Which was more detail of what had happened in the ambush than he’d yet heard from Banichi.
“Can you walk on it?” Cenedi asked.
“In an emergency,” Banichi said, which proved nothing at all about how bad it was. It was broken, Bren thought. The ankle didn’t rest straight. “Not what I’d choose, nadi. What walking did you have in mind?”
“Outside Maidingi Airport, which seems unavailable, there are two, remotely three ways we can go from here.” Thunder rumbled, and Cenedi waited for it, while the rain fell steadily. “We’d confirmed Wigairiin as reliable, with its airstrip—hence the feints we asked for lakeward and southwest. But our schedule is blown to hell now. The rebels in Maidingi township have no doubt now that our answer to their association is no and that we’re going west. They can’t be so stupid as to forget our association with Wigairiin.”
“North of here,” Banichi said.
“North and west. On the edge of the hills. The rebels are bound to move to take Wigairiin’s airstrip—or to take it out.”
“Foolish to strike at Wigairiin,” Ilisidi said, “until they’re sure both Malguri and Wigairiin aren’t going with them. And they won’t have known that until we went out the stable gate.”
“Not an easy field to take from the air,” Cenedi said. “Expensive to take.”
“Unless they moved in forces overland, in advance of Malguri’s refusal,” Banichi said.
“Possible,” Cenedi said. “But let me tell you our other choices. There’s the border. Fagioni province, just at the foot of Wigairiin height. But it could be a soft border. Damned soft in a matter of hours if Wigairiin falls, and we’re left with the same guess where the border into loyal territory firms up after that if Wigairiin falls. There’s also the open country, if we ignore both Wigairiin and Fagioni township and head into the reserve there. That’s three hundred miles of wilderness, plenty of game. But no cover.”
“More air attacks,” Ilisidi said.
“We might as well resign the fight if we take that route.” Banichi shifted higher, to sit up, winced, and settled on an elbow. “Railhead at Fagioni. They’ll have infiltrated, if they’ve got any sense. Major force is already launched. Rainstorm won’t have stopped the trains. They know we didn’t take the lake crossing. They know the politics on this side. You were the only question, nand’ dowager.”
“So it’s Wigairiin,” Cenedi said.
“There’s south,” Banichi said. “Maidingi.”
“With twelve of us? They’d hunt us out in an hour. We’ve got this storm until dark, if the weather reports hold. That long we’ve got cover. We can make Wigairiin. We can get out of there.”
“In what?” Banichi asked. “Forgive me. A plane that’s a low-flying target?”
“A jet,” Cenedi said.
Banichi frowned and drew in a slow breath, seeming to think about it then. “But what is it,” Banichi asked, “since they took Maidingi? Four, five hours? Tabini has commercial aircraft at his disposal. He might be in Maidingi by now. He could have landed a force at the airport.”
“And the whole rebellion could be over,” Ilisidi said, “but I wouldn’t bet our lives on it, nadiin. The Association is hanging together by a thread of public confidence in Tabini’s priorities. To answer a rising against him with brutal force instead of negotiation, while the axe hangs over atevi heads, visibly? No. Tabini’s made his move, in sending Bren-paidhi to me. If that plane goes out of Wigairiin, if I personally, with my known opposition to the Treaty, deliver the paidhi back to him—the wind is out of their sails, then and there. This is a political war, nadiin.”
“Explosives falling on our heads, nand’ dowager, were not a sudden inspiration. They were made in advance. The preparation to drop them from aircraft was made in advance. Surely they informed you the extent of their preparations.”
“Surely my grandson informed you,” Ilisidi said, “nadi, the extent of his own.”
What are we suddenly talking about? Bren asked himself. What are they asking each other?
About betrayal?
“As happens,” Banichi said, “he informed us very little. In case you should ask.”
My God.
“We go to Wigairiin,” Cenedi said. “I refuse, with ’Sidi’s life, to bet on Maidingi, or what Tabini may or may not have done.”