Chapter 16
Chapter
Sixteen
Trust your gut (again)
My gut did not like this message, but it was not entirely unexpected.
The Durbok was not sentimental about information.
He collected it the way he collected everything else: quietly, at a margin.
When a paying client was owed a delivery, he delivered.
It was a time-tested way to run a trade operation: be reliably useful and know exactly when to stop knowing things.
I respected that. Since I wanted to learn something from him that was outside of his “knowing,” I’d pay a high price for it, which I had when I loaded his account with far more credits than the cost of the goods I’d purchased from him.
I landed the shuttle in the clearing next to the Durbok’s Cloudbreaker merchant vessel well before the Runams were expected.
This was not the plan I’d intended for today.
I had been planning to go to the Durbok’s today, but not early.
Braija had mentioned that she was taking two others to the Durbok’s for dry goods and salt, and I’d offered to fly them.
I was a generous soul. I was also eager to keep her happy so she continued to give me food when I came to the village.
So when the plan suddenly changed, I told B2 to relay to the village that I’d meet them there, and then I left early.
“You communicated a falsehood, sir,” B2 said, as I was taking off.
“I communicated a schedule change due to a surprise change of plans,” I replied. “It’s not the same.”
B2 was wise enough to let that sit.
The Durbok was behind his counter when I came in. He didn’t look up from what he was sorting. “You made good time, friend.”
“You said to come early,” I said. “I came early.”
“Sit down.” He didn’t have chairs, but there was a crate near the counter that had served the purpose before.
I sat. He finished what he was sorting, then set it aside and looked at me with those dark, deep-set eyes that had probably seen just about everything there was to see in this galaxy. For better or worse.
“I want you to understand I am telling you this because you paid me to tell you,” he said. “And because the sooner you know, the sooner it stops being my problem.”
“Understood,” I said. My gut tightened further.
“A careful person would not use a planet’s name when making inquiries,” he said.
“A careful person would describe the resource. Rare. Natural. Not replicable elsewhere. Valuable enough to be worth finding, obscure enough that finding it takes work.” He looked at me for a moment.
“I flew a different route to get here today.”
Ah, fleck. My stomach dropped somewhere around valuable enough to be worth finding. “Do you know who’s asking?”
“No. And I’d tell you if I did because I want this problem resolved.
” He picked up his inventory tab. “The inquiry came through a broker. Well-resourced. Patient. Not a scrambling outfit looking for a quick score. Whoever they are, there’s a plan already in place.
” He made a note, then looked up once more.
“That’s what you paid for. That’s what I have. ”
“Time frame?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Next month will be my final visit to this system.”
I cursed under my breath.
“Your village friends will be here in about an hour.” He went back to his notes. “Tell them whatever you will, but do not mention the Durbok.”
I understood the drill. “And what will you do, friend?”
He laughed. “Ah, we are friends, now, are we?” But then, he shook his head and looked back to his inventory. “It was a good run. I have made easy credits in this system, but it’s time I moved on to new markets.”
So, the Durbok was abandoning Podnos-9. Conceding control of junver syrup to whoever claimed it, like any slippery, semi-disreputable trader would.
I grunted acknowledgment of the information he gave me, bought a few things I didn’t need so the trip looked like a supply run in the records, said nothing further, and waited for the Runams. I would not have them carry Braija’s heavy salt back to the village.
I stood outside in the late morning light and did not think about what I had learned directly.
That was an old mercenary guild habit. After receiving information, you let it settle.
You do not immediately start connecting points together, because the first connections you made were often wrong in at least one way and then you got committed to them.
I’d seen people die for premature conclusions.
I loaded my supplies into my shuttle and waited.
The Runams arrived at the depot in their usual cheerful fashion, carrying the crate of junver syrup to trade, oblivious to the threat they were now facing.
Afterwards, I helped them carry their purchases to the shuttle.
If I was quiet or disengaged from Pasek’s banter, oh well. I had a lot on my mind.
I brought the Runams back to the village by midday, then unloaded their goods and carried the heaviest loads myself.
Partly because Braija was excited to try a new recipe she was developing and had invited me to dinner after we were done moving supplies.
Mostly I just hadn’t finished thinking yet, and manual labor was where I ended up doing the thinking.
The evening came quietly, with soft, purple-streaked clouds and air scented like flowers and fish.
Braija had brought me to her home, where she’d made a stew.
I sat with her large family around the long table in her central room.
There were eight of us, maybe nine, people coming and going as they tended to.
The conversation moved as village conversation always did, which was in every direction at once and at variable volumes and coherency, if you could track it at all.
I tracked it. It helped me to keep the information I’d learned from the Durbok just under the edge of worry.
As I scraped the last of my second helping from the bottom of my bowl, I knew one thing I had to do. And I had to do it tonight.
After I said all the thank-yous and goodbyes, and had accepted a fresh sack of bread rolls from Braija’s partner, Viltra, I stepped out into the dark village and walked the short way to the stone building where Maive lived.
She’d be home this time of night, and for the first time, I wasn’t looking forward to seeing her.
I knocked on the wooden door, perhaps too loud. It may have sounded more like a pounding than a knocking. Either way, she opened it.
She looked at me for one single breath. “What’s wrong?”
I held her gaze. “May I come in?” I saw no point in saying “nothing,” but fleck, I was not looking forward to this conversation.
She stepped aside and gestured for me to enter, which I did. The door closed behind me, blocking out the Podnos-9 sky doing its trick of skipping from streaky purple-colored clouds to dark blue with very little warning.
“Has something happened?” She crossed her arms.
“Yes,” I said, sounding as old as I currently felt.
She looked at me. Green-gold, steady eyes. “What?”
I thought about the answer. Not about whether to give one—I was going to give one—but about which one was accurate. “I have received word of a party with great interest in the healing syrup you manufacture,” I said. “And that they are planning a visit.”
A pause. I saw her mull over the words party and visit. She went briefly still, processing my words.
She swallowed hard. “Are my people in danger?”
“Yes.”
She looked up, as if she could see the sky through the floors and roof of her home. Outside, the stars were appearing. This was my favorite part of the evening. On another night, we were lifting of to look at the stars from inside my shuttle. This was a very different kind of night.
She wanted more information. I knew that. She had the same look I’d seen when she was dealing with a supply problem, or a dispute between the fishermen, or anything else that she’d deemed within her purview of responsibility. Which was most things.
“I want to know everything.”
I rubbed my forehead and sighed. “I know. I wish I had more to offer you.” On every flecking level.
Her lips had lost their color. The bottom one trembled before she clamped her teeth over it. “I need to know what to tell them.”
“Tell them nothing right now,” I said. “I need to ask some questions. As soon as I learn more, I will tell you.”
Her eyes were wide and locked on mine. “Promise me, Gilrox.”
I took both of her hands in mine and drew them up to my chest. “I promise. I will do everything in my power to keep you, and everyone here, safe.” Then, I lifted her hands higher and kissed the palm of one of them. Her fingers curled around my hands and held on.
The moment crackled. I didn’t know how else to describe it, but that.
It felt like a power cell was discharging its energy in the space between us, showering my skin with prickles of electricity.
She appeared to be experiencing a similar phenomenon because she held my gaze with riveted attention. Color returned to her cheeks, her lips.
I couldn’t say who moved forward first, but one moment I was locked in her gaze and the next, she was up against me.
My arms came around her. Her body pressed to mine and her arms looped around my neck.
She was shorter than me, so I lowered just a little, and she raised up to tiptoes.
And as I held her close, I lifted her up enough for our mouths to fit together.
And, sweet stars, did they fit. Everything about her body felt like it was made for mine.
The soft curves melted against me with warmth and strength and some cosmic power that made my entire body light up with intense, immediate arousal.
In other words, I had never gotten so hard, so fast, in my life, even when I was in my prime.
“Gilrox,” she said softly, leaning back. “I don’t know what to do with this.”