Vergence by John March

three stubby horns positioned towards the rear of its skull in a fan-shaped cluster.
    Sash approached the nearest symor, but the driver waved them towards the front of the line.
    “Why must we take the one at the front? Why can’t we just choose the ones we want?” Sash asked.
    “It will be a matter of custom to be honoured,” Addae said.
    “So we don’t have any choice? But then they must accept whoever arrives first too?”
    “We have such a tradition amongst my people,” Addae said. “In the season of little water in the dry lands we have the solongo . When the people of many tribes must share water each must wait until those before have finished. And those who are before must leave the water in the morning after a day.”
    “How odd … nobody in Senesella would submit to something not of their own choosing. They would just take whichever symor they liked, and the driver would be free to refuse whoever he wished not to take.”
    “Without the solongo custom, the water would be lost to all, and there would be fighting amongst the people over what remained,” Addae said.
    Sash laughed. “Nobody would fight for water in Senessela.”
    The symor at the head of the line was painted in faded colours, the contraption had a tired worn-out appearance. Its driver had some of the features of the Chochin, but taller and thinner. He wore a loose-fitting faded blue long-sleeved shirt and trousers, with a small square cap balanced on top of his head. He grinned at them as they approached, revealing a mouth full of black-stained teeth.
    “You want symor? Come, come, I take you.” He motioned toward the foot-step directly in front of the wheel. “Where you going?”
    Sash showed him the chit Captain Lim had given her, “We were told the Etched Man.”
    “Ah yes — etch man. Good, good, I take you,” he said.
    “What’s the charge?”
    “Three to go?” he said, holding up four grubby fingers and a thumb. “You pay five.”
    Sash produced a small coin and held it out for the driver to see. “Five like this?”
    “Five — yes,” he said, eyes fixed on the coin in Sash’s hand.
    The coin looked like an eighth guilder, not a huge sum, but five would easily feed a man for a day or two.
    “Is it far to the Etched Man?” Ebryn asked.
    “Far? Yes, is far.”
    Sash paid him and moved to the rear of the symor with Addae who helped load her bag and wooden container into the luggage holdall. Ebryn was grateful he and Addae were carrying nothing with them. Although Sash had left nearly all her belongings on the deck of the world-ship there was still barely enough space in the rack for what she had brought with her.
    While Addae wedged the largest box carefully into place, and Sash made anxious noises about not blocking the breathing hole, Ebryn moved over to the three-horned creature at the front of the symor, and laid a hand on its shoulder.
    “What kind of creature is this?” Ebryn asked.
    “He called trikawi,” the driver said. “Strong, very strong. Very good.”
    To Ebryn the trikawi looked fascinating, and he didn't recall seeing it in any of the bestiaries he'd read. Unlike the hairy warmth of a horse, the skin was smooth and leathery, and cool to the touch. Wiry muscles rippled under his hand as the trikawi leant away from him in its harness.
    Ebryn focussed inside himself for a moment, searching for the calm point and allowing it to flow outwards through his hands, pouring out the same instinctive force he used to calm horses and angry dogs.
    The trikawi’s head looped round on its long neck like a striking serpent, and snapped at his hand. Unlike the blunt instruments of a horse, its teeth were pointed at the front and sharp, with large outward facing canines. Ebryn barely managed to pull his fingers out of the way, stepping backwards quickly.
    “ Har , har, ” the old driver bent over, holding the side of his vehicle and laughing loudly. “He eat your finger. You pay in coin, eh, no pay with