“Go on,” Machigi said again, increasingly darkly, and Bren kept going:
“The Farai are too small to swing the entire Marid by the tail. The Farai lord has kept the Senji lord at arm’s length by courting the Dojisigi; and one strongly suspects it was the Dojisigi who set them at the same tactic inside the Bujavid, to gain information about Tabini-aiji’s movements. You were to be eliminated, which would benefit the Dojisigi lord and the Senji. And it would be a race then to see whether the Farai tried actually to deal with Tabini-aiji and ally with your successor in the Taisigin Marid, thus getting the better of the Dojisigi andthe Senji, or whether the Dojisigi would simply squash them overnight and thenmake a move to install their owncandidate in the lordship in Tanaja. The fact the Dojisigi had offered a daughter to meddle in your plans for Baiji indicates they were already taking aim at you.”
Machigi sat silent for a moment, then gave a silent, short laugh. “For a human, you present a reasonably accurate assessment.”
“One has attempted to learn, aiji-ma. The plot against you leads only to the aishidi’tat doing all the work and the Farai, in their imagination, getting all the benefit. The Dojisigi then turn on them, or turn them on the Senji. Except for one thing—a Guild presence that is plotting its own course in the Marid. One has no exact knowlege to match the dowager’s, one is quite sure. But one strongly suspects that there is an infelicitous sixthpower in the Marid, and, on evidence I observe—they do not favor you. What was an ordinarily complicated piece of Marid politics now has taken a very alarming turn, and one begins to understand it is not the Dojisigi or the Senji at work. You have not cooperated with the Guild renegades. One believes the aiji-dowager has convinced the Guild you area point of stability in this region.
One is even moved to suspect the Guild in Shejidan launched its deliberation on outlawry as— between the two of us—a diversion.”
That brought a sharp, angry glance.
“So. What elsedo you surmise?”
“That your own bodyguard is extraordinarily adept, or you would not now be alive.”
Angrier yet. And not, necessarily, at him.
At persons closer to him. Intimates, of which this dangerous young man had very few.
“So. Are we to be flattered by the aiji-dowager’s estimation that we have difficulties?”
“She has no pity for fools. She is convinced you have uncommon qualities as a leader, or I am quite confident there would be no offer, and I would not be here. She seems to believe that those qualities have alarmed your northern neighbors to the point of desperation.”
“And of course she would never encourage that situation.”
“Not, aiji-ma, notwhen the situation is entangled with the problem I have named.”
“The dowager has a reputation, paidhi. She takes what she wants.”
“Yet she has never taken so much as a village, aiji-ma. Territorially, she is not ambitiousc
not in her own district, where other lords view her as a good neighbor.”
“She collects man’chi as some people collect minatures!”
Bren said with a little bow: “Indeed, she has drawn uncommonly diverse man’chi to her. But she does notas a rule offer alliances.”
There was a reason the legislature had feared to make her aiji.
The fist was back under the chin, Machigi’s favorite contemplative pose. The gold eyes were calculating, estimating him, since he was the only available target. Machigi said nothing for a moment.
But the muscles around the eyes held a little quirk of something that had not been there before. Intense concentration.
“You are different from my reports,” Machigi said, “and difficult to read. One understands a human has no man’chi. Yet you dofavor her side of the table.”
“We have another quality,” he said, “something akin. We arecapable of loyalty. We are even capable of dualloyalty.”
Quirk of the eyebrow. He’d said it with forethought—in utter honesty. Which Machigi probably had not expected but ought to recognize.
“Divided loyalties,” Machigi said.
“Dual loyalties, aiji-ma. She knows it. I am advising you with yourinterests foremost at the moment.”
Machigi gave a small disparaging laugh. “She has learned to wield your two-edged talents to her advantage, has she? How well do humans lie?”
“Some better than others,” Bren said. “I have lived a long time on the continent, and everything I have done has a record. I have reserved truth when it served. I have notbased a negotiation on a lie. Ever.”
That was a smile. A small one, almost a laugh, and this one lighter than before. Machigi was either letting his emotions show now, or while talking about lying, he waslying and had turned very deliberately deceptive.
“We have broken with the Farai today,” Machigi said. “My uncle moved too much to the Farai side of the balances: so my bodyguard informs me. We also understand divided loyalties, nand’ paidhi. But you know that. Baji-naji, all things adjust. Balance matters. My uncle played both sides of the board. That hadbeen his value.”
“One very much takes the warning, aiji-ma.”
“Well played, paidhi.” The hand fell to the chair arm. “You have proposals for me, do you?
Let us hear them. I will listen.”
Machigi had dropped the mask, then, a little. And was not in a good mood today: was genuinely sorrowing after the uncle, it might be. Had quarreled with his aishid, it might be or taken a long look forward and backward.
One needed to keep it succinct and direct. “The documents I have given you have names, aiji-ma, specifics of the eastern seacoast, small towns—several promising areas for a port, and in my estimation, the dowager’s backing would carry weight. Local rail could be established, with negotiation: the Eastern lords are highly traditional, reluctant to see modernization go through their lands.”
“Nothing to match mine.”
“Yet villages will be reluctant to see economic advantage flow to their neighbors and not to them. Rail is a way to spread the benefit. When seen in that light—”
“You were an advocate for the railroad.”
“Far less disruptive than roads, aiji-ma.”
“You are building a railroad, paidhi, and we have not yet built a port.”
“Or yet sailed a ship there, aiji-ma, true,” Bren said with a shrug. “But I believe this can work.”
“We build your town. Sooner or later Shejidan will push a rail connection all the way to the east coast—to take business from our ships.”
“Ah, but, aiji-ma, they cannot gain right of way through eastern lands if the eastern lords object. And if these lords profit, youwill have allies, because they have held themselves stubbornly independent of Shejidan. Ports grow into cities. And this port will have industry of its own, and fisheries, and it will thrive. The undeveloped land of the East one day will greatly resemble the view out that window.”
“You dream, paidhi. The East is a rocky coast with treacherous currents and storms.”
“Your ship captains will grow expert, and the orbiting station can warn you of weather with an accuracy unavailable to your ancestors.”
Back went the chin onto the fist. “You dream, paidhi.”