Ambassador 4: Coming Home by Patty Jansen Read Free Book Online Page A

he should play.”
    “I told you that you should stand for the position,” Thayu said.
    I snorted. She had to be kidding.
    Veyada said, “Legally speaking, we’re dealing with two conflicting issues. One: your correspondence is yours and you are responsible for it. On the other hand, gamra bylaws say that Delegates should not step outside the task assigned to them without consulting others.”
    Nicha snorted. “Have you ever done anything that’s inside your assigned task?”
    I said, “Veyada, does that mean ‘Do as you wish’?”
    “You got it.”
    “Hmm. Delegate Namion will be pissed with me if I send him the correspondence. He will also be pissed with me if I don’t send it.”
    “So: send?” Thayu said.
    “Yeah. Why not? At least he can’t accuse me of keeping information from him.” And I wouldn’t have to worry about all those messages in the three seconds he would take to blow up and come blast my ear about it.
    Come to think of it, I didn’t even know him well enough to be certain that blasting ears was his style. “Let’s do it. Give me the other stuff that needs to be dealt with.”
    Thayu sent me a much trimmed-down list of messages. In fact, once I had dealt with a decent number of messages by simply filing them, scheduling them or replying Yes or No , I started to see the last messages that had arrived in the account before I left, before the entire world was turned upside down.
    The last one I had opened was a message from Marin Federza—
    Crap. I should make some inquiries about him.
    “Thay’, have you seen or heard from Federza since coming back?”
    “Thankfully, no.”
    “Me neither,” Nicha said. “No great loss.”
    “I’m kind of serious. He was deposed as leader of the Aghyrians, sacked from his position as Trader Delegate, shot at when he was in my apartment, had the windows shot out of his apartment and his office trashed, and didn’t come to the last assembly meeting before we left. He’s not here and no one seems to be worried about it.”
    “He probably turned up and has simply gone back to his Trader life. He’s got a house and an office in town. And since he’s a Trader, he’s probably travelling.”
    Nicha was probably right, but it didn’t dispel my unease. Federza didn’t seem the type of person who would just quietly disappear. “If I send him a message, that will get to him wherever he is, right?”
    “The Trader Guild has their own satellites, so yeah. It will even bypass the regular public Exchange channels and, if he’s off world, it will have no lag time or booking time.” He still sounded as if he wondered why I bothered.
    So I sent Federza a message, with apologies for my sudden absence and some other vague stuff. It was all strict business, and it was bullshit, but I would feel a lot better if he replied. I disliked the man deeply, but that didn’t mean I wished him ill.
    A bit higher up in the list was a message from Menor that I hadn’t read. It said that he was going home to Hedron for a brief visit. In case we needed his services, he provided a list of dates that he’d be available. Very clinical and professional, avoiding the term “sperm donor”.
    Thayu stopped me staring at the screen and came to stand next to me.
    “Oh,” she said in a low voice. “Have you replied anything to him?”
    “Wasn’t that your decision?” I met her eyes. “We can call him now and you can be pregnant this week. The little Azimi brat can have a playmate.”
    “Hey!” Nicha protested. “You’re talking about my son.”
    Thayu said, “What if we happen to be in the small percentage of people who do interbreed and I have a third child. I don’t want to have to abort if it’s yours.” Tears glistened briefly in her eyes. “I don’t want to forfeit my right to live on Asto. You will have to be careful, too.”
    “Does the two-child limit apply to me?”
    “You’re Domiri clan. I think it does.”
    “Veyada would know,” I said.
    “It