Intruder Read Online Free Page A

in months.”
    “One trusts you would not willingly be so unfortunate. But if your choice of furnishing is breakable, if it can be stained or easily damaged, it must
not
be an antiquity or a public treasure. And do not overcrowd your rooms, mind. Listen to the supervisor’s advice. And note too that a respected master of kabiu will arrange what you choose in a harmony appropriate to the household, so do not give him too hard a task. You will make a list of the tag numbers of those things you wish moved to your suite and deliver that list back to the supervisor. Or you can take back any of your old furniture you would like.”
    “One would ever so prefer to choose new things, honored Mother!”
    “Then do.” She handed him the paper and the plan. “So go, go, be about it!”
    “Yes, honored Mother!” He sketched a bow and headed for thedoor at too much speed. Great-grandmother would have checked him sharply for such a departure. He checked himself and turned and bowed properly, deliberately, lest he offend his mother and lose a privilege just granted. “One is very gratified by your permission,” he said properly. “Honored Mother.”
    A very faint smile lay under her solemnity. It was his favorite of her expressions.
    “Go,” she shaped with her lips, smiling, and gave a little waggle of her fingers.
    He left quietly, shut the door, and let a grin break wide as he faced his aishid, fairly dancing in place.
    “We get to go down to the storerooms and pick out furniture!” he said. It was the best, most exciting thing since he had gotten here. He held up the papers. “And you can pick, too!”
    The papers with the Ragi seal on them meant they had permission to go to the lifts. By themselves. And Lucasi and Veijico, in uniform, had their sidearms with them, and Antaro and Jegari had the small badges which meant Guild-in-training. The guards at the lifts made no objections at all to such a proper entourage, with proper papers. And Lucasi had a lift key, which he used once they got in. “So nobody can stop the lift,” he said importantly, as the lift clanked into motion.
    They went straight down for a good distance; the lift stopped and let them out in a very officelike corridor that showed other, dimly lit corridors. The place was significantly deserted. Spooky. Their steps echoed.
    Lucasi had the paperwork, but did not so much as check it, not since his first look; he said something obscure to Veijico, she said, “Yes, one agrees,” and they kept walking down the hall, arriving at the supervisor’s office, having contacted the supervisor as they walked.
    And the supervisor very politely rose as they entered, looked at the official paper, bowed, then took up a stack of white tags with strings and a little roll of tape, which he brought with him. Veijicogave him the permissible paper with the room sizes. And the supervisor personally led them out and down the hall to a long, long dimly lit side hall, past doors with just numbers on them. He opened the one marked 15 and turned on the lights inside.
    It was a huge, dim, cold room full of furniture that made shadows, shadows upon shadows, more than the lights could deal with. The whole room smelled of something like incense, or vermin-poison. And it held the most wonderful jumble of beds and chairs, some items under brown canvas, some just stacked with pieces of cardboard or blankets between.
    “One might show you first what is already tagged for you, young lord,” the supervisor said.
    “One wishes to see it, nadi,” Cajeiri said, and followed the man to a set-aside area with a little bureau and a little bedstead and a rolled up carpet. The bureau and the bed had carved flowers. And he almost remembered that bureau with a little favor.
    But it was undersized. Baby furniture. It was downright embarrassing to think he had ever used it.
    And there were far more wonderful things all around them.
    “We are permitted to choose different ones,” Cajeiri