway?”

“I ran into someone at the courthouse,” Tatian answered. “Literally. We ended up talking, and I mentioned I needed some work done. And 3e mentioned Starli.”

“Did you get a name? It might be somebody I know.”

“Warreven. Ȝe’s a Stiller.”

Reiss grinned. “I know Raven. He’s a big kittereen fan—I was surprised I didn’t see him up at Irenfot, but I guess if he was in court, that explains it.”

“What’s 3e do?” Tatian asked. He still hadn’t gotten used to Reiss’s habit of translating the indigenes’ two genders into normal speech.

“He—sorry, 3e’s an Important Man.” Reiss used the franca words, switched back to creole. “Ȝe and a couple of 3er cousins, they’re advocates. They specialize in trade cases, defending prostitutes, marijaks , you know. Lately, I heard they were taking on a couple of labor brokers for fraudulent hiring.”

“That’s going to win 3im friends,” Tatian said. The labor brokers were under Temelathe’s direct protection—were licensed by him personally—and were one of the more lucrative parts of the Most Important Man’s private empire. Temelathe’s power might technically be based on his position as Speaker of the Watch Council, and indirectly on his status as the direct heir of Captain Stane, but the money that supported all that came from off-world sources.

“Oh, yeah,” Reiss said, “and that’s not the best of it, either. You know who one of 3er partners is?”

Tatian shook his head.

“Haliday Stiller.”

Tatian shook his head again. The name was vaguely familiar, but he couldn’t place it.

“You remember,” Reiss said, with a hint of impatience. “Ȝe took the clan to court, all the way to the Watch Council, over whether 3e could register as a herm.”

“That was before my time,” Tatian said. But he did remember the talk; the case had been only a few years old when he first came to Hara. Haliday Stiller had demanded the right to call 3imself a herm on legal documents, and the Watch Council, officially the highest indigenous authority, and Temelathe’s puppet, had not only refused to allow it, but, for good measure, had reassigned Haliday’s legal gender, decreeing that, since 3e wouldn’t choose, the proverbial “reasonable man” would see 3im as a woman. But the person he had seen with Warreven had definitely been male—and the name was Malemayn, he remembered suddenly. “Would Starli do the work if you introduced me? I need to get it done soon.”

“I can ask,” Reiss said, accepting the change of subject, and looked down at his hands. He was wired, too, had gotten his suit as part of a corporate scholarship deal. “I have to go over to Kittree Row tomorrow morning anyway, I’ll ask then. You free in the afternoon?”

“I can make time,” Tatian said. “Thanks, Reiss.” “No problem,” the younger man said, and rose easily. Tatian watched him go, and turned his attention back to the files on his desktop, trying to ignore the faint static buzz in the bones of his hand. Tomorrow, he told himself, tomorrow, he would find out whether or not he’d have to go to the port for the repairs.

Seraaliste , seraalistes : (Hara) the man or woman within each clan who is primarily responsible for negotiating with the off-world buyers; he or she is also responsible for mediating among his or her clan’s mesnies . This is an elective office.

They took their time walking back from lunch, savoring the heat and the fitful land breeze. The streets had been dry when they left the bar; by the time they reached the Harbor Market, the last shreds of cloud had vanished inland, and thin white parasols blossomed like flowers in the spaces between the semi-permanent stalls. Warreven paused at the edge of the embankment, leaned on the hot stones of the wall to look along the length of the massive quay that divided the main harbor from the smaller Sail Harbor. This close to Midsummer, all the berths were filled with slab-sided, broad-beamed coasters, and the quay swarmed with dockers and their machines, unloading the first of the summer’s harvest. From the embankment, it was impossible to see even the nearest ship’s cargo, but Warreven could fill in the details from almost thirty summers’ experience: there would be crates of broadleaf kelp, the fronds packed damp, and bales of cut grass gathered from the shallows along the Stiller Peninsula. There would be smaller boxes of wide-web nodes, crumb-coral, and false-kelp fronds and bladders and even, if someone was very lucky, a few of the deep-growing false-kelp’s knotty holdfasts. From the Stanelands to the north, there would be ships loaded down with raw sweetsap and thornberry, branch and fruit alike, and baskets of creeping star. And it was all going to feed the off-world economy. He smiled without humor and shaded his eyes to pick out the off-worlders’ runabouts drawn up in the reserved slots behind the factors’ sheds, company marks bright on doors and engine cowlings. The off-worlders were easy to pick out in the crowd of dockers and sailors, too: pale figures, draped in white or tan against the heat and sun, ghostly against the bright colors around them.

A horn sounded, and the day-ferry appeared beyond the tip of the quay, shouldering its way through the crowd of smaller boats to its anchorage below the Ferryhead. A wedding band was playing on the top deck, the pulse of the drums carrying across the water, and Warreven could just pick out the bride and her attendants, a knot of stark white silk and silver among the holiday colors.

“Anyone we know?” Malemayn asked, and Warreven turned back to face him.

“Not as far as I know.”

Malemayn nodded, shading his eyes to look out over the harbor. “I’d hate to miss an obligation.”

“Don’t worry about that,” Warreven said. “Anyone you owe a present will be sure to let you know.”

Malemayn grinned, acknowledging the truth of the comment. Warreven looked past him, up the hill to the bars of Dock Row and Harborside. Most of the wrangwys houses, the bar and dance houses that catered to trade, off-world players, and Hara’s odd-bodied were closed now; most wouldn’t open until sundown, but a few were already doing business. He picked out the doors, the sun-faded bars of neon light surrounding them, wondering if any of his friends or clients were there already. Shinbone on the Embankment was open, its double doors wide to the afternoon sun, the bouncer Brisban stretching luxuriously in the warmth; a little farther along the street, a couple of off-worlders were standing outside Hogeye’s, nudging each other as they scanned the show-cards and dared each other to go in. Warreven made a face at that and turned away.