The Traders' War (Merchant Princes Omnibus 2) Read Free Page A

she’d established a company to build disk brakes and pioneer automotive
technology transfer. New Britain was about fifty years behind the world she’d grown up in, a land of opportunity for a sometime tech journalist turned entrepreneur. Helge, however, was
strangely fascinated by the minutiae of her new life. Going from middle-class, middle-American life to the rarefied upper reaches of a barely postfeudal aristocracy meant learning skills
she’d never imagined needing before. She was confronting a divide of five hundred years, not fifty, and it was challenging.
    She’d taken the early part of the morning off to be Miriam, sitting in her bedroom in jeans and sweater, her seat a folding aluminum camp chair, a laptop balanced on her knees and a mug of
coffee cooling on the floor by her feet.
If I can’t do, I can at least plan
, she told herself wryly. She had a lot of plans, more than she knew what to do with. The whole idea of
turning the Clan’s business model around, from primitive mercantilism to making money off technology transfer between worlds, seemed impossibly utopian – especially considering how few
of the Clan elders had any sort of modern education. But without plans, written studies, costings and risk analyses, she wasn’t going to convince anyone. So she’d ground out a couple
more pages of proposals before realizing someone was watching her.
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘Milady.’ Kara bent a knee prettily, a picture of instinctive teenage grace that Miriam couldn’t imagine matching. ‘You bade me remind you last week that this eve is the
first of summer twelvenight. There’s to be a garden party at the Östhalle tonight, and a ball afterward beside, and a card from her grace your mother bidding you to attend her this
afternoon beforehand.’ Her face the picture of innocence she added, ‘Shall I attend to your party?’
    If Kara organized Helge’s carriage and guards then Kara would be coming along too. The memories of what had happened the last time Helge let Kara accompany her to a court event nearly made
her wince, but she managed to keep a straight face: ‘Yes, you do that,’ she said evenly. ‘Get Mistress Tanzig in to dress me before lunch, and my compliments to her grace my
mother and I shall be with her by the second hour of the afternoon.’ Mistress Tanzig, the dressmaker, would know what Helge should wear in public and, more important, would be able to alter
it to fit if there were any last-minute problems. Miriam hit the save button on her spreadsheet. ‘Is that the time? Tell somebody to run me a bath; I’ll be out in a minute.’
    So much for the day off
, thought Miriam as she packed the laptop away.
I suppose I’d better go and be Helge
. . .
    *
    ‘Have you thought about marriage?’ asked the duchess.
    ‘Mother! As if!’ Helge snorted indignantly and her eyes narrowed. ‘It’s been about, what, ten weeks? Twelve? If you think I’m about to shack up with some golden boy
so soon after losing Roland – ’
    ‘That wasn’t what I meant, dear.’ ‘What do you mean, then?’
    ‘I meant . . .’ The duchess glanced at her sharply, taking stock: ‘The, ah, noble institution. Have you thought about what it
means
here? And if so, what did you
think?’
    ‘I thought’ – puzzlement wrinkled Helge’s forehead – ‘when I first arrived, Angbard tried to convince me I ought to make an alliance of fortunes, as he put
it. Crudely speaking, to tie myself to a powerful man who could protect me.’ The wrinkles turned into a full-blown frown. ‘I nearly told him he could put his alliance right where the
sun doesn’t shine.’
    ‘It’s a good thing you didn’t,’ her mother said diplomatically.
    ‘Oh, I know that now! But the whole deal here creeps me out. And then.’ Helge took a deep breath and looked at the duchess: ‘There’s you, your experience. I really
don’t know how you can stand to be in the same room as her grace your mother, the bitch! How she