men, who are of my family. I am under obligation to you.”
What he really means is giri, Adrienne thought. Something rather more serious. Which is exactly what I had in mind. Besides keeping Adrian from spitting himself on that sword.
The ambulance bearing his wounded men howled away; the police were examining the surroundings in increasing puzzlement. The night-walkers were as imperceptible as shadows to them, as long as they willed it.
“D?mo arigat? gozaimasu,” Adrienne said, and bowed again. “I am your granddaughter’s guest, and therefore your guest. It is also a disgrace to my family that the traitor acts so, in violation of our solemn agreements. On both accounts I was obliged to do whatever I could.”
Both the thank-you and the gesture were in the extreme polite form, the one used mainly by women in Japan when Hajime was a young man. She could see the very slightest relaxation in the stiffness of the T?kairin clan- head.
“I am obliged,” he repeated.
“I will, of course, leave San Francisco immediately, for Br?z? possessions or neutral land,” Adrienne said. “I am deeply ashamed of how I have brought a Br?z? family dispute onto T?kairin home territory. What must you think of me! I’ll begin packing and close down the town house you so kindly allowed us to secure after the… readjustment.”
“You will do nothing of the sort!” Hajime said. “I will not allow an outlaw to drive out a guest of my family! Besides which, all the West Coast is in a sense T?kairin territory, even if not under our direct control. Our patronage extends over all Shadowspawn in the area. We represent them on the Council of Shadows.”
“Very true, Master Hajime,” Adrienne said. “But I would not dream of causing you the slightest inconvenience. I was only visiting here for social reasons. Shopping, and so forth. Women’s matters. And to visit with Michiko-san, of course.”
He snorted. “And you will stay and amuse yourself as you please for as long as you please. Whether by shopping or hunting… What about this woman your outlaw brother claimed you took from him, by the way?”
Adrienne made a graceful gesture. “He never even fed from her, Master. She was running wild when I acquired her, not under his control at all. I do not think he considered her in his possession.”
She let her shields drop enough that he could read her for an instant. Intent-to-deceive was the easiest emotion to sense, and she was being honest both in form and spirit. Allowing your own thoughts to be tasted was a great concession among their kind. He nodded as her screen went up again.
“And… well, Michiko has kindly invited me to hunt and feed as I will here, but I thought it would be more polite to bring…”
She let the remark trail off. Hajime nodded. “Very polite,” he said, and now his voice was a little impressed.
Not the idea you had of me at all, is it, you costumed dinosaur? Adrienne thought behind her smiling mask. I’m so demurely respectful that only the possibility of projectile vomiting endangers my manners.
“Even excessively polite,” he said. “I wouldn’t have it rumored that T?kairin hospitality is grudging. And these swarming American mongrels are so many that killing a few is a service to us, not a burden.”
“Michiko was kind enough to say the same, but, of course, from yourself I must accept with thanks.”
He nodded. “Go. I insist that you send to me immediately if you have more trouble with this renegade. Here, or elsewhere in our province! The next time we meet him, we will deal with him. The man obviously knows no sense of decency or obligation at all. In which I begin to believe he is very unlike his sister.”
“D?mo arigat? gozaimasu,” she said again. “How extremely kind of you.”
“Dou itashimashite,” he said dismissively.
Her smile was brilliant. “With your protection, T?kairin-sama, I am sure he will be no trouble at all! And I’ve already enjoyed my visit very much. Very much indeed. You must allow me to return your hospitality in some small way soon.”
He inclined his head. She bowed again-not so deeply as she had the previous two times, which could have been subtle insolence, but enough to show profound respect.
Her body flowed once more as she straightened and let the coat fall, changing forms with a fluency he would find impressive in itself. The ten-foot wings of the giant eagle bore her upward with massive strokes that raised a circle of dust and litter for an instant. The slightest hint of cold fire in the east told her that she should seek the sheltering flesh soon, but she wheeled above the spire that bore the two setback stories of the Br?z? town house for a few minutes anyway.
Then she swooped in and landed; a canvas chair overturned with a clatter. A flowing, and she stood in her own form amid the chill silent darkness. Hearing and smell grew stronger, sight weaker; her mind raced for an instant as the fierce pinpoint focus of the raptor’s specialized intellect dropped away and her sense of self expanded into the larger hominid brain. With it came words:
I’ve been having an extremely good time, she thought. With Michiko, with Adrian, and with you, Master Hajime. And not least with Adrian’s little lucy, while I waited for Adrian to be his usual bumblingly straightforward self. She made herself come out to me right over there only a few hours ago…
Adrienne was singing softly as she leaned on the marble railing of the terrace and the stars wheeled around to midnight:
“And we who hold high places
Must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality;
Closer to the heart! ”
Ellen climbed out of the heated pool, toweled down and wrapped the thick robe around herself. Then she filled her wineglass from the last of the bottle and walked out to join her. The Br?z? town house was the uppermost two stories of the St. Regis Hotel tower, forty floors above the SoMa district near the access ramps to the Bay Bridge. It was the sort of apartment that had a two-story waterfall in the lobby and six fireplaces and twenty-two-foot glass walls in the living-room.
She’d rapidly been losing her ability to be impressed by that sort of thing. Except…
This is what Adrian could have had. No, it’s just a sample of what he could have had. An emperor’s life, including the power of life and death, and immortality with it. He could have been a god in shadow, and he chose- chooses every day-to give it up.
More primal concerns crowded the thought out, and even the panorama of San Francisco’s hills jeweled with night, dark water defining the edge of the world and the East Bay cities glowing across it. She leaned on the railing beside the Shadowspawn and carefully set her small glass of wine on the marble; it was something called Tokaji Asz? 1924, which meant nothing to her, except that it tasted very nice and was rather sweet and hit like a toppling statue.
“You’re a little drunk,” Adrienne said.
She was naked and evidently perfectly comfortable that way despite the chilly wind that had dried her long black hair. She brushed feather-tufts of it back from her face as she turned her head.
“I’m terrified, is what I am,” Ellen said.
It had been surprisingly easy to learn there was no point in not talking to someone who could riffle through your mind like a search program through a computer.
Through Ellen dot doc, she thought. Talk about being an open book! Aloud she went on: “So frightened I’d do anything to just make it stop. The booze helps a little,” she finished and took another small swallow.
“Tsk, tsk, using that to drink just for effect… So what are you frightened of? Me?”
“Always.”
“Sensible girl. Frightened of Michiko?”
“Fucking right I am! She wanted to kill me, didn’t she? That was what she was talking about. She’d be killing me right now if you’d let her. Killing me slowly and I’d know it every second of the way and she’d drink it. Oh, Christ.”
She gripped the stone until the wave of hot-cold fear finished surging up from her abdomen, then washed across her face and receded.
