Though an underground connection beneath the garden walk, for the house servants to get back and forth from that wing conveniently at all hours and in all weather would be useful.

Another plus: the garage, which the occupants of the house did not routinely visit, would notbe taking up a garden view. Instead, the garage would be relegated farther out into what was now scrub evergreen and some rocky outcrops, an area of no great natural beauty.

Brilliant solution. It would be minimal disturbance to the ancient garden, it would connect directly to the house—it would put the garage beyond a blank wall, and yet allow easy access to it.

He liked that.

Pen moved. He sketched. The new wing would have a basement connecting to that underground access, beneath the garden walk. So would the restored garage, also joining that underground passage; and the new wing basement could accommodate new staff quarters as well as storage—while the upper structure could be made with the same native stone construction and low profile as characterized the rest of the ancient house. The same terra cotta tile for the roof. And a double-glazed window—greater security than a plain one—overlooking the garden and the main house, the architecture of which had always gone unappreciated except from the garage door.

Excellent notion. A second window, looking out toward the harbor, where the rocks dropped away in a hitherto-unused prospect on the ocean. Maybe use thatfor a dining hall.

He could use local labor at every stage. Najida folk were clever, could learn anything necessary and the income would flow from the estate to the village, as it ought to.

And if the Edi people did build a hall for their own lord over in Kajiminda district—likely for the Grandmother of Najida village, but no one but the Edi quite knew where Edi authority truly resided—the skills of construction and the prosperity in Najida village would both feed into that project.

He liked his idea. He had a brand-new bus sitting in the driveway and a very useful air-castle rising in place of his wrecked gates.

Beside him, Tano and Algini still played poker. He sketched out his plan, derelict in his legislative duties. A new—second— ground floor bath. And a second, larger servants’ bath, with two sides, two baths, below. Thatwould be very useful.

Plumbing—he made a vague squiggle on his design. That detail was for experts to figure out. But another hot water tank on that side of the house would certainly be useful.

God, he was spending money left and right this morning, and he was in uncharted territory now, having no practical knowledge of the costs of such a construction.

He should talk to—

A rap at the door interrupted both the card game, and his daydream of easy, sweeping solutions.

Jago opened the door and slipped inside. “Lord Geigi’s staff has just contacted us, Bren-ji. He is in the air at Mori, and will land here, we estimate, within the hour. The new bus is fueled and stocked and in order. The guest quarters are available now, and furnished with linens. The truck is on its way up from the village. We are ready.”

“Excellent.” He looked at the wall clock. So Lord Geigi, having landed at Shejidan, had come into an airport near the Isles by jet, and was coming down the coast from the Isles by prop planec inventive route, possibly with time for contact with old allies on the northern coast. “We should be moving, then.”

The card game had ended, unfinished. Jago gave a single hand sign to Tano and Algini that simply amounted to, “Banichi and I will go with Bren,” and that was that: all arrangements made. Tano and Algini would stay with the monitoring, along with Cenedi and his men, and Banichi and Jago would go with him to the airstrip.

Certain house staff would go with them, too, particularly to handle the luggage, additional of which might be coming in a second plane—one would not be at all surprised at that arrangement. Personal baggage could go into the underside of the fancy new bus; but the village truck would be a prudent backup, so as not to leave any of Lord Geigi’s belongings exposed at the little airstrip, begging the kind of michief they had had.

Moving an atevi lord anywhere was an exercise in complex logistics, but what a lord saw generally went smoothly—thanks to staff.

And all he needed do was go to his bedroom, put on a nicer coat—Koharu and Supani helped him with the lace and the pigtail and the fresh white ribbon, the white of neutrality being the paidhi-aiji’s heraldry and sign of office. That was his choice for the meeting, a politic choice considering the color choice of the bus.

Then he walked out and down the hall toward the front door, picking up Jago and Banichi along the way, along with four of the dowager’s guard, for a little extra security. One of the dowager’s men would drive, this trip—Banichi and Jago were, on his orders, taking it a little easy the last several days.

It was a wonderful bus, on the inside—new-smelling, modern, and clean, with very comfortable seats, its own lavatory, and a well-stocked galley. NowBren finally got to enjoy it, and enjoy it he did, in a seat of atevi scale, plenty of room for a human, new upholstery, and deeply cushioned, responsive even to a human’s lighter weight, and with a place for his feet. “No, nadiin-ji,” he said, to the staff’s offer of fruit juice. “I shall enjoy it with Lord Geigi when he arrives. Kindly serve it once he is aboard.”

The bus had, besides the luxury of a galley, air conditioning and the very nice protection of windows that appeared black to the outside, even without using the pull-down shutters.

The engine positively purred with power.

And the front seats were arranged by opposing pairs, so that he and a guest, or, at least on the way out, Banichi and Jago, could sit facing one another. There were pull-out trays in the arm-rests, like those on a transcontinental jet. And footrests— the paidhi was particularly happy with that arrangement, usually having his feet dangling in atevi-scale transport. He settled back in utter comfort and watched the slightly shaded landscape go past in backwards order, while Banichi and Jago, similarly comfortable, and armed to the teeth, casually watched for trouble on the road ahead.

None developed. They crossed the tracks at the station and kept going on a reasonably maintained gravel road—thank Najida village for that convenience—which led to, one and a half fairly smooth kilometers from the train station, a small, flat-roofed building with a fueling station, a recently mowed grass strip, and a single windsock.

They parked and waited.

And in time, delayed a little, perhaps, by the soundproofing, one of Ilisidi’s young men thought he heard a plane.

The driver opened the bus door for that young man to listen. Everyone else agreed they heard it.

Finally Bren didc by which time the sharp-eyed young men, gathered at those side windows, said they actually saw it coming. Atevi were just that much keener of hearing and sight—night-sight, in particular. The only area in which humans had the physical advantage was in spotting things when the sun was at its brightest.

In this case, the sound grew until, yes, the human heard it, too. And sure enough, what appeared in approach was a fair-sized plane, a twin prop, a model that served the smaller towns and the outlying islands, where short strips and high winds were the rule. It wasn’t the sleekest of craft that came in, fat-bodied, with high-mounted wings and a blunt, broad nose, but it managed the single strip handily, even in the mild crosswind. Landing gear came down, and it touched down reasonably smoothly, then taxied about and maneuvered back toward the small building and their waiting bus.

The engine slowed to a lazy rotation of the props. The plane’s door opened, lowering as a set of steps. Two of the dowager’s men from the bus and two Guildsmen from inside the plane stepped out—numbers mattered in a situation, and what that read was not an infelicity of two on either side, but an implied felicity of three: they each represented someone protected by their immediate company.