Well, gosh-darn it, but who’d have thought Vergis could be that smooth. Was he smooth? I actually didn’t know what passed for smooth when talking to bagua like Luëris. It was as if I was stuck in an Oscar Wilde play without knowing any of the lines.
Luëris smiled and nodded. “Of course. I apologize. I know my language skills are lacking, but it seems my knowledge of human customs and habits is even worse. I need to improve. Please be patient with me, Rory.”
“Sure. No worries.” That seemed to settle that. Hopefully.
Before Luëris could open his mouth again to say whatever else he wanted to say, Nokim came in, his eyes lingering on Vergis and his entourage as he said in Lugarra that “tokka” was “sen,” or that dinner was ready.
Normally, dinner happened around the large kitchen table, which had taken me a while to get used to, given that it could be a pleasantly loud affair.
Now, because there were a good twenty people with Zeddira, we were outside in the backyard, a stone’s throw away from the gazebo with the ko circle we’d used to get here that first time. Instead of using the garden chairs and tables—Vergis had cursed them to the ninth circle of hell when he’d cleaned out the garage—there were lots and lots of picnic blankets and floor pillows, all of which would make this more comfortable and familiar for the bagua guests.
The evening light was waning. Someone had carried our electric lights out and switched on the fairy lights that crisscrossed the garden to the gazebo, and from there to the large oak nearby.
Luëris stared at all the lights and aahed. “This is very beautiful.”
The gaggle of bagua Vergis had attracted were chatting to him, and he responded in monosyllables or with a grunt here and there, which did not deter them as far as I could tell.
Nokim was trailing behind, but he turned on his heel when Charles said something about a breadbasket. I spotted Inkiri and Kinnek on one picnic blanket along with Zeddira, who looked damn near regal the way he was lounging there and talking with them while somehow managing to look down his nose at them, even though Inkiri was taller.
Luëris gestured. “Come, I will translate for you.”
I couldn’t very well reject that—heavens knew I needed someone to translate—and I ended up sitting between him and Inkiri, with Zeddira on Luëris’s other side.
Inkiri turned his full attention on me so he could greet me by pushing my scarf aside and licking my throat. It was just a brief smack for him. Normally, he liked to draw that kind of greeting out longer.
Kinnek leaned toward me. “Guess what, snapdragon. Your bagu in-law has decided it would be irresponsible not to accompany us to the Stone for our attempt to close up the veils to the monster place.” Kinnek looked a good deal happier about that than he should have, in my opinion. Luëris jumped into translating for Zeddira.
“Oh, that’s very kind,” I said to Zeddira, who looked at me steadily with his yellow eyes before speaking.
Luëris inclined his head and translated. “The second high counselor says it hardly needs mentioning. He thinks of you fondly already, in the way family would.”
Inkiri’s hand had ventured under my shirt and up my back. I had the vague sense that something annoyed him. Maybe he just really didn’t get along with Zeddira in a sibling kind of way.
“I really do appreciate that. That he’s risking himself and his people.”
I saw Kinnek smile out of the corner of my eye, and there was a minute tic setting Zeddira’s upper lip atremble before he spoke.
“The second high counselor wants to assure you the Raiken readily protects their own, much like you have done in Esaka,” Luëris said. “He hopes you won’t mind sharing the attention you gift your family with him while we travel.”
“That was a question, actually,” Kinnek chimed in.
I’d gotten that from how Zeddira was eyeing me. To be fair, I knew that look. Inkiri had looked at me like that, back in the women’s clothing store, and I was less clueless now than I had been then. Still more clueless than a lot of people, but just a bit less than I had been pre-monster marriage.
“I look forward to having meals together.” That seemed the safest option, both then and now. More now that I knew for certain human wasn’t ever going to be on the menu. The way Kinnek was trying to curb his grin told me I hadn’t made a mistake, for once in my life. No one was more surprised than me.
The dinner conversation went on in a mostly exhausting way. It took me a while to figure out that Inkiri only got involved in it when he was addressed directly, which was strange. Then again, he was bagu royalty, and what did I know about anything?
At one point, Kinnek and Zeddira started talking about whether Zeddira would be allowed to have a look at the cola ash dude in the bunker. I hadn’t gotten a look at him since he’d been taken down there. Not that I wanted to look at him, at all.
Luëris flawlessly picked up any lags in the conversation so that Inkiri sat beside me, mostly silent and concerned with making sure I had food I liked on my plate.
We sat there for maybe an hour before a heavy hand landed on my shoulder.
“You,” Vergis said, the one word sounding like an accusation and a mild curse at the same time, which was a lot of heavy lifting for a single pronoun. Vergis could’ve been a voice actor.
“Huh?”
“We’re doing the thing that you asked me to do with you, because you asked me to do it with you earlier, remember? That thing you asked me to do?” Vergis was already dragging me to my feet.
