Deceiver: Foreigner #11

“Cherryh’s gift for conjuring believable alien cultures is in full force here, and her characters . . . are brought to life with a sure and convincing hand.”

—
Publishers Weekly

“A seriously probing, thoughtful, intelligent piece of work, with more insight in half a dozen pages than most authors manage in half a hundred.”

—
Kirkus

“Close-grained and carefully constructed . . . a book that will stick in the mind for a lot longer than the usual adventure romp.”

—
Locus

“A large new Cherryh novel is always welcome . . . a return to the anthropological science fiction in which she has made such a name is a double pleasure . . . superlatively drawn aliens and characterization.”

—
Chicago Sun-Times

“As always, Cherryh alternates complex political maneuvering with pell-mell action sequences in an intensely character-driven SF novel sure to appeal to the many fans of this series.”

—
Publishers Weekly

“Her lucid storytelling conveys enough backstory to guide newcomers without boring longtime series followers. The characters are well drawn, and Cherryh’s depiction of both human and alien cultures is riveting.”

—
Library Journal

“. . . . transforms the book into an absorbing combination of anthropological SF and ‘The Ransom of Red Chief.’ Faithful Foreigner saga followers, in particular, will have a ball.”

—
Booklist

DAW Titles by C.J. CHERRYH

THE FOREIGNER UNIVERSE

FOREIGNER
INVADER
INHERITOR

PRECURSOR
DEFENDER
EXPLORER

DESTROYER
PRETENDER
DELIVERER

CONSPIRATOR
DECEIVER
BETRAYER

THE ALLIANCE-UNION UNIVERSE

REGENESIS
DOWNBELOW STATION
THE DEEP BEYOND Omnibus:
Serpent’s Reach
|
Cuckoo’s Egg
ALLIANCE SPACE Omnibus:
Merchanter’s Luck
|
40,000 in Gehenna
AT THE EDGE OF SPACE Omnibus:
Brothers of Earth
|
Hunter of Worlds
THE FADED SUN Omnibus:
Kesrith
|
Shon’jir
|
Kutath

THE CHANUR NOVELS
THE CHANUR SAGA Omnibus:
The Pride Of Chanur
|
Chanur’s Venture
|
The Kif Strike Back
CHANUR’S ENDGAME Omnibus:
Chanur’s Homecoming
|
Chanur’s Legacy

THE MORGAINE CYCLE
THE MORGAINE SAGA Omnibus:
Gate of Ivrel
|
Well of Shiuan
|
Fires of Azeroth
EXILE’S GATE

OTHER WORKS
THE DREAMING TREE Omnibus:
The Tree of Swords and Jewels
|
The Dreamstone
ALTERNATE REALITIES Omnibus:
Port Eternity
|
Wave Without a Shore
|
Voyager in Night
THE COLLECTED SHORT FICTION OF CJ CHERRYH
ANGEL WITH THE SWORD

DAW Books Collectors No. 1508.

DAW Books are distributed by the Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

All characters and events in this book are fictitious.

All resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental.

The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal, and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

First Printing, April 2011

DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED
U.S. PAT. AND TM. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES
—MARCA REGISTRADA
HECHO EN U.S.A.

ISBN : 978-1-101-54980-3

http://us.penguingroup.com

To Jane.

I
t was an interesting little pile, the stack of wax-stained vellum that occupied the right side of Bren Cameron’s desk, in his office, in Najida estate, on the west coast of the continent.

This stack of letters held treason. It held connivance. It held the intended fall of the whole coast.

It also held a set of interesting names.

Machigi of Taisigi clan was one of them.

Now
there
was a piece of work. A younger man, quite young for a clan lord, in fact, he had inherited the ambitions of his predecessors down on the southern coast, but he had proved himself far, far more clever—and more dangerous.

A child named Tiajo was another name. A child of fifteen—and probably not as innocent of political ambitions as her tender age indicated. Machigi had intended to marry her off, a political wedge into the west coast—and as quickly make her a widow.

Once her husband was dead, of course, her relatives would step in to help run his estate—and that estate, a Maschi clan property, held treaty rights up and down the southeast coast of the continent . . . a district long coveted by Taisigi clan.

The third name, everywhere in those papers, was the addressee and source of those papers: Baiji of Maschi clan, nephew of Lord Geigi of Kajiminda. Baiji, who was the former lord of Kajiminda, betrothed of Tiajo—and the object of Machigi’s long-running plot.

Baiji, who happened, at the moment, to be locked in the basement under Bren Cameron’s feet, a prisoner stripped of all titles.

Najida, Bren’s estate, sat on a peninsula within Sarini Province, on the southwestern coast of the aishidi’tat, the nation-state that spanned the continent. Bren Cameron, paidhi-aiji, was interpreter and advisor to Tabini-aiji, who was ruler of the whole aishidi’tat. And in recent days, Bren himself had become the target of an assassination attempt directed from Taisigi clan.

Hence the sound of hammering, which was distantly audible. The staff was repairing damage to the garden portico from the latest of Machigi’s little ventures . . . and fortifying the house against the next.

Meanwhile, up on the space station, Lord Geigi himself, the lord of Kajiminda
and
of all of Sarini Province, had enough to do running atevi affairs on the station. He had not been pleased to hear the account of his nephew’s misdeeds.

Likewise Ilisidi, Tabini-aiji’s grandmother, the aiji-dowager, who had happened to be Bren-paidhi’s guest—along with her great-grandson Cajeiri, son of Tabini-aiji—had not been pleased with Baiji of Kajiminda
or
his promised bride, no, not in the least.

And factor in the Edi, the aboriginal people of the island of Mospheira. The Edi, uprooted by the treaty that had given that island to humans, had settled on this coast of the continent . . . and had immediately become the enemies of Taisigi clan and their whole district, further south. The Edi, lacking a lord of their own, had been represented in the aishidi’tat by the lords of Kajiminda for the last two centuries, and the Edi were up in arms about their old enemies of Taisigi clan trying to move into that lordship.

Other books

Nine Days by Toni Jordan

Baker Towers by Jennifer Haigh

Elly's Ghost by John R. Kess

Bound to Blackwood by Sharon Lipman

Footsteps of the Hawk by Andrew Vachss

A Heart Decision by Laurie Kellogg

Waking Sarah by Krystal Shannan

CARLOTA FAINBERG by Antonio Muñoz Molina

Scrivener's Tale by Fiona McIntosh

The Obedient Wife (an erotic short story) by Delilah Devlin