Diplomacy (5a/27)
Title: Diplomacy ( Table of Contents)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Nothing you recognize is mine. I gain nothing of material value from this.
Pairings: Gen.
Chapter1a-- 1b Chapter2 Chapter3 Chapter4 Chapter5a-- 5b Chapter6 Chapter7 Chapter8 Chapter9 Chapter10 Chapter11a-- 11b Chapter12 Chapter13a-- 13b Chapter14a-- 14b Chapter15a-- 15b Chapter16 Chapter17a-- 17b Chapter18 Chapter19 Chapter20 Chapter21 Chapter22 Chapter23 Chapter24 Chapter25 Chapter26 Epilogue
Note: As always, long stretches of non-English dialogue are italicized. Buckle up, folks--this is where the fun finally starts!
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Son
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16 August 1998; O'Neill/Jackson Residence, Earth; 2000 hrs
"I could skip it," Jack offered, even though Daniel knew he really couldn't. "Carter'd go along with it. Tell the President 'we saved the world, now we want a vacation.' I haven't seen Abydos in almost a year."
Exactly a year, Daniel thought, but that was in Abydonian years, not Tau'ri ones. Tomorrow, it would be a year. A whole year. "You can't skip it, Jack. And you told me once that you hate deserts, so it wouldn't exactly be a vacation."
"Yeah, but I meant deserts on Earth. Abydos is great."
Daniel forced a smile. "Congratulations on the award," he said. "The Air Medal, yes? I was talking to Lieutenant Hagman on Friday, and he explained that it's a great honor, and that you and Sam really deserve--"
"Don't try to change the subject," Jack interrupted. Daniel sighed and stopped talking. "When's the last time you slept?"
He flapped a hand in the vague direction of the air. When Jack raised his eyebrows expectantly, he admitted, "I don't know."
"Have you tried kelno'reem-ing with Teal'c? I'll take you back to the Mountain tonight if it'll help."
"No, I...can't concentrate enough," he said, because he'd tried that last night on his own, and he didn't think it would be much better even with Teal'c's calm, solid presence beside him. "I would only be disturbing Teal'c. You know," he added, "we need to leave very early tomorrow morning if you don't want to miss your airplane to Washington."
"Stop that," Jack said.
"Stop what?"
"You know what."
"No, I--"
"Daniel." Jack waited until he looked up. "Sit down a minute."
Daniel glanced up at a clock. "It's getting late, and didn't you say you never finished your report from P2X--"
"I've still got all night to finish whatever I need to. Now stop trying to wear a hole in my floor and sit down."
Daniel stopped, not having realized until then that he had been pacing. Exhaling slowly, he sank down onto Jack's couch. "I'm fine," he said for what had to have been the fifth time in the last couple of hours.
Jack lowered himself into a seat opposite him and believed him as well as he had the other four times. "I'd be a little worried if you were."
Better than a lot worried, like you are now, Daniel thought, but didn't say it. He fixed his eyes on the window instead.
"Excited?" Jack said.
Scared anxious overjoyed terrified confused-- "Yes," he said.
"Second thoughts?"
"Of course not."
"Because--"
"No, Jack. And you're supposed to leave tomorrow at--"
"Will you drop it about the damn plane?" Jack snapped. Daniel shut up. More calmly, Jack asked, "What's on your mind?" Daniel gave him a disbelieving look. "Okay, dumb question. I mean--is there something in particular you're worried about?"
Daniel chewed his lip, then said finally, "A lot of things. What if they don't open the 'gate tomorrow? What if they forgot, or Kasuf thought it was too dangerous? What if the calculations were wrong and they already opened and closed it without us knowing, and I'll never be able to--" He cut himself off, that time.
"Oy. You're making me be the logical one here?" Jack said lightly. "Well, I'm not doing it. Take a step back yourself and think about everything you just said to me."
A moment later, Daniel sighed and conceded, "Tobay is very responsible--he would never forget to tell Kasuf, and Kasuf would never forget about the Stargate. Sam checked the calculations several times, and even if she were wrong, General Hammond let us try dialing Abydos over the last few days with no lock. And Kasuf wouldn't leave the Stargate buried, because he's hoping his children will be coming back."
"And you," Jack reminded him. "You were practically raised with his kids, right? He's waiting for you, too."
"I just...I don't want anything to go wrong. I want to go back and see everything the way it used to be. "
Jack stilled, his fingers unmoving on the arm of his chair and his face pinched. "Daniel, it won't be," he said quietly. "Don't...don't go expecting things to be the same."
"I know. I know." Daniel ran his fingertips nervously over the material of the couch. "How do I tell him, Jack? How do I tell Kasuf that I'm safe and well, and his children..."
"You tell him that Skaara and his sister are still alive, and we're still looking for them," Jack said patiently.
"But we don't know if they really are." What could he say-- 'Kasuf, I participated in blowing up a ship when I knew your son was in it a few months ago. Assuming your daughter wasn't there, too, we've narrowed her possible location down to only several thousand planets.'
"We've been operating based on the assumption that they've both survived and are alive," Jack said. "You tell their father we'll keep looking."
"Yeah." Daniel fidgeted in his seat, then admitted, "I know. I know all this. I went over it with General Hammond, and...and Teal'c, and Major Ferretti, so I know what I'm supposed to say and what I'm supposed to do, but..."
"It'll be fine. SG-2 and Teal'c will make sure nothing happens. Carter and I will join you and relieve SG-2 as soon as we're done with the medal ceremony. And we'll keep people stationed there for the Abydons' safety, too, until this whole thing's settled."
"That's not the point," Daniel said, folding his arms before he could tear apart the seam he had been picking at. "I have to be the one to tell him--I can't...I have to tell him, not strangers from Earth. And then there's the alliance with Nagada to think of, and...and asking him to let me leave. Again."
Jack was watching him closely. "What do you think he'll say?"
Daniel shook his head. "It'll work. Kasuf will recognize the benefits of the SGC's friendship."
"Not the alliance part. What'll he say about you?"
Naturu, what will he think of me? "I suppose I'll find out tomorrow."
"Daniel, if this thing goes through the way we hope, they won't have to bury their 'gate forever," Jack pointed out. "You'll be able to go back and forth between both planets."
But it would never be the same.
Teal'c had visited his wife and son three brief times in more than eight months, and one of those times had been during their escape from the Goa'uld hatak. Like Teal'c, if Daniel was staying to help, he had to stay and help, not run home every few weeks. Besides, the Land of Light was a safe place and Teal'c a skilled warrior--the general might not allow Daniel to go to a high risk planet while alone and unprotected, which would restrict trips even more. He suspected his best chances for visiting Abydos would be if some team were sent there for an official reason and brought him along.
Still, he nodded. "My parents would have done everything they could to fight against the Goa'uld. What we're doing can only help my people. And this is what I was raised to do: study different places and people and, and...and learn things. It's what they would have wanted me to do, right?" Daniel chewed his lip and glanced up with a sudden jolt of anxiety when there was no answer. "Right, Jack?"
"They would've wanted you to be happy," Jack said finally. "So do we."
"I think I need to do this," Daniel said. "And there's a place here for me, at the SGC. I know that now."
"Yeah," Jack said. "Okay. And yeah, there is. But tomorrow--you're going home, Daniel. It's not just for SGC business. There are...things you probably want to do while you're there. Take some time for yourself, for whatever you need. Lou would understand."
Daniel thought about the home where he had grown up and wondered what it looked like now, after a year empty of people. "My parents will be at rest there now. My brothers--my friends. I don't even know who...died."
Jack was staring at him when he glanced up. "They would've been so proud of you, kid."
Unexpected tears stung his eyes, and Daniel had to look away again. Sometimes it felt like so long since they'd spoken to him, and so much had changed that he no longer knew what they would have thought of anything. "How...how can you know that?"
Jack was suddenly next to him, not touching, but sitting close. "Because," he said, and somehow, it was enough.
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17 August 1998; SGC, Earth; Nagada, Abydos; 1100 hrs
"Chevron seven--locked," Sergeant Harriman announced. "Wormhole to Abydos established."
"Ready?" Ferretti asked.
Daniel nodded, picking nervously at the sleeve of his uniform and fiddling with the strap on his backpack. "Ready."
"SG-2, Teal'c, Jackson," Colonel Makepeace called to them from the control room, "you have a go. If you run into any problems before General Hammond and SG-1 return from Washington, you contact me here immediately."
Daniel walked up the ramp to the shimmering event horizon and stopped with a feeling of mixed anticipation and apprehension churning in his gut. The sound of boots on metal approached from behind him. "We'll go first," Ferretti said. "Then Teal'c, and then Jackson."
"No," Daniel said quickly, putting a hand on Ferretti's arm as he started forward. "I should go first, so they see a familiar face and I can warn them others are coming through. Sir, the MALP didn't show anything wrong," he added when Ferretti started to shake his head. "They'll feel threatened if too many armed people go through at once." He glanced at Teal'c, who seemed reluctant, but inclined his head in understanding and took a step back.
"You and me, then," Ferretti compromised, calling back, "Count to ten, then follow us through."
Daniel shut his eyes briefly, then opened them and determinedly strode into the wormhole--
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--and stepped out into Nagada.
He sucked in an involuntary breath, nearly overwhelmed by the sight of the familiar chaapa'ai room. Torches lit the chamber with fire; not artificial, electric light bulbs, but real, warm flames swaying and dancing in their oil. Dry heat swelled heavily around him.
"Gods," he breathed shakily, sweeping his gaze around until he caught sight of...
"Dan'yel? Is that you?" Kasuf uttered, surprised relief in his voice, and took a few steps toward them.
The Nagadan dialect of Abydonian floated to Daniel's ears for the first time in a year, and suddenly, he was at a loss for what to say. To cover his momentary disorientation, he stepped to one side. "Elder Kasuf, this is Major Ferretti. There are four others coming--do not be afraid. They are all friends."
As if waiting for that cue, Teal'c stepped through, followed closely by Major Warren and Captains Griff and Casey. The Stargate deactivated behind them.
"Do not be afraid," Daniel said again, stepping toward Teal'c as he noticed Kasuf's gaze drawn to the Jaffa. He was momentarily grateful that Kasuf hadn't been in that room last year to see Teal'c as First Prime of Apophis. "They are here to help protect our people. This is Teal'c, my good friend and teacher."
"I am not your enemy," Teal'c added himself, arms spread to show his empty hands. "I am honored to meet you, Elder."
Kasuf glanced apprehensively at Daniel, but nodded in acceptance. "Then I am also honored to call you 'friend.'"
"Major Ferretti, SG-2," Daniel said, switching into English, "this is Elder Kasuf."
In heavily accented English, Kasuf said, to Ferretti, "I thank you to return Dan'yel safe. It is a long time." Then, to Daniel again, "It has been very long, my child."
He opened his arms, and, swallowing hard, Daniel stepped into them, burying his face in Kasuf's shoulder and breathing in the scent of the desert woven into the cloth. "Too long," he agreed in a whisper.
"Ay, Dan'yel," the man murmured in his ear, a hand on the back of his head. Even as he tightened his arms around Kasuf, part of Daniel knew that, while people on Earth saw him as a child, here, on Abydos, he truly was not, anymore. The rest of him knew he would always be a child to Kasuf and didn't care about the nearly desperate way he was clinging. "We feared you would never return, but you come back to us dressed like a man from Earth."
"The tunic I wore when I was taken is too small for me now," Daniel said sheepishly into the man's robe.
"It was a child's clothing," Kasuf said affectionately. "You begin to look as your father did when I first saw him all those years ago."
Reluctantly, Daniel pulled away, sobering. He stepped back--from the embrace, from the feel of Abydonian linen, from the comfort of Kasuf's steady voice--and lowered himself to one knee. "I regret that we do not return with Skaara and Sha'uri," he said as calmly as he could. "We believe they still live. We have not yet been able to find them and bring them back, but we will continue our search until we do."
"What do you mean by 'we?'" Kasuf repeated, glancing toward the Tau'ri.
"Elder, may we go somewhere to speak? I come here as a messenger from Earth, and there is much that I need to discuss with you." Daniel tried not to flinch as Kasuf's eyes narrowed and ran over his Tau'ri uniform again, lingering this time on the tactical vest he wore over the desert camouflage and the way he came to his feet in his now-comfortable military-issue boots.
"We can speak in my dwelling," Kasuf said finally, though a glint of suspicion shone in his eye. The Tau'ri cared a lot about Daniel's education, but Kasuf was proof that a person didn't need schooling to be intelligent. "But first, come with me. I will take you to the end of our land."
Daniel's throat tightened, and he folded his arms while he fought to control his expression. Noticing his sudden tension, Teal'c bent down slightly and said in English, "This makes you uneasy?"
"No," he denied. Then, "I don't know."
"Are we not already at the end of your land?"
"Not exactly. This is the edge of our territory, but that's not what people mean when they say..."
"Then what lies there?" Teal'c asked.
"Not 'what;' 'who,'" he corrected. "That's where we lay our dead to rest." Instead of waiting for Teal'c's answer, he turned around to SG-2. "Major Ferretti, Elder Kasuf would like me to...visit--"
"I heard," Ferretti interrupted quietly. "How far is it?"
"It's just outside the main part of Nagada. A thirty minute walk, perhaps an hour."
"I'll go with you. Warren, hold the fort until you hear from me. Keep your radios on, and make sure you don't shoot any of the natives if they wander by."
"Major," Daniel said delicately, "um...you don't have to go with...I mean..."
"I'll give you privacy when we get there," Ferretti told him, his tone understanding, though he didn't offer to stay away completely. Daniel nodded, then turned back to Kasuf.
"Come," the elder said, and led the way out of the room.
Daniel stepped out with him, Teal'c and Ferretti both on his heels. He blinked and had to squint against the glare of the sun at high noon as he emerged from the chaapa'ai room. The sharp rays beat down like a familiar physical presence, and he couldn't help crouching for a minute to touch the ground and let the hot sand sift through his fingers. How odd it was to be back home at last and not be able to feel the ground under his bare feet or drifting through sandals to tickle his toes. He closed his eyes and had to fight a sudden urge to unlace his boots, stop thinking about enemies and alliances, and just run...
"Jac--uh, Daniel?" Ferretti's quiet voice sounded from behind him.
The sand slipped out of his hand. "It's this way, sir," Daniel said, rising and moving across the desert toward the outer limits of Nagada's territory.
They started down a small dune, and Ferretti muffled a curse as he slipped on the shifting sands. Daniel felt his balance adjust automatically and smiled, just a little--his legs still belonged to the desert, no matter what seal was stamped on his boots.
Kasuf hadn't missed the exchange. As Daniel drew nearer, Teal'c and Ferretti keeping a considerate distance behind, the man asked him, "Was the land very different, on Earth?"
"Yes," Daniel said. He let out a small laugh, because, of all the things that were different, the physical land was the last he would have imagined missing."Everything was very different."
"And they have treated you well, the ones who rescued you?"
"Yes," he said again, emphatically. "They have been wonderful. The hero of the Great Rebellion himself has been very good to me," he added, knowing the elder would remember Jack, at least. "He could not come immediately, because he now being honored by their...their leader. But he will come, along with another friend of mine, as soon as they are finished. They are eager to meet the Abydonian people again."
"You have grown close to them," Kasuf observed shrewdly, a little sadly. "With your fair skin and hair, and your clothing, and the manner in which you speak of Earth...no one would guess you were born of this world. I almost did not recognize you at first."
A pain that had become all too familiar recently stabbed through him. He stared straight ahead. "I am still Abydon, Elder."
A hand cupped the back of his head, and he turned to look into Kasuf's serious eyes. "And you will always find brothers here," Kasuf said. "You will always be a son of Abydos, and as a son to me. You will never have cause to doubt your place here."
By the man's choice of words, he must at least suspect what Daniel had decided. He had to avert his gaze again. "Elder, there is something I must ask you. It is about Earth, and what they--what we plan to do against the enemy who has--"
"There will be time for that," Kasuf said firmly. He stepped in front of Daniel, making him stop walking and look at him again. "You have always been a child of two worlds, Dan'yel Mshai Jackson. But you cannot remain a child forever. Come now and pay your respects to the fallen. Then, we will speak, as one man to another."
When they reached the reached the stretch of land outside the walls of the town, though, Daniel's steps slowed. By squinting, he could make out small markers in the distance. He jumped a little when Teal'c's hand found his shoulder and glanced back into the Jaffa's sympathetic eyes set in his expressionless face. Ferretti crossed a final few steps to them.
"Major..."
"Go ahead," Ferretti told him. "Just don't wander out of sight."
Teal'c leaned in a little closer when he didn't move. "My friend, I will accompany you if you wish it, but I do not believe my presence to be appropriate in this place."
Daniel shook his head, saying, "It's not because of...it's just...I'd like to be alone with them for a while." Teal'c inclined his head in understanding. Daniel turned back to the burial ground but felt suddenly as if he were stuck, unable to step forward.
"Come." Kasuf grasped him by the arm, and he lifted his feet one by one and let himself be led away from his friends and toward his fallen family.
This land was sacred to all. The Rebellion was celebrated, it was true, but nothing could wipe away millennia of belief and betrayal of belief without some disorder and ruined foundations that needed to be rebuilt. This place, however, remained revered by all Nagadans, no matter what their varied beliefs were about gods and the kalach and the afterlife in the years since Ra's downfall.
Now Daniel was acutely aware that even the Abydonian word 'kalach' was a word borrowed from the Goa'uld, a corruption of a Tau'ri Egyptian word for the life-force that had somehow become associated with the Jaffa concept of the life that followed life. Abydonian beliefs were so entwined with the Goa'uld that truth and lie, genuine history and muddled falsehoods...nothing could be truly separated any longer. Not for the first time, he wished he knew for certain which was real and which only a legend created by a tyrant.
It was one more thing the Goa'uld had to answer for. Sometimes, Daniel thought it was the worst of their crimes.
There was a small piece of land before him, the place marked by a small, flat stone lying at its head. An approximation of 'Claire' and 'Mel' in hieroglyphs, and then the names in Roman letters below, had been carved painstakingly into the stone. Daniel stared at them in confusion--so few people could read that most grave stelae, such as they were, normally bore no words. There was nothing else, though, and he was relieved that no one had tried to inscribe an offering of his parents' kalach to some god who might be nothing more than a parasite, anyway.
Daniel inched forward. "Who wrote this?"
"Your brothers and sisters of the pen ensured that their names were written into the stone," Kasuf told him. "They wished to honor their teachers. I thought it fitting, for the people who brought learning back to our world." There was a pause, and then, "Claire and Mel rest together, Dan'yel. They were mourned by all."
Daniel had seen people laid to rest, over the years. Burial rites were simple on Abydos--use of sarcophagi and ornate tombs had been lost during Ra's oppressive rule, but some things had been preserved. He had always thought the words spoken over a grave were beautiful, but never before had he been so miserable and yet so relieved to have missed the ritual. Who had spoken the words of power for them? What had they buried with his parents to take into eternity?
Steeling himself, he stepped closer, close enough to reach out and touch the stele if he only bent down. "Kasuf, could I...?"
"I will wait for you in my dwelling," Kasuf told him. "When you are ready, lead your friends into the village and find me there--there is something I must show you. Do you remember where it is?"
"Of course." He had never gotten lost within the walls of Nagada proper, and he wouldn't now. "Thank you, Elder."
Daniel waited until the sound of Kasuf's sandals on the ground faded, then turned back to the grave and tried to figure out what to do.
There was a moment when he wanted to say something but wasn't sure what language to use, and then he wanted to laugh at himself for worrying about something so stupid when he didn't know that anyone would hear, anyway. If a kalach existed at all, it was in the afterlife, not trapped here beneath barren soil. There were stories, of Anubis and Osiris and Ma'at, but Daniel didn't think anymore that he wanted his parents' kalach in the keeping of beings whom Teal'c knew as despised Goa'uld.
Just in case they were listening, then. People were always telling him that, these days. Just in case.
"Hello," he started, coughing uncomfortably. "Uh. I was going to tell you something, but I don't know... Look--Robert says my accent's almost inaudible now. That's a good thing. I think. So..." He rubbed his forehead, feeling stupid, then folded his arms. "I don't...know what to say to you."
At the realization, his eyes began to prickle, and he let himself drop to his knees. "Um, Teal'c says I should learn when to be silent, too, s-so..." He brushed impatiently at a spot of wetness snaking down his cheek and reached out to touch their names in the stone, feeling the care that someone must have taken, and wishing he had been that person. "You don't know who all those people are, of course," he said when he found his voice again. He hated that his parents and this place had been his whole world before, and now the SGC was, and they didn't know each other. "B-because everything has changed. Which is...I mean, that's just th-the way... Gods, I miss you, and I don't know...I don't know."
He tore his eyes from the stone and fumbled with the straps of his backpack until his arms were free, then reached in and dug blindly through it until his fingers found one of his journals. "I took notes about Earth, and the SGC, and my friends, my teachers there." He coughed again and sniffed. "I wish so much that you could meet them, they're really...really. But. So, um...I wrote about th-them, and..."
Daniel bit his lip, scrubbing his jacket sleeve roughly against his eyes. "Naturu."
He gave up talking, focusing instead on digging a shallow hole in the dry earth next to the stele with his fingers. Once he'd placed the journal inside, he stared at it for several long moments, because it looked so small and meaningless now, but there was nothing left he could do, even if it didn't matter, and what if it did matter, after all, and it wasn't enough?
But that was all. "I miss you," he said again. "Mama, Papa. I miss you." He kissed his fingertips, pressed them against the cover, and, with a last sigh, swept the earth back over it.
That done, he leaned forward, elbows on his dusty trousers, swallowing back something that caught in his throat. He pressed a fist to his mouth, wishing he had a candle flame to stare into, and tried to reach some sort of calm on his own.
When he could breathe normally again, he sniffed once and said, "There's something...I need to tell you something, okay? I'm going to ask Kasuf to let me stay on Earth and serve the Stargate program. For Skaara and Sha'uri, and what was done to...to you, and...and everything both of our planets have suffered. I know you always said to find the peaceful solution, and you didn't want me to be a f-fighter...and I'm not, exactly, but...but the war came to us first. It's the right thing to do. You understand? Why I have to be part of this fight?"
He found himself irrationally disappointed when no answer came. Not that he was expecting...but. Still.
"I don't know what gods are real, or if you were looking for them," he said. "But...if they are..." He waited. There was no response--no sound or sign from above or below, and not even the dry desert to answer him. He sighed and finished, "If they are, I hope you find them. And..." He searched for some blessing he could say and actually believe and mean it, because, before these of all people, his words had to matter. Finally, he fell back into his native tongue and said, "May your names live on in our hearts, in eternity."
But when he rose to his feet, his heart sank all over again when he realized that there was another grave next to him that looked just as new as his parents', and that he didn't even know whose it was. Next to that were two more.
"Bolaa rests here," a voice said from behind him, as if reading his thoughts. "And here, Ide, and there, Mriyu."
Daniel hastily wiped his eyes again and turned to see a solemn young man standing a few steps away, the knife hanging from his hip and the thick leather band on his left arm betraying his occupation as a Guard of Nagada.
"I spoke on their behalf at the burial," Tobay said, walking toward him and looking down at Bolaa's grave. "They died with honor, in defense of our people. Kasuf spoke for your mother and father that night, as well." Daniel could only nod, not trusting his voice. Tobay smiled slightly. "I told Kasuf that you would surely return, brother."
"Tobay," Daniel choked out, then straightened to his full height and extended an arm. Tobay clasped his forearm in his strong grip, but then pulled him close into a tight embrace. Daniel brought his other arm up around and clung to his brother, his mind still numb from renewed mourning. "It is good to see you again, Tobay."
"I only regret that your return must be darkened by grief." Tobay pulled away and held him out at arm's length to run a critical eye over him. "I almost did not know you, Dan'yel. You have grown tall and strong in your absence."
"Perhaps you have become short and weak," Daniel countered, falling easily back into the familiar banter he had once shared with the boys here.
Tobay laughed delightedly, releasing him with a playful shove. "Someone needs to remind you of your place, little brother."
Daniel found his eyes drawn to the faint stripe of rank that streaked the older boy's wristband. Tobay had worn the mark before, for a time, until Skaara had bested him to claim the position; now, it seemed, Tobay was head of the Guards once again. Daniel fingered the bands around his own arm; he could still see Klorel in his mind's eye and remembered that Skaara no longer wore anything on his arms but a device of torture and Goa'uld ornaments.
His brother's smile faded then, seeing where his gaze rested. "No one can replace our Skaara, nor would I wish to. But the village must still be protected, now more than ever. I merely hold Skaara's place until his return. Kasuf tells me that you bring news of him."
"Yes," Daniel said sobering as well.
"He is not with you--but he lives?"
"Yes. Skaara and his sister, both. I will tell you, but it is not a simple matter."
"Then we have a surprise for you, for we already know of Sha'uri."
Daniel frowned. "How? What do you mean?"
Tobay grinned at him. "Sha'uri is here. We did not tell her of your arrival--she will be very pleased."
Continued in Part b...