Protector, Page 3

  The world had suspected, when she had not departed with her staff, and tonight, with that shocking arrival in the dining room, she had laid any lingering doubts firmly to rest.

  • • •

  The second course arrived, and then the third, with the traditional pause for applause for the aiji’s truly excellent personal cook. The old man, reasonably new to the aiji’s service, bowed happily, accepted the praise, and then had his staff bring out the next, the fourth course, a set of imaginatively arranged dishes which filled the ample table to overflowing.

  Bren took the vegetables he knew, and did not trust the seasonal tubers, last of the winter root crop, traditional to use up before the first breaking of the vine-buds.

  The traditional recipe, alas, rich in alkaloids atevi thought wonderful, would have a human dead in short order.

  “You are missing the traditional dish, paidhi,” Tatiseigi chided him.

  “Alas, one must leave it to your enjoyment, nandi. One is very strongly advised against it.”

  “Oh, surely, just a sample . . .” Tatiseigi said, not because Tatiseigi wanted him dead, Bren hoped—such an ungracious way to get out of a dinner invitation. The old man’s relaxed, somewhat wine-assisted complacency indicated he was in an unprecedentedly happy mood this evening. It was, Bren decided, actually rather touching, that solicitude about the dish, as if Tatiseigi was certain the paidhi-aiji had become atevi enough now to survive the diet.

  2

  Brandy always followed a formal dinner. With brandy, business talk, banned at the dinner table, could be conducted in an alcohol-fueled but somewhat torpid contentment. It was a social hour in which there was much leeway and little offense taken.

  In the case of the aiji’s dinners, there were always more guests for brandy than would possibly fit at the aiji’s private dinner table—guests who did not fit for reasons of rank; or who did not fit for reasons of politics; or for a number of other considerations including the frequency with which they had lately been invited.

  People kept track of these matters. Tabini’s master of kabiu more than arranged flowers, he arranged people. And he would keep everyone properly happy, even those not invited at all to the evening’s festivities, with small gifts, elaborate invitations, and special recognitions that substituted for invitations, keeping all the contacts polished, as it were.

  So it was out to the large reception hall for brandy, more people, and light refreshment. There was still enough food on the buffet tables for a reasonable meal, had one not had supper yet—and it was shoulder-to-shoulder in places. There were Names in the room. That these were all well-wishers of the administration was a comforting notion, considering the political variety of the gathering, and considering the tradition-breaking legislation about to arise in the session. It augured well for everything they were trying to get settled.

  Ilisidi was definitely a focus of attention in this room. Her personal understanding with Machigi, the new overlord of the five clans of the Marid, as he was shaping up to be, was certainly at issue. Machigi himself might have gone home to take care of business, but he had set up a new trade office down the hill from the Bujavid, and Ilisidi was doing business for that office wherever she walked, setting up meetings, extolling the virtues of the southern porcelains. She was simultaneously courting votes for the admission of the two west coast tribal peoples to the legislature—a matter which was not near and dear to her new ally Machigi, but which was definitely connected to her recent dealings with him—and an issue most certainly connected to Lord Geigi, whose Kajiminda staff came from the local Edi people. She talked to this lord and that, the redoubtable cane grounded for a prolonged time, occasionally thumping the antique carpet in emphasis.

  Bren judged himself not remotely as effective with the conservative set as Ilisidi, who, as the most powerful lord of the traditional East, had immense influence among western conservatives. Tatiseigi led that faction, and attended the dowager in her tour of the room. Bren just watched, taking mental notes as to who had a pleasant expression, and who looked less happy.

  “Bren-nandi!” someone said, behind him. He turned, recognizing the voice with pleasure: the young lord of Dur, Reijiri, son and often proxy of the sitting lord, was the bravest, staunchest, and most reckless of his own allies. Reijiri was not in his usual flight-casuals this evening, but wore a very plain formal dress in this company of glittering elite.

  “Jiri-nandi,” Bren said, with a quick bow. “So good to see you. Is your father here with you?”

  “I tried to persuade him to fly.” The elder lord’s reluctance toward his son’s bright yellow, open-cockpit plane was a standing joke in present company. “But you know how that is. At least I shall have his apartment in order when he gets here.”

  “Will you sit this session,” Bren asked, “or will he take the seat, himself?”

  “My father has declared he will,” young Dur said. “Which is good for the bills. He carries far more weight than I do.”

  “His support is very welcome,” Bren almost had time to say. Cajeiri arrived, with:

  “Nandi! One is very glad to see you!”

  Reijiri, he meant. Reijiri was one of Cajeiri’s favorite people in the whole world.

  “Young gentleman,” Reijiri said with a bow. “Delighted. One wondered if you would be in attendance this evening.”

  “Oh, one is obliged to be here,” Cajeiri said. He had yet another fruit drink in hand—a charge of sugar, instead of the sedation steadily progressing in the company. “One is so bored already with being shut in! Did you come with your plane? Might you possibly, possibly persuade my father to let me go up over the city, just once? Seeing the city from the air would be very educational!”

  “Alas, though I do have my plane here, young gentleman, I fear your father would never consent to that, under current circumstances.”

  “I am a prisoner in the Bujavid, nandi! I am bored!”

  “Are you indeed, young gentleman?” Ilisidi had come up uncommonly silently. “Come, come, a pleasant face, Great-grandson. Smile. And good evening, nand’ Reijiri. We are so glad to see you.” She laid a hand on Cajeiri’s shoulder, turning him to face the sparser center of the room. “We wish to introduce our great-grandson to his second cousins.”

  “Cousins?” Cajeiri asked, wide-eyed.

  The dreadful cane, only slightly elevated in the press, pointed across the room. A contingent of strangers, two of them younger folk—a girl and a boy, accompanying a father, as seemed—held a corner. They all were Eastern in their dress.

  “Calrunaidi clan,” Ilisidi said, which explained everything, even to Cajeiri, and certainly to Bren. He wondered for an instant was one of the two younger folk Maie-daja, who was now married to Geigi’s nephew.

  But no, the girl looked much too young . . . very early teens, closer to Cajeiri’s age.

  “We shall introduce you, shall we not?” the dowager said. “Take your leave of Lord Reijiri and nand’ Bren, young gentleman.”

  The Calrunaidi had not been at the dinner. That was a piece of delicate footwork, Bren thought. They had not been invited to mix in western politics, but it was mandatory that these people receive careful attention now.

  “Nandiin,” Cajeiri said obediently, with a glance at Reijiri. “One has to go.”

  “Young gentleman,” Reijiri said solemnly, and bowed, amused.

  “Just a few days short of fortunate nine,” Bren said, regarding Cajeiri’s age, and watched Ilisidi maneuver the boy into a meeting.

  “Quite a youngster,” Reijiri said.

  “He is that.” Bren had an eye on Damiri-daja, too, who was, yes, entirely aware that her son had been drawn by the dowager into a meeting with relatives of the dowager’s association. Damiri had a smile on her face, but it was thin.

  And one did not want to be caught noticing that fact.

  “So,” Bren
said cheerfully, glancing at Dur, “one wishes you might join us on the train tomorrow, when we deliver Lord Geigi to the spaceport. Might we hope for it?”

  “Alas, nand’ paidhi, one would far, far rather, but I have to meet my father at the train station in the city and get him safely to the hotel. He will come in tired and out of sorts, one would never say, confused, and I have all the requisite papers and authorizations and keys. He will never let the major domo have them, and he is bound to be overtired.”

  “Indeed.” One less piece in motion tomorrow morning was likely to the good, though he and Geigi would have enjoyed the company. “Ah, but I shall be giving dinner parties this season. A formal card will come when I have a date established; but please, both you and your father, do save room for me on your schedule, sometime before the session ends. I should much enjoy it. And I should be happy to have a quiet evening with you both.”

  “I shall answer for my father, in greatest confidence. Consider such an invitation accepted.”

  “Excellent.” It was very certain, given the situation with the Ajuri, to the east of Dur, and to the north of Tatiseigi, that those two had an urgent need to establish contact. If he could succeed in managing Tatiseigi at dinner once, with the dowager in attendance, he might try twice, with Dur. He dared not promise anything—but he hoped. “Well, well, I had best go do my job tonight, should I not?”

  “Nand’ paidhi.”

  A courteous bow, on either side. He and Reijiri broke apart to wander. He targeted a convenient pair of committee heads he had to deal with. He needed those votes on the tribal bill. And he had them reasonably happy on his change of vote on the cell phone bill.

  “Paidhi-aiji.”

  Tatiseigi wanted his attention.

  Tatiseigi with half a brandy in hand, and several glasses of wine taken at dinner. Overindulgence was not the old man’s habit, but he was in a rare mood, tonight.

  “One notes,” Tatiseigi said, “that you are conspiring with the west coast again.”

  A joke, a slightly barbed one, but he was sure it was a joke this time. “Arranging guests for yet another dinner, nandi. Dare one hope you will actually consider my invitation? I am quite serious. I would be very honored. And getting together with Dur—I had you in mind in inviting them—if your first trial of my hospitality with the dowager persuades you.”

  “Two opportunities to savor Bindanda’s dishes,” Tatiseigi said, and dropped his voice to a confidential tone. “I shall be hosting a festivity of my own soon, be it known, to which you are reciprocally invited. One assumes you will be free on the twenty-third. Perhaps we shall include Dur. He is bordering Ajuri’s association, a provisional member. One considers you may have that fact in mind.”

  The gesture amazed him. “One is very highly honored by your consideration, nandi. Might one ask what occasion the twenty-third marks?”

  “One might indeed. You have inspired me, paidhi. I have had a grand notion. I shall be bringing certain of my own collection in by rail.” Porcelains, the old man meant. “You need to talk to the subcommittee on imports, in the dowager’s cause, and you will have my support in the effort. She has explained her plans to me, and this new Marid trade initiative is a very bold move on her part. A very bold move, paidhi. And I shall support it. My exhibit will put porcelains in public view which have not been seen outside Atageini territory in two hundred years. It will mark the connection of this profound art with the southern Marid trade. I have no few pieces of that origin.”

  God. Amazing. The old man was a shrewd campaigner, and he was a passionate collector of an item the south had produced from ancient times. The paidhi-aiji had, trying for something relatively non-controversial, proposed the south’s famous porcelains as an opening trade item in the new agreement with the Marid. And in vague hope of at least appeasing Tatiseigi, he had gifted the old man with, as he increasingly suspected, a very special piece. “One would be profoundly grateful for your support, nandi.”

  “I have also told the aiji my views. We should follow up on our advantage in the south. We also shall open trade talks. We shall bolster the dowager’s agreement with this young lord—Machigi—and we must assure he reciprocates in his acceptance of all guilds from outside his province.” Aha, Bren thought, pricking up his ears a bit—the old man lived for agendas, and nothing regarding the guilds and their ancient prerogatives was entirely disconnected from the conservative platform. “That was certainly a part of your discussion with the aiji.”

  “It was certainly part of our discussions,” Bren said. “And remains so.” Things had gone a little surreal. Ilisidi had surely been talking to the old man, and now a new twist had become an issue. The Marid’s acceptance of the northern-based guilds’ authority within its bounds—yes, that had been on the table in the agreement. It was in there, in the fine print. But the conservatives seemed to have gotten it into their heads to run farther on that matter than discussions with Machigi had yet gone. The Assassins’ Guild was down in that district in major force—mopping up the renegade elements of their own Guild who had supported Murini. There had been a little talk of the Transportation Guild getting involved in improving rail service to the south.

  The conservatives, however, suddenly envisioned the whole Shejidan-centered Guild system going into place in the Marid, in every district, never mind the Marid’s long tradition of locals-only in the only two guilds they had historically accepted—the Assassins and Transportation. That was not going to be a totally smooth road—though he was working on that matter with similar hope, particularly for the Scholars and the Physicians.

  “I shall be offering these items of my collection,” Tatiseigi added, “for public viewing in the museum downstairs. And we shall catch the public imagination. The television service may be advised.”

  Tatiseigi proposed television coverage? The famed Atageini porcelains on television? Tatiseigi had had three atevi-scale glasses of wine at dinner and at least, from the snifter in his hand, three-quarters of a brandy. Bren had had one of the former, and decided that going slow on what he currently had in his hand was a very good idea.

  “One has become sensible,” Tatiseigi continued, “how truly rare items one has in that collection. The honor of the Atageini is to possess them—and to offer the experience of them to the people of the aishidi’tat, who will not have seen the like, ever in their lifetimes or their parents’ lifetimes.”

  “A generous gesture. A very generous gesture.” It was, indeed worth a bow, while the less worthy thought was cycling through one’s brain—that the rush of publicity and the sudden availability of southern porcelains for the collector’s market was going to mean something to certain individuals, too. Collections of scope and antiquity would become more valuable, in status as well as monetarily.

  And in Tatiseigi’s blue-blooded circles, status was as negotiable as currency.

  More so, if you had long been considered old-fashioned, out-of-date, and a little eccentric, were politically ambitious to the hilt, and had just had the aiji’s consort turning up in clan colors. Tatiseigi had never scored such an evening.

  And if the other guilds could be gotten into the Marid without reference to the historical, Marid-born-members-only policy, the backers of that agreement would have political capital to put any financial gain to shame.

  Was that it? Was the old man making a move for influence in the new shape of the aishidi’tat?

  “One is certain such a gesture will be well received across the aishidi’tat, nandi.”

  “Well, well, all due to the aiji-dowager’s wise notions. —Ah,” Tatiseigi said, spying someone of immediate interest across the room. “I shall speak to you about this, paidhi-aiji. Be assured I shall. But remember the date!”

  Tatiseigi was off, at fair speed for an old man, and the alcohol was curiously not that much in evidence.

  Bren drew a slow and careful breath, and was reliev
ed to note that their little conversation had not appeared to draw undue interest. Only a few steps away, Tabini was deeply involved with Geigi, and across the room, Cajeiri was still talking to his young female cousin from the East, as Ilisidi carried on a lengthy conversation with the Calrunaidi lord.

  He hadn’t been able to intervene in that situation, which was not Ilisidi’s nicest move, damn the circumstances. Damiri was on a permanent hair trigger regarding the dowager’s influence over her son, and, making matters worse, there was a very political cast on that meeting of second cousins. Calrunaidi was the clan of the bride of Geigi’s miscreant nephew. That meant ties to Lord Geigi on the one hand, and ties to Ilisidi on the other. Cajeiri was good and he was perceptive, but an eight-year-old was not up to negotiating the tricky grounds between his mother and his great-grandmother . . . and the boy could not refuse either’s orders.

  Oh, damned right Damiri was keeping an eye on her son, at the moment, watching with whom he formed associations—particularly female associations; and at the moment she did not have a happy look.

  Bren shifted objectives, and went to be introduced to the Calrunaidi guests, which gave him a chance to bend aside and say, quickly and quietly into Cajeiri’s young ear—“Your mother, young gentleman. Go attend her. Quietly. Now.”

  It was not a case of warning the average eight-year-old. Cajeiri was a veteran of literal fire-fights and palace intrigue.

  Did the boy blurt out, I don’t care? Or ask, sullenly, What does she want?

  No. The boy did none of those things. Cajeiri said in a low voice, with a deep bow, “Please excuse me, nandi. I have just received a request from my mother.”