Betrayer

“Might we have tea while we wait for breakfast?” he asked Banichi and Jago. “Did we drink it all last night?”

“There is a supply, nandi,” Veijico piped up. “And a heating plate.”

A tea caddy and service for nine stood on the buffet. So they had a heating plate somewhere.

That was, among amenities their host had provided, a very welcome one.

“Then a pot of tea, if you please, nadi.” Veijico, for her past sins, had not yet ascended to

“nadi-ji” in his book. But with Barb safe and ambulatory this morning, and in spite of her answering out of turn, Veijico was rising a bit in his esteem.

Veijico rose still further in his good graces when she brought him the hot tea and several pieces of toast without saying a word. Bren had found a seat in a straight chair at a small side table, and Jago had brought him an occasional pillow for his back, which, with the tea and momentary quiet in the room, set him up very well.

He had time for serious thoughts over one entire cup before Barb came back from the bath, scrubbed and with her hair a little damp and wearing the russet gown—the clothing she had worn the night she was kidnapped.

“Cup of tea?” he asked politely, and Barb sat down in the opposite chair, across the little table, moving slowly and carefully.

“So when are we going home?” Barb asked.

Home. That was a curious way to put it. But, then, Barb and Toby’s only home, their boat, was in harbor at his estate.

He poured her a cup of tea himself and offered it, with a saucer and a piece of dry toast. “It’s not that simple, I’m afraid. I’ve been assigned a diplomatic job to do here that is going to take a few days. If I can get you sent home, I will, but otherwise, just settle in, stay inside the suite, and be patient. The dowager has given me a problem to solve.”

Barb held the cup in both hands to drink. It was large and it was warm, and she sat in the atevi-scale chair with her feet off the ground. She had two sips, eyes downcast. Then: “I haven’t even a change of clothes.”

“Best here that you wear exactly what you’re wearing.” Atevi dress was far less apt to excite comment. “We can ask staff to try to find you a change. Child’s sizes will work.”

“I haven’t my makeup!”

“Next time you’re kidnapped, try to pack.”

“Don’t joke, Bren!” Therewere the tears, just under the surface. “I look like absolute hell.”

He’d gotten wary of saying things to Barb. No, you don’t look like hell, was the automatic reassurance, but he’d had enough trouble disengaging Barb after their several-year relationship.

And of all people on earth he could have shared close quarters with, Barb wasn’t his choice of roommates.

Of all people on earth he could have underfoot during a life-and-death diplomatic mission, Barb wouldn’t be his choice, either: not Barb and her emotional reactions—and not the aggressive inexperience of the young Guildswoman who’d turned up with her.

“Were you at all able to speak to anybody?” he asked her. Barb understood far more Ragi than she spoke. “There were no Mosphei’ speakers among them, were there?”

“No,” Barb said, and her lip trembled. She held the atevi-scale teacup in both hands, elbows on the table, and took a steadying sip. “I tried to talk to them, and they hit me.”

“The kidnappers? Or the people here?”

“The kidnappers.”

“So the locals have treated you fairly well?”

“Fairly well, I guess,” Barb said. “But they wouldn’t listen, either.”

“What did you try to tell them?”

“I’m not too fluent.”

“Well, but what did you want them to know?”

“I tried to say I was from Najida, and I mentioned your name and the aiji-dowager. I hoped they’d phone you.”

Interesting point. Barb had drawn a mental difference between her kidnappers and where she was now. It might not be a real difference; but somewhere in Barb’s subconscious, it might signify that she had, in fact, seen a difference.

But he didn’t bet their lives that nobody on Machigi’s staff had a few words of Mosphei’, either, and the room was undoubtedly bugged. So it was worth being careful and steering Barb away from certain topics.

“Well, but by then we were out trying to find you. Did you stop at any house, even a shed, a fueling station?”

“We just drove. Forever.”

“Didn’t stop at a fuel station.”

Shake of her head, gold curls moving. And a wince. “Ow. No. We didn’t.”

So they’d come prepared, maybe with a double tank. “Did you hear any names?”

“I couldn’t hear much. I was in the back of the truck, and this man—he didn’t talk. Just sat there with a gun in his hands.”

“Rifle?”

A nod.

“Guild uniforms?”

A nod.

It confirmed Veijico’s story. The truck had been moving incredibly slowly, but it was still moderately impressive that Veijico hadmanaged to intercept it afoot. It was much more impressive that she’d taken them out.

He was certain that the truck had been trying to draw attention to itself and get a reaction, wanting to be tracked into Taisigi clan territory. What they might not have anticipated was the desperation and outright rule-breaking lunacy of one young Guildswoman tracking them.

They’d have expected her to follow Guild procedure: contact authority and track them until they chose to lose her.

Their mistake.

And the behavior added points to the dowager’s theory that it wasn’t Machigi who’d ordered that kidnapping. Machigi had been a bit more subtle than that.

The Taisigi had reportedly closed in immediately after Veijico had shot the kidnappers, so they had been watching, too. Guild were not prone to emotional reactions or personal retribution. But there was a limit to that professionalism, if Veijico had just shot down a number of their partners.

The fact was they had notshot Veijico, roughed her up, or even questioned her closely. They had handled her as someone attached to Barb and kept her withBarb, proper treatment for a high-ranking prisoner, one assumed by her situation and her species to be a prize worth taking home.

It was a jigsaw puzzle of pieces that couldfit together, if one assumed someone was setting up the Taisigi and also assumed that Machigi had had time to hear about it, investigate it, and set his people in place.

His people still hadn’t stopped that truck themselves. Possibly they’d spotted Veijico, who was staying hidden from the truck, but maybe they hadn’t seen her at all and had been surprised by her attack on the kidnappers.

Possibly Machigi, if i

Interesting notion, all considered.

“What are you thinking?” Barb asked.

“I’m thinking it’s a dead certainty we’re bugged, and it’s not impossible there’s someone hereabouts who can understand some Mosphei’. There’s a lot of that going around lately. But there’s a lot more that doesn’t add up in what happened. We thought you’d been taken to a place called Targai. That’s Lord Geigi’s clan residence, though he’s not been there in years.

So Geigi and I went there to ask questions, and the clan lord at Targai turned out to be a problem. Tried to shoot us, in fact. Geigi ended up taking over his clan lordship. He’s over there now, trying to put his clan association back together, and he’s not happy to be there.”

“Why not happy?”

“He doesn’t want to be lord of Maschi clan. He’s got enough to do being lord of Sarini Province, and he absolutely intends to go back to the space station and live up there safe from all of this. But that’s where he is.” He’d said what he’d said for the benefit of anyone eavesdropping. If they understood. And afterward he drew a breath.