Intruder

After the cakes came a tour through the heart of the apartment, Father’s office, which was very fine, a little darker walls, with polished wood, and beautiful old carpet and porcelains on pedestalscit was not as nice or as cozy as Great-grandmother’s office, in Cajeiri’s opinion. But it was fancy, and he liked it. There was the library, also comfortably dark and full of books.

His mother’s room was white with pastel greens. And the nursery, which came first, had windows, three of them, and the room was brilliant yellow—the only color in the whole apartment, and the only windows.

The dining room had been white. The bath was white tile. Even the towels were white.

It was just—not fair that the baby was going to have all the windows.

But he was on best behavior. And he had to stand still and bow and say the white bath was beautiful, and he had to listen respectfully while the staff pointed out the phone, which was in a cabinet on which one could raise the lid, and the light switch, as if one were too stupid to find a light switch in the bath, and a button to call staff, which was, of course, beside the light switchc

Then Father said, unexpectedly, “You may go see your rooms, son, if you wish. One is certain that more interests you.”

“Yes!”he said and half-turned to go, and then decided it was politic to be quiet and far more grateful. “Thank you, Father. Thank you, Mother. Nadiin-ji.” He bowed, including the staff, then collected his bodyguard, who, like all the rest of Father’s and Mother’s staff, had tagged after them and crowded into every room they were in, and escaped with them.

He took off into the i

He and his bodyguard went back up the hall to the first door on the left, just past the servants’ access door, and he pressed ahead and opened the door to his suite himself, he was so excited and hopeful.

The door opened directly into his sitting room, and the place smelled of paint and it was, yes, white.

But redeeming that fault, there were plants everywhere: dark green ones, and light green ones and leaves with pale borders, and blue borders and yellow borders, each with bright lights to support them.

And there was his table, and the chairs with the animals, all polished up like new. With the red tapestries.

Best of all, nearly hidden behind potted plants, and behind a gnarly tree trunk that was also, cleverly, several shelves for more plants—there stood the big brass cage, dusted off, still with a lot of corroded green, but clean, and intricate, and old. He went immediately to see it and make sure it was what he remembered.

And its door worked, and everything.

There were no windows in his rooms at all: that was the biggest fault with the whole place, so far as he was concerned. But everywhere, on the walls, on stands, in pots on the floor, sat potted plants. Even the air smelled better in here than out there, a lot better.

And when he went back further into the suite, down a little hallway with two rooms for his bodyguard, there was his little office, with the desk, and everything, and still more plants. His office had shelves, and the books he had packed were on them, two that he had borrowed from nand’ Bren, and his own books, his atlasescand his map, his precious huge map, that he had had hanging in his bedroom in mani’s apartment: his world map, with all the towns and cities and harbors and rivers and mountains, that he had studied until he could draw whole pieces of it, and they had kept all his pins, which marked places he wanted to think about and places he had been.

There was the west coast, where he had just been. And Malguri, far across the mountains, where mani was. He had a black pin at Malguri, for Great-grandmother. He had a white one at Najida, for nand’ Bren. He put another white one halfway between the west coast and Shejidan. That was nand’ Bren’s plane, coming here to Shejidan, to get his apartment back, which would be just the other side of his father’s office wall.

The kabiu master had made his map the center of the wall, easily in reach, and there were tall plants on either side, but not in front of it, because it was not an ordinary hanging. The master had understood. His office was right. It felt right.

And across the little foyer from that, his bedroom was full of plants, each with its light, and there were the red and blue hangings he had picked out, and the wonderful carved bed with the snarling beast-head, and the bureau that matched it. The bed had figured red pillows and a red tapestry bedspread with green leaves winding over it, and a picture of mountains in the middle of it. There was the red and green carpet, all fresh and clean, and another red and gray hanging he did not remember ordering, but it was all of leaves, and the drapes all along the short wall, as if there were windows, even if he had none, with plants at either corner—those were red, wonderful red, so one could drink down the color and be happy.

It was the most splendid place. It was his.He had as many plants as he could possibly want, all different kinds, and the cage, and the dark animal furniture that was warm and old and just the sort of thing he liked. He threw himself on the bed and bounced, and sat up and looked at his aishid, who had come from admiring their rooms to admire his.

“Mani would like it,” he said, and his aishid agreed with him. “She would,” Antaro said.

And that the kabiu master who had arranged everything would have understood exactly what he wanted and made everything feel right, right down to the plants and the cage and all of it—that felt good, as if the man had understood how he saw things and respected him. That was what kabiu masters did. Mother’s and Father’s rooms would fit them, and the white sitting room had to impress important people and make them sit still and be solemn, but this was a place for him to be comfortable and at home, and for him to think about things, and for him to imagine things, with the mythical beasts and the real ones and the ones from the human archive all mixed up. In real life, he enjoyed open places, with animals ru

And this place had a little of all of it. And, as on the ship, the lights would keep the plants growing, and, well, the servants would water themc

The servants.

Thatwas a problem.

He went sober all of a sudden, in that thought. He had plans. He had secrets about his map and his books. He had things in his baggage that mani would understand, but some people would not.

His mother would not, in particular. He could not imagine that she would.

He could ask her if he could have a servant. But then she would ask why.

“Is something the matter, nandi?” Veijico asked.

He had his little office. He had a sitting room all his own, the same as at Najida. He was so proud of it. But it was not his,while he had no staff to keep it. And he could not ask his bodyguard to do household things.

He only wished—

He thought, I will have to account for everything.

And he thought about the cage.

And all those plants that had to be taken care of, because the Bujavid had no such systems as the starship had, to keep them healthy.

“Nandi?” Antaro asked.

Best if there were young servants, at least as young as his bodyguard was.