Deceiver

  He bowed. He started to retreat.

  “Nandi,” the officer said.

  He turned about.

  “You will need communications,” Damadi said.

  “We can manage the equipment, nadi,” Banichi said, “if you will do us the courtesy of leaving it.”

  Damadi said somberly, “One asks that you keep the bus rolling for a space, nandi, nadiin, while we discuss this matter.”

  Tabini’s men were not agreeing to be let off. There was hope, at least, that he would not have to take his bodyguard alone into a situation this dangerous. His stomach, which had sunk entirely when he had read the dowager’s order, grew still more upset with the notion there might be support for them—help that might have strings attached. They could not be sending messages back and forth to ask advice, not least because advice could not be given without involving Tabini. But wise heads were together back there.

  And one lone problem in their situation stood on one foot behind them, leaning on a seatback, looking at them with anxious eyes.

  “Nandi?” Lucasi asked faintly as Bren passed.

  One lone problem whose immediate concern had just dropped to the very bottom of the pile, along with every other personal obligation. Along with Barb. Even with Toby. He held a position of trust for millions of people. He didn’t have the luxury of thinking of Barb. Or a stray young Guildswoman. Or a very confused young man who wanted a way out.

  “We have been diverted, Lucasi-nadi, with extreme regret for the urgency of your situation. We shall pursue our course down this road, but if circumstances have taken your partner in any other direction, we cannot now pursue it. Our orders now come from the aiji-dowager. You may leave the bus and make your own way back to Targai.”

  “One wishes to stay with you, nandi.”

  “You have an assignment,” Banichi said. “Go to it.”

  A deep bow. “Nandi, allow me to stay. Allow me to continue.”

  “The mission has changed,” Bren said. “Take Banichi’s advice. Go back to Targai. And go ask Lord Geigi if he has a place for you.”

  “We have lost everything,” Lucasi said. “We have nothing. Let me stay, nandi. Let me do whatever duty there is. One asks, one asks, empty-handed.”

  “This is not a mission for suicides,” Banichi said coldly. “That intention has no welcome here. Go do that on your own recognizance.”

  “One will take orders, nadi! One will do anything.”

  “Then get off the bus and walk back to Targai,” Bren said. “Talk to Lord Geigi. I shall count it a personal service. It is very likely Barb-daja was taken by some other clan, and matters have grown complicated.” He continued forward to the driver. “Stop here, nadi,” he said, before young Lucasi could find out anything or protest further.

  “Nandi,” Lucasi said, bowed his head then came limping after them down the aisle, holding to the seats and railings.

  The bus braked to a stop, the rumble and racket falling to what was, by comparison, a lingering and breathless silence. The door opened, at Banichi’s instruction.

  “Go,” Bren said.

  “Nandi.” With a bow of his head he ducked down toward the exit, limping, looking very young and pitiable at the moment.

  Bren watched him go with painful sadness, but very little regret for the decision—not when the boy’s lack of judgement could jeopardize other lives, and the mission, and compromise the aiji’s integrity. There was one thing—one helpful thing the boy could do, put Geigi wise to the fact the bus was not coming back, so that Geigi would not be phoning Najida and putting sensitive information onto the phone lines.

  Beyond that—

  We are going to die, Bren thought, trying out the thought. I am taking Banichi and Jago and Tano and Algini into a situation I don’t know how to get us out of. And if we do survive this, that poor kid’s look is going to haunt me so long as I live.

  He chanced to meet Algini’s eye. Algini nodded once, grim confirmation of his dealing. A sweep of his glance left met Banichi—with the same expression.

  And in that same interval, while the bus was stopped, Damadi came down the aisle. Alone.

  “Nandi,” Damadi said with a little bow, “we are with you. Your orders are the aiji’s orders.”

  That many more men and woman were all in the same package. All at extreme risk. All his responsibility.

  “My extreme gratitude,” he said. “Thank them. Thank them all—for myself and for my bodyguard.” If there was a chance of getting out alive if things went wrong—it was in numbers. It was in covering fire.

  It meant losing most of these people, if he failed. They would try to keep him alive. And it was not a priority he wanted.

  He leaned forward to speak to the driver. “Carry on, nadi. Mind any disturbance of the road surface. There was a mine today on Najida road.”

  “Yes,” the driver said. He was himself one of Tabini’s men.

  Bren straightened up again, caught his balance with the upright rail as the bus resumed its bumpy, headlong speed.

  Toward Tanaja. Toward the largest capital of the Marid, a place he had never in his life wanted to see up close.

  He sat down, and his bodyguard clustered together over in and around the opposite seats, talking in low voices.

  Which left him to consider what he was going to do so as not to die, along with everybody else in his charge.

  That meant communicating with Tanaja before taking this bright red and black bus full of Tabini’s Guildsmen deep into the Marid.

  And that meant having something eloquent to say in the very little time Machigi might listen.

  He didn’t have his computer with him on this trip. It, and all the sensitive information it contained, including reference materials that might have been useful at this point, were back in Najida. That was probably a good thing.

  He had, however, a small notebook in his personal baggage. He got up, got that out, and settled down, extending the tray table for a work surface.

  He wrote. He outlined. He lined things out. He went to a new sheet, and finally, as Banichi and Jago returned to their seats opposite him . . .

  “One is appalled, nadiin-ji,” he said, “one is extremely distressed at the situation. One is willing to go, but the risk to my aishid is entirely upsetting to me.”

  Banichi shrugged. Jago said, “The aiji-dowager has not done this lightly, and the support of the aiji’s men lends us a certain moral force, Bren-ji. The sheer number of us and the man’chi involved is considerable. We are gratified by their confidence in us.”

  “Survival is a high priority in this undertaking,” Bren said. “Your own as well as mine—and that is not only an emotional assessment. Your knowledge, your understanding of situations in the heavens, among others, cannot be replaced in the aiji’s service.”

  “Our immediate priority,” Banichi said, “is your survival, Bren-ji, and please favor us with the assurance you will not take actions contrary to ours. By no means rush to our rescue.”

  He had done that silly thing, among the very first things he had ever done with them. They had never let him forget it.

  “One is far wiser now,” he said, “and one offers assurances I shall not.” He moved a hand to his chest, which hurt with every breath. “I am wearing the vest, nadiin-ji, and shall wear it in the bath if you ask it.”

  “You will not need to go that far,” Jago said, “if you use your skill to keep us close to you. Do not let them separate us, Bren-ji, or disarm us. If they attempt that, be certain from that point that they mean nothing good, and harm is imminent, to all of us. At that point, if they move on us, we must take action.”

  “One understands,” he said. He took comfort in their presence and their calm, utterly outrageous confidence. He didn’t know where they got it, whether out of being what they were, atevi, and Guild, or out of the moral character he knew they had.

  Their devotion, their emotionally driven man’chi, was his. He was absolutely sure of that. There was no d
ivision between them.

  “I am going to get us out of this alive,” he found himself saying. “I need to contact Machigi himself. How can we go about this, nadiin-ji? Should you initiate the contact?”

  “That would be advisable under most circumstances,” Banichi said. “We can do that, Bren-ji, Guild to Guild. We can attempt to get information in the process.”

  “I need to know,” he said, trying to think through things in order, “if they are aware of the mine on the Kajiminda road and the kidnapping of the child. One assumes they are. I need to know if they are aware that the Guild Council is meeting on a question of outlawry. One assumes they have the means to know it.” The Marid Guild had been outcast, though not in legal outlawry, for months, as far as their being accepted in Guild Council . . . those members of the Guild who had been supporters of the Usurper were now, so far as he knew, Machigi’s, since Tabini’s return to power. That was surely part of what was driving Guild deliberations, now. “How close contact can they maintain with the Guild in Shejidan?”

  “Likely,” Jago added, “the Kadagidi clan Guild that have fled down here will maintain kinship contacts up in the central districts. And one naturally expects them to know any news that has gotten to Separti, where they have informants.”

  “Find out. And advise them that I have a message for Lord Machigi and wish to speak to him personally.”

  That should be enough to get the attention of a sane man who had any awareness he was in a trap . . . except, one could not help but think, Machigi was a very young man—in some ways reminiscent of the young man he had just dropped off the bus.

  Young, brilliant, so gifted that he had not tolerated many advisers, so confident that he had offended many of his peers—and perhaps now found himself the target of a move both underhanded and well-planned by far older heads: not smarter men, but more experienced. He had never seen a photograph of Machigi. In his mind’s eye he kept substituting Lucasi’s face in that moment Lucasi had descended from the bus—and that was a mistake. That was a supremely dangerous thing to do.

  It gave a faceless opponent an imaginable face, one whose reactions he could imagine.

  Imagine. That was the trap. He could lose this mission by a mental lapse like that, but once he had thought it, he had trouble shaking the image. That was precisely the age.

  Arrogance. Inexperience. Brilliance. All in one hormone-driven, unattached package. An aiji had no man’chi. He got it from below. And that made him hard to predict.

  Machigi would be irate, granted the dowager was right and some other lord of the Marid clans had not only defied him, but actively moved to plunge him into serious difficulty. He would be irate and he would not necessarily know who his enemy was, nor how many of his association might have turned on him.

  He would also be, quite likely, embarrassed to be caught without knowledge. He would be in a personal crisis as to how others thought of him, and he would be touchy as hell about exposing that weakness to his enemies and to his own people. The machimi plays, that guide to the atevi psyche, had had that as a theme more than once. Man’chi had turned, not to be directed to him. He was not as potent a leader as he had thought, and now everyone could see it. Others might be talking about him. The servants might become uncertain in their dedication. His spouse, if any, might be reassessing her marriage contract and talking to her kinfolk. It was a potentially explosive situation—both inside Machigi, and inside Machigi’s house, once it became known he had been this egregiously double-crossed.

  Granted, still, that Ilisidi was correct in her assessment of him.

  If she was not, and Machigi really had committed that foolish an act as to order Guild to violate Guild rules, then Guild action would have to take him out.

  Unfortunately none of them on this bus would live to see it.

  It was going to take a while for Banichi to get through to somebody in Tanaja, quite likely.

  And then there might be some little time of back and forth communication between the bodyguards before two lords ever got into dialogue.

  So he had time to think. He needed desperately to concentrate, and simply stared at the road ahead, past the seats Banichi and Jago had vacated.

  The people he loved most in the world—and this time around, he had to defend them. He had to be smart enough first to figure Machigi accurately and then to get a self-interested and arrogant young lord to do a complete turnaround in his objectives, his allegiances, and his—

  Well, Machigi’s character was probably beyond redemption. He would be no better than he had ever been. The question was, in self-interest, could he act in a way compatible with the interests of the aishidi’tat?

  How could he achieve that? Machigi would, assuming he was acting sanely, act in his own best interest. That interest had to become congruent with the interests of the aishidi’tat. And Machigi had to perceive that to be the case.

  And the situation would have an explosive and embarrassing emotional component: he had first to make Machigi aware of the situation with the Guild, if he was not aware already, and avoid Machigi’s indignation coming down on him as the bearer of bad news. He could not seem to despise Machigi in any regard.

  But neither could he afford to be intimidated. And it was a good bet Machigi would try to do that.

  He thought of the approach he would make.

  Getting into Tanaja alive was first on the list.

  What did they know about Machigi’s character? Without his computer, he had to haul it up from memory, and arrogant, ostentatious, argumentative, and ruthless were at the top of the list.

  Young, brilliant, and unaccustomed to failure or reversal.

  Ambitious, and already at the top of the Marid power structure.

  Challenged from below, really, for the first time.

  Humility was going to win no points with this young man. Brilliant?

  What about educated? That was different than brilliant.

  An education about the world outside the Marid would be an asset. He couldn’t remember data on that. But Machigi, like most Marid-born, had never been outside the Marid. His world experience was somewhat limited. Ergo his education was somewhat limited. He would not have seen things to contradict his own ideas.

  Bad trait, that.

  One couldn’t attempt to intimidate him with education: he wouldn’t recognize conflicting data as more valid than his own.

  It was a difficult, difficult proposition, this mission.

  “Nandi,” Tano said suddenly, having been listening to something for a few moments. “Nandi, Banichi has gotten to the lord’s bodyguard. He has gotten them to advise their lord you wish to speak to him on a matter of importance.”

  Get ready, that meant. He straightened his collar, his cuffs, as if Machigi could be aware of that detail; but he was, and it set his thoughts in order.

  Points to Banichi, if Banichi could get this man to talk in person. It would be damned inconvenient to have to conduct this argument relayed through his staff . . . a process that could go on for hours and end up with a number of important points taken out of order or lost entirely.

  Fingers crossed.

  He shut his eyes and waited. Sixty. Fifty-nine. Fifty-eight.

  He got to minus twenty, and Tano said: “The lord will be available momentarily.” Tano passed him an earpiece and mike, across the aisle.

  That was actually amazingly fast. Machigi had pounced on that one. Interesting. Encouraging, even.

  Curiosity, maybe. A burning, though predatory, curiosity.

  And now there was a very delicate protocol involved. One could not be waiting for the other. And one could not be made to wait for the other, not without creating serious problems from the start. Algini, with his own headset, was listening, and held up a finger to signal that, by what he heard, the lord was very likely about to take up communication. Two opposed security teams were required actually to cooperate to achieve simultaneity.

  He put on the headset. Tano signaled him.
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  “Nand’ Machigi?” Bren asked.

  “Nandi,” came the answer, a young voice with the distinctive Marid dropping of word endings. “You are on our border.”

  “It is our hope you will favor us with a meeting, nandi. More than that one should not say in this call. We ask a truce and safe passage to Tanaja, and a personal meeting at the earliest.”

  A lengthy silence. “Interesting.”

  “My office is not warlike. Discussion will be, one hopes, of mutual benefit. We ask your active and constant protection on the road to Tanaja, nandi, for very good reason.”

  A second, shorter silence. Then: “Come ahead, nand’ paidhi. You have our assurances.”

  That simplified things. One stipulated the road to Tanaja. That got a yes.

  Getting out again . . . he would have to manage that when the time came.

  “One looks forward to our meeting, nandi. Let communication pass now to staff.” He handed the equipment back to Tano, and Tano resumed listening. Doubtless Banichi, in the rear of the bus, was handling the specifics.

  Bren drew a long breath, thinking of Najida at the moment, his pleasant little villa above a sunny bay. He thought of the dowager and Cajeiri. Of Hanari and Lord Geigi, who would have to pull together a staff and a defense, in a house where Machigi’s agents had just been. No little bloodshed there, warfare right on the threshold of the Marid, lives lost . . .