Protector

“It is salty,” Eisi forewarned him. “But it will help. Drink it all.”

No punishment ever tasted good, and he was sure this was punishment. Salted fruit juice was awful, but not as awful as it sounded, and he actually had no trouble drinking the whole glass.

Then he let his head down to the pillow to be miserable again.

“Feed Boji, nadi-ji,” he asked Eisi. “I shall lie here a while.”

“About half an hour,” Eisi said, “and you should feel significantly better, young gentleman.”

“I hope so,” he said, and Eisi left and shut the bedroom door, leaving him in the dark, in his misery.

His aishid, who ordinarily lived with him, in those rooms just outside his door, would tell him he had been an idiot to drink it . . . especially Lucasi and Veijico, Better yet, they would have told him that last night, beforehe did it. They would have told him the consequences. They were older, and probably knew about things like drinking. Andthey were qualified to carry guns, which was what Antaro and Jegari were trying to become. He so hoped Antaro and Jegari would not become all proper and forget how to laugh.

But they had to—get qualified to carry guns, that was; not forget how to laugh. They were over at Guild Headquarters, taking tests to get an emergency qualification, not just to carry weapons, but a lot more that most Guild didn’t learn ’til they were much, much,older, because they were hisaishid, and being the aiji’s son put himin more danger than most bodyguards had to deal with. He understood the necessity, miserable as it was, and worrisome as it was to have anybody but him telling Antaro and Jegari what to do.

Before he’d gotten hisaishid, he had had borrowed older Guild protecting him. High-ranking Guild—and theyhad not been able to prevent things happening. They could not even prevent himdoing things he shouldn’t . . . like drinking that brandy last night.

But the four he had now . . . they were good. They understood him and when theyadvised against doing something it was for good reasons, not just arbitrary adult reasons. Antaro and Jegari were only a little older than he was, but they had grown up hunting in the forests in Taiben, so they’d learned to shoot and hit a target and walk very softly a long time ago.

It was just handling weapons in public places, Lucasi and Veijico said, that took special training . . . and they could pass. He was sure they could. And they would be back soon. Verysoon.

But not soon enough. He sighed and wondered how long it had been since he’d had Eisi’s medicine, and how long before his head stopped hurting.

Veijico and Lucasi were older, but not thatold. They were real Guild, though, and his father had assigned them to him, when he had been in the middle of the trouble over in Najida. They were good. They had had a reputation in the Guild for being too independent, too stubborn, and too reckless. He had overheard that from his great-grandmother and Cenedi. They had had problems. They had gotten in a lot of trouble, over on the coast.

But Banichi and Cenedi had gotten hold of them and they had reformed. They had been downright arrogant, and thought themselves too good to be assigned to guard a boy. But they had changed their minds, after everything, and they had sworn man’chi to him and meant it. He so wished he had had them to stop him last night. They might have done reckless things, themselves, but he was very sure they would have stopped him from drinking the brandy.

And he was so glad they were not here to see him this morning, even if he did wish they were all here now.

Last night—when he had had that very bad notion to try the brandy—because it was supposed to make one calm and happy—

Last night had been gruesome. Most of it, anyway. Mother and Great-grandmother had made peace. Officially. But not really. They had put on a show for politics and they were having tea this morning, and he was glad they could at least agree to do that. But it did not mean they were going to get along, and that his mother was going to forget she was upset.

He wished they really could get together, but Mother and Great-grandmother, his mani, were just too different. And worst of all, their quarrel mostly was about him, and things he just could not change. Mother was jealous of Great-grandmother. His parents had sent him off to Great-grandmother right before the troubles started in Shejidan, and there was no fixing it now. He had been with his Great-grandmother, up in the space station, and then on the starship, and he had been with her all the way, when they had met the kyo and gotten the Reunioners off their station and all—it had taken them two whole years, most of it just traveling, but he’d been learning all the time from Great-grandmother, and he couldn’t help it if, sometimes, he turned to her first.