“Very well,” Acorna said, and began with her earliest memories of her uncles and the mining ship.
She had not quite finished when both of them fell asleep. The next morning, Acorna awoke to the sound of birds singing and a stream burbling very nearby. She sat up.
The stream was running right behind her head, as a matter of fact, down one glass column, across the floor of the pavilion, where it was joined by the waterfall flowing down the glass column on the opposite side of the floor. Acorna cupped her hand to dip out a drink, and found that the water was actually covered by glass. So were the singing birds that flew from another column, across the top of the pavilion, to disappear into the column opposite the one where the flight had begun. Within the bird’s path, clouds drifted with seeming air currents and, at the base of the pillars, the branches of bushes seemed to bob in a breeze.
Acorna yawned and stretched. The pallet beside hers was empty. Then she noticed that beyond the bird column, the flap was closed and voices were coming from the other side.
She rose and pulled on the undergown from the previous night, wishing she still had her flight suit instead.
The front flap opened, and Grandam Naadiina entered the pavilion. Her arms were full of various items, bouquets of wild flowers, notes, and sheaves of edible grasses and big leafed vegetables.
“Here, let me help you,” Acorna said, rushing forward to relieve her hostess of some of the burden.
“You may as well take them all. Young males haven’t left such tributes to me in a long time.”
“You mean these are for me? But-why?”
“Your welcome home reception was interrupted and your guests did not get properly introduced. I suppose these are by way of being an apology, if not an invitation, on behalf of some of your guests. Perhaps some of them were fellows who are going off planet now and will have no chance to meet you until they return.” She paused. “Besides, the Ancestors seem to approve of you, whether or not Liriili does. The opinions of the Ancestors carry a great deal of weight with our people.”
Acorna shook her head, disbelieving, as she deposited some of the edibles-the wildflowers were edible, too-on one of the low tables near the eastern wall of the pavilion. There was no kitchen facility, or rest room either. Like Acorna, the Linyaari of course tended to graze, eating only fresh vegetables and grasses, so a food preparation area was unnecessary. They buried their waste in the ground, too-or in an area of the hydroponics gardens, as Acorna and her shipmates had done aboard ship. There was no taboo about this. Linyaari recycled food with a clean efficiency that made the waste excellent fertilizer, Neeva had told her. Acorna s human upbringing made her wonder at the lack of squeamishness about this function, but then, humans often used recycled urine for water while on long voyages, too, and the connection was at least one step more remote in this case.
“I’m glad they approve,” Acorna said. “It was rather difficult to tell.”
“It always is, for anyone other than an attendant. Your brow is wrinkled. Why is that? What’s bothering you?”
“Just that I made a fool of myself last night, and then there was the emergency and here I am being given gifts, when everyone is so very worried. I don’t want people to give me things because they feel guilty or intimidated. I want to make friends, to learn to know and understand our people.”
“You are a very sensitive girl and your attitude does you proud. However, many of the people last night, including our leader, were most ungracious to you and the gifts show that they realize that. The emergency no doubt kept some of them from making complete asses out of themselves. These gifts are actually quite a healthy sign-that in spite of the crisis, some of them cared enough about your feelings to apologize. Once this would not have been at all unusual but our people have changed, since the evacuation.” Her voice drifted off, sadly. When she spoke again, it was to change the subject. “Now then. Tell me more about your adventures.”