Текст книги "Precursor"

Автор книги: C. J. Cherryh

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Текущая страница: 24 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

“They wish to be bribed?”

“I think they do. I think I understand. They want, individually, to see us, to assess our behavior, our patience, our tolerance of them… in short, they’ve never seen atevi up close, they’re scared, but they’re letting themselves grow familiar. At any given wrong move, they could turn on us and draw weapons, but right now I think they’re edging toward believing we’re not that scary, that they might deal with us. In a certain way I think they’re trying to figure out whether Ramirez is, after all, right about dealing with us, and one must respect their courage and common sense in trying to make that assessment. I’m not sure they’vethought it all out. But I think there’s a real curiosity about the candy… about the planetary resources… and about us. In a certain sense, food is a very basic, very instinctive gift of goodwill. And they’re taking it. They’re approaching us. They’re supporting Ramirez.”

His security looked at him as if he and his entire species had run mad in the streets.

“They test whether they maintain man’chi to Ramirez?” Jago asked, always the cleverest of his staff at seeing through human behavior. “They test feelings?”

“Something very close to that” Bren said. “In this case there’s less intellectual about it than usual. This is far more instinctive… far more simple, in many regards. These people have been left no way to choose their leaders, but they arechoosing, I’m relatively sure of it. And every one of them is taking a chance.”

“Of harm?”

“Of harm to the entire ship. The power structure isn’t instinctive, not wholly; it’s pragmatic. And it’s functioned against their will. I believe a good many of the crew hope Ramirez will survive, but they have no confidence in his state of health; they act as if it’s a doomed cause, but not one they’ve utterly given up. Banichi didn’t say, but I think some of them are sheltering him, and I would not in the least be surprised to learn that Jase and Mercheson and various others related to them by kinship are in on it. Subterfuge and indirection, it well may be mediated by kinship. The captaincyseems to pass down by kinship instead of merit.”

“Who are Ramirez’ kin?” Jago asked, straight to the point. “Is it not Jase? Do I not recall Ramirez has no descendants?”

“Jase. Jase and Yolanda. Ramirez’s wife died long ago. Her network remains attached to him, one gathers. Jase tried to lay out the relationships for me. Until Kaplan and his cousins, I confess I didn’t understand all he might have been saying.”

Jase and his family chart, he began to think, might be more important to them than their map of the station and its workings.

“The crew has no weapons,” Algini said.

“None.” They had been over that with Jase, and as far as he had ever learned, it was the truth. The crew had no access to hand weapons. Those existed, but the officers had the keys, and the resistance to shooting one’s cousins and officers, one could only guess. “But wehave Ramirez, if we can keep him alive. I think there’s good reason not to bring him here. The crew has to believe he still has authority, not our authority: hisauthority. If he dies, any hope they have of a captain of his disposition dies with him. And the fourth captain, the one we’ve not met or dealt with, thatcaptain is our problem.”

“Tamun.”

“Just so. I rather think Ogun might stand with Ramirez if he had the chance. He may be doing so, for all I know. For all I know he’s barricaded in some safe place trying to keep himself alive.”

“Tamun must fall,” Jago said.

“But wemustn’t do it,” he said.

“Are they not pragmatists?”

“Emotional creatures, as well. We should not do it if we can possibly avoid it. The captains are reservoirs of an expertise in operating this ship that we can’t pull out of the archive: it’s the same business as the starship crew not being able to fly the shuttle. We can’t just take over the ship and hope to operate it. And without it, if the aliens are real, we have no defense. We haveto get Ramirez back in power, but at worst, we may have to make peace with Tamun, if only for the sake of what he knows.”

“This would not be an agreeable outcome,” Jago said.

“No,” he said, “it would not be. But we are limited in what we can do, besides try to maintain an alternative, and not frighten the crew. If we run out of candy, we pass out dried fruit and offer them shots of vodka, and promises, and we hope Banichi stays safe. He’s doing the right thing in trying to keep Ramirez alive and away from assassins: I think Jaseis advising him how important that is, and we need to support him. Take inventory of supplies we do have. We need to get decent food to Kroger’s rooms and advise themof the situation.”

“Do we trust her, Bren-ji?”

“Against the likelihood of a conflict in the crew and an unknown rising to authority?” There was one thing Mospheira detested even more than change and that was uncertainty. “There’s all the history of the Pilots’ Guild and the colonists in our favor. In this, I think quite likely they’ll work with us.”

That the shuttle had landed safely was the most welcome news.

There was not one damned letter from any of the committee heads, and while it was remotely possible that Tabini hadn’t written, it was by no means possible that felicitations from the mainland would not pour to Mogari-nai, and onto his staff, who likewise sent no word.

Infuriating. Troubling. Bren found multiple words for the situation.

From his brother there was not a word. None from his mother. Therewas a disturbing situation. If she’d mentioned the shuttle landing, that alone might have caused the captains to censor her letter—which she would hardly understand, when her son failed to write, when Toby was trying to hold his marriage together, and couldn’t take time out to go solve another crisis that was the cause of the difficulty in the first place.

Bren took his computer back to his desk and carefully, patiently, constructed a positive mood… an hour’s worth of construction, which led to a day’s constructive work in another set of missives for Tabini.

His last ones had gotten through. He was relatively sure Tabini had a clear notion that not everything was as well as the first letters indicated.

At the mid point of the night the outer door opened, and shut; and Bren rolled out of bed, looking for the gun.

His door shut. Immediately. He waited in the dark, shivering in the chill, listening with trepidation as the door opened and shut a second time.

The door of his quarters opened; and Jago stood in silhouette against the muted corridor light.

“A message” Jago said. “Nothing of concern, Bren-ji. Banichi says a hunt is going through the tunnels and that we should affect not to hear it.”

“They’re hunting Ramirez.”

“They have begun a door-to-door search, claiming we have secreted some personnel aboard, nadi. Banichi will not be caught by their nets. Go to sleep.”

“On that?” he asked. “Jago-ji, he can’t stay out there forever. If you’re communicating with him, tell him the hell with independence: bring Ramirez here. Let’s raise the wager. Let them take him from us, damn them!”

“I believe he would be willing,” Jago said. “The humans may be reluctant.”

More than likely, he thought, trying in vain to recover any urge toward sleep. More than likely there was considerable resistance in the crew, all the reasons he himself had already thought of, but what they were risking, keeping a wounded man on the run, was everything, everything humanity owned in this end of space.

Come in, he wished Banichi, staring into the dark. Don’t listen to human reasons. Talk sense into Jase. Say no to him and get back here. Get himback before someone gets killed. There’s still a way to patch this.

Wishes did no good.

Sandwiches did, at least improving Kroger’s rations, a strike back in a war of nerves.

The lights went out for fifteen minutes or so in the evening; came on; and went out again an hour later.

A candle in the hallway provided sufficient light for atevi, and the household proceeded with supper.

“I fear they may be aware of our monitoring,” Bren whispered to Tano after supper, in the utter, ghostly stillness of that dark. “Dare one think they might move up on us?”

“Significant monitoring is passive,” Tano said, “and we listen, nadi Bren, we do listen for any such. They make noise in the tunnels now and again, but nothing near us.”

“It makes no difference that we have no idea where Ramirez is. Certain authorities might thinkhe’s taken refuge with us.”

“We watch, nadi Bren. We watch.”

“One knows so,” he said. He wanted Banichi back. Immediately.

But he did no good pacing the floor or making his security nervous. There was always the chance that the lights might not come on again. There was the chance they would freeze in the dark, though he doubted that his security would allow that without a blow struck.

He wantedthe adjacent rooms in their hands.

And then he had the most uncomfortable notion where Banichi might be, and where Ramirez might be, and how the fugitive captain was receiving food, water, and care. He cast Tano an uneasy look, and kept quiet about the idea.

He went back to bed, where it was warmer, and shortly after that all the lights came on and the fans started up.

“One doubts they will willingly freeze the water pipes,” Jago said blithely the next morning. “One believes, nadi, these outages are connected with the search.”

“With listening?”

“Likely,” Jago said. “Likely they hope to hear movement.”

He simply cast a look toward the door, by implication toward that section beyond it.

Jago shrugged, and said not a thing.

He made a gesture for here! Made it emphatically. Bring him here!

Jagogave a negative shrug: not wise, she meant, he was sure of it. His security would not jeopardize him, whatever else, and would not let the search lead here. He recalled what Banichi had indicated, of making noise in distracting directions.

A dangerous set of maneuvers.

Damned dangerous, he said to himself, but he doubted close questions served anyone’s safety: if they were where he thought, they were as good as within their perimeter.

Day, and day, and night and night.

No messages came up from Mogari-nai, not a one. He ordered Cl to send-receive, and had no idea whether his messages went anywhere. He wrote to councillors, to department heads, to his staff, and to his mother, not daring to mention that he hadn’t gotten any messages, not daring to admit he was worried.

“Any word from Jase Graham?” he asked daily, as if there were nothing wrong in the world.

Occasionally he called Kroger, and twice summoned Kaplan for uneventful escorts over and back.

He’d thought he’d found the limits of his nerves and passed them long ago. Shouting and argument he could deal with; silence was its own hell.

But withstanding that was as important. And Jago was happier, at times, even cheerful… interspersed with days of bleak worry, when he was relatively certain something was going on that his security opted not to tell him. There were more outages, and one that lasted until he was sure the pipes were in definite danger.

He sat by candlelight fully clothed and wrapped in a blanket from shoulders to feet, and with his hands tucked under his arms and his feet growing numb no matter the precautions. How general it was or whether Kroger was likewise suffering he had no idea. The silence without the air duct fans was eerie… one grew accustomed to that constant sound. The notion of air that no longer moved gave the place a tomblike feeling.

He wondered if Tabini had done what he urged and opened direct negotiations—such as the University on Mospheira could mediate, using more Bens and Kates—with Hampton Durant on the island. He hoped so. He hoped that by virtue of what he had sent down to the world that men of common sense could form a common purpose and not give the Guild what would damn them all: if it was the xenophobes in charge of the Guild now, minds that truly didn’t want to deal with foreigners of any stamp, and they were determined to alienate the atevi before they took on aliens from far out in space, everything was in jeopardy. He’d made that clear to Tabini, and included a letter for Mospheira, and hoped Tom Lund had corroborated his report.

At times things seemed to be going very slowly to hell with his own position, and in the candlelit dark he asked himself whether he or any of his team might survive this, or whether fools were going to let this go on until the station was damaged, the ship remained unfueled, and the planet had to take its chances with whatever came, helpless to launch more than a shuttle.

He passed despair, achieved numb patience—and guilt for having drawn people he cared for into this mess. He reanalyzed the meeting he had had, when everything had gone too well, too fast, and wondered if he might have precipitated this reversal himself, simply because he was a negotiator and the captains weren’t. Perhaps, he thought, he had pushed the opposition into desperate measures.

It might have happened. It might be that he had driven the opposition to desperation, or encouraged Ramirez to an aggressive posture that proved his downfall… if that was what had happened.

“Mr. Cameron,” the intercom said, breaking its long silence. The lights stayed out.

He stayed seated. The intercom made several tries. He still stayed seated. If they were going to ask him if he had had enough, he wasn’t going to make it convenient for them.

The lights and air came back on within the hour. His security had kept their watch, and reported no movement in their area.

He found himself tempted to order a seizure of the adjacent rooms and main corridor, down to the next security door, in the theory the blackouts might be local, and that he might command an area more difficult for them. But he had no desire to provoke anything until the shuttle was back.

“Mr. Cameron,” the intercom nagged him. He refused to answer.

It went on intermittently for the next day. Narani and the servants ceased to regard the noise. He ceased his daily harassment of Cl, preferring to let the captains worry about the silence from his side.

“Mr. Cameron,” the intercom said finally. “ We know you hear us.”

He somewhat doubted they could guarantee that.

It interrupted his sleep during the night.

An alarm went off, flashing lights from the panel, a loud klaxon that sent them all from their beds.

Jago was in his, and he said, the two of them entangled beneath the sheets, “I honestly hope that’s real and they’re having a bad night.”

“I should go to security,” she said, and eased out of bed. She flung a robe about herself on the way out the door.

He lay and watched the ceiling in the flashing red light. The intercom said,

“Mr. Cameron. The captains are willing to meet with you now.”

That worried him. But he stayed in bed.

The section door opened and shut outside. Thatbrought him out of bed, wrapped in a sheet.

Banichi was back, and for an man who ordinarily suffered not a hair out of place, he looked exhausted.

“Bren-ji,” Banichi said. “One apologizes for the inconveniences.”

“What’s going on?” he asked. “Be carefulout there, nadi-ji, I earnestly request it.”

Banichi found that ruefully amusing. Jago, who had turned out with all but Algini, did not laugh, nor did the rest.

“We have lost contact with the lower level,” Banichi said then, not happy. “A number are cut off. I ask your leave, nandi, to deal with that.”

He felt a chill that was far more than his bare feet on the cold floor. This one went to the gut and advised him what Banichi was asking, political permission for lethal force.

“I don’t know enough to decide, Banichi. Advise me. We have repeated requests from the captains for me to meet with them, since the last outage. I keep refusing.”

Banichi did not seem to account that good news at all. He heaved a heavy sigh. “It is not from weakness,” he said. “They may have taken Ramirez.”

No, not good news. “I hoped he might be here.”

“We tried to convince them he was at another place,” Banichi said. “The rooms next to us are all vacant now. We had moved everyone back, fearing they might attack here, jeopardizing you, nandi, and we never convinced Ramirez to come to this level. For your safety, Bren-ji, permission to act.”

“To protect this place, or yourself, or our people, Banichi. But if Ramirez is lost, we have no choice but deal with the successors.”

“You must not go to their meeting,” Jago said.

“No,” Tano agreed. “You must not.”

“We can’t protect you,” Banichi said. “It would not be wise, Bren-ji. Your security strongly requests you not take such a chance.”

“I’ll talk with them,” he said. “I won’t agree to go there. But I’m worried about Kroger’s safety.”

“We cannot guarantee it,” Banichi said.

“But the station has no reason at all to antagonize her,” Bren said. “That’s in her favor. If she just stays quiet.”

“One fears Mercheson has contacted her,” Banichi admitted.

“Then she is involved.”

“Yolanda Mercheson believed she had credibility with the Mospheirans,” Banichi said, “and one believes there was contact from Ramirez as well.”

Worse news.

“Stay here,” he said. “Narani, attend him. Banichi, at least an hour or two. Rest. Eat. Whatever suits. I’m going to talk to the captains.”

“Agree to nothing that involves going to them, nadi-ji. I most emphatically urge against it. No matter what they urge.”

They had seven more days until the shuttle came back… let alone the fifteen until they could service it and give them another chance to get off this station. He had been known to lie, in the course of diplomacy, when it was absolutely necessary; but in this case… he had decided qualms about a lie to Banichi, and even greater qualms about a diplomatic failure.

“I’ll do what I must,” he said, knowing it was not what Banichi wanted to hear. “And trust my security will rest so they can deal with it. I have to deal with these people. If the threat they foresee materializes, we can’t afford years of standoff. I have to find out what we’re dealing with.”

“Don’t go there,” Banichi said, as forcefully as Banichi had ever said anything, and that stopped him and made him think hard.

“I can’t evidence fear of these people,” Bren said. “And they have a certain obligation to respect a truce.”

“These are not Mospheirans, Bren-ji.”

“No,” he agreed. “Nor would I risk my security; but, Banichi-ji, if we arrange a meeting and they attack, it will not please the crew. The captains have used up all the crew’s patience with the attack on Ramirez. But I believe the crew has a limit, and I believe the captains are worried they may reach it.”

“Bren-ji,” Jago said. “We have the aiji’s orders, as well.”

“You’ll have to follow them, Nadiin-ji, as I must, and mine are to take this station. My way is by negotiation, and the aiji sent me to try that to the limit of my ability. I believe I read this correctly, and I will not lie to you. I intend to go and to confront them in their territory and to demand they honor agreements.”

“If they were atevi,” Banichi said directly, “you would not be right.”

“I may not be right as it stands,” he said, “but if I’m not, I give you leave to remove the captains and their security on the spot.”

“That,” Banichi said, “we find satisfactory.”

Chapter 24

It was not Kaplan who guided them. It was the old man, whose name-badge said Carter; and it was a long, glum-faced progress into the administrative section, into the region of potted plants and better-looking walls.

It was the same chamber, at the end of the hall, and the old man opened the door and let them in.

Ogun was there. So was Sabin, so was Tamun, and a fourth man, a gray-haired man, who was not Ramirez, all seated at the table, with armed security standing behind, and next to the interior door.

Bren stood at the end of the conference table, waved Jago and Banichi to the sides of the room… one each, hair-triggered, and expecting trouble, but not by the stance they took. Banichi adopted an off-guard informality he never would have used in the aiji’s court, a folded-arm posture that verged on disrespect.

Jago became his mirror image.

“Mr. Cameron,” Sabin said reasonably. “We won’t mention your incursions into the station. We understand your security precautions. We advise you we have our own.”

Interesting, Bren thought. Ogun sat silent. Sabin, now second-ranking, spoke, and Tamun still said nothing. The new man sat silent as Ogun. “I’m glad you understand. I see you’ve rearranged your ranks. This is no particular concern of ours.”

“It shouldn’t be,” Sabin said harshly.

“We can salvage agreements,” Ogun said, “if you’ll observe that principle.”

Ogun had difficulty meeting his eyes, and then did, and on no logical grounds he read that body language as a man who took no particular joy in the present situation, a man who might be next.

“Captain Dresh,” the fourth man said. “Taking Ramirez’s place. We will not tolerateany interference in our command of the ship.”

“What you do with the station—” Tamun spoke for the first time. “—is your affair. Yours and the Mospheirans. You don’t interfere with command, you don’t interfere with the ship, her officers, or her operations.”

He cocked his head slightly, cheerful in the face of what was surely an attempt to shake his nerve. He had Banichi and Jago on his side, and the security standing at the captains’ back had no idea, he said to himself. He failed to give a damn for the threats, did hear the proffer of an understanding, and refused to proffer anything in return.

“Mr. Cameron,” Sabin said. “Do you understand?”

“I’ll relay your sentiments.”

“We have messages,” Ogun said, “representing our position. We’ll transmit them when you take the next flight down. They’ll be extensive, and detailed. We include the agreements as we see them, our requirements, our commitments to the aiji and to the President of Mospheira.”

They hadn’t gotten a separate offer. Durant and Shawn had been too canny for that; so had Tabini.

And next shuttle flighthad seemed attractive until theyoffered it, and thought it to their advantage.

“My clerical staff can begin work,” he said.

“You begin work,” Sabin said. “And you take that flight, Mr. Cameron. We’ve done all the negotiating we’re prepared to do.”

“An incentive.” Tamun tossed a signal at the guards behind him, and the man nearest the door opened it, not without Banichi’s and Jago’s attention.

The guards brought out a man in filthy coveralls.

Jase.

Clearly he was meant to react. He did, internally, and thought of options at his disposal to remove Tamun from among the living.

“Take him with you,” Tamun said. “Take him, take Mercheson, and their adherents. They’ve refused to live under the rules of this ship. You repeatedly claim you need their assistance in translation. You have it.”

“Jase,” Bren said calmly. He was rumpled and scraped and had a bloodstain on his sleeve; he might be unsteady on his feet, but he saw a signal to join him. The guards brought Mercheson out, similarly bedraggled; two older women, and a younger… Jase’s mother, Bren thought. He’d seen her in image.

All of them, exiled. All of them, turned over for shipment down on the next flight.

“Chances for dissent are few,” Tamun said, “except at stations. Our last port of call took away no few dissenters, but they had no luck. Let’s hope, Mr. Cameron, that this one fares better.”

“Let’s hope that my mail starts coming through,” Bren said. “Let’s hope that the power stays stable. Let’s hope I take this gift as an expression of your future will to have a working agreement and get our business underway. Where do the Mospheirans fit in this?”

Sore point. He’d thought so.

“You raise that question with Ms. Kroger,” Tamun said. “Next time let them send someone with power to negotiate.”

“Probably myself,” Bren said equably. “I’m a pragmatist, Captain Tamun. I deal where I have to, to my own advantage. I can use Jase; I’m sure I’ll find a use for other help.”

“You stay the hell out of our affairs!”

“You give me direct communication with the aiji and no damn censoring of my messages, Captain. Blocking out my messages won’t make me any more reasonably disposed.”

“Don’t push us.”

“The messages, and stable power to our section. We’ll be taking the adjacent rooms. We needthe space.”

“The shuttle will be on schedule,” Tamun said quietly, as quietly as he had been violent a moment before. “Be on it. Let’s see no more than scientific packages for a while, Mr. Cameron. We’ll honor agreements. This is the authority you’ll be dealing with. Accept it, and go do your job, whatever that is.”

“My mail.”

“Damn your mail, sir! You don’t make demands here!”

“You don’t make them down there. If you want anything transported, I need access to mail I know hasn’t been tampered with. You altered one of the aiji’s messages! That’s a capitalmatter in the aishidi’tat, sir, and you leave me to explain that to my government, which will be damned difficult, sir! If you want anycooperation out of me orthe mainland orthe island, you consider the mail flow sacrosanct! You’re verging on no deal at all.”

“Get out of here!”

There was the explosion point. “Jase. Yolanda. I take it these are your respective parents. Let’s go.”

He turned, gave a glance to Banichi, a signal, and Banichi moved with him, not without a harsh glance toward the captains, and Jago never budged from her position by the door until their whole party was out it, in company of the sullen old man who had guided them there.

Then she swung outside, hand on her sidearm.

“We’ll return to our apartments,” Bren said to their guide, and the old man led off.

There was a conspicuous presence of armed men down the hall as they walked, a presence that retreated down a side corridor when they came and that proved not to be in the side corridor when they passed.

Jase said not a word, seeming to have enough to do simply to keep himself on his feet, but doing it, walking with his hand on his mother’s arm. Yolanda walked with the two others, and Jago brought up the rear, not taking anything for granted.

Not a word, all the way back, and to their own doorway, which opened to receive them.

Narani hurried out to offer Jase his support. Bindanda took Yolanda in charge, with small bows to the relatives.

The door shut, walling out their guide; and Jase slid right through Narani’s grasp floorward, would have hit if Narani had not caught him a second time.

Bren offered his own arm, supported Jase’s head, and he was cognizant, half-out, as his mother attempted to intervene from the other side. “Sorry,” Jase said.

“Sorry, hell,” Bren said. “Narani-ji. Use my bed. Jase, where are you hurt?”

“Ribs. Slid down the damn ladder.”

“Damn. Damn. Don’t pull on him, Rani-ji. Broken ribs. Banichi?”

“Bandaging,” Banichi said, and gathered him up as if he were a child in arms.

“Ms. Graham,” Bren said, laying a hand on her shoulder. “Yolanda. I take it this is your mother and sister.”

“Yes.” Yolanda was righting reaction, vastly upset, but not letting go. “It’s Tamun that’s done this.”

“I’m fairly sure,” Bren said calmly. “Are you hurt?”

“I’ll live,” Yolanda said between her teeth. “My mother, my sister… This is Bren,” she said suddenly, as if there were no knowing.

“Ms. Mercheson. Olanthe, is it?”

“Yes, sir,” the girl said. She was in her early teens, thoroughly shaken, tear-tracks on her face. Eyes darted to the least movement of the atevi near her.

“These are myfamily,” he said to reassure her. “You’re completely safe with us. Come into the dining room, and we’ll get you something to drink. Fruit juice, Bindanda, if you would. This smaller one is a child.”

“One understands,” Bindanda said. “Yolanda-nandi, will you bring these good persons and come? Come. We will find you whatever comfort you ask.”

“I have a report to give!”

“You have them to settle,” Bren said. “Easy. We have time. God knows, we have time. You can talk to Bindanda. They can’t.”

“See to Jase,” she said, distracted, and went to direct Bindanda. Yolanda always tried to take charge. It was her way, but she worked, she tried with all that was in her. She’d refused to give up on the Mospheirans, and she’d helped Jase, that much he knew.

Tano and Algini were inside the security center, monitoring activity with fervent attention, learning what, he was not sure. Nojana had gone to help Banichi.

Jago was distressed and angry, and had nowhere to spend her temper.

“I do not consider this a reverse,” he said. “Only an obstacle. I need the additional rooms, nadi. Get Nojana, and go take them.”

“Yes,” Jago said fiercely, and went on that errand, braid swinging.

“It hurts,” Jase said, lying slightly propped. “I hit every rung for ten feet, and caught a platform edge.”

Bren could only imagine. It gave him chills. “Banichi says the ribs aren’t broken. Cracked, more than likely.”

“I couldn’t tell.”

“They didn’t hit you.”

Jase shook his head slightly. “Not except when I laid into one who had it coming. Releasing us is what they had to do. They could shoot Ramirez. They can’t hold a crew-wide bloodbath. Couldn’t attack my mother. That was their downfall. Women… women are damned near sacred, remember?”

The necessity of child-bearing. Continuance of the species. The Guild had set that priority and the women had fought it; and kept their job rights, Jase said, even if risks set the Guild’s teeth on edge. But you didn’t attack one. You outright didn’t attack one.

“Good job that’s so,” he said.

“Doesn’t help us, with me here, and her here,” Jase said morosely. “Getting rid of us and our next-ofs this way, nobody’s going to challenge them for what they’ve done. Give it three years and people won’t bring it up again. Maybe she could even come back, and she’d only be a nuisance.”

“I understand that,” Bren said, still doubly glad he’d taken the course he had, the lower-key, less confrontational course. It had left them with resources, the women not least. “But three years, the four years, fiveyears that we may spend building their ship… they’ll hear about it. They’ll hear from us. They’ll get damned tired of hearing about it.”