Free Stone Spring by Stephen Baxter

mountain range far from here, were among the most valuable of all.
    He handed Magho one of the smaller pieces. Magho turned the black, shining rock over in his hands, his eyes wide, his mouth a dark circle. ‘I take it you have better examples,’ he breathed.
    ‘Oh, yes. All from the finest source in the known world. And all yours, if—’
    ‘If I can pay.’ Magho let out his throaty laugh. ‘I do like you, Chona. Well, I like all traders. At least you’re honest, which is more than can be said for most people in this wretched world.’
    ‘That particular piece would make a fine axe-head,’ Chona said. ‘Or perhaps something more abstract. An amulet—’
    ‘Oh, I’ll leave that to the experts,’ Magho said. ‘There’s a man on the other side of town, called Fless, very old now, about forty and half-blind, but he works stone as you wouldn’t believe. My way is simply to give him such pieces as this, and let him see what lies within the stone, see with his cataract-blighted eyes, and then tease it out, flake by flake with his bits of bone.’ He mimed a fine pressing. ‘Marvellous to see him work, with those twisted-up hands and his milky eyes. Yes, he’s the man. If I can get his time, if somebody hasn’t stolen him away.’
    Chona took back the obsidian scrap, and handed him another piece. ‘I’m sure what Fless makes of these pieces would dazzle your friends like rays of the sun . . .’
    This was the odd part of trading with the men of Jericho. Everywhere in the world you found men, and sometimes women, of power, who accumulated wealth - maybe trinkets, maybe more functional items like tools or food. But everywhere else you showed off your power by giving your treasure away: the more you had to give, the greater you were. In Jericho’s elaborate, layered society men strutted and showed off what they owned, be it women and children, goats and stores of grain - and pointless, purposeless trinkets. Your status came from what you kept to yourself, not what you gave away.
    Well, Chona didn’t care. He never judged a man he traded with. Magho could wipe his arse on his precious obsidian for all Chona cared - as long as Chona got a fair price first.
    But the boy, Novu, still nursing his head, snorted his contempt at Chona’s manipulation.
    Magho handed back the stone. ‘Let’s do business. How many pieces?’
    ‘A dozen. I’ll show you the rest when we have a deal.’
    Magho nodded. ‘Very well. So let me show you what I have to trade . . .’ He produced a figurine of a pregnant woman, carved of the tooth of some sea creature, quite fine. And a whistle made from the bone of a bird, delicately carved, so small you would need a child’s fingers to stop its holes, and yet fully functional, Magho assured him. And a bit of iron, small but one of the purest pieces Chona had ever seen. Magho evidently knew Chona’s preference for small, portable treasures, and with one piece after another he built up an array on the rush mat.
    Chona kept his face like stone, merely nodding politely. Some of this was impressive, and in the loose map of the Continent he carried in his head he calculated where he might make a decent profit on each of these pieces. Still, when Magho was done arraying his treasures Chona was disappointed. He would win out of the deal, of course, but not as much as he had hoped.
    ‘I have to be honest, Magho. I’d love to do business with you, you know that. But I’d have to haul away a sack full of pieces like these to compensate me for my obsidian.’
    Magho’s face fell, but Chona wasn’t fooled; Magho, while clearly wanting the obsidian, was an experienced trader too. ‘Perhaps we could come to some arrangement. If I could choose the best four or six of your pieces—’
    ‘I wouldn’t want to break up the set. That way, if I need to take it elsewhere in the town, I’ll have a much better chance of a sale.’ That was true enough, and a subtle threat to take the hoard to one of