Finding a usable star map, it turned out, was considerably harder than simply wanting one badly enough.
The public terminals scattered throughout the Anchorage offered only local transit information — routes between the Span’s own worlds and stations, nothing that extended meaningfully beyond the system’s own borders. When Rohan tried, cautiously, to query one of the terminals for anything resembling a broader regional chart, the interface politely informed him that detailed cartographic data beyond local jurisdiction required either a registered citizen account or a licensed data broker’s assistance, and helpfully suggested he visit the Anchorage’s licensed information district if such data was required.
Of course it does. Nothing here is free. I should have expected that by now.
He spent the better part of a day simply walking the lower concourses, listening more than looking, picking up scraps of conversation the way he’d once learned to read the subtle signs of danger in the Ashen Marches — which stalls did legitimate business and which did something else beneath the surface, which corridors emptied out at certain hours and which stayed busy regardless of the time, which faces belonged to station security and which belonged to something less official but no less watchful.
It was in one of the Anchorage’s mid-level markets, a cramped, noisy stretch of stalls selling salvaged components and questionable information in equal measure, that he found what he was looking for — not a map, not yet, but a name, mentioned twice within the same hour by two entirely unconnected vendors in the tone people reserved for someone whose services were expensive, reliable, and best not discussed too loudly.
Renna Voss.
A data broker, according to the fragments he pieced together, who operated out of a modest storefront three levels down from the main concourse, dealing in exactly the kind of information the Anchorage’s public terminals refused to hand out for free — cartographic surveys, ownership records, shipping manifests, and, if the rumours held any truth at all, the occasional piece of information that wasn’t technically supposed to be for sale at all.
Rohan found her storefront tucked between a defunct repair shop and a noodle stall whose steam smelled better than anything he’d eaten in days, a narrow doorway marked only by a small, unassuming glyph he’d learned by now denoted registered, licensed trade.
He hesitated outside it for a long moment, running through everything he had to offer in exchange for what he needed, and found the total considerably less impressive than he would have liked.
A sealed reserve record from a settlement this entire system has probably never heard of. A spear a goddess gave me that I’m not selling under any circumstances. Whatever labour I can talk my way into performing on short notice.
It wasn’t much. It would have to be enough.
He stepped inside.
The interior of Renna Voss’s storefront looked nothing like what Rohan had expected, and exactly like what four months among Veyrhold’s careful record-keepers should have prepared him for — shelves lined not with physical goods but with row upon row of small, dark data cores, each labelled in a neat, precise hand, the air carrying the faint electric tang of active processing equipment running somewhere behind the walls.
The woman behind the narrow counter looked up at his entrance with an expression that catalogued him in the space of a single glance — travel-worn clothing, unfamiliar weapon, no visible identification markers, the particular wariness of someone who’d learned recently and thoroughly that trust was a currency spent carefully. She was perhaps forty, sharp-featured, her dark hair shot through with premature grey, a single augmentation line glowing faint gold along one temple.
"You’re new," she said, before Rohan had said a word. "New enough that you don’t know this district charges premium rates for exactly the reason you’re standing in my doorway looking like you’ve never bought information in your life."
"I need a star chart," Rohan said, deciding bluntness was probably his best available strategy.
"Something showing the current spread of human territory in this region of the universe. As detailed and as accurate as I can afford."
Renna’s eyebrows rose slightly. "That’s an unusually specific request from someone who looks like they just walked off a salvage barge. Most people who wander in here new want passage records, or debt clearances, or somebody’s shipping manifest they’re not supposed to have. Nobody asks for a regional survey unless they’re planning something considerably bigger than they look capable of."
"I’m trying to find a place," Rohan said carefully. "A specific location. I don’t know its name. I don’t know exactly where it is. But I have a way of narrowing down the search, if I can get my hands on a decent map to work from."
"A way of narrowing down the search," Renna repeated, studying him with fresh interest now, the wariness in her expression shifting into something more calculating. "That’s a very careful way of not telling me what that way actually is."
"It is," Rohan agreed. "That part isn’t for sale."
Something in his tone must have landed the right way, because Renna’s mouth twitched into something that wasn’t quite a smile but occupied similar territory.
"Fair enough. I respect a man who knows which of his secrets are worth keeping." She leaned back against the shelf behind her, arms crossed. "Regional charts of this quality don’t come cheap, though, and something tells me you didn’t walk in here with a fat account balance ready to transfer."
"No," Rohan admitted. "I have this, instead."
He drew out Bryan’s sealed packet, setting it carefully on the counter between them.
"A reserve record. Condensed, from a settlement called Veyrhold, on a planet you’ve probably never heard of called Cael Athis. It documents salvage rights, holdings, and standing I earned over several months of expedition work. I don’t know exactly what it’s worth in your currency, or whether it’s worth anything to you at all, but it’s real, it’s mine, and it’s what I have."
Renna picked up the packet, turning it over once in her hands, studying the seal with a practised eye.