“Oh, dear!” Acorna remembered now the thought patterns she had heard from her aunt and shipmates about the peculiar custom humans had of baring their teeth. They understood, because of their contact with her people, that an open smile was a gesture of good will. But this was not yet known to the rest of the Linyaari. If only Thariinye’s appetite had not gotten the best of him, he could have explained. His smile and social lie earlier about her dress showed, or so she had thought at the time, his willingness to try to adapt customs familiar to her in order to put her at ease. Now she wondered. Perhaps he had been actually baring his teeth in the Linyaari sense of the gesture after all?
Whatever could she do to correct the appalling impression she seemed to be making?
“Calm yourself, girl, you look as if you’re about to fly apart,” the grandam advised.
“But what will they think of me?”
Grandam snorted. “No less than you should think of them, particularly Liriili, dragging you out to this thing before you’ve had time to rest from your journey and have a bite to eat. And before you’ve been properly introduced to your new home and had a chance to meet people in the normal way. It was unforgivable, her sending Neeva and the others away and leaving you alone among strangers except for that uppity young stud, Thariinye.” She snorted. “These young ones are making such a fuss over culture, but culture begins with kindness. I was just saying so to Liriili when you bared your teeth at that young ass. Not his fault, of course, but I daresay in your position I would have done the same.”
“Oh, but you see, I wasn’t trying to bare my teeth at all-1 mean, I did bare my teeth, but where I come from, among the people I grew up with, one shows one’s teeth to be friendly, happy-it’s an expression of greeting and cordiality, not at all one of hostility. I have been told, actually, that it isn’t viewed the same way among your-our-people, but I got a bit flustered and …”
“There, there, child. You needn’t explain to me.”
She firmly took Acorna by the elbow and led her to the highest of the tiers where the delicious foods grew. In a long and rather shrill Linyaari utterance that sounded eerily like “Hiiire me!” Grandam Naadiina stopped the music, the dancers, the talking, and drew all stares to herself and Acorna.
Acorna noticed, meanwhile, that both viizaar and her aide had left the pavilion hurriedly, looking worried. She suddenly had the feeling that the crowd’s reaction had more to do with Liriili’s exit than her social grace.
“My children, you have all gathered here to meet our long lost kinswoman, Khornya, daughter of the late lamented Feriila , and Vaanye. She only just this afternoon, as many of you know because you were there, arrived on the planet from a journey of ; many months. Her closest relative and only acquaintances among us had to ship out immediately on another mission, leaving the child here among us. Yes, her accent is strange and her dress is a bit of the old fashion instead of the new, and because she was not properly instructed, she greeted a prospective lifemate with an expression interpreted differently by the culture from which she comes than it is in our own, but she is a good girl, I can tell, a nice girl, and she’ll be glad to meet any of you later on when she’s had a proper chance to rest, collect her thoughts, find her way around, and get a decent meal or two under her belt.”
As Grandam spoke those words, many people stopped dancing. Rather than paying attention to their elder, they were looking toward the flap of the pavilion where Liriili had exited as if they were waiting for something to happen. Something far more important to them than Grandam’s slap on their collective wrists. They were waiting, Acorna thought, for Liriili to return and explain what business had compelled her to leave.
isia, precious, you look fatigued,” Uncle Edacki said.