Fledgling Read Free Page A

time she was oriented again, Kamele was calling her.
    "Theo! Dinner's here!"
    * * *
    They ate at the meal bar in the alcove between the common room and the shuttered kitchen, teetering on tall stools in the dim, directionless light. Kamele had ordered ginger soy noodles and plum soup, with juice for Theo and coffee for herself. Ginger soy noodles being one of Theo's favorite meals, her portion was quickly gone, and the plum soup, too, both reduced to smears of sauce at the bottom of the disposable bowls. She sat then, her hands tucked around her cup, recruiting, as Father put it, her courage.
    Across from her, Kamele had eaten a few ginger noodles, and given the soup a long, thoughtful look. Mostly, she was drinking coffee, her movements sharp and not quite steady. Theo thought again about wine, but didn't quite know how to ask if there was any in-house, let alone suggesting if it might be a good idea for Kamele to have some.
    The other question hovering on the tip of her tongue . . .  She did know that this wasn't the optimum time for asking questions, with Kamele trembling at the edge of a crash. But she had to know—she had to know why .
    Her mother ate another few noodles, washed down with a large swallow of coffee. Theo took a hard breath.
    "Kamele?"
    Over-bright blue eyes focused on her face. "Yes, Theo?"
    "I'd like to learn the reason why we've moved here." There, she thought, that sounds calm, and grown-up, and non-judgmental.
    The bright gaze dropped. Kamele used her hashi to poke at the noodles in her bowl.
    "We've moved here so I can do my work more efficiently," she said quietly.
    Theo blinked, thinking of the high-end access available at Father's house.
    "You can work from home," she blurted, "and a lot more comfortably, too! Kamele, your office at home is bigger than this whole apart—"
    "Precisely." Her mother was looking at her again, cheeks flushed and mouth tight. "A true scholar must value her work above all else. Living in Professor Kiladi's house, I—we have grown . . . accustomed to certain luxuries that are not necessary for—and indeed may be inimical to—the process of orderly and analytical thought."
    That, Theo thought, sounded like a rote response, and if it had been Kamele asking and Theo answering, the rote response would have only earned her a closer interrogation.
    Theo took a breath.
    "Kamele—"
    "I am not done answering your question yet, Theo," her mother said coolly. "Or have you decided that you don't wish to learn, after all?"
    Oops . Theo bent her head. "I framed the question," she said quietly, like the well-brought-up child of an academic from a long tradition of Waitley academics; "because I wished to learn."
    There was silence while Kamele drank more coffee, then pushed the considerable remains of her meal to one side.
    "Research, study, and teaching are only three-quarters of what a scholar must do in order to . . . become prominent in her field," she said slowly. "A scholar must have contacts, allies; colleagues who support her work and whose work she supports in return. These associations cannot be built, or strengthened, by living retired in the suburbs. I need to be here , at the intellectual heart of the planet, in order to make the contacts I need to . . .  The contacts I will need to further my career."
    Theo opened her mouth, and hastily raised her cup for a swallow of juice.
    "I've gotten out of touch," Kamele said, slowly. "And it has cost me. Cost us all. We can recover, of course. With work. Hard work. Work that must be done from the Wall." She looked up, bright eyes fierce. "I am a scholar of Delgado. I must be resolute."
    She might have seen Theo staring, because she smiled suddenly—a real smile, tired as it was. "So, we will take up the professorial lifestyle, as our mothers and grandmothers have done before us. It will be an adventure, won't it, Theo?"
    Applying Father's definition of an adventure being a series of unlooked-for and