The Raist’s cargo hold could have held a medium-sized habitat. Maybe it did. I couldn’t see it all.

  The thirty-meters-high ceiling stretched away into the distance, far enough for the ceiling and floor to flow together at the visual horizon. The regularly spaced floodlights above my head became starry dots, and the far-away auto-loaders and cargo containers looked like toys. I could have raced the Bucket through the hold without trouble, and this was only one of the Raist’s levels.

  Even the loading dock was huge, and the airlock ring had a step-down mechanism that allowed it to match the Bucket’s. The largest setting was wide enough to outclass the main cargo doors on the Belithain, our mothership.

  The clamp engines were twice my height, massive steel screws fatter around than the Bucket’s cockpit. If the load master decided, he could let them rip the Bucket’s docking holds away from her hull.

  Luckily for us, Young Voice was smiling, a friendly crudmucker grin that I’d happily share a meal with, and never play cards against.

  “Welcome to the Raist, Bucket of Diamonds,” he said, holding out his fist to be bumped. “Well, hello there.”

  The last was directed to Maia, who’d come through the magedowser, lighting it up behind me.

  “Looks like we’ll have to search you, my pretty,” Young Voice said, straightening the bright-red, shiny polymer jacket he wore above sensible deep-green work pants. A name tag proclaiming him to be D. Radell swung on a short, gold chain from his breast pocket. Clearly not regulation, but then rank hath its privileges.

  “In your dreams, Davan,” a female voice said. Older woman, slightly more than my age. Same deep-green work pants as Young Voice, but paired with an equally deep-green work jacket, both with plenty of pockets. “This way, Miss.”

  She turned, heading for a customs locker. Maia gave Young Voice a light smile that brought a flush to his cheeks and swooshed away, leaving Young Voice staring.

  “Crud,” he said.

  “Better not let her hear you,” I told him. “She has a very particular sense of irony.”

  “If irony is all I can get, I’ll lick it from the deck plates,” Young Voice said.

  “Your nose to the deck plates sounds about right,” I said. “Weren’t you about to search me?”

  “Oh, right,” Young Voice said. “This way.”

  He led me to a different customs locker, a small, empty room with a camera feed that was marked as private in multiple languages, most of which I knew. I showed him my Chimer, let him handle my jacket and stare at the wards.

  “Is she married?” Young Voice asked, handing my jacket back to me. He made a note on his com, saving the image of the warded armor plate he’d withdrawn.

  “Married?” I said.

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  “In a permanent economic-romantic relationship,” Young Voice clarified. “I could offer her a bonded place in the family.”

  “You could try,” I said, putting on my jacket. “I know of sixty-two other people who have. We have a betting pool going about when she’ll reach a hundred.”

  “She might accept,” he said, a dreaming look in his eyes.

  “And a void wyrm might land on your ship, while free helion flows from the void.”

  Young Voice sighed.

  “I’ll always carry this moment around.”

  Then he gave me his wide crudmucker grin again. I decided I liked him. He hadn’t tried to scam me, or threaten a bribe out of me, or do any of the dozens of other things minor functionaries did to harass new arrivals into parting with their money.

  On impulse, I decided to trust him.

  “What’s the going rate on the credit exchange?” I said. “Helion to local script.”

  “Twelve points,” he said. “Fifteen if you end up with a scalper. But I can give you ten here on the dock.”

  “Two,” I said.

  Which was outrageous, because twelve points above mid-market rates sounded about right, but we had seven-hundred-odd kilos of helion to convert into local credit lines, and every point I could shave off meant almost a kilo saved.

  The crudmucker grin became wider.

  “Dream on,” Young Voice said.

  I laughed.

  “What if I told you we have seven hundred and twelve kilos to convert, on the spot?” I said. “And offered you a kiss, too.”

  Young Voice’s eyes went wide as tea plates.

  “From her?” he whispered.

  “No, from me,” I said, and he laughed again.

  I’m good when I want to be, and I liked the kid. He reminded me of myself at that age, full of bluster to hide the empty pockets and the fact that I had no patron, no documents, and nowhere to go.

  Young Voice would have. Getting away with that garish jacket was enough to tag him as family, likely one of the Raist’s founding families. No contract worker would remain on station so blatantly out of uniform for long.

  “I could give you ten points,” he said. “I’d need to make some calls first, though.”

  “What if I took the uncertainty out of it?” I said, trying to sound confident. “I leave our entire stash in your care, bonded storage. You scan it at your leisure. Do your due diligence, anything you want as long as you don’t crack the vials. Then pay us when you’re convinced.”

  He thought about it.

  “Seven points,” he said. “But it will take a day to secure the funds.”

  A day for five kilos of helion. Where I came from, you could live like a senior captain for a month on five kilos. And we wouldn’t need the funds for the duration of the day, as we’d spend most of the time poking around the various suppliers, doing our own due diligence and figuring out the prices and quantities of the tech we were supposed to buy.

  “I’ll need twenty kilocreds up front,” I said. “For down payments and the like. And a tip.”

  “What kind of a tip?” he said.

  “Whom to talk to,” I replied. “Someone skilled and trustworthy, who knows all the traders and is willing to share their knowledge with us.”

  “For a fee?”

  “A small fee,” I agreed. “Enough for a discussion over a good dinner, and great tea.”

  Young Voice laughed again.

  “I hear you,” he said. “You’ll want Caramon.”

  “Who is?” I said.

  “My uncle, and first shift’s load master.”

  Said with an impish grin. Young Voice grinned a lot, but he obviously liked his uncle. If the feeling was reciprocated, it would explain both the out-of-uniform jacket, and why Young Voice got to be acting load master.

  “He around?” I said.

  Likely not. A load master didn’t let others handle docking if he was on station. It would look bad.

  “Got called to the hub for a meeting,” Young Voice said. “Lots of big meetings these last five days.”

  Which was free information, and the look I got from Young Voice made sure that I knew it. Big things were happening in the trade fleet, and there would be opportunities to be had. Something that might be common knowledge to everyone on board, but a newcomer could lose good helion not knowing.

  I gave Young Voice a grateful nod.

  “Six points?” I said, holding up my fist to be bumped.

  “Six-and-a-half?” he replied.

  I bumped his fist. If he was honest, I’d just saved enough helion to buy uncle Caramon a hundred good meals. Things were looking up.

  Of course, if Young Voice decided to scam us, we were floating deep in the cold void.