In the kitchen, Yvonne sat him down with a glass of Special Lemon and a few of her plain cookies. He snapped them down with a few hungry bites so she buttered him some slices of bread then refilled his emptied glass. She sat down and took a sip from her own drink to cover her nervousness.
"What do you want to know?" she asked.
"Why is my picture on top of your piano? "
"You weren’t a bottle bairn, you grew under my heart," said Yvonne with a touch to her stomach. "I was in solitary when I was pregnant, your little flutters were my only companion. I talked and sang to you, loved you."
"I wasn’t a made thing then?" Dante looked puzzled.
"No."
"My father?"
Yvonne sighed. The truth remained a difficult thing. "He raped me. I’m sorry."
"I, when my wife and I first. My magic overcame the implant for a second and I made love to her. Then it descended again and I couldn’t explain, couldn’t ask. Madam corrected me and I thought I had done that to Martha. It was a misunderstanding. Martha loved me and I loved her." His face twisted for a moment. "It wasn’t like that was it?"
"No. But I loved you and knew, despite your beginning, that you were very special. A fay seraphim showered like silver through my prison window. It couldn’t stay long because of the iron walls but I let it investigate, they’re so curious. Then it comforted me and left its magic. The angels blessed you."
"Shine child," murmured Dante.
"Laius had set it up, putting in steel bars in the window. I worried what he wanted with such a child. More I worried about the Queen. Your half-brother Dedalus looked after the pregnancy examinations as you grew. He didn’t mind experimenting with eggs and sperm in test tubes, but I could see this bothered him. Not all can be bad in a family.
"I convinced him to get a message to my father. It was a great scandal, especially when Dedalus revealed the existence of your test tube brothers and sisters. Lapis almost lost his throne. Dedalus was sent here for a few years, as a punishment, mostly for opening his mouth. He was never undermage, lived alone as I do. The Queen was backed by parliament when she ordered the destruction of the experimental fetuses.
"But you grew safe inside me. I wouldn’t let them abort you. You were no slave’s child, they knew they couldn’t make me. Laius was forced to acknowledge you, I think he thought he could still follow his experiment. My family insisted that no one know of my disgrace. Your Nanny was my maid-in-waiting, Anna. An educated woman from the merchant class who fell into slavery through poverty. I remained in prison, convicted of terrorism and treason." Yvonne gave a small, sad smile. "The useless fire of youth. All true charges. As were the writs against my brothers later, that lead to their beheadings. We fought the good fight, but to no avail."
"They did it to me, my father and brothers," muttered Dante to the table top. "The net in my head, the transporting. The Mage’s golem. A living death." His face hardened back into his father’s frown. "The grace of Gaia thwarted them. They’ll not have me."
"No," said Yvonne. "As much as I would love to, I can’t let you believe a lie. You’re a slave because of me."
"You gave me life. Loved me from afar, I think," said Dante glancing at the picture. "What they did to me’s not your fault."
"Yes, it is." Yvonne poured herself a moccatine to give her time to think of the words, took a sip and drew in her breath. "When I heard about my father’s death, then Anna’s murder, I knew your father would destroy you."
"Wait. Nanny was murdered? She didn’t commit suicide?"
"That’s what they told you? You poor child."
"Bastards." The word exploded into life, ragged and black. He grabbed it with his invisible hand and dissolved it before it could cause damage, then looked a little sheepish. "I should be the last to use that word in vain. See my problem with control?"
"Seems to me you handled it well." Yvonne’s blood ran cold but she continued, "I secretly contacted Dedalus, he was back on the Old World, back in favor for a few moments. He created the implant and put it in you. My old trusted resistance friends arranged the passage." Her voice shook. "You must believe me. No one wanted you to be a transpo. Something went wrong. The trainer who knew about you was transferred away at the last minute. You were supposed to be kept in secret, the implant stopping your magic so your father wouldn’t find out you lived. His spies and magic sniffers are everywhere on the Old World. Yevgeny’s trying here, but he’s not a patch on Laius. And now with Princess Beatrice gone..." Yvonne paused and pulled herself back to the unwanted topic. "The Black was supposed to pick you up, unharmed, at the other end. A special order. The trainers apologized, they’re so smooth. Said a mistake. They weed out defectives. You’d been sent into space."
"Many times I wished for it," said Dante in a low voice.
"I’m so sorry."
"It’s all water under the bridge."
Yvonne shook her head. "The cruelty."
"Yes. Transporting is an evil thing. And slavery too. Though Madam Elizabeth treated me well, considering." He sighed.
"Treating people well doesn’t excuse owning them."Yvonne paused. "Or correcting them."
He shrugged. "She’s in her grave from knowing me."
"Then you did it? What the reports said."
"No. Always blame a transpo," he remarked.
"I don’t."
"You do. Yevgeny murdered her. Murdered my wife and baby daughter. William. Lots of innocent babes, innocent men and women. A reign of terror. No one seems in a hurry to condemn him."
"You have been in the bush," said Yvonne. "Rebellion grows these last few years. Yevgeny accused the Botany temple sisters of treason and closed the nunnery. The Queen and Princess Beatrice have left him, gone to the rebels. The Xian freedom fighters have become cunning guerrillas, a lightening attack or bomb then melting into the bush or town. Yevgeny laid waste to a few large tracts of jungle in Free Alabama. But only turned up a few charred hita." Dante’s eyes narrowed at her words. "The resource companies threw a fit, so that stopped. Parts of the army have mutinied and joined the rebels, harsh discipline and lack of pay’ll do that. Slaves are running away. Yevgeny uses newly arrived troops and transpos." Yvonne stared sadly at her son. "His transpo guards are fanatically loyal. Vicious. Do anything, anything he asks. "
The strange blank look crept back over her son’s face. He stared out the back door window, his good hand playing with his glass. The setting sun bathed the bone fence in blood. Yvonne laid her fingers over his stump.
"Is that how you lost your hand? Yevgeny? I’ve gathered rumors."
He stiffened and pulled his arm away. "I’ll go to your barn now."
"Don’t be silly. You’re my son. You must stay in the guest room."
"You floored me with the picture on the piano. I admit it. Growing under your heart, so romantic. What you say, I’d like to believe," said Dante. "But I haven’t had very good experiences with my family. You talk about your father and your brothers. Did you have a mother? They would be my grandparents and uncles, wouldn’t they? I never met them. Hell, until Madam Elizabeth figured it out, I had no idea who provided my maternal D.N.A." He rose to his feet.
"It was a great scandal," whispered Yvonne. "They wouldn’t agree to let you live unless it wasn’t known. Later, I insisted that you come to a party that was supposed to celebrate my getting out of jail. But I never made it, the guards whisked me away to the ship that brought me here. I would have made them acknowledge you."
"I remember a party. Only party I ever went to when I was a child. Nanny took me to something she called a family gathering, all mysterious she was. That picture was taken just before, us all dressed up. She wrapped it so carefully, and brought it in her knitting bag. To give to you? If I was introduced to anyone, I don’t remember. There were other children there. My cousins? I didn’t know them, they knew me. Taunted me, calling me freak and bastard. This man came over to Nanny, said something that turned her white and we went home. Nanny cried in her rocker that night. I told her I didn’t care about any old party or any old children and she cried harder. Was that the party? Was that an uncle of mine who told us to leave?" Dante’s voice carried an icy edge as he walked to the door. "I should never have come here. Telling you about some stupid meaningless childhood memory."
"No apology can take away what’s happened to you," said Yvonne. "We’re strangers. Why I expected more, just because I held you to my breast a few times before they took you away, I don’t know.
He turned at the entrance. "You seem like a nice person. You gave me Nanny. She loved me, brought me up well. Gaia’s given me love and people to love, this beautiful planet.
Many times I’ve felt despair, once I tried to kill myself. But fixing your roof with the sun warming my back and shining on the gold leaves as I sang, enjoying the bread and the moccatine and Special Lemon, those kind of things make me glad to be alive. I thank you. And Gaia." He made the sign of the Goddess’s ankh. "Been a long time since I’ve worked in a barn. I’ll look after your animals tonight." He flashed a brief sarcastic smile. "Not forgetting the peas and stones. See you in the morning."
Her son disappeared out the door. Yvonne lay her head in her arms and wept.
The night crept by, carrying broken, dream writhing sleep. Yvonne reached out for her crying baby gliding by in space, not quite reaching, waking with the aching breasts and arms of more than twenty years past. The dog gave a low growl. The grey dawn wind tossed the trees, a nightlizard screeched.The house creaked with a hint of the coming winter’s cold.Yvonne stepped from her bed to the mat, wrapped her red wool robe around her and crossed into the kitchen to put on some moccatine. No rest for the wicked. She stared out the kitchen window. Broken shadows from the little moons wavered along the fence then settled. The wan beginning light glittered the first hard frost on the tops of the bones. The moccatine maker perked. She poured herself a steaming cup then walked her chilled bare feet to an old stuffed green chair by the electric stove and sat down, warming her toes against the grate.
"Come my Black," she called to the void, as she had summoned so many times over the years. The wind rose and the door knob rattled. An icy blast rushed through the room as the door slammed back. A crimson cloak fluttered and glowed in the night.
"Close the door, you’re letting the heat out. It makes me uncomfortable," snapped Yvonne.
"Pardon," said the red wraith as the door banged shut behind it.
"I called for The Black. Where is it? My son turned up at my door today, caught me totally by surprise. It didn’t go well."
"Black longs to report but cannot, the Child does not wish it."
"The Child? You mean my son?"
"Yes."
"The Black pledged to me. What’s going on?"
The wraith shrugged. "The Child caught Black in the material. Letting it go for a pledge."
"We’ll see about that," said Yvonne, stiffening in her chair.
"May I leave?" asked The Red.
"Yes. Go, go," said Yvonne, waving a hand.
The wraith left as it came, leaving behind another icy draught.
Yvonne drained her cup then threw on a man’s work pants and a top. She stomped across the yard, dog at her heels, frosted grass spears crackling underfoot, and yanked open the door to the barn. The dog froze by the door, tail and shackles up, then backed up behind her in a flurry of barks.
"Shut up!" shouted Yvonne. The dog descended to a growl and plastered itself to her side.
Light and warm, humid heat flooded around her. A blended smell of smoke, manure and exotic cooking assaulted her nostrils. Someone, no doubt her son, whistled a hymn. A kettle of orange pottage bubbled on a small fire banked in the middle of the dirt floor. Back packs, hitabear furs and skins lay heaped around it. Her three wraiths, The Red, The White and The Black stood in a huddle near the door, cowls together in silent conversation. All this she took in at a glance for her attention riveted on a hita standing at the other end of the barn, trunks wound around a spraying hose held over it like an umbrella. It stared up unblinking at the fountain of water. Yvonne let out a small gasp. The hita focused its devil eyes and blank gaze towards her.
Her son wandered out of the room filled with the pile of peas and stones, naked as the day he was born, and glanced at the hita. The creature padded over to the faucet and turned off the water. Dante turned to her and stared for an instant. A blush rushed down his face and neck then over the top of his chest, emphasizing a circlet of white scars over his shoulder that she had noticed before but never connected with a bite. A hita bite.
He dashed back into the room, shouting, "Clothes come." His overalls untangled themselves from the heap of skins and floated into the enclosure. Her son reappeared, red faced, buttoning up his top.
"Sorry," he muttered. "I’m not used to wearing clothes."
"What’s all this?" demanded Yvonne crossing her arms, her anger hiding her fear of the wild creature in her barn.
The hita extended its trunks and drew in a breath. The loose skin at the ends of the snout rippled as it wheezed, "Hello."
Yvonne stood stunned. "Did your pet just speak?"
"Yes. It’s been dying to try it out," replied Dante, the half smile playing about his lips. "And it’s not a pet. This is Shaman. My friend, more than that, my guide to this planet and its magic."
"That’s a parlor trick. Do you earn your living having it dance as well?"
"Shaman says the hose is a wonderful thing, fills it with delight," replied Dante. His voice held a barely concealed irritation. "It’s wondering when you’ll greet it back."
"Excuse me?"
"You son communicates with the hita, speaking with the thoughts,"said The Black.
Yvonne turned on the wraith. "Why didn’t you tell me my son was alive? It’s a simple request. Even a fay seraphim could figure it out."
"He is here," answered the wraith, unperturbed.
Yvonne glanced nervously at the hita. "I could have prepared."
"That’s why I asked the Shine not to talk to you," said Dante. "And don’t think they haven’t watched your road and the forest for me. I won’t be Yevgeny’s creature."
"What!" shouted Yvonne. "Do you think I have any use for the Strega!"
"Your own people, then. I’m pretty valuable. A wizard transpo. I only took the risk of coming here because the wraith insisted." His face tightened. "I know the score." The hita amazed her again by reaching out a snout and touching Dante’s shoulder as if to comfort. "The shine said you might know humans who would help stop the killing of hita."
"And what about the hita bears and all the other animals?" remarked Yvonne with a glance at the skins round the fire. Dante laughed. The hita wandered over to the furs, pulled some on and created a bear. She blinked.
"Hita bear are really hita?" she asked as the creature shed its second skin.
"Yes," said Dante. "Or me."
"How long have you lived with them?"
"Since my escape. Maybe two, three years. We’ve been on walkabout through a whole river of the moons." Yvonne looked confused. He thought for a moment. "Hita time idea. The moons flow across the sky. A river is about a year."
The hita bear waved its trunk at her and repeated once again, "Hello."
Yvonne gave a tentative smile, reached out nervous fingers to touch its snout and murmured, "Hello." The fleshy ends wrapped round her hand and the hita pumped her arm in a hearty handshake before letting go.
Yvonne shook her head. "You’re full of surprises."
"Oh, I separated your stones and peas."
"Then I’ll have to accept you as my apprentice," she smiled. "You’ve certainly passed my tests."
"What makes you think you’ve passed mine?" said Dante.
"I don’t believe the ‘prentice tests the master," snapped Yvonne. How dare he test her.
"There’s the problem for me," he replied in a soft voice. "The word Master, or in your case, Madam. This visit makes me understand. The hita give freely without bondage or obligation. Even when Shaman hated me because humans murdered its family for their skins, it let me stay nearby, learning. Humans aren’t so generous.
"I’ve enjoyed my visit. Talking to a human after so long, tasting human food and drink again, learning a little bit about myself. Thank you for telling me the truth about Nanny’s death. But it’s time for us to finish walkabout and return home."
"I thought you came to find help for the hita."
" There’s no help here.You’re afraid and angry."
"And you? Aren’t you afraid and angry?
He stiffened, then gestured at the door. "There’s things more frightening than humans out there."
"There’s no need to hide it," she said, her voice softening. "I’ve felt the terror of pain and helplessness. Yes, once a touch of the rod. You should be afraid and angry. Even Trevor Xian, the great courageous hero of the people, has cowered, broken, before the correction rod. It’s not weakness to be afraid of it." She paused. "And what it can make you do."
Dante stared at the little fire, his mouth pursed. The flames blinked out as he walked over to the furs and bent to gather them together. Yvonne stepped up to him and laid a hand on his back. He stiffened beneath it.
"I’m sorry. I’m sharp and ill tempered," she said. A small smile crossed her lips for an instant. "A perfect witch. It’s my way. You resent, justifiably, what you see as slave treatment. Your... I mean the... hita scares me. But I also see a miracle. The Black is right. I do know people who can help end the killing. And free the slaves. Come back to the house. And, what’s his name?"
"Shaman," said Dante examining the furs piled before him.
"And Shaman too. Will he eat bacon and eggs or will you bring that porridge?"
"Hita are male and female."
"Right. Will it eat bacon and eggs? What about you? Fried onions, tomatoes and bochgar, fresh bread? Moccatine?"
"That sounds nice. Shaman says walkabout means trying new things. It’s curious about your cottage." Dante pulled at a patch of fur, making no effort to move.
"Will you accept my hospitality as an equal, then?"
"I guess. For a little while." He sighed and stood up.
The cow mooed from its stall. "And fresh milk, too," said Yvonne.
"I would have milked for you, but I couldn’t find your milker," said Dante.
"I only have one cow. I do it by hand,’ said Yvonne as she found her stool and pail. "You lived on a big farm then?"
"Big enough." Dante opened the stall door for her.
"Aren’t you polite," said Yvonne. He shrugged.
The hita crowded in behind her, squatting in a corner, staring at her every movement. The cow stomped and twitched under its gaze.
"Shaman’s making Bessie nervous," said Yvonne.
The hita rose and left but the cow knew it remained nearby. Yvonne rested her forehead against the animal’s side, murmuring soothing words. Scuffling and packing sounds floated in from the open area. She finished, pulled away the pail and looked up. Her son stood leaning against the doorway, his arms crossed with the stump hidden, watching her, for how long she had no idea.
"I’ll take out Bessie for you," he said and squeezed up the far side of the animal, taking the halter, whispering calming words with the inflection of the laboring classes in the Old World. The words, perhaps, of the murdered William he had mentioned? A father figure? Her eyes filled with tears for him. She glanced away as he led the cow out of the barn.
The hita sat by the dead fire, its trunk dipping in the potage then curving to spray the food into its mouth. It ignored her. She let out the goats, shooed a few of the geese from the straw and gathered some eggs. Dante reappeared.
"Shaman wonders why you haven’t joined it. Yellowroot is very good," he said.
"It gave no sign."
"You just sit down and eat. No invitation necessary." He dipped his fingers in the pot, extracted a blob of goo and sucked it into his mouth. "We’ll bring the potage as our contribution to breakfast, then you can use a bowl and spoon."
"Umm. Yes," said Yvonne, trying to banish thoughts of dirty fingers and drippy snouts.
The hita grabbed the kettle from the pottery hob. Yvonne knew from her reading that some of the digs around the abandoned hita poles had yielded odd, smooth stones that some said resembled worked earthenware. The anthropologists had dismissed them as odd rocks natural to the planet. She ran a finger down the warm hob. Not that knowing the intelligence of hita would make a scrap of difference. Men would hunt them all the harder. The three of them walked in silence across to the house.
The hita stood frozen in the doorway, its blank, reptilian face tracking the room. The creature extended its trunks and sniffed the air then squatted, dropped the kettle by the door, and touched the oriental rug and polished floor. It rose and snuffled over the chairs. Dante plopped down in one to show the use.
The trunks swayed out to the electric fire, touched and shot away at the heat. Yvonne watched it with as much curiousity as it showed to her house.
The hita moved over to the piano and examined every picture, grasping and lifting with its snout. It took a long time over the picture of her son and Anna. With the formal picture of her family, it glanced back and forth between herself, Dante slumped in the chair and the picture before putting it down.
Dante stood up and wandered over to the piano. He stared down at the keys for a few long moments then his good hand toyed with a few notes. The hita jumped and the half smile crossed her son’s lips. He sat down on the bench. The alien’s snouts sniffled over the ivories, pressed down several bass keys causing the creature to start again, then plinked several more with the discordant curiousity of a child. Though not so much as a glance, a word or a movement passed between man and beast, the creature dropped down on the carpet and waited, staring up at Dante, its trunks still stretched out above the keys nearest it.
Her son lifted his stump into position beside his good hand. He sighed. A slow left hand scale played, each key slammed by an invisible finger. Dante tried a few chords, they clanged and stumbled. The first few bars of the left hand basic, Little Bird, skipped and shuddered with missed and wrong notes. He grimaced with frustration and his good hand balled into a fist that shook as if longing to smash the keys. Dante’s face screwed up as if he might burst into tears. Though she longed to watch the magic miracle that her son, caught up in his loss, couldn’t see, Yvonne decided to give him privacy by starting the breakfast.
She picked up the pottage and tucked it in a forgotten corner of the counter, sliced a rasher of bacon, chopped together, herbs, onions, purple bochgar and tomatoes and threw them on the grill. The piano tinkled and stumbled, then the Happy Song began to play, first slowly and hesitantly without chords, then smoother with increased confidence. An odd oboe/tuba sound accompanied it. Yvonne turned down the grill, glanced into the room, and saw Dante concentrating, his eyes closed, the part of the keyboard below his stump seeming to play by itself. Beside him, the hita swayed back and forth, the ends of its snouts opening and closing, its trunk winding up then straightening out as its own music soared.
"That’s amazing and wonderful," said Yvonne.
"Thank you," said Dante opening his eyes.
"You’re very good." Yvonne turned to the hita. "And you, Shaman isn’t it? That’s incredible."
The creature got up and wandered past her into the kitchen, as if she was invisible.
"Well," huffed Yvonne.
"Shaman thanks you. Says your house is full of magic wonders. It wants to know what other miracles the human shaman creates," said Dante turning from the piano. "It seems like it’s not acknowledging you, but you’re surrounded by an ocean of images and emotions. They’re pretty chatty, hita, just not with words or gestures, though it’s picking up a few from me."
"Since you’ve commandeered my piano, play a song for me."
"What would you like? I can play almost anything, for a few months I had a job as the piano player in a country pub and I was cantor at the village temple." He swivelled on the bench and stared down at the keys. "Had a cottage and a bit of land that belonged to me, and a cat. A small dream of a family. Owned this fantastic bike, up to a hundred and twenty clicks with just a touch on the accelerator. I liked it there." He sighed. "But they turned me over to Yevgeny. How about Lily Valley?"
"Yes, that would be nice," said Yvonne. "I’m so sorry."
He shrugged. "Taught me the truth of the words of Blessed Kore, All is impermanent save the love of Gaia."
"I haven’t noticed Gaia spreading a lot of love. Seems more like hate," muttered Yvonne.
"Hita never hurt or reject one of their own. The problem is humans, not Gaia," he said. Yvonne could almost hear the gears grinding in his mind. How he would have enjoyed the bubbling viewpoints of her university days. All dry and practical job training now. Free thinking, creativity and discussion could lead to rebellion.
"I’ve thought about this a lot." His voice held a touch of excitement at actually having someone to share his ideas with. "Something wrong with the way humans evolved. See in this data base from Botany University that I found, they talked about how creatures and plants changed over millions of years on the Old and New World, not made by Gaia, just maybe she put it in motion, you know. Anyhow, humans don’t match, so on the world the legends say humans came from, that Blessed Kore came from, animals evolved differently. Always destroying and polluting nature, fighting among themselves. Maybe humans died out there, they’re a dead end species. The Shine agrees with me. Says humans are from away."
Yvonne stared at him, thinking how full of blasphemy he would appear to the priests. Somehow, in his self-teaching, he had stumbled across a pocket of scientific knowledge missed in Laius’s purging of all information not economically useful or orthodox.
"That’s an interesting theory. Odd to find it coming from one so religious," she said. "But hita murder and massacre."
"Only to protect themselves. Have you ever wondered about the blue poles standing in the empty clearings? Each one used to have a village round it."
"Yes, I know that."
"Well, anyway, you wanted a song." He ended any further discussion by closing his eyes, concentrating then beginning to sing and play,
There’s a lovely valley, far far away,
Where silver lilies dip and sway.
The trees shine with leaves of gold,
And the grass is as soft as a newborn vold.
Oh, my lily valley....
He stopped. "Shaman says your food is making funny sounds."
"Oh. It shouldn’t be burning."
Yvonne rushed into the kitchen, Dante behind. The hita stood examining the rifle on a rack by the door, its trunks snuffling over the smooth barrel and handle. The bacon spluttered, it ignored it.
"Everything’s fine, " said Yvonne. "But I better turn it over and add the eggs. There’s no bullets in that rifle but tell your friend to be careful. If you press the trigger button, it makes a mighty pop." The hita moved its snouts away.
"I never learned to shoot," said Dante. He rubbed along his bearded jaw."Could you teach us? Shaman’s fascinated by it."
"I don’t see why not," said Yvonne. Anything to make him stay. She dished the food onto the plates and set them on the table. "Tell Shaman the food’s hot."
Dante pulled out a chair for the hita. It snuffled over the seat then gingerly sat down, its feet flat on the floor, snouts steadying it on the chair. Dante grinned.
"It’s afraid of falling off the seat," he said to Yvonne.
He bowed his head with a short prayer, picked up his knife and fork and dug in. Shaman’s snout snuffled over its food and utensils then reached out and ran over Dante’s hands The hita balanced itself on the chair, clenched the fork with the fleshy ends of its snout and stabbed a perfect round of fried bochgar. As the fork rose, the vegetable slithered off the fork. The hita dropped the fork on the table, picked up its plate and flopped down on the floor beside the table.
The dog overcame his reluctance and sniffed at the plate. Shaman handed the dog a bit of bacon making friends for life then started to vacuum up its breakfast, avoiding the tomato.
"Shaman says that’s a dang funny way to eat, using tiny tools," grinned Dante. "I said it’s cleaner, it says I should wash my hands. See, it already rinsed its snouts in your sink."
"Now I get to be a real mother," laughed Yvonne. "Or maybe it’s just the Baba in me coming out. Shaman’s right. Go wash your hands."
"Long time since anyone said that to me." A shadow crossed his face then vanished. "Think I’ll use your bathroom though."
"You do that," said Yvonne. She smirked. "But don’t take long, your breakfast’ll get cold."
He sent her the half-smile. "Yes, Baba."
It sounded fine.