Mercedes Lackey - The Wizard of Karres

"The Agandar. Criminy! You mean . . . ?"

"Yes," said the captain, sorting the suits into order. "I think this pack of cards that the Leewit has been carrying around in her pocket is what the Agandar's pirates were looking for all along."

He drew the royal flush out of each suit and laid them out. "I think . . . I'm sure the answer is right here. Right in front of our eyes." He stared intently at the picture-cards. Patterns imported centuries ago from Old Yarthe, that had altered gradually over the centuries.

The Agandar had been on Uldune. Bloody-historied Uldune. The world whose pirate fleets had once spread fear and terror across a huge sector of the galaxy. The world that had turned from piracy and raiding to become the clearing house of half the dubious merchandise in the galaxy. A place that still welcomed pirates, at least successful ones.

Why had the Agandar been on Uldune? To follow up the rumor of a new spacedrive? Or had he been on Uldune anyway, for another purpose?—when his spies had brought him the rumor that the Venture was being renamed the Evening Bird by courtesy of the Daal's highly efficient staff of forgers.

Uldune still welcomed pirates. Successful pirates.

It provided, among other services, a fence for stolen goods and . . . banking. The pirates of ancient history hid their loot in secret hoards on desert islands, but the modern pirate was more likely to use a bank vault. Or a numbered private account. Kleesp's accomplice had actually said as much! Pausert was willing to bet that the cards in front of him held the key to just such a numbered account. But the question was: how? He studied the pattern on the edge of the cards. It was a simple repeat-pattern, hand-painted and skillfully so, but still nothing more than that, at least as far as he could see.

"I'll bet it's supposed to give us the numbers of the Agandar's bank accounts. Probably with the Daal's Bank. But for the life of me I can't see what the numbers could be. I suppose you could count which number of the repeat pattern was wrong, but what order would they go in?

He picked up the four sets of marked suits. "See," he said, dealing them out again. "There are sixteen repeats of this pattern on the top margin. Each one of these cards has a different one of those repeats altered." He moved the cards around, arranging them in the order of the altered repeat pattern on the top edge. "We can make pretty patterns, but they don't . . . ulp."

As he laid the last card in the row, the altered patterns linked up. There was a brief hum and a small hyperelectronic screen and keypad appeared above the cards.

Letters began forming on the screen: ENTER ACCESS CODE.

"They aren't cards at all," whispered the captain. "It's a hyperelectronic computer. Those are circuits, not just patterns."

"And a mini-subradio!" said Goth. "No wonder the Agandar was able to keep in touch with his fleet."

The captain shook his head incredulously. "He even said he had a secret shielded transmitter! The Sheem robot was also hyperelectronic. We should have guessed."

"Only question is: what's the access code?" asked the Leewit." Then, a little plaintively: "And when do I get my cards back?"

"That's two questions," said the captain. "And I don't know either answer."

ENTER CODE WITHIN THE NEXT THIRTY SECONDS.

"Or . . . ? I guess we don't dare find out," muttered the captain. "I need to be lucky. I need every ounce of klatha power." He took a deep breath and began to type a sequence of numbers.

Nothing happened.

FIVE SECONDS

"Hit enter," said Goth.

CODE ACCEPTED. DESTRUCT PROGRAM ABORTED.

A menu popped up. A very ordinary menu of choices, including subradio banking.

Pausert exhaled slowly. Then, accessed the subradio banking option.

"I think," he said, "the Leewit's cards have given us the jackpot. Let's see if we can transfer enough into my account to allow us to simply buy new engines, and forget about repairs. That'll be a lot faster."

When the figures came up, the Leewit whistled softly. "We could buy a whole new ship," said Goth.

"Buy a whole clumping fleet!" exclaimed her sister.

The captain shook his head. "The paperwork would take longer and attract more attention than a repair job. Besides, I like the old Venture . She's been places with us that no new ship would ever have coped with. But, when this is all over and we decide what to do with what's left of the Agandar's fortune— after we track down those of his victims we can trace—I will promise you both a refit and a redecoration of your cabins. And fifty decks of cards for the Leewit."

"Want that one," said the Leewit, pointing. "Always knew those were my lucky cards."

"Hmm. I was thinking about that share in the Petey Byrum and Keep," said Goth thoughtfully.

Even spending money like water, it took three days to get the "Evening Bird" ready for space again. The captain was nervous every minute of that time, because he knew that the amount of money they were spending was sure to get someone from the ISS interested, before too long.

So, the minute the preflight checks were done, Pausert lifted the Venture . As if to make up for his brilliant landing on jury-rigged controls and with a mere three battered tubes, the takeoff was one of his worst. Still, they were space-borne before the authorities figured out just who had been spending rivers of money on little Porlumma. There were going to be some red faces if they ever they found out that they'd put in new engines for the infamous Captain Pausert, whose vid still graced Porlumma customs control offices. Still, in fairness, they could say that Captain Aron from far-off Mulm had looked nothing like the vid-picture. The stern-visaged, planar-faced Aron bore no resemblance at all to the images of the cheerful criminal Pausert.

"Right," said the captain to his two witches. "The time has come to show me how to work the Sheewash Drive. I feel I'm ready."

"Huh. Otherwise we'll have to hit you over the head or something," said the Leewit, cheekily. "I'm not going to do it with you dragging us back like a big rock, again, that's for sure."

"Only if you promise me you'll stick to the pattern exactly this time, Captain," said Goth sternly.

So Goth and Leewit talked the captain through the pattern. As it was developing, the captain thought he saw where it could be done differently. But this time he stuck exactly to the pattern as Goth and the Leewit presented it.

They kept it up for a mere fifteen seconds. The captain was sweating and beginning to feel as if the entire weight of the Venture was pressing onto his shoulders, when Goth said "Enough."

"Whew," said the captain. "It sure does take it out of you."

"Uh-huh. Come on. Let's eat."

They walked through to the mess. The captain found that Hantis had had the forethought to order the new electric butler to make them a substantial lunch. It was more reliable than the old electric butler, but he'd gotten used to the way the old one used to burn the eggs. "How did I do?" he asked.

" We did pretty good," said the Leewit, talking with her mouth half-full.

Goth swallowed and started loading up another huge forkful. She looked sideways at him with those big brown eyes. "Told you the captain is a hot witch."

Captain Pausert concentrated on adding food to a stomach that was telling him he'd been starving for a while. After he'd got to his third plateful he said, "You know, when we were doing the klatha pattern—the part where we sort of plait those strands of light—I thought, well, if we . . ."

Both witches started to giggle. In the Leewit's case, as she had a mouthful of juice, the captain had to pat her on the back while Goth fetched a pile of napkins. "Told you so," said Goth to the Leewit.