Local Customs

10

Local Customs

    On Old Rthfrdia spring followed its usual course. The fl’oouu catkins, those that hadn’t been gathered for tea, dropped, the bluebells and the khyai’llh came into bloom on the forest floor, in the towns and villages the housewives did their spring-cleaning, and at Court the Spring Ball came and went.

    The Spring Ball was not attended by the Lady A’ailh’sa M’A’ail Mk-L’ster: she was said to be spending the Season in her brother’s keep in the high reaches. Been got at by an undesirable, was the usual conclusion in Court circles. Though some merely maintained he’d lost his temper with her once and for all and was keeping her locked up until she learnt to spell “cat.” A’ailh’sa’s absence was barely noticed: there were other débutantes even prettier, some more intelligent, and some nearly as rich as she, that Season. And besides, there were better things to talk about: for one thing, the Lady of U’Rhy’iior’thn turned up at the ball on the arm of Representative M’Klui’shke’aigh, and proceeded to flirt outrageously with him all night, under the disapproving stares of the dowagers. Many of whom wouldn’t have disapproved of her looking favourably on their sons: after all, Shn’aillaigh was a considerable landowner, even if this silly new law that everyone was talking about did come to pass. Those who’d earlier averred that they’d spotted her riding with Sh’n M’Klui’shke’aigh at an ungodly hour in the park not long since were vindicated, and went round loudly saying so. Those who’d heard the rumour that she’d disappeared once or twice since last winter in the direction of The Mk-L’ster’s hunting lodge sniggered and looked sideways at him. Drouwh appeared unmoved, but most of them concluded he was looking so stony-faced because there was something in it. He left the ball very early: obviously because he couldn’t take another minute of Shn’aillaigh flirting with M’Klui’shke’aigh. –Many of the dowagers of course did not recognise Sh’n, and the sounds of “Who is that man? Who?” were loud on the perfumed air, almost drowning the efforts of the Band of the Household Cavalry. So were the subsequent sounds of: “Oh. Well, I suppose we’ll just have to learn to put up with that sort of thing, now.” Though some, true, added: “Until dear Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd puts a stop to all this people’s rights nonsense!” Many of the dowagers might, however, have recognised Shn’aillaigh’s pale green dress, had it ever occurred to them that anyone would offer such an affront to the Ruler as to recycle their grandmother’s old dress at his Spring Ball. But her local dressmaker had worked wonders with it. And the gently-moving flowers on her shoulder were cultured Phang-Phangian senso-orchids from Sh’n’s hot-house, which the more fashion-conscious of the ladies couldn’t take their eyes off.

    The Regent did not grace the ball with his presence, but since his health had cracked under the weight of affairs of state over six months back no-one was surprised: poor Prince Rh’aiiy’hn was in a very discreet nursing-home near his mother’s estates in the South Cwmb. They just shook their heads and exchanged murmurs on the subject of his father’s having been just such a weakling—and of course that disproved utterly that silly story about his real father having been an off-worlder: they’d always said there was nothing in it—poor dear Mh’aaiivh! She wasn’t there, either, but no-one was surprised. It must be such a disappointment for her, after that early promise—but then, they'd always said, forcing that boy to practise all that mind-power rubbish could not have been good for him!

    The Ruler was there, however, with his Mother. The gossips shook their heads and noted sadly that dearest Mh’aii’rhi Roz was such a scatterbrain! Letting a boy of that age drink like that! But of course she never had had any control over him, only poor dear Rh’aiiy’hn had had any influence over the boy. –There, now, dear Lord Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd was going up to him, he’d keep an eye on him! The elderly Lord’s idea of keeping an eye on a boy of seventeen was to tell him sternly that he’d have to learn to hold his uissh like a man, the people didn’t expect their Ruler to drink like a cursed girl. Rather naturally, the Ruler’s tutor, a thin-faced, worried-looking man who wore the skirt of Clan Rh’n’lhd with no grace whatsoever, was called upon to remove the young man at an early hour. More head shaking: Mr Black might be terribly good at all this economics and Feddo political history and nonsense that the Regent had insisted the poor boy’s head be stuffed with, but when it came to discipline—! Well, it was clear that Parliament would have to be convened and a new Regent appointed. What? Oh—after Feddo Day, of course, yes. –Ridiculous idea! People’s rights? Nonsense, what was good enough for our ancestors... And so on.

    Spring, oddly enough, also came to less distinguished sections of Wh’sh-fh’r. In his humble urban electorate young T’mmai’h Mk-Fr’w proselytised the small businessmen eagerly, and with considerable success. Choice 542 made good sense, it would more or less guarantee there’d be no trouble from the clans—and besides, Lord Mk-L’ster had a cursed good business head on him! In fact T’mmai’h was so busy that his wife complained that he was spending more time out of the house than he had before the last election: what was the matter with him? To her astonishment her doting and really quite meek young husband, who always deferred anxiously to her in household matters, turned on her with a snarl and pointed out that as she’d have the vote in the Referendum like the rest of the populace (T’mmai’h actually said “populace”, he was pompous to his bones) it was a great pity she couldn’t get a bit more into her empty head than jam-making and the best way to dry fl’oouu catkins!

    “I suppose you want me to be like that awful Shn’aillaigh of U’Rhy’iior’thn?” she cried furiously. “Going round the place making a show of herself in men’s breeches!” –The words “Shn’aillaigh of U’Rhy’iior’thn” had figured rather largely on T’mmai’h’s lips since his visit to the Mk-L’ster’s lodge. Which she had pointed out to him more than once. So he returned bitterly: “You? In breeches? With your hips? HUH!” and stalked off to his study. Mrs Mk-Fr’w burst into tears and threw a very nice vase across the room. It hit the wall and shattered into a zillion pieces, leaving into the bargain a nasty mark on the wall. Well, the minute the stupid Referendum was over she would so have this room done out in the new Feddo lumo-sheeting everyone was talking about, so there, and T’mmai’h could just put up with it!

    In more affluent circles Sh’n also did a great deal of proselytising and speechifying, and he was feeling quite hopeful. They had a lot of very sound men on their side. It was gradually becoming apparent that only fanatics and old Lords of a like persuasion were ranging themselves definitively with old Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd and his faction. And the skirmishes in the eastern lands, mainly Clan Rh’n’lhd country, had almost entirely ceased.

    Sh’n flew east and spent several weeks in New St’rtburg, the principal city of those parts, and confirmed an impression that there was only one electorate there where the clanspeople were strong for the Regent’s faction. And two that were obdurately pro-Fh’Ly’haiyn and Rh’n’lhd, but that was to be expected, they were largely his kinfolk. In the heavily populated manufacturing areas the people appeared to be solidly for Choice 542. The facts that there was Mk-L’ster money in many of the industries and that the Mk-L’ster factories were the only ones where real preparations had been made to face up to the planet’s changing economic fortunes after Feddo Day were distinctly a factor, here.

    Sh’n talked to a lot of Mk-L’ster’s people and discovered to his astonishment that there was a strong off-world influence in the east which appeared to be solidly backing Mk-L’ster. He didn’t manage to find out exactly who or what was behind it, or what they were expecting to get out of it, but he was quite sure he wasn’t wrong. Tactful probing of Mk-L’ster’s key men revealed that they apparently believed Drouwh to be unaware of the whole thing. Very odd indeed. Still, if it was working to their side’s advantage— He made a mental note, however, to warn Drouwh that Feddos had had a finger in the pie in the east, and to look out, after the Referendum, for accusations of IG-illegal relations pre-Fed.

    At the lodge in the Forests of Mk-L’ster a remarkably peaceful way of life had evolved. At first Drouwh was suspicious and watchful of the Pleasure Girl but there was no change in her: her memory remained clouded. He was sure she wasn’t faking it, he would have spotted instantly if she was shielding her mind: he’d encountered the phenomenon off-world. Gradually, as spring wore on and the forest clearings became carpeted in soft blues and mauves, although he did not cease to inspect her mind narrowly morning and evening for signs that she was recovering, his attitude towards Roz relaxed. He felt less uneasy during the trips to the city to show his face around the Court, and as the weeks went by in fact came to rely on her more and more—though he himself did not realise this—to keep A’ailh’sa in line and keep the peace between her and the militant K’t-Ln. –He had brought the Lady A’ailh’sa back from The Mk-D’rm’d’s manor house the day after The Old Woman left, and, over her loud protests, had installed her in the lodge in the unworthy company of the Pleasure Girl and three grimy little forest bandits. Dh’aaych had pointed out, when A’ailh’sa protested once too often, that it was she who was unworthy of their company; and had been duly ignored for two whole days.

    K’t-Ln had woken up the day after her accident with a mind that was as clear as it had ever been. But her leg healed very slowly, and M’ri was very glad that Pleasure Girl Roz proved a willing helper. If oddly clumsy at first. K’t-Ln was the only girl M’ri knew who’d never been eager to learn nursing and that sort of thing off her mother, and she was very puzzled to discover that the Pleasure Girl was apparently the same. Finally she decided in a muddled way that Roz—who knew an awful lot about an awful lot of things that M’ri had never even heard of—must have been born a lady, and had fallen on hard times. She attempted to treat her with due respect but in the face of Roz’s laughter was unable to.

    Dh’aaych’s arm also healed slowly. In fact when it still looked nasty after five solid days at the lodge Drouwh ordered him off summarily to Wh’sh-fh’r and a doctor. Dh’aaych went meekly: for one thing he was fed up with the arm, and for another thing K’t-Ln, when she wasn’t asleep, was being markedly indifferent to him. Besides, it might look odd if he stayed any longer, it wasn’t the nyr hunting season. He left with a laughing injunction to Drouwh to take R’rt’s advice and show himself round the place with the Pleasure Girl on his arm.

    Drouwh hesitated for another two days but finally did so: it was apparent that they were in no immediate danger from her. He had, of course, to find her a suitable dress—he was cursed if he was going to parade her round his estates in those little gold pants or a man’s shirt; and besides, the weather was still chilly out. To A’ailh’sa’s fury he solved this dilemma by making a lightning trip to town and fetching a selection of her clothes.

    “Pink?” said Roz dubiously, holding it up.

    “Very pale eggshell pink and it’s my FAVOURITE!” shouted A’ailh’sa.

    “Then I won’t deprive you of it,” she noted drily.

    “Take it, Roz. It looks dreadful with her red hair,” said her brother.

    “It does NOT!” she shouted. “And you’ve got a closed mind! And you’re OLD-FASHIONED! Everyone’s wearing eggshell pink this year!"

    “What sort of being has an egg with a shell this colour?” asked Roz curiously.

    Drouwh smiled a little. “They tell me it purports to be the same shade as the inside—not the outside, that’s sort of a muddy speckled fawn—of a ghrr’s egg. Don’t you like it?”

    “I’ll have it!” cried A’ailh’sa, snatching at it.

    “You’ll have your bottom smacked over my knee,” he said grimly. “It looks good with your black hair, Roz.”

    “Yes: and she’s got a Feddo mini-web, it isn’t FAIR!” screeched A’ailh’sa.

    “A what?” he said blankly.

    “Show him,” she said, pouting. “If you think that hair of hers is natural, you’re in for a shock!” she said rudely to her brother.

    Roz smiled, and gently removed the mini-web from her hair. The swirling black silk fell limply round her face. “See? –Be careful, they’re very sensitive.”

    Drouwh peered at the semi-translucent thing on her hand. “They? You’re not telling me it’s alive?”

    “Yes, of course.”

    He took an involuntary step backwards.

    “He doesn’t know anything!” said A’ailh’sa triumphantly,

    “Not about ladies’ fashions no,” agreed Roz tranquilly. She raised her hands to put it back but Drouwh said hoarsely: “No—wait.”

    “Do you want another look at it?” she said, smiling at him, but A’ailh’sa glanced at his face and snorted: “Huh! He's gone all soppy over you, look at him! –And you can have that old dress, and I hate it anyway, and it’s LAST YEAR’S!” She rushed out.

    Roz looked uncertainly at Drouwh.

    “You look quite different with your hair down,” he said awkwardly. “Much younger. And your face seems... a different shape. I don’t know; I don’t know much about fashion!” he said with an awkward laugh.

    She smiled at him, the big dark eyes twinkling in the bewitching heart-shaped face, and he went very red and said harshly: “I suppose I don’t know much about women. But I’ve learnt enough to be cursed wary of them, Pleasure Girl!” And turned on his heel and went out.

    Roz replaced the web slowly. It was customized for her, and as she didn’t know how to re-customize it she couldn’t give it to A’ailh’sa, the colony would pine. It was evident, even if you had no mind abilities, that The Mk-L’ster hadn’t had much experience with women. He was terrified of them, for a start. And terrified of the way they made him feel. Terrified of her in that way? Yes, Roz thought he was. Though of course he was also terrified she might turn out to be some Federation spy, after his pathetic little secrets.

    She wore the eggshell pink dress for the trip to the nearest town via the local village in Drouwh’s old-fashioned ground-car. A’ailh’sa had begged to come but had been locked in the cellar for her pains, with a new blob-lock on the door.

    The trip, take it for all in all, was only a mixed success. The Lord was greeted in the village with great delight and the Pleasure Girl was stared at avidly. That was distasteful to him, though he was pleased that they were all recognising that this must be why he was still at the hunting lodge. When they reached the little town he was annoyed and disconcerted to find that she didn’t mean the man standing at the junction of the two busiest streets when she used the term “Traffic Controller,” and disconcerted to find she didn’t realise the statue in the middle of the main square was civic art. He was also disconcerted when she didn’t think much of either the local pastries or the local sweets, but very pleased to be recognised by the plump middle-aged woman in that shop. She passed some coy remarks about children when he bought some treats for T’m and the girls, and smiled in a meaning way at Roz, so then he was embarrassed as well.

    At this point Roz almost suggested they give up and go home, but she could feel that wasn’t what he wanted. Or rather, not what he’d decided on: he would have been very happy to leap into the ground-car and flee the place, after that encounter. So they went and had a meal at a little shop that served food. He had to explain that the decorations were supposed to be clan colours and that the mannish one of the two middle-aged women who ran the place was—with a wince—wearing the colours of Clan Rh’n’lhd incorrectly: the red stripes in the yellow cloth should never run diagonally.

    On the way back they paused in another small village and he was very annoyed when she immobilised a shopkeeper’s cat on the shop doorstep.

    So there you were, concluded Roz with a mental shrug. She was becoming more and more… disillusioned? If not disillusioned with Drouwh Mk-L’ster, then disappointed in him. Though why, she couldn’t for the Federation have said. He was manly, determined, intelligent, and of course very, very good-looking. Added to which, he was a righteous being. Every so often Roz tried to regain that feeling she’d had at the very first moment of opening her eyes in the forest. Sometimes—if he was wearing a shirt open at the neck to show a few tendrils of golden chest-hair, and long, slim, nyr-suede breeches on the long, slim, legs—she almost did regain it. But somehow it never lasted more than a few IG microseconds…

    “She can wear that pink dress to the fête,” said A’ailh’sa, pouting.

    Roz watched her with her head a little on one side. Then she said: “No, I can’t, it’s ancient!” –pouting.

    From her bed K't-Ln gave a delighted crow of laughter. M’ri, who was sitting by the window in the antique rocker, choked and put down the cloth she was embroidering.

    “Well, I suggest you sort something out,” said Drouwh drily. His shoulders shook slightly but he fought down the desire to laugh and added, in a voice that wobbled just a bit: “Remember the Ruler’s Mother'll be there, with her usual train of snr-cats.” And got himself out of the room before the desire to laugh could overcome him.

    His sister poked out her tongue at the door and said: “Well, you definitely can’t wear any of my green things, Roz!”

    “Ugh, no!” agreed M’ri, shuddering.

    “Why not?” asked Roz.

    “Why NOT?” screamed A’ailh’sa. “Look!” She grabbed Roz and rushed her over to the big mirror, holding her own green sleeve under the heart-shaped face.

    “Ugh,” said Roz, as her face seemed to turn a nasty yellow as they looked.

    “Yeah. Don’t tell me you’ve been wearing green!” said A’ailh’sa in mingled horror and delight. “Ooh, you have!” she gasped.

    Roz looked at her limply. “Is that me?”

    “I don’t know: I picked it up from you,” said A’ailh’sa lamely. “You can’t have worn a thing like that!”

    Roz frowned as the memory of a small black-haired humanoid being in a hideous greyish-green garment dissipated.

    “She wasn’t in that when we found her,” volunteered K’t-Ln without much interest. “Wasn’t wearing anything, much."

    “Gold scintillion skimpies,” she remembered. “I think The Lord put them in the recycler.”

    “What?” said A’ailh’sa. “Do you mean the disposal? There isn’t one here."

    “No; there wasn’t much substance in them but it was worth recycling.”

    “Some Feddo thing, she must mean,” said M’ri.

    “Look it up on the Feddo Encyclopaedia,” said K’t-Ln in a bored voice, staring out of the window at a windy day with a suggestion of rain in the high clouds.

    “You were looking at it yourself, yesterday!” returned her sister.

    “Nothing else to do. It’s better than that mindless Romance kna shit you two watch,” she noted pointedly.

    A’ailh’sa managed to ignore this. “Well, are you going to wear the pink dress to the fête, Roz?”

    “I suppose so. I don’t care, really.” Roz shrugged. “One garment’s more or less like another, isn’t it?” She went out while M’ri and A’ailh’sa were still gasping.

    “Losing it,” pronounced K’t-Ln definitely.

    “Don’t be horrid,” replied M’ri weakly.

    “Um, I’ve got a white one she could have,” said A’ailh’sa weakly.

    “Don’t bother,” drawled K’t-Ln. “She won’t be interested.” She tried to ease her position.

    “How's the leg?” asked M'ri anxiously.

    “All right! Stop fussing!” she snarled.

    M’ri sighed faintly.

    “Roz doesn’t fundamentally give a curse about all this fashion junk, hasn’t that dawned yet?” added K’t-Ln.

    “Of course she does!” gasped M'ri.

    “Kna shit.”

    “How do you know, anyway?” demanded A’ailh’sa.

    “I can feel it. Don’t try reading her mind, just let yourself feel it. Then you realise. She despises all your fashion junk, and she despises you, and she doesn’t think much of M’ri. And your famous brother drives her desperate with all his master-of-the-house kna shit."

    “K’t-Ln!” gasped M'ri.

    A’ailh’sa was very red. “You’re making it up: just because it’s how YOU feel!”

    “It is more or less how I feel, yeah. Only if I told ya how I really feel, your face’d be even redder than it is now, Lady. Only it’s how she feels, too. –She likes T’m, though. The only time she’s really happy is when we’re all looking at the Feddo Encyclopaedia together and she's helping it explain junk. Like, um, maths and equations and hyperdrives and junk.”

    “All right, go and WATCH it!” screamed A’ailh’sa.

    K’t-Ln glared: she was confined to her bed unless Drouwh or one of the four loyal clansmen he’d brought down from the high reaches carried her downstairs.

    “I think she needs a rest,” decided M’ri. “Come on, A’ailh’sa, we'll go to your room and look through your dresses, shall we?”

    “Yes. You can have that lilac one, if you like,” she said generously.

    “Ooh, really? Ooh, thank you!” she gasped.

    They went out, M’ri all pleased and blushing, and A’ailh’sa very pleased with her own generosity.

    “‘It’s three years old, anyway,’” muttered K’t-Ln, pulling a hideous face.

    She sank back on her pillows, scowling. She knew she was right about Roz, even if those kna-brains wouldn’t believe her!

    It didn’t occur to her that maybe she ought to mention this to The Mk-L’ster. She had no true grasp of how precarious their situation was. To a certain degree this was Drouwh’s fault: although he’d had several talks with her about the political situation, and about the prisoner upstairs, for he’d realised that she must be able to pick up his communications, his attitude towards her had remained rather amused and patronising: she had been left with the strong impression that to him she was just a little girl who needed humouring. Since K’t-Ln disapproved of the Royal Family anyway, she didn’t care about The Mk-L’ster’s having kidnapped one of them. In fact she was mildly glad, if anything, that one of them had got his comeuppance. She had listened to the rest of it avidly, though pretending she wasn’t. Drouwh’s attitude had not encouraged her to show up her ignorance by asking questions, so she hadn’t. Subsequently, however, she’d had several fights with T’m over who was going to choose what on the Encyclopaedia, in an endeavour to look up some of the concepts Drouwh had mentioned. But whether because she hadn't got the terminology right or because the Encyclopaedia didn’t include many references to Old Rthfrdia, she hadn't managed to learn much from it.

    Not much that was political, that was. She and T'm had learnt a lot about “maths and equations and hyperdrives and junk.” Drouwh was unaware of just how much they both were learning, and about what. He was just glad that the two of them seemed content to spend so much time out from under his feet. Particularly T’m: he’d been afraid the boy would whine to accompany him on his hunting forays into the forest. Even Roz’s asking him for some text-blobs for them hadn't alerted him. He’d merely said that if those were Feddo things, as he suspected, they were out of luck.

    After a bit of head-scratching by all three of them, T’m had recalled the slates they used at the village school and had gone down there late one afternoon, waited until the school emptied, and nipped in and liberated a couple, plus a handful of slate pencils. Drouwh knew nothing of this: it was one of the days he’d gone into the city. And T’m was more than capable of fooling the clansmen from the reaches on his own home territory. He and K’t-Ln now spent hours scrawling equations, looking up the Encyclopaedia, and asking it for more sums. Theoretically either of them could now have set a Seeker’s course to hyperdrive between point A and point B anywhere in the Known Universe. They hadn't yet realised that there was a lot more to it than that. Such things as the precise mass of the vehicle had to be taken into account. Not to mention body weights and the weight of the cargo and time-shifts and— Well, one or two things like that. Roz was biding her time to break these facts gently to them. So was the Encyclopaedia.

    After a period of pointless scowling into the treetops K’t-Ln got her slate from under her pillow. Say your Seeker was—um, yes: if it was in between stars EK45798 and EK45791 in Sector 45000003 of Galaxy One, and say you wanted it to... Hang on, then it would also come under the influence of Star EK45790, of course... Yes. Ah-hah! K’t-Ln scrawled busily.

    In A’ailh’sa’s room M’ri got into the lilac dress, loudly encouraged by the donor. She looked down at herself uncertainly. “What do I do with all these—um—bits?"

    “Here!” Eagerly A’ailh’sa draped them round her, clipping them in place with little green quog brooches. “Feddos use special blobs for this,” she reported enviously. “When I was on Friyria—that was ages ago, I was just a kid—Lady Gry’ttervill’ya had all different coloured blobs! Silver and gold, of course, and kind of luminous ones, they were lovely.”

    M’ri looked at her in awe. “Have you been to lots of off-world places, A’ailh’sa?"

    “No. Only Friyria,” she admitted. “It’s incredibly stuffy, Friyrians go in for all the formal diplomatic junk like you wouldn’t believe! You know: boring tea-parties—bad as Aunt M’wd,” she muttered. “And, um, morning calls, and afternoon calls, and ladies’ luncheons. That sort of thing.”

    “I see,” she said wonderingly.

    A’ailh’sa pouted. “I would have gone to lots of other places, of course, only then they put that horrid x’nb-web round us, and I couldn’t!”

    Innocent though she was, M’ri eyed her in some amazement. The whole Federation had evidently conspired to put the web in place just when the Lady A’ailh’sa was of an age to take trips off-world.

    “Friyrians aren’t really ladies, of course,” A’ailh’sa added carelessly, looping up the last few trailing hems round M’ri’s shins. “They can be male or female, you see. But most of them choose one or the other. I forget what it’s called, there is a name for it. Anyway, if you met old Lady Gry’ttervill’ya, you’d never know, she’s just like all the ghastly old dowagers at Court!” she added viciously. “–There! That looks great!” She stepped back and admired her handiwork.

    “Thank you,” said M’ri dazedly, twisting to observe the effect.

    “It needs a hat. I suppose we’ll all have to wear hats, if the Ruler’s Mother’s coming. I hope it won’t be too windy, there’s nothing so horrid as having to hang onto your hat all day, is there?”

    “No,” she said faintly, beginning to wonder what Mum and all the villagers would say if they spotted her dressed up like a lady, wearing a hat, in The Lord’s party.

    “Don’t worry, they won’t recognise you,” said A’ailh’sa, reading her thoughts with ease. “Mh’aii’rhi Roz’ll have a galaxious hat, she always does,” she added jealously, reaching down hats from her closet shelf. “Drouwh only brought a few of my hats, he’s a beast!”

    He’d brought seven. M’ri stared. That was a few? She didn’t own a hat at all. And Mum only had two. “Who’s Mh’aii’rhi Roz?” she said faintly.

    “The Ruler’s Mother, of course, don’t you know anything?” she gasped.

    “No,” said M’ri humbly.

    A’ailh’sa pulled a face. “Yes, you do, M’ri. You know all about sewing and cooking, and all that nursing stuff. You make me feel really dumb!”

    “Me?” she croaked.

    “Yes,” she said, scowling.

    “I could teach you,” said M'ri timidly.

    “Would you? Could you teach me how to do lovely embroidery?”

    “Um... I could try. Only it took me years to learn. And I’m still not nearly as good as old Mrs Mk’Strt from the village.”

    “She’s the woman that makes the lace, isn’t she?"

    “Yes. I can’t do that at all, it’s awfully hard.” She looked at A’ailh’sa’s wistful face. “Um—well, I could start you off on tray-cloths or pillowslips,” she said weakly.

    “Could you? Thanks, M'ri!”

    “That’s all right. But a lady doesn't need to know how to do those things,” she said shyly.

    “Yes, I do! I don’t know anything! And Lady Gry’ttervill’ya can do anything her servants can do. When she gets a new servant she trains it herself! She can do the sewing and the preserving and—and everything! And Mother could, too, before she got so sick.”

    “I see,” said M’ri, wondering why she’d never taught her daughter.

    “She was never interested in me. She wanted me to be another boy,” said A’ailh’sa simply. “Hang on, I know!” She dived into a drawer.

    M’ri watched her limply, reflecting that maybe she hadn’t been so badly off herself, after all. Mum was hopeless in lots of ways, of course, but she could cook and sew and had taught her all she knew. And she’d encouraged her to learn fine embroidery from Mrs Mk-Strt. True, she sold most of what she produced and kept most of what it earned, allotting her only pocket-money out of it, but still...

    “Here!” A’ailh’sa produced a long gauzy scarf in the same shade of lilac as the pretty dress. She put a broad-brimmed white yi’ish-straw hat on M’ri’s head and just as M’ri was going to say that looked good, tilted it so that it hid her right ear. M’ri stared at her reflection. Then A’ailh’sa draped the scarf right over the hat and tied it in a big bow over the left ear. She held up a finger. “Wait!” She delved in another drawer. “I knew there was something!” She pinned a big bunch of artificial mauve khyai’llh flowers to the front of the hat with a green quog brooch, so that they seemed to be peeping out from under the gauzy scarf. “How’s that?” she beamed.

    “It’s wonderful, A’ailh’sa,” said M'ri in awe. “I look like a real lady!”

   A’ailh’sa giggled pleasedly. “I could get a job in Mh’aaiivh’s of North Wh’sh-fh’r any time, couldn’t I?”

    “I’m sure you could,” she agreed. “There’s a branch of that in M’nfr North, they have great hats. Only this is just as nice as anything I’ve ever seen there!”

    A’ailh’sa laughed pleasedly, and kindly didn’t say that M’ri’s mind was telling her very clearly she’d only seen the M’nfr North branch of Mh’aaiivh’s of North Wh’sh-fh’r twice in her whole life. Nor did she mention that M’ri was thinking that it was a great pity that she, A’ailh’sa, hadn’t been born into a walk of life where she could have become a milliner. She led her off to show K’t-Ln and Roz the result of their labours, not betraying how very odd it felt to be the object of the pity of a little village girl.

    “In that? Don’t make me laugh,” said Drouwh shortly.

    “I think she looks very sophisticated, Lord,” quavered M'ri.

    A’ailh’sa had finally chosen black for the village fête: immensely draped and pinned, covered in sparkling objects, and adorned with trailing fringes. With a giant black turban on the head. Eventually, but not before Drouwh had to shout at her, she flounced out to change.

    He sank limply into his big leather chair and mopped his brow. “Why in the name of the two Rthfrdias did you let her deck herself out like that?” he said tiredly to Roz.

    “Me, Lord? I know very little about Old Rthfrdian fashions.”

    He sighed. “No, very well. –You look very pretty, M’ri,” he added with an effort.

    M’ri blushed and smiled, very pleased, and murmured that Roz looked very pretty too.

    The draped white dress that had been A’ailh’sa’s was tighter on Roz’s more rounded body. The effect was far from unattractive, certainly. “Yes, very nice,” he said shortly.

    Roz returned indifferently: “Thank you, Lord. The megazillion buckles on these knee-length boots are Vvlvanian-cursed things, though. Why in Federation not use blobs for this sort of thing?”

    “They’re very smart,” said M’ri quickly, feeling The Lord about to lose his temper because he was very, very sick of hearing the word “blob” from poor Roz.

    “Pooh! I think they’re Vvlvanian-cursed!” put in T’m stoutly.

    “Yes. Why aren’t you in the skirt to meet the Ruler’s Mother, T’m?” drawled Drouwh.

    T’m went very red and M’ri said quickly: “He hasn’t got one, Lord. There’s a lot of material in a skirt, and, um— Well, anyway, we washed his breeches.”

    Drouwh had regretted he’d said it the moment the words were out of his mouth. “Aye, well, all this dashed paraphernalia’s a cursed nuisance, you’re well out of it, T’m!” he said with a would-be easy laugh.

    T’m looked uncertainly at The Lord in the dark green, grey and black Mk-L’ster skirt, with a cloak clipped to the shoulder of his brown grpplybeast-leather jacket, and shin-knives in his brown leather buckled boots, and said: “Um, yeah.”

    “I think you look very smart, Lord,” said Roz with simple admiration.

    “Thank you. For a humanoid, is this?” he said drily.

    M’ri and T’m winced. There had been a certain episode where the word “humanoid” had been bandied about and The Lord had got very annoyed with poor Roz.

    “Of course, Lord,” she said, smiling at him.

    “Yes,” he said, swallowing a sigh. “M’ri, I hate to ask you this, but could you possibly go and hurry A’ailh’sa up? –Try to,” he amended, grimacing.

    Obediently M’ri scurried out.

    “No,” said Drouwh, as T’m began to edge off, the words “Feddo Encyclopaedia” hovering above his little ginger head in letters of gold a half arm-measure high.

    “Aw! Couldn’t I just—”

    “No. Those who want to come to the fête will be in this kitchen ready to leave when I go, or be left behind.”

    “I don’t want to see the stupid Ruler’s Mother, anyway!” he shouted angrily.

    Nor did Drouwh. “No. But I presume you do want a ride to the cursed thing?”

    “Yes,” he muttered, subsiding.

    Silence fell in the dim old kitchen. T’m emanated resentment, plus some very mixed feelings about the fact that he wasn’t wearing the skirt, and Drouwh regretted sourly that he’d ever mentioned the topic. Roz just sat there. He took a look at her mind. Maths. Again. Of late he’d begun to have a feeling that she was using the maths in order to shield her other thoughts from him. However, after a while T’m said in a surprised voice: “Ooh, is that the answer?’ and she looked at him and laughed, and said: “Yes!” So possibly she was genuine. This time.

    At long last the Lady A’ailh’sa, becomingly attired in a pale humblerose-yellow gown fitted to her age and status, reappeared in the kitchen, pouting, and informed her brother that he was a mean beast. And that they’d be late, unless he drove at more than his usual pace of an elderly hggl with two bad legs. Ignoring that, Drouwh marched out to the ground-car with a final shout of: “No! T’m’s Kitten is NOT coming!”

    And they all got into the ground-car and set off for the fête.

    For some time Drouwh breathed heavily through flared nostrils, lips very tight. Next to him T’m was sulking because he’d had to leave T’m’s Kitten behind and still resenting the fact that he didn’t have a skirt. On the other side of T’m A’ailh’sa was sulking because her beast of a brother had ordered her to change out of something that made her look like an aged tart from off the back streets of South Wh’sh-fh’r and into a pretty dress. Drouwh was aware that the black thing had been intended to impress R’rt Fh’laiin with her advanced age and sophistication but he was, not, alas, vitally interested in the fact. In the back M’ri was shaking silently with nerves because he’d incautiously mentioned that she’d have to curtsey to the Ruler’s Mother. Beside her, Roz was concentrating partly on her feet in the many-buckled high white boots and partly on a knotty problem in quantum physics. On a beautiful fine day like this, when she should have been merely enjoying herself? Old gods of Rthfrdia!

    Drouwh was, of course, blissfully unaware that all over the area innumerable similar scenes were taking place, whether the passengers were being loaded into ancient bubbles, clapped-out ground-cars, or horse-drawn carts or waggons. Or, indeed, that at any given moment throughout the two galaxies there were bound to be a megazillion similar scenes taking place. Sentient life was like that. Well, as far as the Known Universe went, it certainly was.