daja-ma.”
Tabini had moved closer. Bren saw him. And Tabini moved again, this time to intervene, all casualness, all smoothness and ease.
“Your aishid and Geigi’s are waiting, nand’ paidhi. Dami-daja, we should let the paidhi-aiji get his distinguished guest home. Lord Geigi has a flight tomorrow and a long train ride to get there. Nand’ Bren, we hope there will be
some
sleep for you both tonight. We have kept you so late.”
“We shall manage, aiji-ma.” Bren speared Geigi with a glance and flung another toward the door, a signal. He bowed to Tabini, and to Damiri, and had to pass Ilisidi on his way—not without a sharp glance in return. He bowed. And he got a look back that made his skin prickle.
Well, he had tried. For good or for ill, he had stepped into that sticky relationship and tried to patch the wounds. It was family business, now. It was as much as he could do, and he was glad the boy was abed. One hoped he was sound asleep, because the dowager was still there and showing no sign of leaving.
He gathered up his aishid, Banichi and Jago, Tano and Algini, in the foyer. Geigi collected Tema and his company, and they were very quickly out the door, escaped into the coolth and lower emotional pressure of the hall, a startling, ear-numbing silence around their presence.
“Brave
paidhi,” Geigi said.
“It had to be said,” Bren said as they walked together. It was only a short distance to Bren’s own front door—that being the first apartment after the aiji’s.
One still heard silence behind them as Tabini’s doors shut. And the dowager, Cenedi, and
her
bodyguard definitively had not yet left Tabini’s apartment.
He was not sure he wanted to know what might happen back there, but he had done as much as he could, and perhaps more than he should. Black Guild uniforms were securely about them both, now, the presence of those nearest and most faithful, in every emotional sense. And he didn’t know whether he
was
going to sleep tonight, playing that business over and over and trying to think of what he should have said, and whether he should have said less.
“Return becomes a relief, Bren-ji,” Geigi said. “In my steel world up there, in the atevi sector, I am free. The Guilds cooperate, and our little community is so reasonable.”
“May it remain that simple,” Bren said. They reached their own door, and Banichi or Jago had already passed a signal. It opened just as they got there, and Narani and Jeladi met them to take coats and ease their way into the safe quiet of a house at rest.
Interior lights were dimmed. There was not a sound of revelry to be heard, and the air smelled only of the flowers in the hallway. The aiji’s had not been the only party going on. His domestic staff and Geigi’s had held their own farewell celebration; but in the discreet way information flowed in a well-put-together staff, he had absolute faith they would have begun to set things in order once they knew the party in the aiji’s residence was ebbing down. He was sure that nothing now was out of order, and that he would find all the preparations for Geigi’s trip were on schedule.
He thanked Narani and Jeladi, who had stayed awake and dressed to let them in, and he dismissed Geigi and his bodyguard to two servants who turned up quietly in the inner hall—Geigi’s valets appeared; and his own valets, Supani and Koharu, had not gone to bed yet either.
“Koharu, if you will attend my aishid,” he said. His bodyguard was perfectly capable of seeing to their own persons, and usually did so, but they had a short turnaround before them, with breakfast scheduled for daybreak, and that train trip to make to the spaceport. Anything that would aid his bodyguard to get a little more sleep tonight was to the good, and Koharu went off in that direction.
Geigi, however had not gone to his room. Geigi quietly dismissed his own bodyguard, with his servants, and cast him a significant look.
“A moment,
Tabini had moved closer. Bren saw him. And Tabini moved again, this time to intervene, all casualness, all smoothness and ease.
“Your aishid and Geigi’s are waiting, nand’ paidhi. Dami-daja, we should let the paidhi-aiji get his distinguished guest home. Lord Geigi has a flight tomorrow and a long train ride to get there. Nand’ Bren, we hope there will be
some
sleep for you both tonight. We have kept you so late.”
“We shall manage, aiji-ma.” Bren speared Geigi with a glance and flung another toward the door, a signal. He bowed to Tabini, and to Damiri, and had to pass Ilisidi on his way—not without a sharp glance in return. He bowed. And he got a look back that made his skin prickle.
Well, he had tried. For good or for ill, he had stepped into that sticky relationship and tried to patch the wounds. It was family business, now. It was as much as he could do, and he was glad the boy was abed. One hoped he was sound asleep, because the dowager was still there and showing no sign of leaving.
He gathered up his aishid, Banichi and Jago, Tano and Algini, in the foyer. Geigi collected Tema and his company, and they were very quickly out the door, escaped into the coolth and lower emotional pressure of the hall, a startling, ear-numbing silence around their presence.
“Brave
paidhi,” Geigi said.
“It had to be said,” Bren said as they walked together. It was only a short distance to Bren’s own front door—that being the first apartment after the aiji’s.
One still heard silence behind them as Tabini’s doors shut. And the dowager, Cenedi, and
her
bodyguard definitively had not yet left Tabini’s apartment.
He was not sure he wanted to know what might happen back there, but he had done as much as he could, and perhaps more than he should. Black Guild uniforms were securely about them both, now, the presence of those nearest and most faithful, in every emotional sense. And he didn’t know whether he
was
going to sleep tonight, playing that business over and over and trying to think of what he should have said, and whether he should have said less.
“Return becomes a relief, Bren-ji,” Geigi said. “In my steel world up there, in the atevi sector, I am free. The Guilds cooperate, and our little community is so reasonable.”
“May it remain that simple,” Bren said. They reached their own door, and Banichi or Jago had already passed a signal. It opened just as they got there, and Narani and Jeladi met them to take coats and ease their way into the safe quiet of a house at rest.
Interior lights were dimmed. There was not a sound of revelry to be heard, and the air smelled only of the flowers in the hallway. The aiji’s had not been the only party going on. His domestic staff and Geigi’s had held their own farewell celebration; but in the discreet way information flowed in a well-put-together staff, he had absolute faith they would have begun to set things in order once they knew the party in the aiji’s residence was ebbing down. He was sure that nothing now was out of order, and that he would find all the preparations for Geigi’s trip were on schedule.
He thanked Narani and Jeladi, who had stayed awake and dressed to let them in, and he dismissed Geigi and his bodyguard to two servants who turned up quietly in the inner hall—Geigi’s valets appeared; and his own valets, Supani and Koharu, had not gone to bed yet either.
“Koharu, if you will attend my aishid,” he said. His bodyguard was perfectly capable of seeing to their own persons, and usually did so, but they had a short turnaround before them, with breakfast scheduled for daybreak, and that train trip to make to the spaceport. Anything that would aid his bodyguard to get a little more sleep tonight was to the good, and Koharu went off in that direction.
Geigi, however had not gone to his room. Geigi quietly dismissed his own bodyguard, with his servants, and cast him a significant look.
“A moment,
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