The Crystal Variation (123 page)

Her eyebrows lifted.

“An excellent guess,” she said. “Alas, that I must disappoint you. The sign of the house is a grapevine, heavy with fruit. However, several of the revered Maarilex ancestors bred cats as an avocation. The breed is well-established now, and no more to do with Tarnia, save that there are usually cats in the house. And the sculpture, of course.” She inclined her head, gravely. “Well done, Jethri. Now, let us announce ourselves.”

She turned back to the door, and Jethri did, keeping his eyes low. He had the understanding that he’d just passed a test—or even two—and wished that he felt less uncertain on his legs. All that openness, and not a wall or a corridor or an avenue to confine it. He shuddered.

Facing the door was a relief, and it took an active application of will not to lean his head against the vermillion wood. As it happened, that was a smart move, because the door came open all at once, snatched back into the house by a boy no older than ten Standards, Jethri thought—and then revised that estimate down as the kid bowed, very careful, hand over heart, and lisped, “Who requests entry?”

Master ven’Deelin returned the bow with an equal measure of care. “Norn ven’Deelin Clan Ixin is come to make her bow to her foster mother, who has the honor to be Tarnia. I bring with me my apprentice and foster son.”

The kid’s eyes got round and he bowed even lower, a trifle ragged, to Jethri’s eye, and stepped back, sweeping one arm wide.

“Be welcome in our house, Norn ven’Deelin Clan Ixin. Please follow. I will bring you to a parlor and inform the delm of your presence.”

“We are grateful for the care of the House,” Master ven’Deelin murmured, stepping forward.

They followed the kid across an entry chamber floored with the blue stone, polished to a high gloss, from which their boot heels woke stony echoes, then quieted, as they crossed into a carpeted hallway. A dozen steps down the carpet, their guide paused before an open door and bowed.

“The delm comes. Please, be at ease in our house.”

The parlor was smallish—maybe the size of Master ven’Deelin’s office on
Elthoria
—its walls covered in what Jethri took to be pale blue silk. The floor was the same vermillion wood as the front door, and an oval rug figured in pale blue and white lay in the center, around which were situated two upholstered chairs—pale blue—a couch—white—and a low table of white wood. Against the far wall stood a wine table of the same white wood, bottles racked in three rows of six. The top was a polished slab of the local stone, on which half-a-dozen glasses stood, ready to be filled.

“Clan Tarnia makes wine?” he asked Master ven’Deelin, who was standing beside one of the blue chairs, hands tucked into her belt, watching him like he was doing something interesting.

She tipped her head to one side. “You might say so. Just as you might say that Korval makes pilots or that Aragon makes porcelains.”

Whoever
, Jethri thought, irritable with unexpended adrenaline,
they are
.

“Peace,” Master ven’Deelin said. “These things will be made known to you. Indeed, it is one of the reasons we are come here.”

“Another being that even you would be hard put to explain this start to Ixin!” A sharp voice said from the doorway.

Jethri spun, his boot heels squeaking against the polished floor. Master ven’Deelin turned easier, and bowed lightly in a mode he didn’t know.

“Mother, I greet you.”

The old, old woman leaned on her cane, bright eyes darting to his face. Ears burning, he bowed, junior to senior.

“Good-day, ma’am.”

“An optimist, I apprehend.” She looked him up and looked him down, and Jethri wasn’t exactly in receipt of the notion that she liked what she saw.

“Does no one on
Elthoria
know how to cut hair?”

As near as he could track it, the question was asked of the air, and that being so, he should’ve ignored it or let Master ven’Deelin deal. But it was
his
hair under derision, and the theory that it had to grow out some distance before he was presentable as a civilized being wasn’t original with him.

“The barber says my hair needs to grow before he can do anything with it,” he told her, a little more sharply than he had intended.

“And you find that a great impertinence on the side of the barber, do you?”

He inclined his head, just slightly. “I liked it the way it was.”

“Hah!” She looked aside, and Jethri fair sagged in relief to be out from under her eye.

“Norn—I ask as one who stands as your mother: Have you run mad?”

Master ven’Deelin tipped her head, to Jethri’s eye, amused.

“Now, how would I know?” she said, lightly, and moved a hand. “Was my message unclear? I had said I was bringing my foster son to you for—”

“Education and polish,” the old lady interrupted. “Indeed, you did say so. What you did not say, my girl, is that your son is a mess of fashion and awkwardness, barely beyond halfling, and Terran besides!”

“Ah.” Master ven’Deelin bowed—another mystery mode. “But it is precisely because he is Terran that I took him as apprentice. And precisely because of chel’Gaibin that he is my son.”

“chel’Gaibin?” There was a small pause, then a wrinkled hand moved, smoothing the air irritably. “Never mind. That tale will keep, I think. What I would have from you now is what you think we might accomplish here. The boy is Terran, Norn—I say it with nothing but respect. What would you have me teach him?”

“Nothing above the ordinary: The clans and their occupations; the High modes; color and the proper wearing of jewels; the Code.”

“In short, you wish me to sculpt this pure specimen of a Terran into a counterfeit Liaden.”

“Certainly not. I wish you to produce me a gentleman of the galaxy, able to treat with Liaden and Terran equally.”

There was another short pause, while the old lady gave him second inspection, head-top to boot-bottom.

“What is your name, boy?” she asked at last.

He bowed in the mode of introduction. “Jethri Gobelyn.”

“So.” She raised her left hand, showing him the big enameled ring she wore on the third finger. “I have the honor to be Tarnia. You may address me informally as Lady Maarilex. Is there a form of your personal name that you prefer?”

“I prefer Jethri, if you please, ma’am.”

“I will then address you informally as Jethri. Now, I have no doubt that you are fatigued from your journey. Allow me to call one of my house to guide you to your rooms. This evening, prime meal will be served in the small dining room at local hour twenty. There are clocks in your quarters.” She glanced to Master ven’Deelin.

“We have him in the north wing.”

“Excellent,” Master ven’Deelin said.

Jethri wasn’t so sure, himself, but the thought of getting doors and walls between himself and this intense old lady; to have some quiet time to think—that appealed.

So he bowed his gratitude, and Lady Maarilex thumped the floor with her cane loud enough to scare a spacer out of his suit, and the kid who had let them in to the house was there, bowing low.

“Thawlana?”

“Pet Ric, pray conduct Jethri to his rooms in the north wing.”

Another bow, this to Jethri. “If you please?”

He wanted those walls—he did. But there was another portion of him that didn’t want to go off into the deep parts of a grounder house on a planet no Terran ship had ever touched, leaving his last link with space behind. It wasn’t exactly panic that sent him looking at Master ven’Deelin, lips parting, though he didn’t have any words planned to say.

She forestalled him with a gentle bow. “Be at peace, my child. We will speak again at Prime. For now, this my foster mother wishes to ring a terrifying scold down upon me, and she could not properly express herself in the presence of a tender lad.” She moved her hand, fingers wriggling in a shooing gesture. “Go now.”

And that, thought Jethri, was that. Stiffly, he turned back to the kid—Pet Ric—and bowed his thanks.

“Thank you,” he said. “I would be glad of an escort.”

THEY WERE HARDLY
a dozen steps from the parlor when a shadow moved in one of the doorways and a girl flickered out into the hallway, one hand raised imperiously. His guide stopped, and so did Jethri, being unwilling to run him down. The girl was older than Pet Ric—maybe fourteen or fifteen Standards, Jethri guessed—with curly red-brown hair and big, dark blue eyes in a pointy little face. She was dressed in rumpled and stained tan trousers, boots and a shirt that had probably started the day as yellow. A ruby the size of a cargo can lug nut hung round her neck by a long silver chain.

“Is it him? The ven’Deelin’s foster son?” She whispered, looking up and down the hall like she was afraid somebody might overhear her.

“Who else would he be?” Pet Ric answered, sounding pettish to Jethri’s ears.

“Anybody!” she said dramatically. She lowered her hand, raised her chin and looked Jethri straight in the eye.

“Are you Jethri ven’Deelin, then?”

“Jethri Gobelyn,” he corrected. “I have the honor to be Master ven’Deelin’s apprentice.”

“Apprentice?” another voice exclaimed. A second girl stepped out of the doorway, this one an exact duplicate, even in dress, of the first. “Aunt Stafeli said
foster son
.”

“Well, he could be both, couldn’t he?” asked the first girl, and looked back at Jethri. “Are you both apprentice and foster son?”

No getting out of it now
, he thought and inclined his head. “Yes.”

The first girl clapped her hands together and spun to face her sister. “See, Meicha? Both!”

“Both or neither,” Meicha said, cryptically. “We will take over as guide, Pet Ric.”

The boy pulled himself up. “My grandmother gave the duty to me.”

“Aren’t you on door?” asked the girl who wasn’t Meicha.

This appeared to be a question of some substance. Pet Ric hesitated. “Ye-es.”

“What room has the guest been given?” Meicha asked.

“The Mountain Suite.”

“All the way at the end of the north wing? How will you guard the door from there?” She asked, folding her arms over her chest. “It was well for you we happened by, cousin. We will escort the guest to his rooms. You will return to your post.”

“Yes!” applauded her twin. “The house cares for the guest, and the door is held. All ends in honor.”

It might have been that Pet Ric wasn’t entirely convinced of that, Jethri thought, but—on the one hand, his granmam had given him the duty of escorting the guest, and on the second, it seemed clear she’d forgotten about the door.

Abruptly, the boy made up his mind, and bowed to Jethri’s honor.

“I regret, Jethri Gobelyn—my duty lies elsewhere. I leave you in the care of my cousins Meicha and Miandra and look forward to seeing you again soon.”

Jethri bowed. “I thank you for your care and honor your sense of duty. I look forward to renewing our acquaintance.”

“Very pretty,” Meicha said to Miandra. “I believe Aunt Stafeli will have him tutoring us in manner and mode.”

Jethri took pause and considered the two of them, for that might well have been a barb, and he was in no mood for contention.

Miandra it was who raised her hand. “It was a jest, Jethri—may we call you Jethri? You may call us Meicha and Miandra—or
Meichamiandra
, as Ren Lar does!”

“You will find us frightfully light-minded,” Meicha added. “Aunt Stafeli despairs, and says so often.”

“Jethri wants to be alone in his room to rest his head before prime,” Miandra stated, at an abrupt angle to the conversation.

“That’s sensible,” Meicha allowed, and turned about face, marching away down the hall. Between amused and irritated, Jethri followed her, Miandra walking companionably at his side.

“We’ll take you by the public halls this time, though it is longer. Depend upon Aunt Stafeli to quiz you on every detail of the route at Prime. Later, we’ll show you the back halls.”

“That is very kind of you,” Jethri said, slowly. “But I do not think I will be guesting above a few days.”

“Not above a few days?” Meicha looked at him over her shoulder. “Are you certain of that, I wonder, Jethri?”

“Certain, yes.
Elthoria
breaks orbit for Naord in three Standard Days.”

Silence greeted this, which didn’t do much for the comfort of his stomach, but before he could ask them what they knew that he didn’t, Miandra redirected the flow of conversation.

“Is it very exciting, being at the ven’Deelin’s side on the trade floor? We have not had the honor of meeting her, but we have read the tales.”

“Tales?” Jethri blinked at her as they rounded a corner.

“Certainly. Norn ven’Deelin is the youngest trader to have attempted and achieved the amethyst. Alone, she re-opened trade with the Giletti System, which five ambassadors could not accomplish over the space of a dozen years! She was offered the guildmaster’s duty and turned it aside, saying that she better served the Guild in trade.”

“She has taken,” Meicha put in here, “a Terran apprentice trader under her patronage and has sworn to bring him into the Guild.”

The last, of course, he knew. The others, though—

“I am pleased to hear these stories, which I had not known,” he said carefully. “But it must go without saying that Master ven’Deelin is legend.”

They laughed, loudly and with obvious appreciation; identical notes of joy sounding off the wooden walls.

“He does well. In truth,” gasped Meicha, “the ven’Deelin is legend. Yes, even so.”

“We will show you the journals, in the library, if you would enjoy them,” Miandra said. “Perhaps tomorrow?”

“That would be pleasant,” he said, as they began to ascend a highly polished wooden staircase of distressing height. “However, I stand at Master ven’Deelin’s word, and she has not yet discussed my duties here with—”

“Oh, certainly!” Meicha cut him off. “It is understood that the ven’Deelin’s word must carry all before it!”

“Except Aunt Stafeli,” said Miandra.

“Sometimes,” concluded Meicha; and, “Do you find the steps difficult, Jethri?”

He bit his lip. “My home ship ran light gravity, and I am never easy in heavy grav.”