The East had mineral wealth and fisheries, and the Marid had textiles, leather, glass, ceramics and foodstuffs of more delicate sort—for starters. And though rail and air linked the capital at Shejidan and the mountainous heartland of the East, the rail and air network excluded the Marid—as it excluded the coastal areas of the East.
Joining the two orphans of the aishidi’tat by a wild and stormy sea was an ambitious plan. The Shejidani lords who understood it were betting most heavily on the new railroad linking the once-hostile Marid to the capital; and they were laying all their money there. They predicted that the sea venture would be all show, for the political effect, but that the real flow of goods would be the new rail line, and that it would be moderately profitable.
The dowager in fact had other plans, not that the Shejidani lords were going to lose money on their venture, but they would, in the dowager’s intentions, not get all the gain. The dowager, champion of endangered species and threatened handcrafts, patroness of village systems and ancient traditions—had the very modern atevi stationmaster in space, Lord Geigi, for a close ally. She had, moreover, flown on Phoenix on the Reunion mission, and she understood what could be done from space. She understood it far better and with more imagination than most of the learned technical advisors who counseled her grandson Tabini-aiji.
Bet against her claim that a profitable sea route could link these two forgotten and marginalized districts?
Bren personally bet that she had never given up her decades-old plan to develop the southwest coast of the mainland, and that the Marid trade link was only one step on a lifelong path—her design for the aishidi’tat, which she had maintained through three aijinates and her own regencies. Shejidan had long been the well into which all goods went, and what came out was, in the dowager’s view, not quite equitable—in terms of districts and ethnicities.
“Notably,” Ilisidi said, “we have just had a success in the Guild problem. The change of administration in the Assassins’ Guild has helped us in more than one way. We may have brought back the old intransigent and inconvenient masters of that Guild, but these officers have returned to their posts with a new appreciation of our reasoning. They now admit themselves very glad that the East and the Marid have maintained their own Guild offices separate of Shejidan. They are now listening to Cenedi. They are respecting his advice, and this they would not do before.”
Cenedi was the dowager’s chief bodyguard, head of her security, and his absence right now, along with Banichi’s, said that there was some intense conversation going on between the dowager’s bodyguard and his own. The Eastern Guild out of which the dowager drew her over-sized bodyguard was differently organized than the Assassins’ Guild in Shejidan. Most notably, it drew from local applicants without completely divorcing them from their local culture and their clans of birth.
When Ilisidi’s marriage contract joined the Eastern and Western Associations the Shejidan Guild had been forced to acknowledge the authority of Cenedi’s organization in the East, but that didn’t mean they trusted it or even respected it. And now they applied to Cenedi for advice? They were considering the principle of local Guild as opposed to centralized Guild as something that might have advantages? The changes indeed represented a tectonic shift.
“One would hesitate to believe the leadership has completely abandoned their resentment of the regional Guilds,” Ilisidi said, “but change is coming. We are privately assured the Assassins’ Guild is drawing up a rule change to acknowledge our training center in Malguri Township, and once that principle is admitted, it will very readily extend to Lord Machigi’s training center in the Taisigin Marid.”
“Indeed!” He was beyond surprised.
“And where the Assassins’ Guild goes, the Merchants, the Physicians, and others troubled by the matter of regional offices—will find their way. There may be a cost, however.”
“There would have to be,” he said. “What are the Assassins asking?”
“This, and in this consideration, your trip to the station may well prove a convenience. The Assassins wish to establish an office on the space station, as a condition to their recognizing the regional offices. So while you are preparing to deal with matters up there—that matter may well arise.”
Deep breath. Half a year ago he would have been appalled, with a kneejerk no, absolutely not. Never let the Assassins’ Guild up into Lord Geigi’s domain—within reach of humans.
Now, in circumstances the dowager herself had created, with his help, it did not appear to be such a bad idea.
If the Guild sent the right people. The Assassins’ Guild, effectively the justice structure of the aishidi’tat, needed direct access to accurate, unfiltered information—information which would help them guide opinions in Shejidan about situations the ground-based Guild could not readily imagine. Cenedi and Banichi—and Algini—had the ear of the Guild leadership. They might influence the choice of agents.
Having an informed opinion advising the Guild about Geigi’s security up there could also be very helpful.
All this—granting what he never would have granted before: that the oldest of all Guilds was actually in a process of adapting and changing.
There was Tillington to explain to them. That underlying issue flickered like lightning on the horizon, illuminating a very scary landscape.
There was Tillington, there was Louis Baynes Braddock, and there were all the old quarrels that lay in human politics.
But those were the very matters the Guild needed to understand. The way humans dealt with their own and solved problems—they had to learn that, too, among very important considerations. High-level Guild were not fools.
And there was no better person on the atevi side to explain a situation to the Guild than Lord Geigi, who understood, for one principal difference, that human leaders were far more replaceable than atevi aijiin—and that a problematic opinion therefore tended to be an ephemeral condition that could change with a new appointment—short of the need for an assassination. And he hoped to illustrate that fact very quickly regarding the current human stationmaster.
“One does not foresee Lord Geigi objecting to that proposition, aiji-ma, though one is certain he will have some adjustments and observations.”
“To say the least. And this human stationmaster. Tillington.”
She knew the name. God, that was disturbing.
“Tillington,” he said carefully. “Yes, aiji-ma.”
“One hears he is inconvenient.”
“Exceedingly. But a word from the Presidenta can remove him. He is an appointed official, not elected.”
“Well, well,” Ilisidi said, bypassing the entire situation with a wave of her hand, “one understands you will have various matters to deal with up there. The man seems singularly useless. I leave him to you.”
God, did she know? He still couldn’t tell. If she did know—she’d just posed a question. And he had to answer it.
“I shall deal with the matter of Tillington in the next few days, aiji-ma. I think he has become quite inconvenient. I shall begin, as I now intend, by asking the Presidenta to call him home for consultation, which may settle the entire problem with minimal fuss—at least as soon as we can secure a shuttle berth. When I do go up to the station, perhaps the Assassins should indeed send their mission with me and stay in close contact as I work—granted only they will agree to work with me and bring me their questions. Certainly they should develop a close association with Lord Geigi, and respect his good advice.”