They reached the lift and rode it toward five-deck with the dowager’s entire party, and with Ginny Kroger and her crew. No one spoke. The dowager leaned on her cane with both hands, vastly content.
They reached fifth deck.
The door opened.
“ Bren-nadi.” The intercom in the lift-car, right in his face, scared him.
“Jase-ji?”
“ Will you mind coming up here?”
He drew a deep breath.
It wasn’t over.
The dowager meanwhile had left the car, with young Cajeiri. Ginny Kroger and her crew debarked. Cenedi held the door open.
“I’m requested to come to the bridge, aiji-ma,” Bren said.
“Escort him,” Ilisidi said, and Cenedi with a rapid gesture detached two men.
Two. Infelicity. Unless one counted Jase.
“Need help?” Ginny asked, from outside the doors.
“No. Questions from Jase, likely. I’ll give you a report.—Aiji-ma.” One owed last, parting courtesies to the highest rank present. “I’ll report.”
“Go,” Ilisidi said. The pair of men got in. Cenedi got out.
The door shut.
“Do you know what this regards, Bren-ji?” Banichi asked him.
“One isn’t sure,” he said. His mind conjured a dozen scenarios, most disastrous—even the bridge being held at gunpoint by Sabin loyalists. “I don’t thinkit’s a trap, nadi-ji. I think it’s Jase.”
Chapter 18
There was indeed an atevi presence on the bridge when the lift let them out—two men, felicitous three, counting Jase, the object of their protection: a better counter, perhaps, could have predicted it, with their infelicitous four.
Exceedingly fortunate seven. One wasn’t inclined to count the number of humans on the bridge, technicians and operations chiefs, and security… but Bren did. They were outnumbered, if not outgunned.
Jase stood amid the rows of consoles, reserved, serene, among crew at work. And spared him a glance.
“All quiet?” Bren asked in ship-speak, precisely because there wereeavesdroppers.
“Quiet here,” Jase said. “How is Captain Sabin?”
“Strong-minded.”
Jase quirked an eyebrow.
“In favor of the mission,” Bren amended that. “Anxious to see it underway.”
“We have section chiefs going through the corridors now, final check on stowage.”
“It’s the pilot that does this, isn’t it? All the technicals. I’ll assume things will work.”
“They’ll work,” Jase said. And shot him a less cheerful look. “Clear operations with me or with Captain Sabin. No installations we don’t know about. And where I don’t know the risks, I’ll have one of the technical staff pass on it.”
“Understood. We remember how humans got to this star in the first place. We’ve no desire to foul up navigation.”
“You understand. I want to be sure your staff does. I want to be sure the dowagerunderstands us.”
“I’ll attend to that.”
“Do.—Banichi-ji.”
“Nandi.”
“There’s hazard in moving about the corridors. Understand that, nadi-ji.”
“One understands, nandi.”
“There may be hard feelings. And suspicion, nadi. Very deep suspicion.”
“There’s something about being that sick, among strangers,” Bren said in Ragi, “that makes one re-evaluate the world.”
“I don’t count on it,” Jase said bluntly. And in ship-speak: “Mr. Hammond, take over while I make sure our guests reach five-deck.”
Not the deepest cover they could imagine, but Jase put a hand on Bren’s back and walked him to the lift, his bodyguard attending.
Jase punched five, inside. The doors shut between them and the bridge. The lift started into motion.
“Tell me this one,” Jase said. “Did you know?”
“I didn’t. I honestly didn’t. I don’t think it was sure until it went difficult at the table.”
“Dammit, Bren.”
“Dammit, indeed. But she and the dowager exchanged frank words. Very frank words. There may be communication.”
“We’re going out there in the deep dark with no agreement. With everything in flux.”
“Not wholly our doing. This limiting the dowager to fifth deck. This niggling away at the agreements started long before the dowager even came up to the station.” The lift reached bottom. The door opened. They couldn’t delay in conversation without provoking human suspicions. “You know Ramirez expanded agreements: you know he expanded them and you know he pushed, and you know the danger in that. He pushed Tabini into haste, and when he died, damned right we had an emergency. We had a council of captains without a useful clue attempting to change pace on the course we’d been following breakneck for years, all on human promises—”
“It doesn’t give you leave—”
“Not excluding Sabin all along being outvoted by the Ramirez-Ogun combination and Ramirez putting youin. That’s going to be with us. No, I don’t trust her, Jase-nadi. I don’t see a woman who’s open to strangeness, not now, not yet. I see a woman who shouldn’t be in charge of foreign contact, and yet that’s where she’s ended, and you and I know we’re in trouble.”
“This is our household,” Jase said in a shaken voice. “Do you get that, Bren? I’m willing to take an office I don’t want and try to make things work in non-technicals, in the things I cando. And hereafter—I may speak the language, but man’chi is to the ship.”
“You know how to sit in a two-species meeting and get out of it with a civilized agreement. That’s the point, Jase. That’s the very point.”
“We can’t have another incident like this.”
“I expect the dowager will invite Sabin back to dinner.”
“I expect Sabin will invite the dowager first.”
That, in fact, seemed very likely. “We’re going to have our hands full, Jase-paidhi.”
“I’ll get that tape,” Jase said, and reached for the lift control panel. “Out. Takehold’s going in effect in short order. I’ve got to drop by and talk to Sabin.”
“Luck,” he said, and got out, with his escort. Cenedi had a man on watch by the lift—a precaution. “Understand—no more restriction of our movements.”
“None,” Jase said. “Not on my watch.”
The door shut. The lift departed.
Bren cast a glance to the borrowed escort. “They stand ready to move the ship, nadiin. I send you to the dowager, with thanks.—Banichi.”
Banichi walked with him. The escort walked behind.
“Jago should come back down, to ride through this with us,” Bren said. Maybe it wasn’t wise, but things were about to change on a large scale. They were about to do something his gut insisted was dangerous—even if it was only getting up to speed, to clear the vicinity of the only world he’d known—and he wanted all the people he cherished safe and taken care of.
“I’ll pass that order,” Banichi said.
“Sabin should be safe. Her own people will see to her.”
“One hopes, Bren-ji.”
They walked down the curve of the corridor, past the dowager’s guarded door—two men there; and that place absorbed their escort.
They reached that area of hall that was the paidhi’s establishment—his own quarters. Doors were all shut.
Banichi spoke to Narani on his personal communications, and the door very quickly whisked open on a room vastly changed since the explosion of baggage.