An impromptu move against the paidhi?
Oh, far from a single move. It was a movement he had stumbled into. The Farai might be bitterly regretting now that they had taken the paidhi’s apartment—that a chain of events had moved the paidhi to the otherold Maladesi estate, the one the Farai hadn’t dared claim.
He had come out here, the Marid had made a fast move to be sure Baiji didn’t pay a visit to Najida, Toby’s daughter broke her leg—three bored kids had decided to take to the water in a sailboat. And when he’d come over to do the socially correct thing, a handful of local trouble trying to contain Baiji had decided they had a chance at taking out the paidhi-aiji.
Maybe they’d been misinformed as to the identity of the youngsters, or just—as the dowager seemed to think—counted the aiji’s son inconsequential, if they could take out the aiji’s advisor.
He thought about that. And his heart rate got up. He was, he decided, mad. Damned mad about that.
Count on it—if low-level agents had blown their secrecy, the Marid was probably moving assets from wherever it had situated them, maybe inDalaigi, maybe in Separti—because an operation intending to spread Marid influence onto the coast wasn’t going to rely on a handful of agents holding Baiji silent. There was more out there. There could be a lot more out there.
God, he hoped Tabini had read between the lines. Ilisidi had made the call; protocol had dissuaded him from following up with a call of his own, and now, on a bus headed into the thick of it, he had second thoughts. Not about getting the kids out— that was increasingly imperative. But about what they were dealing with.
They needed help out here. They might need a lot of help, very soon, and if they didn’t move quietly, they could see events blow up in a major way—a little action spiraling out of control, into major armament, movement of forces—
It could get very, very nasty. He needed to talk plainly to Ilisidi—who wasn’t talking, at the moment. Nobody was, among her group. All he could do was put Tano and Algini into the current of his thinking, and trust if there was information flowing down Guild channels, they could be sure at least that Cenedi was thinking about it.
Dark was coming fast. It was just light enough for the whitewashed wall to glow a little in the twilight. For the windows of the house to show light.
And Cajeiri’s legs were asleep, a fierce kink getting worse in his back. Jegari and Antaro did not complain, but one was sure they were in more discomfort, being larger.
There was still no sign of nand’ Bren or Banichi or a rescue. That was getting scary.
Pain.
Excuse me, he signed, and had to wriggle about to his knees on the concrete floor, just for relief.
“Are we going to go, nandi?” Antaro signed back. And that was getting to be another trouble. They signed, to stay quiet. But it would reach a point soon when that would hardly work.
“If we go over the wall,” Jegari whispered, right against his ear, “we are bound to make some noise. Those are Guild, nandi, they are real Guild! We cannot take a chance.”
Noise.
Noise.
He had had an idea which had been simmering a long while, considering present resources, and with the lights in the house more or less indicating where people actually were—except the man on the roof, who must be getting very tired up there, and probably boredc
There was printing on the side of the fertilizer canister.
It said: fertilizer stakes.
It was just worth curiosity. He wriggled around where he could get into the canister, pried up the lid, and found curious hard sticks of smelly stuff. He tried breaking it.
It broke. It broke into nice pieces. It belonged in a garden, did it not?
So if they missed a few shots and somebody looked down, that somebody would only see fertilizer bits. Right? He thought he might just lob a few pellets into the trees. Hitting the windowsc that would bring another search of the garden, and maybe their patio, which he did not at all wantc but if he could get enough range, if he could get a clear shotc And nobody would see anything but fertilizer for the plants.
There was that gap in that very white garden wall. There was that black gap, which was the potentially noisy metal gate.
That was a fair-sized target. He could risk it. And that would get a lot of attention, and maybe show them how many enemies were out there.
He had Jegari’s and Antaro’s curiosity. He stuffed the pieces in his pocket, kept one, handed them a stake apiece to break up, and took the slingshota out of the other.
Thenthey understood him.
“Nandi,” Jegari whispered, not against his ear, but very, very softly. “Please be careful.”
“Pardon,” he said, took his piece of a stick and the slingshota, and worked his way out, very low, behind the little stucco wall beside the downward steps, putting his head up very, very slowly. His dark face and hair were going to show against the white stucco, no question, if he got up above the level of the wall. But from the far angle the steps offered, he had a good view of the iron gate.
He put his missile in the slingshota, having the other two ready. He had just one perfect alley, right between two trees that would block the shot.
He let fly.
Damn. Hit the branches. Rustled them. He didn’t stop to see whether the man on the roof had noticed. He fished more pieces out of his pocket, laid them down in front of him and fired the first. Muted clang, where it hit the gate. Third. Clang.
He ducked down immediately. Then scrambled back on the miniature landing, behind the little wall.
“The man has gone from the roof,” Jegari hissed.
The best outcome. He had planned to peg whoever came to investigate the noise. But that was the best.
“Now, now, now,” Cajeiri hissed, giving a shove of his knee to Jegari. “Over! We are going!”
They had prearranged, that when they did go, Jegari would go first, to test the distance, then Antaro, then himself, with them to help break his fall. He saw Jegari go over the wall, saw that Antaro had picked up the rusty garden claw. She was supposed to be counting: thirty-two the sweep of the sensor to the left, thirty-two to the right. But she solved it. She jammed the garden claw into the track. Hard. And slithered out along the walkway and went over the wall.
The man had reappeared. He came out onto the tiles. He was looking their way just as Antaro went over the edge.
Cajeiri snatched up the last missile and shot it straight across the gap. Hit. The man fell back, hit the tiles, tiles came loose, and slid, and Cajeiri did not watch a heartbeat longer: he stuffed the slingshota into his shirt, then he flung himself astride the battlement and spotted Antaro and Jegari with upheld hands below.
He got half a handhold and slid around and off: the handhold failed on the rounded surface. He scraped his cheek on the rough stucco, raked coat buttons on the way down. His companions’ hands broke his fall, snatched him around, and all of a sudden they were running for the woods, exactly what they had agreed not to do. They were supposed to run along the wall, sheltered from the sensor-units.
But Antaro had jammed this one. There was a hole in the net. And they were going straight through it, into the trees, Jegari and Antaro half-carrying him in their breakneck haste to get to deeper cover.
They had made a lot of noise when he hit the man on the roof—tiles sliding, what sounded like a lot of tiles sliding and hitting the ground, and whether the man had gotten clear— whether he was in shape to report them—he had no guarantee they had not been spotted. He had not planned to shoot anyone; Antaro had been supposed to count the sweep. They were supposed to have followed the wall back away from the road to stay out of the sensors and then get into the woods, and now the plan had unraveled, and they were just running as fast and as far as they could, dodging among the trees, avoiding branches, no matter the noise they made.