Trade Secret (eARC) Read Free Page A

a ring as this?
    "Yes," the trader crooned, "this is an object one might wear in many places, secure that it would be noticed and appreciated. The stone, of course, is flawless, and the setting is true multi-banded flash-formed Triluxian!"
    The ring was deposited oh-so-gently in Jethri's hand for inspection. After a moment he sighed, looking at it from this way and that--and requested, with a bow, "May I use my handscan for a closer look?"
    Triluxian--bonded of microlayered titanium, gold, platinum, with a salting of rhodium--was not something to be ignored. The style of the thing suggested it was a very old ring, and the slight signs of wear suggested it was an artifact someone had actually used--which is to say, displayed on their hand in public--frequently. Thus the scanner, looming for details, and giving back the certifiable purity of the finding. There was value here, but not riches.
    As for the stone--he held back a chuckle mightily. Firegem, yes, truly a flawless firegem, but for the worth of it in any state . . . it was a fluted cabochon firegem, which made it odd, but other than that? What it was doing set in--
    "Of course," said the trader, though his face tensed enough for Jethri to see it. "You'll find some odd lettering, I believe . . ."
    Handscan again. Jethri studied the band of the thing, and indeed, there was odd lettering, which likely appeared even odder to the trader for it being Terran lettering, and very tiny. Perhaps it was someone's name, perhaps there was also a date, Cobol 426 . . . he let the scanner record the thing to look at later. Might as well set blast glass in the thing as a firegem, unless it dated to the original discovery of the things, or was the first . . .
    "An extremely unusual item," Jethri admitted, allowing the trader to have the ring back. The ring must be more than it looked . . . else a story worth sharing if it could found.
    The trader flipped to the next display page.
    There, a simple sheet of metal with rolled edges, almost like one of Dyk's small cooking pans upside down, with diagrammatic instructions inscribed on it, and a few words in oddly stilted Liaden. Instructions for what? Might be of interest to a specialist but didn't touch him very much . . .
    A twitch of fingers--within the sheets, for there were two of them interlocking, were fractins.
    Fractins. Four of them. Fakes, he thought, just looking and needing no scanner to vet them. The color was--not right. The man's hands shook. As common as these were in Terran space, on this side of the trade line they were deemed Old Tech, and thus contraband, and unmarketable in the bargain. Of course, if they were fakes they might not be illegal--he hadn't got to that section of Liaden trade laws yet, and would have to study,
    As noncommittally as possible, he flicked fingers, and there were three more fractins, fitted together, and they were real. They were not only real, they knew he was there, he was sure, knew that they were recognized as real, knew--it was as if they called for him to buy them and take them away.
    He blinked. He'd had that reaction several times as a child, the feeling that real fractins looked back at him. He'd liked his own fractin, and was always glad it was his lucky piece; he'd been convinced that his fractin liked him, too. When Arin, his father, had talked with him about his fractin collections, he'd never doubted Jethri when Jethri could point to his own fractin amidst a score of true-and-fake fractins. Arin hadn't argued, either, when they'd built the fractin frames and Jethri'd insisted that his fractin wasn't comfortable with being put in with the others in this order, but must be in that order or in this position . . .
    Jethri realized that he'd taken several seconds too long this time, that he could still feel the fractins calling, even though he knew he shouldn't--no, couldn't --be found in possession of them. So he permitted himself a slight grimace, as if disinterested, or perhaps bored by