Invader (48 page)

Damiri cast Tabini a silent, sidelong look.

"Send him a piece of the porcelain," Tabini said. "The lily… would do quite well. One believes possibly someone exceeded orders. On the other hand, perhaps they wished to signal their contempt of Atigeini claims to command by using this as a diversion."

There was a positively fierce enjoyment in Damiri's eyes. "Your plane."

"At your disposal. But I want it back by morning. And it
doesn't
refuel there. — Bren-ji, you're quite safe, one assures you, in whatever bedroom you choose tonight. Don't let 'Miri-daja bully you. It's a damn stiff mattress."

One could well blush. "Tabini-ma." The ache in the shoulder made his teeth hurt, he had never yet found the chance to be rid of the gun, and he tried consistently to keep that side and that pocket away from atevi eyes. Especially those of the Bu-javid police. "I only, earnestly, regret that I attracted such difficulty to this house, and I'm quite content with my bedroom."

"The paidhi is very gracious," Damiri said, and offered her hand, expecting his: he gave it, perforce, compelled to look up to a straightforwardly curious stare, a very solid handclasp. "Scandal, scandal, scandal. I think it's a very nice, a very honest face, myself, and my aunt can swallow her salacious and doubtless entirely envious suspicions. — You're so exquisitely polite, nand' paidhi."

"I — hope to be, daja-ma."

"I may never get my staff back. They're quite besotted."

"I — hope I've done nothing improper, daja-ma."

"Bren-paidhi. They
dream
nightly of you doing something improper. I've heard the reports."

"Daja-ma —"

Tabini rescued his arm and his hand and walked him a little distance away. "Atigeini internal politics be damned, the lily porcelains are
not
the question, Hanks-paidhi is. The attack on your residence might have been quite serious, but I doubt they expected to succeed: it was likely intended as a diversion from the real objective, and my prospective wife's relatives will
not
take this lightly, not the attack, certainly not the collateral damage, least of all the slight of such damage being a mere diversion, no matter how they've regarded your tenancy here on other principles. Have you any personal suspects in the kidnaping of Hanks-paidhi, Bren-ji?"

"I — no, aiji-ma, discounting that it was anyone of the Guild, no, all my suspects vanish. Except — someone who wanted revenge. Or someone who —" the thought nudged its way to the center of his apprehensions "— who wanted both: her in their hands and me dead — leaving no paidhi between you and Mospheira at this juncture. For whatever reason."

"If they could achieve that. Which they surely don't expect."

"I would not say," Damiri interjected, having overtaken them, "that this attempt evidences great intellect. Desperation. But not great intellect."

"Or carelessness of Atigeini disposition."

"Stupidity," Damiri said. "Aiji-ma."

"The fact that one doesn't care what your uncle thinks is not necessarily evidence of stupidity. — Daja-ji."

"The fact
I
regard the lilies as
my
holding and the artist however dead as in
my man'chi
should have them sleep

less at night. If my uncle demurs, I demand satisfaction!"

"One will have it, lily-daja, but the paidhi's safety is in my own, and you will
not
initiate actions that jeopardize Bren
or
that disagreeable woman whose life I foolishly agreed to protect."

"One has no wish to jeopardize Bren in any way." Damiri laid a hand on Bren's sore shoulder: a very gentle hand, of which he was glad. "Have I ever shown such an inclination?"

What did one do? Flinch from under the aiji's lady's hand? One stood still, aware of the double entendre, and said, solemnly, "By no means, nai-ma."

"Aiji-ma." It was Algini in the doorway, bidding for Tabini's attention, with: "The ship is asking for Bren-paidhi. Forgive the intrusion."

The mind — wasn't ready for one more extraneity, not for Mosphei', Mospheiran politics, or foreign negotiations. The mind was on shattered porcelain, Damiri's not-entirely joking threats, and the intricacies of atevi association: that, and Ilisidi, and the Guisi, and politics 11 and the disappearance of Hanks-paidhi, which, outside its atevi impact, was going to play very badly in certain Mospheiran circles — let alone aboard a ship contemplating sending personnel down to them.

The ship mustn't find out. The associations within the Association had already absorbed all the strain the bonds of
man'chi
would bear. Tabini could
not
bear any reneging on the landing, no matter the reason for caution.

"If I could guess," Algini said, as he headed for the doorway, "it's a young man, nadi-ma."

"Jase," he said.

"The landing," Tabini said, tagging him close. "Possibly."

"Very possibly," he said, on his double train of thought, trying to gather up the lost threads of the Jase Graham affair: like why the ship hadn't called the mainland for two days, and what Mospheira had been trying to argue with the ship, latest, in the meantime, and what he had to say as a contingency to the ship trying to back out for reasons that might have nothing whatsoever to do with assassination attempts.

At least one answer to matters held in suspension — or news that another deal was collapsing — was waiting for him on the phone.

«
^
»

"H
ello ?
"
Jase's voice was cheerful, perhaps, Bren thought, to put the best face on a change of mind. "
Bren? Is that you?
"

He refused to be seduced. But answered the tone. "It better be, since nobody else here can talk to you. How are things up there?"

"Doing fine, actually. How are things below?"

"Oh, fine." He was taking the call in Damiri's office, standing, because otherwise the crowd overwhelmed him: Tabini, Damiri, Banichi, Naidiri, Saidin and two of Naidiri's aides. Which fairly well accounted for the wall space and all the standing room except the small area by the desk that he maintained, holding the phone. "Just kind of waiting for your call."

"
Well, sorry about that. Things just proceeded slower than I thought. I hope I didn't worry anybody, but just getting through the notes you sent up and talking to the captains
—
meetings, chain-reaction meetings, I suppose it's no different where you are
."

"No, no, unfortunately not. One of those things that seems to go with air-breathing biology. — So how's the process running?" He didn't
want
to sound short of breath, he tried to keep his voice cheerful and light, and all of a sudden his hands were shaking so he feared he couldn't keep the tremor out of his voice, either. "Sorry. A little out of breath. Had a bit of rush to get here down the hall. Are we agreeing or disagreeing?"

"Agreeing, actually, pretty well. We've picked Taiben for a landing. What's your assessment?"

He cast a look across at Tabini before it dawned on his shock-numbed brain that Tabini didn't understand. "Taiben," he echoed, and looked in vain for a reaction. "It's convenient, easy to get to and from. Has a jet-port, wide, wide flat with no trees, no likely complications, at least." He got a sign from Tabini, finally, that told him that Tabini understood the choice and accepted it. "Fine with us."

"
I've been practicing. How's
Dai ghiyi-ma, aigi'ta amath-aiji, an Jase Graham?"

"
Hamatha-aijijin
, but that's real good." Ears around him had gone quite attentive, and he hoped Jase tried nothing with infelicitous variants. "I'm impressed. You puzzled that out of notes."

"I'm anxious for this to work. They don't just shoot, do they, if they don't recognize you? The island's been saying there's a chance of attacks. But Taiben is the aiji's estate. "

"Public land, actually, in the way atevi reckon. But the people on the land are the aiji's staff. And, no, atevi don't go shooting at the aiji's invited visitors. They're trying to scare you."

"That's not difficult at this point. Tell me again the chute's going to open and this is all going to go without a glitch-up."

"Ninety-nine point nine percent of the pods worked." He'd no idea of the real statistic, but statistical accuracy wasn't the reassurance Jase was asking for. "The second that chute takes hold, you're all right, and I imagine you'll feel it; that's what they say in the old accounts. How's the pod look to your experts? That's the important question."

"
They've substituted the heat shield. On your advice and our discussing it in committee, they didn't ever unpack the parachute. They're just providing a second one. If the drop
—
I
really
hate that word
—
doesn't slow after the original chute should have deployed, the second chute's supposed to blow open automatically. If they put the canister together right
."

"The first one won't fail. You damn sure won't lose two. You're sure of your coming down where you want.

They've got that figured. Just don't use the old targeting. You'll land on Mospheira for sure."

Another nervous laugh. "
I'll be right on the mark
, if
the parachute opens. If we go to the backup chute, well, I'll fax you the charts and figures. Can you receive those where you are
?"

"No trouble. Just use the protocols I gave you, and I'll walk down the hall and get it."

"Then we're go for launch. Or drop. Or whatever. Landing's due for thirty-two some hours from now, Taiben's dawn, 0638 hours local. Right? Daybreak after tomorrow?"

Less than two days. He took a breath. "0638, dawn, day after tomorrow. I hear you. — That fast, Jase?"

"
They're ready. We're ready. They're going to tow us in close before they drop us, a chance to back out, I guess, down to the point they cut us loose
. —
At which point we trust to atevi hospitality and the gods of gravity wells
."

Atevi hospitality. Taiben. Everything Jase was saying indicated the ship had ignored the President's offer to cut atevi out of the deal. Which was incredible to him.

And in a dizzying two seconds of trying to sort out the implications, he'd bet any amount of money the ship knew it would have the same deal out of Mospheira without giving Mospheira a single one of its requests —

Mospheira being the ally they could always have made it completely unnecessary to risk the ill will of atevi, whose reactions they
didn't
know as well — and, thank God, somebody on the human side had thought down a train of logic. Excitement made it hard to keep his voice calm. "Sounds good," he said, he hoped without missing a beat. "There'll be somebody out there to meet you. I'll be there to meet you if I can talk the aiji into ferrying me out to the estate. What do you need from us on landing?"

"
Get my partner onto the island as soon as possible. Me
—
I'm at your disposal, I guess. Next several years
."

"Well, it's your partner's choice, a good dinner at Taiben, a personal intro to atevi leadership and a night's sleep- — or a quick pickup and no-frills rush to the airport at Taiben, then straight on to Mospheira.
You
, on the other hand, absolutely get the deluxe dinner, the personal intro, and a whole night's sleep before they expect you to be fluent."

Nervous laughter. "
Sounds fine to me. I'll take the fancy deal. I'll put it to the captains and Yolanda about the ace-all treatment. Any requests from space
?"

"Just pack walking boots. Something real comfortable. There are places you can land where there are no roads. You'll get a welcome committee. But even after they meet you, you may have to walk to a road, even to a place where we can get overland vehicles, if you happen to drop in somewhere truly inconvenient. It's kilometers of grass out there, dust and heat with no sanitary stops. At worst case, you come down in some woods and we have to cut you out of the trees first. Please be on target. It's much easier. My mark was in an area where they can drive right in and pick you up in fine style."

"As long as they don't shoot at me and as long as that parachute opens, I'm happy."

"So are we all. If you
should
see wildlife, by the way, don't panic; there's no animal out there in the grassland that's going to attack you, and we'll be tracking you all the way down. We'll be there — hopefully I will — but if anything intervenes, trust the atevi, be very polite, bow if they bow, and don't worry about where they're taking you. The aiji will have every ranger on the estate warned to watch out for you and to take good care of you. That's a promise."

"
I
'
ll
take it. Deal
."

"I really hope to be there. With luck, I will."

"I'd really feel better."

"I don't blame you in the least — but with me or without me, you'll make it fine. Keep me posted on progress. If I do go out to Taiben, it may take some moments to get to the phones, but I'm almost never out of reach of radio. You can get to me."

"
I
appreciate that
. —
And I'd better sign off, now, and quit tying up the chair. Corn's got some people working to link with the pod, I'm just cargo at this point, and I really don't want to annoy the techs. See you. I really mean see you."

"Yeah. Good luck. Good
luck
, Jase, good wishes from me
and
from Tabini-aiji.
Kaginjai'ma sa Tabini-aijiu, na pros sai shasatu
. All right?"

He was looking at Tabini when he said the latter. And Jase signed off with, gained from the material he'd sent up, a courteous repetition,
kaginjai
.

Tabini lifted a brow. Damiri and Saidin stared in evident amazement as he hung up the receiver. Banichi, arms folded, listening from the side of the room, also lifted an eyebrow as if to say, well, there it was, suns might be stars and stars might be suns, and neither bothered him, but a paidhi falling out of the sky into Tabini's estates was about to become real, and for good or for ill within his
man'chi
.