“Oh, say on! Do you think the Kadigidi will go on flattering an old fool?”
“Disagreeable woman!”
“So you say throats will be cut in the capital, once the conspirators fall out. Granted, of course, granted, and they will. But whose throats, say. And where are the knives being sharpened? The southerners are the foreigners in these central regions, here at invitation. And which of the central provinces have bedded down closest with these southern fools? And who will do the throat-cutting when complacency takes hold? The Kadigidi will cry ‘Foreigners on our land!’ and be at them in short order. Will they not, Tati-ji? And they will rouse up the central provinces, and they will lead, taking an even firmer grip than they have now, while you have no daughter of your house married into that line, do you, Tati-ji?”
“Damn your nattering! This is breakfast, no time for business! You insult my table!”
“I merely point out—”
“Oh, point out and point out, do! Do you say we are fools who never saw these matters for ourselves!”
“Absolutely not. We have come under your roof, have we not? We had every confidence that the Atageini would not be swayed by Kadigidi blandishments. These are excellent preserves, Tati-ji.”
Tatiseigi took a mouthful of eggs. “Empty flattery, and you mean not a word of it.”
“Everyone can do with a little flattery, so long as it stays close to truth. You were always too wise for your neighbors. And remain so, we believe, or we would not have come here first and foremost.”
“Not first! You sojourned with the Taibeni!”
“Taiben lies between your land and the coast, Tati-ji, and always has. We received assistance, yes. Would you expect otherwise? But we came to you, having received a report—from the Taibeni—that you held out very bravely.”
“Ha! One doubts those are the words.”
“An approximation. In these times, Taiben respects you, and respects your borders. And joins you in disapprobation of your neighbors to the east.”
“The Kadigidi are fools and troublemakers. And bed down with other fools. That whelp of Direiso’s… ”
“Murini.”
“… had the extreme effrontery to write a letter to this house, under his seal, attempting to enlist us.”
Ilisidi pursed her lips, above the rim of her cup. “Did you pitch his man onto the step, Tati-ji?”
“I was very cordial, and temporized.” Another spoonful of sauce. The paidhi ate very quietly, meanwhile, listening to all this extraordinary flow of confidences and not rattling so much as a cup. Cajeiri sat likewise quiet, those keen ears taking in everything, remarkable patience for a boy. Definitely, Bren thought, Cajeiri showed the qualities that created his father.
“So what was the gist of this impertinent letter?” Ilisidi asked.
“They wanted to use the Atageini name, can you imagine? We explained to these fools that since a daughter of this house is their quarry, we would either take command of the search and the campaign or we would tastefully abstain and make our demands clear if they should find her. For some reason they did not immediately cede the search to us, and seemed confused by our rebuke.”
Ilisidi snorted, short, dark laughter. “Wicked man.”
“This generation has no sense. Do you hear, great-grandnephew? ”
“Sir.” Cajeiri was caught with a mouthful of toast.
“Why are they fools?”
A rapid swallow. “Because the Atageini hate them, and they wrote a stupid letter, grand-uncle.”
“Not the answer, boy. They are out of touch with kabiu. Their hearts are dead. They have lost touch with the earth, with the seasons. Like humans. They practice flower-arrangement as if that was the be-all, and conceive that I would help them.”
“Nand’ Bren understands kabiu,” Cajeiri said, seizing on the casual slight, ignoring the central issue. “Much better than any Kadigidi.”
“Does he?” Tatiseigi’s pale gold eyes swung toward Bren, questioning, hostile, and Bren, wishing for invisibility, gave a little nod to the old lord. “Do you, paidhi?”
“Enough to know flower-arrangement is a manifestation of respect for the earth and the numbers of life, nandi, and that the mind and the heart surely improve with a deeper understanding of such issues.” He had no wish at all to debate the old man, or to become the centerpiece of argument, but Cajeiri had taken him for a shield… hell, for a weapon. “As, for instance, your arrangement, the three sprigs, fortunate in number, honor yourself, the dowager, your young kinsman, the evergreen lasting in all seasons.”
“Ha!” Tatiseigi said, caught out in his little grim humor. “He knows by rote. Like my great-grandnephew, who has doubtless read all the books. Where does one learn kabiu up in the ether of the heavens? Where are flowers, where are stones, where is the sun?”
“One sees the stars,” Cajeiri said firmly. “Which behave together, all connected to each other and to us.”
“Ha,” Tatiseigi said again. A wonder if Tatiseigi knew or cared that the earth went around the sun. “Stars, indeed. Can you say your seasons, youngster? Or do you even remember them?”
“We could say the seasons when we were six!” Cajeiri said, leaning forward, and using that autocratic pronoun. “And we have also seen very many stars, nandi, and have a notebook with their numbers and their motions.”
“And the numbers of the earth, young sir, and the numbers even of this room? Can you declare those?”
“The small wildflower in the arrangement, sir, is surely because of my mother, as if she were at the table, since lilies are not in season. But I see nothing here for my father. My great-grandmother, and nand’ Bren, and I are at this table for him, fortunate three, and since Bren has no representation at all, perhaps the addition of a remembrance for him would have upset the favorable numbers of our breakfast—since you are at the table, and you clearly do not count yourself for my father, sir, which would make it four, without amelioration in the bouquet, which you did not add. Am I right, mani-ma?”
The only trace of the child, that last appeal to his great-grandmother, who arched her brows and pursed her lips.
“Precocious boy!” Tatiseigi was annoyed, and would not have taken such a rebuke from an adult.
“One has noted the arrangement,” Ilisidi said, and no, the paidhi could not have read that much of it, except that lilies were out of season, and that in this kabiu household nothing out of season would appear out of a hothouse.
“Damned precocious. Is this disrespect your teaching, or the paidhi’s?”
“I told you I would not neglect the graceful arts, Tati-ji.”
“And courtesy? Where is respect of his elders?”
“I am very respectful, nandi,” Cajeiri said. “And offer regret for the patio.”
The mechieti incident, with the wet cement.
“Precocious, I say!” It was not a compliment. Profile stared at profile across the table, that Atageini jaw set hard—on both sides of the equation.
“Where are my mother and my father, nandi? If you know, we request you say.”
It was the uncle who broke the stare and looked at Ilisidi, whose face was perfectly serene.
“Have we an answer to give the child, nandi?”
“No, we have not an answer. Your grandson offered me none. Likely he failed to tell my niece, either. They kited off into the night without warning or courtesy.”
“Afoot, nandi? In a vehicle?”
“On mechieti, as they came.”
“Ha.” Ilisidi nodded sagely.
Mechieti meant an overland route, off the roads, which made them hard to track by ordinary means.
Aircraft, on the other hand…