It was a terrible situation. Servants devoted to the house would want to protect it—would do what the staff at Najida had done and protect the place, as best they could, moving fragile things. Their lord ordered otherwise.
And if their aishidi had contact with the Guild proper yet, there was no word of it.
Down and down the stairs. Bren struggled with the pace. Jago’s hand arrived at his elbow, trusting him, but there if he should slip.
He was breathing hard by the time they reached a basement passage—basement, by the number of turns they had made— and headed down a bare stone corridor. Old, this passage.
Electric wires were a dusty afterthought. And an iron door gave them passage into yet another tunnel.
Lungs ached for air. Ribs hurt. Bren reached a hand to the wall, and Jago’s hand held him up from the other side.
In the dim light, Tema made a sign. Banichi returned another, something about transport, or leaving, Bren wasn’t sure. But they kept moving, now with some shred of a concept where they were going.
Two turns more, another door, and they moved by flashlight, as that door shut with the resistence of age. Locked.
It was only dust in their way, dust, and a few pipes; and finally a stair upward, to yet another, modern door, with a keypad. Tema input a code, and the lock moved, and the door opened onto a short lighted hall. They might not even be in the same building. God knew. Bren didn’t. He found himself dizzy, short of breath, not aware, when they stopped, that there was one more door to unlock, until he heard it click.
It opened on a concrete, utilitarian space with a smell of machines, and exhaust, and oil—
garage. Transport. Their steps were quiet, but they disturbed a deeper silence as they went up a ramp. Four vans sat there, showing dim lights.
Outsiders, Bren thought, with a very atevi abhorrence of any help not from inside their operation. But they waited while one of Tema’s men left cover, approached one van, talked to whoever was inside, and signaled a come-ahead.
They moved. The three other vehicles suddenly showed lights. And one didn’t like the number of additional people involved. One didn’t trust the situation. One didn’t like it in the leastc
Bren moved, however, with Jago, thinking with the scant supply of air he had, God, we don’t know the streets. We don’t know where the hell we’re going. Do we?
They stopped at the first van. The side door opened, and they were supposed to get in with strangersc
“Rely on them,” Tema said. “They will get you to Targai by a safe road. As safe as exists.”
Three other vans, all leaving. Diversion. Confuse the enemy. Bren let Jago boost him up the step, to the seat inside. It was as far as he could get. The back door opened, and the rest of his bodyguard got in, Banichi moving forward to take the seat beside him.
And Machigi himself blocked the open side door.
“To Targai,” Machigi said, “to Najida if you insist, paidhi. And one hopes sending youto safety is not the act of a fool.”
“Aiji-ma, I willrepresent you to the aiji-dowager.”
“ Survive, paidhi. I give you that order.”
“Do the same, aiji-ma.”
Machigi gave a heave on the door and slammed it between them. The back door shut. The van started moving—one Taisigi driving, one more occupying the front seat, whether Guild or the garage’s regular drivers one couldn’t tell in the dark, with just the headlights and the reflected light off concrete to make them into silhouettes.
He was sweating, not alone from the haste getting here. This wasn’t going to be a tame bus ride to Najida. In no sense. It wasn’t just the schism in the Guild. It was the Marid itself. The paidhi-aiji was persona non grata with a lot of the Marid: he couldn’t count the number of well-placed people in the region who’d like to see him deadc and the two handling the van were faceless, nameless, obedient to God knew what.
But they had no choice. Hunker down and hope the halls were never infiltrated—small chance. Machigi’s orders might be to retreat to neutral position—but that wouldn’t prevent the renegades from looking for hostages. He had to get clear before he blocked the solution—
if there was to be a solution.
So did Machigi. Where he was going, whether any of three other vans loosed into the dark were Machigi’s or whether he was going to some deep bunker to wait it out, there was no telling. The regular Guild would take the place, sooner or later, one hoped, with a minimum of damage, a minimum of bloodshed— the way things were supposed to proceed, with the Guild being the only armed force in the aishidi’tat.
But with a splinter of the Guild taking up position—God knew. God only knew. Lords didn’t get in the middle of it. They had a responsibility to stay out of it, and let the Guild settle it, with the force of law. And to stand up and be assassinated, if it came to that, if one were taking the high ground. Lords had done that, to end an impasse. To protect a house. To protect a family. To save a dynasty.
That wasn’t what would fall out here. The Guild was trying to get their hands on Machigi to keep him alive, but in the early hours there weren’t enough of them, and innocents could get killed in the crossfire if Machigi tried to stay on, contrary to Guild planning. Get out, get out, get out was allthey could do: he thought it with every thump of the tires on the drive—felt the sway as the van made the turn onto open street, and Jago moved to pull him aside on the seat, and get between him and the window. It hurt the ribs. Banichi helped from the other side, and the paidhi-aiji, Lord of the Heavens and half a dozen other titles, was obliged to kneel on the carpeted floor and hold onto the edges of the seats, keeping his valuable head lowest of anybody’s.
Damn, he wanted his 20-year-old body back. His body from before his head had hit the damned chair in Pairuti’s parlor would do at the moment. He never got dizzy like this. He hated it, hated the mess he was in, wished for once in a long career he’d told Ilisidi he wasn’t going where she’d taken the notion he should go.
She was tired of him, maybe. Wanted to inherit a place on the west coast.
Wanted to make her grandson deal with the world her way.
He shouldn’t have listened—
Thump. He swore the van had driven over a curb. And floored it. He lost his balance. But Banichi and Jago had him, and if either of the men in front proved traitor, there was firepower enough in his company to make it suicide.
And by the fact nobody opened fire, the pair up front were doing all right, never mind the bump and the scrape of shrubbery along the side.
They swerved onto pavement, headed uphill, fast.
“Situation,” he asked. He didn’t expect them to know more than he did.
But Banichi said quietly, “We are with Guild born to the district.”
Born here, not Guild who had fled here. Taisigi-born. He had never in his life thought that would be comforting to hear.
The van cornered again, righthand turn, and sped up a paved road.
To Targai, Machigi had said.
Good. Good. Righthand and upland was a good direction.
His mind was racing. He couldn’t see a damned thing but Jago’s knees and Banichi’s, and the back of the seat in front of him.
They turned, four more times, and the pitch was continually up. The whole of Tanaja sat in a stream-cut half bowl, fronting on the harbor, with the center of government midway up the hill. They were climbing, at every opportunity, headed for the heights where—God knew—