There was a small space of silence. One said something in his own language, but it sounded like a question; and Lord Geigi’s men answered in that language in no milder tone, something involving Najida, Kajiminda, and the paidhi-aiji. Then they shouted an order, and the young men took off running, back into the woods, guns and all.
God, it was all he had in him. He was spent. He wanted to sit down right where he was.
“Bren-ji,” Banichi said, laying a hand on his shoulder. “You have done what you could do. At this point youare the person the renegades would most like to lay hands on. More to the point, the word is going out that you are here. The Edi are not a disciplined force. Some may fall back. Some may panic. We shall hold this place, up on the heights. Can you drive the truck?”
“I shall not,” he said. “Not leaving you here, no.”
“The renegades have failed to get past Machigi,” Banichi said. “They have the Edi between them and Kajiminda and somewhat between them and Separti Township. And then there is this road, back the way they arrived. The Edi will not take orders in any organized way, and if they start to take losses and panic, we are too few to hold what comes behind them.”
“I can make them listen.”
“You have no experience of this situation, Bren-ji. Your bodyguard advises you abandon this area, and fall back. If we have to, we will draw back to Kajiminda.”
“Afoot?” he shot back. “No, nadiin-ji. If you have to leave here, you will need a little speed, will you not?”
Banichi looked exasperated.
“Tell Machigi I am here,” he said. “Tell Machigi to push them if we can’t organize the Edi to do it. The Edi will shoot what shows up first, am I right?”
“We can hold that,” Banichi said, with a wave of his hand toward the rocky side of the road, and went to instruct the driver. The truck started up, pulled over near the rocks, and backed in, positioning itself for a run for Kajiminda. Everybody aboard the truckbed began getting off.
Bren found a small outlier of those rocks, next to a stand of brush, and sat down with a wince from the damned vest. His bodyguard was off giving directions. Geigi’s men positioned themselves off in the brushy outskirts of the woods, Nawari and his crew off in the rocks near the truck.
He just sat, and he wished he had the canteen he’d left in the truck, but he was not inclined to walk after it.
He was done, utterly done. He rested his head on his hands and was so dizzy he thought he might fall asleep where he sat. Three forces were going to collide and start shooting, and he could just sit here on his rock, undisturbed, unnoticed. That would be good. Just no one to notice him for at least an hour. He could sleep.
But the fire kept up, sporadic, even lazy. God, how long could they keep at it without running out of ammunition? They’d get down to throwing rocks at each other. Damned fools.
He came very close to sleep.
Then a whistle sounded in the woods, and a voice, calling out in accented Ragi, told him something had changed.
He started to get up. It wasn’t graceful. He grabbed hold of the brush one-handed and hauled himself up to a wide-legged brace before he got his balance.
A group of Edi, five in number, in hunting camoflage, came down the road, calling out and stopping where one of their side had planted three stacked rocks.
Good idea, those rocks. They got attention. And Geigi’s men went to them and talked to them, and guns were in safe carry when they came in, properly quiet and respectful.
Bren started in their direction, but Geigi’s men waved them off again, a little back up the road.
Sit there, that was. And talk to anybody coming in. A welcoming committee. It was amazingly genteel.
One only hoped they got their information straight—a whispering game, one to the next. But it was what they could do.
He was on his feet. He limped over across the road to the truck, opened the door and got the canteen.
Jago came around the end of the truck. “Best you stay with the truck, Bren-ji. We are organizing.”
“Yes,” he said. “One will, Jago-ji.” He hoped Banichi wasn’t mad at him. He couldn’t even figure out whether he deserved it. If they were going to get killed, he really didn’t want anybody mad at him.
He climbed up to the seat of the truck and sat down, closing the door mostly, and very quietly, and had a small drink of water.
He was too damned tired, he thought, to be properly scared. He was scared in a numb sort of way that was not much different from acute terror. But he was here, and he had to be here.
Worst was knowing he’d done everything he could do.
It got very still for a while. He heard Tano talking to someone, he thought, on com. Maybe talking to Machigi’s people. Maybe there was a code for Watch out for our allies once you get close to them. Please just shoot at uniforms.
That wasn’t too comforting, either.
His bodyguard and Geigi’s and the dowager’s were scattered out. Lucasi and Tano were still on the truck, which argued that Banichi had taken his plan for a fast retreat, those being the two that weren’t able to sprint for it, but he wished people were a little closer to the truck.
More of the Edi showed up. Once, through the driver’s rolled-down window, he heard a scattering of whistles and began to think, they cancommunicate. They arecommunicating.
That was hopeful. That was hopeful in a major way. But he wasn’t hearing the firing nearly as often now.
Something was going on. There were just the whistles.
The Edi were moving.
Moving back.
Then a distant fire opened up.
That—that might be Machigi.
And one couldn’t damned well hear. One couldn’t get a direction on it. Bren opened the door, slid down to the step-down and held on to the door, getting down. He didn’t want to distract anybody.
He just wanted—
“Bren-ji!” Tano said from the rear of the truck. He turned around, saw Tano leaning on the sidewall of the truck, pointing off to the northwest. Lucasi struggled to the same vantage with a thump that rocked the truck, as gunfire rattled steadily in the distance.
“What is it?” he asked.
Tano pressed the com to his ear, talking to someone. “The bus!” Lucasi cried. “The bus is on the road, nandi!”
He still saw nothing. But he trusted atevi hearing. He stood holding on to the truck door, hoping the engine block was some shield against anything coming his direction.
They had the bus, they lost the bus—somebody outranked them and took it from them. And now it came back.
Without a damned word.
“Bren-ji,” Tano said. “Tabini-aiji is coming.”
God. He wouldn’t. An absolute cold chill went through him. Tabini. Risk himself. Risk everything.
And if Tabini came charging in here with the Edi andMachigi andthe renegades going at each other and none of the latter respecting the aishidi’tat, he didn’t lay bets on which side would attack whom.
“Tano.” He made his way to the side of the truck so he could look up at both of them, the resources he had. “Tell Tabini-aiji the situation. Inform him. One doesn’t care who hears at this point. It is not the time for him to come in unaware.”
“Yes,” Tano said, and: “We have code we can use, nandi.”