Ice and Fire
Chapter 10: A Little of What You Fancy
Until Sarek answered the door, hair tousled, and clad only in what had to be a hurriedly donned night robe, Amanda had not truly realized how early it really was. Made from pale amber cottony fabric, the robe provocatively clung to his broad chest and lean hips. Intended to fasten up both sides with short ties, in his obvious haste, he had missed a few of the chunky laces and the gaps in-between revealed that he wore nothing underneath.
At the knowledge, Amanda's face flushed scarlet but he appeared far more interested in her presence than his own state of undress. His gaze, though fleeting was mesmeric. As she stammered out a halting clarification for her premature arrival, he neatly sidestepped so that she could precede him into the room.
As on her previous two visits, his quarters were incredibly neat. Unsullied by a lone sock, or an open book, or the latest tape of his favourite recording, the russet carpet stretched to cream and salmon pink walls. However, the curtained off sleeping dais was still spread with night linen and further, a rumpled mat lay on the floor before a black stone plinth that she had failed to notice before, atop of which stood a statue of some strange winged, cat-like beast, a bowl filled with glowing embers held between its outstretched front paws.
"I'm disturbing you. Perhaps I should return later," She tried to apologise but he would have none of it.
"Indeed not, Miss Grayson. The fault is mine. As you see, I seek Attunement, a process I find better undertaken before breaking the night's fast - but which can be somewhat--- absorbing. Have you eaten? Will you take tsa'e?"
Her newly implanted knowledge informed Amanda that, as she had thought the day before, it would be an insult to refuse. She dipped her head, "If it would please you, Kula' at."
Dark eyes observed her shrewdly, and she felt the blood once again rise into her cheeks as he dryly murmured, "Perhaps a weaker infusion would be preferable for your Q'uomi tastes. Please, sit."
With a clumsy grace, Amanda sank onto the cushioned seat she had occupied previously. Her eyes followed him as he strode across to the selector. Even his walk conveyed authority. On most Terrans, the sleeping gown would have appeared theatrical, or merely comical, but on Sarek, it emphasized his natural male hauteur, a presence and power she found spellbinding.
He came back with a plain stone tray bearing the ubiquitous blue crystal teapot, drinking bowls, and a plate of krayla, along with various other utensils and small dishes from which arose a mingling of mouth-watering steam. Sarek set the tray down between them, took his seat opposite, and patiently regarded her. It took Amanda a moment to realise that it was another lesson. She took a deep breath, feeling rather faint. He sat cross-legged. The posture pulled the ties of the sleeping gown even further apart to reveal a leanly muscled thigh and a tantalizing stretch of bare hip that drew her gaze.
Confused at the direction her thoughts had suddenly taken, she hastily cast her eyes down at the tray, while the disapproving voice of her conscience chided such impropriety. Swallowing hard, she wet dry lips with the tip of her tongue, struggling to regain a measure of composure. Her mind flashed abruptly to a recollection that she recognised was not her own. A moment later, she knew what her reaction should be.
Lifting her head, she met him eye to eye. "It is undignified for a woman to play servant to a man that is not hers, Kula' at Sarek."
"Quite so," He agreed, and although his tone was peremptory, Amanda sensed approval. "As my guest, therefore, it is my honour to serve you."
Without a pause, he indicated the contents of the tray, "An ancient proverb on my world instructs that if you are privileged in eating something original, your life will be lengthened by seventy-five years."
"Meaning that variety is the spice of life?" She ventured, looking at him with amused wonder.
Did his eyes soften in response or was it entirely her imagination?
"In recent years this small truth has fallen from grace among my people." He passed her a bowl, offering it with both hands. As she held it out in the same fashion, he poured a measure of tsa'e. "Have you eaten any of our foodstuffs before, Miss Grayson?"
"Only the krayla and tsa'e yesterday---"
"Indeed." His brow rose as if in awareness of her reservations. "We are essentially still a desert people. Resources for growing produce are limited. However, there is a misconception that we enjoy bland cuisine. You may now appreciate that, as with many other details of our culture, that belief is not entirely the case."
Amanda studied him, watching his eyes, trying to read what little expression he allowed, "There is much I do not know, Kula' at Sarek. But I do wish to learn - if you are willing to teach me."
The moment she voiced the desire, she knew how naïve it sounded, how gauche, even couched in the proper Ti-Valka'ain form. He must have thought so too, for a winged brow arched. But all he said was, "A further mind-touch will be necessary. Do you have any objections to that, Miss Grayson?"
Her heart leaped in silent answer, but she said only, "Indeed not, sir."
"You did not find the process debilitating? There were no ill-affects?"
She decided on the truth, "A slight headache, but I assumed that was my unfamiliarity with tsa'e."
"Remarkable," For a moment he considered her from beneath hooded lids, before he bent gracefully at the waist, and reached for a pair of tapered, chopstick-like, eating utensils from the tray. "These are called?"
The name for them popped unbidden into her head, "Jom'ir."
"You recall the appropriate phrase we speak before the start of a meal?"
"Ta'nara son-ghai sup ni da?" Amanda supplied, pronouncing the syllables with some care.
He inclined his head, "And its purpose?"
She contemplated the question, brow furrowed in concentration. "At one time, food was scarce. Meals were important. The literal meaning is 'I will eat well'."
"That is so. Even now, we do not ask in your way 'how are you?' but enquire 'have you eaten?' When the meal is over, the appropriate phrase is?"
"Ta'nara ut-ghai sup ni da. I have eaten well."
"Do not confuse them."
"Indeed not, Kula'at Sarek."
Again, he bent to the tray, indicated the assortment of small bowls and their contents. "As with krayla and tsa'e, another principal food on Vulcan is kahf. It appears in many variations and is always present on the table, whatever the meal. You are able to translate the term?"
The interpretation came to her as if she had known it all her life, along with the taste of subtle heat and sourness on her tongue. The recollection set her taste buds singing in anticipation. "Because of the severity of the climate, it was essential for food to be preserved for times of particular need. Vegetables were 'packed' into layers with natural salts, peppers and herbs until they fermented. Even now, kahf is made in exactly the same way it was in Surak's day."
Sarek picked up another bowl. He presented it with both hands as before. "One of many customs we continue to practice, although real hunger is now rare as we trade extensively with both our colony worlds and other species. Please, eat well, Miss Grayson."
The breakfast was the strangest Amanda had ever consumed. For the most part conducted in silence, she found her unexpected enjoyment of Vulcan cuisine a complete surprise. Though a 'memory' existed of eating such dishes for most of her life, each mouthful was also a new experience. She did not hesitate to hold out her drinking bowl when Sarek proffered the teapot. Even while she shuddered inwardly at each tiny sip of the distinctively flavoured tsa'e, she also acknowledged her desire for the drink. The preference for the herbal infusion had started to grow on her, just as Mike had told her it would.
Neither could she deny the conviction at the back of her mind that she needed the tsa'e for another successful mind-touch. Just the remembrance of Sarek's strong, yet responsive, fingers pressed lightly against her skin caused her heart to lurch and her pulses to quicken.
Wanton! Amanda thought with inward, ironic laughter. There had been nothing remotely intimate in his touch the day before, yet, like an adolescent school-girl, she had already concocted a whole host of silly romantic fantasies about him. Hopeless child, she told herself sternly, employing a phrase her father used often. He is Vulcan and Vulcans don't have such sensibilities. Rummaging carefully through her new knowledge, she realised that there seemed no concept in modern Ti-Valka'ain for the usual Human emotional responses. When she tried to translate 'love', her extensive lexicon came up blank. The same appeared true of jealously, anger, and grief. Even 'desire' had no direct translation and 'lust' only came back with 'appetite' as the derivative, an expression from much earlier in the history of the language. It was undoubtedly fascinating!
"Miss Grayson, you appear distracted. Are our dishes not to your taste?"
Startled, she looked up to find Sarek's enigmatic gaze fixed upon her, saturnine brows ominously drawn together. Could she still be broadcasting her thoughts to all and sundry? Her cheeks flamed again before his stare. Then, his eyes dropped to the almost empty bowl she held in silent explanation.
In her own Western culture, good manners decreed that a morsel or two remained uneaten, an indication of how well the host provided for his guests. On Vulcan, the opposite held true. At once, she chased the last small pieces of food around the bowl with the jom'ir and popped them into her mouth.
Replete she murmured, "ta'nara ut-ghai sup ni da," and meant it as she assiduously wiped her mouth and fingers, wrapped the used jom'ir in the moist napkin, and placed the small roll along with the delicate crystal bowl beside the other empty dishes.
"I am honoured." Sarek inclined his head, picked up the tray, and deposited it back into the selector recess. He returned but did not resume his seat. Instead, he studied her, one eyebrow on the rise. "Does your bladder need emptying, Miss Grayson?"
The question, uttered with the utmost seriousness almost made her choke. She hastily covered her mouth and masked her astonished laughter with a quick cough. However, she fooled no one with the subterfuge, it seemed.
"You find the enquiry amusing for some reason," He continued to regard her with unblinking intensity. "Humour is alien to me, particularly Q'uomi humour. Explain if you will."
She was in no doubt about his bafflement or the command in his voice, "Forgive me, Kula' at Sarek, I did not mean…"
"To be undisciplined?"
"To offend you," Blue eyes flashed as she met his gaze.
"Indeed?"
The butterflies danced in the pit of Amanda's stomach at his tone. He stood over her, boldly intimidating and yet she felt not fear exactly but an odd, primitive excitement. Her heart skittered as she tilted her head back to regard him. Their eyes locked for what seemed an eternity. Beyond her control, the muscles of her abdomen clenched, and heat rippled under her skin as a dizzying current arced through her.
"I don't mean to be insolent, sir. On my world, such a question is … demeaning. You might ask it of a child, though a decidedly young one. From one adult to another, particularly from a man to a woman, it is emphatically indiscreet."
"I stand corrected, Miss Grayson," Cross-legged as before, he settled into his chair, "Apparently, I also have much to learn."
Amanda swallowed tightly unable to suppress her abrupt awareness of him, entirely caught up in her own emotions. From somewhere deep within came the urge to touch him, to reach out and spread her fingers across his face as he had done to her the day before, to connect with him mind to mind. Disconcerted by the impulse she clasped her fingers together in her lap but she still could not tear her gaze away from his face.
Sarek regarded her thoughtfully for a moment before continuing, his voice velvet-edged but insistent, "The mind-touch is not a one-way process. If you will permit it, I would gain knowledge of your culture in the same way you learn of mine. What do you say, Miss Grayson? Will you instruct me in those things I cannot learn in any other way?"