Thirteen Orphans (32 page)
“Maybe business is just good,” Des suggested. “Albert’s shop is quite trendy these days. I saw it mentioned in a couple of high-end magazines as
the
place to get good chocolate. There were rumors he’s branching out into teas as well.”
the
place to get good chocolate. There were rumors he’s branching out into teas as well.”
“He is,” Gaheris said. “He mentioned something about how tea is going to be the new coffee. I’m not sure that Albert isn’t right. Maybe I should offer him the bobblehead mandarins. He might be able to use them in a holiday promotion. Wasn’t one of the villains in the
Nutcracker
a mandarin doll that nodded?”
Nutcracker
a mandarin doll that nodded?”
“I think that was in ‘The Steadfast Tin Soldier,’” Brenda said, “and the mandarin wasn’t really a villain there. I think the villain was the jack-in-the-box.”
“Oh.” Gaheris looked momentarily disappointed, but Riprap offered him a beer, and the question of selling Albert Yu mandarin bobble heads was forgotten in the pleasure of discussing local micro breweries.
Albert Yu’s not the only one who has mellowed,
Brenda thought.
Dad seems to have lost that … bitterness? Sense of rivalry? Whatever it was that made him so uncomfortable with Albert. Pearl said they’d been rivals as boys. I guess Dad didn’t like how Albert assumed that being the emperor’s heir made him more important. Now that the emperor has been forgotten with the rest, I wonder if they’re both not happier.
Brenda thought.
Dad seems to have lost that … bitterness? Sense of rivalry? Whatever it was that made him so uncomfortable with Albert. Pearl said they’d been rivals as boys. I guess Dad didn’t like how Albert assumed that being the emperor’s heir made him more important. Now that the emperor has been forgotten with the rest, I wonder if they’re both not happier.
It was an uncomfortable thought. Up until now, Brenda had been focused on getting back for her father what had been stolen from him, but what if Gaheris Morris was happier without his memories of the Rat? Brenda wasn’t certain that
she
wouldn’t be happier without what she’d learned. Since she’d inadvertently drawn down the Three-Legged Toad, the universe had seemed fragile, as if made of cheesecloth or tissue or something else that gave the illusion of solidity but was too easily poked full of holes.
she
wouldn’t be happier without what she’d learned. Since she’d inadvertently drawn down the Three-Legged Toad, the universe had seemed fragile, as if made of cheesecloth or tissue or something else that gave the illusion of solidity but was too easily poked full of holes.
Dad stayed for dinner, which was served out on the patio out of deference to Nissa’s need for quiet.
He succeeded in charming Lani, whom he claimed to have met when she was an infant, when he was out in Virginia doing a deal on key chains printed with the UVA logo as an alumni athletic club tie-in promotion. Of course, Dad had forgotten that he’d ever had a more personal reason for wanting to know Nissa’s family.
“But you’ve got the wrong sort of name,” Dad insisted, as an enchanted Lani sat on his knee, snapping her finger under the chin of a bobble-headed penguin figurine he’d given her. “You can’t be Nissa’s daughter. All the girls in her family have ‘N’ names—or are you a little boy?”
Lani was appalled. “I’m a girl! An I do have a ‘n.’”
“Lani doesn’t begin with ‘n,’” Dad insisted, being deliberately obtuse.
“Noelani!” Lani insisted. “My name is Noelani.”
“No-lani. I got that,” Dad said. “Your name is not Lani. All right, what is it?”
Brenda thought Dad was pushing the kid a bit hard, but evidently Lani had heard similar teasing before.
“My name is Noelani,” Lani repeated, not only showing excellent patience with this stupid adult, but also demonstrating the best diction Brenda had seen from her so far. “Noelani begins with ‘n.’ It’s Hawaiian for something …”
She looked inquiringly at Brenda. “I can’t say it.”
“Beautiful one from the sea,” Brenda said, who had asked Nissa about the odd name. “It’s a pretty name, and my dad is being difficult.”
“Am I?” Gaheris grinned. “Then maybe Noelani, who does have an ’n’ in her name after all, needs someone to keep Mr. Penguin company. Would you like a Mrs. Penguin?”
Lani was delighted with the set, and settled in to feeding them bits of hotdog and loose grapes. Brenda and Riprap took turns making sure that Lani herself got a few bites.
Later, as Brenda took Lani up for her bath and bed, she heard Pearl apologize that she didn’t have a spare room. Dad didn’t try and press for a space on the sofa. Brenda would have worried that in losing his memories of the Rat he’d lost his legendary sense of economy—or cheapness, as her mother had been known to call it—but then Dad mentioned he had a meeting at his hotel early the next morning with a manufacturer from China.
“It’s great you taught me how to speak the language, Auntie Pearl,” he said, kissing her cheek in parting. “With China entering the world economy in a big way, I have a huge advantage. You really ought to see about getting your movies released there. I bet you’d outsell your old rival.”
“Never a rival,” Pearl said, her smile audible. “Shirley had me beat all the way—and I liked working with her. Still, I’ll talk to my agent and see if anything can be done.”
With Mr. and Mrs. Penguin nodding approval from the dresser top, Lani was the soul of cooperation when it came time for her to go to bed. Brenda came down in time to visit a bit more with her dad before he had to leave.
“You get some sleep, Breni,” Dad said, hugging her. “I’ll tell your mom she worries too much, but don’t let her know I said that, okay? She’s so proud of how well you two get along, she’d be annoyed that I let on that she still worries about her little girl.”
“Promise,” Brenda said, hugging him back, but as she went up to bed shortly thereafter she found herself wondering. Had Mom really been the one who was worried, or had it maybe been Dad?
Dad. It made a lot more sense if it was Dad.
She wondered why the realization made her so nervous, and pulled the sheet right up to her chin, then, on impulse, up and over her head.
The day after Gaheris’s visit, Pearl waited until Des was busy with Brenda and Riprap, and Nissa and Lani were napping. Then she climbed the stairs to the third floor, where the men had their rooms. The time had come for her to talk to Foster—and to address the questions of his freedom and his ability to communicate.
After a great deal of meditation, Pearl had arrived at a solution that she thought would satisfy her allies, reward her unwelcome guest for his good behavior, and provide her with an edge for the future. She had confided her thoughts on the first two points to Des, and he had agreed to be satisfied. The third point, however, Pearl had kept to herself.
As Des had threatened to do after one of their earlier arguments regarding Foster’s treatment, he had rearranged the sleeping arrangements so that he and Foster now shared a bathroom.
The area at the top of the stairs opened into a broad, comfortable foyer. Long ago, Pearl had furnished this as a informal sitting area, where her boarders might visit without needing to invade each other’s rooms—or her own living areas. That was where she found Foster, seated cross-legged in a wide, high-backed chair, a book in his lap, his elbows resting lightly on the arms of the chair.
His posture was perfect, loose-limbed, yet not in the least bit sloppy. Pearl envied him that young, graceful body, that hair that shone as dark and glossy as her own once had, that youthful skin, clear and golden brown, without the faintest of lines or wrinkles.
Foster rose when he saw it was her upon the stairs, a graceful movement, lithe as that of a young animal. When Pearl topped the stairs, all too aware of the dozens of tiny protests age had set as a symphony in her limbs, he bowed deeply and stood with his hands folded before him, a gesture that recalled how he should have worn embroidered robes into whose wide, deep sleeves those strong, long-fingered hands would have vanished.
Pearl gave him a polite bow in return, and was pleased to see Foster’s eyes widen slightly in surprise at her courtesy. That was all that gave him away though. He stood, still and straight, a young tree, a young tiger, and waited to see what new storm the old woman in front of him would bring into his life.
Pearl spoke to him in Chinese, deliberately using the strange dialect which mixed up times and histories and that was the native tongue of those from the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice.
“Foster, please, I pray, be seated. I have come to speak with you about some matters of great import.”
Foster moved a step closer to the chair in which he had been seated, but did not sit until Pearl herself had taken a seat in the matching chair. Then he lowered himself in, drawing up his legs and crossing them with automatic grace and ease. The chair had been upholstered in red, but over time the color had faded to the dusty hue of dried and faded rose petals saved from a Valentine’s bouquet. The color went very well with Foster’s coloring, and again Pearl felt the dangerous shifting of envy.
However, she had not come here to attack this young man, no matter that everything about him set her teeth on edge and made her want to growl.
“The other night,” Pearl said, “the night when you, Nissa, and Brenda played at mah-jong, I have been told you did us a great service. I am grateful.”
“I played with the babe, Honorable One,” Foster replied. “That is all I am good for, and if I did this well, then I accept your gratitude.”
There was bitterness in his tones, and in the cast of his eyes. Pearl could sense that Foster sought to hide that bitterness, but her ears were too schooled in the nuances of language and expression not to catch the hints. She didn’t doubt she knew the reason for Foster’s bitterness. Even if he remembered nothing about himself, he must feel certain he had been more than a nanny. The T-shirt he wore exposed his arms, and she could see the thin silver lines of scars. When she and Nissa had undressed Foster back in Virginia, they had seen other scars, including one that crossed his chest, as if a sword or spear might have cut quite deeply.
No. Foster only need look at himself in a mirror to know that once he had been more than a nanny.
“Let us not play games with each other,” Pearl said, adopting the tone of general to soldier. “We both know you are good for far more than playing with the babe. We do not know what other talents you have. Perhaps in time we will learn.”
“Desperate Lee says that you and he study upon the matter,” Foster said. “Have you learned something?”
“Some things,” Pearl countered, “but nothing that would mean anything to you. Foster, I have come to tell you that in reward for your patience and valor—in reward for your tending Lani with such gentle strength and so freeing her mother to enter into a battle from which she is still healing—in reward for these things, I have decided to grant you a gift.”
Foster’s face settled into neutrality, and no wonder. Pearl had shown him very few kindnesses. She recalled how she had learned to suspect her father’s gifts, to look for what Thundering Heaven hid behind apparent kindness. The recollection made her feel uneasy. She had seen her father in Foster’s face and form. She had never thought that she herself might have become a more genuine representation of Thundering Heaven’s self.
“A true gift,” Pearl hastened to clarify. “You have been barred from ease of communication with any in this house but myself and Des. I have it in my power to grant the others the means of understanding your tongue.”
Foster did not ask her how she could do this. If he had any trace memories, they would include sorcery. Words for spells and amulets were part of his vocabulary, those words untainted by any sense that “magic” was in the least a matter for doubt.
“I would like this,” Foster said politely. “I will admit to frustration that I can talk less easily than does young Lani.”
“I have another gift for you,” Pearl said. “Would you like to be able to leave this house and see something of the places without?”
This time Foster’s control failed him. He gaped at her, then collected himself and gave a seated bow.
“I would be very grateful, Honorable One. Your palace is lovely, filled with miracles, and with items of great beauty, but I will admit that the walls do close upon me.”
“Then you will have your freedom, but with one condition.” Pearl went on quickly, lest Foster think this reward no reward. “For now, I ask that when you leave the house, one of our number accompany you. You will not be able to speak to the majority of those you meet. There should be someone present who can translate. Also, there are many strange and dangerous things out there, and I would not have you go free only to have you harmed.”
Foster grinned, for a moment a young man, not a warrior /courtier. Then he resumed his more formal manner.
“Honorable One, I remember the journey I made with you and Riprap. I saw the many dangers, even though we traveled mostly within the car. Then, too, Nissa showed me the dangers in things as innocent-seeming as electrical cords and outlets. I can understand only too well how many other dangers there may be. I will abide by your ruling with honor and faith.”
“Nissa still rests,” Pearl said. “And the others are at their studies. Will you permit me to be your first escort? I fear my old limbs may have some difficulty keeping up with your young ones, but perhaps for a first venture, you will not need speed so much as care.”
Foster leapt to his feet and bowed.
“Shoes. I will need to put on shoes as I have not since coming to your palace, Honored One. If you would wait?”
Pearl smiled. “By all means. I will await you down by the front door. I think you will find this neighborhood quite interesting. I look forward to showing some of its wonders to you.”
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