A sudden thump of Ilisidi’s cane. “The nephew neglected business in Shejidan. Evidently he had a situation he wished not to report, and the aishidi’tat has been remiss not to inquire more closely regarding this sudden change in attitude and relations. The aishidi’tat took for granted the favorable association which has long existed in this region and took an attitude of patience with this young nephew. This was a mistake. We hope it has not cost lives, nor will cost them, but we fear to the contrary. The aishidi’tat has no wish for a continuing Guild presence in this region, and forces will withdraw as soon as we are sure Southern influence does not threaten the peace of this district.”
With which, and a second thump of the cane, Ilisidi fell back into silence, leaving a ripple of whispering and disturbance in her wakec again, not hostility, but hard to read what precisely it was—except honest fishermen and craftsmen trying to read all the way to the bottom of a remark by a master of Shejidan politics. Aieso, her gnarled hands laced before her lips, sat in silence, her eyes, gold dark nearly to bronze, taking in every movement.
“Neighbors,” Bren said, with a nod to that lady, “people who have a birthright on this coast should be reassured. The Southern influence which moved into Kajiminda has been dislodged, permanently, and there will be no threat to the region from that quarter. One wishes one could claim that one’s own cleverness detected this intrusion and laid all this plan to deal with it, but, baji-naji, there has been more chance on our side and more plan on the Southern side. They thought they had caught me without allies. They were mistaken. I thank the dowager, I thank the aiji, and the brave folk of Najida that we have overturned that schemec” That drew pleased looks. “But we remain concerned for the fate of people harmed by these goings-on. If there is any help the estate can give, we would be very glad to provide it.”
A single young man stood up, a thin, shabby-looking young man in the far corner of the room; and every Guildsman around the periphery went on alert. “Nand’ paidhi.”
“Nadi?”
A bow. “My name is Teigi. I came here as the son of Paigi. This was a lie. I am Edi, from Kajiminda—a youngest, and expendable.”
His security would not be happy with this deception. But none of them were surprised by it. He simply bowed in acknowledgement.
“One rejoices to hear from Kajiminda, Teigi-nadi. Say on.”
“This is what the Edi say. Throw the Southerners out or let us do it. Let us have our lordships and our law and our land back. I am the youngest. If you arrest me, you have no one.”
“There is no question of arresting the spokesman for the Edi,” Bren said, and in the tail of his eye, saw the dowager rising to her feet, when she was, being who she was, perfectly entitled to sit to address anyone in the aishidi’tat. It was a courtesy, and it was hard for her.
She stood upright, however, and planted the cane firmly.
“We are an Easterner,” she said in that incisive, absolute voice, “and we comprehend the position of the Edi people. We of the East have Malguri and those in its man’chi. Where is the house of the Edi lord? There shouldbe a house of the Edi, and one of the Gan.” Those were the other aboriginal people, the latter, like the Edi, dispossessed from Mospheira. “We think so. We have not expressed this thought to our grandson. But it is our opinion.”
My God, Bren thought. She was proposing two new provinces.
The young man stood there, just stood for a moment.
“We would not expect,” Ilisidi said, “that representatives of the Edi and of the Gan would bring such proposals to the aiji in Shejidan.”
The proposal of an Edi and a Gan estate had thorns all over it. The Edi and the Gan had neverofficially joined the aishidi’tat, because the Edi and the Gan were both inside other provinces.
“You have suffered,” Ilisidi said, “as have other peoples of this coast, from the chaff of the quarrel between the South and the Ragi of the central districts. This is a case that should be made. The aishidi’tat is not weaker because it contains the intact East. The aishidi’tat would be stronger if it contained an intact West. Right now you are the majority on this coast. And you have no lordship. Take my encouragement to pursue it, and set up your own defenses.”
The young man still stood. The dowager sat down again, and Bren drew a breath, finding the silence beginning to fray into a mutter.
“The dowager’s opinion,” he said, “will carry weight. You have a potential ally.”
The young man finally came alive to give a sketchy bow.
“One is by no means instructed on a reply, nandiin. One will carry the message.”
Cajeiristood up. Bren took in a breath, starting to signal the boy to the contrary, but Cajeiri was unstoppable in the best of circumstances.
“Listen to my great-grandmother, nadi,” Cajeiri’s young voice rang out. And, God, he could not have done better, with the matrilineal Edi, if he had targeted it. “My father does.”
There was a stir in the room. Everybody reacted.
And Cajeiri promptly sat down, leaving Bren alone to deal with the assembly.
“The young gentleman has many virtues,” Bren said, “including forthrightness. He says what he thinks, and what he thinks will one day be the policy of the aishidi’tat.”
There was a pause, a murmur, and then the stamp of a foot. Which became many feet, until the room thundered.
Bren bowed, and sat down, as the young Edi sat down, and all around the room security stood just a little easier.
It wasn’t going to be the safe direction. It was going to kick up one hell of a storm in Shejidan. But the coast had the backing of the East, and it was a natural ally against the South, a back and forth piratical war that had gone on for centuries.
Policy had just shifted. The thing once named had the power to exist, and once it existed, it would change the aishidi’tat.
Policy had just shifted and the wind had begun to blow, a sea wind, into the heart of the continent. The dowager, who had once bid to become aiji herself, had just tilted policy and directed the future course of politics.
And the paidhi hadn’t the least clue how he was going to explain it to Tabini.
—«»—«»—«»—
An Excerpt from
Bren Cameron’s notes.
The House of the Maschi
The Maschi clan has declined over centuries to a handful of the name, resident within the Sulesi clan, the inland limit of Sarini Province.
Within the Maschi clan:
The Marid, subdivided into the Tasaigin Marid, the Senji Marid, and the Dojisigi and Dausigi Marid—the four major districts that, with their clans and septs, rule the South. There are also the Sungeni, the local islands, ruled by the Tasaigi.
The Tasaigin Marid has been the most persistent problem to Tabini, but the other three districts, jealous of the power of the Tasaigi, have been laying their own plots.
One of the first indicators of trouble to come was the stir the Marid tried to make over the space program. They attempted to ruin Lord Geigi, who was a major supporter, and who had an aerospace plant in his district. They had subverted his Samiusi clan wife—who then fled to the Marid, married again, and had three children with Coidinje of the Tasaigi.
Badissuni was a previous problem to Tabini-aijic he appeared in the early accounts of Marid troubles: he was very much against the space program, mostly because it gave him an issue to use against Tabini. He came to consult with Tabini after the assassination of Lord Sagaimi of the Tasaigi, on a notable occasion of a visit from Lord Tatiseigi to the Bujavid, and that didn’t go well.