Inheritor

by C. J. Cherryh

  "The lilies," Damiri-daja said quietly.

  "Lord Tatiseigi," Tabini said, "will tour the restored breakfast room. And there will be cameras — official cameras. Do you think you can keep nadi Jase proper and kabiu for the duration? This is unavoidable timing. And highly unfortunate. But it might be an excuse, if Jase-paidhi were to take to mourning. Perhaps some human custom of retreat. Would it be appropriate for him to take ill?"

  God, he wished he could say yes. He felt sick at his stomach, from sheer imagination of the Atageini lord visiting the apartment, ahead of television cameras. A formal reception. Jase, distracted as he was apt to be, in the mood he was bound to be in. He felt very sick at his stomach.

  A broken-legged assassination? Dared he?

  Maybe they could just slip Jase a sedative. A dose of mildly poisonous tea.

  But no, no, then the press would blame the lord of the Atageini. The headlines would banner an assassination attempt.

  Perhaps he should take a double cup of the tea himself, and not have to face this lordly inspection tour.

  But that would leave everything in Jase's hands and that was impossible.

  "I'll decide," he said to Tabini, "based on what I hear from him after he's talked to his mother. But, in all honesty, aiji-ma, I fear I can't offer a method. Unless we claimed some custom on the ship. Which — could answer to most anything, I suppose. If it were necessary."

  "I would have avoided this timing," Tabini said. "But trying to delay it could make a worse problem."

  "One can't tell my uncle no," Damiri said, hands folded in her lap, very proper, very demure. "He wishes to see you, nand' paidhi. And one believes this business on the peninsula has made him that much more aggressively determined."

  Bren drew a quiet breath, getting the full picture: Saigimi's wife and daughter, relatives to Geigi, had fled to the Atageini's neighbor, Direiso.

  And Tabini entertaining lord Badissuni, the one Banichi said would be dead by fall.

  "Not," Damiri went on to say, "that my uncle will grieve for Saigimi. Nor that he will be displeased to see Direiso discomfited — but he will set great store on being here, nand' paidhi, and in public, and — One relies on your discretion."

  Tabini shifted in his chair and propped his elbow on the arm, his forefinger across his lips as if, unrestrained, he would say something incredibly indiscreet.

  The paidhi could well imagine. Tatiseigi would rather double-cross lady Direiso only after she'd knifed Tabini.

  Failing that, was Tatiseigi's move a public display calculated to annoy hell out of Direiso and to promote Tatiseigi's importance in the aiji's court — as uncle to the aiji's now publicly revealed lover, and unwilling host to two humans?

  There was the sticking point.

  But meanwhile they'd be civilized. That was the essence of things: civilization. They were the lords of the Padi Valley: Tabini's house, the Atageini, Direiso's Kadigidi, and a handful else.

  Tatiseigi of the Atageini and Direiso both had encouraged the peninsular lords to rash actions, which Saigimi had undertaken most rashly of all. Saigimi's death was the means by which the aiji pulled the chain — hard — and reminded them all where authority and force rested.

  Hell, it did beat war as a solution.

  What he thought of saying was, It's rather brave of Tatiseigi to walk in next door, considering he's a logical target.

  What he also thought was, God, what kind of Guild members is the old man going to have with him, and what if they break out guns, and shoot at Tabini?

  What he did say was, "Would it be wise of me and nand' Jase both to relocate permanently and allow your uncle possession of the apartment, Damiri-daja? Would that solve the problem? Or we might move for a few days —"

  "No such thing!" Tabini said. "Let him be resourceful in his lodging!"

  "I'd by no means wish —"

  "No, nadi, let my uncle be resourceful," Damiri said more quietly. "Nadi-ji, he will manage. With the aiji-dowager's good grace, perhaps he will lodge directly downstairs: he is no stranger to her premises."

  "Is she here? I thought she was bound for Malguri."

  "Oh, grandmother is returning here," Tabini said. "She will arrive tomorrow. I'm sure she stayed on in the western provinces for exactly this show — I mean the matter of the lily porcelains, not lord Saigimi and that nonsense. She'll amuse herself with the party.

  Then she'll be off to the east in all haste, mechieti and staff and all. So she promises me." Tabini had settled back in the chair and folded his hands across his stomach, both elbows on the chair arms, feet out in front of him. "If you have wondered, nand' paidhi, yes, regarding lord Saigimi. That is all I will say on the matter. And all you should reasonably ask. Grandmother will of course be furious with the affair in the peninsula and very busy with phone calls all about the Padi Valley. But you have such a marvelous capacity to soothe her tempers, Bren-ji. — And I do trust you to do so."

  "Aiji-ma, I have no such influence, I assure you —"

  "Oh, don't be modest. She dotes on you. You're civilized. That's her word. Civilized. And you have, she says, such lovely hair."

  He tried not to flinch or to blush. Tabini was amused and Damiri's mouth courted dimples one after the other. "So my security tells me," he returned dryly, and was immediately aghast at himself. He'd twice now gotten direly reckless with atevi lords, but he drew a laugh from Tabini, who'd, in point of fact, challenged him.

  In truth, the paidhi sat outside the system of lords and inheritance, and couldn't possibly challenge Tabini in any sense that mattered.

  "My uncle will not lodge with you, nand' paidhi, be assured so." That from Damiri-daja, and quite soberly. "Only be very careful. I ask you, be careful of him. He is in some ways delicate in constitution and more delicate in sensibilities."

  "He's in all ways an unreasonable old man," Tabini muttered. "It would be indecorous to file Intent on him, but, gods less felicitous! He does try me. — How, by the by, is the peninsular society this season? I hear you took advantage of lord Geigi's hospitality."

  "He was a very good host and wishes you well, aiji-ma."

  "Well he should. Well, well, I'll have your report of him. I trust you have it in preparation."

  "My staff does, yes, aiji-ma."

  "The plague of Uncle descends tomorrow —"

  Tomorrow! he thought, and did not say.

  "— barring rain," Tabini said, "which I am told prevents the paint from drying completely enough. And the weather report is clear. — If you charm this impossible man, Bren, I do swear I'll make you a ministerial department."

  "I doubt that I can do so much." The relationship between the Atageini and the aiji's house was already such that the aiji himself couldn't stall the man or his questions, and probably many of those questions (except the peninsular assassination) involved two humans guesting on the property.

  He'd enlist the staff to keep Jase and Tatiseigi separated. Saidin might do it. Saidin might have far more luck than the aiji of Shejidan, in that matter.

  No one, it seemed, could tell uncle Tatiseigi no — and, technically speaking, he supposed no one could do so legally in the matter of the impending visit. What he had heard of the shouting in the hall indicated something truly beyond Tabini's control, unless Tabini wished to take extreme action.

  The old man was going to push that situation. And Tabini. Which was one thing considering interpersonal relations. But this was two clans involved. And Damiri.

  Wonderful place for two humans to be standing. And impeccable timing. Jase wasn't up to this.

  "One can still wish for rain," Tabini said. "So. Bren. — What about Geigi?"

  Now it came down to the matter on which the aiji wished to be informed — officially speaking. It came down to Geigi's good reputation and the reputation of all the workers in that plant and in all the other labs and plants he'd visited, who relied on him to represent their work, their good will, and all the things they'd tried to demonstrate to him. He
tried to collect his scattered wits and represent them well.

  "So when will it fly?" Tabini asked him bluntly. Early on, it had been, Will it fly?

  "Ahead of schedule, by some few months, aiji-ma, I still maintain so, until and unless we find some problem that delays us the months we allowed for such events."

  "But as yet no such problem exists." Tabini rested his chin again on his hand and looked satisfied. "It might have arisen, understand. Now such an interruption is far less likely."

  He was so busy thinking of engineering details he didn't take Tabini's meaning immediately.

  Then he did.

  "Saigimi did not want that ship to fly," Tabini said. "He viewed it as a means to bring down the government. He was wrong. His assassins did not reach Geigi and they did not reach the director of Patinandi Aerospace. So you had a very quiet trip."

  "Yes, aiji-ma."

  "You noticed nothing untoward."

  "No, aiji-ma."

  "Good," Tabini said. "As it should have been."

  * * *

  CHAPTER 10

  « ^ »

  The interview with Tabini had gone relatively quickly, and on a day interrupted by phone calls and upsetting news of the Atageini visit — to his apartment — Bren was hardly surprised.

  That left him time to go back to the apartment before the television interview, or, on the other hand, time to visit the office down in the legislative wing and to pay a courtesy call on his staff.

  He might, he decided, accidentally interrupt Jase's phone call if he went back to the apartment: Jase had to make his call either from the library or from the security station, and the library venue had been so hard to predict regarding noise from the reconstruction (hammering would begin at the damnedest times, and the staff would go running, trying to silence the culprits) that he rather imagined Jase would use the security office phone near the front hall out of force of habit.

  Which didn't need the confusion of the front door opening and closing and the servant staff running about.

  So he opted for the office downstairs, where his clerical staff maintained a dike against the flood of correspondence. It was a rare honor, the dedication of one of the three available offices inside the Bu-javid, 'for security reasons,' as he'd heard, meaning that he tended to visit the clerical office often and that his security and Tabini's didn't want the paidhi going to the building that was the other option, down the hill to what was officially called the Maganuri Annex Building. It had been built in haste among the hotels at the foot of the historic real estate, and it probably forecast the trend: the governmental complex was starting to sprawl, and the last rank of intruders, the hotels, were, only since last year, starting to crowd the residential areas, which the Planning Commission wouldn't have.

  So there was to be a new subway link to a hotel district being built on the city outskirts. Tabini's enemies pointed to the growth of government.

  But those same enemies supported the creation of various commissions and agencies that kept the aiji from making autocratic decisions, which was the alternative. And they required more offices and more hotels. He'd warned Tabini against more committees. Tabini had been willing to let the power go last year, saying that certain things needed more study than his staff could give it.

  But now Tabini was looking with a very suspicious eye at some of the commercial interests that had crept in with agendas which had no place in the traditional structure, agendas being backed by some of the lords. That office building out there, the Maganuri Building, built to house the study committees proposed by the legislators opposed to the growth of government, was beginning to be plagued by sewer and electrical problems. The opposition blamed sabotage by Tabini's agents, or by the old aristocracy, a wide range of conspiracy indeed, and no few of the commons avoided it and wouldn't attend committee meetings there because of the reputed bad numbers.

  Others said it was built on a battlefield (it was) and that the dead troubled it. Oddly enough, the surrounding hotels and businesses had never had such difficulties.

  So the paidhi was quite glad to be honored by the office he had, and not to have to take the subway down the hill, or to the edge of town — where according to the latest rumors, the construction, since the folded space controversy had set certain numerologists playing with an expanded deck, was also plagued by bad numbers, which might even halt construction.

  Certain numerologists were suggesting that the number of state offices be shrunk, and the whole thing be cast back to the system whence it had blossomed, tossing the responsibility for information-gathering back into the hands of lords and representatives, who, in the old days, might suffer personal disgrace if they handed in bad information. The names of lords authoring reports previously had been permanently attached to the measures they proposed and the results, good or bad, had remained their responsibility.

  Some said the fact that Maganuri had died and that the three local lords (who had been very forward to hire construction agencies within their associations) failed to affix their names to the building ought to be a warning.

  Some said that old Maganuri himself haunted the office building on stormy nights, looking for Shimaji, Sonsini, and Burati, the contractors in question, to put them to haunting the building in his place.

  So the paidhi was definitely glad not to be down there, in a building some were seriously talking about demolishing before it was fully occupied. As it was, he needed only go to the lower tiers of the Bu-javid complex and, via the security access, walk into his premises, never having broken a sweat.

  Secretaries scrambled out of their chairs, rose and bowed as he and Banichi walked in, and nand' Dasibi, the chief of his clerical staff, came hurrying from his office to bow and receive the paidhi's personal inquiry into office affairs.

  While he was listening to Dasibi's running commentary, Dasibi walking beside him with his notebook the while, the paidhi took his usual tour down the aisles of the clerical desks, pausing here and there for a word to the clericals who answered his mail, the first line of defense between the paidhi and his more interesting correspondence.

  He routinely scanned that, too, or at least the prize pieces. Nand' Dasibi had established a board on the south wall in which the staff delighted. It recorded, Bren had discovered, the tally of death threats versus marriage proposals, choice crank letters, some proposing how to protect the earth's atmosphere against pollution from passing spacecraft and one, his favorite, from a husband and wife in the East, regarding the invention of a ray that would convert the ether of space into breathable atmosphere so that airplanes could fly to the station.

  The paidhi through his staff had suggested that the proposed spacecraft did have wings for atmospheric operation, so that, if the gentleman and his wife could perfect the conversion ray, it would be perfectly compatible with the current design.

  So far there was no news from that province of such a development.

  And there was the board devoted to children's letters: the staff tallied those, too, mostly sweet, occasionally clever, sometimes fearful of half-heard adult conversations. The staff passed on to him the best of the children's letters and the letters which seemed to represent a trend, and occasionally gave him copies of the really good crank letters and marriage proposals. His security handled the death threats.

  But mostly these clericals dealt with the flood of general correspondence, which would have inundated him and taken all his time. They also transcribed his tapes and cleaned up his rough and informal notes into the language most appropriate for the occasion. That small service alone saved him an immense amount of dictionary-searching — not that he didn't know the words, but he was never sure there wasn't a better one and never, on an important report, dared trust that the word that popped into his head didn't have infelicitous connotations that he had no wish to set onto paper. A written mistake might fall into the hands of news services interested in catching the paidhi in such an infelicity. The press daren't take on the aiji, mustn't,
in fact; but a lord of the Association was a fair target; and in less than a year he'd become such a person — protected, still, in certain ways, but increasingly fair game if he made a blunder that saw print.

  Besides, his dictionary was one humans had compiled, of necessity, to equate human words — and sometimes one could make an unthinking glitch on the numbers because counting didn't come naturally and even atevi made mistakes. These experienced governmental clericals would, like his experienced governmental security, fling their knowledge between the paidhi and the dedicated number-counters who sometimes sent letters specifically designed to entrap the paidhi into numerically infelicitous statements, which they, in the perverse self-importance of such experts, could then term significant.

  As a minor court official, again, he'd been immune from such public relations assassinations. As a major player in affairs of state, he, like the aiji, was a target of such manipulators, and his strike in return was a standing order for commendations to any clerical who by handwriting, postal mark, or other clues, identified one of these nuisances by name, handwriting, and residence and posted them to others in the pool. The staff shared information with the aiji's staff and, in a considerable network, with various lords' staffs: 'counters could be a plague and a pest, and the clericals detested and hunted them as zealously as the Guild hunted armed lunatics.

  It made him feel a certain disconnection from the job he'd used to do himself, however, and he feared that he was in danger of losing touch with ordinary atevi as fast as his increased notoriety and importance had gained him the ability to know them. He liked the atevi he'd met, the elderly couple at Malguri, his former servants in the Bu-javid, the astronomy students at Saigiadi — most of all, people of various staffs he'd dealt with.

  And he couldn't stay in touch with them, and couldn't allow himself the human softness, either, to reserve a spot for them in that inner limbo where lost and strayed acquaintances dwelled. They were outside his man'chi. They weren't his. He couldn't expect them to become his.