“That is enough,” the dowager said. “The paidhi-aiji has other things on his mind. You will rest, nand’ paidhi!” Stamp went the cane. “Sweet tea for the paidhi! What are you standing there expecting? You, young gentleman, may go to your rooms. See you stay there! It is an indecent hour of the night!”
There was motion. In short order there was sweetened tea. He drank it down, and shut his eyes and listened to nand’ Siegi talking to his assistant. The dowager was safe. Cajeiri was. Nobody had gotten into the house, and if anything were going on, he thought his bodyguard would surely come in to advise him.
In time, nand’ Siegi pronounced himself satisfied, and turned his attention to Bren.
“Take more tea, a little nourishment. Rest a few hours, nand’ paidhi. Nand’ Toby is doing well, much assisted by your effort.”
“One is very grateful, nand’ physician. One is extremely grateful. How will nand’ Toby be?”
“He has been fortunate—fortunate to have had medical assistance at hand; fortunate in your arriving. We have repaired the damage. One foresees a good recovery. Tell him he should not exert, should not lift, and he will have no impairment. He should rest. My assistant will remain with him until he wakes. If you wish to stay with him to rest, that would not be amiss. He is greatly concerned for the lady.”
“One understands,” Bren said, and started to get up to bow, but Siegi prevented him with a gesture.
“Stay seated. Rest, nandi. If you wish to walk, use caution.”
“Yes,” he said. It was all there was to say, except, “My profound thanks, nandi.”
So all there was to do was sit there, wondering. Siegi left. The assistant sat beside the light, and Toby rested very quietly.
A servant came, offering more tea, which he declined.
His eyes grew heavy, though his mind continued to race. Then Cenedi came in, quietly, and went into the interior rooms to speak with the dowager, doubtless to report. Bren wanted desperately to know what was going on.
And in a little time Cenedi came out to the sitting room.
“There is no sign of the lady, nand’ paidhi,” Cenedi said. “Two of my men have been attempting to find a clear trail, which is greatly obscured by the passage of the young gentleman’s guard.”
Both hopeful—and grim. “How do you read those two, Cenedi-ji?” he asked.
“We cannot read them,” Cenedi said, “except in their man’chi, which is considerably in question. The aiji’s men are investigating. These two were often in the operations center. We are not pleased, nandi, with that combination of circumstances.”
Things were in an absolute mess. If there was now question about the loyalty of the two young Guild, there was no knowing how much those two could have overheard, with application of effort—and Cenedi, one could read between the lines, was beyond angry at the situation.
“I shall consult with Banichi, Cenedi-ji. One believes we must make some decisions this morning, and make them quickly.”
“If we had the mecheiti we could find them,” the dowager said grimly. She had arrived silently in the doorway, having gotten no more sleep than he had. “You should have a stable of your own, nand’ paidhi. Someone in this benighted region should have a stable.”
“One wishes we did, aiji-ma,” he said, and stood up, gingerly, fully awake now, and only a little light-headed. It was true. Mecheiti could have tracked them. But the nearest were up in Taiben, near the capital, and bringing them in would take a day at least. “We can send to Taiben,” he said, “but one fears delay under these circumstances.”
“Speed is of the essence,” Ilisidi said grimly, and lowered her voice as Toby stirred, responding to the voices. “Lay plans, paidhi-aiji. Talk to your aishid and talk to Lord Geigi. We must not only react to their moves.”
“Yes,” he said. Press them back, the dowager meant. And move to get firm control of the region before they could receive any ransom demands—even if it meant Geigi taking control of the Maschi clan. Damned sure it was not a time for retreating and waiting with hands folded for their enemy to dictate the next move—he agreed with that agenda.
Moving into questionable territory to do it—that wasn’t so attractive, but the dowager was absolutely right. They could not back up and wait.
“I shall speak to Lord Geigi,” he said, and went outside, where Banichi was talking to Ramaso and gathered him up, Banichi with a finger to his ear and likely in touch with operations, bringing himself current with what Cenedi might have relayed to ops. “We may need to draw in Tano and Algini, Banichi-ji. We are going forward with our own agenda. Immediately.”
“Yes,” Banichi said. “They will not likely have killed Barb-daja. They would be fools.”
“They will have to find someone who can speak to her,” he said. “And then she knows very little of interest to them. Her main value is in exchange.” When he had started his career he had been practically the only bilingual individual on the continent. That had changed—partly, he was grimly aware, because of his work. He’d built the dictionary. He’d taken it from a carefully prescribed permitted word-list to a self-proliferating, autocross-referencing file that had gotten wider and wider circulation and contribution.
And with the atevi working on station and the station’s communicating with the planet, and Mospheira’s development of contacts on the continent just during the two years of the Troubles—one couldn’t rely any longer on there not being someone who could interrogate a human prisoner.
He couldn’t stay here with Toby while that happened. That wasn’t where he was needed. Not even the search for Barb preempted the need to get onto the offensive and make their enemy reassess Barb’s value, if they for a moment doubted it.
And if Geigi was going to make the move they needed him to make, Geigi needed support—undeniably official support—not just a solo operation. And to stay alive where they planned to put him, Geigi needed Guild resources familiar with current onworld tech.
The dowager shouldn’t do it. But somebody official had to go with him.
It was a very, very short list of official people available to back Geigi up.
He knocked on Geigi’s door—his own, as happened—and walked into a night-dimmed suite. “One will rouse him, Bren-ji,” Banichi said, and Bren, finding himself a bit light-headed, subsided into his own favorite sitting-room chair.
In short order, Geigi came out, his considerable self wrapped in the bedspread in lieu of a night robe.
“Banichi says your brother is recovering, Bren-ji. This is excellent news.”
“One is greatly relieved. But impossible for me to stay here with him, Geigi-ji. The dowager urges us not to let our enemy seize the initiative. You and I—must continue—”
“Say no more! I am willing, Bren-ji. Outrageous goings-on, and not a shred of help from Maschi clan in our situation! I have lain awake thinking about it. I have thought about my sister, and my nephew, and the situation all across this coast. If I had been here, I would have been outraged. One cannot help but feel a certain responsibility, as lord of this province—”
“No part of it, Geigi-ji, no part of it attaches to you. You gave your orders, which I well know, and if Maschi clan had followed them, the situation would not be the mess it is! Maschi clan did not maintain ties with the Edi during the Troubles. They did not oversee the transition of power in Kajiminda—everyone on this coast knows that much. Nobody in the north will fault you for taking action. And the aiji and the aiji-dowager will explain it to the rest of the aishidi’tat.”
“One regrets it, still,” Geigi said. “Gods know I did not want this. I did everything conceivable to avoid it. But unless Pairuti proves a better man than he has proved thus far, I shall take the lordship from him. Gods witness Maschi clan did not want the clan lordship tied to Kajiminda! Not from the beginning!”
“Times have changed, Geigi-ji. Many things have changed. We have changed. And if the nation we met in space comes calling—we must have our house in o
rder, Geigi-ji. We must. They have formed an impression of us as rational and stable people, with whom a treaty could be lasting. They are strange folk and accustomed to destroy what threatens them. Those of us who were on that voyage have not told all our experience of these people, not to anyone on earth but to Tabini-aiji . . . and for good reason, Geigi-ji. We have no wish to see every lunatic in the aishidi’tat break out in proclaiming they were right, that we have put holes in the sky and people from the moon have taken offense. We dare not meet them with the attitudes of a past age, Geigi-ji, and if it means that you must take steps—one regrets, one regrets extremely the necessity. But this coast, this whole coast is locked in a pattern with the South that originated with the landing of my people on this world. Nothing has changed. Attitudes have not changed. The Marid still thinks domination of this coast is their way to rip the aishidi’tat apart and settle the world as they want it. These are your reasons, Geigi-ji. We are fighting against people who believe the space shuttle puts holes in the sky, and who believe they can go on fighting regional wars and profit from them. We know better. And we have to do something.”
“I am with you,” Geigi said. “If I have to appoint a proxy in the heavens, this has to be dealt with. I see that. You could not have convinced me until I saw this stupid attack, Bren-ji, this abysmally stupid action, and not even yet has a single messenger or even an inquiring phone call arrived from Maschi clan! When shall we go, Bren-ji? And most of all—with what resources?”
13
They moved Toby to his own suite and out of the dow ager’s at the very crack of dawn. Nand’ Siegi said he was doing well enough, and that was a relief. Servants hurried about, arranging this and that, about which Toby knew nothing.
Bren watched, standing in the hall, judging that things would go more smoothly if he stayed out from underfoot.
And there was one other early watcher in the hall, a forlorn boy, escorted by his two remaining bodyguards. Cajeiri could be stone-faced—his grandmother’s teaching—but at the moment he was not. He looked very lost, very miserable, very short of sleep.
And for once, the disaster was not his fault.
Bren walked over to him, with Banichi attending, and Cajeiri bowed and looked at him about on a level—they were almost the same stature—and bowed a second time.
“One is extremely sorry, nand’ Bren. One is so extremely sorry!”
“One by no means blames you, young gentleman. Your bodyguards behaved badly. Not you.”
“We failed to manage them,” Cajeiri said.
“That would have been difficult,” Bren said, “where the Guild failed. No one blames you.”
“But everything is a mess, nandi! And if I had not gone downstairs, and if I had not evaded my guard—”
Bren shrugged. “Yet rather than consult with those guarding the estate, not to mention those who know you better, those two made a general and undisciplined rush to the boats and drew my brother with them. One may imagine my brother understood that one word and your name, young gentleman, if nothing else. Hence he went with them. And Barb-daja went with my brother. It was your guard’s foolish decision that took them outside.”
“Or perhaps a most ill-timed independence of action,” Banichi said. “And one does not discount that possibility, young gentleman.”
Cajeiri looked at him, confused.
“One does not believe,” Banichi said quietly, “that your bodyguards were acting against you, young gentleman, or they could have done so at any time—against you, or nand’ Bren, or your great-grandmother. I do not believe that motivated them. But Guild man’chi does not rush off into forbidden territory, taking innocent parties with them.”
Confusion became consternation. “You are saying that they were . . .”
“One does not know what they were doing. But they were not acting in your interest, nandi. If they were acting in your interest, they would not have lost track of you at any moment. If they were acting in your father’s interest, they would not have lost track of you.”
One had to remember the boy had spent two formative years with humans as his closest associates. The instinct for man’chi was potentially disturbed in him. It was one of the concerns everybody had had. If Cajeiri missed fine points—it was only what they were trying to correct.
But two near-adult Guild were a separate issue. When Guild attached—they attached. By what Banichi was saying—attachment had never happened in those two. Regarding Cajeiri, a minor child, that was clear. But if they were working at cross-purposes with the household the aiji himself had assigned them to . . . that was potentially a far darker matter.
And yet, Banichi had also said they were not acting against Cajeiri—or his father.
“Banichi?” Bren asked, suddenly aware he didn’t understand what Banichi was reading in them, either, wasn’t wired to understand it—not the way Banichi picked up the clues.
“They were not focused on the young gentleman,” Banichi said. “They have not been focused on the young gentleman. They did not regard the young gentleman’s orders, or his anger. Or the aiji’s. This has been the difficulty.”
“Yes!” Jegari said suddenly, as if something had suddenly said the thought in his mind. And far more quietly, Antaro, under her breath: “Yes.”
“Did you know this?” Bren asked, looking at Banichi, shocked if this should be the case.
“One knew they were not attached,” Banichi said, “but not that they would never become attached, nandi. That was not evident until this incident. That they wished to be attached was evident, but wishing does not create a man’chi that does not exist.”
So something had tipped across a line for Banichi in that incident. Cajeiri hadn’t picked up on it. Jegari hadn’t been sure, Antaro looked still a little doubtful, but Banichi was willing to say so, now, for some reason which didn’t have clear shape to human senses.
“Explain,” he said, and used the request-form, not the order-form. “Explain, please, Banichi-ji. What is going through their heads? What are they up to?”
A slight shrug. “Their interests are not the young gentleman’s. They have reserved themselves. Now they have acted along those lines without consulting senior Guild in this house. The direction is not clear, but it is not in line with service to the young gentleman. They have laid their lives on this choice.”
“Literally?”
“Literally,” Banichi said grimly, and added a phrase from the machimi: hoishia-an kuonatei—a shooting star. Somebody flaring off. Sometimes it was gallant, admirable. And sometimes it was not. Often enough, in either case, it was fatal.
And it was one of those aspects of the machimi plays that never had made rational sense. His personal translation for it had been somewhere between suicide and irrational, emotionally driven sabotage.
“Why?” he asked. “Do you think they actually asked Toby to follow them into that mess, Banichi-ji?”
“Maybe they did,” Banichi said.
“Was it aimed against me?”
Banichi frowned. “One hesitates to guess that, nandi.”
The Guild did not guess. In public. He had to content himself with that, until he could get Banichi in private. But then Banichi said, in a low voice: “The young gentleman is involved, nandi. One surmises, surmises, understand, that while this household may seem ordinary to your staff—it seems vastly different to outsiders.—Is that so, Antaro?”
“Banichi-nadi.” Antaro bowed a degree lower than protocol, and so, immediately, did Jegari. Both faces looked shocked.
“You have gotten used to your young lord,” Banichi said, “have you not, nadiin? And you are Taibeni.”
“One does not understand, Banichi-nadi,” Cajeiri said in distress; and there stood the paidhi-aiji and an eight-year-old child, both left in the dark on that one. “Are we in the wrong?”
“They are from the mountains, nandiin,” Banichi said, “and they are not Ragi. They are extraordinarily gifted, but they have been called out by their
superiors in the Guild no few times for independent actions, and have not mended their faults. They entered their adulthood in the Guild during the Troubles, when Guild leadership did not take them in hand and when they were not attached to that leadership. This was the beginning of their fault. Second, they have seen the aiji restored, but they reached their adulthood outside the surety of his man’chi. One is relatively certain they did not attach to the Usurper. There is that. They could not have passed the Guild’s security check, else. But they have not attached to the restored regime, either, nandiin. One has feared this. Algini and Cenedi alike have attempted to sound them out and have received indefinite answers. Therefore we have maintained some distance from them, which may have worked harm in itself. They reasonably expected high honor and considerable latitude here—they attempted to exert rank with us—and instead met a far stricter discipline in this household of humans and Edi and a far lower rank than they expected. If they were mature in mind, they might have applied to the aiji, who assigned them, and ask for transfer into his household. They did not. They flared off.”
“Then what are they doing, Banichi-ji?”
“It is an important question, nandi, whether they requested nand’ Toby and Barb-daja to go out—or whether your brother conceived the notion through misunderstanding. Certainly this pair did not consult Cenedi before opening the house door onto an area under watch. That was a serious breach of rules.”
“One does not understand,” Cajeiri protested with a shake of his head. “Are they traitors?”
“They are confused at this moment,” Banichi said. “They do not know. That is the point.”
“One is quite helpless,” Bren said in frustration, “to grasp the logic in this. Did they shoot Toby, do you think?”
“One doubts it,” Banichi said. “But there was a state of alert declared on the grounds just before they went out that door . . . with nand’ Toby and Barb-daja. They were in receipt of that information. They knew they were running into fire. If they invited nand’ Toby out there, it was in that knowledge.”