Defiance, page 10
“I will say so,” Ramaso said. “We had no idea you were coming until the call for the bus—but we can manage for the house. The people camped—”
“The people camped are not your responsibility, Rama-ji. They will feed themselves from their own supplies. But those of us in the house—we will greatly appreciate a sandwich, a bowl of soup, anything you can manage for people who arrive unannounced. A large supper—the Guild with us may appreciate. I fear I am too tired. Likewise the dowager.”
“Nandi.”
“You are much appreciated, Rama-ji. I can hardly express how deeply appreciated. We have been traveling for days, and drenched as we are, we are glad to be here. I shall want a pot of tea—the samovar filled—the little sandwiches. Those I favor. You know.”
“We can do those, indeed, nandi.”
“The Grandmother of the Edi needs to know as much as we know. Advise her that I will send information as I get it—I do not know how the dowager is faring and I may not be able to come down to the village under these circumstances, but I shall try to visit her. Tell her there is a problem in Ashidama Bay. The dowager herself would send salutations to her if she were able. Please say we are determined to protect Najida. Say that the aiji-dowager is here and that the possibility of immediate trouble is very high because of it. The other—I shall try to deal with.” Weariness overwhelmed him, astonishingly urgent. It was coming on full dark and suppertime, and the energy he had summoned was beyond running down—it was heading toward a crash. All things being safe, he would go to bed and be done with the day, given two spoonfuls of soup and a brandy.
But he was not a guest here: he had a responsibility to warn the residents of the peninsula, besides a responsibility for their defense—and the dowager’s. They might all, even himself, be under Cenedi’s command, but he was resolved to protect his own staff, his own province, and get information to Tabini-aiji, damn Cenedi’s priorities: if anything was happening to Ilisidi, Cenedi’s man’chi was without an anchor, and if she were incapacitated, where was his focus or his man’chi? Not to Tabini, one feared. Even the silence that had surrounded her for days might not have been of her ordering.
And what could a human do to get around Cenedi’s emotional state and set Najida as a Guild priority—at least within primary consideration—not alone because it was his concern, but because it had strategic importance, the man’chi of its inhabitants being perhaps indeterminate and less important to Cenedi, but certainly not to him. He desperately wanted to get a word with Ilisidi herself on that score. He wanted to have her set priorities for the Guild force sitting back there at the station with its weapons and gear, and have them dig in and form a formidable and immediate barrier to anything the Shadow Guild could possible send up here, not only for Najida, but likewise for neighboring Kajiminda, Geigi’s estate—vacant, but not vacant. Its defense was a duty the aishidi’tat owed to Geigi and to Najida. Edi were resident there, as well, and shared a shoreline with the Townships on Ashidama Bay. Ashidama had seasonal commerce with Kajiminda—still maintained it, though the history of Edi involvement with Ashidama was not a peaceful one, and not that many years ago. Trouble was set up and waiting like a tight-wound spring, if it were Cenedi’s concern to know that right now. It likely was not.
He had to give Cenedi that information, at least. He had to have it clear with the Guild force spreading out near the train station that Edi were a recognized, entitled member of the aishidi’tat. The force out there came from all over the aishidi’tat. They were not likely to be aware of the situation of Kajiminda and the Edi. Banichi could explain it to them—Banichi could, better than any Easterner; but Banichi had no authority to order that force, because the paidhi-aiji’s own power was civil, and the Guild deployment was under the aiji-dowager’s orders, meaning, again—Cenedi.
Call Tabini? There was no guarantee the phone lines out of Najida were not compromised already: the Messengers’ Guild, who managed them, was notoriously problematic and the old coms were certainly compromised. Cenedi, who had the only safe means of communication, would not surrender it to him.
There was, however—
—what the paidhi-aiji did have, an ability very rare among atevi on Earth.
“I shall need a phone,” Bren said. “I shall be calling Lord Geigi.”
Their neighbor, lord of Kajiminda . . . who was not at home, but who had a vantage point like no other.
He would have called Geigi long since, had he had the new communicator that Cenedi had taken back.
But with the near certainty that the Shadow Guild was at Jorida—if Cenedi was operating on some order from Ilisidi, who was not doing well, and if Tabini was not getting reports. . . .
Yes, he needed a phone.
“I would like to make a call,” he explained to Ramaso. “I would like that first. See to the other things, Rama-ji. There are so many things to tell you. But the phone, first.”
“Yes. Yes, nandi. And this new young gentleman . . .”
God. Nomari.
“Nomari. Presumptive heir of Ajuri,” Bren said, “pending the aiji’s approval. You and I shall have a brandy at leisure, once I am rested. Then I will tell you everything.”
“Of course. Of course, nandi. Refreshment is laid out. The baths are heating. Dry clothes are in the closet.”
A steaming bath. A glass of something. Anything. Dry clothes . . . he kept mostly comfortable ones here, and what he was standing in was dripping on the polished floor.
All these things—but first:
“The Grandmother needs to know as soon as possible.”
“I shall see to it all, nandi. I shall send the phone. Please rest. Leave everything to us.”
Us. The Najida staff. The Edi folk. One and the same. If Ragi atevi were a mystery, the Edi and the Gan atevi, the Tribal Peoples, were an enigma to the Ragi, let alone to a human. But he cared for them in ways that would confuse their atevi hearts—they protected him for what he was sure were their own reasons, too, neither wholly understanding the other, but expecting good behavior. He permitted himself an emotional attachment, risky as that was with atevi—trust, and a sense of being home, whenever he was here.
He went through the door to his own suite, Banichi and Jago preceding him, Tano and Algini following, into the comfortable familiarity of the rooms. Banichi and Jago immediately began to check the sitting room, while Tano and Algini disappeared on an inspection of the other rooms where, presumably, Narani and Jeladi were already at work laying things out. Familiar pattern, familiar surroundings. Sounds were muffled here. The light was old-fashioned lamplight. Smells were spice, and the fragrance of new evergreens from an arrangement on the mantel, the furnishings simple but polished. Two servants were in the room adding finishing touches, and by the time he had crossed the floor to the buffet laid out on the other side of the sitting room, they had quietly escaped out the door.
“Serve yourselves, nadiin-ji,” Bren said, as Tano and Algini reappeared. It tempted. But, not yet. “We are home. Rest.”
The room was warm. The fire in the fireplace and the metal stove in the next room were doing their job, but he was still shedding water onto, fortunately, a wooden floor. His bodyguard, somewhat more waterproof, had hung up coats and Jeladi was busy toweling off boots. Narani moved in to claim his coat. Even the vest was wet about the shoulders, his lace cuffs were sadly dripping, and the shirt had to go, right there in the sitting-room, before he dripped his way further. Bindanda held up a bathrobe and he gratefully shrugged it on, warm and dry, though his hair was dripping onto it and the white ribbon that tied his queue, badge of office, was undoubtedly beyond saving.
An Edi servant came through the doors with a phone.
“There,” he said, indicating the desk in the corner, which had a socket for the phone, and after the servant left, he sat down and plugged it in.
Phone was at once one of the lowest and least secure communications to be had, and theoretically included in the communications silence, but Cenedi had released general com, had he not? And the Red Train sitting at the station and a camp being set up rather well indicated to the whole west coast that at least he was here. He initiated the requests and gave the authorizations to the operators up at Cobo to reach the boards of the Bujavid itself. Codes given there bounced the call back to Cobo operators and finally into the upper echelons of that least trustable guild, the Messengers, who clung to their control of the big dish, the first earth station at Mogari-nai.
Fine. The fact the paidhi-aiji had phoned Geigi could be spread across the continent and broadcast on the daily news, for what he cared.
The Messengers’ Guild operator at Mogari-nai requested numbers and names. He repeated the codes and gave another. The opposition wilted.
Interest at Mogari-nai certainly would become acute: the call once launched blazed up to automated station operations, direct to the atevi side of the station, and finally, with a series of beeps and blips, to wherever Lord Geigi was, personally, and interrupted whatever he was doing.
“Bren-nandi,” came the familiar voice. “One is delighted. Felicitations. Are you well?”
“Nandi,” he said in Ragi, and then switched to ship-speak, a step beyond Mosphei’. Ship-speak was the language of the starship Phoenix, even distinct from the dialect of the Reunioners, and atevi not in the space program had no foothold in that.
But Lord Geigi did.
“I’ll be quick,” Bren said. “I’m not using names. You know where I’m calling from. We’re here. The lady—you know who I mean—is not doing well. She fainted once at the station. We’re in the house, she’s safe and resting. Her doctor is with her. We hope it’s just exhaustion—tired from the trip. The track was a mess, we were very slow. We know about trouble to the south. My house where I am I’ve informed and they’ll be watching. I don’t want them to get involved in it. I know you’ll keep an eye on that situation. Warn us if it travels. We’ve had a driving rain, heavy cloud. Can you see the lowermost peninsula?”
“Yes,” the answer came back a few seconds later. “Dojisigin ships in port. We have sight through cloud. We advise of any movement. We monitor transmissions up here, down there.”
Ships? What did he mean, ships? Was there more than one? Possibly just locals as well as the Shadow Guild ship. But . . . down there. Kajiminda, did he mean? Dared he take time to ask?
“We should be safe where we are. We have a force at the station. She is our greatest worry. She’ll rest here, tonight, maybe tomorrow—she is not talking to us. Not able to talk to us. You-know-who is standing in the way. Call the city, call him, let him know the situation. Do you copy that? Tell him order her guard. He won’t regard my orders.”
Thunder cracked. The phone could go out.
It stayed. “I copy. Got it. You safe?”
“Yes.”
“Why phone? Com not working?”
“They’re working fine. I don’t have one. He does. He might call you.”
“You suppose to have one unit.”
“We had two, but he took them back—possibly greater need with the force that protects us. Call her grandson. He needs to know where we are. He urgently needs to have my report. But I can’t give it on the phone.”
“Understood clear. I am distress about the com.”
“I know. So am I. But we’re secure here. And it’s possible she’s just exhausted. Bad track most of the way. Bumps and racket for days. I hope sleep will help. And a floor that doesn’t vibrate. We’re safe here. I trust our people. But I’m afraid—I’m afraid I could have trouble getting north in time to help your problem. Let her grandson know that, too. Tell him call my brother. He doesn’t have ship-speak, but—”
“Yes. Yes. I hear. But you should have com! My order.”
“I don’t know. They didn’t expect to have to equip the camp, maybe. I don’t know. It could be the dowager not wanting reports. Tell her grandson that, too. All right? We can’t stretch this call too long. Call us and call her grandson if you see trouble. We’re safe, we’re protected, and I’ll get up north as soon as I can, straight from here, if I have to.”
“Got it,” Geigi said. “Got it. You stay safe.”
“Absolutely agree. You too. Ending now.”
Geigi closed the connection from his side. Bren hung up the phone, staring into space and seeing for a moment, in memory, Lord Geigi and his steel-and-plastics environment, and his capabilities—those panels blinking awareness of everything that moved under the station’s view. Godlike power—threatened by a mass of panicked human refugees tearing their own environment apart.
And atevi power struggles doing much the same down here.
It was going to take time to solve. He was supposed to be part of that. He was supposed to handle translation for the refugees they were going to bring down. Reassure them of their safety.
Welcome to the planet. Pardon us. We’re having a war at the moment. Your translator is delayed.
Skittish humans—who had survived hell already. And were terrified of other species.
Geigi had multiple reasons to call Tabini, with questions to ask as well as to answer. Bad news to deliver, if Ilisidi herself was failing—disaster affecting not only herself and the power structure of the aishidi’tat, but all that they had done.
The documents. The agreements left in the hands of Lord Topari, the lord of Hasjuran, to get down the mountain to Shejidan. Topari—a decent man. But erratic. With his capital suffering a total power outage. And no train to send until one reached him, there on the roof of the world.
God help them. There was a technicality: the documents had to be filed while all the signers were living.
He had to talk to Cenedi. If he could get to Cenedi in a calmer frame of mind.
“Bren-ji.” Tano put a cup of hot tea into his hands, anchoring him to this room, this place, the current situation.
Geigi would act. No question. Geigi would get the message to Tabini. Presumably, charitably thinking, Cenedi would be doing the same thing, with his own view of events. One had to assume that, professional that he was—everything that Lord Topari of Hasjuran was not—Cenedi was taking logical actions.
Within the sphere of his last orders.
Whenever those had been.
God.
He took a sip of tea, set down the cup and opened the desk to extract one of his several message cylinders, then decided on a more direct route.
“Banichi,” he said, and when Banichi came near: “The documents. Have we heard anything on them? Have they gotten out of Hasjuran yet?”
“We will ask,” Banichi said. Which meant that Banichi himself went to the door and out to face Cenedi, while Bren took a shaky sip of tea. And another. Trying not to think until Banichi returned.
“Nawari believes Cenedi has indeed messaged Tabini-aiji about the documents needing to be picked up,” Banichi said. “There is the train bringing in a transformer.”
God. The replacement transformer.
“They will go back on that, then,” he said with relief. “Topari will see the documents aboard. He will not fail that.”
Banichi gave him a look that said—it was Topari.
But if Topari knew one thing, it was surely that Hasjuran’s future depended on those documents. Topari himself might be on that train with the documents, sleeping with them, headed to Shejidan . . .
With the highest security little Hasjuran could muster, in fur-edged hunting leathers and with personal rifles . . . because the order for that transformer might have launched that train with no one at operational level even imagining how precious its return cargo might be, and not realizing its urgency. Topari would assuredly explain that, however. Passionately.
God.
“We know the man is unstoppable,” Bren said. “In this case—an excellent quality. Sit, Banichi. Rest. We have done what we can for now.”
Banichi settled his large frame into an accommodating chair. There was space to breathe. A good chance the documents had moved or would move soon. Down the hall, in that suite Najida maintained for her, the dowager was resting in, one hoped, far greater comfort than she had known in days. The only sound in hearing for the moment was the crackling of the fire. The tiny squeaks of certain boards in the floor. The distant closing of a door somewhere in the house.
Rain, on the roof.
He hoped the Shadow Guild was equally soaked and waterlogged tonight, wherever they were.
But likely they had moved onto Jorida Isle—not even troubling to look like a merchant operation in doing so. The Master might not favor such a force arriving in his hall. But there they would be, not necessarily with armament evident. The approach might even be soft, appealing to the Master’s vanity.
The force would come when they had seen everything they needed to see. Should he just phone Jorida, warning the man?
If they had been a few days earlier, it might have helped.
By now, there was no knowing whether the Master was still alive. Probably he was. Probably he was regretting by now not having made a phone call himself, while he had time. The number of Guild on that ship, if it was the only ship, was entirely sufficient to take the town unless there was a very good plan of defense. It would not stand long. Tiajo, if they had not dropped her overboard, was likely sorting through whatever glittered.
Possibly by now the Master was hearing offers from the Shadow Guild, propositions before the threats.
After which there was the reality of a Shadow Guild operation setting up a day’s drive south of Kajiminda.
Dislodging it was going to be a problem. Najida had no influence in Ashidama. The nature of the aishidi’tat was cooperative unity. Participation, not compulsion. But that was precisely the Shadow Guild’s own way of operating—in reverse. They would find the weak points very quickly. Take hostages. Apply force. Appall the populace with their acts. Instill terror—but not quite enough desperation. Promise rewards. Pay off a few. Promise better things soon.
And once they had the populace well under their heel, without an organized underground resistance, it was very, very difficult to dislodge them.
