Destroyer

by C. J. Cherryh

  Seeing where they had disposed their critical items, Bren had put his gun there, too, with its ammunition, with his computer, with his personal bag. So there everything sat, sacrosanct, if in danger of water, still muddy, but with that in their control, they knew nothing could be added or subtracted. They felt ever so much safer, collectively.

  The laundry and cleaning staff, meanwhile, had a major job on their hands, if they meant to restore ravaged clothes, scratched and rain-spattered leather, lace that had long since lost its starch and its whiteness. He had a change of clothes, but of coats he had only one, a formal one, and his staff owned only the coats they wore, which were in need of treatment they habitually attended to themselves. God knew what he would do if they had to ride with another load of frozen fish, or where he was going to get another pair of trousers his size—not to mention the boots, of which he had only the one pair, and those were in the hands of the servants. He had to muster something sufficiently respectable for this house, if they had to pay the courtesies and join Ilisidi downstairs, and oh, he dreaded that.

  He shut his eyes. A shadow bent over him. A servant offered him a cordial glass on a tray.

  He cast a brief, questioning look across the tub to Banichi, who blinked placidly, a signal Banichi judged it should be all right. He took it, then, but asked what it was. “Gija, nandi,” the servant said.

  Safe. No alkaloids. He nodded and sipped the fruit-tasting item, which had a considerable alcohol content.

  This staff had never in their lives had to wonder whether there was an alkaloid in certain foodstuffs, since it provided only a nice tang for them. They might make such a mistake in utter innocence. It became his own concern, to eat and drink only things he could identify and keep to simple foods, if his own cook had not prepared the meal—and Bindanda was up on the station, sleeping peacefully in his own bed at this hour, one hoped.

  He sipped the drink, arms on the tiled rim, and felt the slow fire spread down his throat, into his stomach, through his veins. The atevi notion of a small drink was a bit excessive for a human and he left a percentage in the glass, when he abandoned it on the edge.

  God, he didn’t want to move again. He didn’t know how long the painkiller would hold out. He had no blisters, at least. He’d wondered, this last few hours.

  “Do you intend to go down to dinner, nandi?” Banichi asked him.

  “I heard no invitation,” he said. And it was a question, now that he considered it, whether to let Ilisidi work her charm solo—she had it in abundance if she wished to use it—on her old flame, Tatiseigi. But food—food was one thing this house could provide them.

  “One can easily plead indisposition,” Banichi said. “Your staff is certainly ready to plead indisposition.”

  This from a man who could still lift him with one hand and fight his way out of the house unaided. But it was also the justified complaint of a staff who’d run long and hard. And a reminder that he, like the rest of them, might not be at his sharpest, going into an encounter where sharp wits would be everything.

  “Nadi,” he said to the seniormost servant, who had drifted into the bath to retrieve the glass, “one has the suspicion that we would intrude on the reunion of old association in the lower hall. One hesitates to place greater burdens on an already accommodating host, and we are, when all else is said, exhausted. Might we impose on the generosity of our host to request a small, private dinner here in our rooms, for me and my staff?”

  “Certainly, nand’ paidhi. One is warned the paidhi has special requirements.”

  “My staff will certainly appreciate the full range of offerings of the season,” he said, “with profound thanks and compliments to the chef, for whatever courtesy he may extend to such an uninvited arrival, and one is certainly appreciative if he will consider my not inconsiderable difficulties of diet. One only asks modest accommodation, simple bread without seasonings for me, a simply grilled and salted meat of the season—such would be extraordinarily appreciated, nadi. A bottle of common brandy, nothing at all extraordinary. We shall all stand in debt of your lord. And there may be one other person sharing this meal, if she should come back.”

  A bow from the servant. He had kept his requests very limited, his instruction clear and easily handled, consideration for a chef already discommoded by an unexpected arrival—even Bindanda had his limits of endurance, and a lordly request from a human guest for particular favors and special cooking instructions would not meet with favor under this roof, he was quite sure.

  He wished the servant staff, at least, to report the house guests as well-behaved.

  There were robes provided—his reached the floor, and had to have the sleeves rolled up threefold, so that he looked like a child playing dress-up. His staff helped him with the sleeves, laughing the while, then wiped down their muddy baggage, using a pile of soft white towels, wiped down their coats, as well, and broke out the small store of leather treatment they carried in their gear, a comfortingly domestic task, the air filled with the sharp, oily smell of the bottle. Servants only gingerly offered to assist and provide cleaning cloths—the Guild rarely permitted another staff to touch their personal gear, which had an amazing array of small pockets and reinforced seams, not to mention outright weaponry and wires. Damp hair went up into queues, a stubbled human face benefitted by a shave and lotion, and over all, they presented a more civilized appearance by the time dinner arrived, borne by a procession of servants.

  And the offering evidenced a chef in decent temper, or one severely instructed to maintain the dignity of the house. His requested meat of the season turned out to be a massive grilled fish, perfectly prepared, with a domed loaf of crusty hot bread, in a warm clay container to conserve the heat, with a very nice southern fruit wine in a sealed and sweating bottle. The meal for Banichi, Tano, and Algini was a savory game roast with gravy, with spiced vegetables, fresh greens of the season, and a lovely iced fruit dessert, which happily they all could share. Not to mention a very nice bottle of brandy, as if the great lord would possess anything less.

  “I had thought Jago would join us by now, nadi,” he said to Banichi.

  “She likely will attend the dowager to dinner,” Banichi said. “She will attempt to manage it, Cenedi permitting.”

  Jago would stand formal guard so their separate staff might have a report of the doings down there, Bren thought. A very good idea. The pocket coms were useless except as walkietalkies, in a place where there was no supporting network. They were obliged to sit ignorant, this rainy evening, of all that was happening elsewhere. The world which had been so tightly knit around them, themselves aware of every tic and twitch on any deck, around the clock, in every circumstance, was far away, floating in space and out of reach. Here, separated for an hour from Jago and the dowager, their world began to develop dark pockets of delayed or no information.

  But it was also a kabiu house, and, on the side of Jago’s continued attendance on the dowager, it was not particularly graceful for Jago to show up in their male society to sleep—he realized that the moment he thought of it. The old lord would not have male-female teams on his staff. That Jago slept with a human—the old lord would have a conniption, a whole litter of them, if what was likely common gossip in the capital turned out to be reality under his roof.

  Prickly old man, devotedly maintaining a life in the previous century, a dragging anchor on change in the aishidi’tat—but not, evidently, following the Kadigidi, who only put on a show of old-fashioned attitudes. It was not so much that Tatiseigi had ever been deeply loyal to Tabini. It was that this old man would insist, if there was no Tabini, he, not his upstart neighbors the Kadigidi, had the right to govern the mainland, at least the central part of it, where people of his own opinion lived. It was centuries-old ambition, he had the picture quite clear—ancient ambition, and a grand-nephew who, in his day, might bring absolute power to the Atageini bloodline.

  One could only hope Cajeiri did not regale his uncle at supper, downstairs
tonight, with his opinions on humans and racing-cars.

  But that was trouble Ilisidi would be there to handle—quite deftly, giving up nothing, the paidhi was sure.

  And a delicate, wonderful fish, with bread dipped in salted oil, the light, iced wine, the like of which he had not tasted literally in years—all these things combined to persuade the paidhi that it was a very, very good thing he had stayed in his room. He was by no means qualified for diplomacy, tonight. If he had sat at the table downstairs he might have fallen asleep in the soup course, and a drink of wine would have completely finished him. As it was, he only tasted the wonderful dessert, and apologetically took to his bed, face down. Banichi, Tano, and Algini were, except for the dessert, of the same mind, and Tano and Algini bedded down together in the adjacent bedroom, while Banichi was about to take the guard post aside from the small foyer, where a cot could be let down.

  “Share the bed,” he said to Banichi. “I rattle around in it anyway, Banichi-ji.” It was a very large mattress, even by atevi standards, and he probably could have fitted Tano and Algini in for good measure, if they had not already settled.

  The fact was, it made him feel safe. Safe, and watched over, when the circumstances of the house were not as safe as they could wish. His head was reeling from the wine and the half glass of brandy. He wasn’t up to conversation, or questions, and too stupid to judge reassurances. It was enough to know that Banichi was there, and he wished Jago were, too. Having her out of his sight and elsewhere in this place made him marginally anxious, but if trouble was to come tonight, he relied on Jago to make it heard from one end of the house to the other, and on Banichi and the rest to handle it, no matter the odds.

  “I hope we have clothes tomorrow,” he murmured.

  The bed shook to Banichi’s silent, short laugh. “One would expect they will have attended the laundry, Bren-ji. We have told the staff you would perhaps attend breakfast. With enough bleach, staff may even be able to restore the lace.”

  “Very good,” he murmured. “Ever so good, Banichi-ji.” And he went straight to sleep.

  There were, indeed, clothes in the morning. The staff had even darned a small rip and drawn in the pulled threads where thorns and brush had snagged his coat. The shirt was bleached white, the modest lace was immaculately starched, his boots were polished, and even the white ribbon for his queue was washed and pressed despite its frays and snags, not to mention there were clean stockings and linen. Bren dressed himself as far as the shirt, but getting the hair braided properly and ribboned was a difficult operation even if he were less stiff.

  “Here,” Tano said. “Let me do it, nandi.”

  “Bren,” he said decisively. “One wishes the staff would always call me more familiarly, in private, Tano-ji, if it would not distress you.”

  “It would by no means distress us,” Tano said. And quick, deft plaiting secured the braid, with its ribbon. With a pat on his shoulder, Tano pronounced him fit for public appearance.

  Staff’s uniforms were fit, everything done to perfection, everyone feeling very much better, it was certain, after a night’s sleep and clean clothing. Even the stiffness was somewhat abated this morning—it still warranted sitting a little gingerly, but not so much as before.

  A servant appeared, with a formal message scroll, an invitation to breakfast on the terrace.

  “I have no means to reply in kind,” Bren answered the servant, “but advise your lord I shall be there, and I thank him for his gracious invitation.”

  Message cylinder. One small item he had neglected to pack. He’d left it—the mind jolted between worlds—in the bowl on the table in his quarters aboard Phoenix. Staff had packed it. It must be in his apartment on station. He was very loath to lose it.

  And if he was taking up brain cells mourning lost personal items, he knew he was dodging thinking about what he was going to do downstairs. Nervous about the meeting? Oh, not a little. He had had no report yet from Jago. He caught himself pacing while Banichi restored a number of arcane items to his jacket’s inner pockets and then to the hollow seam of his right boot.

  Odd, he thought, as the small pile of strange objects diminished. As long as they’d been together, he’d never seen the whole array. It was curious, some of the pieces, though the uses for almost invisible wire were disturbing to think of.

  A rap at the door. Jago’s signal. Thank God. Algini let her in, and she had fared as well, clean and polished, as immaculate as she might walk the halls of the Bujavid.

  “Nandi.” A bow. “Nadiin.”

  “How did it go, Jago-ji?”

  A slight glance at the ceiling, warning they might be overheard, far from surprising in a modern great house, and not, reasonably, in this one. “The conference last night was interesting,” Jago said, her eyes sparkling. “Lord Tatiseigi, nadiin-ji, firmly believes the aiji is alive.”

  Indeed astonishing that Tatiseigi should say so, when he had everything to gain by hiding that belief—if he entertained personal ambitions of supplanting Tabini with a young and pliant Cajeiri. Maybe the old reprobate was in fact on the up and up. Maybe Ilisidi had gotten good behavior out of him.

  Maybe there were motives he hadn’t thought of.

  Damn, it was altogether what he’d tried to avoid doing, immersing himself in possibilities before listening to what might be going on at the breakfast table.

  “What did the dowager say to that supposition, Jago-ji?”

  “That she would not tell Cajeiri until there is something certain.”

  “Cajeiri did not attend last night?”

  “No. He dined in, with his staff, and Nawari.”

  He approved of Ilisidi’s caution. Atevi or human, the boy had feelings for his father and mother, and sending them soaring and then crashing on every tidbit of news was not good, not at all good for an adult, let alone an eight-year-old.

  “Does our host say where Tabini-aiji is?” Banichi asked.

  Jago put her hands in her jacket pockets, with another cautionary glance at the ceiling. “Nand’ Tatiseigi maintains that the aiji sent Mercheson-paidhi ahead of him to Mogari-nai. He followed her route as far as the coast, then when it was attacked, returned to Taiben, then here.”

  Exactly as the Taibeni had said—except the detail about Tabini coming back to Tirnamardi.

  “He and Damiri-daja stayed here three days, with certain staff, and then two staffers left, and all the rest of them left shortly after. There has been no word since. The aiji did not say where he was going, nadiin.”

  “One would not expect it,” Banichi said. “Nor should we discuss our opinions of his whereabouts under this roof.”

  “Indeed,” Jago said. They were speaking for eaves-droppers’ consumption. Listening devices. Jago had confirmed it, and she might well be the one of the team carrying electronic means of knowing for sure. Tatiseigi favored antiquated lighting—but this said nothing about Guild members in the household, who, one reasonably presumed, would not use centuries-old equipment.

  But this news—this news, if it was true and even if Tatiseigi only believed it to be true—this affected how they dealt with the old man, and the turns things might now take. He was keenly aware that he himself had become an issue, because of his advice to Tabini, and that it was likely a very hot issue under this roof. He personally had two choices, as he saw it—personally absorb the blame for everything Tabini had done, which left Tabini looking weak and reliant on bad advice—or vindicate himself, and thereby vindicate Tabini in the eyes of a lord who had voted against the space program, decried the shift in economy, hated modern technology, human culture, foreigners in general, and had taken a position in those regards, publicly and loudly, for years.

  “Would it be possible,” he said to his staff, putting the final touches on his lace cuffs, “rather than us trying to go personally to Shejidan, for us to urge members of nand’ Tatiseigi’s staff to go for us, and notify the Guild that we are intent on reaching them—even ask them to put a hold on Gui
ld actions until we can arrive?”

  It was a legal question, on one side of the coin. It was a question of lordly opinion on the other, as to whether Tatiseigi would honestly cooperate with an effort on Tabini’s behalf—and, presumably, Damiri’s.

  “It would be technically possible,” Banichi said, “legally possible. Tatiseigi certainly has standing in the question, as a relative.”

  “It might save lives,” Tano said. “Through them, we might obtain a safe conduct for the paidhi. If he asked that, it might work.”

  “Saving our own lives, among others,” Jago said.

  “The Guild, debating its course of action,” Banichi said, “is only doing so as a subterfuge. They wish not to support Murini as legitimate, not to support Tabini-aiji either, until questions are resolved. They will debate, at all hours of session, if someone has to stand and recite poetry to continue the flow of words—as I imagine they must have read several volumes in by now. All this is a way of remaining neutral, and it will be impossible for them to dissolve the session until they can vote one way or the other, if the question has been put—they will be reasonably anxious to find some resolution. The traitors have not persuaded them to end debate, and one suspects that now the Kadigidi themselves are urgently raising their offers and making promises they would not make otherwise, ceding portions of their authority to the Guild—which the Guild seems to have been wise enough to ignore. If we convince them to send for the paidhi to testify, this would represent a break of a sort ominous for the other side. They might try to do something about it, at very, very great risk of offending the Guild.”

  Bren asked, out of his own musings: “Might Tabini himself have asked them to stalemate, knowing he could not carry the vote until we came back?”

  Banichi thought about that. So did all his staff. “It would certainly be a canny move,” Banichi said. “His own staff has evidently taken a heavy strike. It would have impaired his ability to take direct action. Worse, he may have suspected treachery from the inside.”