Текст книги "Inheritor"

Автор книги: C. J. Cherryh

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Текущая страница: 22 (всего у книги 27 страниц)

One of the things that humans had done most amiss in the days before the War was to make what they thought were friendships across lines of association that could not otherwise be associated: they’d ripped atevi society to shreds and killed people and ruined lives, never realizing what they’d done.

“Damn,” he said, with a very sick feeling; but with a little inaccuracy in the dark, Jago touched his hand.

“This is not necessarily bad, Bren-ji.”

“It was damned foolish on my part.”

“Ah, but not necessarily bad. Once youwished her to come to Dalaigi, which Tabini’s actions against Saigimi had made unwise—she was free to suggest Taiben. Which Tabini expected. But she wished you to go to Saduri, and now we know why: Deana Hanks is coming to the mainland and the aiji-dowager already knew it.”

“To the mainland!”

“We don’t know how. Boat or small plane. It could be anywhere on the coast.”

“ Why, nadi-ji?”

“One would ask the paidhi thatquestion. But this information is since last night, Bren-ji. Tabini didn’t know, and Ilisidi may yet know more than we do.”

“To ally with Direiso. A second establishment—to challenge Tabini’s government. That’s what Deana’s up to. God! But where’s Ilisidi in this?”

“With the aiji. We hope.”

He had recently realized there were new players in the game. Dangerous ones. He recalled the controversy with the pilots forming a Guild. The opposition of the Messengers. “And the Messengers’ Guild? The Guilds in general?”

“The Guilds in general stand with the aiji. We expressed that fact in the Marid, when we carried out our commission. Meanwhile Hanks is coming to the mainland for reasons we don’t know; but we do know that Direiso has not yet explained to her that she has much less support than previously. NowHanks is an asset which Direiso musthave to demonstrate to her wavering followers that she has the resources to deal with Mospheira; and we think that is exactly what she intends. Mospheira seems weak, lacking in resources—its ship will not fly in advance of ours. And could Direiso secure her own position by dealing with Mospheira, she would do so. That she dislikes humans would only make it sweeter to her.”

“That Hanks’ faction dislikes atevi wouldn’t stop them, either. She’s coming here to make a deal for resources Mospheira can’t get without those rail lines and the northern shipping ports. Where Direiso is strong right now.”

“It would accord well with our suspicions.”

“ Durwouldn’t support this—would it?”

“The boy? Completely innocent. And aware of far more than young ears should hear. His father wished to keep the island out of difficulty, I suspect. Or told the boy that wiser heads would settle it. Dur is not reckless. It’s an island that used to live by smuggling and now wants tourism. They’re far too small to matter in most accounts. But the boy—is a boy. He stole the plane, and with a map six years out of date, he flew out of Dur at night and followed the railroads to Shejidan, which brought him over the rail terminal. And right across your approach route.”

Rain suddenly hit, rattling hard on the canvas.

On the edge of that downpour a shadow appeared in the doorway. Bren’s heart jumped.

“Nadiin.” Banichi squeezed into the dark, dripping wet. “Have you explained everything, Jago-ji? Made clear the universe?”

“Almost,” Jago said. “And given him the gun. Which you will use, Bren-ji, at your discretion.”

“I hope not to need it.”

“Traceable only to me,” Banichi said. “But such details matter very little in the scope of this situation.”

“How did she get me to ask her to come here?” He still struggled with that thought. “Am I so transparent?”

“Immaterial that you asked her. One believes the aiji would have packed you up and sent you, all the same,” Jago said. “She didn’t needyou to ask her. She came back to Shejidan to get you. The party was the excuse. She was feeling out Tabini, feeling out your position—and observing Jase.”

He had a sinking feeling. “Tatiseigi. Where is hein this?”

“Ah,” Banichi said. “Uncle Tatiseigi. Bets are being laid. Very high ones.”

Thinking what he’d been meddling with, in that crazed business with the blown lightbulb, he felt cold all the way to the pit of his stomach.

“You still don’t know where he is in this.”

“Bren-ji,” Jago said quietly, “Saigimi didn’t know where hewas. Even we make mistakes of man’chi. It is not always logical.”

“And he can’t find the television set,” Banichi said somberly. “One hopes.”

He laughed. He had to laugh.

“I shall sleep with Jase,” Banichi said. “Just—be prudent, nadiin. Keep the noise low.”

“Banichi,” he began to say. But it was too late. Banichi was out the door into the rain, headed for his tent, hisroommate, and leaving him nowhere else to be for the night.

He was in the dark. In utter silence. And there might be more briefing for Jago to do. “So what else is there to ask?” he inquired of her.

“I’ve said all I can, Bren-ji.”

A silence ensued.

“We should rest,” Jago said.

“Jago,” he began, and had to clear his throat.

“One is not obliged, nadi-ji. Banichi has a vile sense of humor.”

“Jago—” He reached for her hand in the dark, found what he thought was her knee, instead, and knew how he’d possibly rejected her and embarrassed her, last night, after what seemed a set-up. He didn’t know, that was the eternal difficulty, even what signals he sent now, and he thought about her, he thought about her in his unguarded moments in ways that made this touch in the dark the most desirable and the most reprehensible thing he could do.

Her hand found his with far more accuracy, and rested atop his, warm and strong and its gentle movement occupying all the circuits he was trying to use to frame an objection of common sense.

“Jago,” he began again, and Jago’s hand slid across to hisknee. “I’m really not sure this is a good idea.”

And stopped.

To his vast distress. And disappointment. But he was able then to find her hand and hold it. “Jago,” he said for the third time. “Jago-ji. I am concerned—” Her fingers curled about his thumb, completely throwing his logic off course. “Propriety,” he managed to say. “Banichi. The dowager. I want you, but—”

“She is outside your man’chi. Not far. But outside. And it’s safer, tonight, if you’re here and Banichi is with Jase, if anything untoward should happen.”

“What might happen?”

“Anything. Anything might happen. Whatever pleases you. I would be inclined to please both of us.”

He could feel the warmth from her. The lightning showed him her shadow, close to him. “Then should we—” he began, in the glimmer of a self-protective thought.

“We should be careful of the guns,” she said with what he was sure was humor, and her fingers searched the front of his jacket.

He felt a rush of warmth, shifted position and took hold of her to defend himself from her exploration in search of the firearm. “Is this a good idea?” he asked, reason sinking fast. “Jago-ji, if you do that, we may both scandalize the company.”

“Not this company,” she said, and somehow they were past each other’s defenses and he was no longer thinking with complete clarity of purpose, just exploring a territory he’d not seen and didn’t see, alone and not alone for the first time in his life. She was doing the same with him, finding sensitive spots, and presenting others he might have missed. Clothes went, on the somewhat bouncy and thin mattress—“We have to look presentable,” was Jago’s prudent warning, and with clothing laid carefully to the side, caution went. He moved his hand along smooth expanses in the darkness, to curves that began to make sense to his hands, as her hands were traveling lightly over him, searching for reactions, finding them.

God! Finding them. He brought his hands up in the shock of common sense that said danger, harm, pain—and at that moment Jago’s mouth found his and began a kiss both explorative and incredibly sensual.

He had never known atevi did that. She tastedforeign; that was odd; but matters now reached a point of no-thought and no-sense. They were in the dark, neither knowing in the least what hurt and what didn’t, but efforts to consummate what was underway began to be a rapid and frustrating comedy of errors that at first frustrated and embarrassed him and finally started her laughing.

Her good humor made him less desperate. “We have to practice this in daylight,” he muttered. “This is exhausting.”

It won a finger poke in the ribs, which she’d discovered got a protective reaction. He curled up—and at a thunder boom, jumped against her and held on. They were, he thought, both out of their minds, in a tent, halfway to the lightning-laced heavens, under a metal frame, and in earshot of Ilisidi’s men. Then—then, maybe it was the plain admission he was being a fool, or maybe it was Jago’s changing position—a sudden and by no means coordinated reaction sent him toward release. She shivered oddly and didn’t complain; and his eyes shut and the dark went darker and red and black.

For a moment or two then he just drifted in space, half aware of the warm body wrapped around his, tasting the strange taste that was Jago, and feeling, well, that he’d managed enough. She seemed to have found something enjoyable out of it, and he was appalled at the thought she’d tell Banichi and make a funny story of their night.

Which it was, dammit. She was right to laugh. Thank God she could laugh. It made it all less serious, what he’d gotten into, and he tried to set it in perspective as they lay together with the lightning turning the walls transparent. She was curious; he’d answered her question. She’d surprised the hell out of him about the kiss—he felt warm even thinking about it—and he wondered whether she’d done a little research of her own or whether atevi just did that.

And she hadn’t given up on the night. Bad trouble, he said to himself, as Jago’s fingers wound curls in his hair, as she fitted her body against his just for comfort and seemed satisfied. In that moment his human feelings slid right over the edge of a cliff more dangerous than the one outside. She brought him no recriminations, found no fault—maybe had an agenda—but this was the woman he’d trust for anything, and whose good will he wouldn’t risk for anything.

Evidently, by those fingers making curls out of his hair, he still had her good regard. He’d risked everything and hadn’t lost, and there might be other nights, when he’d thought he’d reached a safe numbness to his personal affairs. Oh, God, it was dangerous.

“Was it pleasant?” she asked him.

He drew a breath. “I enjoyed it.”

“It was not very responsible of us. But Banichi knew we would do it.”

“ Didhe?” he asked, but he was sure of that, too.

“Of course. But we should get dressed, in case. There was no danger early on. But toward morning we should be a little on our guard, in case we must move.”

“Direiso?”

“Possibly.”

“What’s going on? Whereare we going and what are we up to?”

“Cenedi and the dowager know that for certain. But Mogari-nai, most likely. Which Direiso-daja will not like.” She unwound herself upward and tugged on his hand.

Will not like? he asked himself. Getting to his feet, he agreed with. But she ducked out of the tent stark naked into driving rain and pulled him out with her. It was cold rain. They were standing in water. Lightning was still going on, the wind was still fierce and Jago, her black skin glistening in the lightning, sluiced over by the rain, and her braid streaming water, acted as if she were in the safe, warm showers at home.

He followed her example, unwilling to think himself more delicate than she was. He scrubbed and rubbed and was oh so glad she ducked back inside in a hurry. She flung his insulated sleeping bag at him for a towel, and they both cleaned up and dressed and snuggled down with one of the open bags beneath them and one zipped out flat above them, both shivering and holding on to each other.

“Better than a roof in the peninsula,” she said, and hugged him close. “Get some sleep.”

He tried. He didn’t think he could, after the shock of cold water; but the shivering stopped, her warmth was comfortable, her embrace was trustable as anything on earth, and he found himself drifting.

Not love, he said to himself. And then thought, with one of those flashes of insight his professional mind sometimes had, maybe they’d had such rotten luck with the love and man’chi aspect of relations because that word in Mosphei’ blurred so many things together it just wasn’t safe to deal with.

They were lovers. But Ragi said they were sexual partners.

They were lovers. But Ragi said they were associated.

They were lovers. But Ragi said they were within the same lord’s man’chi.

They’d made love. But Ragi said there were one-candle nights and two-candle nights and there were relationships that didn’t count the candles at all.

They’d made love. But a Ragi proverb said one candle didn’t promise breakfast.

He and Jago would be lucky to have a breakfast undisturbed by the trouble that might come tomorrow, but he’d know his back was protected, come what might, by her andBanichi. So if their languages didn’t say quite the same thing and their bodies didn’t quite match and the niches they made that said this person satisfies enough requirements to make me happywere just a little different-shaped in their psyches, the center of that design might match, leaving just the edges hanging off.

But didn’t his relationship with Barb have unmatched edges? Didn’t every close relationship?

He was quite out of his depth in trying to reckon that. But with Jago he certainly wouldn’t count the candles. Whatever they could arrange, as long as it could last from both sides, that was what he’d take.

He was happy, right now, where he was. He didn’t swear it would bear the light of the sun. He didn’t let himself hope—the way things in his personal life that had looked as if they were going to work had tended not to—that it would stand the sun.

But he trusted that Jago would protect herself.

That thought let him relax, finally, listening to her breathing. In dim-brained curiosity he began timing his breaths to hers and seeing if they could be brought to match. He could force it—but it wasn’t quite natural. She seemed asleep, so that might not be a fair test.

He went on trying to make a match, but it eluded him.

21

Good night?” Banichi asked them, in the cold, rainy dawn, when Ilisidi’s men were off to saddle the mechieti.

“Quite good,” Jago declared with a tilt of her head. “For the curious, yes, Banichi-ji, and you’ll go begging for the salacious details.”

Bren tried to keep an expressionless face as Banichi glanced at him for information. And didn’t think he succeeded.

“Shut out,” Banichi said. “Abandoned.”

“Fled,” Jago said. “Having set the scene.”

“ Shewas the one who said we needed to set separate guard last night,” Banichi said. “But I heard no appeals for rescue.”

“Be decent!” Jago said, finally rising to the defense. “My partner has no shame, paidhi-ji.”

Banichi strolled off quite happily, while the servants hastily struck tents. Ilisidi and Cenedi had gone out to get the mechieti; until Babsidi came to his rider, no other would. The boy from Dur had found Jase and was tagging him on a course toward them.

Jase was limping: it needed no guess to say why, in a beginning rider. Jase looked worried. Likely he was going to ask why they’d been separated last night.

And he didn’t know how he was going to explain it. The truth was going to have repercussions. There was no way it wouldn’t.

“I have duties,” Jago said, and deserted him.

“Bren?” Jase said.

“Good morning, Jasi-ji. Sorry about the change of arrangements last night.”

“The rain. I know.” Jase rushed past that item. “Where are we going? nand’ Rejiri says west. West, am I right, nadi? Mogari-nai? Not fishing. Not down to the sea?”

The boy from Dur looked as if a glimmering had reached him that he had just possibly said something out of line. And Bren tried to recall what he’d told Jase on the other side of a mountain of new information.

“You promised me the ocean,” Jase reminded him, “nadi. We were going to go fishing. You said political problems at Mogari-nai. Nand’ Rejiri says his father should bring guns there and I should ask you to ask the dowager if he can go to his father and bring guns.”

“Ask the dowager,” Bren said to the boy, “nadi.”

“One has asked, nand’ paidhi. But she won’t rely on me.”

“Possibly she has other reasons, nadi, such as intentions she holds in secret, and I would suggest that you remember she is old because some of her enemies are dead.”

Rejiri’s face grew quite sober. “Nandi,” he said.

While an aggrieved roommate with a good deal more than that on his mind waited to have hisquestion answered.

“Jase,” Bren said, “we are going to Mogari-nai, and I am increasingly certain we have a difficulty.”

“We are not on vacation.”

“I do not think we are on vacation, no, Jase.”

“Where were you last night?”

The boy was there, all ears.

“Talking,” Bren said.

“But not to me,” Jase said, and walked off.

“Jase!” he said, but Jase kept walking down what had been a line of tents and now was a set of bundles of baggage.

He couldn’t run after after Jase in front of the whole camp. He couldn’t start a quarrel. Jase was nota diplomat. He didn’t know how far it would go, or where it would end if Jase blew up, and blew up at the wrong people.

Meanwhile Ilisidi was up on Babsidi and she and Cenedi were bringing the herd in to the place where the gear waited.

“I suppose I talked too much, nand’ paidhi,” Rejiri said shamefacedly.

He’d never dealt individually with atevi youngsters. Certainly not with a boy verging on independence.

And he had no wish to humiliate the boy, who had probably heard his faults enumerated by Banichi. “Did nand’ Banichi give you advice?” he asked.

“Yes, nand’ paidhi.”

“Was it good advice?”

There was a moment of silence. “Yes, nand’ paidhi.”

“He’s a wise man,” Bren said. “I take advice from him, frequently. Even the aiji does. I’d watch himand do what he does.”

He wasn’t thinking about the boy. He was thinking about Jase, and how to patch his own mistakes, and maybe it was a little revenge for Banichi’s jokes to aim the innocent in his direction. But the boy said, enthusiastically,

“ Thankyou, nand’ paidhi,” and set off in Banichi’s direction.

He wondered what he’d just done; and then it struck him that Ilisidi and all her men were eastern, and he and Jase were the only officials here whose man’chi was really clearly Tabini’s. He’d just confirmed to the confused lad that, indeed, he could rely on Banichi, and recommended he do so.

At least it was the truth, and he hadn’t misled the boy or done any harm to the situation.

If he could only be so lucky with his own species.

Jase didn’t look at him as he walked up. The camp was a snarling confusion as the dowager’s men saddled the mechieti.

“Well, well, well,” Ilisidi said cheerfully, as Babsidi moved up to tower against the gray-ribboned sky, “good morning, nand’ paidhi.”

Was she upset? Bren asked himself. Did she know?

Ilisidi knew every sneeze in her vicinity. And that courtship game they’d played, he and Ilisidi. Did it mask real possessiveness? An old woman’s real inclinations?

Disaster?

“You inspire so manyquestions,” Ilisidi said from her height of vantage, and signaled Babsidi to go past him. Nokhada was saddled. So was Jase’s mechieta, and there was no place to talk, no timeto talk with the mechieti waiting for riders and the men who were doing the saddling wanting to get riders up and out of their way.

He made Nokhada bend down for him, got himself up with that unique pain of the second day in the saddle. Jase was no better, he was well certain. He was sure the only ones immune were Ilisidi and her men.

He kept Nokhada under tight rein and knew he wasn’t going to have a chance to talk to Jase in anything like the length and complexity of topic that could calm Jase down.

Jase knew he’d been lied to. Not by intent, maybe, but he deserved Jase’s anger at being left literally in the dark last night. Banichi would be good-humored and a quiet bedfellow, veryquiet, meaning Jase would not have gotten any information out of him. He’d indicated he’d come back. Lie number one.

He’d not told Jase where he’d been. Lie number two, at least by omission, and he hadn’t remotely thoughtabout Jase’s state of mind in terms of anything but the storm and the lightning he knew Jase feared, Banichi wasn’talways good at reassuring a man, Banichi and his jokes. Banichi had probably given him the statistics on people hit by lightning on camping trips.

He had to get his wits together. He couldn’t treat Jase that way. He was solidly in the wrong this time, because he’d been distracted by personal affairs, and it was just too damn serious a matter to say I forgot.

The last of the company mounted up. The sea was a misty gray beyond the cliffs. The island of Dur showed indistinct in a morning haze.

Ilisidi kept it on her right as she led off at a fast clip. They were headed west. And they clearly weren’t going fishing.

The clouds kept blowing overhead from some inexhaustible source beyond the horizon, wave after wave driven by stiff winds aloft; but the sun began to win the battle toward midmorning, and light and shadow played on the velvet-textured rolls of the land.

Beautiful. A distracted mind couldn’t but notice.

Bren said as much to Jase as they rode, trying to set up a friendlier mood for the rest stop he knew was coming, when he hoped to have a chance to talk.

“Yes,” Jase said; but nothing more, and when they did get their stop, and did get down, Jase listened to his “I’m sorry,” and said, “Where is the truth, nadi? How do I tell the truth?”

“I was with Jago,” he said in the lowest voice that would carry. “I’m sorry! I wasn’t thinking! I was stupid! Will you listento me?”

“Go ahead.” They weren’t that far from Banichi. But that meant they weren’t far from the boy from Dur, who’d attached himself exactly as he’d said. And Jase’s tone didn’t invite confidences.

“There’s a rumor Deana Hanks is coming to the mainland. I suspect Mospheira is going to try an independent deal with Direiso of the Kadigidi to peel the northern provinces outof the Western Association, but I’m not sure I can make atevi see entirely what Hanks thinks she’s doing: it’s too foreign to their instincts. The whole east is shaky, held mostly by Ilisidi’s influence. Do you follow me?”

“Is that what you discussed in bed?”

“ Yes, dammit, among other things. Listen to me. We’ve got a problem a hell of a lot larger than my mistake. I admitit was a mistake, all right, I was a damn fool, but I was trying to find out the situation last night—”

“Among other things.”

“Yes, among other things.” He was getting madder. He was so mad already his muscles were shaking, and his breath was short, and it didn’t help communication. He shifted to Mosphei’. “Can you for God’s sake quit keeping score on who’s wrong and who’s right and hear what I’m saying?”

“I do hear what you’re saying. If you’re not lying one moretime, what are we doing out here in the middle of it? Why did they bring us here, if this was going on? Can you answer that?”

“I’m trying to!”

“What does it take? More research?”

“Use your head, dammit! This is serious.”

“I don’t take it for anything else. Where are Tano and Algini? Why are we suddenly with thesetwo? Bren, give me an answer!”

The dowager was getting back in the saddle. They had to follow or it was certain the mechieti would go and leave them stranded.

“I assure you they’re all right,” Bren said. “They’re working back at the fortress, securing the area.”

“Easy answer.”

“These are partners of theirs!” The man assigned to help Jase up was waiting. They were almost the last.

“Consider man’chi. Consider everything I’ve told you. Banichi and Jago aren’t going to see anything happen to them.”

“Meaning you don’t knowwhy they didn’t come.”

Question begot question begot question. “I can’t argue with you. We haveto go.” He went to Nokhada, so charged with temper he hardly felt the effort it took for bruised muscles to catapult him into the saddle. He reined about to be sure Jase made it as the man boosted Jase up, then assisted the boy from Dur into the saddle.

Jase didn’t understand him. Given professional experience, he ought to be able to achieve an understanding with Jase with far less trouble than he had with atevi; and it didn’t work that way. It hadn’t worked that way all year.

Why are we withthese two? Stupid question, ignoring everything he’d said.

But Tano and Algini had been there while Jase was in the apartment, and Banichi and Jago hadn’t been there for a long while. Tano and Algini were the reliable figures in the household that Jase knew of, the ones hewould go to; so from Jase’s viewpoint there was attachment quite as valid as his—admitted—attachment to Banichi and Jago.

In that reassessment of Jase’s obstinacy he rode Nokhada near him, hoping that he would choose to talk; but Jase said nothing to him nor seemed to care he was there. Jase sometimes rode with his eyes shut, maybe ignoring the pitch and heave of the land, maybe motion sick: he had complained of it a great deal when he’d first come down.

“Pretty clouds,” Bren said.

No answer.

“This whole land tilts,” Bren said. “There aren’t that many roads. The fortress watches the slope up off the plains. If it weren’t there, someone could drive up undetected. They’re back there to warn us. That’s what they’re doing.” It dawned on him then in cooler temper that a man who had trouble with a flat surface wouldn’t intuitively grasp warfare and its tactics. “Like the foyer at home. Stand in that door and nobody can come in. Just like them staying in the foyer office. As long as they’re there, nobody can come up on this land. And Tano and Algini might do that if we wereout here on vacation. The aijiin never assume no one’s after them. Ever.”

Jase didn’t answer. But Jase did at least look at him.

“Four, five hundred years ago,” Bren said, “before humans on this planet, atevi rode mechieti to war.” He pointed to the rolling land ahead of them. “Five hundred riders could be just up there, close as the gardens to the apartment. You couldn’t see them. That’s why men keep riding ahead of the dowager. Ordinarily the mechieti don’t like to do that—get ahead of the leader. But they do it for short rides out and back, looking to see the way is clear.”

Jase waslistening. He caught the quick and worried glance at the horizons, and saw Jase’s whole body come to a different state of tension. In that distracted moment Jase suddenly synched with the mechieta’s moving and seemed to feel it.

“That’s how you oughtto ride,” Bren said, “Jase.”

Jase looked at him, lost his centering and found it again; and lost it.

The fact Jase hadsomehow coped with being out here didn’t mean Jase knew a thing, Bren thought, not about the mechieti, not about the concept of land, or tactics, or how to stay on or how to protect himself if someone did come up on them and mechieti reacted as mechieti would do. Politics and language and living in an apartment was what he’d taught Jase. It was allhe’d taught Jase.

“If the mechieti have to run,” he said, “—in case they do.” He changed languages and went rapid-fire. “The atevi riders stay on by balance. Youjust hunch down tight and low and hold to the saddle. It won’t come off. Get as low as you can. If they canjump something they will; otherwise they can turn very fast, and if you’re not low you’ll fall off. Join his center of mass. All right? If he jumps, his head will come back, and if your face is too far forward he can knock you cold. If they jump, center your weight, lean forward, head down while he’s rising, lean back while he’s landing and duck down again. We’re small. Nothing we do affects them as much as an ateva’s weight. Don’t pull on the rein and don’t try to guide him. It can turn his head and blind him to the ground and kill you both. If you do nothing with the rein, he’ll follow Ilisidi’s mechieta come hell or high water.”

“Are we going to run?” Jase said. “From what?”

“It’s just an ‘in case.’ ”

Jase gave him one of those looks.

“It’s a possibility, nadi,” Bren said, and then wished he hadn’t said. He wished he’d said, To hell with you, and not shaved the meaning one more time. “You’re not going to find absolutes in this situation. There aren’t any. I’m sorry. I knew I was asking for a hard time up here when I turned matters over to other people. I knew last night things were getting complicated. I figured—maybe we’d get a chance to go down to the water. Somehow. And things might not even involve us.”

“Once we left the fortress,” Jase said in Mosphei’, “I knew we weren’t going fishing.”

“Because you knew I’d lie? You don’t know that.”

There was lengthy silence.

Then Jase said, “We were still going fishing? All around us, people with weapons. People on radios. Hanks. We were going fishing.”

“Well, we will.” It sounded lame even to him, in what he began to see as a long string of broken promises, broken dates, incomplete plans—not professional ones, but personal. He couldn’t explain all that was going on. Jase didn’t understand the motivations. And God knew what conclusions he’d draw.

The silence persisted some distance more. He wasn’t there for the moment. He was across a table from Barb. Barb was saying, When? When, really, Bren?

“You really tellyourself we’re going fishing,” Jase said, “don’t you?”

“Jase, if I don’t plan to do it, we’ll damn sure never get there. At least,” he added, beginning to be depressed, “if you plan a dozen trips, one happens.”

“Are all Mospheirans like you?”

He’d like to think not. He liked to think, on the contrary, that he was better than the flaws that frustrated him in his countrymen. But it was an island full of people living their safe routines, their weekend trips to the mountains, their outings to the market, like clockwork, every week, sitting on a powder keg, electing presidentiwho lived the same kind of lives and left decisions to their chief contributors rather than those with any knowledge or insight.