Master of None (48 page)

“And I don’t need to justify anything to you,” he added softly. Ruuspoelk leaned back, her mouth pressed thin. He didn’t wait for her to answer, and rose on his knees.

“I’m sorry if you had the wrong impression that I have any influence over the Pratha Yronae just because I’m Nga’esha, or that I would even try to influence her just because I’m Hengeli. Now if there is nothing further I can do for you, would you mind allowing me to leave? I have a long night ahead, and I’d like to get it over with as quickly as possible.”

“Not just yet,” Rashir said, her tone mild.

He sat back onto his heels, annoyed.

“How much do you know about the trade dispute between the Nga’esha and the Changriti over the Dunton Station issue? I think the Vanar call it Sukrah Station?”

“Absolutely nothing,” he said coldly. “Men here are barred from any involvement whatsoever in High Family business affairs.” Even the news available to men was heavily censored.

“You are at least aware that the Changriti and the Nga’esha have long been hostile business rivals?”

He briefly contemplated several caustic responses, but settled for the one that would give him the least trouble with Yronae.

“Yes.”

“We are in possession of information that could possibly resolve the current dispute in the Nga’esha’s favor,” Rashir suggested, studying her blunt nails. “Then again, the Changriti might want to pay to ensure this information doesn’t reach the Nga’esha, should your pratha h’máy not agree to a reasonable commission.”

If Rashir didn’t enjoy negotiations with Yronae, he thought, he’d love to be present when she tried to threaten Eraelin. He leaned back, pensive.

“Unfortunately you’re talking to the wrong person. Pratha Yronae is simply not going to allow me to be involved with High Family business. If you have something to offer the pratha h’máy, you should be speaking to her about it.”

“We can’t. Not openly.” She exchanged an enigmatic glance with Ruuspoelk. “Official negotiations are too exposed to public scrutiny. It would jeopardize a delicate intelligence operation. You’re in a unique position. We can use someone inside the Nga’esha who can relay private documents and information for us without attracting undue attention. Not only can you act as our courier with the Nga’esha, you have access to the Changriti, which may be of value to Pratha Yronae as well.”

“Whatever Pratha Yronae chooses to use me for, I still can’t help you with the Changriti. My wife has begun divorce proceedings against me—”

“Then
un
-begin them,” Ruuspoelk said sharply. Her green eyes were intense. “Kiss and make up. Because there is more at stake here than your personal life.”

This time Rashir shot her a warning look, then went back to inspecting her nails. “Believe me, Mr. Crewe, it is no pleasure to see any Hengeli citizen being subjected to what is not much better than slavery,” Rashir said. “But my personal sympathy is not the issue here. The thousands of Hengeli men, women, and children dying every day is. Their survival is my sole priority. For humanitarian reasons alone you should help us to help them.”

She was making the same error he once had, presuming that Hengeli philosophy and values gave her a cultural superiority to the Vanar. To her Hengeli mind, the Vanar were antiquated savages who had done nothing to deserve their vast wealth. Their tyrannical customs offended her, and she resented being compelled to appeal to an outlaw colony whose primitive ethics had to be tolerated, if despised.

Nathan said nothing, not trusting himself to speak. For a moment, he wanted to warn her that patronizing the Vanar would be a grave mistake, but knew the attempt would be futile. Suzenne Rashir was not a woman easily convinced any society other than her own could ever possibly be as sophisticated or civilized.

“And if we can’t appeal to your compassion,” Ruuspoelk added caustically, “would it help to clarify things if I told you that while you sit there mulling it over, little Aenanda Changriti could be in danger? Surely your pratha h’máy is not so inflexible she would risk the safety of a five-year-old child, her own
niece
, would she?”

Even Ambassador Rashir glanced at her aide in annoyance. He stared at Ruuspoelk, aware of the pulse beating in his ears, and had to clear his throat before he could speak. “My daughter is not part of the Nga’esha family, and my pratha h’máy will not be concerned with her welfare. But I’d advise you to be extremely careful about making threats against my daughter,” he said slowly, finally allowing his anger to show.

Ruuspoelk looked up with a good deal more surprise than was natural. “You misunderstand. I’m not threatening anyone. How could anyone threaten the Vanar?”

“Enough,” the ambassador said tersely. “I think we’ve made our point. Hopefully you can make it to your pratha h’máy.”

“You should have just left the monitors functioning,” Nathan said grimly. “My opinion one way or the other doesn’t matter to Pratha Yronae. She isn’t likely to regard me as anything more than a recording device.”

“That’s fine, Mr. Crewe,” Ruuspoelk said. “We didn’t neutralize this room to prevent the Nga’esha pratha h’máy from knowing what we’ve discussed.”

He absorbed their meaning. “Then if you’re finished with me, it’s late and I’d like to be allowed to leave.”

“By all means.”

He stood, his legs shaky, and bowed. He paused by the door, however, and looked back. “I suppose it is an Hengeli failing. It seems it’s not beneath you to use less-than-ethical methods for your own gain as well.”

Rashir barely acknowledged him with a hint of a nod, while Ruuspoelk glared at him acidly.

Two of the Nga’esha household guards waited for him on the other side of the soundproof doors, dark eyes impassive. He bowed slightly and said, “I believe the pratha h’máy is anxious to see me.”

It was one of the rare times he had seen one of the dour, muscular Dhikar smile.

XL

T
HEY ESCORTED HIM DIRECTLY TO
Y
RONAE’S PRIVATE APARTMENTS.
T
HE
low bed had been recently occupied, to judge by the bedclothes in disarray, and Yronae wore an oversized tasmai tied at the waist, her hair unbraided but tied back loosely from her face. But he saw no sign of drowsiness in her eyes or in the compressed set of her mouth.

The dalhitri b’ahu of Dravyam, Mahdupi, sat sipping brandy from a heavy blown glass while a nameless medical taemora waited at a polite distance. With the Dhikar on either side of him, he bowed, doing his best to hide his dread.

He was both surprised and grateful when Yronae dismissed the Dhikar. “We won’t need them, Nathan.” She indicated he should kneel on the thick floor cushion rather than the floor. “We may be here for some time, and I want your mind on your task, not your shins.” Her tone was curt, but not cruel.

He knelt, settling himself comfortably as the taemora pushed up the sleeve of his mati and pressed a medgun against his upper arm. It hissed, and seconds later he felt the rush clearing his head, his thoughts suddenly coalescing into concise patterns. The taemora gave him two steel oblong spheres to hold one in each hand. Yronae would hold the third, his emotions amplified through the skin of her palm, reading his heartbeat, breathing, muscular electrical activity, hormonal activity in his blood, brainwave patterns. It was similar to the process Vasant Subah had employed to extract information from him. Minus the soul-crushing pain.

“Ready?”

“Hae’m, pratha h’máy,” he murmured, closing his eyes.

He replayed the discussion, word for word, as accurately as he could remember, which, he knew, was accurate enough. For her part, Yronae allowed him to go at his own pace, uninterrupted. Nathan could feel his own fatigue under the drugs, like shadows hidden by the light reflecting from the surface of a pool.

“The ambassador then said that they hadn’t neutralized the room to prevent you from knowing what we’d discussed.”

“Meaning?”

He stopped, inhaled a deep, slow breath, and opened his eyes. The taemora was still beside him, her attention on the medical monitor in her lap. She began fitting up another dose in the medgun.

“Meaning they don’t trust our security,” Mahdupi interjected before he could think of a more judicious way to phrase it.

Yronae sucked air through the space between her front teeth, making a common sound Nathan had always disliked in the Vanar. Then her brow wrinkled momentarily, glancing at him, and he realized that although he had not reacted visibly, she could feel that dislike through the sphere in her palm, if not the reason. He wondered if she could also feel the involuntary thrill of alarm, his body ingrained to expect Dhikar retaliation.

“Typical Hengeli paranoia.” She shifted the sphere from one hand to the other and rubbed the empty palm on her tasmai as if it itched, then frowned, irritated. “Run an inspection anyway, just to be thorough,” she said to Mahdupi.

The older woman nodded. Yronae turned back to Nathan: “Go on.”

“I requested her permission to leave. I did so at that point. The Dhikar were waiting outside to escort me immediately to you.”

“And that was all?”

He hesitated, then said firmly, “That was all.”

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. The sphere in her hand told her he was lying, but he kept his eyes on the locus over her shoulder and his breathing even. His parting retort to the Hengeli was a private matter. After a moment, she grunted and relented.

“Who’s in charge of security on Sukrah Station?” Yronae asked Mahdupi. Dunton was the Hengeli name for the Station, one Yronae would never stoop to using.

Mahdupi gestured to him. “You may go.”

He had bowed and started to rise when Yronae whirled on him. “No, sit.” Surprised, he sank back, the spheres still clutched in his hands. She glared at Mahdupi’s questioning look. “He stays.”

Mahdupi frowned, and began to speak in the incomprehensible language of women before Yronae cut her off impatiently.

“He stays,” she insisted. “Up until now, he’s been nothing but an annoying nuisance. At least I’ve finally found some use for my mother’s worthless toy.”

Mahdupi scowled her disapproval, shaking her head. “Rohnae dva Navamam Nga’esha,” she said. “Head of Sukrah security for the past eleven years.”

“What do you know about her?”

“She’s from the Nga’esha Estate in Praetah, where she was born and raised. Her
traeyah
second cousin once removed is the household h’máy. She has no direct familial connection with the Changriti that I’m aware of.”

“Check. Now.”

With a sigh, the older woman fished in the belt of her kirtiya for a monocular lens, settled it over one eye, hooking it into the soundpearl in her ear, and slipped into a near-trance state as she began tapping into the Nga’esha security system. Green and red lights reflected from the surface of her eye, the data impressing itself directly into her retina and processed by long training by her brain. He glanced at the carved window screen, trying to judge by the light between the latticed wood how late the hour it might be. Or early, he thought glumly.

“She has no Changriti ancestry for five generations. Two kharvah at present, both from respectable Middle Families. She has one daughter and one son. Both kharvah are registered as the fathers sharing parentage for both children.” Mahdupi’ s voice was atonal, focused on the data. She paused, switching into a different network. “The son would have been conceived during the first year she was on Sukrah.” Pause. “Ah.” Mahdupi’s eyes focused past the flickering lights. “There is a notation in the medical files that neither kharvah is the genetic donor to her son, a fact apparently unknown by either of them.”

Yronae sucked air through her teeth again. If she noted his involuntary reflex, she ignored it. “Changriti?”

Mahdupi was silent, her attention again back to the data oscillating through her retina. Despite the cushions underneath him, his legs ached, exhaustion shivering over him. Yronae paused from her restless pacing, the sphere still in her hand, and nodded curtly at the taemora. The drugs hissed into his arm before he realized, the pain abating.

“Not Changriti,” Mahdupi said finally, then added, “not Vanar.” Yronae snorted her disgust, with an acrid glower at him.

“So who is the genetic father?”

Mahdupi shrugged. “If you like, I’ll run a match, but it will take time, Yronae. Especially if the child’s father isn’t Vanar. We might get lucky, and find it’s a Sukrah employee. Or it could be one of any number of transient passengers. There are fifty-two individual Hengeli systems connecting through Sukrah.”

“Search them all,” Yronae insisted. “Find him. I want every detail of Rohnae Nga’esha’s movements, any contact, any connection she has ever had with the Changriti no matter how trivial. If she has been passing on Nga’esha secrets to the yepoqioh, I want to know what and who. And how.” She looked grim. “I don’t care why.”

“Yronae, he should not remain here any longer,” Mahdupi pressed. “This is not anything to concern him. He’s tired; let him go.”

Yronae waved the suggestion away irritably.

“Neither Ambassador Rashir or Heloise Ruuspoelk gave you any idea of what this information might entail, other than vague threats?” She pronounced the foreign names as badly as she did ‘Nathan Crewe.’ ”

“No, jah’nari pratha.”

“And they said nothing else about the Sukrah Station dispute between the Nga’esha and the Changriti, nothing at all?”

Normally, his personal evaluation would not be welcomed. He faltered, uncertain of how to couch his reply. Yronae snapped her fingers at him brusquely. “Come on, come on, now is not the time to prove how outstandingly Vanar you’ve become.”

Nettled, he retorted sharply, “As I don’t know a damned thing about what the Nga’esha and Changriti are involved in concerning Sukrah Station, all I can do is repeat as precisely as I can what was said,” he said sharply. Yronae rocked back on her heels as Mahdupi hid a smile. “Jah’nari pratha,” he added more prudently.

“Have you considered the possibility this could be nothing more than a trick, the Hengeli infecting you with their paranoia to persuade us into a concession?” Mahdupi suggested. “Rohnae dva Navamam Nga’esha may be guilty of nothing more than bad taste in men.”