Damia's Children Read Free

complex to the Hall where most of the combined household’s activities took place. With their ’Dinis’ help, Morag was already plucking, skinning, and eviscerating the catch. Zara, who would not butcher animals, was washing and preparing vegetables and greens. Afra and Flk were trussing bird and scurrier beast for the spit while Damia and Trp were doing multiple tasks with the rest of the meal. The ’Dinis were also carrying on a voluble conversation with their returning young. Despite the differences in shape and origin, there were many similarities between Mrdini and Human in the care, education and nurture of their progeny.
    Laria caught only half of what Flk and Trp were saying to the younglings but the sounds merrily ranged up and down the pitches available to ’Dini vocal cords so she knew that nothing was amiss. ’Dinis might not use body-language supplements when speaking to their own but tone could be interpreted in this home of sensitive Talents.
    Anything new?
Laria asked.
    Nothing at all, darling,
Damia said.
Can you do some more carrots? You know how Flk and Trp adore them but they haven’t got the hang of using scrapers.
    Vitamin A!
Laria replied with a mental grin, and’ported two more bunches from the storeroom, holding them up for her mother to approve the quantity. A nod sufficed and Laria began preparing them.
    Tlp and Hgf immediately came to her assistance, their single poll eyes glittering for they were as fond of carrots as the adults. Once she had scraped, they sliced, Tip and Huf twitching their upper torsos happily, their “heads” bent so that their single poll eyes were focused on what their hands were doing. Ordinarily, ’Dinis brought whatever they were working on up to eye level but when attempting a Human task, they tended to adopt Human postures.
    Some people said they couldn’t tell one ’Dini from another but that’s because they didn’t work closely with a pair. Laria recognized, and knew the names, of every pair living on Aurigae. ’Dini Pairing itself was another mystery that hadn’t been adequately explained, though biologists were trying. They had had to accept the fact that Mrdini always came in pairs. Laria did not know if Tip and Huf were the young of her parents’ Flk and Trp: she didn’t know if Flk and Trp were birth pairs, or had paired off by mutual choice when mature. There were still gaps in communication levels.
    The Mrdinis Dreamed explanations but these did not explain their biology. Mrdinis reproduced during their annual hibernations. Whether mating occurred before or during was still debatable: the Mrdinis did not seem to understand “gestation” as a concept of time or even a process. They did not understand “abort” or “impotence” as a reason why not all “pairs” reproduced. Nor whythere were always twin births. Diplomatic courtesy denied Humans the right to observe in the hibernatory. No one was certain that these were live births, or if the Mrdinis might be oviparous. But the young were born “adult,” in that they understood the basics that all ’Dinis instinctively knew. They had to wait until their muscles strengthened to walk upright but they needed only to be “reminded,” Laria thought, of sounds—words—to reproduce them properly. As Damia once said, ’Dini young went from “oh” to “oration” in nothing flat. And they left the hibernatory “house-trained” and with mouths full of sharp teeth.
    Mrdini builders had constructed the special hibernation facility well up in the hills behind the sprawling Raven-Lyons home. To this all the Aurigaen Mrdini retired for their two-month long period of inactivity. Not all pairs reproduced in that time. Not all remained for only two months. When all had left the facility, it was scrupulously clean and ready for the next hibernation period.
    Laria was both