Read Protector: Foreigner #14 for Free Online Page B

could help, young gentleman. One very much wishes it. Why are they advancing your bodyguard’s certification? Do you know?”
    “My father did it. Antaro and Jegari know about guns, of course.” A shrug. “They have hunted since they were little, in Taiben. But Lucasi and Veijico say they have to have a certificate to have guns in public places. And to use Guild equipment.”
    “That is so,” Bren said. “So no one is staying in your suite with you?”
    “Just Boji.”
    Boji was small, black, and furry, and lived in a large cage in the boy’s room.
    It was unfamiliar solitude for a young boy, particularly a boy who, in his life, had traveled on a starship, dealt with aliens, been kidnapped by his father’s enemies, nearly run down at sea, and habitually went armed with a slingshot—which was probably in his pocket even here. The empty rooms must be particularly unnerving for a boy who, in the last year and in part
because
of his tendency to collect adventures, had acquired an aishid of his own, four bodyguards dedicated to keeping him safe in every moment of his life.
    “And how is Boji?”
    “Very well, nandi! I am training him to be without his cage sometimes.”
    “Excellent.” The women had made half the circuit of the room. And unfortunately, he could not afford to be a babysitter at the expense of the Marid treaty. He spied, finally, a committee head he urgently needed to talk to. “One has to speak to this gentleman a moment. Will you be well for a moment, young sir? Will you stand right here?”
    Cajeiri gave a two-shouldered shrug, a little grin and a wink. “Oh, with no trouble, nandi. There are no kidnappers here. And if they come back arguing, I shall have to go with my mother.”
    Of course the scamp would find his own way. He had been doing that all his life. And Cajeiri absolutely had the priorities straight. Bren went off to intercept the head of Transport, and the head of the Commerce Committee walked up to join the conversation.
    The talk became intense, and substantive, and encouragingly productive.
    When he looked for the boy again, he found no sign of him. He did see that the aiji-dowager and Damiri had gone their separate ways, busy about the fringes of the room, and that conversation, which had hushed progressively as the two went about the room, had resumed.
    Tabini-aiji, however, looked his direction, gave a little nod, and that was an immediate command appearance.
    He went. And bowed. “One is currently looking for your son, aiji-ma, and one is just a little concerned.”
    “His servants took him to bed a moment ago,” Tabini said. “He is quite safe.”
    “One is relieved.” He let go a breath. “One should not have left him. Even here.”
    “Oh, he has been on his own all evening. And he could not have gotten out the door unremarked,” Tabini added with a little wry humor. “My whole staff has their instructions. My son has entirely understood the current difficulty, and he has stayed very well within bounds.” A sharpening of focus, and a frown. “My grandmother. Did she plan that?”
    That the aiji had to ask
him
what Ilisidi was thinking . . .
    “One does not believe so, no, aiji-ma. One believes she was quite taken by surprise, reacting to your honored wife’s choice of colors this evening.”
    “It was Damiri’s choice,” Tabini said somberly. “Her father has left her none. But these are not easy days in the household.”
    “One well understands, aiji-ma.”
    “Have you heard anything in the room?”
    “Nothing regarding that matter, aiji-ma.”
    “Come aside a moment.”
    “Aiji-ma.” He followed Tabini to the far side of the room, through the door and into the deserted dining hall, tracked, at a slight remove, by Tabini’s bodyguards.
    Servants, working at polishing the table, withdrew quickly. Two of Tabini’s bodyguards went across the room and shut those doors. The other two, from outside, shut the dining room doors. The likelihood of