“Jago?”
“I’ve got to go. Got to go, Bren-ji.”
He tried to delay her to ask where Banichi was or what they meant by hold them—but her fingers slipped through his, and Jago was away and out the door, her black braid swinging.
Alarm brought him to his feet—sore joints, headache, and lapful of blankets and all—with half that Jago had said ringing and rattling around a dazed and exhausted brain.
Hold them? Hold a mob off from Malguri? How in hell, Jago?
And for what? One damned more illusion, Jago? Is this one real?
Innocents, Jago said.
People who wanted to kill him? Innocents?
People who were just scared, because the word had begun to spread of what had arrived in their skies. Malguri was still candle-lit and fire-lit. The countryside around about had had no lights. People in cities didn’t spend their time on rooftops looking at a station you couldn’t see in city haze without a telescope, no, but a quarter of Maidingi township had been in blackout, and ordinary atevi could have had pointed out to them what astronomers and amateurs would have seen in their telescopes days ago,
Now the panic began, the fear of landings, the rumor of attack on their planet from an enemy above their reach.
What were they to think of this apparition, absent a communication from the paidhi’s office, but a resumption of the War, another invasion, another, harsher imposition of human ways on the world? They’d had their experience of humans seeking a foothold in their territory.
He stood lost in the middle of a nightmare—realized Ilisidi’s guards were watching him anxiously, and didn’t know what to do, except that the paidhi was the only voice, the only voice that could represent atevi interests to Mospheira’s authorities—and to that ship up there.
No contact, the Guild had argued; but that principle had fallen in the first stiff challenge. To get the deal they wanted out of the station… to go on getting the means to search for Earth, they’d given in and allowed the initial personnel and equipment drops.
And two hundred years now from the War of the Landing, what did any human on earth know… but this world, and a way of life they’d gotten used to, and neighbors they’d reached at least a hope of understanding at distance?
Damn, he thought, angry, outraged at the intrusion over their heads, and he didn’t imagine that there was overmuch joy in Mospheira’s conversations with the ship, either.
Charges and counter-charges. Charges his office could answer with some authority—but when Phoenix asked, Where is this interpreter, where is the paidhi-aiji, what opinion does he hold and why can’t we find him?… what could Mospheira say? Sorry—we don’t know?
Sorry, we’ve never lost track of him before?
And couldn’t the Commission office, knowing what they knew, realize that, with that ship appearing in the skies, they’d better call his office in Shejidan? Or realize, if their call didn’t go through, that he was in trouble, that atevi knew what was going on, and that he might be undergoing interrogation somewhere?
Damned right, Hanks knew. Deana Nuke-the-Opposition Hanks was making decisions in his name on Mospheira, because he was out of touch.
He needed a phone, a radio, anything. “I have to talk to my own security,” he said, “about that ship up there. Please, nadiin, can you send someone to bring Jago back, or Banichi… any one of my staff? I’ll talk to Cenedi. Or the dowager.”
“I fear not, nand’ paidhi. Things are moving very quickly now. Someone’s gone for your coat and for heavier clothes. If you’d care for breakfast…”
“My coat. Where are we going, nadiin? When are we going? I need to get to a phone or a radio. I need to reach my office. It’s extremely important they know that I’m all right. Someone could take very stupid, very dangerous actions, nadiin!”
“We can present your request to Cenedi,” Giri said. “In the meantime, the water’s already hot, nand’ paidhi. Tea can be ready in a very small moment. Breakfast is waiting. We would very much advise you to have breakfast now. Please, nand’ paidhi. I’ll personally take your request to Cenedi.”