Intruder (2 page)

So…in the upshot of it all, two Marid lords who hadn’t won Ilisidi’s favorable attention were now dead, their houses occupied by the Assassins’ Guild, who were busy going through their records and finding out a host of things the deceased lords would not have wanted published to the world…or to their own clans.

And here he was back in Lord Machigi’s territory for the second time in two weeks. Machigi’s premises were also being occupied by Guild forces, but in a theoretically benevolent way.

Tabini-aiji, back in the capital of the aishidi’tat, in Shejidan, was still watching the operation in some curiosity—rather in the manner of one watching two trains run at one another, as Bren saw it. Tabini
could have vetoed the notion. He hadn’t. He’d let his grandmother run the operation, backing her up as needed…and possibly intending to let any adverse events bounce back on Ilisidi, not on him.

But Ilisidi’s plan was apparently still going smoothly.

The potential in the situation had been damned scary for about three very unsettled days, in which the Assassins’ Guild in the capital had met to consider a massive operation against a sizable portion of its own membership—a faction of the Assassins’ Guild which, three years ago, had overthrown Tabini’s rule for two significant years and then fled the capital when Tabini had come back on a wave of popular support. The Assassins that had supported the usurper, Murini, had run south…and reorganized.

Worse, Guild internal secrecy had covered the problem. It had covered it so damned well that not even Tabini-aiji had known—because Tabini, who had replaced his Guild-approved bodyguard with men of his own clan, who were not high up enough in the Guild to suit the Guild leadership…. had somehow fallen off the list of persons to be informed of certain maneuvers.

Politics, politics, politics. The Guild had started running its own operation, trying to mop up their recent split, not advising Tabini of everything it knew—

Like the fact that the splinter group had moved beyond organizing in the Marid—that they had turned the two northernmost lord of the Marid into puppet lords, putting the two clans at
their
direction.

Tabini still hadn’t been told, because his bodyguard, who should have informed him, had ties and relatives not approved by the Guild leadership.

The aiji-dowager’s bodyguard hadn’t been told, either—first because she was in close company with the aiji, and second because she had been a guest of a lord with notoriously lax security, who might innocently have blown the Guild operation.

So secret were the inner workings of the Guild that the paidhi’s high-ranking
bodyguard hadn’t been told, either, and
his
bodyguard contained at least one person who was tapped into the Guild at highest levels. Algini, partnered with Tano, had reasonably expected information he hadn’t received.

Why not? Because
his
lord, the paidhi-aiji, was working closely with Tabini and the aiji-dowager, and somebody high up in the Guild was in the final stages of planning a strike against the renegades in the south and was absolutely not confiding in the messy households of people who actually lived lives outside the rules of the Guild, and who were running around near the sphere of action at the time.

And what then happened?

The Guild’s enemies tried to assassinate the paidhi-aiji, because he’d walked into
their
operations, unadvised.

Then they’d gone on attacking, because the aiji-dowager and Tabini’s young son had added themselves to the target zone.

Just run over to Tanaja and get Machigi to join us…that had been Ilisidi’s approach to the situation that had landed on them at Najida.

And that had tripped up the Guild’s maneuvering for good and all, since Machigi had been the first target the Guild had been putting the pressure on.

An ignorant intervention?

One didn’t quite think so. The
hell
Ilisidi’s bodyguard hadn’t started to get information that the Guild hadn’t been willing to give to Tabini, once bullets had started flying, and the
hell
the aiji-dowager hadn’t made threats and promises to get it out of them—the aiji-dowager’s chief bodyguard, Cenedi, probably allying with Algini to get accesses. The paidhi-aiji knew the smell of politics when it wafted past him. Cenedi had started finding things out, and then
Algini
had started finding things out, as the machinery started to move.

Now the Guild in Shejidan had the shadow-Guild on the run. The average citizen in the northern Marid might know that his own lord had died, yes. That they were also missing a minister or
two might take longer to notice. The sudden appearance of uniformed Guild in the halls of government would be the only sign—and that would get to the flower market and the fishmonger by the city rumor mill…that and certain government offices opening under the direction of lower-level officials, senior officials having had the sense to resign and go tend their personal business…

That was the pattern in Senji clan territory, north of here, the other side of the Maschi district. It was the same across the Marid Sea, in Dojisigi clan, where most of the shadow-Guild had clustered—and where some of the nastiest fighting had gone on.

The Guild had told Tabini, finally; the Guild had been in communication with Ilisidi, and right now the paidhi’s bodyguard was in radio contact with the Guild authority, and everybody was talking to everybody else.

Going into Taisigi territory was still a scary proposition. But it certainly beat the last trip. He had packed hiking boots this trip. He’d sworn to himself he would never go anywhere again without hiking boots.

And—theoretically—this time the Guild would courteously warn them if they were heading into a trap.

He had his lunch while lightning broke around them, while from time to time the windshield went awash with water. It was a typical spring front, coming in off the straits. But with luck, the worst of the weather would blow past them and be off across the Marid Sea by the time they got to Tanaja, on the coast.

Meet with Machigi and then call and arrange a secure flight from the airport over in Sarini Province, a bus ride back to the airport, and on to Shejidan. For business. A lot of business.

His guests had all departed from Najida. Young Cajeiri had flown back to Shejidan yesterday—Tabini-aiji had insisted on a plane flight, no more train rides. Young Dur had flown his own plane
home yesterday, too, ahead of the storm. Dur’s father, going home by sea as of two days ago, would have had a rougher trip, at least at the outset.

Ilisidi and her security team would have taken off hours ago, just ahead of the incoming front, the last of his guests to leave. She would change planes at Shejidan, not delaying for pleasantries, and continue on to her own estate, Malguri, across the continental divide. She was taking Lord Geigi’s traitorous nephew Baiji with her—under close guard. Baiji was a fool, but he had his uses—primarily in begetting an heir.

Lord Geigi himself was still over at Kajiminda, the estate neighboring Najida, lingering to straighten up some last-moment business there, before catching the next shuttle back to the space station and getting back his real job.

So the construction crew would be moving in tomorrow to repair Najida’s main hallway and the roof with more than the patches that currently kept the rain out. And to do some major renovation while they were at it.

He loved that little estate. He wanted to stay and supervise the construction and be consulted for small decisions.

But he had a promise to keep. And a duty to perform.

And if he succeeded, the world would change.

I
t was going to be goodbye for good to the little bedroom in Great-grandmother’s apartment, and Cajeiri was not happy. It had been home ever since they had gotten back from space, but where they were going next was their real home…which they had not been able to go back to until now.

It was repaired, since the coup. The bullet holes were patched. It was repainted.

But in Cajeiri’s view, his room there was going to be only one more room in the Bujavid.

Where Cajeiri had rather not be in the first place.

He had only been infelicitous six when he had last seen his parents’ real apartment in the Bujavid.

Oh, it was a fine place, the Bujavid. His father had his offices and his audience hall here. Here the legislature sat, and here was the national library. Here almost all the most important lords lived when they were in town, and the halls were full of important and historic things, and all that.

But his father’s newly painted apartment was so—clean. So white. So—modern. He had had a look through the doors yesterday, only that. And it was just—white. Which was actually the way he remembered it, from long, long ago.

He had only really lived in that apartment when he was a baby. He had, since then, lived in Great-uncle Tatiseigi’s house; and then he had gone up in the shuttle and lived on the starship, and he had flown on the starship farther than anybody on earth could
imagine; and he had traveled back to the space station—which he had had to leave in a hurry, leaving all the people he had met in space.

And then he had flown back down to the world with nand’ Bren and Great-grandmother, because his father had been overthrown and enemies were in control of the capital, and they—he and Great-grandmother and Father and nand’ Bren—had had to fight their way from Uncle Tatiseigi’s house back to the Bujavid again and set his father back in power.

So he had come to live in this room, in Great-grandmother’s apartment, which had stayed safe during the Troubles. His father and his mother had lived here, too. And he had been almost a whole year living in this warm little bedroom. And taking lessons from his incredibly boring tutors—well, except for one small incident. Or two.

His father had of course become aiji again, so his father was obliged to live in the Bujavid and, as soon as he could, to have his own apartment back. They were cramped, living with Great-grandmother.

But
he
had rather live with Great-grandmother or with nand’ Bren, which was where he had just been—at Najida—even if he had only gotten to go out in a boat once.

Well, twice, if one counted the accident. But that had not exactly been a proper boat.

And everything was better at Najida now, and just when there was a real chance nand’ Bren could have taken him out every day on his boat, or nand’ Toby could have—his parents wanted him back in Shejidan, and told him he had to fly home.

Great-grandmother had gotten to stay in Najida. And now she was coming back, but she was not even going to come in from the airport. She was taking that fool Baiji to meet the girl he was going to have to marry.

So he did not even get to see her.

And now everybody was running around in excitement because
they were moving back to their own apartment, as if that was good news.

They were moving there tomorrow.

And that was where he would have to live.

Forever.

With a boring tutor giving him boring lessons.

He had ever so much rather have his lessons from Great-grandmother, even if she did thwack his ear for mistakes.

Or from nand’ Bren, who had taught him all sorts of things.

Or from Banichi, who was Guild, and incredibly scary and very kind and understanding. Those were his best teachers. Ever.

When they had been on the starship, nand’ Bren had given him vids from the human archive, about dinosaurs and musketeers and horses. He never got those any more. He scarcely ever got to spend time with nand’ Bren and Banichi.

And worst of all, Great-uncle Tatiseigi was back in residence in the Bujavid, now, and they would probably have to have dinner with him once a week once they had a dining room.

Then his mother’s Ajuri clan relatives were coming in, because the legislature was about to meet, and they would take
any
excuse to come visit. The aunts were not so bad. But Grandfather was appalling.

Mother was about to have a baby, that was the problem. That was a lot of the problems. The Ajuri were all excited about it, as if his mother did not already have
him.
They were probably saying that
this
baby would never be exposed to nand’ Bren, and they would far rather a baby that
they
could rule—

They would certainly rather have somebody
they
could influence. He had had far too much to do with Great-grandmother and with humans. That was what they thought. He was sure of it.

Great-grandmother would come back when she had gotten Baiji married off.

But by then he would have moved out of this apartment, with his parents, with all sorts of rules.

In
their
apartment, he would have a whole lot of
their
staff watching him. A lot of his parents’ staff who had not been killed in the coup had been off on paid leave since his father had come back to power because there was just no room for them in Great-grandmother’s apartment.

But his father’s staff would be all over the new apartment, and he would not be able to make a move without somebody reporting it to his father or his mother.

It was just dismal.

Pack, they had told him. Or would you rather the servants did it?

He most certainly did not want the servants going through his things. They would hardly know what was important. The things they could handle were in the closet—which was a lot of clothes—and what was not clothes was in the boxes on the floor, which were his drawings and his notes.

And then there were the important things in his pocket, where he kept his slingshota, along with three fat perfect rocks from Najida’s little garden, which he never ever meant to shoot where he could lose them. They were more precious to him than anything but the slingshota itself.

It was not very much to own for somebody who was the heir of all the aishidi’tat. But it was all he really cared about keeping. Not counting the clothes. Which he personally did not count. The servants could move those.