“I understand you have a matrix of souls that you use with your soulstones. Don’t expose any souls caught in them to vivic fire. They will be dispersed and returned to the Land. It is not the Warp, but they are still circumventing the Law of Death, and so vivus will return them to the land just as it does undead... and creatures of the Warp.”

He pursed his lips slightly as he looked at the vivic fire. “And why would we consider this worthwhile knowledge?” he asked freely, suspicion, curious, wary.

“It does the same to undead, demons, axiomites, and unnatural energies. It is the unnatural energy of our reality... vivic is to them what warpfire is to us. It feeds them to the Land, and reinforces the Land around them, settling down warp storms and breaches, cleansing and purifying their corruption. The details and features are in the data download and the data crystal I have delivered to you.”

“Interesting. And why have you given this to us?” He asked, doubtful, amused, warning that she would not take advantage of him.

“There are only upsides to having more danger to the Warp and unnatural creatures around... such as the Reapers, the Dwellers, or the Aberrants, all of which use unnatural energies and vivic fire will punish for it.

“To humanity, the elvar, and other races born of this reality... vivic has no effect, unless they are breaking the Law of Death, as your cloistered souls are. In any event, it will still save souls from the Warp, merely dispersing them naturally into the Land, to be gathered up randomly and be born anew as life once more.”

The elvar captain considered her words, and the serious and sincere undertones she was using calmly and patiently. Despite its danger to their cloistered souls, it really was a dangerous weapon against the Warp... and their Dark Elvar kin, who seethed with the influence of the Warp they tried to hold at bay, and which painted their skin so dark with their sins.

“And what do you expect us to do with such a boon?” he asked further.

“Spread it far and wide as fast as you possibly can,” she admitted with tones of searing truth, impetus, and warning of danger. “The Warp does not want knowledge of vivus spread, and they are already taking actions to restrict its spread in the Empire. I would say at this point they have already killed a million souls and spent some assets they have cultivated for centuries just to stop the spread of vivus.

“And they will act against you. Carry it far and fast, Sunhawk, or you will not carry it far, at all.”

His eyes flickered. Tones of grave danger, urgency, solemn warning. The Coronal Knights did not enjoy playing political games.

He nodded slowly, amused at the idea that it would also remove him from this system and the potential prey he might have netted here. “I will do so. Is there aught else you would have me do?” Mocking, humor, but acknowledging urgency.

“On a completely separate matter, we have potential business you may be interested in. We have knowledge of a vein of Sunwater Silica, known among your kind as flowlight crystal. I understand that it is a primary component of the psionic lattices in your ships and Starhomes. Now, the Empire has never used this as anything but circuit boards in some more fluid nanotech adaptations, and there are substitutes. But it has great value to the elvar.

“We are wondering if you would like to trade for it?”

His look suddenly got very predatory. “Interesting. The Coronals, dabbling in matters mercantile?”

“We are seeking Void Osmium. I understand your people can manufacture it, but have little use for it. We can trade for it at two thousand to one for the raw ore, or a thousand to one refined. I understand your refining is a touch more efficient than ours. The rating on the ore is 27, our refinement brought it up to 30.”

Boring data, data, data. He sat back and stared at her, an expression like a cat hunting a mouse on his face. “And how shall such things be delivered? Trade between our people is rather fraught with danger, my dear Coronal Captain.” Fun, trust me, let’s play...

“You will be given the location of the freighter with the cargo when we receive the tested Void Osmium. You can choose to purchase the ship with the cargo, or simply take the cargo on yourself.”

“Us, deliver first? And we would find this acceptable how?” he asked archly. Mocking, rebuking, admonishing.

“Because of the reputation of yourself and your people, which is fraught with broken contracts for miniscule reasons and desires, and replete with acts of piracy hidden behind the desire to not trade equitably... and the reputation of the Coronal Knights is that we deliver on our promises.”

Fact. Steel. Dare to refute.

The elvar captain steepled his fingers thoughtfully. “And how much flowlight are we speaking of?” Greed, standoffish, assessment.

“We have only refined ten thousand tons at this time. The expected volume of raw ore is 2.33 million tons.” Fact, fact, fact.

Now his glowing eyes grew wide indeed. That was enough ore to craft a new Starhome... or an entire fleet of ships. Perhaps both!

“This...” This was a very big deal, indeed. Gaining hold of that much flowlight crystal would gain him resounding fame among his people. Of course, if he could trick it out of the humans it would be even better... but he was dealing with a Coronal, who were depressingly aboveboard in all their dealings, and would only be seeking a mutually beneficial trade in response. “I do not believe I can arrange for that much oblivichrome in short order...”

“We did not expect you to. Multiple shipments are fine. The need is long-term as well.” She tilted her head. “You may, of course, request specific containers and such, if Imperial Standard Bulk is not adequate for you. Do we have a deal?”

“My suppliers may seek better terms,” he began, and she cut him off calmly.

“We are not negotiating price. If the terms are not acceptable, rote circuit boards they shall be.” She watched his face twitch at the waste. Once processed that way, they would naturally be useless to the elvar. “Do we have a deal, Captain?” she went on. Asking, neutral, neutral.

He hesitated only a moment before nodding. “They may wish to see proof of the quality of the ore.”

“They have the word of a Coronal.” His cheek twitched despite himself. There was no viable statement in his language that was more absolute for the purpose, the elvar simply didn’t speak that way. “The refined tonnage is immediately available if you have the Void Osmium stocked, and you may name any number for the deal if you so desire, please specify refined or ore.” Relaxed, controlled, encouraging.

“How shall we contact you?” he inquired. Caution, wary, suspicious.

“We shall establish a contact buoy here, or you can employ an agent and simply contact the Coronals through Threshold Station, and I will be in touch.” Reasonable, patient, waiting.

The elven corsair slowly nodded, and after some minor details were worked out, the deal was struck.

---

-Totally untrustworthy.- -Pointy-eared git.- -Throne, what a smug twit!- -His armor looks like it was done by a fashion designer.- Oh, the truest insult. -He’s going to pull something, or he’s got a leak in his crew, it’s guaranteed.-

Tiffany just smiled. Of course she didn’t trust him, or his crew. The Elvar were naturally Chaotic of mindset, the settled Elvar were the ones who defied their nature and embraced discipline in attempting to defy the influence of the Warp on their emotional states. The corsairs reveled in it, thinking their emotions could defy the Warp as long as their willpower was strong.

Idiots. Like she couldn’t see his morals faltering from the greying hue of his skin. He was accumulating sin and ignoring it as irrelevant, when the Elvar literally wore their sins on their skin... and were rewarded for it by the Warp.

Still, to get hold of Void Osmium, a needed component for the Harmonic Drives, it was worth the dealing, as the Sunwater Silica really was a fairly low-value commodity in the Empire. Human psychics had no use for it, and so despite its relative rare dual-Energized status, it simply had no value of note to humanity. To the Elvar, well, it was indeed precious enough to trade for tons of a material that had to be psychically refined at the edge of black holes.

The universe was fair...

------

Energized materials came in all types and sizes. Knowing what they were good for, and to whom they were good to, was integral to making full use of what you had.

The common use of Sun-Water Silica in the Empire put it on the low end of usefulness, and it was basically expended as dross, just one more reason for the Elvar to be annoyed with us. Of course, they didn’t bother to tell us what they used the stuff for, so we had no idea of the demand... and it wasn’t precious enough in the eyes of traders to risk the smuggling. If the Elvar suddenly proved willing to start paying what we called exorbitant prices for it, then it would become a strategic good, so it was highly likely the Elvar had placed agents who made quiet efforts to redirect any raw or refined amounts of the stuff subtly into their hands, trying to keep us unaware of its value.

Its usefulness to them was a toss-away fact recorded in the material archives of the Celestial Tribute. Taking full advantage of the vein of it found well north of the city was a natural decision. It was normally something that would only be excavated in tandem with something else nearby, controlling the costs, but with the true value known, it was worth operating a mobile miner and refining station purely for itself.

They wanted samples of both, so ten thousand tons of each type, refined and ore, whereupon they would decide which they preferred. Of course, their agents were going to be going nuts trying to find where the vein was, so they could race in, extract everything possible as fast as possible, and get out without paying the price.

Happily, since production was so low, they had no way to figure out where it was being produced from, and there were so many mines around... For some reason they were a bit leery after one ship drifting in too close to Janus III was suddenly blown to bits out of nowhere, them damn drow raiders in their cloaked ships were everywhere, cough cough.

Yeah, some very specific anti-Elvar sensor suites were among the things getting printed off and installed on key vessels. Also, Rantha eyes. Add to their Masks amplifying range, and just how damn showy those elven ships were in the spectra, and it was amazing how far away they were visible from.

Briggs and I were basically on permanent duty in the Warp Zone, eliminating any and all remainders of Warped creatures and troops, extending the cleared zone leading to the Tribute wider, and exterminating pretty much everything in an ever-broader zone. Given that it was thousands of miles from the border to the center, that still left a lot of things to kill, but that was alright, because modulation from my pet addicted Spell Weaver was slowly shrinking the internal size of the zone, compressing distances down. My visits every five days were the total center of its life now.

This was useful, since it kept the very hostile and BF-cuckoo Warped troops shooting at one another, and killing one another, thereby cleaning the place up. With vivus popping up all around half the sector and making their lives much more difficult, the fact endless minions weren’t dying for the glory of their masters on Janus III anymore wasn’t really registering, as they were merely dying where they would have been pulled from, anyways. Janus III was now just one more place where vivus was seeing heavy use, among scores of systems and hundreds of planets, and there were more every day.

Ah, pissing off the Warp Gods was a great way to spend your days...