He loved this hallway. It had something quite rare in atevi architecture, a technique perhaps borrowed, centuries ago, from Mospheirans. The wing ended in a stained-glass window, a huge affair: staff had lit the outside lanterns, which only hinted at its colors. He looked forward to morning, when its smoldering reds and blues and golds would bloom into pastels and light, a rare representation of an actual object—atevi art was given to patterns completely overwhelming any hint of a person or a tree or a landscape. This was indisputably a tree, with branches more natural than patterned, and he loved the piece. He’d almost, of all things, forgotten it; and the little he could see of it was precious to him, the final touch on his homecoming. He loved this whole place—small, as lordly houses went, cozy. He found himself completely at peace as he entered the dining room, smelled the savory aromas wafting in from the service hall, and met three familiar faces—serving staff he and Banichi and Jago had known and trusted for years.
“Nadiin-ji,” he said warmly. “So very good to see you.”
“Nandi.” Bows. Equally warm greetings. “Will a before-dinner drink be in order?”
He named it, an old favorite, perfectly safe.
And saw those three calm expressions change to shock, as Toby entered—with Barb clinging to his arm and with her blonde curly head pressed against his shoulder. Laughing.
His face must have registered almost the same shock as his servants. Toby stopped, taking the cue. Barb left Toby and came and hooked her arm into his, tugging at him as he stood fast.
“Bren. This place is so marvelous.”
“Thank you,” he said, and disengaged his arm enough to bow slightly, to Toby, then, in complete disengagement, to her. He said, then, soberly: “Customs are different here. People don’t touch. Forgive me.”
“Well, but we’re family,” Toby said, trying to cover it all.
“So are my staff,” Bren said shortly. It was an unhappy moment. He saw resentment in his brother, beyond just a natural embarrassmentc old, old issue, the matter of atevi culture, which, the more he had taken it on, had separated him further and further from Tobyc and their mother. And thatwas the sore point. “Sorry, Toby. Sit down. What will you drink? No beer, I’m afraid. We have vodka and some import wine. Vodka and shebai is good. I recommend it.” He was talking too much, too urgently. He was on the verge of embarrassing his staff as well as himself, doing their job instead of translating. And he resented the situation Barb had put him in. “Take the shebai.”
“Sure,” Toby said. “Barb?”
“White wine.”
He turned and translated for the staff. “Nand’ Toby will enjoy shebai. Barb-daja will have the pale wine, nadiin-ji. Forgive them.” He saw, in the tail of his eye, Barb reattaching herself to Toby, and he didn’t know what to do about it.
Neither did his staff, who would have seated them.
“Toby. Barb. Take those endmost seats, if you please. Toby. Please.”
“I think he means no touching,” Toby said to Barb, attempting humor. Barb actually blushed vivid pink, and shot him a look.
Jago shot a look back, Bren caught that from the tail of his eye as he turned to sit down, and as he took his seat at the head of the table, Banichi simply walked to Toby’s end of the dining room, in the ample space the reduced table size allowed, and stood there, looming over the couple while a very embarrassed servant moved to seat first Toby, who had started to seat Barb himself. It was a thoroughly bollixed set of social signalsc and dammit, Toby had guested here. Toby knew better.
“Toby always sits first,” Bren said in Mosphei’, to Barb. He didn’t add that Toby, as his brother, outranked Barb—and that the staff’s opinion of Barb’s social standing was surely sinking faster by the minute. He could imagine the talk in the kitchenc questions as to whether Toby had brought an entertainer—and a stupid one, at that—to a formal dinner under his brother’s very proper roof.
It was a social disaster and he was furious at Barb: Toby clearly knew better; and Barb was not that unread—but no, Barb decided she could push the whole atevi social system, here, under his roof, to assert herself—which Toby might or might not read the same way, and there was no way on earth he was going to convince Toby what her game really was. There was no way he could bring it up at the dinner table, for damned sure.
There was one way to defuse it gracefully: diplomacy, the art of saying what one didn’t believe, in order to swing the behavior toward what one wanted: guidance, more than lying. So he needed to have had a special talk with them. He clearly needed to have a talk with them, but not now, with personal embarrassment in the mix. It was likely Banichi and Jago would have that talk—by now, he was sure they intendedto have it in Mosphei’ the minute they had the chance, and logically they wouldhave had it immediately with Toby’s personal guard, if Toby had arrived with onec which, of course, he hadn’t—unless one counted Barb. It was the sort of social glitch-up and attitude that had led to the War of the Landing. Humans were sure atevi would adapt to their very friendly way with just enough encouragement. Atevi—who didn’t even have a word for friendship— assumed humans, who seemed so intelligent, would eventually learn civilized manners. Atevi assumed since they owned the planet, humans were in theirhouse, while humans considered that they could just naturally get atevi to relax the rules, since their motives were the bestc or for mutual profit.
“Drinks will arrive momentarily,” Bren said quietly. “I do owe you both a profound apology for not mentioning certain things beforehand. This is a formal occasion. It’s my fault.”
“You’ve been here too long,” Toby said, and it came out like a retort.
“I live here,” Bren said, just a trifle unwisely: he knew that once he’d said it, and added, the truth: “I won’t likely live on Mospheira again. So yes, I’ve changed.” That, for Barb, just a trifle pointedly, and for Toby, with gentler intent: “I’ve done things a certain way so long I’m afraid I’ve lost part of my function as a translator, because I truly should have translated the situation. An atevi house is never informal—but tonight is official. Barb, forgive me, you have to keep a respectful distance from each other except in the bedroom. If someone does something for you in your quarters, bow your head just slightly and say mayei-ta. About the seating: Toby takes precedence because he’s my relative and this is my house; gender has no part at all in the etiquette.”
“You mean we just shocked them,” Barb said.
“Profoundly,” Bren said mercilessly. “The same as if they’d surprised you in bed.” He actually succeeded in shocking her— not in what he said; but where he said it. And the drinks were arriving. He smiled at Barb with edged politesse, and wiped the hardness off his face in a nod to his staff. “Mayei-tami, nadiin-ji. Sa heigieta so witai so kantai.”
Which was to say, “Thank you, esteemed people. Your service is timely and very considerate.”
“Mayei-ta,” Barb said with a little nod, on getting her drink. “Mayei-ta,” Toby muttered, “nadiin-ji.”
“A amei, nandi.” This from the young server, who did notaccord Barb a notice, except to use the dual-plus-one, to make the number fortunate, and who paid a second, parting bow to Bren, a unity of one. He left via the serving door, and Jago turned smartly and tracked the young person straight out of the dining room, probably to deliver a certain explanation to the staffc