Destroyer (24 page)

He opened his coat and took out a disc from an inner pocket of his coat, where he carried that, and Tabini’s letter. He gave the right one to Toby. He was extremely careful about that transaction.

“This little thing,” Toby said. “Doesn’t look dangerous to me.”

“Don’t let anybody see it until you’ve read it end to end. That’s all I ask. You’ve had a rough enough time being related to me, brother. I really, really don’t want to make it worse.”

Toby pocketed the disk and patted the pocket. “I secretly enjoy it.”

“God, I don’t know how you could.”

“Oh, look at us, now. Good excuse for a fishing trip, good view of a forbidden coast, breaking the law with a naval escort off beyond that horizon . . . and knowing there’s something useful I can do about the current messed-up state of the world. What more could I ask?”

“A brother who shows up when it’s really important.”

Toby grabbed his arm, hauled him around, never mind the boatful of atevi that went from relaxed to high alert. “Don’t you ever say that, Bren.”

“A discussion of brothers, nadiin-ji,” Bren said over the rush of the water, and more quietly, to Toby, who had let him go. “I won’t say it, but I still think it. Don’t meddle with my load of guilt, Toby. It looks like hell, but I’ve got it pretty well balanced by now.”

“Don’t joke.”

“I’m not joking.”

“The hell. What happened with mum was what had to happen, sooner or later, the course of nature, happens to us all, and no, as happened, you couldn’t possibly have been there, or you couldn’t have gone and done whatever you’ve done out there. What happened between me and Jill was my doing, my business, our business—Jill undertook a warfare the same as mum, to have me disavow everybody but her own circle. I must have picked her out of my subconscious, a familiar style of dealing with people, something I understood by upbringing. God only knows. But she and mum were a real bad match.”

“I won’t argue with you.”

“And Barb’s not like that. She’s not Jill.”

Oh, God, he most of all didn’t want to tread that territory. He didn’t want to claim to know her the way he did. But he did know her. “The reason we didn’t get along was the job, brother, just the job.”

“She’s not possessive.”

Not possessive yet, he thought, Toby was wrong about that: Barb was exactly like Jill, exactly like their mother. At least—he said to himself—she had been of that stamp. She’d gotten along perfectly with their mother, understood exactly what grief their mother had, at war with Jill.

But he carefully, determinedly, gave Barb credit for improvement over the years, most of it a matter of growing up, dealing with the consequences of her choices, after he’d gotten as far from Barb as he could get. She was entirely agreeable, if she was getting what she wanted, exactly like their mother. She was adept at making the environment constantly tense if she wasn’t getting what she wanted, exactly like Jill, and on one level his conscience told him he was a coward not to say exactly that to Toby, right now, while he had the chance and before Toby got himself into another bad relationship. But half of all that had been wrong in his relationship with Barb . . . was him, and his being constantly on the mainland; and constantly resenting the demands their mother put on him, and recognizing that game all too well—he knew that, too. If Toby and Barb shared a boat and were never apart—they might be happy. They could be happy. Could he help, by breaking that up with what he thought he knew?

“Is there a problem?” Toby asked, going defensive, and worried.

“She’s Barb, that’s all you can say. The fire’s completely cold between us, not even an ember left alight. That’s no problem of that sort; but we never got a chance to make a decent friendship after we broke up. I’ll do my level best to do that now. For your sake. You can tell her that, if you like.”

Toby let go a breath, so wonderfully open, so transparent and honest, all the way to the depths, his brother, two things which he wasn’t, and couldn’t be for two minutes running.

“I’ll do better than my level best,” he said. “We’ll work it out. Don’t worry about it.”

But
he
worried about it. There was one more thing Barb liked, different than their mother, and Jill. She liked the spice of drama in her life. She couldn’t pass up the opportunity for a little excitement. And if Barb pulled one of her shifts of attraction from Toby to him, just to see the sparks fly, he didn’t know what he’d do. The stability Barb demanded in her partners had never had to apply to Barb.

A thought which he shut down, except the determination to have a talk with Barb and lay down the rules of engagement—or non-engagement, as the case might be.

“Tell you what,” he said to Toby, “if you have any lingering doubt, believe this: Jago will keep us honest. I
have
an attachment. You know that.” Half humorously: “And believe me, Jago’s not to cross.”

Toby shifted a glance aft. Jago was not in view. But his shoulders relaxed as he leaned against the rail. “I hope you’re happy, Bren. And I’m not criticizing. Jago is special. She’s very special. And I really hope you’re happy. Contented, in the human sense.”

“Mutual,” he said, glad to escape the topic, and leaned there beside his brother, while Barb steered the boat and Jago—did whatever Jago did. Rested, perhaps. Perhaps just watched Barb like a predator watching prey. One never forgot, either, that Jago’s hearing was far more acute than humans were used to reckoning, and she understood Mosphei’ much better than humans were used to being understood.

Had she overheard? The rush of the water was very loud. Probably she hadn’t. He let it go. There was honesty between him and Jago, such that he could outright ask her, and they could discuss what Toby had said—remarkable, wonderful in relationships he’d had. He let go the tension.

Peace, for about half a minute.

A commotion, Cajeiri’s exclamation, and a sharp word from Ilisidi, involving venom, and cutting a line.

“Stingfish,” Bren cried, without even seeing the situation, and shoved away from the rail to get back past the deck house, which blocked their view. Toby was right behind him.

Cenedi had snagged the fishing line, it seemed, and with a flash of a knife sent Cajeiri’s orange-spotted, finny prize back into the sea, hook and all, to the relief of all aboard.

“But I had no chance to see it!” Cajeiri protested.

“Fortunate,” Ilisidi said dryly, from her seat against the cabin wall. “Foolish boy.”

“But, mani-ma, Cenedi cut my line!”

“Nand’ Toby can show you how to rig another hook to the line, young sir,” Bren said, “a valuable skill for a fisherman.” Water was scattered over the white deck, right across Ilisidi’s sitting-area, from what must have been a considerable inboard swing of the snaky animal in question, with lethal side spines and an equally lethal bite of needlelike teeth, had the boy attempted to disengage the hook. “And when we have an opportunity, I shall show you a detailed picture of the creature—which, if it had bitten your great-grandmother, would have grieved us all.”

A stamp of the formidable cane on the deck.
“We
would not be so foolish as to be bitten. One does not say the same for a willful boy.”

“Mani-ma.” A bow. A very measured bow. Oh, we are not behaving well today, Bren thought. The boy was as tired as the rest of them, and desperately trying, after the frantic habit of youth, to be entertained, but patience and good humor was in very short supply.

Ilisidi had noticed this sluggishness of respect, too, and arched a brow, and stared at the young rebel, her lips a thin line.

“Where are you, boy?”

The jutting lip faltered. Tucked in.

“Answer.”

“On a boat, mani-ma.”

“As if to say, a
ship.
And
that
is the ship-aiji, more, the
owner
of this boat, which we are not. We are guests of a person placing himself at great risk in transporting us. Does this fact suggest anything?”

A moment of silence, in which Cajeiri shrank half a handspan and drew a deep breath.

“Need we suggest it?” Ilisidi said sharply.

“One apologizes, nandiin.” Delivered very quietly, with a bow of the head, from a boy who looked, now the energy had gone out of him, frayed, running on nervous energy, and, yes, terribly scared, when the whole ship had reacted to a creature he had flailing on the end of a line he had had no particular skill to manage. “I did not intend disrespect.”

“Bow,” Bren said, nudging Toby, who managed it, and Cajeiri bowed to Toby, and the dowager nodded, and matters were patched.

“This boy is tired,” Ilisidi said. “Nawari-ji. See him to a bed and tuck him in.”

Indignation. “I do not need to be tucked in, mani-ma!”

“He does not need to be tucked in,” Ilisidi said serenely, “but will benefit from a little rest.”

“Nandiin.” With a bow and a great deal of dignity the young rebel laid aside his pole and departed to the companionway, one of Ilisidi’s young men at his heels.

The deck was silent meanwhile. Barb, at the wheel, kept clear of the business, watching with apprehension, decidedly.

And then things went back to ordinary, the staff relaxing, Ilisidi enjoying the sunlight, hands on her cane, eyes shut.

Toby cast Bren a worried look.

“There are rules,” Bren said carefully, since Ilisidi herself understood more Mosphei’ than was at the present comfortable. “He’s doing very well. But he’s only eight.”

Toby gave a deep breath, on edge, clearly, and perhaps recalling his time about the mainland shore, where people had been on holiday and relaxed, as relaxed as atevi staff could be. The whole picture of atevi manners had never been available to him, and was not, now. It might not seem Ilisidi had been understanding, even kindly, in her handling of a boy whose temper and self-command had just snapped, and snapped because he was a child who’d been snatched from a world of routine and order into a world that had grown very remote from him. But Ilisidi was not cruel. Two years ago, at six, Cajeiri had had no independence. Now he had begun to run certain things—being tall as a human adult and strong and dexterous enough to do things for himself. But on the earth—and under present circumstances—he was obliged to take fast, concentrated advice from his great-grandmother, and become very much more adult, for his own safety’s sake, overnight . . . not mentioning the fact his physical strength was enough to do serious damage.

“This boy,” Bren said in a low voice, as they turned and leaned on the rail, “may be aiji within the week. He will have life and death in his hands. Indulgence is nowhere on his horizon.”

“You think Tabini is really gone?”

“I don’t know,” Bren said. “No one knows.” He moved the conversation back to the side of the boat and forward, under the white noise of the water, recalling atevi hearing. “She learned a great deal of our language on the voyage.”

Understanding dawned. Toby nodded, gave him a look, then leaned beside him on the bow rail, the white froth rushing along below them.

Long silence, then. Conversation on old memories, winter on the mountain, school days. Their mother’s cooking. The whereabouts of their father, who never ventured back into their lives, not even lately. That was a lost cause. They both knew that.

The wind shifted, and Toby looked up at the sail, and quickly left to see to the trim. Bren thought of going with him, handling the boat just for a moment, but, again, Barb was back there, and they’d clearly worked out that smooth teamwork, Barb and Toby had. He chose not to interpose his own skills.

A full day of such running, and half the night, and they’d work into the shoreline isles under cover of darkness. He might, extraneous thought, get off the boat without dealing with Barb, postponing all such dealings until he got back from the mainland—granting he would ever get back. He could duck below for an hour, get some sleep, and let his staff relax, more to the point, which they would not be able to do with emotional tension on the deck: they weren’t wired to ignore a situation that their nervous systems told them was unresolved between him and Barb. God knew there would be no violence, but their nerves, already taut, would resonate to every twitch and gesture and look, especially since he was sure by now Banichi also knew that was
the
Barb.

And the last thing he wanted between him and Toby at this imminent parting was Barb. He didn’t want to go below, into the close dark. He thought he just ought to bed down as Ilisidi had done, on deck, wrap up in a blanket somewhere where no one would step on him. He could lie near the bow, and just listen to the water. That would be good. There was a decided nip in the air. But only enough to remind him the planet wasn’t temperature-regulated, not on a local scale.

“Bren.”

Barb. Barb had slipped up on him, masked by the rush of water, the very person he hadn’t wanted to deal with. He stared at her, frozen for the instant, caught between a desire not to deal with her civilly and the fact that he’d promised Toby peace.

“Barb?”

“I’m sorry about your mother. It was two years ago for me. I know it was only yesterday you heard. So I’m sorry.”

“Accepted.”

“You’re upset that you weren’t there. She accepted that.”

“The hell she did. She never forgave me. She blamed me to her last breath because I wasn’t there. Let’s have the truth.”

“She did that,” Barb conceded. “But it doesn’t mean she didn’t love you.”

That hit to the quick, that
love
word, that sentiment humans needed, and atevi didn’t understand. He felt an angry sting in his eyes and turned his face to the wind, his eyes to the horizon, unwilling to have Barb come at him on that topic.

“You know there were things she wanted in her life,” Barb said, unstoppable, “and that didn’t happen, and she’d have been disloyal to her hopes to ever give in. One of them was your father. She never would deal with him again. But she never stopped loving him.”