Protector

They would have done that. Cajeiri entirely approved. And Gene told him why he had gotten in trouble—he was trying to get into the atevi section of the station where humans were not supposed to be—like the mainland and Mospheira.

And Gene told what it was like to get arrested on the station, if one did not have a person like mani to straighten things out, or a father to call on, just one’s own cleverness, and the cleverness of one’s associates. He made it funny, even if he had been worried at the time. For a while, listening to their adventures on the station, it was like being back on the ship.

His guests wanted to hear, too, about the escapes he had had, and how it was, when he had flown back with mani and nand’ Bren and they had had to do all sorts of things, like riding on a train with fish, to get here to Tirnamardi without being shot or caught. He had written about it in the letters, but he had been very careful what he wrote, then, especially careful about naming names; and now they wanted to hear it all, through two rounds of tea and cakes.

They had gotten down to the shells falling on the lawn at Tirnamardi, and the stables being wrecked, and young Dur landing his plane, and—

A black streak bounded for the top of a chair.

Thatcould not happen. Boji had his harness on. His leash was clipped to the cage.

Boji took another bound, toward the cage, and Cajeiri leaped up. “Close the window!” he yelled at Lieidi, who was closer, and ran to do it himself.

They all moved, knocking chairs aside, and Boji panicked. Boji dived straight for the open window, dodged Lieidi’s hands, and was out the window.

“Gods less fortunate!” Cajeiri leaned out over the sill, as far as he could, and heard his bodyguard, who had been caught by surprise, object to that effort, warning him not to try to reach too far.

Boji was down on a line of stonework trim, just out of reach. Cajeiri stretched further, felt hands on his coat, not pulling him back, but being sure he stayed in the window. “Boji,” he said quietly, reasonably, holding out his hand. “Boji, come back. Do you want an egg?”

Boji looked at him round-eyed and frightened, then ducked down and skittered right down the sheer wall below, using his clever little fingers to find the joints in the masonry.

“Go out, nadi,” he heard Lucasi say to someone, “try to get him from below.”

“Boji,” Cajeiri called, holding out his hand. “Boji, the game is over. Come back.”

Boji stopped, down by the next tier of windows, and looked up at him.

“Get me an egg,” Cajeiri said, upside down, and with the blood rushing to his face and his hands.

“Egg,” he heard Veijico say, as the door of the suite opened and shut, and he could heard his guests’ voices, offering to help.

He could see the harness and leash on Boji, or about a hand’s length of the leash, and a ragged end where Boji had chewed it through. He lay across the windowsill as far as he dared.

“Egg, Boji! Egg!”

“Nandi.” That was Lieidi’s voice, and he did not leave the window or make any sudden move that might frighten Boji. He just held out one hand backward, and when an egg arrived in it, he slowly brought it down and offered the egg clearly to Boji’s view.

Boji had climbed down another little bit. The movement had gotten him to look up, and Boji did see the egg: the fixed stare of his golden eyes said he had.

“Come on,” Cajeiri said. “Come on, Boji, Boji, Boji.”

Boji was definitely interested. Cajeiri held the egg to make it completely visible.

“Boji? Time for your egg!”

Boji started climbing up the wall, one large stone and the other, his thin little arms holding him as strong little hands found a hold on the stones.

“Hold my legs!” Cajeiri said, and more than one person grabbed his legs and held on. He leaned a bit more, and Boji climbed after the egg.

Boji reached up to snatch the egg, Cajeiri positioned his other hand to grab the harness, and just then someone came running around the corner of the house below.

Boji looked down, screeched, bristled up, and took off diagonally, far, far across the wall, headed for another open window, not in their suite. He reached that window, clung just outside it.

Gods. Cajeiri counted windows, divided, trying to figure how many rooms that was and what suite Boji had gotten to.

Great-uncle’s.

“Boji! Come back! Egg, Boji!”

Boji disappeared into the window.

Cajeiri began pushing at the sill and trying to get back inside, intending to run to Great-uncle’s suite, knock on the door and avert disaster . . . but just then Boji came flying out the same window and came scrambling back toward him across the stonework, chittering and screeching. He was almost to the window, then veered off in renewed panic, diagonally downward, while the person below—Jegari—waited there to try to get him.