Visitor

  Prakuyo paused, parsing her words, perhaps, and then gave booming approval. “Nine. Felicitous nine years! Yes.” Which led one to wonder how mature kyo reckoned nine years to be. “Ilisidi dowager.” Prakuyo bowed. “We are welcomed! Here see Matuanu an Matu and Hakuut an Ti. Welcome!”

  “They are indeed welcome. We are glad to see you in good health, nand’ Prakuyo. We did not expect your visit so soon, but you have arrived in good order, we presume, with some matters to discuss. We have arranged a good supper. Bindanda is here to manage the kitchen. You remember Bindanda, perhaps.”

  “Danda-ji?” Prakuyo repeated, pulling that name out of her uncompromising welcome. “Teacakes!”

  “Indeed there shall be,” Ilisidi said. “And very shortly there will be supper. Will you join us?”

  “Supper,” Prakuyo said. “Yes. Yes. Good. Very good.” He gave a little bow, and rendered an enthusiastic explanation to his companions, who stood by with the baggage.

  “Here,” Bren said, motioning to the open door on the far side, “guest room. All good. Prakuyo’s.”

  “Guest room,” Prakuyo said, and explained it to his companions with more words, all related to the topic, all enthusiastic, all happy, and possibly involving where to put the luggage.

  God, Bren thought, seeing their guests bow and go off to see the guest quarters—it was going so astonishingly well. No hostility, no threats, no demands or conditions. Prakuyo seemed to be in charge, the others backing him up—perhaps even serving as bodyguards, the same as Banichi and Jago had been with him on the ship. Perhaps they were just there as a reciprocation of numbers. They were an assorted lot, Matuanu larger than Prakuyo, and Hakuut not as tall as either.

  Prakuyo and his companions entered into their guest room, with booming and thumping and excited voices. They were discussing the furnishings, and perhaps the disposition of luggage.

  They were aboard. They were in. Nobody was angry. He felt drained of energy. Relieved. Exhausted. Feverishly anxious to talk with Prakuyo and apprehensive at once.

  And they’d only started.

  “They seem happy,” Cajeiri said.

  “Seeming is not being,” Ilisidi said. “And they will think the same of us, since persons sent so far to speak to us are surely not shallow-minded or feckless.”

  Cajeiri bit his lip. “We shall not be feckless, mani,” he said quietly.

  “Indeed,” Ilisidi said. “One would not countenance it.”

  Bren cast a look at his aishid, looking for cues. Ilisidi had come only with Cenedi, and Cajeiri had come out without any of his young bodyguards. The Guild Observers were behind closed doors. There were a far greater number of Guild not in view than present in this room, and one wondered if things outside were proceeding as smoothly, regarding the ship.

  “Have we heard from Jase-aiji, nadiin-ji?” he asked.

  “The kyo ship is holding its position, nandi,” Banichi said quietly. Tano and Algini, among those not in sight, were undoubtedly tapped into the information flow, right along with Geigi, right along with Jase, who bridged between this room and ops’ opinion of that ship. “They are staying under their own power, maintaining as they were.”

  Not relaxing their guard, surely. He was not wholly surprised at that. It was much what they had done at Reunion.

  “Is Jase coming down?” he asked.

  “He will, but he will stay to your suite, nandi, unless requested otherwise.”

  His suite. Which was connected to information constantly, where Tano and Algini were in touch with Geigi, and with Jase, and Jase was connected to ship-com.

  Nobody was relaxing yet.

  One wondered if Prakuyo was investigating the communications he had in the guest suite. It would give him, mediated through ops, as good a link to the kyo ship as they had. The display screen beside it was locked on the same view they had had, the exterior of the kyo ship on camera. That, they hoped, would tell Prakuyo what the communications unit connected to.

  Or perhaps Prakuyo would decline to experiment, and ask him. He thought, if he were in Prakuyo’s place, that would be his choice—not to give those watching a notion he was reckless.

  Prakuyo was occasionally demonstrative. But not, he thought, reckless in any sense.

  “Tell Jase to tell me if there is contact with the ship,” he said.

  Record that contact, if it happened?

  That was a given. They were recording everything.

  17

  Dinner, when it arrived, an event quietly announced by staff, brought them out of their quarters, and the kyo likewise ventured forth quietly, now dressed in loose patterned robes, Matuanu’s greenish blue and Hakuut’s greenish gold, muted shades which agreed with their gray, freckled complexion. Prakuyo’s, however, was various shades of off-white, bringing to mind his curiosity, two years ago, about Bren’s clothing, which, as paidhi, was shades of white on formal occasions—like their visits to a kyo ship. Was it deliberate? Was he saying, in his own way, I’m here to hear and be heard? Or had his interest simply reflected a personal preference or a mark of rank?

  They boomed and hummed softly in apparent appreciation of the elaborate table setting, and taking their cue from their hosts, they sat down at the table only after the dowager had been seated, settling in the chairs, which were generously wide even by atevi standards.

  Perfect. Bren heaved a great sigh of relief as staff began to serve the drinks—fruit juice, this evening, in addition to the water. The fare was safe for humans, and therefore safe for kyo—Prakuyo having survived it in the past. They had had no means to inquire about the acceptability or the safety of alcohol, but at the sharp flare of nostrils and interest from Prakuyo when staff poured vodka into the dowager’s fruit juice—

  Prakuyo indicated his own glass.

  “Maybe safe, maybe not safe,” Bren cautioned.

  “Safe,” Prakuyo declared, quite definitely, though he smelled it and tasted it carefully when served, then gave a rapid series of soft booms that drew interest from the others.

  So it was vodka all around, except Cajeiri’s glass. “Moderately for our guests, very moderately,” Bren said to staff, none of whom were fools.

  The courses were a great success, all round, food, drink—even conversation, limited as it was, in the dual mode, kyo, then Ragi and Ragi, then kyo, expressions which, without the little screen handy at the table, Bren struggled to remember. Yet. There was a little reminiscence of dinner at Reunion, which triggered a lengthy spate of Prakuyo talking to his companions.

  And there was discussion, too, involving the centerpiece, two bits of driftwood, arranged artfully with a bit of water-smoothed stone.

  “Come away planet?”

  “It came from the planet, yes,” Bren said in Ragi, then in his best kyo effort. “Wood. The wood comes from trees.”

  “Wood. Trees,” Prakuyo repeated, carefully, and appeared to translate, to nods and bobs from his companions. “Alive? Now dead?”

  Bren nodded, and with an upward gesture. “Tall.”

  “Not food.”

  Bren nodded. They’d had fruit on the kyo ship, and bread. Grains. Prakuyo had lived on fish and synthetics for six years on Reunion, which had not sufficed for him, though whether quantity or substance was at issue remained a question.

  “Does your world have trees, Prakuyo-nandi?” Ilisidi asked, a step into what might be more sensitive territory—but reciprocal. Bren translated it.

  From the exchanged looks, there was a little consideration on that point. Then the smallest said something, and Prakuyo nodded.

  “Trees,” Prakuyo said, and indicated something very wide rather than tall. He offered a kyo word, which Bren repeated, then, indicating the stone, another word, also repeated. Then . . . with a lift of his water glass, Prakuyo made a gesture, as if holding something in one hand, smoothing it with the palm of the o
ther, and offered two more words, similar, but with an added sound, ka. Perhaps stone and wood altered from its original form? By water? A third mimed gesture. This time, he held something in his hand, and seemed to carve it with his dinner knife. Another pair of words, same core, with ba attached.

  Stone and wood . . . altered by intent? Words altered by suffix, denoting by nature and worked by hand?

  No conclusion. Yet. But an interesting possibility—all from a simple centerpiece.

  No atevi art existed without purpose. And no centerpiece landed on this table without careful consideration. Kabiu dictated a dining table should have something at its heart, and the usual flowers were not easily to be had here. Atevi might read meaning into the choice and color and number of blooms . . . but Ilisidi and her major d’ had chosen items so basic, so important—

  So very basic to the planet.

  It was not casual, that choice. Ba and ka might be a tricky way of describing materials. Or artwork. But atevi talked in presentation pieces and table arrangement. There was more to the statement, in atevi terms. It was about basics, and foundations, the beginning of a relationship.

  But it was also, under these circumstances, planetary geology on a plate, for the discerning eye. The action of water and gravity and time on two things very durable. Physics.

  More, it was a gesture of openness, that arrangement, revealing aspects of the planet below them. Three species from three worlds sitting together at a table and the object in the middle of it all, a representation of one of the most fundamental aspects of nature—atevi kabiu, at its finest.

  And the kyo had taken the bait. Chance had nothing to do with an atevi arrangement settling kabiu. He had been occupied with his pictures. Ilisidi had laid the traditional opening statement on the table, and asked—Does your world have trees? Do trees find their way to moving water, to weather like this? Is this sedimentary rock, smoothed by ages, recognizable in process?

  This is our world.

  Do you recognize it?

  We find both beauty and symbol in these items.

  Do you?

  Prakuyo touched his eye, and pointed to the object. Laid a hand on his midriff. “Good,” he said.

  “Indeed,” Ilisidi said, and gave a little nod. “One is gratified.”

  Triumph. At least in setting a tone, and making a statement—and discovering that, first, kyo recognized natural from manmade in that item, and that they were sensitive to symbology.

  That invited questions, at an appropriate time, about those kyo colors, and patterns.

  Wide trees? Low-lying woody vegetation? There was surely water in some abundance.

  And what ceremony had kyo offered their arrival on the kyo ship?

  Pure water. Among other things edible. And Prakuyo’s water consumption, while a guest aboard the ship, had been considerable.

  They preferred dimmer light, cloyingly thick, to a human, air, so it was possible Prakuyo’s gesture had described not the width of trees, but the wide expanse of forests—

  Bren made a mental note for one of the first images to bring up, when they got down to business.

  Prakuyo’s skin seemed sensitive, thin, about the face—lack of protection from the sun’s ultraviolet rays? Their colors seemed muted, browned to human senses. Might kyo see ranges of color neither humans nor atevi saw? The booming and thumping that was so much a part of their communication had the power to make the very table vibrate. Might they feel those vibrations through, not just ears, but other internal organs that were, so far, not even guessed at? To his recollection, sounds carried better through water, through water-laden air—would they change in greater barometric pressure? He was a linguist, not a physicist.

  The arrival of the main course, a pasta with green sauce, met with great approval, and drew its own conversation.

  It was sparse, very slow conversation, more eating than talking at most times. Servants came and went. Bren had asked for no more than a taste of the vodka, and ate lightly. As the meal drew to an end, and before the dessert course, Bindanda, as was Ragi custom, put in his appearance and gave a little bow, to receive his due for the meal.

  Prakuyo recognized him at once. Perhaps it was Bindanda’s size. Geigi himself didn’t equal Bindanda’s prosperity.

  “Is this Danda-ji?” Prakuyo exclaimed, and rose, making a strange little hum.

  “Indeed,” Bren said, “indeed it is.”

  “Teacakes!” Prakuyo said. “Good! Good food!”

  “Prakuyo-nandi,” Bindanda said, bowing, and replied, with satisfaction, “Teacakes there shall be, nandiin, immediately!”

  Bindanda vanished, and shortly after, staff brought out a plate, yes, of orangelle teacakes, fresh from the oven.

  It was a crowning success. There was more than one plate of teacakes, and not a one left by the time they were through.

  “Good,” another of the kyo remarked. “Good. Good.”

  “Excellently done,” Ilisidi said, and made a move of her hand, summoning Cenedi, who stood behind her chair. Cenedi handed her her cane, turned her chair from the table, and Ilisidi rose. They all must. The kyo likewise rose.

  “We shall sleep now,” Ilisidi declared. “We wish our guests a good night.”

  No brandy. It was not Ilisidi’s habit to retire without it. And leave a potentially good conversation? She was the soul of curiosity.

  No. It was not weariness. It was a maneuver.

  “May I stay, mani?” Cajeiri asked.

  “Young people should have their sleep,” Ilisidi declared, at which Cajeiri let his own surprise show, but he dutifully bowed to the company and attended his great-grandmother in her retreat.

  Their door closed. Bren said, first in Ragi, then in kyo. “We may sit and talk, Prakuyo-ji, if you wish. Sleep or talk?”

  “Talk,” was Prakuyo’s answer.

  “Banichi-ji. Jago-ji. Go tell Narani we shall need him.”

  Silent bows, Guild-style. His aishid left, into his suite, and shut the door, not only to bring Narani, but ready to exchange with Tano and Algini what they had observed, and to hear what they had perceived—a quick analysis of what had happened and where things stood, which could flow by back passages to the Observers, to Jase if he was present, and from Jase to Geigi, to Gin, to Sabin and Ogun.

  Advise the kyo formally that they were welcome to contact their ship? Of course. He wanted them to do that. He wanted neither side to grow nervous.

  • • •

  And there could be more teacakes. With tea very slightly laced with brandy. Narani served, with Bindanda—who had shed his kitchen apron and turned up in a servant’s modest coat: an elderly man and a middle-aged and portly one, both Guild themselves, keen observers, and quick to take a cue. Banichi and Jago came back to stand watch.

  Bren settled at the table in the kyo’s outer room, and the kyo sat down, one human and three kyo, a company of eight. Asicho saved the felicity, coming and going by turns, listening, cleaning up.

  “These kyo?” Bren asked, unwilling to assign rank, or to use that touchy word associate.

  “Matuanu an Matu. Hakuut an Ti.”

  Well, that gained nothing.

  “Association?”

  Prakuyo waved a hand, boomed softly, said something involving the names in kyo, then in Ragi:. “Matuanu an Matu Banichi. Hakuut an Ti computer.”

  A bodyguard. And a computer tech?

  “Bodyguard. Aishid?”

  “Yes. Aishid.”

  “I understand.” Gesture to eye and head. Booming and nodding from the kyo.

  Bodyguard. Or something very close. Someone who protected. But weapons and body armor were not in evidence, unless they wore them beneath the robes. Matuanu, largest of the three in girth, had a distinctive double wrinkling at the corners of his mouth that gave him a perpetually amused look. But it was not, on
e had always to remind oneself, a smile: it was the set of the folds.

  Hakuut was the shortest and slightest of the three, with a mouth quite lacking in folds and a shadowing beneath the eyes that might be cosmetic—or natural. It made the eyes very distinct, pale by comparison, and the movement of those eyes was attention-getting, quick and lively. If cosmetics, did it indicate rank? Gender? Personal preference? One had no idea. And were the darting glances apprehension, or just curiosity about everything around him?

  Those eyes sparkled when Bindanda, on request, brought in four tablet computers—that had been a mild emergency, procurement of two more of those, with Geigi’s off-site help, but the devices had arrived before dinner, exactly the same as the others, and instantly loading themselves with all the information the moment they located their assigned group, clever little machines.

  Bren turned his on, demonstrating the button, then wished Narani to hand their guests the others. There were styli to hand about—Bren had thought of that item, recalling similar tools on the kyo ship; and the kyo had no question at all how to use them. Hakuut did a mouth-gape and uttered a little set of clicks as a button-push brought the screen up with the same image as Bren’s, a world in space.

  Programming had dealt with that. Bren had the master code, which brought all the screens into sync, and displayed whatever image he chose.

  He called up a picture of a star and touched the star with his stylus. The area glowed. Then he touched the right side of the screen, and from the machine’s speakers came, in Ragi, “Star.” He lifted his stylus. Touched the left side of the screen. It said the word in kyo. “Pak.”

  “Star,” and lifted his finger. A second touch and his own voice played back, naming the object.

  Hakuut’s eyes widened. Fingers twitched, the stylus tapped. “Star,” his machine said. And if a kyo could show a childlike delight in a toy, that was the body language, even the momentary expression, mouth open, stylus poised. Tap. “Star.” Then: “Pak.” Tap. Tap again. The machine said, “Pak.”

  The others figured it. “Excellent!” Prakuyo proclaimed it. “Good!”