“God, it’s good to see you!”
“Good to see you,” Bren said, and Toby hugged him; he hugged Toby. Atevi had to wonder at them, and he didn’t care.
“What are you doinghere?” Bren managed to ask.
“What are youdoing?” Toby asked. “Are we at war or something? We were doing fine but a gunboat escorted us down here.”
“They’re ours. How’s mama?”
“She’s doing fine. We couldn’t bring her. But Jill’s with her. And the kids. We brought Shawn’s family, though.”
Shawn was there, in a puffy insulated jacket, bright blue, the most informal thing he’d ever seen Shawn wear. He let go of Toby and recovered wit enough to hold out his hand.
“Welcome ashore, sir. I take it you had something to do with this.”
“It was getting uncomfortable,” Shawn said, and nodded over his shoulder where Jase and the other ship-paidhi were giving atevi another exhibition, oblivious to all else. “I figured it was easier to talk to the aiji than to George, truth be told. We just assembled down at Bretano and Toby flew up to the coast and got the boat. Got my wife, my kids, a Ms. Johnson who said you sent her—”
“God, Sandra made it.”
“Showed up at my door with two plants in a grocery sack as I was leaving for Bretano. I said come along, we’d explain it. She said she didn’t want to go this far, but it sounded safer here.” Shawn cast a look around the beach. “She’s probably changed her mind.”
Bren looked behind him, where a row of atevi stood, Banichi, and Jago, and Cenedi, expressionless, uniformed, and armed.
He suddenly realized how they must look to Toby and Shawn. And blinked again and saw his dearest friends.
28
The wind came in from the sea, in a summer warm and pleasant. The leaves sighed in a lazy, sleepy sussuration on the face of the wall, where the djossi vine had spread itself wide.
Lord Geigi was bringing the boat. His new, two meters longerboat, gratefully donated by Murini, lord of the Kadigidi. It was a short walk down to the water.
“Quiet day,” Jago said, leaning elbows on the rail. She made hand-signals. The paidhi could just about bet that Banichi was below, watching over the boat dock.
Jago made a furious sign then, and a sign of dismissal, but not in anger, in laughter. Banichi’s unseen comment was, he was sure, salacious.
“The boat’s coming in,” Jago said.
“One thought so,” Bren said, and stood up and looked over the the rail himself.
Toby was joining them—that was the second boat, tied up just down the row. Geigi especially favored Toby: a fine sailor, Geigi called him, a true fisherman. Toby had an invitation in his own right; and he’d brought their mother for a three-day visit coinciding with the paidhiin’s two weeks at Geigi’s estate. Jill, who was pregnant, had flung herself valiantly into the breach, and was, with Shawn’s wife, not only entertaining their mother, but escorting a children’s birthday party (Shawn’s oldest) to the beach, which had Tano and Algini occupied.
“Nadi.” Jase joined him, with Yolanda, coming out of the house. “Are we promised fishing gear? One wants to be sure.”
“There is, nadiin,” Bren said. “I assure you it’s on the boat.”
“I’ll be sure before I board,” Jase said, and the two of them took the steps quite rapidly for spacefarers.
The ship—it was up there. The government of Mospheira was dealing quite politely nowadays, having apologized for the misunderstanding—one knew they would. The aiji had threatened an embargo of more than aluminum if they didn’t come up with a passport for anyone the paidhiin requested—an offer the validity of which Sandra Johnson had tested, returning once for a visit, and a night of live machimi theater in Shejidan, the experience of her office-bound life. Now the State Department wanted Yolanda to come back and lecture to the Foreign Studies program at the University. One was absolutely sure she would not accept the offer, although Shawn said with Eugene Weinberg in as Secretary of State it was a certainty they’d honor her passport.
The telling matter was that the government of Mospheira, no longer able to pretend it had a space program, was dealing for Patinandi to build an expansion plant on the mainland to build a second spacecraft, part of a fleet of five such craft, that being the only way humans were going to get up to the station; and the ship did want them.
Shawn, however, was not going back to Mospheira. Emissaries came to Shawn, who said he’d wait for the next elections to see whether the voters had really acquired some sense. The Progressive Unionists wanted Shawn to run for President of Mospheira in the fall, but he said he’d think about it. Meanwhile Sonja Podesty was a very good candidate for Foreign Secretary if they’d use their heads. He wrote letters to Weinberg suggesting Weinberg run for President for the Unionists and appoint Podesty to the cabinet post.
Mospheira had to revise its notions of the universe, quite as much as Geigi had—and with far more disturbance to their expectations.
A radio show on the far side of the island, on which George Barrulin was a frequent guest, still maintained that atevi were going to pour across the straits and murder them all; but tell that, this summer, to the traders who saw their markets opening up, tell that to the companies which were making across-the-straits deals. The Foreign Office and the State Department were beginning to issue trade permits and companies would cut throats to be in early on the market—even if the aiji would not issue patent protection beyond three years for any product. The aiji wasprotecting certain Mospheiran patents, where it served the interests of atevi or where the paidhiin recommended exceptions. Everything among atevi was both patronage andmerit. It always had been. And Gaylord Hanks wasn’t on the aiji’s list.
Tides ebbed and flowed in that blue water, and the one that had carried Deana Hanks to the heights of influence was ebbing. Her father still had money; and the old money still gathered at the Society meetings and talked about the unfairness of it all, but money meant less when the ideas it bought and backed were on the ebb of their fortunes, gotten down to the tide-pools and creatures that skipped away for deeper, safer water.
The aiji was in Shejidan, the heir of Dur was attending University, grandmother was riding mechieti at Malguri on the lake, and uncle Tatiseigi was in Shejidan politicking with the fragments of the association which had revolved around Direiso and now wanted very much to be seen with Uncle andwith lord Geigi, who was the guest of the season in social circles.
As for the bad neighbors out in space, those who needed to know were warned. They were working on it. Nobody mentioned it. Yet.
Bren picked up the lunch basket that had rested on the terrace and joined Jago on the way down the steps.
They had gotten fairly good at certain things. Practice, Jago called it.
The aiji-dowager had invited the paidhiin and their staff for a season at summer’s end—the aiji-dowager had promised themboating, too, and a bedchamber guaranteed to be as haunted as the lake.
The ghost bell has been heard this summer, Ilisidi had written them, in that careful, delicate hand Jago said was the old school of penmanship. I propose to spend the night in the old watchman’s tower on the island in the lake. If we find no ghosts the view of the stars will still be extraordinary, and if it rains, the fireplace is intact.
I assure you of the safety of the old tower and the caution of our cuisine as well as the security of our boundaries. The shell holes are patched. The banners fly. There’s a nest of wi’itikiin on the roof this summer.
The damned creatures have taken advantage of the repairs and are getting entirely too impertinent.
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