“Ja, lot of stuff we’d need to make it worthwhile going. I’m willing to invest my savings, but not lose them-why do you think I’m sleeping in flophouses with three thousand krona in the bank? The return would be worth it, but only if we’re properly equipped.”
Jonah rubbed at his jaw; the stubble was bristly, and he reminded himself to pick up some depilatory, now that he could afford it.
“What prey is in prospect?” Bigs said.
Shwartz understood the idiom; he seemed to have had some experience with kzin. Enough to know basic etiquette like not staring, at least.
“Depends, t’kzintar.” Warrior, in the Hero’s Tongue; a derivative of kzintosh, male. “Possibly, nothing at all! That’s the risk. Have to go way outback; anything near a road or shipline’s been surveyed to hell and back. Take in filter membranes, then build a hydraulic system if we discover anything. Pack it out. Only the heavy metals and rare earths worth enough. With luck, oh, maybe ten, twenty thousand krona each-profit, that is, after expenses. Depends on when you want to stop, of course.”
“Twenty thousand sounds fine to me,” Jonah said. About the price of a rockjack’s singleship, in normal times. More than enough for independence, if he managed carefully; passage back to Sol System, if he wanted it. “Excuse us for a minute?”
“Ja,” the old man said mildly, stuffing his pipe and turning away to sit quietly on his cot, blowing smoke rings at the grimy ceiling of the dosshouse.
Jonah and the kzin brothers huddled in a corner; the half-ton of sentient flesh made a barrier as good as any privacy screen.
“Sounds like the best prospect going,” he murmured.
“Yes,” Spots said. He took a comp from his belt and tapped at the screen; a kzin military model, rather chunky, marked in the dots-and-commas of the aliens’ script. “That would repurchase enough land to sustain our households. With an independent base, we could contract work to meet our cash-flow problems.”
“I am tempted,” Bigs cut in; they both looked at him in surprise. “My liver steams with the juices of anticipation. With enough wealth, we need no longer associate so much with humans.” His ears folded away and he ducked his muzzle. “No offense, Jonah-Matthieson. You hardly seem like a monkey.”
“None taken,” Jonah said dryly. Actually, he’s quite reasonable… for a pussy, he thought, using the old UN Space Navy slang for the felinoids. That was flattery. Accepting defeat violated kzin instincts as fundamental to them as sex was to a human. Walking among aliens who did not recognize kzinti dominance without lashing out at them took enormous strength of will.
“Hrrrr” Spots closed his eyes to a slit; the pink tip of his tongue protruded slightly. “How are we to raise the additional capital?” He brightened, unfurling ears. “A raid! We will-”
Jonah groaned; Bigs was grinning with enthusiasm aggressive enthusiasm. How had these two survived since the liberation? Badly, he knew.
“No, no-do you want to end up in prison?”
That made them both wince. Kzinti were more vulnerable to sensory deprivation than humans; they were a cruel race, but rarely imprisoned their victims except as a temporary holding measure. Kzin imprisoned for long periods usually suicided by beating their own brains out against a wall, or died in raving insanity if restrained.
“No, we’ll have to go with what the old coot had in mind,” Jonah concluded.
Huge round amber-colored eyes blinked at him. “But he said he did not have access to sufficient Funds,” Spots pointed out reasonably, licking his nose and sniffing. Puzzlement: I sniff for your reasoning.
It was amazing how much you learned about kzinti, working with them for a month or two. Back in Sol System, nobody had known squat about the aliens, except that they kept attacking-even when they shouldn’t. Now he knew kzin body language; he also knew their economic system was primitive to the point of absurdity. Not surprising, when a bunch of feudal-pastoral savages were hired as mercenaries by a star-faring race, given specialized educations, and then revolted and overthrew their employers. That had happened a long, long, long time ago, long enough to be quasi-legend among the kzin. They had never developed much sophistication, though; nor a real civilization.
What they had done was to freeze their own development. The kzin became a space-faring power long before they understood what that meant; and with space travel came access to genetic alteration techniques. The kzin used those, both on their captives and on themselves. The plan was to make them better; but better to the Race of Heroes meant to be even more primitive, even more dedicated to the Fanged God, even more loyal to the Patriarch. Civilization breeds for rationality; but the kzin used gene mechanics to build in proof against that.
While they were at it, they altered their social customs, then changed their genes so the new customs would be stable. The result was a race of barbarians, culturally well below the level of the Holy Roman Empire, roaming through space in wars of conquest and slavery.
Fortunately they had also changed their genes to make themselves more Heroic; and to a kzin, Heroes were rarely subtle and never deceptive.
Heroes don’t lie, and they don’t steal. It should be enough, Jonah thought. So. “He’ll have a backer in mind,” Jonah said. “A beneath-the-grass patriarch. A silent partner.” Explaining the concept took a few minutes. “Otherwise he wouldn’t have talked to us at all.”
The huge kzinti heads turned toward each other.
“We need him,” Spots said. “Badly.”
“Truth,” Bigs replied morosely.
Each of them solemnly bared the skin on the inside of a wrist and scratched a red line with one claw, then stared at him expectantly.
Oh, Finagle, the human thought. “Can I use a knife?” he said aloud.
“I won’t take money from Harold Yarthkin,” Jonah said bluntly.
He stared narrow-eyed at the lean Herrenmann face across the table, with its arrogant asymmetric double spike of beard. The room was large, elegant, and airy in the manner of Old Munchen, on the third story of a townhouse overlooking the Donau and the gardens along its banks. Almost as elegant as Claude Montferrat-Palme in his tweeds and suede, looking for all the world like a squire just in from riding over the home farm. He lounged back in the tall carved-oak chair, framed against the bright sunlight and the wisteria and wrought iron of the balcony behind him. His smile was lazy and relaxed.
“Oh, I assure you, there’s no money of his in this. We’re… close, but not bosom companions, if you know what I mean.”
Ingrid, Jonah’s mind supplied. An old and tangled rivalry; resolved now, but the scratches must linger. His were about healed, but he hadn’t spent forty years brooding on them.
“Although he probably would back you up. You did save both their lives, there at the end.”
Jonah felt a cold shudder ripple his skin, but the sensation was fading. There are no more thrint, he told himself. None at all, except for the Sea Statue in the UN museum, and that was safely bottled in a stasis field until the primal monobloc recondensed. After an instant the sensation went away. A year ago the memory attacks had been overwhelming; now they were just very, very unpleasant. Progress, of a sort.
“Not interested,” he said flatly. For one thing, our dear friend Harold might have left me here for the pussies, f it wouldn’t have made him look bad in front of Ingrid. Harold Yarthkin was a hero of sorts; Jonah knew the breed, from the inside. As ruthless as a kzin, when he was crossed or almighty Principle was at stake.
“But as I said, it’s my money.”
“Why are you spending your time on this penny-ante stuff, then?” Jonah asked. His nod took in the room, the old paintings and wood shining with generations of labor and wax.