Peacemaker

“What is she saying?” Artur asked—it was not the sort of conversation they had ever had, on the ship, and there were words Cajeiri was hardly sure how to translate.

“Everybody is back. There’s still an alert but everything’s all right. It’s still good.” He changed to Ragi. “My father will see you have no trouble, Jico-ji, and I shall remind him. And I shall remind mani, too. I shall by no means let them send you away!”

“We would be honored,” Veijico murmured with a little nod. “And your guests should not worry about this. We should not alarm them.”

“Good people run the Guild now,” Antaro said, little words their guests knew. “They are hunting the bad ones.”

Irene had said nothing, just sat listening, hugging her robe close and shivering a little. “I don’t think we ought to tell our parents everything,” she said with a little laugh, and they all agreed.

“Are you cold?” Cajeiri asked. “We can order tea. Even at night, someone is on duty.”

She shook her head. “Just scared,” she said. “I’m always scared of things.” Another little laugh. “I’m sorry.”

“Not sorry,” he said, and gave the old challenge. “Who’s afraid?”

She held up two fingers, just apart. “This much. Just this much.”

“We’re safe,” he said. “Are we safe, Jico-ji?”

“Safer,” Veijico said. “Definitely safer.”

“Good, then!” They had just a little light, sitting there around the table, in the dark. Human eyes were spooky, shadowy, and never taking the light. Veijico’s and Lucasi’s, Antaro’s and Jegari’s, theirs all did, so you could see their eyes shimmery gold, honest and open. But with humans, one had to trust the shadows, and know their intentions were good. Irene shivered, she was so scared, sometimes. Irene had said—she just was that way.

But who had stood there facing his mother without a hint she was scared at all?

Irene.

He understood Irene, he thought. There were two kinds of fear. There was facing bullets, which meant you had to do something. And there was the long slow kind of fear that came of knowing there were problems and there was nothing you could do right away except try not to make things worse. His associates had seen both kinds in their short visit, and not shown anything but a little shiver after it was all over. Even Irene. She was very bright. She thought about things. She thought a lot. And she was certainly no coward.

He was proud of his little household, and he was increasingly sure he could count these three as his. He had attracted very good people. Mani had always said that was the best proof of character . . . that one could know a person by his associates. He felt very happy with himself and them, overall.

And when they all went back to bed—who was it who had to go to bed alone, with all this going on?

Him. And Irene.

“We can all sleep in this room,” he said. It was a huge bed, and there was room enough, and they could just layer the bedding and make it all proper, the way folk did who had only one bed.

So they did that. His aishid got their proper beds for the rest of the night, and he and his associates tucked into various layers of satin comforters and settled down together, like countryfolk with visitors, in the machimi plays.

He had hardly ever felt so safe as then.

14

Getting up in the morning—was not easy. A splitting headache—did not describe the sensation.

Bren slid carefully out of bed, felt his way to the light, and rummaged in the drawer of the little chest for the pill bottles. The scalp wound had swollen. He had no desire at all to investigate it, for fear his head would come apart. He simply swallowed, dry, two capsules of the right color and crawled back into bed face down for a few more moments.

The rest of him was amazingly pain-free. Usually when he and his aishid had been in a situation, he emerged sore in amazing places. But the back of his head paid for all.

And he had to find out how Banichi was doing. That thought, once conceived, would not let him rest. He crawled backward off the high bed, felt after his robe, and padded barefoot down the hall toward the security station and his aishid’s rooms.

The door was open, and there were servants about in the back halls, being relatively quiet. He heard nand’ Siegi’s voice, and Banichi’s, which was reassuring. He reached the little i

“Arguing,” Jago said. “Nand’ Siegi will not permit him to sit up until afternoon.”

“Nor will we,” Algini said, and cast him a look. “You are next, nandi. Nand’ Siegi will deal with that.”

He truly was not looking forward to that. “Cup of tea,” he said, thinking hot tea might steady his stomach. The headache remedy was not sitting well.

He did not, however, get that far. Nand’ Siegi turned in his direction, saw him, and came his way with business in mind.

And treating it did hurt. God, did it hurt! Nand’ Siegi graciously informed him that it would scar somewhat, that he was very lucky it had not fractured his skull, that there were certain symptoms he was to report immediately should they occur, and that he should sleep on his face for several days. He was out of the mood for tea, after that, but by that time Jase was up, breakfast was about to be served, and Supani and Koharu were asking him whether he would dress for breakfast, or have it informally.

He was not sure he could keep toast down, his neck was stiff from tension and he did not want to tilt his head out of vertical. But he advised his valets that he would be paying a visit to Tabini-aiji as soon as the aiji wished. And he got up carefully, trying not to tilt his head, and made it to the little breakfast room, where Jase was having morning tea.

“How’s the head?” Jase asked.

He sat down, staring blankly at the out of focus door, and took about a minute to say, “Sore. Damn sore.”

“Tea?”

The door was still his vision of choice. It was uncomplicated. It didn’t move. And he didn’t have to turn his head to look at it. “Did Kaplan and Polano ever get any sleep?”

“You’re white. Here.” Jase reached across the little breakfast table. A cup of tea thumped down in front of him. “Drink.”

He picked it up and tried, gingerly, without looking at it. It was strong, sugared, and spiced.

“Nand’ Bren needs toast and eggs,” he heard Jase say.

He was far from sure about that. He was not sure about the spice in the tea. He blinked several times, and brought the door completely into focus. That was a start.

“We’re doing fine,” Jase said. “The kids got some sleep, I understand. I did. Algini says he’s been in touch with the Guild periodically during the night, and they’ve run down one of their fugitives. They have three others holed up in a town to the south.”

“Trying to run for the Marid,” Bren murmured, turning his head slightly, trying his focus on Jase’s face, which was a shade blurry. “No surprise. But that won’t be as ready a refuge now.” Two more sips of tea. “Anything else?”

“Nothing that’s reached me,” Jase said.

He was sure there would be messages. The message bowl in the front hall was likely overflowing since dawn. He remembered the bundle of post-mortem letters he had put in Narani’s hands. Retrieving those and destroying those was absolutely urgent.

He said, “Anything from Geigi?”

Jase shook his head. “Nothing. But I don’t expect anything. We haven’t advertised the problem. It’s really been rather quiet until this morning.”

“Last night,” he said, “last night in your venue. How did it really go?”

“Amazingly well,” Jase said, and the eggs and toast arrived. The youngest of the servants spooned eggs onto Bren’s plate, scrambled, thank God, nothing requiring such focus as cracking a shell and eating a soft-boiled egg without spilling it. “Sauce, nandi?”