In Arcadia

Chapter Thirteen

Laura’s workroom opened off the southern side of her bedroom, and had the best ground floor view of Braid Meadow. The outside wall, in keeping with the rest of the house, was a single curving window, fitted with an equally curving bench. A sink and a mass of shelving, cupboards, and places to hang tools filled the other walls, but because of the room’s generous size it did not feel cramped or crowded.

When she’d first arrived on Muina, with only a tiny wallet of her favourite crafting implements tucked in a pocket of her backpack, Laura had felt overwhelmed by all the empty possibility of the workroom. She’d added a divan to the nook at the eastern end, and a plushy woollen rug to the floor, but the place hadn’t really felt like hers until she’d had several projects under her belt, and accrued pots of paint, spools of wire, and all manner of cloth, leather and thread. Fortunately Pandora had a thriving artist’s community, and she’d had no trouble sourcing materials she was skilled with using—and samples of unfamiliar goops, clays and foams to try out.

To fill the day before meeting Gidds and his daughters, she was working on models of Romana-Angharad and Ruvord, each facing their first teszen. The last few years she’d been experimenting with unjointed wire frame and air-dry pieces—foam-light statuettes much larger than the gothic palm-sized dolls that had been such a reliable source of income. The larger, more expensive pieces hadn’t been such easy sales, but she loved the amount of detail she could lavish on them.

For the Red Exchange characters she was trying out a slow-drying Taren polymer clay which gave her a heavier but still slightly-flexible result. She’d completed the basic forms earlier in the week, and now dived into the fine detail layer, appreciating that even on a grey, drizzly day she had plenty of natural light to work with.

Lira: Can I come visit, Unna Laura?

Laura: Of course.

Laura glanced at her internal clock, a little surprised. Nearly lunchtime. Hadn’t Cass arranged to take the kids into town?

Double-checking that all the clay was properly sealed, Laura visited her bathroom, and then headed to the kitchen for a drink and to meet her granddaughter.

"Would you like something to eat?" she asked, when Lira paused at the patio door to wipe her feet.

"No thank you, Unna Laura."

Lira hadn’t bothered with an umbrella or coat for the trip up the hill, and stood damply in the doorway. Even from the kitchen bench, Laura could see her eyes were red-rimmed.

"Go dry off a little," Laura recommended.

Lira wordlessly obeyed, and Laura started putting together a light lunch that could be easily shared if the girl changed her mind.

Laura: Cass, are you still going into the city for lunch and shopping?

Cass: We’re about to leave. Have you changed your mind?

Laura: I’m still overwhelmed from the last cavalcade. Is there a reason Lira’s not going?

Cass: She headed up there, did she? We had a storm over her ditching her Kalrani guard. I wasn’t planning on more than asking her to be a little more considerate, but things always seem to escalate with Lira, especially since the latest round of will she fade away. I wouldn’t have punished her except she tends to push or kick furniture when she’s angry, even though we’ve told her it’s a bad idea, and today we ended up with baby bottles everywhere. So no shopping trip.

Laura: Can I shower her with treats and generally spoil her?

Cass: If you want. We didn’t tell her to stay in her room or anything, so there’s no problem with her hanging out with you. If you’re in the mood to entertain her, I’ll let her security detail know they can stay snug in the guard house.

Laura: I’ll give her a project, then.

Cass: Thanks, Mum. See if you can put her in a good mood for the aether trip tomorrow.

Lira, when she returned, appeared to have spent more time washing her face than drying the rest of her.

"What did you think of the ice skating?" Laura asked, choosing to ignore dramas altogether.

Lira dropped heavily into a chair. "It’s pretty, but it would be a lot of work. Can you knife dance, Unna Laura?"

"No. Roller skates, yes, ice, no."

"Rol-ler?" Lira sounded out the English word carefully.

"Shoes with wheels on the bottom. You can’t jump on them in the same way as you can ice skates, but they’re fun to zoom about on. And there’s a sport you can play on skates."

Laura quickly ran through the mass of movies and TV shows she’d brought from Earth and had converted to the Muinan file system, but couldn’t off the top of her head think of one that included a roller derby, so settled on Xanadu, and pulled out a few clips.

Lira absently picked at the plate of food while she watched, then said: "Do you have to sing while skating?"

"Only in musicals," Laura said, and wondered if Cass had introduced her kids of Disney, or if she was avoiding the princess theme given the class issues Nuri and old Muina seem to have shared.

"Do you want to see my latest project?" she asked instead, and was pleased when Lira brightened immediately, and headed straight for the workroom.

Laura triggered the door so that it opened as the girl arrived. "I’m working on a model of my character in a new game I’ve been playing," she explained, as Lira inspected the two partially-complete figures.

"What are their names? Are you being both of them?"

"No, this is mine," Laura replied, picking up the female model and reviewing her progress. The face had come out well—very reminiscent of Lalla Ward—and the hands were expressively posed. "Her name’s Angharad. The other is my friend’s character, Ruvord."

"Do you always make figures from the games you play?"

"Often. It’s like taking a picture to remember them by. Though I left my previous ones in storage with your Great-Aunt Bet when I came here, since I didn’t have room for them in my bag."

"Great-Aunt," Lira repeated. "Does that mean Big Aunt?"

Laura smiled, and explained while rolling out and shaping some clay for the clothing detail.

Lira listened attentively, then made a face. "This is a stupid language," she said—demonstrating a tolerable command of it. Daily breakfast lessons had had an impact.

"It’s known for its contradictions. But I like all the shades and complications. Words that mean three things, names that have history."

"Does your name mean something?"

"Laura comes from laurel, which is a kind of tree that symbolised honour and victory."

"Do you have a secret name too, like She does?"

"A secret name?" Laura repeated, surprised. She was Cass, whenever Ys or Lira were angry with her. "What’s Cass' secret name?"

"Eloise."

"Oh, her middle name?"

Tarens didn’t go in for middle names, and Nurans and Old Muinans ran their House and personal name together—so Lira’s full name was Liranadestar because she had belonged to House Destar, just as Sen was Sentarestal of House Restal. Ys and Rye had been only Ys and Rye until Cass and Kaoren had adopted them, and there were worlds of rank and privilege issues tied up in this naming system. It was not only out of Australian habit that Cass called Sen and Lira by shortened names.

"My middle name is Rose," Laura said. "Which is a type of flower that grows on both Earth and Muina, though Earth has a few thousand more varieties."

"Your name is Tree Flower and you like plants." Lira smiled for the first time. "That is very silly."

Laura stroked the girl’s thick hair. "I’ll have to name one of my characters Tree Flower one day. It’s nicely literal. Now, would you like to work on something as well? I’ll be meeting my friend in my game in an hour or so, but there’s time enough for me to show you how to use this type of clay."

"Can I try the game?" Lira asked, eyeing the Ruvord figure speculatively. "What is it called?"

"Red Exchange," Laura said, sending a link while admiring the girl’s unerring instinct for the nuances of friend. "I don’t see why not. Do you need me to help you make an account?"

Lira might have been born in a pre-industrial culture, but she’d clocked up a couple of years of heavy interface use, so this offer earned only a scornful negative, then some absent nodding as Laura told her which island to start on, and where to meet later. Laura watched her curl up on the workroom divan. There would be no long download delay—most of the games Laura had played on Muina had taken only a few minutes before they were playable.

After a pause to adjust the room’s temperature a notch higher, Laura sent a message to Gidds.

Laura: Would there be any issues with Lira joining us for today’s game?

Gidds: None occurs to me. She will know Allidi and Haelin a very little from Kaoren and Cassandra’s wedding.

Laura: I’ll see you soon, then.

Gidds had actually been the celebrant for Cass and Kaoren’s wedding—something Laura hadn’t managed to notice on multiple viewings of the event’s recording, so busy had she been staring at Cass. After meeting Gidds she’d gone back to look for him, and forgiven herself for not noticing the few side-on glimpses. But she should have remembered that voice.

Before returning focus to her models, Laura sat for a while watching her granddaughter. The girl’s usual haughty mask relaxed into a small frown, and then an absorbed expression that Laura suspected meant she’d reached character creation. When she let her guard down she looked younger than her thirteen years.

Lira had spent a very long time alone and afraid. She hardly ever let her guard down.

Since Laura had no solution to public speculation about the lifespan of a girl brought back from the not-quite-dead, she returned to working on Angharad’s starting outfit, but only made a little progress before it was time to pack away for the day. After tidying up, she touched Lira’s shoulder, murmured that she would be logging in, and then climbed the loops of the spiral stair up to her roofline window seat.