He bowed three times, to the whole staff, all around, who demonstrated great pleasure.
It was a happy gathering. The computers digested the flood of letters that came in to the paidhi, letters to be catalogued and answered, ranging from schoolchildren’s inquiries to matters of state. He had used to do it all by hand. And it had used to come only by post, taking days. Now it was minutes. They had yet to receive the physical mail, which would arrive in sacks and on trolleys, he was quite sure, excavated from post offices that had been physically shut down.
He enjoyed a piece of pizza. Banichi and Jago, on duty, declined to eat in public, but he shared lunch with all the staff, some of them eating with one hand and punching keys with the other. He had already told Madam Saidin that the refreshments in the office would constitute sufficient for the day— please God they had ordered enough food, as fast as it was disappearing. The capacity of some of these computer workers for food and drink was astounding.
Nuggets of information arriving amid the general flow of congratulations, he had received substantial letters, welcome news of escapes and survival among the Manufacturing and Transportation staff, news of associations that had held fast despite Murini’s hunting his people—there had been six of his personal staff brought to trial and one imprisoned. That man was released, recuperated, and on his way by train. Kinships, marriage ties, on-job associations, and all sorts of obligations— and his staff’s understanding of what records were precious. The University had suffered the most, and had been the target of immediate armed raids, but the students had gotten warning, as it turned out, from the paidhi’s staff. Consequently, the students had walked out with their library and the papers. Communication between his staff and the pilots at the spaceports had outright saved the aishidi’tat’s records and research in that areac not to mention lives. These people were heroes— every one.
“Nand’ paidhi.” One staffer came to him earnestly with a printout in hand, and bowed. “The Messengers’ Guild reports that Mogari-nai’s link has just gone up. It expects contact with the station at any moment.”
“Excellent!” he exclaimed, absolutely delighted—it was something he had hoped to hear for days; and now—now that the messages were beginning to flow unchecked, the Messengers’ Guild managed to get the dish up. Something had gotten their attention: he was not so uncharitable as to think they had been waiting for some more atevi request from members of their own Guild. “Excellent, nadi!”
And in that selfsame instant of triumph, he noticed an anomalous sight in the doorway, a smaller than average anomalous sight: Cajeiri had turned up, with his two young bodyguards.
Cajeiri had spotted him, too, no question, but made no effort to come his way.
He went to Cajeiri instead, a matter of precedences. The young rascal bowed, and he bowed. “Welcome, young sir,” he said. He had not invited the boy. It might have been the aroma of pizza, or the gossip of staff which had drawn him, and by his manner, the boy knew he was trespassing, junior lord of the aishidi’tat or not. “One certainly hopes your father knows where you are.”
“Oh, we’re at the library,” Cajeiri said pertly, and in Mosphei’, in a room where rudimentary knowledge of that language was not that rare. “We heard there was pizza. We haven’t had pizza since the ship.”
We in this case embraced only the young rascal, not his staff, who probably had never had the treat. “Well, you and your staff are welcome to share, young sir.” He persisted in Ragi. “Some people here can understand Mosphei’, you may know. And how are you faring? Are you doing well with your parents?”
“One is bored,” Cajeiri said in flawless, adult Ragi. “One is very, very bored, nandi.”
Banichi and Jago had noticed the boy’s presence. The whole room had noticed, by now. The party had greatly diminished in noise and impropriety, and hushed all the way to silence as Bren looked around at the staff.
“This is nand’ Cajeiri, the aiji’s son,” Bren said, fulfilling clear expectations of some sort of ceremony at this arrival. “He has come to felicitate the staff on its survival and is somewhat fond of pizza.”
Faces lit in relief and gentle laughter. There were bows all around, and with the instincts of a consummate politician Cajeiri happily bowed back and beamed. Banichi and Jago stood in close attendance. The Taibeni youths had come in, and stood shyly by, looking entirely uneasy.
“Indeed,” Cajeiri said in his high, childish voice, and in the children’s language. “We are very pleased. Thank you, nadiin.”
This pleased everyone. Smiles broke out, and the staff—the office was already well-stocked with stationery and other supplies—came to beg a ribbon and card for the office, that genteel custom of seals and signatures as mementos of an official contactc “Which we would frame behind glass for the office, nandi.”
“I have no ring,” Cajeiri said sotto voce and still in the children’s language.
“One may just sign and use the office seal,” Bren said. “It will be perfectly adequate for the purpose, young sir.”
“Nandi,” Cajeiri said with a nice little bow, and the staff happily scurried about getting the wax and cards and ribbon— there was even available the black-and-red ribbon of the Ragi atevi as well as the white of the paidhi: the office, dealing as much as it did with protocols, had prepared for all ceremonial eventualities. There was a coil of red wax, there were embossed cards, and Bren, on inspiration, ordered out not just a simple card, but a large sheet of paper vellum for the signatures and seals of everyone who had come in. He signed it himself, and Cajeiri did, as well as signing personal cards. The office had lost most of its framed commemorative cards in the organized vandalism that had hit the former premises, except those that had returned with returning staffers, and now the office had a new start on suitable items to hang, an honor for the place and the moment that cheered everyone.
In the midst of it all, a Messengers’ Guildsman showed up at the door, officially to report Mogari-nai’s dish was indeed functioning and the link was indisputably up. The paidhi could speak to the ship above at his leisure and at this very moment.
“We are very grateful, nadi,” Bren said, and nothing would do, in his staff’s opinion, but immediately to link up a phone, hush the tumultuous party, and indeed, to formally salute the station staff aloft, the entity with whom the office had been in frequent communication, in the name of the paidhi, before the troubles came on them. There was quick consultation on felicitous wording of the formal statement.
The Guildsman, personally put on the spot, saw to the link, and set everything on speaker, so that the whole hushed room could hear the staff at Mogari-nai, out on the coast, actually complete the link to the space station.
“This is Alpha Station,” the human voice came back. “Is this Mogari-nai?”
The office director leaned close to the mike, and said, in passable Mosphei’. “This is the office of the paidhi-aiji in Shejidan, rejoicing to resume communications with the office of the station-aijiin.
Stand by, Alpha Station, for the paidhi.”
Cheers broke out, as the acknowledgment came back, and fell away to an excited hush, as Bren moved close to the mike.
“This is Bren Cameron,” Bren said, leaning near. “Alpha, hello.”
“Bren,” another voice said delightedly.
A smile broke out on Bren’s face when he heard that: he couldn’t help it.
“How are you?” that voice asked him.
“Jase.” He lapsed unthinkingly into ship-manners, then bounced back to Ragi, which Jase understood. “One hardly expected one of the ship-aijiin to be standing by, nandi.”