Bregani asked: “And is this compartment less terrifying?”
Husai’s gaze darted from one to the other, lips compressed. There was not much space in the doorway. She seemed to want to fade behind Nomari, himself looking distressed.
“I think we may assume,” Bren ventured, “that nothing untoward happened here. Nomari-nadi, can you say so?”
“Nandiin, please ask her. We were accompanied by my entire aishid, assigned me by Lord Tatiseigi and the Guild.”
Which was to say, high-up Guild, impartial, without man’chi, and no, not lying.
“Daughter,” Bregani said. “Did someone do something?”
“No!” Husai said. “No.”
“She is scared of the descent,” Nomari said quietly. “She is scared of the situation. And the meetings. And of what may be happening in Senjin. I could at least tell her the train is behaving exactly as it should. Her bodyguard scared her. I apologize, nandiin, especially to her parents, for the locked door. And the silence.”
“It is not his fault,” Husai said. “Honored Father, Honored Mother, I asked him not to let them find me. I was just upset. And the baggage car was dark, and I just—I came to nand’ Nomari’s car. And I thought—the next car is nand’ Machigi’s, and his aishid is—is—”
“Scarier,” Nomari said, and with a flicker of eyes to his face and away again, Husai nodded.
“So I knocked at nand’ Nomari’s door, and he was there.”
“Nomari-nadi,” Nomari said, staring at the floor, “daja-ma.”
“Nomari-nadi,” Husai corrected herself. “But he will be a lord. And he gave me tea. And that is all we were doing.”
“Nandiin,” Nomari said, looking to Bregani and Murai, “you were in an important meeting. Husai-daja appeared distressed with the guards. I knew you were with the aiji-dowager, nandiin, and I should not interrupt that, but if anything had happened to make her afraid, I should try to find out without disturbing everything. That has happened, and one is deeply sorry.”
“I,” Bregani said, “am waiting for the story myself. I am waiting to learn in detail. Daughter.”
“It was just the train,” Husai said. “It was just the train. I keep feeling we might fall. And you had gone to deal with the dowager, and the guards would not tell me anything that was going on, and I wanted to know. But then—then I just panicked. I thought if I found where you were I could stay. And then I realized I had to go past Machigi’s guards. And I was afraid to go back. So I knocked on nand’—on this door. And he was here, and not at the meeting either. He said that he had taken this trip before and that the train was not out of control and everybody was safe, and I just—I just wanted to sit and have a cup of tea and have somebody tell me we are not all going to die.”
“The guards did not frighten you,” Murai said.
“No,” Husai said, and looked at the two who had been hunting for her. “No. It was nothing they did. I am so sorry. It was my fault. I will tell anyone, it was not your fault. I lied. And I slipped out. And I upset everyone. Please do not be mad at my parents.”
“Your bodyguard,” Banichi said, “should not have to overcome you in your own protection, Husai-daja. We may have more than one compromised individual aboard, one of whom you know. Please lessen the risk to your guards and yourself.”
“I shall,” Husai said. “I am so very sorry.”
“Forgive our daughter,” Bregani said, and to Nomari: “Nadi, you were cautious, and one appreciates the caution. Forgive her parents’ concern.”
“Nandiin. I hope the meeting was not disrupted.”
“I think it went well, nadi,” Bregani said. “Though I think we may wish to sit down in our own compartment and take something stronger than tea. Our profoundest apologies to the aiji dowager.”
“I shall relay them,” Bren said.
“Daughter,” Bregani said. “Nadiin.” The last to the Guild unit, who could not, Bren thought, look forward to a report on the matter.
Bregani and his family moved on, with their assigned bodyguard, while Banichi reported a curt, “Safe. Stand down,” to a Guild operation thoroughly set on end.
Nobody had wanted to upset the dowager’s meeting. Nomari had doubtless had a quandary of his own, as to his own situation.
And a teenaged girl and a young man with reason not to trust the law had for a number of minutes thrown the dowager’s affairs into disorder.
Machigi had a dark sense of humor, rarely glimpsed. Machigi, if he gathered very much of it, might be quite amused.
The dowager—less so. The Guild, less than that. They did not enjoy working as they did now, with unknowns, outsiders, and strangers. They did not favor sudden assignments to individuals who might have immense significance to plans and absolutely no grasp of the tactics that might be brought against them.
“One apologizes profoundly,” Nomari said. “To everyone. I am sorry. I am very sorry.”
“It was not all the girl’s safety that may have concerned you,” Bren said. “Be honest with me. It is generally a good idea.”
Nomari drew a deep breath. “You are right, nandi. My bodyguard asked emphatically to report. I—was trying to think what to do.”
“Trust the Guild,” Bren said. “There were years when that was not necessarily the best idea. But trust the unit that protects you to have your best interests at heart.”
“Nandi. Should I write to the dowager?”
“I shall take on that matter,” Bren said. “And in the spirit of truthfulness, I also had to learn, several times quite painfully. Trust your bodyguard, so that they can trust you.”
7
“So,” Bren said to the dowager over tea, while the Red Train screeched and groaned its tilted way down the grade, “we now have everybody back in their respective cars, and Nomari-nadi is safely an entire baggage car removed from the young lady.”
The dowager loved a scandal almost more than she loved a good wine. Her eyes positively sparkled, but quickly grew more serious. “It is not a bloom we can ever encourage.”
“For many reasons,” Bren said. “But I do not greatly fault either, aiji-ma. They are young, they are neither one in power over the situation, they are justifiably anxious about their future and the young lady was quite uneasy about the dangers of the route. Neither is stupid, which is to their advantage, but their intelligence keeps a lively fire under their imaginations. For him, there are ghosts in the shadows and motives are suspect. For her, every clank and squeal is overturn and ruin. I confess this descent makes me quite anxious. She is only sixteen.”
Ilisidi positively smiled. “A questionable number. And a very handsome young man kept looking at her over dinner. Did you mark that, paidhi?”
“Oh, I did. I saw it going both ways, aiji-ma.”
“Mmm. How extraordinary that her imagination overwhelmed her with fears only until she found herself outside the young man’s door!”
“She said that it was fear of meeting Machigi’s bodyguards that stopped her short and sent her to Nomari’s door. Which is understandable.”
A wicked, wicked smile. “I have been a girl of her age. And I take all this flightiness as seriously as I take ghosts—though, mind you! there is a very reputable ghost in the vicinity of my house at Malguri, and I have myself heard the old bell ringing down on the shore. So we shall halfway believe in her dread of Machigi and simply count ourselves fortunate we had a convenient very handsome young man in the way to prevent that meeting.”
Appalling thought, that . . . though Nomari’s guards were surely not apt to be fools.
“I feel rather sorry for Nomari, however,” Bren said. “He was put in a very difficult place, with her parents standing there, with the young lady in no frame of mind to be logical. And his sleeve wrung to ruin in her hand.”
Ilisidi almost laughed. “Do you think anything did go o
n?”
“Oh, there may well have been thought of it, aiji-ma, but there were four Guild witnesses with no man’chi to either. I rather imagine Nomari’s mind was filled with visions of your wrath and her parents’ indignation, and the collapse of the association so carefully assembled, all falling on him.”
“With my forces in control of Senjin’s capital, far less likelihood of anything falling. But we have had quite enough Marid blood married into the midlands lordships, and one would not like to view that machimi again if at all avoidable. It has no good lines in it.” She took a sip of tea. “Well, well, she is the heir of Senjin, and that fixes her in place. He is safe. She cannot go to Ajuri. And if we do confirm that young man, he will be fixed in Ajuri, and I would not be surprised to see Tatiseigi push some regional choice in his direction—ill-starred as that link has been for both Ajuri and Atageini clans. I would rather urge that young man to look to Dur or Cobo.”
Northwest and west, as the Atageini sat to Ajuri’s east. Good choices, both, stable small clans with a strong economy, a strong Transportation Guild, historic links to Ajuri and no history of conspiracy.
“You are then leaning toward approving him.”
“I have found no fault in him. And he truly is a handsome fellow.”
“That has no relevance at all, aiji-ma.”
“No, but there is no fault in it, either, if, as likely, he will be in my sight now and again, under Tatiseigi’s roof, not to mention that he has attracted my great-grandson’s approval and, my greater worry, might someday attract my great-granddaughter’s. If this young man is wise, he will attach very strong man’chi in both directions and learn his statecraft from Tatiseigi, since he comes to us as a blank slate, untutored and unattached. I have seen nothing in his comportment to say he is a fool, a profit-seeker, or in any degree prideful. He has shown himself modest, has not traded on his prospects, has not pushed himself forward even at clear opportunity to do so. If anything, he is a little too reserved and modest to survive court, as he is, and some people would practice on him, but he is no fool, either, or he would not have lived. One would hope he will resort back to Tatiseigi and learn from him how to send off a scoundrel without becoming one. Mind, I am thinking of my great-grandson, now, too. When Cajeiri is twenty and inclined to act the fool, if ever, that young man will be mature, and fully sensible by then, I would hope, if not sage. The fact my grandson’s wife will likely be regent for my great-granddaughter when that child inherits Atageini, well, someone should have a memory of having his hands in the mud and muck and making a living on his own. There is such a thing as too elevated a living and too little honest work. And the fact this young man is still alive is all his own doing. No one rescued him.”
One was surprised . . . and not. The dowager’s own home lacked modern conveniences—including, in many areas, electrics. She had been a competitive rider. She tended her mecheiti herself whenever she had the chance, and while she was meticulous and fussy about some things, she could come in mud-spattered from the stables and cheerfully wade a puddle up to her ankles when she had been caught out in the wet—granted it was her loyal staff who would turn her out coiffed, ribboned, and wearing satin and rubies for dinner in the next hour.
Nomari had somehow seemed to have passed her exacting standards. Nomari had not been invited to tea with the dowager, in the way Bren had, when he was new, but then—the dowager had been playing rather higher stakes in that long-ago meeting, her grandson Tabini-aiji having made the unprecedented decision to take a human advisor to his personal retreat, and to converse with him.
He did not, personally, begrudge Nomari a gentler start in public life. He was quite relieved to hear Ilisidi’s assessment overall. Nothing could have gained her personal interest faster than a breath of romantic scandal; and count Bregani’s pretty daughter in for Ilisidi’s continuing interest in her future. That young woman had now gained Ilisidi’s notice, which could be an advantage, if one did not slide into the negative column. Bregani, a relative of Cosadi, who came near the top of the list of people Ilisidi had detested alive and dead, had sired Husai, who had possibly made a play for a person, Nomari, destined to share a boundary with Ilisidi’s closest and most favored ally, Lord Tatiseigi, and to advise her great-grandson, Cajeiri. Was she involved? Oh, yes.
And a darkness in that young man, Ilisidi had said. It was not all approval.
Bren sipped his tea and felt the train strangely change pitch, the car rocking ever so slightly. He paused, setting the teacup down, a little alarmed, and then felt the train running on the level.
Ilisidi looked completely unruffled.
There was the curious sound then as the train entered a tunnel—as they were to do twice on this descent. It was the first time that he had had a clue where they were.
Probably the view from the switchbacks would be absolutely spectacular.
If there were windows.
Probably it was all absolutely spectacular, depending on which side of the train one stood. If there were windows. One imagined sunlight glancing off the Marid sea, and a vast flat plain all hazy—no winter in the Marid, where snow rarely came. His imagined vision began to look like a map. With place names. He had absolutely no sense of scale, just the dry recollection of his study. With tunnels to pass through, and timber spans to pass over, and thoughts of sabotage, the Dojisigi surely being aware they were on their way.
But there were also Guild units hopefully snug in shelter, camped along the track and watching those key points.
“I should fancy a game of chess,” Ilisidi said. “Will you?”
It was not the paidhi’s place to refuse. Ilisidi had done what she had done, had arranged what she had arranged, and one would never suppose that the aiji-dowager had any nervousness about what she had yet to deal with, no, never.
Cenedi, doubtless her regular chess opponent, bestirred himself from his reading and provided the board and the pieces.
“You seem distracted,” Ilisidi observed to Bren.
“I would say this is a unique experience.”
“We have lost three trains on this descent,” Ilisidi said, “but two were sabotage, back in Cosadi’s time. And we have taken measures.” She set out the pieces as she spoke. “And when we ship such things as Machigi’s steel, we shall naturally do it on the lowland route: heavy loads were never the intent for this route. This rail was built, truly, as a pretext, a way into the Marid that fairly hangs over their heads. Its building vastly annoyed the Dojisigi, and enabled Senjin to maintain some independence, which we saw even then as a good thing and which set them up in what liberty they have. So we continue to use this route—for trade to keep Senjin somewhat independent, and for statements such as we are making now, and also to help little Hasjuran, which has clung to life and trade since the days when we were actively building the rail. Senjin is a good market for them. Trade between those two points makes sense. No air service, nor any likely to come, for various reasons. And the rail will always be mostly the lowland route.”
“But you are still serious about Lord Machigi’s sea route, aiji-ma.”
“Oh, yes.” A pawn moved. “I am serious and Lord Geigi is perfectly serious.”
Lord Geigi, master of the atevi side of the space station, who talked about weather prediction, and satellites in various positions to observe the world, even submersibles to study the depths of the Great Ocean and travel the far side of the world, was part and parcel of the dowager’s plans. There was no limit to Geigi’s imagination, and the more details the human archive poured forth—now that they had achieved parity in technology—the more projects Geigi had in the planning stages. The Department of Linguistics on Mospheira was increasingly agitated by Lord Geigi’s projects, and proposed this and that law to curtail access to the archive, to no avail, since the human Captains of the ship had to approve the human director up there, and the human director was, lately, quite coope
rative and not at all to the liking of Linguistics and its conservative Committee.
So, yes, Lord Geigi was generally serious about his projects, and likely lay awake nights imagining new satellites to do useful things.
Bren moved a pawn. Ilisidi moved another.
The train exited the tunnel and clanked on its way.
* * *
• • •
Uncle Tatiseigi had made a hasty trip out to Tirnamardi and back to the capital again since mani had taken the Red Train and left. Cajeiri gathered all of it from staff, who talked to other staff, and he was worried about Uncle.
He had a standing permission to visit anyone on the third floor of the Bujavid, which was, besides Father . . . mani, and nand’ Bren, and Uncle, who was actually Great-uncle. And Cajeiri worried about Uncle Tatiseigi. Mother had called on Uncle Tatiseigi and brought the baby to see him just after mani had taken the train and left, which would have cheered Uncle, Cajeiri was sure.
But that was Mother’s visit, and Mother had not asked him to go visit Uncle with her, so he had not asked or intruded his presence, thinking he would go later.
And then Uncle had left.
But Uncle was back now, having dealt with something at Tirnamardi that took two days; and Uncle had not sent any messages that staff knew of. Uncle was just keeping to himself and seeing no one.
That was what Eisi found out.
So with Rieni’s warning in mind, Cajeiri put on a formal coat and took just his younger aishid, that Uncle knew well, and went out and down the hall to the endmost apartment, which was Uncle’s. He was determined to be careful with what he knew, but he was determined, too, that Uncle would not feel disregarded.
Madam Saidin answered the door, knowing they were coming, because staff passed word. Madam Saidin was Uncle’s major domo and ran Uncle’s business in the Bujavid, whenever Uncle was not in residence.
“Is Uncle well?” he asked. “Is he seeing anyone?”
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