Local Custom (18 page)

At one side of the room, the rug broke and flowed around a hearth of dark gray stone laid with white logs. The mantle that framed the fireplace was of a glossy reddish wood she could not identify, carved with a central medallion slightly larger than her fist. The design tantalized a moment before she named it—a Compass Rose, pure in the smooth red wood.

Turning from the fireplace, she nearly fell over the table and two comfortable-looking chairs. On top of the table was a board, margins painted with fanciful designs. The center of the board was marked into blue and brown squares, bounded by larger borders, like countries. There were twelve countries in all, Anne counted, each containing twelve small squares.

On the table outside the board were four twelve-sided ebony dice. Two shallow wooden bowls likewise sat to hand, each filled with oval pebbles. The pebbles in the right bowl were red; those in the left, yellow.

"Do you play, Professor Davis?" Daav yos'Phelium inquired suddenly from her side.

She glanced up with only a slight start and shook her head. "It's a counterchance board, isn't it?"

"Indeed it is. You must ask my brother to teach you—he's a fiend for the game, you know. And very good, besides." He flashed a smile up into her face, humor crinkling the corners of his eyes. "Although of course it wouldn't do for him to hear I've said so."

Anne laughed. "No, I can see that would be a—bad move."

"Precisely," he agreed, raising his glass. "I've left young Shan scouting for rabbits," he continued after a moment, gesturing toward the window and the child kneeling motionless before it, nose pressed to the glass.

"That should keep him busy until lunch," she said, grinning. "There's a shortage of rabbits on University."

"Ah. Well, there are more than enough here for him to enjoy, never fear it." He tipped his head slightly, black eyes quizzical.

Anne lifted her glass—and brought it down as a low move to the right caught her attention.

"What a beautiful cat!" she breathed.

Daav yos'Phelium turned his head. "Lady Dignity, how kind of you to join us! Come in, do, and give grace to the guest."

The cat paused in her progress across the carpet, considering him out of round blue eyes. After a moment, she sat down, brought up a paw and began to wash her face.

"Wanton," the man said calmly and Anne laughed.

"Lady Dignity?" she asked. "Is she very shy?"

"Merely shatterbrained, I fear, and a great deal set up in her own esteem. She does well in her role, however, so I don't like to complain."

"Her role?" She glanced expressively around her. "Tell me you have mice!"

He laughed—full and rich, a world apart from Er Thom's soft, infrequent laughter. "No, how could I? But she's useful, nonetheless."

Anne looked to where the cat had settled, chicken-fashion, onto the carpet, front paws tucked under creamy chest, blue eyes half-closed within the mask of darker fur.

"She frightens off unwanted guests," she suggested and Daav opened his black eyes wide.

"Isn't that why I keep a butler? No, I will tell you—" He sipped wine, glanced over at the cat, then back to Anne.

"My sister is very proper," he began earnestly, "and I am a great trial to her. She says I have no dignity and I fear she may be correct. Still, scolding will not create what the gods have not provided and I confess I grew tired of being reminded of my deficiency."

He used his chin to point at the drowsing cat. "So I have employed this lady, here, to act in my behalf. Now, whenever my sister demands to know where my dignity is, I can produce her upon the instant."

Anne stared at him, a smile growing slowly, curving her big mouth and lighting her eyes. The smile turned to a chuckle and she shook her head at him in mock severity.

"Your poor sister! I don't expect she was amused."

Daav sighed dolefully, eyes glinting. "Alas, the gods were behindhand in Kareen's sense of fun."

"Daav!" This from Shan, vigilant at the window. "Look, Daav! Cat!"

"Good gods, in
my
garden?" He was gone, moving across the carpet with a quick, silent stride to lean over the boy's shoulder.

Anne drifted over just in time to see an enormous orange-and-white cat slink into the bushes at the base of a small tree.

"Relchin," Daav said. "Doubtless gone birding." He glanced up at Anne. "He never catches any, you know, but the chase does amuse him."

"Exercise," she agreed, seriously.

"Indeed," he murmured and seemed about to say something else, when there was a step at the door.

"Ah, there you are, brother! We were only just wondering when you might return and free us all to dine!" He slid past Anne and crossed the room, blocking her view of Er Thom's face. "How do you find your mother my aunt?"

"A trifle—distressed—today." Er Thom's voice was soft and smooth as always, yet Anne felt apprehension shiver through her as she reached down to take Shan's hand.

"Er Thom, if your mother is not—able—to take on the burden of a guest—" she began, and that quickly he was before her, looking seriously up into her eyes.

"No such thing," he told her, softly, though she was cold with sudden dread. "She sends apology to the guest, that she will be unable to greet you instantly upon your arrival. She looks forward to the pleasure of your company at Prime meal this evening."

She stared down into his eyes, feeling—
knowing
—that there was something wrong—badly wrong. Er Thom was lying to her. The thought—the surety—shocked her into still wordlessness.

"Anne?" He extended a hand and she caught it tightly, as if it were a thrown rope and she floundering far out of her depth.

"What's wrong?" she demanded, voice raspy and dry. "Er Thom—"

His fingers were firm, giving back pressure for pressure; his eyes never wavered from hers.

"My mother is—inconvenienced," he said patiently. "She is not able to meet you at once, but shall surely do so at Prime." His grip increased, painfully, but she made no move to withdraw her fingers. "You are welcome in my House, Anne. Please."

She held his eyes, his hand, for another heartbeat, trying desperately to plumb the wrongness, identify the ill. At last, defeated, she bowed her head and slid her fingers free.

"All right," she said softly, and raised her head in time to see Daav yos'Phelium's bold black eyes move slowly from her face to Er Thom's.

NUNCHEON PASSED IN a flurry of small-talk, of which Er Thom's brother apparently possessed an unending supply. It seemed absurd, Anne thought as she nibbled cheese, that she should have found him strange and formidable scarcely an hour ago. Now, he was merely an amusing young man with a flair for the dramatic and a penchant for telling the most ridiculous stories with an entirely straight face.

He's a bit like Jerzy, really,
she thought around a stab of homesickness.

Er Thom's contributions to the conversation were slight: Set-ups for his cha'leket's absurd stories and tolerant corroborations of unlikely events. Mostly, he busied himself with feeding Shan bits of cheese and slices of fruit from the plate he had filled for himself.

Anne, watching surreptitiously, thought Shan accounted for nearly all of the plate's contents, and that Er Thom perhaps had a taste of cheese with his wine.
Worried,
she thought, and wondered how ill his mother was.

When at last nuncheon was over, Daav walked them down the long hall to the door and gave Er Thom another hug.

"Don't keep yourself far," he said and Er Thom smiled—wanly, Anne thought, and caught his brother's arm.

"Come to Prime, do."

Daav's eyes opened wide. "What, tonight?"

"Why not?"

"An excellent question. I shall come in all my finery. In the meanwhile, commend me to your mother."

Er Thom's smile this time was a little less tense. Daav bent to hug Shan and kiss his cheek.

"Nephew. Come and visit me often, eh? I think we shall deal famously."

Shan returned the embrace and the kiss with exuberance, then stood back to wave.

"'Bye, Daav."

The man bowed lightly—as between kin, Anne read. "Until soon, young Shan."

"Professor Davis." The bow he accorded her was of respect. "We shall speak again, I hope. I have read your work, you know, and would welcome a chance to discuss your ideas more fully, if you will grant it."

"That would be pleasant," she told him, returning his bow with one of respect to a delm not one's own. "I look forward to it."

"Good." His eyes were intent on hers and she felt again that he was utterly beyond her, more alien than she could fathom.

"In the meanwhile," he said, all gentle courtesy, "if there is any matter in which I may serve you, please know that I am entirely at your disposal."

"Thank you," she said, matching his inflection as precisely as possible. "You are gracious and—kind—to a stranger."

For one moment more, the black eyes seared into hers, then he was bowing them gracefully out the door.

"Until Prime," he called, lifting a hand as Er Thom started the landcar. "Keep well, all."

 
The best advice for any Terran with a yen to visit the beautiful planet of Liad is: Stay home.

—From "A Terran's Guide to Liad"

"THE NAME OF THE valley," Er Thom said, deliberately—Anne thought—to cut off any additional questions she might ask, "is Valcon Berant'a. Korval's Valley, they say in Solcintra. It was ceded by the passengers to Cantra yos'Phelium and Tor An yos'Galan, for the piloting fee. Jelaza Kazone was built first, of course, after the Tree was planted. Trealla Fantrol—the house of yos'Galan—that came later. It was built as a—sentinel post, you would say—to guard the inroad, to act as first deterrent—and to give warning to the delm."

Anne looked out the window at the lush landscape, turning this burst of information over in her mind.
Valcon Berant'a
? The Liaden name Er Thom had given did
not
mean 'Korval's Valley'. It meant, she decided after a moment of concentrated thought, 'Dragon's Price,' or perhaps 'Dragon Hoard'.

"A sentinel post," she asked as Er Thom slowed and made the turn into another drive. "Were there wars?"

"Ah, well, in the old times, you know, there were—disharmonies. Things did not always run smoothly and the Council of Clans did not always agree. Daav says civilized behavior is never to be depended upon." He laughed his soft laugh, so different from his cha'leket's. "Do not fear that I ask you to guest in a fortress, friend. Trealla Fantrol has—amenities. Very soon, now . . . "

It was, in fact, a matter of three more minutes and two more twists in the tree-lined drive. The car passed under an arch rich with yellow flowers and entered a sweeping curve.

Er Thom pulled up to the bottom of the stairway and turned the car off. Anne sat and tried not to stare, Shan completely still on her lap.

Trealla Fantrol was a mansion, with a marble stairway and towering granite facade. Windows glittered like diamonds among the gray stone and lawns like plush green velvet sloped away on both sides.

"This is the outpost?" she demanded in a voice that cracked. After the warm hominess of Daav's house . . . 

"All of us would live at Jelaza Kazone," Er Thom said quietly, "if we could." He lay a light hand on her arm and immediately took it away.

"Come, allow me to show you and our son to your rooms. I will leave you for a time, so that you might refresh yourselves and rest. One has been engaged to care for our son—Mrs. Intassi, who had been our nurse when we were young. She will arrive before Prime. I shall instruct Mr. pak'Ora to conduct her to you immediately . . . "

Chattering,
Anne thought, in no little wonder, as Er Thom came around to her side of car and lifted Shan to his feet.
Er Thom is actually chattering
.

Chattering, he brought them up the marble stairway, through the front door and across the echoing lobby, up the Grand Staircase—each riser hand-carved with a scene from the Great Migration—down an interminable hallway to her room.

"The house has your palmprint on file," he told her as the door slid open. "If you do not find all precisely as you would wish it, only tell me and the deficiency will be corrected." He looked up at her, chatter suddenly broken as his eyes took fire. He glanced away.

"I am sorry to leave you so abruptly, Anne. I—necessity. Later, if you like it, I shall show you the house—and the grounds." He lay a hand on her arm and this time did not remove it so quickly. "My private code is in your computer. If there is—any way—in which I may serve you, do not hesitate . . . "

"All right," she said soothingly and against all sense extended a hand to stroke his cheek, meaning only to ease his nervousness.

As soon as she touched him, she knew it was a mistake; she barely needed to hear the sharp intake of his breath, or see the blaze of his eyes, which echoed the re-awakened blaze of her desire.

Ensorcelled yet again, she looked helplessly into his eyes, her hand trembling against his cheek, unwilling—unable—to move.

It was Er Thom who moved.

A single step, backward, his eyes hot on hers. Her hand fell, lifeless, to her side and he bowed: Esteem and respect.

"I shall return," he said, very softly indeed. "Please. Be at ease in our House."

He turned on his heel and was gone, the door closing behind him with the barest whisper of sound.

HE CAME AS ORDERED to her private parlor, dressed in plain shirt and trousers, with the dust of the Port still on his boots, and made his bow, dutiful and low.

"Mother."

"My son."

Petrella surveyed him from her chair, meaning to make him writhe while she leisurely surveyed the wind-rumpled golden hair, the delicate wing of brow over eyes more purple than blue, the pleasing symmetry of face, and the firm, give-me-no-nonsense mouth. Er Thom, the son who was not her son. Chi's work, this one, returned at last to the mother who bore him on his twelfth name day, when he boarded
Dutiful Passage
as cabin boy.