Destroyer (33 page)

The dowager did not comment on the matter. Bren watched, unable to hear those quiet voices above the general movement of the mecheiti. It was a peaceful ride, a quiet ride, few people speaking even to immediate companions, and it was only belatedly that he realized the oldest rider and the youngest children were no longer with them. The whistles from elsewhere in the woods continued, fewer in number, but perfectly audible.

Toward afternoon: “We are inside Atageini lands now,” Jago rode back to tell him.

He had noticed an upright stone a moment ago. He had learned to pay attention to anomalies, even when he had no idea what they might be.

And he had not heard a whistle in at least an hour.

“One remarks a certain silence here,” he said to her.

“The rangers will not signal near this boundary,” Jago said. “Atageini hunters cross here. None recently, by the look of things.”

“Does that indicate, nadi-ji, that the Atageini avoid crossing into Taiben?”

“It is worth remarking, nandi. We have no word of any hostilities, however, and none of any intrusions.”

“Inform my ignorance, Jago-ji. What do you think it would it mean?”

“Possibly that Lord Tatiseigi wishes no incident with Taiben in these perilous times. Possibly he wishes none of his hunters be caught and questioned by the Taibeni, which might give away too much of his intentions and his position, even if his intention is to stay neutral. And possibly some installation hereabouts has frightened the game away and there is nothing to bring hunters here.”

“Electronic surveillance?”

“We have picked up a signal.”

The subtler elements of Guild technology, which he was sure some of their staff carried, and the nastier elements of Guild actions possible on the border they were crossing. Wires. Traps. Not likely to stop others of the same Guild, but enough to slow them down.

He had noted Cenedi had traded mounts with Ilisidi this morning, taking the more fractious herd-leader for himself. Banichi had also pushed his mecheita up ahead of Ilisidi’s, he and Cenedi riding first and second in the column the last few minutes, a small indication of worry. Theirs were very experienced eyes, apt to spot specific things even a ranger might not, and that the mecheiti might sense, but not know the danger.

He himself knew entirely too much about such devices, and their more lethal adjuncts, which were ordinarily deployed in secure places in Shejidan. One scarcely expected them to be placed out here in the depths of the woods, where roaming animals might trip them too often, with bloody result, not to mention the provocation it posed against Taiben.

And it was not without significance, he was sure, that Jago stayed closer by him now, with Tano and Algini staying very close behind him. Ever since they had passed that stone, their progress had acquired the caution of Guild very much on the alert.

The woods thinned, and there was open land visible, beyond the screen of trees. They were still within forest, riding that ridge of low hills, Bren recalled from his railroad-building days, which was the nebulous boundary between Taiben and the Atageini.

Soon, sure enough, they exited the woods onto open meadow, and took a downward pitch, now firmly within Atageini territory and evidently free of monitoring or threat. From the broad slope of the high meadow, they could see a village, an Atageini village, far down and across extensive grassland, past winding brown hedgerows, into cultivated fields gold with ripened crops or dead brown with harvested stubble. A little haze overlay equally grassy hills beyond.

It all had a quaint look, as many small villages did, hereabouts, little places nestled in sheltered nooks, not all of them to this day using electric lights. One saw no electric lines in this province, no more than in Taiben: installations like the monitoring equipment they suspected back there had to be battery-powered. The siting of the railroad right of way had been a particularly bitter controversy here, and in Taiben, and the train when it did go through had been slowed by Atageini insistence that the tracks, where allowed, should follow old farm-to-market routes. It meant a curving, inefficient progress that prevented trains going as fast through Atageini territory as they ran elsewhere . . . and they ran not at all through Taiben, except on the very border. He knew the whole untidy history. He had had to mediate a dispute on the junction of two regional rail lines that had, finally,
finally
gotten Atageini permission to lay track to that set of villages.

No sign of the disputed rail from their vantage. Only isolated copses of woods and rolling meadow, intermittent with plowed fields, until it grew too dark even for atevi eyes to be sure there were no traps.

Then they settled down for another camp, and, daringly, a hot cup of tea, a hot bowl of soup.

And another dose of analgesic.

Beside the little stove, Keimi and his remaining people announced their intention of going back in the morning, back to Taiben land, back to organize a second meeting with Ilisidi once she left this territory and proceeded northward to gather support there, as she intended to do.

And, in the conversation that followed supper and tea, there were statements of gratitude, hopes for their success, concerns for their welfare. It was all the Taibeni could offer at this point: Taiben rangers were persona non grata where they were, already. The district had a long, long history of cross-border forays and, before the aishidi’tat, of outright warfare.

So they would be commiting themselves to Ilisidi’s plan in the morning. Bren found himself a flat place where no one would tread on him and went to bed early, absolutely exhausted. Traps, wires, old feuds . . . he had reached that stage of exhaustion and compliance when even terror for his life and the world’s welfare were no barrier to sleep, deep as a pit and dreamless, so far as he could remember.

 

He lifted his head, startled, when he heard stirring about, when daylight was at least faintly discernible to human eyes. His head objected to the sudden elevation. His eyes wanted to shut. He wanted to drop back down to the uncompromising ground and lie there another day, perhaps a week. An experimental movement of one leg convinced him that the saddle was, oh, no, not going to be comfortable today at all.

But staff had more important things on their minds this morning than playing servant to him. The Taibeni were to leave them. He levered himself up on his hands and knees, and got up, brushing off the clothes that by now were truly showing signs of wear. He had loosened his queue. He rebraided and tied it. He had neglected to take his boots off, and now he was sorry for it, but he limped about a sluggish morning routine, trying to make himself look as presentable as possible—the dignity of a lord was a protection to his staff, and he did as much as he could for himself, shaving, picking small bits of detritus off his coat, the effects of sleeping under a tree that shed.

“How are you this morning, Bren-ji?” Jago brought him a cup of tea from the Taibeni stove, abundantly steaming in the morning chill.

“Awake,” he said, fumbling with the analgesic. Human-specific. He had no help for his companions. “Minimally awake, Jago-ji.” She had been with him long enough to know he never, ever waked as she did, full of energy, whether or not it was daylight—he wondered where she got the moral strength, this morning. He wondered, too, that they had heated the stove, but it was bitterly chill this morning, and he supposed it would cool rapidly for packing.

Beyond anything, he was grateful for the hot tea, and washed down a nutrient bar and his pills. The knees were not quite so bad as yesterday. The seat was, if possible, worse.

He was so muzzy-headed with early waking and breakfast he failed to realize when the stove was packed up, failed to see the preparations for separate departure going on apace, but he saw Keimi and his people were saddling up, going.

So Cajeiri was losing his two companions, Deiso’s youngsters. He saw looks being exchanged, saw a glum unhappiness in Cajeiri’s countenance, as the boy stood with hands locked behind him, watching the separation of baggage.

The two young people kept looking back at him, too, while packing and beginning to saddle up. They spoke together. And Cajeiri never stopped gazing at them, with a dejection in his whole bearing that bespoke more than a childish disappointment.

The young woman took a hesitant step toward Cajeiri, away, then went back to her father and mother, and bent in a profound bow.

“We wish to go with the young aiji,” the girl said distressedly. Not I,
we.
“We have to, father.”

The father was clearly distressed. So was his partner, and the uncle. But he said something Bren could not hear, and spoke to the girl, and then went and spoke to his son. So did the others of the family.

Then the two came back to Cajeiri and bowed, choosing to go with him, evidently, with parental permission, the girl and then the boy extending their hands to his, emotions brimming over in the moment so that eavesdropping on them seemed all but indecent.

Dared one think—?

Because a curious thing was proceeding. Cajeiri gripped their hands one after the other, and bit his lip fiercely, and looked as moved as it was possible for a reserved young lad to be in public.

Man’chi. That emotion. That binding force, that sense of other-self. What had almost been broken was made whole all in an instant: it was a choice of directions and attachments, and there wasn’t a damned thing a father or a mother with safety concerns or a great-grandmother with her own plans could do about it.

A little chill went over him. Do I see what I think I see? he wondered, and was too embarrassed to look toward his own staff, who themselves felt such an intimate thing for him. He’d never actually seen it work—well, there had been the time he had bolted from cover to reach Banichi and Jago under fire, an action that so scandalized their concept of proper behavior that Jago had been willing to shake his teeth out. He had been lucky enough to gain a staff he could absolutely trust, and, from his side, love, but the shift of loyalties had generally been so subtle and so internal with him and his staff, all of them sober, older creatures than teenagers, and while he never doubted deep emotion was there—and felt it—he had never seen a case of man’chi shifting, except in the machimi plays.

But the fact was—those two young people were utterly honest, and Cajeiri was, and there it all was, a life-choice. They hadn’t broken bonds with their family, but they’d formed something else, something that had, in a day, taken over their lives, totally shifted their focus. They were about at that stage when humans hit first love, and had to be counseled and persuaded against tidal forces that could shipwreck their whole lives . . .

Nothing of sexual attraction, here, not in man’chi. But clearly it was a sort of chemistry, and a choice might be just as problematic—for Taibeni youngsters dragged into danger of their lives and a Ragi prince who, two years from now, might have made a more mature, political judgement.

“Young persons,” Ilisidi said severely.

“Mani-ma.” Cajeiri pulled his young followers over to Ilisidi, and they bowed, and he bowed, all of which she accepted with a deep frown.

“This will be dangerous, nadiin,” she said to them.

“Yes, aiji-ma,” the young man said.

“Names.”

“Antaro, aiji-ma,” the girl said; and, “Jegari, aiji-ma,” the boy, both under Ilisidi’s head to foot scrutiny.

“What, sixteen?”

“Fifteen, nearly sixteen, aiji-ma.” The boy answered.

Twice Cajeiri’s age. That made no difference in what they felt. It by no means affected rank, or precedence.

“So,” Ilisidi said, and gave a nod and leaned on her cane, then looked at the parents, another exchange of bows, hers and theirs.

And Cajeiri—Cajeiri was incredibly happy, solemn, but his whole being aglow as he went off with his companions—from dejected, he hurried to deal with his own mecheita, to make himself ready, to do everything himself. They wanted to help him, but let him manage what an eight-year-old could.

Jago turned up at Bren’s side, to help him saddle up. So did Tano. They looked solemn, themselves.

He looked a question at them, but they had no immediate answer. There were some things which, if he asked them a plain question, would be several days explaining, and no greater understanding at the end.

Now, God, the parents had to be upset—but they showed no inclination to go along. How could they, if the next ride took them down into Atageini territory, where their presence would not help negotiations at all?

Neither, the thought occurred to him, would this young pair.

Damn, he thought, arriving at, perhaps, the thoughts that were racing through several atevi minds, but never, of course, the young minds in question.

“Nandi.” Algini had his mecheita saddled for him. He took Tano’s help getting up, and hit the saddle with, oh, the expected pain. In the periphery of his vision he saw, to be sure, a leave-taking, Cajeiri with the two Taibeni youngsters, after which Keimi and the parents and everyone else rode away, back toward Taiben lands.

There was a moment of quiet. Then a burst of energy as Cajeiri went to mount up, with his associates’ help, as if the whole world was made new around them. The dowager accepted Cenedi’s assistance to mount, and, curiously, to Bren’s eye, she had a satisfaction about her this morning that said, indeed, she was not that displeased, not nearly as much as their situation might indicate.

So there were still nuances he failed to understand.

They started off, the young people planted firmly in the center of the column, with the dowager, and with him. For a while he listened to Nawari instructing the young people, advising the new arrivals what to do and what contingencies to consider if they should come under fire.

And the dowager sternly advising Cajeiri that if he picked shelter, he should now adjust his thinking and pick shelter wide enough for three.