Burning Bright

The Water, the massive deep-water channel that bisected Burning Bright, was as crowded as ever. Enormous cargo barges wallowed along in the main channel, warned away from the faster, lighter john-boat traffic by lines of bright-orange buoys. Dozens of tiny, brightly painted gondas flashed in and out of the double channels, day lights glittering from their upturned tails. Damian swore at the first to cross his path, matching his words to the jolting rhythm of the swells, and felt the john-boat kick as it crossed the gonda’s wake. He lifted his fist at the gonda driver, and got a flip of the hand in return. He swore again, and swung into the lane behind a seiner, its nets drawn up like skirts around the double boom. It wallowed against the heavy chop—Storm was only two days away, and the winds had already shifted, were driving against the current, setting up an unusual swell. The seiner’s holds were obviously full: on its way back from the sequensa dredging grounds off the Water’s Homestead Island entrance, Damian guessed, and throttled back still further to clear its heavy wake. It was likely to be the last cargo they’d see for a few weeks, until Storm was past.

Even at the slower pace, it didn’t take long to come opposite the mouth of the Straight River, and he slowed again to thread his way sedately through the bevy of smaller craft that swarmed around the entrance. The main wharfs loomed beyond that, massive structures filling in the bend in the bank between the Straight and the channel that led to the Junction Pool and the warehouse districts beyond. He felt a distinct pang of regret as he edged the john-boat into the channel that led to his own docks— if not for business, and if not for Roscha in particular, he could have spent more of the day on the Water—and transformed it instantly into anger. It was time Roscha learned her lesson: that was all. He edged the john-boat between the barges tied up at MADCo.‘s end-of-dock terminal, and let himself drift down easily, nudging the boat along with short bursts of power, to fetch up against the worn padding almost directly beneath C/B Cie.’s antique ship poised against a flaring sun. A familiar face looked down at him—Talaina Rosaurin, one of the wharfingers—and a couple of dockers ran to catch the lines.

“Morning, Na Damian. I’ve the day’s plot set up, and Roscha’s on her way in,” Rosaurin said.

Damian nodded in acknowledgment, and leaned sideways to catch the webbing that covered the fenders. He held the john-boat steady with one hand and tossed the stern rope up onto the dock. The nearest docker caught it, began automatically looping it around the nearest bollard. “Thanks, Rosaurin. Finish the tie-up, will you?”

It was not a request. The wharfinger nodded, and dropped onto the bow.

“I’ll take a look at the plot as soon as I’ve seen Roscha,” Damian went on, and swung himself easily up onto the dock. “Send her in as soon as she gets here.”

“Right, Na Damian,” Rosaurin said, but Damian was already walking away.

His office was in a corner of the main warehouse, insulated from the noise and smell of the moving cargoes by a shell of quilted foam-board, and well away from the wharfingers’ station at the end of the pier. He threaded his way past the gang of dockers busy at the cranes unloading the barge that had brought the drop capsules in from the Zone, and glanced sharply into the open cargo space. He was moderately pleased to see that only two capsules remained to be brought onto the dock, and made his way past a whining carrier into the shadows of the warehouse. A pair of factors looked up at his entrance, and the taller of the two touched his forehead and came to intercept him, leaving the other to preside over the newly opened drop capsule.

“I’m sorry, Na Damian, but there’s some minor spoilage in this shipment.”

“How lovely.” Damian bit back the rest of his response, said instead, “Finish checking it and give me a report. Is it TMN again?”

The factor nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

“I need to talk to them,” Damian said, and continued on toward the office. The door opened to his touch, reading his palmprint on the latch, and admitted him to the narrow lobby, empty except for the secretary pillar that guarded the inner doorway. The sphere that balanced on the truncated point of its slender pyramid glowed pale blue, tinged with green at the edges; threads of darker blue danced in its center, shaping a series of brief messages. At least two of the codestrings signaled longer messages backed up in the system—probably from his siblings, if they were sent here—but he stepped past the pillar into the inner office.

Behind him, the secretary said, in its cultured artificial voice, “Na Damian, you have messages waiting.”

“Oh, shut up,” Damian Chrestil said, and closed the door behind him.