Shadow's End Read Free

supplanted by Firstism, though it is practiced by some remote peoples still. “Practiced,” we say of all religions but that of the Gracious One. “Because they haven’t got it right yet.” It is the kind of joke our songfathers tell.
    But Lutha shook her head at me, crying angrily, saying well, no, not the Holy Grail. But Leelson had found the Sword of Salibar, and the Gem of Adalpi. And there was that business about his fetching home the Lost King of Kamir. Well, we knew what came of that!
    Perhaps the Procurator understood her ambivalence, for he lurched toward her, grimacing. “Sorry!” He chewed his lip, searching for words, his twisted body conveying more strain than the mere physical. “I perceive the fact of his disappearance does not convey apprehension.”
    â€œHis disappearance alone does not make me apprehensive,” Lutha drawled, emulating his stuffy manner. Though it annoyed the Fastigats, who claimed intuition as a province solely theirs, even laymen could play at inferences. “I gather from
your
obvious distress, however, that his disappearance does not stand alone.”
    Seeming not to notice her sarcasm, he gestured toward the wide chairs he had ignored since she entered the room. “Sit down, please, do. Forgive my rudeness. I haven’t had time for niceties lately. Let me order refreshment.”
    â€œIf it pleases you.” She was starved, but damned if she’d let him know it.
    â€œI hope it will please us both. Today …today could use some leavening of pleasure, even if it is only a little fragrance, a little savor.”
    She seated herself as he murmured rapidly into his collar-link before scrambling into the chair across from her, a spindly lopsided figure, his awkwardness made more evident by the skintight uniform. When in the public gaze, draped in ceremonial robes or tabards or togas or what-have-you, even elderly bureaucrats could look imposing enough, but without the draperies, in official skinnies with their little potbellies or saggy butts fully limned, many of them were a little ridiculous. Even the Fastigats. So she said of him.
    He, peering nearsightedly at her, saw wings of white hair at either side of her face, stark against otherwise char-black tresses, a bed-of-coals glow warming the brown matte skin at lip and cheek: forge lights, comforting or burning. He saw her square, possibly stubborn jaw. He looked into her eyes, a dark warm gray, almost taupe,showing more anger and pain than he had expected. No doubt the Procurator saw it all. If he cared about such things, no doubt he thought what I thought: how lovely! Though perhaps he had less reason than I to value loveliness.
    So he looked at her but did not speak again until the almost invisible shadows had fetched fragrant teas and numerous small plates of oddments, something to suit every taste. Lutha averted her eyes from the food items that were still moving or all-too-recently dead and concentrated on the tray of small hot tarts set conveniently at her elbow. The aroma and taste were irresistible.
    â€œYou have some problem concerning Leelson Famber?” she prompted, brushing crumbs from her lips with one of the folded finan skins provided as napkins, soft and silky to the touch. On its own world, the finan is rare, almost extinct. Using its skins for napkins would be a conceit had the animal not been made for that purpose, as the Firsters aver. They are the hierarchs of homo-norm, of whom there are many, even upon Alliance Central. Besides, the finans’ genetic pattern had been saved in the computers at Prime. So Lutha told me.
    Instead of answering, the Procurator asked, “Are you familiar with what is now called the ‘Ularian crisis’?”
    Familiar, Lutha thought. Now there was a word. The crisis had been when? Almost a century ago. And on the frontier, to boot. Why in the world would a linguist like herself—a document expert, yes, but