“Yes,” Ky said. “A matter of trade and profit.”

“It’s always nice to see a Vatta representative here. A tisane, perhaps? I will inform the consul that you wish to see him.”

“Thank you.” Ky sat in the comfortable chair the clerk pointed out, and looked through a window into a covered garden filled with Slotter Key natives. Not, of course, a tik tree. She sipped the tisane the clerk brought her.

“A new Vatta on this run?” The consul appeared quickly. He looked like a northerner and had a North-Coast accent. His ID patch provided a name, Parin Inosyeh, and a brief biography. Ky ignored it; her own wiring would store it for her. “Trade and profit, you say?”

Ky nodded. “A Pavrati shipment. Ag machinery that didn’t arrive on the last Pavrati ship. Customs say they asked for a next shipment priority. I want to bid on it.”

“Does Vatta approve?”

Ky blinked. How could he ask that when the main office was light years away… oh. She was Vatta here. So—did Vatta stand behind this venture or was it personal, a captain’s gambit? She could commit Vatta to a course of action that would not play out until after she returned shipless, the old hulk sold—or she could work this solo, and—if it came out as she hoped—use the profits to refit the ship. If it didn’t, she would be out of luck, but Vatta wouldn’t be harmed.

She had not thought that far. She felt stupid that she had not thought that far.

“I have not decided,” she said, hoping she sounded more capable than she felt. “There are advantages either way, for me, my family, and Slotter Key. More information would help, and that is why I have come here. I would like to know—” Her mind raced swiftly through the decision matrices, noting blank cells she most wanted filled. “I would like to know Pavrati’s trading history here, and where that could be found. The customs employee I spoke to, Inspector-junior Ama Dissi, directed me to the Economic Development Bureau, which he said had tried to find out where the shipment went astray, and obtain a replacement. I need an introduction to that Bureau.”

“Indeed. Some of this I can help you with, certainly. Pavrati began yearly contacts here some six years ago, and increased their service to twice yearly two years ago. The initial contact of my predecessor with the Pavrati concerned a customs dispute about interdicted psychoactives. Recently… let me just say that it would be indiscreet of me to complain that Pavrati captains have been a plague to this office for years—always demanding, never asking. So I would not say that. I would say that if Vatta brought trade and profit out of this, it could only help my office perform its duties and possibly improve relations between governments.”

Ky wondered how much “incentive” from Vatta had contributed to his attitude, or if Pavrati captains had really been stupid enough to alienate their own government’s consul repeatedly. She remembered those entries on the books, something she’d questioned back in what now felt like distant youth. We don’t bribe people, do we? she’d asked in horror, only to be glared into silence by her father and uncle. It was not a bribe, they’d explained. It was merely a courtesy, too small to do more than suggest that Vatta Transport was a friendly and cooperative entity.

As neutrally as possible, she said, “I was hoping you could inform me of local law and custom in such matters.”

“Easily. These people distrust outworld traders as they breathe air. They consider us all cast in the same mold, and blame any of us for all of us. If you were to make good on a promise Pavrati made, they would be very surprised, and probably indecently grateful. As for Pavrati’s reaction, they care not. There are no statutes requiring notification of intent.”

She thought that over for a long moment, while the consul finished his own tisane. She could commit Vatta… she could go independent. She had just made a huge blunder going independent at the Academy, but this was different. Here that boldness protected the family… she hoped.

“It’s my venture,” she said to the consul.

He nodded. “First command, I assume? Yes. You Vatta seem to run to adventures on a first voyage in command.”

Did they? No one had told her about that. “I am not looking for adventure,” Ky said firmly. “Trade and profit.”

“Oh, certainly. Only fools look for adventure. But I daresay your orders didn’t mention scooping Pavrati contracts, not that I’m asking.”

She didn’t know whether to be annoyed or amused at the twinkle in his eye. She went back to the other issue.

“The Customs Inspector mentioned an Economic Development Bureau?”

“Yes. Hidebound, stuffy, and suspicious, like all these people. If they’ve been stiffed by Pavrati, they won’t pay up front, but they’re honest enough and if you deliver the goods, they’ll pay in good credit. I’ll be glad to give you a letter of introduction—they still go in for that kind of formality—to the right office.”

“Thank you,” Ky said. “That’s most helpful.”

He shrugged, a very North-Coast shrug. “Anything to relieve the tedium. It’s normally months between ships, with nothing much to do in between but listen to their complaints. You can’t believe how tedious these people are. Imagine—for amusement, they play some idiotic game with sticks and balls on horses, of all things.”

“Polo?” Ky asked.

“Something like that.” His eyebrows went up. “You know about it? I hadn’t imagined that anywhere on Slotter Key we had anything like that—I’ve never been on a horse in my life.”

NorthCoast… Slotter Key’s industrial hub. Considered themselves superior, North Coasters did. The rest of Slotter Key, Ky suspected, felt much as her family did about North Coasters. Necessary folk, but stodgy and proud.

“I’ve heard of it,” Ky said, without mentioning where. “We’re expected to know a lot of customs from all sorts of places.”

“I suppose,” he said. “Well, if you know enough to chat about chuckles”—Ky realized he meant chukkers—“you’ll get along fine with them, or as fine as any of us can. But look out; they might ask you to get on a horse and play.”

“Oh, I think I can stick to trade and profit,” Ky said.

“Well, then—you’ll have dinner with me, this evening? I’ll have a letter for you by then, and I’ll call ahead as well to see when you might get an appointment. Where are you staying?”

“At the Captains’ Guild,” Ky said. “And thank you. What time?”

“Eight local. I’ll send the legation driver for you, and put a ping on your alarm.”

Outside, the moist air carried all the smells she’d imagined when, as a junior apprentice, she’d been stuck on the ship polishing the floor while the captain and senior crew were onplanet. Here was a whole world she had never seen before; it was hard to believe she was really here, that she had just been talking to a consul, captain to government representative. Her escort joined her at the gate. “Where to?” he asked.

Ky just wanted to walk around, experiencing the strangeness, but that wouldn’t do, not on a company account. “There is a harbor here, yes?” Harbors meant shipping, and shipping was her business.

“This way,” the escort said, pointing. Ky called up a city map on her implant—he was leading her the right way. It seemed silly to check, but it was protocol. They started off, still on foot. Around her, the native population of Belinta went about its business, dressed very differently from the people on Slotter Key. Most wore some shade of green—gray green, greenish brown, yellowish green, bluish green—with a plaid shawl slung around the hips for the women or shoulders for the men. Their legs were bare from the knee down to sandals with turned-up toes, but they wore long-sleeved tops with snug cuffs. What was that about?

She slowed down, feeling the slight difference in the way her foot hit the ground, noticing the odd quality of the light, and the smells… What was that? A gust of wind lifted her cape and the smell grew stronger. Not unpleasant or pleasant, just enticingly different.