Chanur's Venture Read Online Free PDF Page B

berth, counting down from
    fourteen to six.
    There should have been canisters outside The Pride's berth. She made out none,
    and thought further dark thoughts, still not looking back.
    She passed berth 10, which had been Mahijiru. That berth was sealed completely,
    the gantry drawn back with its lines in store-position. Number ten board
    remained dark, not listing the name or registry of the outbound ship.
    Malfunction. Indeed, malfunction.
    Connivances, mahendo'sat with stsho-with stsho who ran before every wind that
    blew -- and now, with Mahijiru on the run and Goldtooth unable to break the
    director's neck in person -- was the prevailing wind kif-tainted?
    It rankled, gods, it rankled, that stsho had dared confront her, stsho, that she
    could break with one swipe of her arm. And dared not. That was the crux of it.
    Stsho showed one face to the kif, one to the mahendo'sat-yet a third to hani:
    non-spacing, stsho law had regarded hani till a century ago, because (though
    hani preferred not to recall the fact) it was the mahendo'sat had given hani
    ships. An artificially accelerated culture. Hani were still banned from stsho
    space, on their very border. Trade was at Meetpoint only, or inside non-stsho
    space.
    And hani in their good nature were patient with these fluttering dilettantes who
    bought and sold-everything. They backed Chanur to the wall. It was stsho doing.
    Everything. And the han being political, and the han being shortsighted, and
    most of all because she was a fool who expected otherwise, Chanur was in trouble
    at home. Of course the stsho knew it, sure as birds knew carrion-had gotten news
    even a hani ship like Prosperity had not; and threw it up in her face at first
    chance.
    Gods, that the han fed stsho bigotry and wielded it for a weapon--
    A deputy of the han has shown concern--
    Or -- a cold, fully sensible fear got past the outrage: the stsho had
    independent sources and played everyone for a fool -- Goldtooth, the han, even
    the kif. They were capable of that. Thoroughgoing xenophobes and slippery as
    oiled glass. Lately the stsho had a new xenophobia to keep them busy. They had
    humankind to worry about, with concerns and motives world-bound hani had no
    least idea of.
     
    Goldtooth, rot you, how much does gtst know? How much the bribe? Nothing holds a
    stsho that's already paid.
    Nothing persuades one against gtst own profit.
    She walked past nine, eight, seven. She saw no activity outside The Pride. No
    sign of any loaders, the cargo ramp withdrawn, the canisters missing. The cans
    were inside, she hoped. She kept alert for any sight of kif on the docks and
    found none. The few passersby with business on the dock were mostly stsho, a few
    mahendo'sat, no hani. If they noticed the rare spectacle of a hani captain being
    trailed by two hulking mahendo'sat station guards, they gave no sign of it. This
    was Meetpoint, after all, where folk minded their business, knowing well how
    trouble tended to travel down line of sight. At the upward-curved limit of the
    horizon, only its bottom third visible, the great seal of the market zone was
    still shut, on gods knew what kind of damage. Money was being lost while that
    market was out of action. Hourly the tab went up.
    The Pride's ramp access gaped ahead, berth six. She ignored her escort, not even
    looking back at them as she took out the pocket com. "Haral. I'm coming in."
    No answer.
    "Haral." She walked up the rampway into the chill, yellow-lighted access,
    hearing no footsteps behind -- walked warily, thinking of kif ambush even here.
    Ambush and stsho treacheries.
    She met a shut hatch beyond the bend of the tube. She had expected that, and hit
    the bar of the com unit in the accessway. "Haral. Haral, gods rot it, it's
    Pyanfar. Open up."
    The hatch shot open at once, with a waft of warmer, familiar air. Tirun was
    there; and Chur, appearing armed from the lower-deck ops room down the corridor.
    Both showed the plasmed seams of recent wounds on their