If any of them have been to Riuhiu recently they might have seen a sign letting them know that representatives of the imperial government are renting space in the same building as Valanda has his office. It's where they'd go for copies of the law or Hari is the Language of the Empire.

If any of them have been watching soap operas about caralendri they might have seen a scene of someone escaping an assault, grimly crawling out of the illusions over the property where it happened, then desperately reporting the crime to the open sky. Whether this works outside of soap operas is unclear.

Katherine the botanist - the one of the engineers most going spare, now that the food supply is secure, and trying to do more organizational sorts of work - goes to the imperial government office and tells the front desk worker, "I want to report a crime."

"Sure, you want to go through that door and tell Girar about it. I don't think he's busy right now."

"Thank you." She nods and goes through and asks, "Girar?"

A belul is curled up on top of a desk. He seems to be Girar.

"Welcome. Did someone hurt you?"

"No. I'm reporting a crime on behalf of a citizen of New Dover, actually. We've never interacted with - well, Har's law enforcement before. There were procedures and processes and forms and the like in our original world. What's the process here?"

Girar gets some paper out of a drawer and sits poised to take notes. "First I need to know what you saw that made you think there'd been a crime. Did you see it happen? Did you see something else that seemed suspicious?"

"I was not the original witness, but there are at least six who saw it directly and a few more who heard it. So. Harold Falkner owns the bar - a business which sells alcoholic drinks and food - and he allows people to have 'tabs', to get things without paying immediately and owe the payment later. The story I heard from six witnesses who I imagine you'll want to interview yourself but did not have the free time to come here, was that another man, Danny Champ, owes several hundred rings to the bar. Harold refused to serve him any more alcohol until he paid some of it. Danny asked for one more anyway. Harold said no. Danny asked some of his friends to pay for a drink for him. Harold told him to get out of his property, and that he won't sell Danny's friends a drink that's intended for Danny, either. Danny got upset and argued some more. Harold physically grabbed Danny to try and move him to the door - Danny punched Harold in the face. They fought, shouting, for a few seconds until other bar patrons separated them and shoved Danny out the door."

Write write write.

"Is Harold willing to talk about this?"

"Yes. Right now I imagine he's cleaning up the mess they made, spilled drinks and so on."

"How would someone recognize Harold's bar while pastwatching? And when did this happen?"

"It happened yesterday evening at nine-thirty." She gives the address. The bar area isn't warded, even though much of the rest of the place is. "I'm also not sure how our rules should apply - we agreed to some town-level rules when we came here, but of course it isn't official until the governor says so, and we haven't addressed at all how to handle, mm, collisions. It would be terribly unfair to punish a man twice for one crime. And if we consider the behavior of some random belul a crime by town rules but Ira Sani doesn't, that's a potential conflict too. Perhaps we should have addressed this sooner, but we were busy not starving and building businesses."

"New Dover is private property, right? Of course you can enforce your rules on your own property, I suggest you post signs at your borders if you want visitors to follow them. How do you expect that to complicate this case?"

"Yes, it's all private property - the 'public' areas of pooled into a collective ownership contract that transfers to the office of the Mayor, and the Mayor administrates the whole thing and will appoint a sherrif and a tax collector and so on... That's a bodge, though. And it might not complicate this case, but say, what if we decided the penalty for this crime was repaying the damage and a fine of fifty rings and a ban from entering any bars for a year. Would the state and imperial law just - let us handle it, or would you further punish the offender, or what?"

"If Harold, as the wronged party and the property owner, asks us to let you handle it we will. If he doesn't, we won't. Your bars can refuse service to anyone for any amount of time for any reason."

"What about someone who wants imperial law to handle it but New Dover would prefer to punish the offender ourselves and not involve imperial law? Wait- Let's pretend the mayor - the controller of the communal property by our group land-ownership contract - decides to post signs everywhere saying that land beyond this point belongs to New Dover and is considered private property of the New Dover Council and the following list of crimes will be judged and punished by the New Dover Council and will not be punishable under imperial law... I can't imagine that will be acceptable on the face of it. But most of New Dover's landowners have strong objections to some aspects of imperial law, you see, and would like to be under different ones at least at home."

"You can make entrance to New Dover conditional on agreeing to waive the right to imperial justice and specify a penalty for breach of contract but we won't refuse to punish a criminal over the victim's objections. If you didn't want to be under Hari law you should have thought of that before coming here."

"Yes, we understand that. It wouldn't be a problem for most of us except for institutional slavery. Would crimes where both the victim and criminal are in New Dover and have agreed to that waiver be pursued by imperial law?"

"If the victim doesn't change their mind, then you'll be left alone."

"So they can reverse their agreement to that waiver and seek imperial justice anyway? And that's what the contract penalty is for, they'll just get bit by that?"

"Yes, exactly."

So they can make the penalty for pursuing imperial justice over New Dover justice fairly steep and all proceeds get devoted to a charitable fund of some kind or another, and probably drive out some of the profitable visitors but be safer for things on the level of bar fights or petty shoplifting in New Dover itself in the future. She's already predicting stores whose counters stride the property line, so shoppers need not sign the waiver. But that's not her problem yet. One thing at a time. 

She makes a 'hmm' noise and searches her memory for how imperial and Ira Sani law interacts with contracts and failure to pay them, etc. They can't very well make New Dover justice the penalty for failing to submit to New Dover justice. Failure to pay the contract fine generally means enslavement - but the New Dover government can't very well go be having slaves for years - maybe if they call them prisoners - and can't release them without some liability under the law, and can't morally execute them unless the original crime was appropriately severe.

She sighs and mutters, "Maybe I should've stayed in Milliways." Louder, she says, "Well, we'll think about that later. What should I do for Harold now?"

"Oh, he has you handling this for him? You can tell him I'd like to see him. He can come here or I can visit New Dover."

"I think he'll want me there when you talk to him. We can probably travel here for that. I'll ask what's best and get back to you."

"I'd like it if you'd do that. I don't think I need anything else from you right now."

"I'll see myself out, then."

She goes back to New Dover.

She's back in the government office the next day, a bearded man following.

"Welcome, Harold. You're here about the human who refused to leave your bar two days ago?"

He glances at Katherine. Katherine nods.

"Yep."

"I'd like it if you'd explain all the events that led up to that night, and the events of that night, in as much detail as you can."

"So, she told you 'bout tabs, right? I let people run tabs if they ain't proven themselves misers yet, they tend to spend more that way, it's part of the experience. Danny's - well, I thought he was just rough around the edges, I let him run up a fairly large tab, but I don't let folk drink themselves into a pit. Ain't proper. So I told him I was cutting him off for the day and reminded him of 'is tab."

"Mhm. Oh," he says, looking at Katherine, "can you go bring us copies of the imperial and state laws? Sorry, please continue."

She raises one eyebrow, as if to say 'I see what you're doing there', or perhaps 'you don't have them memorized?' - and nods and turns and leaves.

"-So I told him I was cutting 'im off. He pleads, he asks his buddies for a round, no way. When I cut you off for the night, you're cut off. But the damnfool started shouting and arguing. So I told him to get out."

"Are you being threatened into not seeking justice?"

Harold blinks. "Yer Honor Judge, if I decide not to seek justice for this it'd be 'cause I don't want a fellow man to end up a slave. Some of us weren't as eager to move in here as others, but we brits stick together. Lady Katherine's the one who's read all your laws and talked to you about it. She's not got a gun to the back of me head."

"If you're sure. Have you decided not to seek justice, or are you still thinking about it?"

"Depends on what you're gonna do to him. He's a bastard but he don't deserve criminal bondage, eh?"

Katherine comes back in with the copies of the legal codes. "Here we are."

"Thank you." He tosses her a ring and double-checks a couple of relevant lines since he has them right there. "Well, under applicable laws, unless there was a specific time when he was expected to pay off his tab, he's only guilty of attempting to trespass. A first offense carries a 4896 ring fine. If you think Danny can pay that and won't do it again it's not likely he'll end up enslaved."

Harold furrows his brow. "Mm. Tabs can sit however long, I don't give folk a deadline. Might start. He does need a kick in the pants..."

Katherine adjusts her glasses slightly. "The fine goes to the imperial government, correct? How long would Danny have to gather the money and pay the fine? Is he not guilty of assault, because our dear barkeep put his hands on him first?"

"It would depend on the judge. I can tell you which you want, some are more willing than others to let people pay fines in installments. Most judges would say he was just fighting back, and Harold was just defending his property, and not convict either of them of assault."

And if the fine can't come in installments, they'll give Danny a loan.

Katherine nods sharply. "That's sensible, the assault thing. We appreciate your help with this. How much do judges vary?"

"No judge in the world would say Harold committed assault. You'd have to go track down an elderly caralendar in Cloudbreak if you wanted a judge to say Danny did. There's nowhere near that kind of agreement about paying fines in installments."

Depending on what being a judge looks like she might be able to find a moral, anti-slavery person who considers it a civic duty to become a judge. She's schemed openly in front of this officer enough, though. She's not sure whether there's anything to gain from leaning to let imperial law handle this, or leaning to let New Dover do it internally.

So she says, "That resolves all my concerns. I don't think Danny would have much of a problem with the money if it can be paid in installments. Harold, I think either path you could take will be alright - imperial justice to kick him in the pants and make sure he learns his lesson, but which might decide he's a slave if he continues doing crimes, or we could find something appropriate internally."

Harold scowls and says, "Throw the book at 'im. The bloke needs a scare."

"We can have him arrested soon. How should we contact you to let you know when we've set a time for the trial?"

"You do mail? We'd get a letter back home. Or you can tell Kat next time she stops by to check, like."

"You'll get a letter within a day of a trial date being set. And, of course, Kat can come ask. Anything else you need today?"

"Nope. That's the end of it, sir."

"Thank you again," Kat says as they leave.

The next day a force mage and a defense mage visit New Dover to arrest Danny.

Danny is not immediately findable! And random New Dovites aren't particularly eager to help find him.

The caralendar force mage takes something small and enchanted out of a case and asks if Danny is visible right now.

"Not now. Last I saw he was walking in to a building..."

He describes the building. A short time later the force and defense mages show up at the alarm clock factory where he works and knock on the door.

The alarm clock factory also manufactures other things, watches and miniature cars have sold well.

Knocking doesn't bring anyone to the door. A sign in English and Hari does, however, say 'ROST MANUFACTURING - DELIVERIES AND PICKUPS GO TO SIDE DOOR - OTHER INQUIRIES PLEASE COME IN'.

Then they'll come in and inquire.

The door opens on a sort of office area with a desk and some sample products on display and some comfy seating. There's a loud beep when they open the door. Large windows allow a view into a clean and organized industrial space with half a dozen humans - including Danny - and one belul in it, all doing some kind of work with the weird tools. A man working with some spinning tool notices the noise and stops the spinning and walks from the work area to the office to meet the two visitors.

"Jeremy Rost, Rost Manufacturing, what can I do for ya?"

"We're with the imperial government, looking for Danny, a human we believe works here."

"Danny works here, yeah. I'm guessin' this is about the bar fight."

"Yes."

"You officers going to oblige me to fetch him right now? 'Cause I'm not entirely up-and-up on what the law permits you to do and I'd rather go find Lady Katherine if anything legal is going to happen here."

They can see him through the window. The caralendar can even tell which human is Danny and is watching him.

"We can wait while you find her," she says.

"Please have a seat." Jeremy Rost indicates the various chairs.

He sits at his own desk and pokes at a thing on it and holds a different thing attached by a cord up to his ear and waits for a minute before saying,

"Hello, Katherine. Some imperial government types are asking- Yes, Danny. How do I tell if they are legitimate? ...I see. Okay, could you come over here when you get a moment? I'd rather be sure. Of course. Thank you."

He sets the thing down. "She will be here in five to ten minutes."

The caralendar takes a chair but keeps looking through the window. The agerah sits on the floor. They wait.

Jeremy does paperwork at his desk, glancing warily at the visitors once in a while. The people inside keep working on various machines.

Katherine arrives before too long, hair tied up neatly, looking prim and proper as always, carrying a notebook and pen. "Hello. I am Katherine. Jeremy would like me to examine your imperial emblems, just to be sure there are no problems here."

They both stand so their pendants are clearly visible, but don't take them off.

She carefully compares them to the (clearly and boldly watermarked) verification amulet she pulls from a pocket.

"They're legitimate, Jeremy."

Jeremy sighs. "Don't suppose you'll let me keep him until the end of his shift? Being down a worker shakes up the schedule."

"When is the end of his shift?" asks the agerah.

"Six PM. Eight to six, with an hour break for lunch. Suppose in the spirit of cooperatin' I could probably manage without him after lunch without losing too much time, that's only in an hour. I'll need to hire someone else for tomorrow anyway, sounds like."

"We can wait until lunch," says the agerah.

"Least you didn't come barging in and rifling through my stuff like the bobbies did in London. I don't think he'll bolt or anything. He's a bit stupid but not that stupid. Thanks for stopping by, Katherine. I won't keep you."

Jeremy stands up and heads for the workshop door.

They watch carefully but don't try to stop him.

He goes back to work. He talks to everyone in the workshop, including Danny, but they can't hear about what. Danny doesn't bolt.

Katherine asks them, "As long as you're waiting, mind if I ask some questions about imperial law enforcement? There are some things I still don't understand..."

"Sure," says the caralendar, still watching Danny.

So she quizzes them on law enforcement for a while. She does a good 'innocently curious'. She's mostly curious about what kind of people become officers and judges and so on and what kind of schooling or experience they tend to have and how the whole organization is structured (though she's a bit more subtle about the last bit).

They look for knowledge mages and people who are good at making it easy for people to report crimes and deal with law enforcement. They look for people with quick reflexes and good magic for subduing people nonlethally. It's very important to the imperial government to subdue suspects nonlethally whenever possible. Judges are appointed based on their ability to consider all relevant aspects of a situation and make judgments that make the empire safer and more peaceful. Imperial judges are almost never appointed without a year of study and the endorsement of one of Har's law schools, that's happened twice in the last hundred forty-four years and both of those judges are noted autodidacts who've proven themselves over and over.

They seem to consider explaining these things a public service and part of the job the government is paying them for.

She might be a good person to make it easy to report crimes and deal with law enforcement, but mostly with this one little community. They trust her and she thinks getting them to cooperate with imperial law is important.

Where are the law schools? What's the pace of study and tuition like? If they know, that is.

"My great-great-grandmother negotiated the surrender of the Confederacy," says the caralendar, "and the most important concession she got was that the government of the State of Anavel Sani would be chosen from the clans. It's the most important thing for peaceful integration. We both want that. So let me know if I can help you. I don't know much about the process of becoming a judge, though."

"I know something about law school and you could make it worth my while to tell you," says the agerah.

"I may well take you up on that," she tells the caralendar. "Perhaps over tea, some other time. I've found that caralendri generally enjoy tea like humans do."

And to the agerah, "A ring to tell me the names and locations of the four most credible in your opinion law schools, and another ring to describe how to get into them and what tuition is like, and another ring to describe what kinds of skills and knowledge help you in law school."

"Sasai College west of Har City, Lanbari School of Imperial Law and Precedent in Lanbari, College of Devor in Elit City, Achav School of Law in Achav. Enrollment might work differently at different schools, I only know how it works at Achav. You take a test, if you fail you can't enroll, if you pass there's an auction and they take the top-bidding however many students graduated or dropped out since the last auction. You should read laws you don't need to know before you start, building codes for states you don't live in, that kind of thing. And read Iri-Reiu on the purpose of the law."

She writes this all down and hands over the rings. She gets the caralendar's mail address before leaving again. The factory workers continue to work. A lot of the machines seem to be automatic or semi-automatic.

She's back a few minutes before a loud bell rings. "That's their lunch bell," she explains. "I'm sure Jeremy will fetch Danny in just a moment. Do you know if the court date has been set?"

Jeremy is talking to Danny. Danny suddenly looks much more nervous and upset and makes large arm gestures. Jeremy keeps talking and Danny calms down again, looking very sad and angry. The pair come out to the reception area.

"Danny Champ, you're under arrest on suspicion of trespassing."

"I won't run. You do statements of arrest-ees' rights around here? Right to remain silent, right to a speedy trial and so on?"

"Suspects detained before trial are allowed sleep, privacy from the general public but not from the imperial government, and clean water if detained more than a day. You will be tried or released within twelve days. Now give me your hands," says the caralendar. She has a pair of bracelets for him. They're visibly different than any of the ones in use for slaves.

"Damn creepy slave magic..." He holds his hands out, though.

And on they go. They don't do anything very noticeable.

And if no one else has any questions or concerns the force mage will fly them away.

Katherine asks, "Is his court date set yet?"

Danny is sullen and silent.

"Not yet," says the caralendar.

Danny's boss says, "You'll have your job back when you get out, and count yourself lucky for that much."

Danny winces. "Just take me away already..."

They fly. All the way to Riuhiu.

Danny is not talking to anyone unless he has to.

He doesn't have to.

The next day Harold receives a letter inviting him to the trial, which will be in a couple of days.

Then he shows up at the trial dressed up fancy, with Lady Katherine.

The room where the trial is held is not hidden and a sign in Hari warns him that giving testimony under illusions is prohibited.

He's asked if he would like to briefly describe for the court how Danny wronged him. It seems to in fact be an invitation and not an order disguised as an invitation.

Do they want, like, the actual order of events from Harold's perspective? Or descriptions of the way it hurt Harold? Or what?

"Anything you're afraid we'd fail to take into consideration. If something only makes sense in your cultural context, or in the context of something that happened months ago, you might want to explain that. If there were five incidents and you only reported one, you could fix that now, but I really hope that's not the case. Otherwise, if it were me I wouldn't say anything."

"I cut people off all the time and they argue a little bit all the time. It's not that surprisin' to argue a bit. Only reported this'n because he kept arguin', and hit me when I made him leave."

"Thank you. Anything else?"

"Don't think so." Danny's not that great at holding his drink, but it's bad form to say that to a judge, especially as a barkeep.

The scene is projected on one wall. The judge watches what happened, up till Danny is out of the bar. He comes to a judgment almost immediately.

"We find Danny Champ guilty of one count of trespassing. As a first offense this carries a fine of four thousand eight hundred ninety six rings. Pay it within twenty four days or come talk to me if you need more time."

"Might need more time, sir... Prolly not, but might. And who do I even pay it to?"

"You bring it here, to this building, or send someone to pay it for you. How much more time do you think you might need?"

"That's two months' rent, your honor, if nobody will give me a loan it might take two months to get it all. If I give someone money to go pay it off and they go and buy a horse with it or something that's theft, right? What happens if I can't pay?"

"That's theft, yes, and we'd have your money returned to you when the thief was caught. If you can pay at all I'd like that to happen, even if you need to pay in installments for a year. If you absolutely can't pay at all, I'll have you sold, but we'll try not to let that happen."

Aah, being sold! "I can pay! Still got a job. Kick the drinking habit. Might need a couple months but I will pay your honor thank you that's all I wanted to ask your honor."

When that's over with the New Dovites are ushered out of the courtroom and in go some furious bloodthirsty beluli. A police officer takes Danny's bracelets off. There are surveys if Harold feels like filling one out and letting the imperial government know how satisfied he is with imperial justice.

'Imperial justice is really weird, but at least faster than British justice' would not be very helpful. The three New Dover humans talk quietly - a bit tense, but civilly, anyway - and go buy tickets for the shuttle automaton to New Dover that some enterprising type set up.

Meanwhile, Nik mostly has broadcast TV sorted out. The receiver should cost about 250 rings to make in bulk, a standalone screen-and-controller about 500, or you can use one of his computers for it. Broadcast equipment will run at least 50,000 rings but can totally send whatever and run at least a dozen channels (he also explains the concept of channels). You can make little cards that allow the receiver to understand the broadcast, and set them for only a couple of channels, or only for four months, or whatever. You can sell subscriptions in this way. An upgrade to the broadcast equipment is in the works but at minimum a year or two out. He's very interested in just making the stuff and letting someone else deal with all the complicated business dealings.

He sends a letter saying as much to that one director of illusion shows and perhaps she'd like to visit or invite him up to visit and they can work out a deal. He sends another one to the imperial government and to Valanda's office, perhaps they could run The Law Will Find you and executions on one channel, and the language tutorials and the laws on another, and so on.

She immediately sends him an invitation to meet with her in her home on the mainland.

The imperial government takes longer to get back to him.

Arranging shipping of sample products is annoying. He does it anyway. Being rich is safety, in this world.

Hello illusion show producer where would you like to talk about stuff?

She invites him into a room clearly meant to hold more than two people at a time. All along a wall that definitely didn't have visible windows as seen from the outside, there are spectacular arched windows, each one a mosaic of clear and stained glass. It might be a dining room. There's a table with seats for sixteen that she gestures for him to sit at.

"Would you like a salad while we talk?"

"I'm afraid salads don't agree with me - not quite human, see - But thank you for offering. My, this is a nice place, though."

He sits.

She sits across from him. "As I understand it, you have a set of working prototype technologies that can do one-to-many and many-to-one communications and you'd like to profit from that but the negotiations with illusion show producers would be more hassle than you'd like. Do you have any other ideas about what you'd like from me or would you like me to figure out all the details and suggest something?"

"Broadly, yes. Systems for one to many are ready and what I brought examples of today. A different invention that will do both one to many and many to one needs more work, perhaps a year or two. The second one relies heavily on computers, which I don't think you actually have any of, since you got the single-purpose encryption machines instead? Media distribution companies where I'm from made a lot of money with advertisements and subscriptions, but you'd know what will work here far better than I. I can definitely demonstrate the technology whenever you want to do that."

"Many-to-one will be the more important breakthrough, otherwise I'm not sure what the benefit of using this technology is compared to using magic. Is there any way I can help that happen faster?"

"Eh, just needs time. Time and testing. I'm not strapped for cash or anything. The stuff I have for one-to-many might still be an improvement over magic, you can change the program at any time, add new ones easily, let people choose which show to watch, that sort of thing."

"How does this version let people choose which show to watch?"

"You run multiple shows in parallel, and they choose which 'channel' to look at. With enough channels you could have one for each show, or even multiple ones per show on different episodes. I could also get you a thing that will write illusion shows onto chips that my computers can play, pause, go back to the beginning, or skip ahead, at any time."

"That would be very useful, yes. How many channels can someone have available to choose between? How big is the viewing hardware?"

"Number of channels largely depends on the quality of the broadcasting equipment. A dozen will be relatively cheap and easy, 144 would be pushing it with my current set of techniques. And if lots of other people want broadcast channels too I may have to limit them a bit or you could interfere with each other. The receiver is about two feet long and weighs five points - and it has to have a cord feeding into one of my computers or a standalone screen device. The screen can be fairly flat and lightweight, less than an inch thick. I'm working on more portable computers, too."

"It'll take a lot of new shows to make that better than buying illusions. If I had two dozen new shows to release exclusively for your broadcast I could guarantee you a market, but I don't. Yet. Will this hardware be obsolete in a couple of years when you have the improved version working?"

"Hmm. I'm trying to design things to avoid that kind of obsolescence whenever possible. Aside from my first calculating machines, I did a lot of iterating before I started selling computers, I have standardized connectors and such. These antennas will let people connect to the internet, the many-to-one system, once that's a thing. Though, if you want six months to get a lineup of shows together before moving on this, that's probably enough time to switch from broadcast to satellite. A sat - or more likely a few dozen once I get the problems the first one needs fixed worked out - is pricier and puts extra steps in the chain of information, but it will be able to broadcast shows to anyone with a receiver on the continent at once and not just one city, and is probably more efficient in the long run."

"...Yes, if they'll only work within one city I don't know that any lineup I could offer you would be enough. Will people be able to decode the satellite broadcasts if they figure out how to make their own receivers?"

"I mean, you could set one up in every city that all show the same thing, but fair. With satellite broadcasting, I can't guarantee that it's totally impossible but it will at minimum be difficult. If it's done I'd have no way to tell that it's been done, though. Internet streaming, the version in a couple of years, also not necessarily impossible but still difficult, and probably more detectable. The cost of internet streaming will scale with the number of viewers and the cost of satellite broadcasting will not, though. I don't have exact numbers for either yet. Also, I don't actually have any way to stop people from making illusions of shows themselves once it appears on the screen, or using another device to record it again, unless magic I don't know about can do that."

"You can hide the screen from knowledge magic... oh, but not from cameras. That'll be a problem already, I bet it's only a matter of time before some enterprising thief figures out how and I have to rethink how I make money from my work... is that a problem where you came from?"

"Yes on both counts. I'm kind of reluctant to redesign my screens and my cameras to be incompatible with each other, and cryptography only goes so far. There were also intellectual property laws that banned copying, but I think they were badly designed. Modern media companies mostly relied on the fact that people are lazy and will get their media from whoever is most convenient, and try to make buying the media cheaper than spending time trying to get it for free would be, and accept that smart and determined media thieves will get their media free, and just try to get by with everyone else's money."

"Hm." She pauses and thinks. "...I have ideas and I'm interested but I think I need time to get more shows ready to release with your technology and work on ways of profiting that will be resilient against spies. If you spend that time making satellites, will you be able to use them for anything else?"

"Yes. Satellites are also critical internet infrastructure. It's either sats or tens of thousands of miles of fiber optic cable, and sats are cheaper because force mages exist."

"Will you be interested in a similar deal for your internet? You make it and I figure out how to make it make you rich?"

"Eh. I'm gonna be more involved on the internet itself. I don't know how to make shows - I know how to run an internet, more or less. I do want people to find the internet and computer programs compelling so they buy more computers, build an ecosystem of business, ya know?"

They discuss business for a couple of hours.

Afterward she asks him if he'd like to join her family for their game night in a couple of days, if he's still in town then.

"Well, that depends on the games. And the size of the group, I think."

"If you come we should have twenty-five. I don't know how familiar you are with games here, if I say Magic Ladders and the Garden of Seihra-Gara and that kind of thing, does that answer your question?"

"Wow, big group. Yeah, not really. Local board games have not been my priority. Settlers of Catan and Power Grid and Monopoly are at least as meaningless to you, I expect."

"They are, but you could bring them and teach people. The Garden of Seihra-Gara is about adding things to a landscape and it's... reasonably representative. I'd be honored to teach you."

"I don't have a copy of any of those board games, though I could probably whip up a chess set. Yeah, I've got a few days of appointments and busywork here, I think I'd like to stop by and play some board games. It'll be fun. Where and when?"

"Day after tomorrow, we try to start, oh, about two hours before sunset. People might be as much as a sixth of an hour earlier or later than that."

"I'll be here."

And he is.

She shows him to what might be a living room. Nine of her husbands and three of her children are there already. One of the men is posing riddles to the kids when he arrives, one is arranging a game board so it aligns perfectly with the table it's on, one is reading a scroll, three are already playing some kind of card game that involves numbers somehow and another three are cuddling on some cushions in a corner. All of them stop to greet Nick. Lanisal introduces everyone.

How... Homey, in an alien sort of way. He can see the social structure here and it's always going to be a bit weird to him. And he's keenly aware of where everyone is - and how he's usually such an introvert who never feels quite safe in a room full of other people.

But he is polite and greets everyone back with a smile and says to Lanisal, "This should be fun. Oh, after I left the other day I thought maybe I should sell you a computer and programming books at a discount. Programming is going to be a big thing, after all, and being familiar with computers will help you run a media network on them. I've also managed to make a simple chess set if anybody wants to learn that game, but it's one-versus-one."

"Oh, wonderful. I bet Seli would like to try chess. Where and when should I meet you to get the computer and books?"

"I have some in a storage unit, been demoing them, I can show you tomorrow morning. Chess is nice, but it's not a group game. What other games are in the works?"

"Tomorrow should work for me. We're just waiting for Lialan to get here before we can play a game of Magic Ladders, I don't know if chess takes too long for it to be worth starting a game while - oh, never mind," she says as Lialan walks in. "That's him now." She formally introduces them and gestures for both of them to follow her to the table with the game board sitting on it very neatly. There don't seem to be any pieces or dice or anything else but the board itself.

"Chess can take a while, maybe an hour at the outside. I do need the rules of Magic Ladders explained, mind."

"We take turns stacking illusions. We pretend they're real enough to need something to hold them up. We measure how high the lowest part of an illusion is and award more points the higher it is. You can cancel your own illusion at no cost, then anything that falls shatters and everyone who added those loses points. Nothing can touch the table outside the board, that's out of bounds. You can make your illusions whatever shape you want. ...Oh, and you trace the shapes in the air or describe them, you don't need to be an illusion mage to play."

"Hmm. Interesting. Are there rules for allowable shapes and so on?"

"No, but everyone has two chances to veto any shape for any reason. You have to do that as soon as it's played and that player retries that turn without a penalty. In practice that means, oh, no pillars standing on the entire board and stretching to the ceiling. ...Standard rules call for a random turn order and we almost never do that, want to pick a number or randomize it?"

Meanwhile most of the others are coming over to sit around the table, except the three who don't feel like leaving their card game. Someone taps the board and a series of marks appears in the air, like a yardstick standing up next to the board, repeated at every corner.

"I have a feeling I'll lose, just because of unfamiliarity with the usual strategies. How do you choose who goes first?"

"So it has to do with our ongoing household chore competition..."

She explains how it works and tells him the current turn order.

Nik makes pleasant small talk and plays, with rapid fire descriptions of his moves when his turn comes. A vampire mind's speed has no special advantage in spatial reasoning. Plus, he's never played before. He'll probably lose.

It turns out it's mostly not about spatial reasoning. As this family plays it it's mostly about alliances between players. People make alliances, build towers together, try to convince their enemies to turn on each other, test each other's loyalty.

Lanisal plays to keep Nik from coming in last. She leaves him openings to build on her towers if he trusts her enough to take them. She avoids moves that would ruin plays he looks like he might be setting up.

Hmm.

...He decides to play like the Joker. Wild card. Arranging alliances and then not taking any benefit from them. Randomly breaking one of his pieces with no clear strategic goal. Making sure his shapes rely on as many different others as possible.

He takes what Lanisal offers, too, and doesn't fail to notice. He winks. 

Somehow all this culminates in him making sure that two different alliances will lose most of their advantage if he wants them to. And he's been playing so erratically, can they trust him? Can they bribe him? Who knows.

...This is fun.

Most everyone seems happy about this, except one of the kids.

Lanisal vanishes a piece that doesn't quite make everything above it fall, but will if anyone tries to build right over the gap in the foundation right now. Building on the other side should stabilize it, though, and that means the Seli-Renbar-Lialan alliance will have to build on foreign ground, so to speak, or crash everything and take the penalty. Seli eyes an enemy tower but Lialan's turn comes first and he brings everything down. Half the pieces in play shatter and disappear. Nik loses his kingmaker position in the crash, but the other alliance seems to decide Lanisal is on their side and since she's on Nik's side so are they. The resulting alliance is big and powerful and definitely going to fall apart before the end of the game.

Late arrivals who stop and watch before going off to play cards with each other seem very entertained.

He'll just go back to trying to build a kingmaker position again, then. With many contingencies this time. This sort of elaborate alliance-building and betrayal is fun for a while, he can think of it in terms of market maneuvering and competitors, but he's starting to get tense since he feels vaguely like an intruder. It would have helped if there were anyone but him who wasn't in Lanisal's family here, but there's not.

"How long does this game usually tend to run anyway?"

"I'd expect us to take about another twelfth of an hour unless everyone suddenly gets tired of it and wants to quit," Lanisal says. "Which has happened, but I don't think anyone wants to stop early tonight, you're a lot of fun to play with."

Most of the others voice agreement with that.

"Variety is the spice of life. You probably all know each others' styles, and I'm new and shiny and tricky, eh?" He laughs.

Next time it's his turn he abandons his conservative kingmaker strategy and starts building high again.

There are a couple not-very-strategically-interesting rounds of the giant alliance stacking unreasonably artistic pieces on top of each other and vanishing pieces when someone else tries to play.

Then someone refuses to be the one to vanish their piece and the next person down refuses too and the glaring match that follows is very understated and nonviolent but there's no longer a giant alliance after that. And now some of the players aren't playing to win, they're playing to make specific other players lose. No one is playing to make Nik lose (yet) and if he keeps it that way and just plays very boring conservative moves he'll probably end up scoring in the top half but it'd take something more than that for him to have a chance at winning.

...He makes a bid for the top three, counting on Lanisal to support him at a critical moment. If she does, he might win. If she doesn't, it'll have been an interesting game.

She does and he places second. Literally everyone congratulates him, all of them sincerely, including some people who weren't even in the game. All the players tell him he's welcome to play with them again. The sincerity there ranges from the one who doesn't care much and is being polite to the one who would play him five more times tonight if anyone else wanted to play five more rounds, which no one does.

Some people start setting up for another very multiplayer board game and invite Nik, if he's interested. They overlap some with the set that was playing magic ladders and it's mostly not the same people but the one whose idea it is to invite Nik is one of the ones who just played magic ladders.

Lanisal's not playing this one. Neither is the young man she mentioned would probably like to learn chess.

In one corner of the room an old man, visibly older than Lanisal, starts playing something that could arguably be called a lyre.

"I usually find games with more than five or so players aren't my favorites, but that was fun. I think I want to teach Seli chess for now."

Seli is thrilled to hear that. He finds a space for them by one wall.

He explains chess, the various pieces, capturing, castling, pawns getting two moves if they haven't yet moved, et cetera.

"You'll probably lose, to be honest. I've been playing this game for years. If I start down a few pieces, think it'd be more even and interesting, or nah?"

"Then it wouldn't be very good practice for playing against someone who has all their pieces, would it?"

"If you say so. Tradition holds that first mover has a slight advantage, you take white."

He starts by moving a knight out and watching Nik's reaction.

He schools his face blank-slightly-smirking, and moves the pawn in front of his king one step forward.

He frowns at the board for a while and then moves his own king's pawn forward a step.

Queen advances two spaces diagonally, and then he starts assembling a staggered pawn line if nothing needs immediate action on the next couple of turns.

Seli gets some of his powerful pieces out but doesn't seem sure how to make the best use of them. He gets the idea of protecting valuable pieces but the protections aren't anywhere near adequate, he'll come out worse if Nik starts capturing pieces.

Nik trades one of his pawns for a bishop when the opportunity presents itself, but mostly focuses on moving pieces into controlling positions so Seli can't do much without putting some piece of his into danger.

After a while Seli gets too overwhelmed to keep trying to win and switches to trying things at random to see why exactly they're bad. He pays careful attention to everything Nik does, trying to figure out what the strategy is.

He doesn't particularly obscure it! Two fundamentals are making a move that threatens two valuable units at once, and you can only save one. Another is making a move that sets it up so that the opponent can't move a piece, or else expose an opportunity to capture something else for free.

Nik's strategy is 'control the center, pin him down, and take his pieces one by one'.

"Check."

He's aware he's losing but he plays out the last few moves anyway, even though even he can see where the string of forced moves will end up. It's fascinating. It's fun.

He's a very gracious loser. He thanks Nik for teaching him.

"You're welcome. Chess is fun. Haven't had a chance to play it much lately. Or games at all, really. Couldn't make myself relax while I was insecure and poor. Busy busy busy busy inventing things. But now I have an industry and a business and can afford to let up a bit."

"You know she's deciding whether to ask you to join the family, right? So you could just invent and play games and not worry about ending up poor again."

...Sigh.

"I sort of suspected as much. Thing is, I'm a human man, not a caralendar one. Suffice to say, reverse harem doesn't really appeal. Ignore that, cultural reference. Having something all on my own is important, too. Motives and desires are complicated, eh? But I can certainly make a lot of money working with her."

"Well, you don't have to - wait, back up, you're human? I thought you were some kind of blood-drinking parasite species."

Oh hey a topic change. "Cursed human, technically speaking. Not of this world. It's a whole thing. I could turn more humans, maybe other species, haven't experimented, don't plan to."

"...Yeah, uh, don't turn more people into carnivores, it's really inefficient."

"I might be able to get vat-grown meat to work if I tried very hard and hired inheritance mages. But, fair. There are other drawbacks too. I wouldn't have chosen it were it optional."

"It wasn't? That's terrible. Did the government where you came from catch whoever did it to you?"

Oh great this again. "That would be a no. I don't like telling this story."

"Okay. ...If they somehow find this world, randomly assaulting people we care about is the kind of thing that could turn the whole clan against them. Just so you know."

"Oh, she's dead. And I'm still probably not going to get any closer than 'friendly', not that I don't like you all, but it's the way I am."

"Then stay friendly. Want me to tell her not to bother asking?"

"Mm." He'd better face this with something approaching seriousness after all. "Probably, yeah. But first, you were going to say something a minute ago, 'well, you don't have to-'?"

"You don't have to join the family. You don't have to be one of us to be a friend of the family and you don't have to be a friend to do business with Lanisal. And you clearly don't need a woman. Or a business partner. Or friends. But whichever of those you want you can have."

"...Yeah. Friends perhaps, and business partners certainly, but not family. I wouldn't be very healthy for one of those, and one wouldn't be particularly healthy for me either."

"Oh." Seli, who has never not had a family, is horrified. "Anyway can we play again?"

"Sure." It's bound to be more fun than talking about this.

This time he goes for a highly aggressive strategy, trying to trap Seli's king and willing to lose pieces doing it.

Seli plays noticeably better this time. He tries to control the center. He defends his pieces better. By sheer point value of pieces lost he's not that far behind this time.

But he doesn't anticipate the trap. It's not a long game. He's a gracious loser this time too.

"I do like chess. The best two-player board games have fairly simple rules but scads of strategy you can learn and master. Maybe I should publicize it, see if it gets popular. Maybe I should teach you Go. Scrabble doesn't work if you don't know English... Mahjong, or the Game of Ur? And I should learn some more local games, as well."

"We have some that don't need lots of players, I can teach you some of those if you want?"

"I tend to like five-or-less-people sorts of games, so I think that'd be fun, yeah."

"Hm. Do you think you'd like a card game, or only board games?"

"Either's fine. Is there a standard deck of cards? There's one back home, but probably not the same one."

"I'll show you." He gets one out of the nearest cabinet, unboxes it, spreads the cards face-up between them where the chessboard was. "So there are forty nine cards but this one's a wildcard, it's not used in every game. There are four suits: scrolls, bottles, people, plants. And each suit has one card for every magic. We start every game by shuffling the deck so the cards are in a random order. There are a couple I think you might like..." He describes both of them briefly and lets Nik pick which one to try.

"Ours has thirteen cards of four suits, and two wild cards. Probably close enough to the same."

He wants to try both, honestly.

He's good at games just by how his mind runs so quickly, especially if they're amenable to card-counting. He tries to distract himself enough not to track which cards are which by the little marks and dings on their backs or literally watching the deck being shuffled, though.

The card backs are exactly identical. If there are any marks or dings they're hidden under an illusion.

The game Seli suggests they try first isn't all that competitive. There's a threshold you have to score above to be able to win, even if you score better than the other player. There's a second threshold that guarantees victory, if both players pass that one it's counted as a win for both. The gameplay is mostly based around building up sets of thematically similar cards.

And it's a lot easier to close his eyes as the shuffling goes and lose track of where exactly that heat of bottles went and if it's still next to the death of plants.

"Very cooperative, eh? Well, I can cooperate. Are we supposed to talk to each other or nah?"

"House rules say sure but lying's allowed. Some people do it differently."

"So do I actually trust you to not just take the win. Heh."

Nick is good at detecting lying. He can watch all the physical reactions to tension, assuming they're recognizable in a caralendar. He'll play nice and give Seli lots of help until and unless he detects lying.

Seli is very good at this and aims for the second threshold. The way score multipliers work that brings Nik's score up a little extra whenever he adds to Seli's sets.

He explains why he makes the moves he does. He's usually cagey about what he has in his hand, but sometimes he mentions other moves he wouldn't make even if he had the relevant cards and why he wouldn't make them.

Nik forms a pretty decent guess about what Seli has, and also aims for the second threshold. "This is something like an allegory. Working together creates greater things than fighting ever could, yadda yadda, and so on."

Seli laughs. "Yeah, and something about harmony. I guess that's what clans are for. And the empire too, I guess."

He doesn't play to keep Nik down, but beyond explaining his strategy he doesn't help much. It's not easy even without competition, Nik would have to be pretty far ahead of the curve to stand more than a tiny chance of winning his first game.

Card counting only helps if you know what cards to count.

He still manages to do surprisingly well for the first time he plays.

"Not bad, you could get really good at this if you keep it up. Want to try again?"

"Sure. Two chess, two of this."

"Want to try shuffling this time?"

"If I shuffle the cards there's a real chance I will memorize all their locations. Kind of an unfair advantage."

"How?"

"I'll know what's coming next and plan accordingly? Or how would I memorize them? Because vampires are kind of ridiculous that's how."

"That's the magic someone did to you? It must have a really horrible downside if you wouldn't've chosen it."

"Constant pain and thirst. Vulnerability to sunlight, though I have mitigated that. Vulnerability to something like command magic that can do affirmatives, from the one who turned me. Amplified emotions and impulses, especially negative and violent ones."

"...Yeah, that sounds pretty bad. Can I help with the amplified negative emotions somehow?"

"It's been sixty years, I've learned to cope. Just, being a vampire is not a walk in the park, and it's definitely something to learn to cope with, even if one ends up deciding the benefits are worth it."

"I bet that kind of memory is useful for something. Magic, maybe, what kind of mage are you?"

"You sure you want the answer to that one?"

"What, will it cost me or is it some kind of alien magic that's inherently gross?"

"I'm no kind of mage at all, apart from the vampirism curse. Most people from my homeland aren't. A small fraction of us are witches, and can do vampirism, death magic, knowledge magic, basically whatever with enough work - and the rest just... Aren't. We're still people, mind you, I've encountered the 'ahhh soulless zombie thing!' thing before."

"Oh, huh, so you only need a chance of having magic to select for intelligence. Cool. Oh, I should've guessed that, before we understood inheritance we practically only had eleven twelfths of people doing magic. What fraction of people in your world are witches?"

"Oh, no, the magic's hereditary. The dominant theory for why they didn't select the rest of us into extinction is that they tend to kill themselves a lot. And we think complex social structures with room for cheating and lying and so on are the selector for intelligence."

"Maybe that's true in your world but it definitely doesn't explain essi or agerah. I don't remember anyone ever telling me caralendri are older than essi, either."

"Yeah, humans are the only sentient species on Earth. For us dolphins, elephants, other primates close-ish on our evolutionary tree, octopi, pigs, some birds, are also considered smarter than your average animal but not people-smart. And none of them are witches as far as I know."

"Is it possible all your humans are descended from witches and... mutated to lose their magic somehow?"

"Well, it's not impossible. I don't have samples and a genetics lab, alas."

"That's probably what happened. Since lots of things are social and lie without being people. Like crows and ants."

"Who knows. Next game?"

He shuffles and deals and they can play again.

This time he lies outrageously - well, actually quite effectively, he's good at lying and bluffing - and tries his damnedest to keep Seli from scoring, trick him into passing up good cards or giving him a boost, and overall confuse the heck out of him.

Seli stops telling him anything, ignores everything Nik says, goes for a cutthroat low-scoring strategy of finishing open sets early to keep Nik from building on them. When he has to start sets he picks bad cards to define them, cards that are hard to build on, cards that close off options, cards that give the sets bad score multipliers or tricky counterintuitive rules. He's quiet and focused and intense and enjoying himself.

He only got one good sucker punch out of that. He should have saved it until Seli had picked a strategy, and undermined it.

Oh well.

Cutthroat spite-picking can go two ways, and Nik considers permutations upon permutations as they play, trying to get a feel for the layers of strategy in this game in less than five minutes.

He still scores less than Seli despite his best scrabbling grabby efforts.

Seli just barely hits the first threshold. When the game is over if Nik doesn't stop him he'll rip Nik's strategy apart pointing out a dozen different ways he could have implemented it better. Here's where he gave Seli a bad opening but not no opening and given what must've had in his hand at the time... here's a place where Seli had to give him an opening and he missed it...

"...but that was great, I almost lost! You're really good at this for a beginner. Really good. I like playing with you."

"Well, I had to use every ounce of my shiny vampire brain. This is a good game. I kept thinking I should have acted nice at first, and only turned it around once you set up something worth a bunch of points and I could steal it. Maybe I would have even won, who knows?"

"Ha. If you get someone less good at this than me maybe you can beat them but it'd be pretty close if you could do it at all. I think the only way you'll win playing with me any time this week at least is if we both do. ...Or maybe you can prove me wrong, that'd be fun."

"I have way too many other things to do to spend a whole week playing this, unfortunately. This evening is pretty much all I want to commit to fun and games for the next while. It's good relaxation, intellectually stimulating, but not in the same way as figuring out what the void is wrong with my inventions and why the stupid secret-thingy-sorry is doing the thing it's doing."

"That does sound fun. How'd you decide to invent things?"

"When I fled my home world for here, it turned out home has invented quite a lot more things. I'm still putting in a lot of work, I didn't know every aspect of every industry, but I have a treasure trove of ideas."

"Ah, well that's cool. And you're doing it all by yourself?"

"Mostly. When I perfect something I train up other people who can make and operate and sell it - same deal with Lanisal and her shows - but I'm trying to keep as much as possible under wraps with secrecy contracts when I absolutely needed to hire mages. Competitive advantage, you know."

"That makes sense. I'm still figuring out what I want to do with myself, you know?"

"Lot of humans are like that too. You seem pretty good at board games, can that be turned into a career? Hmm... You like thinking about systems and consequences and chains of action and optimizing playstyles, that kind of thing?"

"Yeah, I love that."

"You should come along with Lanisal tomorrow when I show her the computer. You might like programming. Telling the computer how to do complicated tasks. And while I can't pay you to learn it or anything, I can probably pay for completed programs soon, and knowing how to code will let Lanisal do new things with her media network without having to bug me for it, and when computers really take off, really good programmers are gonna make a mint. It happened that way in my world."

Seli grins. "Thanks! I will! Are there any kinds of programs in particular you want someone to make?"

"Computer games will probably be popular. If there are fun games you need a computer to play, more people buy computers. If more people buy computers, more people might also pick up your fun games. I'm also working on a lot of big, complicated, heavy utility and background programs and I'm not sure those projects would benefit much from having a junior programmer look at them. More the reverse. I can look for one that can be outsourced... Maybe a sound mixer, that's useful to have and probably not the best use of my time. Same with something that turns a bunch of data into shiny charts. There's options. This'd be in a few months once you sort of get it, though. I wrote a book on programming with a bunch of learning exercises and stuff too."

Seli almost forgets to answer that now that he's thinking about game-playing algorithms.

"...Yes. Yes, that sounds like a great idea."

"Well, tomorrow morning you can learn programming. For now, games. I kind of want to teach you Texas Hold 'Em. It's a betting game, card game, best with three to eight-ish players, but we can say, oh, we each get 144 worthless points to bet instead of putting up 144 rings and the winner is the one who has the most after 20 hands or something. I'm up for about any game though."

"If we can play it with the cards we have we might be able to get a third, depending on how you play it."

"We have thirteen sets not twelve but we can ignore the twos... On second thought, nah, instead show me another local game maybe?"

Seli shows him another local card game. After a round of that there's another very multiplayer game starting that they're both invited to join. And off Seli goes.

Very multiplayer is not his favorite thing in the world. He lurks in a corner for a minute, thinking about one of his projects, looking around to see if maybe he should leave.

The lyre-player stops playing and wanders over Nik-ward.

"Hey there. Know anything about your world's music?"

"Hey indeed. I know there's kind of a lot. Many genres, many instruments. Bit hard to sum up. And I'm no musician."

"Hm. How much for you to sing me something that was popular there?"

"Oh, I'm being friendly today, no charge. Hmm... I'm thinking something by Johnny Cash. Should I try to be quiet about it, or don't bother?"

"Oh, just be loud enough for me to hear you and quiet enough no one goes deaf."

"Well, it's got a guitar to it but I don't know the notation," he hums one loop of the central repeating guitar. "Missing some of the shakeups the original song does if you just repeat that, and it's meant for a guitar, but it'll do."

And then he sings "I Walk The Line" at a fairly low volume. It's a little bit of a love song, but not the kind that really hammers it in. He's not a great singer, but he gets the timing and tone right and tries to put some of that - subdued emotion - into it.

"That's very interesting. It's like the music is there to... decorate the talking. What does it mean?"

It loses the meter in Hari, but he says,

"I keep a close watch on this heart of mine

I keep my eyes wide open all the time

I keep the ends out for the tie that binds

Because you're mine, I walk the line."

"Johnny Cash has a very - low and even style of singing, yeah. That's just one singer, one genre, from when I was growing up. Rock music is something else entirely, for example. And classical. And pop. And electronic. Blues, jazz, country, disco, folk. There were a lot of people back home who came up with a lot of kinds of music. Though if you want talking-with-music I should try to remember a rap. Except I hate rap music, so, no."

"How many of those genres do you know at least one song in?"

"My tablet actually has a bunch of songs recorded on it. Just didn't bring it. Off the top of my head, rock, classical - at least the piano bits - pop, and something that's sort of a cross between electronic and pop. Classical takes a whole orchestra, dozens and dozens of players to execute correctly, and doesn't usually involve singing at all. And male voices aren't really ideal for pop but I could try. And rock loses something without enough instruments, but again, I can try."

"It'd be nice to hear your tablet, then. You didn't bring it to this continent or just not to game night?"

"Not to game night, I have it on the continent. You can't buy it - I could be convinced to play some songs off it for you for a few rings though."

Iramel smiles. "One ring for how many songs?"

"I don't want to let it out of my sight, so how about one per two songs but only as long as I'm talking computers with Lanisal and Seli?"

"What about one for four? It's not like you'd have any other use for it while you're having a conversation, would you?"

"Music while I'm trying to talk to someone is kind of annoying, and I have to pay attention to you using it so you don't look through my notes or something instead, and I'd have to interrupt you to show them anything off it if I wanted to. Two to one."

"Fine, have it your way, two to one and I'll pretend to be a morning person."

"Deal. The computers have a music-playing program too, by the way. The tablet is actually just an otherworldly computer, much faster and more advanced than ones I can make right now. If Lanisal only buys one it might get a bit monopolized, with such a big family, though."

"If it's any good I might just buy my own. - Is it? I don't know what they do besides show illusions and count."

He espouses the features of a computer! Word processors, spreadsheets, paint programs, games, clock and calculator, iffy quality music player, ability to use a bunch of peripherals he also sells, encryption and decryption, and all these other utility programs he's written, you just need to buy the chips for them. Soon(tm) computers will be able to send files and electronic mail to each other near-instantly. Also, ability to make new programs with some skill and effort.

"Yeah, she'll want one. And Seli and... yeah, a few of us will. What's wrong with the music player? Maybe I can fix it."

"The way the computer stores information is not ideally suited to music. Current models are just a bit too slow to read out saved music that sounds like it did when it was played."

"Does it help if the songs are slow? Or if you write them like they're faster than they are?"

"It's more about - how many different sounds are possible than how many you can play at once? My music encoding is pretty complicated, anyway. Maybe I'll see if Seli and you can improve it."

"Aha, so that's what you want with him. He'll be good at that kind of thing, shame you can't just take him to Ira Sani and have him work for you there."

"He's not the only programmer I'm recruiting. But yeah, the distance will slow things down. I can probably visit, or vice versa. I have to work with Lanisal to set up the media network too, and I can sell stuff and meet with other big businesses on those trips as well."

"You know, when you figure out how to make computer mail work, I bet she'll have ideas for that too."

"I was planning on selling the mail service and letting people figure out the rest."

"That works. - By the way, I heard you speak Ilan," he says, switching to Ilan. He's bluffing and watching Nick carefully.

He raises one eyebrow. "No, I am sure you didn't," He says, in Ilan. "But yes, I can. Mostly."

"Mm, sounds a little stiff. But not bad, for being new to it. I told her you'd've learned by now. Did she listen? Nope. Am I going to let her forget it? Nope. Making me speak Hari in my own home with my own family!"

Lanisal looks up at that. He meets her gaze. She's the first to look away.

...Huh. Still in Ilan, "Well, I also know some devin. I absorb languages by existing nearby, it feels like. And ways to program a computer are also called languages, but they're not the same really. Oh, idea, sheet music program and steady beat generator program on the computer, for practicing."

"Good ideas, might get some takers. The problem with playing music won't be a problem with playing beats?"

"The bigger the library of programs that might get some takers, the better. And no, beats can be done with a simple single tone, bum, bum, bum, bum. The problem with music is, uh, music being complicated."

"Hm. Is that a problem with whatever instrument your computers have, if you could attach them to a better instrument somehow would that fix it?"

"Partly. The instrument is sort of like a drum that can shake itself at whatever frequency it wants - but the computer can't make it play chords of more than two tones yet, and it has a limited range besides. I could explain it better tomorrow, with an example in front of me, probably."

"I might have fun working on that, I'll be there tomorrow. Pretending I'm a morning person."

"I could do just after lunch instead if you all prefer. But my flight home leaves late that night and I have to clean some stuff up, so not too late."

"If you want Lanisal to be there you do have to work with her schedule, no way around that. Or I guess we could have the meeting without her - no, Seli's busy after lunch, too."

"Morning it is then." He shrugs. "I think I'm up for another couple of games and then I want to head out. Any suggestions?"

"I have no idea. You seem like you'd be good at bad spell, but that's more the sort of game you play with a kid and a free hour, and I'm getting the impression it's what you do for a job anyway."

"Oh, I love my job I just can't stand doing the same thing forever. Do explain bad spell's rules, at least?"

"Player one has a goal and gives orders to player two. Player two has to obey the orders to the letter and their goal is not to let player one accomplish anything. Half the time it's what you do when you were doing that anyway and want to pretend you're having fun while your four-year-old is acting like a criminal."

"Hah. Yes, that does sound like a little kid's game. It'd be a bit undignified, though."

Game night continues.

When she notices Nik leaving Lanisal leaves the game she's in the middle of to see him off and let him know he's welcome to come back if one of his trips ever coincides with game night again.

"I may well take you up on that. It was fun. I'm probably going to be making trips a fair amount, to coordinate things and sell things. Six months and the internet will be a thing. Six more after that and the next generation of computers will be a thing, probably."

"It'll be an interesting year."

In the morning she and Seli and Iramel show up for their meeting.

He has two computers out and set up, ready to use. "Here's my tablet, Iramel, it's on the music playlist already. Seli, Lanisal, welcome. Here they are - computers. Want a demo, or do you have some questions already, or what?"

Iramel hands over a ring.

"I'd like a demo, otherwise I'll probably overlook something important," Lanisal says.

Seli is a lot quieter than he was last night, like he's letting Lanisal handle things now.

"Well, a demo I shall give."

It's a very impressive demo. He has a practices sales patter, though he tones it down a lot for these three.

The computer does all the things a late 90s PC can, more or less. It's still probably pretty impressive to someone who's never seen computers.

Lanisal is tentatively interested.

Iramel interrupts her trying to say so to ask about the speakers.

Well, how exactly the speakers work is a bit of a trade secret but here are the relevant constraints.

Turns out making his speakers play sound well involves rather a lot of complicated math, involving frequency analysis and so on.

"Why can't you attach two speakers to one computer?"

"You can. It's more expensive and takes some more of the computer's resources to run them, though. Extra speakers are one of the accessories I sell."

"If you do that, can they play chords?"

"It's somewhat easier - the reason I can't do chords easily is the computer's limitations, not the speaker's. I haven't gone for it because I'm still improving my manufacturing abilities and sooner or later current models of speaker and computer will no longer be the best I can do. Might be worth the effort, though, if it'll be a dramatic improvement."

"Hm. If you think this time next year you'll have a better solution there's probably not much point in me coming up with anything, but... can you set the speakers up so the same signal from the computer makes them play different notes?"

"...Hmm. I could probably make it a - fixed ratio, a perfect fifth off of one signal or something - if making the setup for that doesn't take more effort than just improving the driver controller in the first place... I'll have to poke at it."

"If it has to be a fixed ratio that's probably not worth the trouble."

"Oh well. There are so many many things I could be building, even after hiring some help I have to prioritize."

Lanisal asks a lot of questions.

Nik has many answers, having nearabout invented the thing! If they're too technical the answer might be 'trade secret'.

Whenever he gets cagey about something technical, Seli's face gets very blank like he's trying too hard to avoid looking like he's taken it as a challenge.

"Oh, by the way, if think you've figured out an important secret I'll pay a fair bit to know exactly how you figured it out and promise not to disclose it for a few years. In the long run I won't be able to hold on to my monopoly but I'm going to bleed it while I can. Now, who's up for an introductory programming lesson?"

"Ooh, that sounds good. Both of those things sound good."

And he gives a programming lesson! The new programming language he's invented does its best to obscure the actual workings somewhat, but it's a complete and useful, if slightly feature-light, programming language.

He makes an incredibly simple video game over the course of about 15 minutes of explanation. A square appears somewhere random. You click it and it disappears and a new one appears and a counter goes up by one.

"More elaborate games are merely a matter of planning and effort and hard work."

"I think these two will have something for you in a while. I understand your stores sell third-party programs; how do you want to arrange that?"

"I have to have access to the source code, and poke around with the program, to ensure it's of reasonable quality and not hiding some smaller malicious program. There are potentially less invasive verification methods, things that don't have me looking at the actual source code, but I'm still working on those. Something for later if enough people decline to participate because I could theoretically copy something and get away with it. Oh, and I'll have a contract not to copy it without authorization, with a couple caveats to cover, oh, a particularly clever bit that I also happened to come up with as well being pointed out to a judge, for example. You cover the cost of making the chips, you decide the price - I get fifteen percent if it's sold in my store. I won't necessarily make any special effort to advertise them. If it's not selling I'll stop displaying it. If it's not something I want associated with me or for any reason don't want, or I don't like the price or something, I can also stop displaying it. You get all copies back if I decide that."

"If Seli comes up with enough of these I'll want to do some kind of free sample. How much would you charge to display those? Not, I assume, fifteen percent of zero rings."

"Depending on how good the sample is, possibly a few rings per, possibly a daily fee, possibly nothing - exposure to more programs is good for my business as well. We can work out the details later. You still have to pay for the cards, mind."

They work everything out and come to a deal.

Nik goes back home, satisfied at the deal, to start working up the first part of his next big plan...

But in the meanwhile, the Order of Mercy informs the Hari Medical Association that they have developed a vaccine candidate for distemper and intend to organize a trial of it. They plan to provide it free to a whole lot of volunteers and collect statistics on how many of them get distemper, even for a little while. If it works, would they be able to possibly receive a grant to mass-produce the stuff?

They could receive a grant from the imperial government for it. The imperial government would generally follow expert advice in deciding whether a new treatment like this is safe, cost-effective and useful. On medical matters they frequently consult the Hari Medical Association for expert advice.

The Hari Medical Association is not the literal only game in town but they're certainly not going to give the Order of Mercy any advice on dealing with their rivals.

They'll have to be exquisitely thorough with the statistics and documenting side effects and so on. That means paying the volunteers. From multiple species and multiple regions of the globe. With a large enough sample size, that's... Expensive. They send detailed info on the whole thing with well-written summaries to the imperial government.

New Dover is getting fairly rich now, but not all of that money belongs to the doctors. The Order of Mercy sells a few more medicine formulae - one for a total anesthetic, one for treating an obscure joint disease - takes a big joint loan from Lady Katherine and a few other backers to fund their vaccine study. They are careful and thorough with their documentation, and everything is done outside of illusions where possible. But it's going to take months, still.

Meanwhile, they start teaching the next round of apprentices, three of them, including a certain young structure mage. Starting off with general principles of medicine, some basic biology, what the goal of medicine is (broadly, creating health), and why we have this thing called 'medical ethics'.

It's a niche market but there's no one else who can do anything for the obscure joint disease. Their treatment sells pretty well.

The structure mage apprentice shows up promptly and is slightly more attentive and hardworking than the average eleven-year-old but not by a lot.

Before the day's teaching starts, one of the nurses asks her, "Can you tell me why you're here? Do you want to learn from us?"

"Dad said I have to learn to do something that pays. He said I could pick what. I don't really know if I like medicine more than everything else, I didn't try everything else first."

"Well, here we think all kids should try to learn something useful, but we try to give them choices about what to learn. Your father made you an apprentice to the Order of Mercy - that's us, the organization of doctors from the other world - but we can let you try to learn some other things to see if you like them better some time, and if you don't like learning medicine, we can try to work something else out."

"Okay. Thanks. I'll tell you if something else sounds better."

"When we teach you, we want you to ask questions whenever you have one. You learn better if you do that. I hear that you're going to mostly live here, we're going to give you a room and food here, and your father will come visit sometimes. Is that alright?"

"Yeah, that's okay. Why'd you come here?"

"Our home is terribly cold now. It was normal and then one year, something happened, and the weather everywhere became freezing. Nothing grows naturally anymore. It was a bad place to live. But then a scout found this strange place called Milliways. We went into Milliways and met Governor Valanda, and from there some of us came here because he offered free land and a new place to settle. Some of us stayed in Milliways and looked for other places to go than Har."

"That sounds bad, I'm glad you're here instead. ...That means you don't know what shows are any good, doesn't it? I'll give you a recommendation for a ring."

"I think I'll be alright, dear. Let's get you to the classroom we've set up for your first lesson. You'll have two classmates your age, and sometimes the older students will be there too."

"Okay. Am I supposed to interrupt when I have a question or wait for you to pause first?"

"Try to wait until I finish saying something. I'll try to ask if you have questions a lot, but I might forget!"

"Okay."

Her classmates are two local boys, one a bit older and one a bit younger than her. They're chattering about a little metal toy the older one has when they come in. "Adam, Benjamin, this is Raih."

"Hi, Raih."

The other boy asks a question about Raih involving the word 'slave', in English, which she probably doesn't much understand yet.

"Use Hari while we're in this classroom, Adam. Raih might learn English later, but for now it is polite to use Hari. She is the apprentice from Ira Sani. Please take a seat, Raih."

She pulls down a blackboard and gets out a stick of chalk and starts writing on the board.

She says hi to both boys and sits down. She watches the blackboard.

One of the boys asks her what she thinks of his toy, but receives a glare from their teacher and quails and sits meekly in his seat.

And Nurse Abernathy starts the lesson. She goes over what they'll hopefully be learning this year. The general principles of medicine, introduction to something called 'medical ethics', some general biology and anatomy and medical science, germ theory and the different kinds of germs, the basics of diagnosing diseases, and how to correctly administer common treatments. There will be some hands on training, but not with real patients until they're a bit older. They are making medical simulators that act mostly like a real patient, for practice, and those will be ready in a few months probably.

"Any questions?"

She doesn't have any questions yet.

She tries to catch up with the boy who was trying to talk to her after class.

Class continues to actually start on general biology. She asks the kids questions about what she's covered to test their memory - she's not a bad teacher. It lasts two hours before she gives the kids a break.

"There's free time for half an hour, and then lunch for half an hour, then more free time, and then afternoon class. Let me know if you want to go outside! I'll be working in my office right over there meanwhile if you need anything."

The kid is willing to talk to her! "Hi. I'm Benjamin."

"Hi. What's that thing you wanted to show me before?"

"It's my toy car. I think it's cool. Here, watch!"

It's a little metal vehicle of some kind? It looks a little bit like those farm machines she would have seen around New Dover, but sleeker and painted in bright red. He winds it up with a little turnkey and sets it on the ground, and the car zips off and rams a wall, turns, and zips off again!

"Oh, cool, and it's not magic? Not at all?"

"I think it's defense magicked? But not force. It's called clockwork, my uncle does clockwork. It was a birthday present."

"It looks fun! Is that what you use for all your technology?"

"I don't know about all the technology. I'm still just a kid. The au-tom-a-tons are really big clockwork and, and stirring engines though."

"I'd pay for a chance to look at the insides. Or a book about clockwork and stirring engines."

"Maybe you can ask my uncle about that. There's probably a book."

"A ring if you tell me how to find your uncle?"

He makes a face. "Why does everyone here offer money for things like that? It's weird."

"I don't own you, I can't just tell you to do whatever I want. Why, how do you do it?"

"And everyone's a slave. My mom told me we'd mostly act normal and ignore that as long as we're home, because slavery is wrong." He's not wearing any bracelets. "You just ask people? And sometimes they say no and sometimes they say actually I want money and sometimes they want a favor back. I'll tell you how to find my uncle for a ring but Miss Abernathy won't let you go talk to him until after class probably."

"I guess that makes sense, thanks. I'll just find him after class if I can't do it now." She hands over a ring.

"He works at the factory on third street, next to where they're going to put the bridge. The really tall one. It says Camwell Assembly on it. His name is Tom. He usually comes home pretty late though."

Benjamin pockets the ring and goes to grab his car, which has finally stopped, and winds it up again.

"Hm. It wouldn't be safe to interrupt him at the factory anyway, I bet. When's the next time he has a day off?"

"...Saturday?"

"Thanks! ...I know how to find people who know how to do things I don't think you do in New Dover, but I'm not sure if any of them would be useful to you. They're mostly magic jobs."

"I think we're doing pretty okay. We have food and heat and doctors and toys. What kind of magic jobs?"

"My dad makes bracelets. I used to know someone who made scarecrows. You know, that kind of thing."

"Oh. I know someone who makes clocks and someone who makes glass. I want to be a doctor though. Even though I don't have magic for it."

"No one can do all the medical magic anyway. I'll have to send people to a death mage sometimes. The death mages have to send people to structure mages. It doesn't matter."

"Yeah. And our doctors helped people even without magic. I wanna help people too."

"Most jobs help people, otherwise they wouldn't pay you to do them. I guess it's still sort of different if you're a doctor than if you're a police officer."

"Police are important too. It's sort of different if you're a doctor than... A driver, or a mailman, or a fisher, or something."

"People starve if nobody fishes. Or if nobody takes food to places that can't make their own."

"Maybe? But you can get food from lots of people. Only a few people are doctors, and doctors help you live better." He shrugs. "I guess I dunno how to explain it."

The kid goes off to play by himself for a few minutes, then reads a book at his desk.

The lessons continue much the same after lunch. She tries to make them at least marginally fun and interesting. She has diagrams printed out on paper. They meet some of the other doctors, who talk about medicine for a little bit.

At the end of the day, Miss Abernathy asks Raih, "What do you think of the class? Does it seem like you'll be able to learn well? Did you enjoy it?"

"It's better than making sugar. I can probably do it. Uh, I also want to learn about clockwork, I don't know if I should try asking Benjamin's uncle who makes that or if there's books about it somewhere."

"I can certainly get you books. I can ask Mr. Hannel if he wants to give you a lesson as well, or perhaps find another clockwork teacher for you. I think several of the workshops around here employ structure mages, though I don't know the details, so a materials processing job might be a good thing for you to learn instead. I'll ask around for you, okay?"

"Thank you! I don't know if I'll like it better than medicine but I think I might."

"You're welcome. I'm happy to help. I can have answers for you tomorrow, I think. Is there anything else you want or need right now?"

"I should find someone to practice English with but I'm really bad at it and I don't want people to be frustrated with how I don't understand anything."

"Oh, learning a new language is always difficult, don't worry, dearie. I'd offer to tutor you but I have work to do. A lot of people want to learn Hari, perhaps I can also find someone who will help you with English if you help them with Hari, or do a little simple structure work for them, or something."

"I can do that. I can't do very much magic safely, though."

"Well, I'm sure it'll work out somehow. I'll ask around."

"Thank you."

Meanwhile, that eccentric inventor is recruiting for two, preferably three, competent force mages, skilled at flying, willing to agree not to disclose the details of what exactly he's paying them for. 180 rings an hour, plus a bonus of 2000 each when the job is done. He'll pay a few rings just to hear the details of the job and see if it sounds doable and agree to secrecy about it.

He gets some takers, two agerah and a thwilit.

The job involves going into space. He has a large thing that needs to be in a precise place in space, moving at a precise speed in a precise direction. He has a bunch of inventions that will handle continuing to have air, and knowing where they all are, and so on. By his calculations it should take about four hours all told. He wants two force mages in case one of them suddenly gets sick while they're in space, they can get back down safely. This is sort of a test - every individual system has been tested and works, but they haven't been tested all together for real yet. He doesn't expect trouble, though.

If it works, he'll want to do it dozens of times over the next few months, though he won't be paying quite as much since it will be less experimental.

Sound interesting, agerahs and thwilit?

The thwilit's in, definitely. The agerah take longer to think about it. One of them wants to know what the inventions for making them keep having air are and what about the temperature and what about the radiation.

He has computer-controlled oxygen tanks and carbon dioxide scrubbers and pressure regulators. The temperature is a heat mage enchantment - he also has a system of radiators and chemical heaters as a backup if that fails. Details available if you agree to nondisclosure. The radiation is heavy complicated shielding, it blocks something like 98% of it, more than the atmosphere even does, you can see the diagrams and experimental results if you agree to nondisclosure.

"I've been working on this for a while, I am quite sure I have my bases covered, but please do tell me if I forgot anything. Better safe than sorry."

"You know, there's a story you wouldn't have heard, since you're not from here. I'll tell it to you free if you don't mind me watching how you take it."

"Sure. I'm guessing some manner of cautionary tale."

"You're guessing right. We bind kids' magic so they don't hurt anyone else. And when they get old enough to know that, they get cocky sometimes. They think it's just about not making someone stop breathing where you can hear them. So there are different stories for different magics. There's one about a structure mage who was making things from the air and knew that nitrogen was safe and inert so he started making things out of nitrogen. He didn't survive learning that one of the compounds he made was explosive.

"The story every force mage knows is that a long time ago, before the empire, before any of the kingdoms the empire united, before the old continents sank, a force mage asked a knowledge mage why you couldn't go to the moon. The knowledge mage said it was because there was no air, so the force mage took as much air as he could reach at once and flew. When he looked down on the world it was breathtaking. His concentration slipped. He lost his air. Then he hesitated. Then he passed out before he could get more air. He never hit the ground. He burned in the air.

"But it doesn't end there. Because another force mage decided that the thing he'd done wrong was to hold all the air himself. And this force mage made a sealed box. But the box was small enough for her to build. It was small enough not to fall apart. There wasn't enough air inside. So she died.

"Someone did touch the moon and live. So three siblings, two force mages and a structure mage, thought they could do it too. The two force mages could catch each other's mistakes. The structure mage freshened up the air they brought with them. And when they reached the moon the heat killed them.

"Also, there's nothing on the moon, it's just rock. The only thing you can get by going to space is the pride of knowing you did it. So.

"Anyway, I couldn't grow up hearing those stories and not go challenge space the first time anyone came up with a plan that might not get me killed."

"...Well, I've heard 'don't throw every element into the air and kill yourself' a few dozen times by now. I am taking this seriously. I sealed a pig inside the ship and exposed it to vacuum for two days. Extreme heat, too. No real way to test hard rads for real down here. I was planning on going up and then back down, make sure it's all working, before doing the actual deployment. You know, where I'm from, they managed to get to our moon without magic? It was hideously complicated and expensive, and thousands and thousands of people worked on it to get just two of them there, but they did it. No heat magic, no force magic, no defense magic. Just metal and explosives and computers and hard work."

"That's amazing, I'd love to see that. Well, I believe you've tried as much as anyone could to make this safe. If we die it'll probably be in an exciting new way no one's died before. I'm in."

"I can probably dig up a video about it. And in any case, grand! I have two force mages now. Let me arrange a meeting to brief you two on the instruments and procedure. We will have to endure weightlessness- Ever done that before?"

"I've levitated but I think that's a different thing."

"Yeah. I am told it's very disorienting. If you throw yourself up into the air very fast and then let go, it's the same sort of feeling for a few seconds. In orbit, you're moving so fast that you fall towards the planet and miss."

"I can try that and let you know if it makes me too sick to work. When do you want to launch?"

"Four days from now, probably, but that's subject to change based on whether you two can handle free fall and how well you understand the procedures. Launch will be from my workshop, not here, though."

It turns out his force mages don't get too queasy in freefall, though the agerah with the cautionary tale doesn't enjoy it much.

Nothing comes up before launch day.

He triple checks the ship, and the backup systems, and the backups to the backups. Space is hard, after all.

And then... They can go up. Straight up, miles and miles and miles.

They sure can.

There's nothing unexpected in the upper atmosphere. It could just as easily be Earth, except that the continents are different and even more dwarfed by the ocean.

Up further and further. This is near enough to space to count in all the ways that matter. He's a bit tense. He triple-checks all the systems and components keeping them from dying. He tests the ranging and navigation instruments and gets a solid return from both his workshop control center and a shack-cum-radio-beacon on the main continent. The ship's atmosphere and temperature stays marginal. He has them free-fall for a while, to help everyone get used to weightlessness. He has the force mages turn the ship every which way, and start accelerating towards an orbit but abort and reverse it after only a few seconds.

And then they should be gently taken back down. They'll get paid for the time, but the real task will be in a few hours, when everyone's fresh, and the big bonus will come after that is done. He considers the dry run a success, though.

They're nervous and twitchy the whole time they're in freefall and glad to touch the ground again.

"Do you want us to wait here till the next flight or just meet back here then?"