The world was changing, Kiv realized sadly, as he grew older.
But he was proud of his daughter, nonetheless. Her impudence was just one facet of her inquisitive mind, a feature he liked to think she had inherited from him. And she followed the ways of her father in at least one respect: she applied for admission to the Bel-xogas School when she was of the proper age.
Naturally, she was accepted—naturally, both because of her father's great reputation and because of her own quick wits. In the Year of Nitha of the 244th Cycle, just twenty-one years after Kiv peGanz Brajjyd had quelled the hugl plague, Sindi, his daughter, was enrolled as a student at the Bel-rogas School of Divine Law.
SINDI
I
They were having something of a ceremony. Out on the lawn in front of the main building of the Bel-rogas School of Divine Law, they were celebrating the School's anniversary. On this date, sixty-one years before, the Earthmen had come down from the sky to help bring the Law to the people of Nidor. Elder Grandfather Kinis peCharnok Yorgen had officiated at the dedication of the ground; the Earthman Jones had descended from the sky in a shining ship.
Sindi geKiv Brajjyd, who was in her first year of study at the School, stood in the shadows of the stable behind the great building and watched the multitude out front. All she could think of was the way they were crushing the grass on the lawn. It seemed a silly and overly sentimental thing to her, all this speech-making.
She patted the smooth flank of her deest. "There, boy," she said soothingly. "I'm bored too."
The graceful animal snorted and nosed up against the hitching post as if he were anxious to be almost anywhere but where he was.
That was the way Sindi felt too, she decided, as her sharp eyes picked out the earnest face of her father. He was seated out front. Kiv, like a good alumnus and responsible leader of Nidorian society, had, of course, come to Bel-rogas to take in the festivities. Right now he was watching the speaker as if he were the Great Light Himself.
As a matter of fact, the speaker actually was Grandfather Drel peNibro Brajjyd, the current Brajjyd representative on the Council of Elders. Grandfather Drel peNibro had succeeded to the ruling body some ten years earlier, on the death of the venerable Bor peDrogh Brajjyd. Sindi was still able to remember the gnarled, silvered old man who had headed their clan in the years before the accession of Drel peNibro.
She had seen Grandfather Bor peDrogh preside over the Feast of the Sixteen Clans only a few weeks before his death. That had been when she was seven.
Grandfather Drel peNibro was a pompous, somewhat self-important old man who loved making speeches at ceremonial occasions. Sindi was aware of her father's private opinion of him—that he was a tradition-bound, unintelligent old man who had succeeded to the Council solely because he had outlasted all the deserving contenders.
Kiv, who was a priest in Drel peNibro's entourage, had let that opinion drop once in Sindi's hearing, and had done his best to cover for it. But Sindi had noticed it, and it formed part of her mental approach toward the Nidorian Grandfatherhood that constituted the Council.
Sindi watched Drel peNibro from the shelter of the deest-stable. He was wearing the full formal regalia of a Council member, a flamboyant outfit which seemed to
Sindi a fairly silly affair and yet somehow still terribly impressive. His voice floated to her through the quiet air of the Nidorian mid-afternoon.
"... this noble day ..." he was saying, and then his voice drifted out of the range of her hearing. In the distance Sindi heard the chuffing of the Central Railway Extension that ran the five miles from the Holy City of Gelusar to the Bel-rogas School.
Then his voice became audible again. Sindi managed to catch his words as he said, "...is our duty to express gratitude toward our benefactors. And yet we cannot do it directly. For whatever benefits the Earthmen have brought us, these sixty-one years, are creditable, not to them—let me make that clear, not to them—but to the Agent of their arrival on our soil."
The Elder Grandfather looked upward. The multitude assembled followed suit, and Sindi found herself doing the same. She stared at the iron-gray cloud layer which partially obscured the Great Light without hiding His effulgence completely from view.
Then Grandfather Drel peNibro went on. "The Bel-rogas School, in its sixty-one years of bringing the Law to the young people of Nidor, has served as an incalculably valuable—"
Sindi strained to catch the Elder's words, which were competing with the harsh breathing-sounds of the deest and the distant drone of the railway. As she leaned forward to hear better—because, though she was too independent a girl to take part willingly in any such foolishness as the anniversary ceremony, she was far too curious about everything to let a word of it escape her ears—as she leaned forward, a new voice came from directly behind her, startling her.
"Sindi? What are you doing here?"
She whirled and saw a tall, grave-looking man dis-mounting from a deest and reaching for a hitching-rope. He was pale-skinned, dark-eyed, and bearded—the Earthman, Smith.
"Hello," Sindi said, uncertainly.
Smith drew a cloth from his pocket and wiped his face. He was sweating heavily, as most of the Earthmen did in Nidor's moist air. Sindi saw that his deest was near the point of exhaustion. Obviously, Smith had had a long, hard ride from somewhere.
"Why aren't you out there listening to the Grandfather?" Smith asked. His voice was kind and gentle, like those of all the other Earthmen. "All of the students belong out there, you know. You should be with them."
Sindi nodded absently. "My father's out there too,'' she said.
Suddenly Smith moved very close to her, and she became conscious of his curious Earthman odor. His eyes were weary-looking; his beard needed combing. He looked at her for a long time without speaking.
"Tell me," he finally said. "Why aren't you out there with everyone else? Why aren't you with them?"
Sindi slowly rubbed her hand back and forth over her deest's flank. "Because," she said thoughtfully, not wanting to get into any additional trouble. "Just— because."
"That's not enough of a reason."
Suddenly Sindi felt terribly small and young. "It bored me," she said. "I just didn't want to have to sit out there all day and listen to—" she paused, horrified at herself.
"—and listen to the Elder Brajjyd," Smith completed. He smiled. "Ah, Sindi, how your father would like to hear you say that!"
She shot a panicky glance at him. "You wouldn't tell him, would you? I didn't mean anything by it! Smith—Smith—"
"Don't worry." He reached out and patted her shoulder, caressing the soft golden fuzz that covered it. "Suppose you go over now and take part in the rest of the ceremony, and let me worry about keeping secrets."
"Thanks, Smith," she said, all fear gone. "I'll go out and hear what the Elder has to say, I guess." She thumped her deest fondly, smiled at the Earthman, and walked toward the crowd.
Very carefully she tiptoed across the lawn and melted into the audience. The Elder Brajjyd was still speaking. His powerful voice rang out clearly and well.
"You see the products of this school around you," the Elder said. "The most valuable members of our priesthood; the leaders of our society; our most brilliant minds—we may trace them all to the Bel-rogas School of Divine Law. I regret," said the Elder sadly, "that I, myself, was unable to attend the School. But before many years elapse, I think it is fairly safe to say, the Council of Elders will be constituted almost totally of graduates of the Bel-rogas School.