Divergence

by C. J. Cherryh

  There was no shooting. In a moment the alert was off, and he could see the agent in the glasses pinned against the historic mural, but not so fiercely as might have been. The Guild was letting him stand free, with guns, however, endangering the murals.

  “Homura,” Tano said, but not in a welcoming way. Ilisidi was ordering her guards to give her a view, and Bren had his own.

  “Aiji-ma,” the young man said, and took off the glasses, giving Ilisidi a profound bow, and another to Bren. “Nand’ paidhi.”

  Cenedi was still halfway between Homura and Ilisidi. And not moving.

  “We hope to join you,” Homura said. “Or we can find a way.”

  We. Momichi, likely.

  “Visiting the paidhi-aiji, would it be?” Ilisidi asked. “Are we to have another explosion to inconvenience us? Or what is your intention, nadi?”

  “One regrets the inconvenience, aiji-ma. I took care of the problem before I left. He will not trouble Hasjuran.”

  “And you present yourself to us now—why?”

  “The Red Train is going the right direction,” Homura said. “We have business on the coast. Nand’ paidhi. You sent for us. We came to join you . . . at some difficulty.”

  “Do you know a man named Paigiti?” Bren asked.

  “We know you have him.”

  “He never mentioned you.”

  “Not by our proper names,” Homura said. “But yes, we know him.”

  “You are putting yourselves in our hands,” Ilisidi said, “and you should not expect courtesy.”

  “It has been rather a hard trip,” Homura said, and for the first time Homura’s voice faltered into hoarseness. “For much the same reason. We do not need courtesy. But we may be of service, if you are bent on finishing this.”

  “Take him,” Ilisidi said, with a wave of her hand. “Find his partner. Give them Machigi’s car.”

  “Check their equipment,” Cenedi said, which one thought was a good idea. They had been Shadow Guild. They claimed not to be, now. They also had not appeared since vanishing into the Marid and now turned up where the transformer had blown, up in Hasjuran.

  Now, hitherto operating alone, and betraying the interests that had betrayed them, they showed up in another guild’s uniform, expecting . . . it was unclear what. They surely did not mistake the dowager’s sudden departure westward for a holiday trip to Najida.

  Cenedi’s men escorted Homura on ahead of them, through the station. Another rail worker began to follow them, a man about Momichi’s stature. They stopped in the far doorway and went on together.

  “Do we trust that?” Algini asked, who, with Tano, had nearly gotten caught in the transformer blast.

  “There are trails down from Hasjuran,” Jago said, “but to make that trip afoot—one doubts it.”

  Riding exposed to the elements once—maybe twice—risked one’s life. It was a breach of the dowager’s security, and that was not easy to do.

  But if those two had ever told the truth, the Shadow Guild had been trying to lay hands on them since they had surrendered at Tirnamardi.

  The Red Train was puffing steam and waiting for them, as it had been, with several cars empty now. It was a flatlands trip, generally, and it had not shed the excess cars . . . in fact they had reloaded their mobile units, one with a heavy gun, and other armament. They were running as they had been all the way from Shejidan, and the Guild that had come to Hasjuran and Koperna with the dowager was leaving with her, while whatever was going on in the east continued, and while the first of the Guild forces provided security in Koperna.

  It was a trip they had never made, but they were headed for familiar territory, passing by the allied territory of the Maschi lord, and on to a welcome in Najida.

  There was never a time, coming to Najida, that Bren had felt anything but relief. But this time—he did. It was home. It was peace. It was security. And he was bringing the possibility of war with him, with the dowager. With all it entailed.

  Past the west coast, there was only Mospheira, before the ocean went on all the way to the east coast of the continent, a vast stormy nowhere. The west coast was where the atevi world stopped, and they had pushed the Shadow Guild to the edge of it.

  There was nowhere left to run.

  About the Author

  C. J. Cherryh planned to write since the age of ten. When she was older, she learned to use a typewriter while triple-majoring in Classics, Latin, and Greek. With more than seventy books to her credit, and the winner of three Hugo Awards, she is one of the most prolific and highly respected authors in the science fiction field. Cherryh was recently named a Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America. She lives in Washington state. She can be found at cherryh.com.

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