He -was flummoxed. The truth was, he never stuck around for courtship or seduction much past the brief encounters in the pleasure houses-hadn’t since he was younger and encountered all the ladies who wanted a good time but thought spending any part of it on a salvage ship beneath them. Nadhari Kando knew where he lived. She’d been there. “I-uh-I’d really like that. I need to check in with Mac though-that’s the KEN-640 unit-he’s repairing the corn unit on the Khieevi shuttle so we can maybe monitor their movements-”
“By the sacred whiskers, you think of everything, don’t you?” She moved closer and offered him an olive. He held out his hand but she held it with two fingers and her thumb and waved it teasingly till he opened his mouth, then she popped it in. He could definitely get used to this. Her scent was a mixture of musk and citrus, and something like a forest after a rain. He liked it. He held out an olive for her.
“And I-uh-I guess I should get RK back, too. He hasn’t had his usual eighty hours of sleep today.”
“Oh?” she said. “That’s funny. He’s been communing with me. He -wants to stay with me tonight.”
“Well, if that’s not just like a cat!” Becker exclaimed, dropping the olive back onto his plate in his consternation at his first mate’s defection.
Nadhari smiled. Her smile reminded him of RK-he just hadn’t realized that was what a cat smile looked like. “What’s that?” she asked as the cat rubbed against her cheek. “Oh, yes. He wants to stay with you tonight, too.”
“Divided loyalties?” Becker asked.
Nadhari swung her sturdy but very shapely legs down from the divan with a sinuous slither and stood looking down at him. “Hardly. RK is a sacred temple cat. His wish is my command. If he wishes to be with me, and with you …” her hand reached down to cup Becker’s chin and with slight pressure on it, raised him to his feet. “I am not the one to gainsay him. Are you?”
“Disappoint my old buddy?” Becker asked, slipping her hand through his crooked elbow. “Perish the thought. Mind telling me where he wants to spend this time with us tonight?”
“Aboard your vessel,” she replied, and he was surprised to see that she actually had to look up at him. How did she do that? He could have sworn she was taller. “In the hold -where you questioned the first Khieevi.”
“Really?”
“Yes. The sacred cat thinks I would find that environment rather – stimulating.”
“Kitty knows best,” Becker said.
fourteen
Hafiz -would not hear of the Linyaari remaining aboard the Condor. Acorna was glad, particularly -when she saw Becker, RK, and Nadhari strolling arm in arm in the direction of the ship.
A self-contained trio of pavilions triangulated around a garden/grazing area. Kaarlye and Miiri were billeted in one, and although Maati could have stayed with her parents, she asked if she might share a pavilion with Khornya instead. This left Aari and Thariinye to share the third.
Acorna spent most of the rest of the evening with her adoptive fathers/uncles, describing what had befallen her since they had last seen each other.
“This Aari guy,” Gill said. “You and he … ?”
“We’re friends,” Acorna said, off-handedly.
“Evidently, if he’s willing to wrestle bug-eyed monsters on your behalf,” Calum said.
“We -were all in danger,” Acorna said, reasonably enough. “And Aari was trying to save us all.”
“He didn’t know that stuff smeared on his shirt would kill the thing though?” Gill asked. “He just dove right in and tackled it?”
“Well-yes.”
“Sounds kinda suicidal to me,” Calum said.
“I don’t really think he is-at least, not now,” Acorna said.
“But he was before?” Gill asked.
Acorna suddenly felt more uncomfortable than she had ever before felt in the company of these beloved men. “Why are you questioning me this way?” she asked.
“Why do you think?” Calum asked, exasperated. “Because we care about you, of course, and we’ve talked it over and it looks to us like you care about him.”
“But we wish to make sure,” Rank said, “That-well, you’re not just feeling sony for someone who cannot be a good mate for you, to put it bluntly.”