Read Online Precursor by C. J. Cherryh - Free Book Online

a black security door, and saw, not unexpectedly, their associates Algini and Tano, holding place near the rail-access to this closely guarded facility.
    “Paidhi-ji,” Algini said, seeing him, and that was the first word he’d heard since he’d left Jason above.
    “A good trip?” Tano asked him, as if that should be some consolation for what he was sure Tano knew.
    “Very fine,” he said politely. Tano was a good man, a very good man. In the paraphrase of Lund’s question, Tano cared.
    But this wasn’t fine, his trip hadn’t been fine, Jase wasn’t fine… and on the island his family wasn’t fine. He hadn’t thought that, in this suddenly harried trip, but it hadn’t been fine at all. His mother had wanted him to stay. Toby’s youngsters were going through growing pains and grandmotherly spoiling, and were wretched company, grating on his nerves for the single day he’d been with them… he wasn’t used to human children.
    Where had he lost that sense of connection?
    And what had he traded it for?
    What was he losing, back there with Jase? The one human being on whom he’d focused all his remnant of humanity, in a desperate attempt to put together official policy for the aiji, trying to understand the ship-humans’ mind-set?
    He boarded the train, rode in absentminded silence, recalling a dozen and one trips over the years, the first launch… spiraling back in time, the first trip to Malguri, the return… going out to Taiben, once and twice, all jumbled together, Jase and before-Jase. Down to Geigi’s estate, for one reason and another… those were the good times. Fishing.
    What in
hell
was Tabini thinking?
    “Do you know anything about this?” he asked his bodyguard, when they were alone, rocking along the rails.
    Tabini’s rail car—he’d used it more often than Tabini had, this specially secured compartment, armored against all eventualities.
    “No, nadi-ji,” Banichi said. “We, like you, wonder.”
    He leaned back on the comfortable velvet bench seat, red velvet, red carpet, a fresh bouquet in the vase on the counter, blooms of the season, the first in the lowlands. They shed a thick, sweet perfume.
    A wake might have been more cheerful.
    “I need to meet with the aiji,” Bren said quietly.
    “One will forward that request,” Jago said.
    “The dowager is in residence,” Banichi added.
    A new alarm began to go off, deep in his gut.
    “Did she come to see Jason?” Bren asked. “What in hell’s going on?”
    “She invited him to tea” Jago said, “and they discussed the weather.”
    Well, it wasn’t entirely unreasonable; she did come to Shejidan for visits. It was probably coincidence; she’d arrived, and heard he was leaving.
    “He’ll have no weather where he’s going,” Bren said, trying to settle himself to the possibility. “He’ll have to get as used to being without it as he did being with it.”
    “He will,” Jago agreed.
    “So it was one of those conversations?” The aiji-dowager, whom he’d thought safely and remotely at Malguri, was staunchly, provocatively conservative, a promoter of causes, a keen wit.
    A good heart.
    And a talk on the weather with Ilisidi, Tabini’s grandmother. Lords of the Western Association would give a great deal for a social conversation with her.
    But did she do anything…
anything
… by chance?
    “Did she know he was leaving?” he asked his security. It was a three-hour flight from Malguri, for an arthritic woman who didn’t like long sitting. He was prepared to be touched by that effort, if she’d heard and made the trip only for Jason.
    “One has no idea,” Jago said, “nandi.”
    My lord?
Nandi? So formal? What signal was
that?
    Jason had said not a word about his visit with the dowager. But she was, though silently, a head of a potentially restive association, within the information flow. Tabini would have sent the dowager word of a favored associate’s departure… or else. If
Ilisidi
couldn’t press Tabini to