“Oh, yes,” Banichi said. “Carefully. Constantly. Although it hasn’t been ourdirect concern.”
“But it is at risk.” He had cold chills even thinking of a flaw—deliberately induced. “Nadiin-ji, we have so very much at risk in that project. I don’t know—I don’t know if I can explain enough to the Guild how small a problem can be fatal. I’m the translator. And some things I know by being from the island and having the history humans have—but it’s so important. It’s soimportant, nadiin-ji, and I haven’t succeeded in making enough people understand. All the lives of all the paidhiin before me come down to two things: the peace, and this project. This is what we were always aiming at, in everything we did, in all the advice we gave to atevi—the peace, and this project, was all to give us all the capacity that we lost in the War and in the failure of the station up there. And one act of sabotage, one well-concealed piece of bad work—and the ship we build is gone, lost, perhaps not to be built again. The humans aloft—they can’t build your future, nadiin-ji. They won’t. Atevi could lose everything.”
There was something a little less relaxed in Banichi’s pose. In Jago’s.
“At least,” Banichi said, “one perceives distress. Why, nand’ paidhi? Why are you concerned? Is it a specific threat? Is it a general one?”
“Because if this spaceship fails, Banichi, I can’t call that chance back again. There’s so much at stake. Your governance over your own future is at risk. This is why I stayed and why I wouldn’t go back to Mospheira when my government wished me recalled. I won’t go even for my family’s sake.” He realized he’d reprised at least the feeling of his speech to the workers—that fear was working at the back of his brain, and it had been there since before he’d heard of the assassination of lord Saigimi. Perhaps—perhaps it had been there since he’d seen the ship lying in pieces at his feet, and seen all that devoted effort in those upturned faces.
There was so much good will, and so much desire in so many people; and it was so vulnerable to the vicissitudes of fortune—and a few ill-wishers.
Baji-naji. Chance and Fortune, the interlocked design in the carpetoutside the dining room, the demon and the force that overwhelmed the best of numbers and improved the worst.
“Have you some specific reason to fear?” Jago asked: Jago, who would fling her body between any of her charges and harm; but who was trained to do things far more lethally useful for those within her man’chi.
“Just—nadiin-ji, a single act of sabotage, undetected, might set the program so far behind Mospheira we’d never catch up. And I saw so many plants where people from the towns came in without security checks, where lords’ families had access. And shouldn’t. Not that I want to be rude to these honest people—things are going so well. I think it makes me irrationally fearful.”
“Not irrationally.” Banichi let go an easier breath. “We areaware of the hazards—trust me in this. This is an immensely complex project, with many exposures. But without being specific, let me reassure the paidhi, we are not off our guard.”
Banichi would notsay Guild. This was, again, the man who hadn’t known the sun was a star—nor cared. But what he did care about, he knew about in greater detail and with more forethought than most men could keep up with.
“And,” Jago said with a quirk of the mouth, “lord Geigi has the number-counters contained. Or occupied.”
“One hopes.”
The decanter was on the small table near Banichi. Banichi reached over and poured a finger more; and one for Jago, who leaned forward to present her glass. “Nadi?” Banichi said, offering to him next.
He considered. He’d had one with Jase. But if Banichi was offering information, and it came on such skids, he’d have another: he let Banichi add a bit.
“Did I do foolishly to take lord Geigi’s hospitality?” he asked them.
“Evidently not.”
“I didn’t ask was I lucky? I asked—”
Banichi grinned. “Far more wary, these days, our Bren.”
“Lord Geigi’s philosophical persuasion is one of the most rigorous,” Jago said. “Most, understand, follow less rigorous systems, saying that there is no assurance that anyone has yet come up with right answers. But here are Geigi and his Determinist numerologists actually matching up answers with the universe ashuman numbers also perceive it, and the Rational Absolutists are prowling around this new set of ideas trying to find a problem it doesn’t solve. This folded space business has acquired great credibility, Bren-ji. The numerologists are still gnawing the bone of the faster-than-light idea Deana-ji threw them—” That Deana-jiwas certainly barbed. “But no one dares challenge folded space until they’ve posed certain classic problems—which keeps the ’counters and the Absolutists both out of mischief, at least until they’ve worked out their numbers. A challenge to folded space will be hard, by what I hear.”
“I leave such deep questions to my partner,” Banichi said, and took a sip of shibei. “Geigi’s good will is secure. That secures the numbers of the northern reach of the peninsula, which are the numbers that concern me, pragmatically. Geigi’s penchant for honesty—that and his penchant for inviting guests inside his security—that worries me. Tano says you bade Geigi take precautions.”
“It seemed prudent to say. Possibly excessive.”
Banichi gave a short laugh. “He’ll naturally believe you have special inside information from your security, and he’ll listen to you far more than to any advice his security gives him. I’ve no doubt he will lose sleep over it. A good stroke, nand’ paidhi!”
“What willhappen in the peninsula? Who do you think will take over the Marid?”
“Oh, difficult question. Very difficult, Saigimi’s daughter, Cosadi, being a passionate follower of Direiso and all that lot—and a fool.”
“On the other hand,” Jago said, “Saigimi’s younger brother, Ajresi, who is not resident in the house, and who absolutely can’t tolerateSaigimi’s Samiusi-clan wife, is much more forward to defend himself than he is to involve the house in adventurous actions. As a leader of his house he’s both more and less dangerous. He let Saigimi take the risks. But for want of aggression, to allow himself to be pushed aside in the succession by a willful niece who might take the house even further down the path Saigimi took—I think not, myself.”
“Wise conclusion,” Banichi said. “ Thathouse will have internal difficulties. The wife, too, Tiburi, may take refuge with Direiso; Tiburi is, by the way, related to lord Geigi. That was the plan in driving Geigi into poverty, to slip her into that inheritance.”
“Was thatit?”
“Oh, yes. So thanks to her try at dispossessing Geigi, wife Tiburi of the Samiusi is not only no longer welcome with Hagrani clan—she’s no longer welcome with her distant cousin Geigi. Nor will her daughter Cosadi be welcome any longer with Saigimi’s brother Ajresi, especiallysince Geigi’s fortunes are more and more linked to Tabini’s, and the direction of Cosadi’s man’chi becomes more and more unpredictable. She may claim the Hagrani estate with at least equal right, and certain of Saigimi’s household more loyal to the wife might try to prevent the lordship drifting to the brother’s line, in fear he will toss them out the door. Some say Cosadi has assassins belonging to the Hagrani clan poised to take out Saigimi’s brother and make her the Hagrani lord. Certainly Ajresi also has Guild poised to remove her.”