The faint sound of music filtered through gauzy curtains and into the reception hall. As far as Rezin was concerned, it could just filter right on out again, through the gracefully arched windows and over the soft green lawn to the shimmering lake in the distance. And take that damnable crowd with it.
With his own tentacles, and bowing from the upper waist, Khiri President Lu’Had-tiMan served the Witness a bowl of something thick and dark. Doubtless, thought Rezin, a nasty native delicacy. Another relic of the Khi’Ri-rri’s time at the top of the artistic heap. Degraded now, as with their art, to the culinary equivalent of pornography.
With a glance at the cameras, the Khiri leaned in close, long eyebrows brushing Rezin’s face. “I hope you are well rested, Witness, from your travels,” he said softly with his upper mouth.
“Well enough.”
“Then perhaps we may begin.” Lu’Had rose gracefully and turned to the standing-room-only audience packing the far end of the reception room and overflowing to the garden outside.
“Greetings,” he thundered from his lower mouth. “Welcome to the event of the century. We are honored today by the presence of an official Observatory Attendant, to be with us for a year. Make him welcome wherever you see him.” He twitched his eyebrows with excitement. “But first, in a proper Khi’Ri-rri welcome, our Poet Laureate will perform a dance poem created specially for this occasion.”
"… when winter first its dewdrops glistened
and my love sparkled gemlike
like a dewdrop in the morning rain,
then I first felt the tug of love upon my heart strings
[bounce!]
and again
[bounce!]
and, oh, so strongly
[bounce!]
then, I warmed to her like the flower warms to dawn
and I saw her flaxen fur fall down like artificial fibers upon my hand
and my soul was undone,”
The gathered Khiri burst into deafening applause. And this, thought Rezin with a wince, was applause. The Khiri, gifted by nature with six sensitive, flexible manipulators, covered the fleshy pods with wood and metal plates, and banged them together for all they were worth. They had made an art, it seemed, of applause itself, each audience member attempting to outdo the next. It made, unhappily, for a self-feeding cycle of raucous performance art.
At length, Lu’Had called a halt to the chaos with a wave of manipulators and a twitch of his expressive eyebrows. “No surprise there,” he rumbled. “Surely the Poet’s work of a lifetime, and one we will all watch and study for years to come.”
“But let’s hear from a more objective source. Our Attendant is not an art critic, I know, but is a man of experience nonetheless.” He waved enthusiastically at a surprised and angry Resin. “Let’s hear what he thinks of Khiri’s latest artistic triumph. Followed by a word from our sponsor for those of you watching by virt.” Applause attempted to break out again, but was damped before it could take hold. “Here now, to tell us how much he loved that work from our Poet Laureate, is Witness Rezin Patience Miller.” With a flourish of his left-most tail, the MC gestured the Attendant forward to the waiting cameras.
The Observatory existed solely to witness the birth and death experiences of the galaxy’s cultures, but the dying ones, in Rezin’s experience, tended to completely misunderstand the purpose of an Attendant’s visit. Indeed, the Khiri apparently thought they were in a Renaissance. The fifteenth, according to the Observatory’s background notes, such renaissance in the last century. Even Khi’Ri-rri’s entertainment magazines (there being, by now, no scholarly journals worthy of mention) failed to agree on how many there had been. And it was possible that perhaps his sleep-learned language skills had made a mess of the Khiri language, and that he had therefore underappreciated the laureate’s poem. Still, he thought, the weird, jouncing springs that had come with each “bounce,” were hard to ignore. If this were the planet’s poet laureate, the Khiri clearly had not got much farther to fall.
“Khiri,” he began, “as the President noted, I’m no art critic. Attendants are observers; we don’t interfere. But you asked me what I thought of … of that,” he gestured towards the Poet Laureate, preening his eyebrows stage left. “Since you put me on the spot, I’ll tell you. I thought it stank.” He paused as the audience gasped in horror. “I thought it was the most pathetic, most bathetic piece of garbage that I’ve ever seen. It was awful, it was terrible, and it was bad. It was an unneeded reminder that you used to be the galaxy’s greatest artists, and that now you’re a carnival sideshow. A virt-tube paid advertisement that should step aside for people with talent. A bunch,” and here he drove the knife in, “of hacks.”
Silence followed. Dignitaries and audience alike stared in wonder as Rezin returned to his seat. Slowly, however, the Poet Laureate, followed eventually by the President and the rest of the dignitaries, began to clap. And the rest of the hall picked up, until the applause was deafening. It went on, and on, and on, until Rezin despaired of keeping his hearing intact, even with both hands pressed against his ears, and his head hidden under a table. At last, however, the President, with the help of the Poet Laureate, brought the crowd under control. Lu’Had, all his tails standing bolt upright, and eyebrows jerking spastically in all directions, spoke.
“Never! Never in my life! Never in the last hundred years, I dare say, has Khi’Ri-rri witnessed such a performance. We never anticipated that the Observatory would send, not only a Witness, but an artist that the outer worlds can scarcely spare! Such a command of wit, of parody, of sheer emotion! Such verisimilitude, such a perfect rendering of sincerity! He has,” the President looked in Rezin’s direction. “He has the heart of a Khir,” With that, he bowed deeply from both waists toward the Attendant. Applause erupted again, during which Lu’Had conferred briefly with the Poet Laureate before again stepping up to speak.
“Audience,” he intoned, “the Poet and I have spoken.” He nodded to the other Khir, who nodded back with a show of modesty. “And while he had intended to present an unscheduled declamation of a new twelve part song cycle, accompanying himself on tubrone,” he bowed at the Poet, who again nodded back. “While he had intended this, we agree that it would be impolite to compete with the astounding performance we have just seen from our Witness, Rezin Patience.” More applause followed.
Eventually, the evening wound down, and Rezin, now not only deafened, but exhausted by refusing interviews, found his way at last to his quarters. Virt ratings for the broadcast of the ceremony, he was told, had gone through the roof — essentially everyone on the planet had watched, downloaded, or streamed Rezin’s speech. The show’s chief advertiser and sponsor had paid out a substantial bonus to the organizers, and, Lu’Had-tiMan assured him, Rezin’s performance would be studied for years to come. Already, imitations were appearing across the major entertainment nets. Bemused and tired, Rezin at last fell asleep, ears still ringing.
#
His first weeks on Khi’Ri-rri had passed in a blur of tedium. Plays, concerts, recitals, bizarre events too outré to classify, all had been of a quality so low as to barely qualify as art. Even a visit to the jingle factories, which at least produced a commercial product, had been scarcely better. It became evident that even this thin stream of revenue was drying up, and for good reason. Finally, Rezin had shaken off his torpor, and asserted his right as a Witness to wander the world unattended, and on his own schedule.
Thus he found himself, after a long month of aimless wandering, sitting now in a small café in Poi’p-rha, a tiny mountain village on the boreal continent of Lll-l’kTri. Here, at least, his new celebrity status was unlikely to draw the host of would-be fellow artists that he had faced in major population centers. In fact, mused Rezin, sipping from a saucer of hot spiked gleanberry juice, the locals seemed uncommonly reserved for Khiri. It was true that, according to his reference pad, the menu drawn in chalk above the counter was written in dactylic hexameter (with inappropriate catalexis), and that most walls were covered by gaudy sunset landscapes, but this was to be anticipated on Khi’Ri-rri. More important, there were no performance artists leaping between tables, and his order for “Glistening Gleanberry Steaming With Potent Power,” had been received with no more than a polite “Thank you,” and a dramatic bow. All in all, thought Rezin, an adequate place to spend his final month of observation.
He was considering where to stay, having seen no hotels or inns on the village’s one street, when a young female entered. Her short, dark fur in disarray, worn overalls smeared with dust and paint, she was no doubt, he thought, playing a part. The Starving Artist, most likely — a popular Khiri role. Disgruntled at this interruption of a pleasant interlude, he said as much when, having ordered, she sat down near him, at the only other table in the café’s window.
The woman looked over at him, eyebrows waving gently from side to side.
“I am of course an artist. This is Khi’Ri-rri. But I am in no way starving. You see me here with my lunch of Golden Ink Blossom Torn From the Poet’s Heart.” She waved a manipulator at a plate covered with slabs of dripping yellow petals. “And I am in fact possessed of an adequate trust fund, as anyone in town could tell you.”
Rezin frowned. This was unanticipated but intriguing. Most interlocutors took the opportunity to compose an impromptu panegyric to the brilliance of his broadcast performance, coupled with not-so-subtle plugs for their own artistic skills.
“Ah. So I take it that you’re a famous financial artist, then? Your performance as a spendist is congratulated across the continent.”
“Quite the opposite.” She took a bite of ink blossom, winding strands around her minor teeth with a neat gesture. “I am a mediocre sensationist, unknown beyond the foothills you see yonder,” Her eyebrows, delicate and feathery, lowered coolly. “But I see that you are just as crude in person now as you were via virt on the day of your arrival. I do not wish to converse with you further.”
Rezin sat back. This was not a Khiri reaction! The Khiri way was self-aggrandisement and fawning, not self-deprecation and disdain. She had been honest! Or perhaps this was merely another performance, he considered. Yes, that was likely the answer. Easy enough to find out.
“So, you didn’t care for my presentation that night.”
“What presentation? You proved yourself a boor by attempting to humiliate our Poet Laureate in front of the entire world. Our best artists gathered to welcome you in style, and you responded by spitting in our faces.” The eyebrows were now waving quite wildly, noted Rezin.
“I was honest,” he responded. “An approach that you Khiri seem never to have considered. Your Poet’s lyrics were juvenile, his gymnastics awkward. I told him the truth.”
“It is true, Witness,” she responded, two muddy green eyes now focused fully on him, “that the Poet Laureate is a man of limited talent. And yet, to describe his failings so openly…" She vibrated her upper abdomen in negation. “He was mortified, and had no choice but to pretend that you were a master artist.”
“And I suppose that all of Khiri simply went along with this.” His voice dripped with sarcasm. “That hundreds of random strangers complimenting my skills have been part of a master plan.”
“Of course not. But improvisation isn’t quite dead, and the audience at the ceremony played its part. The rest is another matter.” She paused, considering her words. “You showed your contempt for us, and we have returned the favor. In fact, you were the subject of a month-long competition entitled ‘Sarcasm and Revenge: Great Themes in Intra-Galactic Communication’. Your ‘random encounters’ have been broadcast widely, and we have all greatly enjoyed your complete lack of comprehension of some very skillful humorism.”
Rezin slumped back in his chair, the blood draining from his face. Could it be that each of several hundred encounters had not, in fact, been with adulatory fans, but part of a carefully orchestrated scheme of mockery? It seemed unlikely. And yet, there had been, for example, the boy in J’jikrin who had giggled throughout his performance of a traditional dance routine. Rezin had put it down to nervous high spirits, but now…
“You may be right,” he stated coldly, “though I doubt it. The fact remains that your whole race has passed its creative prime. Your art is garbage.”
“You are an honest man.” She laced together her middle manipulators. “But cruel. Do you think we are not aware of our decline? That we are not ourselves in agony over our lost abilities and stature? It is true that most Khiri do not focus on this, preferring happier, more optimistic works. But there are some, such as I, who make our slow downfall the focus of our art.”
“Which I’m sure is no better than that of your buffoonish Poet Laureate.”
“You are trying to wound me, but you are right. I labor night and day, but my works are cartoonish at best. You would not care for them.” She turned back to her plate of ink blossoms, now cooled to a thick and sticky yellow mass.
Rezin turned back to his own saucer of spicy gleanberry juice. Perhaps it would be best, after all, to move on, to spend his final month in a luxury hotel, where he would not be required to encounter unctuous Khiri, who might, after all only be mocking him. Or would he then be subject to yet more performances? The woman implied that the competition had ended, but might there be another? Or had there been no competition at all? In this village he had at least a modicum of privacy.
His plans remained unresolved when the woman finished her meal and attracted his attention with a graceful wave of eyebrows.
“I have a proposition for you,” she stated.
“Do you.”
“I do. I have been thinking. Please,” she waved a tail at him, “hold your sarcasm until I have finished.”
He swallowed a biting, though unoriginal, remark.
“I am a modest sensationist. My art is competent, but not moving, and I do not know how to improve it. You are an honest man, if a cruel and bitter one, and honesty is hard to come by with Khiri. You have one month left on Khi’Ri-rri. Spend it in my workshop, critiquing my art. You may be as cruel as you like, since you seem to enjoy it. So long as you are honest.”
“And in return? Why should I do this for you?”
“In return I will be equally honest with you. I will not mock or ridicule you, and you need not search for ulterior motives in my words. I want to be a better artist. That is all.” She paused. “And of course I will provide a room and adequate food, since there are no hostels in this town,”
Rezin considered. Here was a solution to his requirements. Relative isolation and quiet, in exchange for no more than his honest opinion, delivered as bluntly as he cared to give it.
“I accept.”
#
Not long later, Rezin and Lly-L’a, as her name proved to be, stood in her studio, a large but crowded space some distance up the hill from the café. Walls of bare white fibertex rose to a peaked ceiling four meters above the duraplast floor. The back wall, featuring floor to ceiling windows and a view of the hills below, was largely obscured by vats of a white gel. Everywhere were neat rows of tarpaulin-covered figures and rows upon rows of colorful canvases.
“As you can see, Witness, I am efficient and organized. My living quarters, and yours, are directly adjacent to this studio.” She gestured with two tails to a small door in a side wall. “Do you need to settle in, or shall I show you my work?”
“By all means, let us go straight to your work. I am anxious to see it.” Rezin raised his eyebrows condescendingly. The gesture was perhaps lost on the Khir, who flexed her own much longer brows as she led the way to the back of the chamber.
“Here,” she said, “you have my latest effort, and my best.” Manipulators held high, she slid a cloth carefully off of a long, low object. “Tell me what you think.”
The object was a pallet of sorts, formed of white marble, with a ripple of stone suggesting crumpled sheets.
“What is it?” asked Rezin.
“You have not seen a sensat frame before? See here, how this outline suggests the Khiri body? Lie here as best you can. It will be imperfect, of course. I call it ‘Tgr’B’s Last Gasp’,” She paused. “After Tgr’B-Hala, you understand, one of our last great poets.”
Rezin lay himself gingerly on the stone form. A ridge of marble poked him in the back where a Khiri’s second waist could have accommodated it, and there was ample space around his head where Khiri eyebrows might have fluttered. In fact, he could almost feel them fluttering now. Faintly, feebly, his left eyebrow twitched, strove to rise. He felt weak, defeated by his illness. But not finished! Not quite. Not while there was breath for one final poem — one profound line to instruct his race, to avert the coming decline, to cement his legacy. His mouths opened wide, drawing in air. And all went dark.
The ridge pained him, and the marble pallet was hard. He sat up.
Lly-L’a regarded him as he slowly rose to his feet.
“You’re right,” he said at last. “Your work is mediocre. You might sell it at a tourist shop on Anklee as ‘Old Man Asleep’.”
Lly-L’a’s tails stiffened.
“I promised to be as honest with you as you are with me. I cannot deny that I am hurt by your comment. I thought this to be my best work, a sardonic commentary on modern Khiri culture.”
“Your work is about a poet, but there’s no poetry in it. Your technical skill is acceptable,” he admitted. “The man’s physical situation is clear. In fact, it is so clear that I was distracted from the poetry that should have been in his thoughts. This is description, not art.”
“You suggest that I should blur physical pains to concentrate on his thoughts,” she asked. “But I am not a poet. I cannot presume to create the line that Tgr’B might have uttered.”
“Blame yourself if you’ve taken on more than you can handle.”
“And yet, I am an artist, if a mediocre one. I do know the fire of inspiration. Perhaps you are right.” She sank back, tails forming a modest support behind her. “I must ponder this.”
After several minutes, as Rezin wandered slowly around the studio lifting cloths, Lly-L’a roused herself.
“I apologize, Witness. As you see, you have already given me much to think about, and I thank you. I begin to see some possibilities for a new project. I must consider this further, if I am to start tomorrow. Let us retire for the day. I will show you to your rooms now.”
#
The next morning, Lly-L’a began her work early. She scooped several decaliters of the white gel into a sack, mixed in a colorant, and applied current to set the material. “I have decided to work in a smaller size,” she explained as she removed the sack from what was now a squishy beige oblong. “Your time here is limited, and I most work quickly if I am to gain the maximum benefit from your commentary.”
Rezin nodded.
“I plan to call the piece ‘Pyr-Kala Steps Down’. It will be a depiction of our most famous dancer, you see, in her old age, lying crumpled on the stage.”
Rezin smiled. Here, at last, was an artist after his own cynical heart. Still, … “Why name the piece now? It should be self-explanatory. The title should be an adjunct. I hate art that is meaningless without its label.”
“In Khiri art, the title is an integral part of the piece,” she argued.
“All right,” sighed Rezin. “But I’m suggesting that your work have more dimension. That it be a successful sculpture as a purely physical artifact first, regardless of title.”
The woman bowed from the upper waist.
“This again is good advice. I shall keep my title, but I shall do as you recommend, and focus firstly on the physical aspect, so that it would be good art even if titled only ‘Old Woman on the Floor’.”
She turned her attention back to the oblong, setting it on a low pedestal, gripped at the base by sturdy clamps. On a nearby table, she placed molders, shapers, and assorted other tools of the art.
“The work will of course take time. Perhaps you can amuse yourself in the interim by examining my other work. I would value your opinion, and we can talk at lunch time.” So saying, she donned goggles and filter mask, selected various tools, and set to work.
#
At noon, they joined for a quick meal of scraped tindo root and sautéed fringe grass.
“I am making good progress,” noted the sculptor. “I may have something new to show you in a few days.”
“Days,” exclaimed the Witness. He had spent the morning lackadaisically examining Lly-L’a’s other work, but did not anticipate a further interest in them.
She shrugged with several shoulders.
“Art takes time, even with the rapid pace at which I am moving.” She helped herself to another scoop of tindo root. “But tell me, what did you think of my other work? I noticed that you reviewed it, if quickly.”
Rezin gave a shrug of his own.
“As you say, it’s adequate. Some of the sensats toward the front of the studio, are crude but passionate. Others are better done, but less emotive.”
The Khiri waved her eyebrows in agreement. “The pieces towards the door are my earliest pieces. I felt them to be honest, but crude and unsubtle.”
“You’re right,” he nodded. “They’re crude, but they have passion that your later work lacks. It’s possible for a piece to be both subtle and passionate. Yours aren’t.” He took a drink of gleanberry juice. “Yesterday’s piece is an example. The piece was so subtle as to be obscure, and it had no passion at all. You tried to show the death of your entire culture, via the death bed of your greatest poet, and I felt nothing.”
“I start to wonder, Witness, whether you can in fact feel anything at all.” She waved a tail to take the sting out of the words. “Still, your advice has been valuable so far. I have engaged you as my expert, and I must take your comments as they come. I will try to incorporate this also.” She turned back to her diminishing serving of fringe grass.
“I also saw your paintings,” added Rezin, slowly. “Some of them are almost good. One or two …" he had intended to admit that a few examples had moved him, but in light of her last comments he held back. “One or two were good,” he finished.
The Khiri extended her eyebrows in pleasure. “That is high praise indeed, Witness, coming from you. Still,” she shrugged, “they were primarily an experiment. We Khiri are as much a tactile as a visual culture, and I feel a greater affinity towards sensation than towards painting. As I said when we met, my painting is adequate, but I do not feel that I can progress in that area. My sensations are weak, but I feel they have greater potential for growth.”
“Maybe,” Rezin waved the topic aside. “I’m no artist.”
“Have you never attempted art?” she asked with surprise. “Surely,… We Khiri learn the seven basic arts as children,” She blinked her lower eyes. “But perhaps other races, not so focused on art,…"
“I was too busy for art as a boy,” said Rezin. “Though I was known as a talented hellraiser.” He saw her puzzled expression. “Let’s call it performance art.”
“As you say,” the Khiri agreed. “Still, while you are here, and while I am otherwise occupied, you are welcome to try your hand at painting or sculpture. Of the two, painting is the easier of the two skills to acquire. Especially when you are so … limited in terms of tools,” she said with a meaningful wave of all six manipulators and a tail.
Rezin grimaced, the closest he had come to a chuckle for quite some time. “Sure,” he conceded. “And you can give me your opinion on my paintings.” He grinned to show that he did not mean this seriously.
“Perhaps so,” she echoed with an equally light tone. “Perhaps so.”
#
Some days later, he had explored the few attractions of Poi’p-rha village, eaten again at the café, and spent considerable time in pleasant solitary contemplation. He had even commented on Lly-L’a’s sensat of the old dancer.
“Better,” he had admitted. “But still dry. She’s staring at other dancers’ feet, trying to get up. This time her physical pains don’t overwhelm her drive, but there’s no depth. What’s she feeling aside from a desire to rise? When she sees those feet, is she jealous, ashamed? Or grateful for their help? No one is the monomaniac you showed here. You have to let us sense her confusion of emotion without losing your message.”
Lly-L’a had agreed, and set to work at once on a new, yet untitled work. With no other occupation, Rezin had eventually picked up a palette and brushes, and set up an easel by the rear window of the studio, somewhat hidden from the view (and the noise) of the artist by a large granite sensat frame. His first work was a simple landscape view of the hills descending from Poi’p-rha’s mountain perch, and of the broad plains beyond.
“You have a natural eye,” said the Khir, coming around the corner of the granite frame at the end of a long day. “You have captured the colors and the scale very nicely. My own first painting was not as good, and I have the advantage of several more eyes.” Her eyebrows twitched in gentle humor.
Somewhat to his own surprise, the Witness did not take umbrage as he might normally have done. Not since childhood did he recall losing himself so deeply in activity.
“You promised to be honest with me,” he chided. “I never said I was an artist. I’m just following your advice, filling my time.”
“I am being honest, Witness. But do not worry, I can be critical as well. You have a natural talent, but you are not yet a master painter.” She waved a tail to show that no offense was meant. “You have captured much of the scene, without question. But the painting is flat; you have not captured the depths of the valleys between the foothills, nor the distance of the plain.” She picked up the palette and several brushes. “Let me show you.” She looked to him for permission, and he shrugged. With quick, sure strokes of black and umber, she painted shadows, softened the horizon.
Rezin sat, dejected, and watched. He had wasted his time, if she could so improve a day’s worth of painting with only a few strokes. It had been foolish, he thought, to believe he could recapture his childish sense of wonder. It was, by definition, a childish thing.
“Oh, look at you,” Lly-L’a laughed softly, examining his downcast eyes. “You look just like a child whose brand new toy has been broken. Do not worry,” she curled two tails around him comfortingly. “You have talent, as I said at first. Did you expect to learn all the tricks on your first day?” She laughed again. “You have started with a difficult step, after all. I suggest you try sketching with carbon sticks for a time. You have already mastered color, and sketching with graphite and paper would allow you to experiment with depth and shadows. Try that tomorrow.”
Rezin, had in fact been, he now admitted, rather absurdly proud of his first effort, and hurt by the ease with which this admittedly ‘adequate’ painter had improved it. He now again surprised himself by taking her comments to heart, and resolving to try again after all. With that decision, he rose and went in with Lly-L’a to a quiet dinner.
#
And so their days passed. The Khiri produced several sensats with remarkable speed, and showing substantial improvement to the Witness’ eye. Rezin, for his part, grew enamored of the stark black and white simplicity of graphite sketches, and quickly moved from landscapes to careful studies of sensat frames and of Lly-L’a’s early carvings.
“You definitely have a talent,” the artist commented as the end of the Witness’ term approached. “You have certainly far surpassed me, already. I wish…" She turned away.
“What do you wish?” he asked, surprised. “Remember,” he teased, “you promised to be honest.”
“So I did,” she said heavily. “Alright, then. I wish you were a Khiri.” He jerked his head, taken aback. “Not that you equal our old masters, naturally. No one does, now.” He smiled in wry agreement. “But you have a way, a talent, a … something in the same family. Something that reminds me of what we Khiri used to have.” She straightened drooping eyebrows with a determined twitch. “Let us not dwell on that. We have only a few days before you leave, and you have given me an idea for one last carving. We will have dinner, and I will start fresh tomorrow.”
“And I’ll sketch you working,” he agreed, light-hearted.
#
At last came the morning of his departure.
“You have taught me a great deal,” Lly-L’a said, “for all your disclaimers of being neither artist nor critic. You are honest in yourself and in your art, and that is worth a great deal. Almost enough,” tails and eyebrows twitched in unison, “to compensate for a complete lack of tact.”
“Let’s see your latest piece, and we’ll find whether you still think so,” he taunted with a smile. For she had insisted, this last time, that he not see the piece before completion. He had been forced therefore, to do his sketch of her at a distance.
“Let us not,” Her tails quieted in sudden seriousness. Instead, she indicated a small package on the floor nearby. “I packaged it last night. I am hoping you will take it back with you to the Observatory.” She waved manipulators. “I believe it is good. It is a gift for you, but feel free to show it around to your friends. Tell them what a genius you met.” She raised eyebrows mockingly.
Rezin frowned. He and the Khir had grown friendly over the past weeks, but not really close. Their conversations had stayed close to the subject of art and technique. They had not discussed personal lives. He had no idea whether she had other intimates, and certainly he had seen none. Conversely, she had no idea that his Observatory friends could be counted on no hands at all. Best not to raise that now.
As the day of his return had approached, and with them the prospect of yet more time at the Observatory waiting for an assignment, Rezin’s thoughts had returned gradually to their old cynical tracks. Only in sketching had he been able to retain some of the freedom of spirit he had experienced earlier on. Still, some sort of gesture seemed called for here.
“I have nothing to give you in return,” he protested, empty hands spread helplessly before him.
“Nonsense,” she said, manipulators raised in denial. “We had an agreement. You gave me honest criticism. And I received plenty of that.” Her eyebrows wriggled with amusement.
“Nonetheless. Gifts should be exchanged. Our literature has a long tradition about this,” He glanced down at the bag beside him. It contained only his clothes, medkit, and a few final sketches. What could he offer?
“How about the landscape you first painted? It remains on the easel over there,” She gestured toward the window with a tail. “It is not your best, but it will remind me of you, and that no one is perfect, not even critics.”
He smiled with relief. “Sure, you can keep that. In fact, it’s a collaboration between us. But it needs a title; something appropriately Khiri.” He tipped his head back in an exaggerated pose of concentration.
“How about ‘Dark Shadows are Plain’,” she offered with a quirk of the tail.
"’To the Man with the Brush’,” he laughed. “It’s a deal.”
#
The day of Rezin’s departure from Khi’Ri-rri had passed quickly, with only a few ceremonies and performances to endure. He had confined his public comments to a statement that he had been impressed with the Khiri talent he had seen. True enough, and well received by the dignitaries. It was hardly his fault that they had taken it to apply to the intrepid stumblers and croakers (dancers and singers), while he had had in mind only one specific Khir.
He spent the return voyage to the Observatory sketching, putting minimal work into his report. Technically, no such report was necessary; an Attendant’s job was simply to be present. Nonetheless, most Attendants sent in voluminous, carefully annotated multimedia documents, and Rezin had learned to send in a token effort just to avoid questions.
Report finished and ready for transmission, he had at last opened Lly-L’a’s package. The artist’s final piece was a grey soapstone mask. Curiously enough, it was human, a stern, cruel face clearly based on Rezin himself, the face was twisted into a sneer. He placed it on his face with some trepidation.
He felt nothing as he looked out the eyeholes. Another failure from that degenerate race, he thought. Even Lly-L’a had failed at the end. Talentless despite her technical skills. Worth no more than the rest of the Khiri, despite her patience and friendly… With a cry, he tore the traitorous mask and its all too accurate likeness from his face.
It was only later, when he chanced to see the edge of the mask, that he wept. She had titled the piece ‘Khi’Ri-rri after the Fall’.
#
The Observatory staffer reviewed Attendant Miller’s Khi’Ri-rri report. Brief and to the point, as usual. Unusually, however, there was an attachment. A cover note said only “The Work of a Khiri.” Almost as if it were a title, the staffer considered, looking down at the painstaking sketch of a Khiri artisan, bent over her work. Passable work for a declining culture, he thought. He’d have to have it framed for the Observatory museum.