“Oh no,” Tomás agreed after swallowing. “I do not care to find myself ordered to judge a cooking contest. Or to discover that Shona is chasing Nahla with that big knife of his for daring to exceed his skill.”
“Or worse, both of them quitting and opening a gourmet dining establishment.” She could imagine that all too easily, with Stamm-specific sections for the Staré and a take-away enclosure for humans.
“Or her being pressed into service for the Elders,” Makana added in Staré. “Such has been known to happen, although not within recent generations.” A little //dismay/worry// reached Rigi’s nose, and she wondered.
But the next bite chased such thoughts away, and she concentrated on giving the meal the attention it deserved. A basket with small bean-paste-filled buns from Tomás’s favorite bake shop appeared and he dove in, alternating bun and meat bites. Rigi managed to grab one, and hid her dismay as the first bite revealed black runner-bean filling. She detested black runner-bean paste on its own. Rigi ate the rest of her bun but did not object when Tomás finished the last in the basket.
A crisp salad cleared their palates, and Rigi’s eyes went wide as Makana served the sweet. She couldn’t tell quite what Nahla had done, but the thick custard of cowlee-cream and rosefruit tasted like the first clear morning after the beginning of the rains—sweet and rich, warm, but clean. The fat didn’t stick to her tongue despite the richness. Tomás’s eyebrows rose until they almost brushed his sweep of black hair, and neither of them declined a second bowl, even though Rigi knew she probably shouldn’t.
“Thank you, Makana. That was a wonderful welcome home. Nahla has learned very well, and I hope we get to sample more of her new ideas in the future.” Rigi ignored the ear tips and //ease-of-tension/pleasure// that emerged from the kitchen doorway. Instead she nodded her agreement with Tomás’s compliment.
“Thank you, sir, and I will tell her. She asks that you not go onto the rear verandah this evening, please. There is a triple-batch of tam patty blend aging on trays at the moment, and the verandah is a touch crowded.” Rigi mentally translated Makana’s statement—Nahla had grated every single bit of tam and mixed an enormous batch to freeze, and the scent had overpowered even her.
“Since my lady and I will be retiring soon for the evening, I believe the verandah is safe.”
“Thank you for warning us, Makana,” Rigi said, smiling as Tomás pulled her chair out. “I don’t want to undo all Nahla’s hard work. Although she may have to keep an eye out for tam-poachers.”
“I have been assured that First-Stamm sir is taking steps to prevent such a dreadful calamity,” he assured her, bowing. Rigi and Tomás hand-bowed, returned the courtesy. Once Makana left, Tomás put his hand on her back again, giving her a significant look.
“Let me collect my mending before I lose a needle in the upholstery or something else equally distressing occurs, and I will join you.”
He went toward their bedroom. Rigi tidied the family room, checked on Martinus, and found her husband waiting the instant the door closed. He locked it and embraced her, kissing her firmly.
Some time later, after a quick visit to the washroom, she snuggled up against his back. He fell asleep, snoring a little. Despite her longing to be close to him, Rigi eased out of the bed, pulled on a nightdress, and walked silently out of the room. She’d left a pile of blankets and spare pillows beside the desk in the office, and she made a pallet-bed. Rigi didn’t want to sleep alone, but if Tomás startled awake and his training leaked, she could imagine what might happen. Both Mrs. Prananda and Aunt Kay had told her about their husbands’ behavior in the first days after they returned from combat duty, and Rigi decided that whatever had given Tomás predator eyes in their hallway should be considered combat and treated as such.
Rigi barely got through the prayer before sleep before she dozed off.
The next morning Rigi woke before Tomás did, and before Makana or Nahla found her. She stretched, eased into the bedroom, got clothes, and dressed without making a sound before using the washroom as quietly as possible. Rigi wanted to get into bed and curl up beside her husband, but what would he do if she startled him? As she hesitated, he made waking-up noises of a sort, then began snarling about tea, and she hurried out of the room. He was less friendly than a tumble-gnaw until he’d had his first cup of black tea, and she highly doubted that the advanced scout training had changed that fundamental aspect of his personality. Nahla remembered that as well. Rigi found the young female confirming the strength of the tea in the large pot in the dining room. “Thank you, Nahla.”
Nahla ear bowed, then finished her task and returned to the kitchen. Rigi heard Tomás’s steps and moved out of the line of travel between the door and the tea. He looked around, located the tea urn, and lunged for it in a way that reminded her of Slowth going after the moon-pea husks. He poured a cup of black, steaming brew, tasted it, then drank so fast it made Rigi’s throat and stomach hurt to watch. He poured a second cup and appeared to remember that he was a human and not a marmoline or a striped lion. “Ah, good morning, dear.” He got out of the way so she could serve herself. Rigi added a bit of sweetener and a moderate dollop of wombow milk to her cup. She too moved, clearing space for Nahla and a tray of morning buns.
“Hot breakfast will be in a quarter hour, sir, mistress.” She puffed //mild apology//, ear bowed, and retreated into the kitchen.
“I’m not going to lose weight, I can tell already,” Tomás observed, helping himself to a bun and sitting at the table to eat like a civilized creature.
Rigi looked at the loose fit of his clothes. “Did you lose weight during training, love, or did I get the wrong size?”
“I gained muscle, as did Kor. Alas, I fell into the trap of believing Major Jackman’s assurances that scout training included mostly book and field work.” He finished his bun and Rigi got him another one, then refilled his cup. “Thank you, oh most blessed, wise, insightful, and luscious lady.” Rigi blushed. “I believe I saw two teaching holos and spent the rest of the time working harder than civilized humans and Staré ought to.” He shook his head and Rigi saw a bit of white in his black hair. “So, we have a wombow.”
She let herself sigh, finished her tea, and got a second cup. “We have a wombow, a gelding. He alternates between enthusiasm and indolence, with intermittent excursions into obstreperousness. He’s called Slowth. I believe Makana has several other names for him, but I have not inquired.”
“I hate to say it, dear, but he sounds rather like a typical wombow,” Tomás chuckled.
She gave him one of her mother’s mildly patient looks. “He lacks an intermittent phase. He’s all excitement, or all refusal, all trot or all sulled up and trying to eat the decorative plantings at the corner by the Malinsky house.” Rigi thought for a moment. “He loves moon-pea hulls a little too much. He came with two harnesses, both of which fit quite nicely, and he has smooth paces and good strong legs. I also looked at a spayed female, but she seemed a touch uneven in the hips, and that didn’t bode well for long-term soundness.”
He held up his hands. “Love, I leave that entirely to you. You have a much better eye for wombows than I do, and more experience with their health and conditioning. If Slowth was the better animal, then we’ll live with Slowth.”
A loud Staré sigh heralded the arrival of Makana and scrambled eggs, wombow sausage, more buns, and a selection of late-season fruit. “First-Stamm sir informs me that he has never encountered such an obstreperous, obstinate, and disobliging beast in his existence.” Makana hesitated, as if he didn’t want to finish the quotation.
“Aside from his full-brother?” Tomás filled in.
//Agreement/concern.// “We neglected to inform first-Stamm sir about Slowth’s morning habits, Mistress Rigi.”
“Oh dear. And his cottage is in a direct line with the shed. I will apologize, Makana.”
Tomás leaned back a little, eyebrows rising. “Morning habits, Makana?”
“Slowth lives un
der the erroneous impression that he is actually a gold-crested sun-greeter, sir.” Makana sounded exactly like Lexi, making Rigi wonder a little.
“Oh no.” Tomás had to laugh. “And he’s not quiet, I take it.”
“No,” Rigi, Makana, and Nahla chorused, and sighed. The first time she’d heard him, Rigi had thought that Slowth was in the throes of protracted and agonizing death and had rushed into the shed to see what was wrong. Now she ignored his morning howls and bellows.
“First-Stamm sir has eaten and informed me that he has gone out on business and will return for supper, sir, mistress,” Nahla added before returning to the kitchen.
The humans shared a knowing look, then tucked into breakfast while the eggs were still warm. They tasted a little different than usual, and Rigi reminded herself yet again that eggs were eggs, be they mammal, reptile, or fowl. Although, as she considered the pale orange material on the end of her fork, the native animals classified as “fowl” Shikhari had not all come from reptiles, so perhaps there really was a difference? No, more likely they’d been eating mammal eggs until the vendors had enough true-fowl eggs on hand to ship in wholesale lots. The end of the dry season always brought shifts in availability, just as the end of the wet did.
“Dear, what are your plans for the day?” Tomás inquired as Rigi swallowed the bite of egg.
“I need to see of Dr. De Groet has responded to the message from a few days ago. And to finish the last two draft sketches for the technical manual.” She shook her head a little. “The xenoarchaeology department at the University is producing a technical manual for researchers new to Shikhari, including proper vehicle usage, emergency medicine, and how to tell one end of a wombow from the other. And I am not kidding, Kor’s comments about that statue aside.”
Tomás set down his fork and knife and stared at her over the bun basket. “Someone failed to correctly identify the head and tail ends of a wombow?”
“And she was sober. If Dr. Xian had not told me herself, I would not believe it either. Thus the commission for me to illustrate wombow carts, emergency medicine, how to tell dangerous from relatively harmless leapers, and which end of a wombow is which.”
“But nothing else planned?” He looked as if he had plans, rather delightful, private, and most entertaining plans indeed.
“Not at all. I’m excused from the ladies’ group meeting for the next week, because of your return.”
“Good.”
And it was. Very good indeed, Rigi mused later that afternoon as she worked and he napped.
3
Adjustments and Rumors
Rigi blinked and realized that the young human soldier intended to assist her down from the cart. She’d forgotten what it was like to be around so many humans, and she caught herself, smiled, and accepted his hand. “Thank you.”
He bowed and gestured for her to go up the walk to the imposing official residence of Lt. Colonel and Mrs. Morgansi. Makana showed a second soldier his base pass, and was directed back to where Tomás had disembarked. Rigi walked up the long, white-gravel way through a formal garden done in shades of green and white, mimicking the royal colors. Happily, the weather had moderated into the light, steady mist that the Staré called the waiting-rain, because you waited for hours in it before you got truly wet. Humans did not take quite as long as Staré to moisten, but the name still fit. Several of the plants had been imported from off world, and Rigi wondered if she could obtain permission to sketch them for her personal files. Not today, of course, but perhaps after she was listed as officially married and permitted to come onto the base without Tomás escorting her. The three-level building seemed to loom over the garden, dark green with white trim, so formal and rigid it made the Crown Governor’s official residence in NovMerv seem open and welcoming. Rigi scolded herself a little. One did not judge people until one met them in person, and sometimes not even then. The lieutenant colonel’s lady was not her garden.
Or perhaps she was. Rigi climbed five low, broad steps, wiping her feet on the built-in mats. An ornate glass and wood door opened ahead of her, and a human woman in close-fitting black clothing stood in the entry, studying Rigi. Forewarned by Mrs. Prananda’s books on military manners, Rigi slowly drew the printed invitation from her small bag and offered it to the guard. “Mrs. Bernardi-Prananda for Mrs. Morgansi.”
The other woman looked at the print-out, the corner of her mouth curling up a millimeter or so. “I shall inform Lady Morgansi that Miss Bernardi is here to speak with her.” She backed up, closed the door, and disappeared from sight, leaving a red-faced Rigi standing. Rigi counted to eight, then recited the first part of one of the prayers for patience that everyone knew but could never locate in the official books of worship and guidance. She got to the third invocation of the Creatrix before the door opened once more. “This way.” Cold eyes ran from Rigi’s rain hood down to the toes of her second-best pair of boots, and Rigi knew that she had been weighed and found wanting.
Was she supposed to be ashamed of something? Probably. She did not sigh or make any other sound of unhappiness as she followed her guide into the formal entry way. A human maid took her rain-cloak, sniffed, and disappeared. No doubt she was supposed to feel completely inadequate, Rigi decided, and to be aware of her inferiority to the other women. Rigi decided to play along, at least for the moment, and act the way the others likely assumed Neo-Traditionalist women acted—eyes on the floor, moving silently, scared to speak without her husband’s explicit permission. The carpet's tasteful floral pattern on a dark ground went well with the mild blue wall-fabric and light-brown wood paneling and furnishings. The combination opened the hallway, making it seem larger than it was.
“Lady Morgansi, Miss Bernardi,” her guide announced with a faint sniff. Rigi took in the gathered women, spotted the center of attention, and curtsied slightly, more than to an unknown older stranger but less than to, say, Governor Leopoldi’s official hostess. “Miss Bernardi belongs to Captain Prananda.”
Rigi bit her tongue hard. So the guide was one of those sorts, was she? The flutter and murmurs that ran through the dozen or so ladies in the elegantly decorated room suggested that she wasn’t the only one. Rigi steeled her nerves and walked in.
“If I might venture a slight correction,” one of the older women offered. “Mrs. Bernardi-Prananda has been married to Capt. Prananda for almost a year. Colonel DeLeon and his lady-wife attended both her debut and her wedding. And no one owns Neo-Traditionalist women.” Rigi recognized the speaker, one of the women who’d attended her and Tomás’s one-month reception, and felt a touch better.
“I see.” The seated woman at the center of the group beckoned. Rigi saw that she was tall, and probably quite dramatic when she stood, with her dark green suit, white scarf, and black hair braided into tight rows with iridescent black and dark green beads on the ends. “Please, be seated, Mrs. Bernardi-Prananda.” She gestured with slender fingers toward a low, padded seat that put Rigi below the other women. That fit Mrs. Prananda’s books, and Rigi was not surprised. She was glad she wore full skirts, so she could sit modestly and in relative comfort.
Rigi sat, back straight, a polite smile on her lips as she took in the group. “Thank you, Lady Morgansi,” Rigi put the pieces together and added, “Please allow me to offer congratulations on your elevation.”
“Thank you. You are most kind.” The others gave Rigi interested looks, and two of the younger women, both dressed in the dark, close-fitted clothes that marked someone newly arrived from Home, didn’t bother hiding their curiosity. They’d probably never seen an open Neo-Traditionalist before, so Rigi did not take offense. Their hostess intoned, “Mrs. Goodpasture, if you would be so kind.”
Tea outranked coffee still, something the books averred that had remained unchanged for over half a thousand years. Mrs. Goodpasture poured tea from a heavy-looking silver pot in the shape of a slender-necked bird with a round body and eggs for feet. The tail served as the handle, and Rigi admired what she could s
ee of the craftsmanship. A different, rounder bird did duty as the coffee pot, or so Rigi surmised, with brushed-silver chicks holding the sweeteners and creams. She counted four platters of what seemed to be little sandwiches and sweets, each with four tiers. To Rigi's mild surprise, the plates and teacups bore the regimental crest. The books said that only the messes had that sort of porcelain, not private individuals.
Mrs. Goodpasture did not inquire if Rigi preferred tea or coffee, instead pouring her coffee. “Thank you, ma’am,” Rigi added a few drops of wombow cream and waited for the cream to blend in and smooth out some of the bitterness she suspected might lurk in the coffee. Her first sip proved her guess to be correct. She sighed a little. Coffee in that kind of silver always seemed to taste bitterer for some reason. At Lady Morgansi’s nod, a younger woman in brown passed the first of the tiered serving pieces. Rigi’s heart sank a little as she saw the contents. Over half the sweets and savories included something bright red, either in the filling or the decoration. By the time the first serving piece reached her, nothing remained that she could eat, and Rigi passed it back. Likewise the second dish. The third set of little trays did have a sandwich and pastry without crimson, and she took those.
“Is there a problem, Mrs. Bernardi-Prananda?” Rigi thought she heard ice in the young woman’s voice.
“My faith praxis does not permit me to eat bright red foods, ma’am.” Rigi almost said “blood-colored” but decided that might not be a wise word choice, even though it was true.
The dark-clad women gave her concerned looks, leaning back a little as if to avoid contagion. The woman in brown sniffed and looked down her small, stubby nose. Rigi shrugged to herself. At least she did not have what appeared to be wombow hair all over her leggings, unlike one of the women in Home fashions. And it was not even shedding season yet! Rigi tsked a little even though such thoughts were uncharitable and possibly incorrect.
Woman's Work: Shikari Book Four Page 4