The door opened and sealed again at their backs. They passed Llun guards. The corridor stretched ahead, empty.
“Going to my ship,” Goldtooth said. “Going to back off and keep watch these kif bastard.”
“Going to the shuttle launch,” Pyanfar said. “Got business won’t wait. Got stupid son and trouble in Chanur holding. Life and death, mahe.”
“Kif find you go, make one shot you shuttle. Jik make you escort, a? Run close you side, make orbit, get you back safe.”
She stared up at the mahe’s very sober face, reached and clasped his dark-furred and muscular arm. “You want help after this, mahe, you got it. Number one help. This kif lies. You know it.”
“Know this,” Goldtooth said. “Know this all time.”
Their ways parted at the intersecting corridor. Pyanfar pointed the way back to the dock, a straight walk onward, and Goldtooth took it, his crew with him, a dark-furred, tall body moving off down the hall. Pyanfar motioned her own group the other way, which curved toward the shuttle launch.
Steps hurried after them, clawed hani feet in undignified haste. Pyanfar looked about as the rest of her party did, saw a young and black-trousered stationer come panting toward her. The youngster made a hasty bow, looked up again, ears down in diffidence. “Captain. Ana Khai. The station begs you come. All of you. Quickly and quietly.”
“Station gave me leave for my own pressing business, young Khai. I’m due a shuttle downworld. I’m not stopping for conferences.”
“I was only given that word,” the Khai breathed, her eyes shifting nervously over them. “I have to bring you. The Llun is there. Quick. Please.”
Pyanfar glared at the young woman, nodded curtly and motioned the others about to follow the messenger. “Quick about it,” Pyanfar snapped, and the youngster hurried along at the limit of her strides, hardly keeping ahead of them.
It was, as the Khai had said, not far, one of the secondary meeting rooms at which door a whole host of stationers and no few insystem spacers hovered, a crowd which parted at their approach and swarmed in after them.
The Llun indeed. The old man of the station, sitting in a substantial cushioned chair and surrounded by mates/daughters/nieces and a few underage sons, without mentioning the client familiars, the black-trousered officials, the scattering of spacer captains. Kifas Llun was there, first wife, standing near him, and there were others of other houses. A Protected house; the Llun could not be challenged, holding too sensitive a post, like other holders of ports and waterways and things all hani used in common, and he had slid past his prime, but he was impressive when he got to his feet, and Pyanfar exchanged her scowl for a respectful nod to him and to Kifas.
“This trouble,” he said, and his voice shook the air, a bass rumbling. “This Outsider. Let me see him.”
Pyanfar turned and gathered Tully by the arm. There was a panicked expression in Tully’s eyes, a reluctance to go closer to the Llun. “Friend,” she said. “He.”
Tully went, then, and Pyanfar kept her claws clenched into his arm to remind him of manners. Tully bowed. He had that much sense left. “Male, na Llun,” Pyanfar said quietly, and the Llun nodded slowly, his heavy mane swinging as he did so and his mouth pursed with interest.
“Aggressive?” the Llun asked.
“Civilized,” Pyanfar said. “But mahe-like. Armed, na Llun. The kif had him awhile. Killed his shipmates. He got away from them. That’s where this started. We have a translator tape on him. We’ll provide it with no quibbles. I want it on record he gave it freely, for his own reasons. In the Tahar matter — that’s a han question. I didn’t trust the Tahar as a courier. Gods witness — I’ll be sorry to be right. And by your leave, na Llun, I’ll be back to answer your questions. There’s a matter of time involved. I was given leave to go.”
“Challenge has been given,” Kifas Llun said, and Pyanfar darted her a hard look. “Only now the word came up.”
Pyanfar thrust Tully back to Hilfy’s keeping and started away without a word.
’Ker Chanur,” Kifas said, and she cast a burning look back. “A quicker way: listen to me.”
“I’ll want a com link,” Pyanfar said. “Now.”
“Listen, ker Chanur. Listen.” Kifas crossed the room to her and took her arm to stop her. “Our neutrality—”
“Gods rot your neutrality. Keep the kif off my back. I’ve got business downworld.”
“Got a ship,” one of the insystem captains said unbidden, a hani of Haral’s build. “She’s old, ker Chanur, but she can set down direct on Chanur land, that no shuttle can do. Tyo freight lander: Rau’s Luck. I’m willing to set her in the way of trouble if Chanur’s minded.”
Pyanfar drew in a breath and looked at the aging captain. Rau was no downworld house. Insystem hani, landless and unpropertied except for a ship or two, unless they were Tyo-based, colonials.
“Your word is worth something,” Kifas said, “Pyanfar Chanur. We’re bound by the Compact. We can’t do more than pin these kif at the station. You’ve got the mahe for help. You can do more than we can. Chanur has two more ships in that might be of use. Tahar—”
Kifas did not finish the statement; her ears flicked in discomfort.
“Yes,” Pyanfar said. “Tahar. I’m not so sure I’d rely on their ships either at the moment.”
“We can’t muster a defense,” Kifas said. “Your captains are downworld with most of the crews. So are others. We’ve got kif at dock for as long as we can keep them, but you said yourself — there may be others.”
“You’ve got the insystem captains.”
“Against jumpship velocity—”
Pyanfar looked about her, at the spacers present. “Go to the jumpships you can reach; you can fill out crews. Take orders. No matter what house. Get those ships able and ready. I’ll get the Chanur captains back here; and any others I can find. In the meantime, keeping those ships ready to go will be the best action with the kif.” She looked at Kifas Llun, grim sobriety. “Your neutrality is in rags. Give me one of your people. To bring witness down there to what’s going on. I have to get moving. Now. Mahijiru and Aja Jin will keep the kif pinned and the way open. — If I don’t move, ker Llun… the upheaval in the han is going to make differences, differences to more than Chanur. Tahar’s down there, I don’t doubt they are. Standing in line to get a share of the spoils. You’re already in it. I’m not going to let Chanur go under.”
“Rau,” Kifas Llun said. “You’re ready to go?”
“On the instant,” the Rau captain said.
“Ginas,” Kifas said, with a gestured signal to one of her people. “Go with the Chanur. Talk to them. Answer what you’re asked. You’re at her orders.”
The one singled out bowed. Kifas offered the door, a sweep of her hand. “Llun,” Pyanfar murmured in a quick bow of courtesy toward Kifas and toward na Llun, who had seated himself again. Then she turned and swept her own company, the Llun messenger included, toward the door, following the Rau captain. “This way,” the Rau said, indicating a turn which would take them toward the small-craft docks.
Kohan, Pyanfar persuaded herself, would not have taken challenge immediately as it was offered, not knowing that she had reached the system; and surely he knew by now: it was routine that a house was notified when a ship belonging to it made port. The timing of it argued that his enemies knew; and surely Kohan did. He was too wise to be catapulted into any such thing without some preliminaries: she relied on that, with all her hopes.