At The Edge Of Space (Hanan Rebellion) by C. J. Cherryh Read Free Book Online Page B

been taught.”
    Her look was briefly startled. Then she accepted human strangeness with a little bow, wiped her hands on her chatem and dragged at the bedding to cover him, pulling the bedclothes from beneath him, half-asleep as he was.
    “I am sorry,” she said. “I tried not to wake you, but the night was cold and my lord Kta had left the window open and the light burning.”
    He sighed deeply and reached for her hand as it drew the coverlet across him. “Mim,—”
    “Please.” She evaded his hand, slipped the pin from his shoulder and hauled the tangled ctan from beneath him, jerked the catch of his wide belt free, then drew the covers up to his chin.
    “You will sleep easier now,” she said.
    He reached for her hand again, preventing her going. “Mim, what time is it?”
    “Late,—late.” She pulled, but he did not let her go, and she glanced down, her lashes dark against her bronze cheeks. “Please, please let me go, lord Kurt.”
    “I asked Djan, asked her to send you word—so you would not worry.”
    “Word came. We did not know how to understand it. It was only that you were safe. Only that.” She pulled again. “Please.”
    Her lips trembled, and eyes were terrified, and when he let her hand go she spun around and fled to the door. She hardly paused to close it, her slippered feet pattering away down the stairs at breakneck speed.
    If he had had the strength he would have risen and gone after her, for he had not meant to hurt Mim on the very night of his return. He lay awake and was angry, at nemet custom and at himself, but his head hurt abominably and made him dizzy. He sank into the soft down and slipped away. There was tomorrow. Mim would have gone to bed too, and he would scandalize the house by trying to speak to her tonight.
     
    The morning began with tea, but there was no Mim, cheerily bustling in with morning linens and disarranging things. She did appear in the rhmei to serve, but she kept her eyes down when she poured for him.
    “Mim,” he whispered at her, and she spilled a few drops, which burned, and moved quickly to pour for Kta. She spilled even his, at which the dignified nemet shook his burned hand and looked up wonderingly at the girl, but said nothing.
    There had been the usual round of formalities, and Kurt had bowed deeply before Nym and Ptas and Aimu, and thanked the lord of Elas in his own language for his intercession with Djan.
    “You speak very well,” Nym observed by way of acknowledging him; and Kurt realized he should have explained through Kta. An elder nemet cherished his dignity, and Kurt saw that he must have mightily offended lord Nym with his human sense of the dramatic.
    “Sir,” said Kurt, “you honor me. By machines I do this. I speak slowly yet and not well, but I do recognize what is said to me. When I have listened a few days, I will be a better speaker. Forgive me if I have offended you. I was so tired yesterday I had no sense left to explain where I have been or why.”
    The honorable Nym considered, and then the faintest of smiles touched his face, growing to an expression of positive amusement. He touched his laced fingers to his breast and inclined his head, apology for laughter.
    “Welcome a second time to Elas, friend of my son. You bring gladness with you. There are smiles on faces this morning, and there were few the days we were in fear for you. Just when we thought we had comprehended humans, here are more wonders,—and what a relief to be able to talk without waiting for translations!”
    So they were settled together, the ritual of tea begun. Lady Ptas sat enthroned in their center, a comfortable woman. Somehow when Kurt thought of Elas, Ptas always came first to mind,—a gentle and dignified lady with graying hair, the very heart of the family, which among nemet a mother was: Nym’s lady, source of life and love, protectress of his ancestral religion. Into a wife’s hands a man committed his hearth, and into a daughter-in-law’s