He had not suggested the young rascal visit him. He had challenged the boy to summon him through his father’s front door—which was exactly the situation: thorny, difficult, and not the paidhi’s to mend. Cajeiri might just have figured it out.
Oh, doubtless there would be storms once Cajeiri reached the privacy of his father’s apartment. Bren felt, rather than saw, Banichi’s close presence, and Jago’s, supporting him.
But there was more than one crisis going on. He tried to regroup, knew he urgently needed to do something about the situation he had just put Toby in, being an utter fool—since hostile clans knew the shipping lanes just as well as the rest of them. In the subsurface of his mind, he wished he had dealt otherwise with the young heir, maybe drawing the boy out into the hall to have that last exchange with him. It had been, God help him, public. In front of the whole staff. Yes, he had tried to get Cajeiri to deal in private, and yes, Cajeiri had kept after him—but was he, like Cajeiri, eight-years-old? He had been psychologically pressed, dealing with someone at eye level, but it was an eight year old boy, for God’s sake. What else was Cajeiri going to do but throw all his ammunition? And now he had gotten rattled enough to breach security, risking his own brother’s life. And he had put his staff in a position, besidesc Besides this deliberately provocative turn in the boy, who was no saint, nor had been on the ship. But there Cajeiri had kept to pranks, not such deliberate misdeed. He was no longer in any authority over the boy, and the boy was acting out with a vengeance. It was not a pretty character trait the whole office had just seen, and it was not private: it had public implications, in the fitness of the aiji’s heir and the dowager’s teaching, and he himself had not come off with any credit in the business.
“We have to reach Toby,” he said under his breath to Banichi and Jago, looking all the while at his office staff, who still stood thunderstruck, caught between pretending they hadn’t heard and the respect they tried to pay to his distress and embarrassment.
“Nadiin-ji,” he said then, and gave a sober little bow. What did he ask them? For discretion on a private matter? His own staff were devoted to him, and it would insult their man’chi to imply they would talk. Did he plead that he had lost his focus and that the boy was having a tantrum? Both were evident enough. “Thank you very much. The message contained excellent personal news. My brother is found safe, and his location must be kept secret. One has every confidence in this company.”
There were bows. One could have heard the proverbial pin drop.
Acknowledge that the heir had been a brat?
There were some things atevi did not mention. Children were one of those topics, a private matter, intensely so.
“Please,” he said, with a broad gesture, “this is a celebration, and with every reason to celebrate. Continue, please, nadiin-ji. And thank you.”
The room collectively drew a breath. People moved from where they had rooted themselves, and refilled cups and opened pizza boxes.
He refilled his own cup, trying to seem casual, wishing it were stronger, and turned from the watchers to Banichi and Jago.
“I should have applied the brake on the young gentleman at the very first,” he said under his breath. “One entirely misread him, nadiin-ji.”
“He realized he was in the wrong,” Jago said.
“The witnesses have children of their own,” Banichi said. “Even his father has had to restrain that one in public. And we have just contacted Tano, nandi. We will find nand’ Toby. We are moving on the matter.”
That was a vast comfort on that front. On the other— “What we lack is the dowager’s stick,” he said shakily, and drew grins from both of them, which afforded the large room encouragement to more noise. The air in the room lightened perceptibly.
“He goes about the halls with only the Taibeni,” Banichi said under his breath. “Which is not good, nandi. One has no idea how he has shaken his guards.”
“They told me they were at the library,” Bren said. “He has abused a parental permission, one suspects.”
“He has deceived his father’s staff,” Jago said. “This is not a small matter, Bren-ji. His security needs to know exactly what he has done, and report it to the aiji.”
“Indeed,” he said, and was not surprised when Banichi named himself to go, and likewise to consult with Tano on the other matter. “Do, nadi-ji,” he said, and Banichi left on that dual mission.
“We no longer live on the ship, nandi,” Jago said.
“No, we do not,” he said, aware they were still under furtive observation by the staffc and being aware, he turned from Jago and picked his individual, his advisor in correspondence protocols, an old man many times a grandfather. Idly wandering over into converse with the old man, he remarked, “The heir misses his great-grandmother, misses my staff. Hearing of a party, the boy hoped, one believes, for a few guests here his own age.”
He did not mention that the heir of the aishidi’tat had formed strong associational bonds to a human, never mind he had quite publicly and vehemently attempted to contact a human aboard the ship, disregarding all protocols with a ship-aiji in the process. And never mind he had never heard of an adult party with children in attendance. It was a foolish excuse he had uttered. His mind still racketed back and forth between the mainland and the ship aloft.
Here and there. Now and then.
So, unfortunately, must Cajeiri’s. The boy was eight. How was he to know what the world’s customs were, regarding parties?
“One entirely understands, nand’ paidhi,” the old man said in low tones. “A nameless year, a difficult age. And the boy has been right in the thick of the trouble. He doubtless has assumed a certain maturity of expectations.”
That was certainly one way to put it.
“He accompanied us,” he agreed, “through gunfire, explosions, shellingc all directed near him. At a certain point, we had to restrain him from rushing to our rescue.”
The old man laughed gently, perhaps taking it all for exaggeration. It was not.
“A bright and excellent young man,” the old man agreed. “The aishidi’tat will be well led, in his day.”
He had several virtues, did the protocol officer. He was dignified, he expressed himself well, and he was very willing to spread his tidbit of information at least among staff. As diplomacy went, it was a little like painting, starting with the black and the white of a situation, adding a little color here and there, until the disastrous image revised itself.
He only wished his gaffe with Toby’s situation could be so readily patched. He imagined hostile Assasssins moving at high speed, seeking to reach those waters.
On the sea, however, he would wager on Toby’s side: Toby handled that boat with great expertise, and would let no one near him that looked in the least suspicious.
“Banichi has overtaken them, and has them under personal escort, nandi,” Jago said, meaning the boys. “He will speak to Casimi and Seimaji.”
Those were the boy’s proper, adult, and Guild security—the ones the young rascal had escaped. The discomfiture of Guild members was profound, even life-threatening. The Assassins’ Guild did not accept excuses.
“I shall owe my own explanation to the aiji,” Bren replied, not looking forward to that, either.
Jago looked no happier in that prospect than he was. But, he said to himself, thank God Toby was accounted for—damn him. Toby couldn’t let it go, couldn’t just go back to port—he’d probably already had his understanding with Shawn Tyers, no less, the President of Mospheira, that day that he’d showed up at the hotel, and he hadn’t gone back to the island after landing his errant brother and his party on the coast, no, he’d simply sailed south to waters he knew would be close to information, trusting no one with his position, and hanging about the coast, ready even to intervene, it might be, if things had gone badly in their return to the continent—relaying news reports while he sat there, and ready for a pickup.