Zarn shook his head. He went back to the low table, dropped down to the mat seat behind it, his fingers scrabbling among a number of small sticks littered there. Each was notched in a different pattern, one which could be read by touch, even in the dark. But he had no need to try to sort out again those orders, threats, demands.
There was a muted sound, hardly louder than his own labored breathing. Zarn's head came up, he was on his feet at once, to pass through a concealed doorway into that narrow room where there was a panel high in the wall open to the night sky. Through this his awaited messenger had come to perch on the desk table. It uttered two plaintive squawks as the merchant reached it.
His hands went out to stroke and gentle the flyer. Then met those avian eyes with his own compelling gaze. This was one of the best trained of the shrine flyers. At least they had accepted that the task demanded the very best weapons they could bring to the field.
Zarn plucked the message from brain to brain. His tongue tip swept dry lips. His life—well, he had known in the end it would come to this—his life in the balance against victory. But they were giving in, if reluctantly; they were agreeing that his suggestion could now be the only way.
So—in hope he had already made certain moves; now it was time to follow those up. He gave the flyer its reward and left it squatting on the desk top, the opening in the roof unclosed. There would be no message he could send now—that he wanted to send. What he would do needed no interference from those at a distance who had never encountered the players he must draw into the game.
Dawn was smoky pale in the sky as he began to set into action the plan he had labored on. He sent another messenger, this one two-legged and from his household, with a very ambiguous report that he had lately obtained certain wares from the north which might interest that particular buyer.
Down in the larger chamber devoted to business he oversaw the unpacking of two bags, the setting out of his bait—star stones worked by Hemcreft himself. The High Shagga had parted with those as easily as if they had been implanted toothwise in his jaws—but they were unique enough to hold this Xantan.
He had time to compose himself fully, to practice the Six Exercises of Quiet and Preparation. So it was with his usual composure that he faced the woman who answered his summons.
She was clearly an off-worlder, a thin-bodied figure with elongated arms and overlarge hands. Her dark skin had a metallic sheen and looked very smooth, almost as if she were indeed encased in some hard coating. A great deal of it was exposed by her scanty clothing which consisted mainly of strips of shaggy material which might be the fur of some strange beast and was of a violently vivid flame color, showing even brighter against the grey-black of the body it wreathed around. Her head was swathed in a large turban that flashed a border of jewels, the seeing of which gave Zarn a hidden satisfaction. It was plain that this envoy of the Guild had a liking for gems, so that what he had to offer should prove tempting.
'Gentlefem'—he bowed and escorted her to a pile of seat mats well raised above the floor to accommodate her longer limbs—'you honor this house of trade.'
She raised her first set of eyelids and opened the inner ones halfway. Her narrow, almost snoutlike, mouth was not meant to shape a humanoid smile but it twisted somewhat in what might just be the equivalent of such.
'The wares of Ras Zarn,' her trade tongue had a rasp as suggestive of metal as her body, 'are well known to produce treasures. It was spoken to me of a special shipment—'
She had not glanced once at the display on the table. However, Zarn believed that she had not only surveyed it but at the same instant had been able to value it.
'As you see, Gentlefem.' He waved a hand toward the gems set out skillfully on a darkened strip of leather which enhanced their incandescent silver and gold natural coloring.
Now she did turn a little on the mat seat, that exercise twisting her long neck (looking far too slender to support a large head made even more bulky by the turban). Both her outer and inner eyelids were fully open. She made no move to lean forward a little farther to touch the gems, merely regarded them. Zarn did not doubt in the least that she knew to a quarter star credit their value.
'A showing, Merchant Zarn, a showing. But—'
'A buying—no?' he said quietly. 'Ah, well, it was the Gentlefem I considered first when these came to me, knowing how great is her ability to pick the best and make the finest use of such. But if they do not suit your taste, then I am most sorry to have troubled you.'
Her mouth worked again and those second inner eyelids half closed, surveying him now, rather than the display of stones.
'We buy and sell, both of us, merchant. If I buy, what then is the price?'
Inwardly Zarn relaxed a fraction. She was willing—at least enough to discuss matters. But any deal with the Guild was tricky, very tricky.
'There is a story to be told, Gentlefem.'
She made a sound which might either have been a sigh of boredom or one of impatience. 'There always is when one of you wishes to deal with us.' She was frank enough anyway.
'We seek a man, a traitor, one who has betrayed us blood and bond.'
The woman raised a hand as if to straighten the mound of her turban.
'Your world is wide, but I do not doubt that you have the means for tracking him—Shagga!' She mouthed that last word almost as if it were an accusation, but Zarn was not taken unawares. No one could deny that the Guild had their own seekers of knowledge, that they kept account and learned all they could of any they might have future dealings with.
'Unfortunately he is off-world. Before we could put hand on him he blasphemously used the code which had been stripped from him and oathed with an off-worlder— a Zacathan.'
'Ah, yes.' Now the woman did reach out, and, with one of her long equal-length six fingers, tapped the table below the first jewel in line.
'That lizard skin is one I have heard that your own people have an interest in.' Zarn ventured the first push. He must assume more authority or else be defeated before he began.
