A man planning unhappy actions in the adjacent territory, however, looked on it as a chokepoint in any escape plan, one worth remembering, and Bren was sure their respective bodyguards took note of it.

Beyond the gorge, the road gently climbed again, to a high plateau, and wide grasslands and scattered woods.

“This is Mu’idinu,” Geigi said. “My clan homeland.”

If one had had no prior knowledge of the Maschi, then, one would still have understood a great deal about them, seeing that great grassy plain, with a handful of tracks branching off the main road that were more footpaths than real roads.

This clan hunted. From coast to coast of the aishidi’tat, there were no domestic herds, such as humans had had in their lost homeworld. There was no great meat distribution industry, though such had begun to appear, since airliners had made the impossible possible. An atevi district, aside from that—and traditionalists greatly questioned the ethics of transporting meat—ate local game supplied by local hunters, in its appropriate season, and not a great deal of it. There was fish, mostly exempt from seasonality, even by the traditionalists; and there were eggs, which were a commercial operation; and there was wool, but no meat came from that operation. One simply did not eat domestic animals. Even non-traditionalist atevi were horrified at the notion.

A hunting clan, and vast, undeveloped lands: that said a great deal about the psychology of the clan. They would be nominally independent, but very dependent on their markets for things they lacked, manufactured goods, and the like. They had, despite a cadet branch of their house being on the coast, been historically isolated from their neighbors, except in trade at appointed locationsc one of which logically would always have been their common border with the Marid.

And their original good understanding with the coastal Edi had eroded over recent years—since Baiji had offended the Edi. That little detail had come clear in the various dry papers and accounts: mind-numbing detail, but the story was in them. Trade with the west had stopped and not resumed. The fish market had dried up. So if this district was not eating onlyseasonal game, it was getting its fish, that staple of various regional diets—from some other direction.

Like its eastern border.

The Marid.

Curious, the complexities that turned up out of such mundane information as the Najida market figures.

One began to form a theory on the Maschi’s actions during the Troubles: that the Maschi had become a target of Marid diplomacy, economically and politically—they had been tied to the central district and Shejidan during Tabini’s rule, but when Tabini had been out of power, and once Kajiminda fell into arrears on its accounts with Najida fisheries—

The Maschi clan estate at Targai had fallen right into the arms of the Marid.

Geigi had an unaccustomedly glum look as he gazed out on the broad plateau—remembering, it was sure; regretting, to a certain extent, the situation of his clan.

And Bren, looking out at that same landscape, thought about Barb, and a lot of personal history; and Toby, and his promise, and how the data that had made things seem possible back in Najida were having an increasingly spooky feeling in all this untracked grassland.

There had been no ransom demand from the kidnappers. That, he found ominous. That said they were traveling—further than some nearby hideout. Or that somebody was figuring out what to do with a human hostage.

And that question would likely go right up the chain to Machigi in the Taisigin Maridc guaranteeing at least some period of safety for Barb. Andc he could not but think it without much humor at allc Barb was as likely to make herself a serious problem to her kidnappers—which could mean she was not as well off as one would ordinarily hope. They would not likely hurt her—since it was unlikely they could figure out her rank or her right to pitch a fit; but she could push them too far. Knowing Barb, she would take a little latitude as encouragement to push. And that wouldn’t be good. Not at all. He’d personally had an arm broken—by an ateva who didn’t know how fragile humans were.

Not to mention food. God, they could poison her so easily without the least intention. Just one wrong spicec Stick to the bread, Barb, he thought desperately. Please stick to the bread.

The servant collected the teacups. Geigi sighed and seemed apt to drift off to sleep.

“Has there been any news?” Bren asked Jago quietly, not to disturb Geigi.

“None yet,” Jago said. “Guild to Guild, Lord Pairuti has been informed officially to expect visitors. They have not phoned the Marid. We know that.”

Thatwas interesting. His bodyguard, over the years, had increasingly taken to informing him on things lords often didn’t find outc things somewhat in the realm of Guild secrets.

“But then,” Tano said, “the Marid Guild has its own network.”

“Illegally so?”

“Oh, indeed illegally, Bren-ji,” Banichi said in his lowest voice. “But then, they are no longer privy to our codes.”

Tano said, from the facing seats: “The Guild has at least taken pains to keep them out. But we take care not to rely on that.”

“If there is any Marid Guild in this district,” Jago said, “they will not be minor operators. And they will not be taking orders from the Maschi.”

“The Maschi lord,” Tano said, “directs nothing regarding any Marid operation. If Barb-daja is there, she will not be in his hands.”

“Therefore she will not be there,” Bren said glumly, “and we may expect they will move her as rapidly as possible to the Marid, I fear too rapidly for us to overtake them.”

“Plausibly so,” Algini said. “The best we may hope for, nandi, is to settle the Maschi.”

“By reason or otherwise,” Tano added. “And one very much doubts reason.”

“Nandi.” Algini, who had had a finger to his ear, listening to something relayed to him, took on a very sober demeanor. “Go to the convenience.”

At the rear of the bus. It was not better shielded back there. It was not the potential for gunfire that Algini meant, not so, if he was to be leaving Geigi behind. It had to be informational, a consultation waiting for him back there.

He got up and quietly walked down the aisle to the vicinity of the several strangers who had boarded with them. Algini was right behind him, and so, he saw, turning, was the rest of his aishid.

Which had to alarm Geigi’s bodyguard. He cast a look back down the aisle and saw none of that lot stirring.

The next glance was for Algini, who said, in a low voice, “The aiji has Filed, Bren-ji. Word has just now come through.”

“Filed.”

“On Pairuti, on Machigi, on every lord of the Marid.”

“One believes,” Jago added dryly, “that the Farai will be quitting your apartment tonight.”

The strangers near them could hear, surely. So could the domestics sitting nearby, and several of the dowager’s guard.

“Lord Geigi—should not know this, nandiin-ji?”

“His bodyguard, nandi, is simultaneously receiving the same information,” Tano said.

Then a glimmering of the reason came through. But he was not sure. “But Lord Geigi—”

“His honor and his position,” Banichi said, “would require he advise Pairuti, Bren-ji. His bodyguard need not do so. They will not advise him.”

“One understands, then.” He almost wished hehad stayed ignorant. Far better, indeed, if Geigi were not put in a delicate position. His own, human, sense of honor was hard-put with the information—how to approach Pairuti with apparent clear conscience—how to walk into that hall and betray nothing. It was not fair play. It was not honest. It was not—

It was not easy for his aishid, either, to breach Guild secrecy and bring their lord in on the facts—on Tabini-aiji’s business. He had no good instinct for what had moved them to do so, except that, he, more than Geigi, was adjunct to Tabini-aiji. Hell. He needed to understand that point.