Free The Nutcracker Coup by Janet Kagan Page A

something like that. A renewal. A promise of spring to come.”
    “Yes, we have an Awakening on Tememb Nap Chorr as well.”
    Marianne nodded. “Many peoples do. Anyhow, I mentioned that I wanted to celebrate and a number of other people at the Embassy decided it was a good idea. So, we’re trying to put together something that resembles a Christmas celebration-mostly from local materials.”
    She gestured toward the player. “That piece of music is generally associated with Christmas.
    I’ve been playing it because it-gives me an anticipation of the Awakening to come.”
    Tatep was doing fine finishing work now, and Marianne had to stop to watch. The bit of sweetwood was turning into a pair of tommets-the Embassy staff had dubbed them
    “notrabbits” for their sexual proclivities-engaged in their mating dance. Tatep rattled his spines, amused, and passed the carving into her hands. He waited quietly while she turned it this way and that, admiring the exquisite workmanship.
    “You don’t get the joke,” he said, at last.
    “No, Tatep. I’m afraid I don’t. Can you share it?”
    “Look closely at their teeth.”
    Marianne did, and got the joke. The creatures were tommets, yes, but the teeth they had were not tommet teeth. They were the same sort of teeth that Tatep had used to carve them.
    Apparently, “fucking like tommets” was a Rejoicer joke.
    “It’s a gift for Hapet and Achinto. They had six children! We’re all pleased and amazed for them.”
    Four to a brood was the usual, but birthings were few and far between. A couple that had more than two birthings in a lifetime was considered unusually lucky.
    “Congratulate them for me, if you think it appropriate,” Marianne said. “Would it be proper for the embassy to send a gift?”
    “Proper and most welcome. Hapet and Achinto will need help feeding that many.”
    “Would you help me choose? Something to make children grow healthy and strong, and something as well to delight their senses.”
    “I’d be glad to. Shall we go to the market or the wood?”
    “Let’s go chop our own, Tatep. I’ve been sitting behind this desk too damn long. I could use the exercise.”
    As Marianne rose, Tatep put his finished carving into his pouch and climbed down. “You will share more about Christmas with me while we work? You can talk and chop at the same time.”
    Marianne grinned. “I’ll do better than that. You can help me choose something that we can use for a Christmas tree, as well. If it’s something that is also edible when it has seasoned for a few weeks’
    time, that would be all the more to the spirit of the festival.”

    ###
The two of them took a leisurely stroll down the narrow cobbled streets. Marianne shared more of her Christmas customs with Tatep and found her anticipation growing apace as she did.
    At Tatep’s suggestion they paused at Killim the glass-blower’s, where Tatep helped Marianne describe and order a dozen ornamental balls for the tree. Unaccustomed to the idea of purely ornamental glass objects, Killim was fascinated. “She says,” reported Tatep when Marianne missed a few crucial words of her reply, “she’ll make a number of samples and you’ll return on Debem Op Chorr to choose the most proper.”
    Marianne nodded. Before she could thank Killim, however, she heard the door behind her open, heard a muffled squeak of surprise, and turned. Halemtat had ordered yet another of his subjects clipped-Marianne saw that much before the local beat a hasty retreat from the door and vanished.
    “Oh, god,” she said aloud. “Another one.” That, she admitted to herself for the first time, was Page 2

    why she was making such an effort to recognize the individual Rejoicers by facial shape alone.
    She’d seen no less than fifty clipped in the year she’d been on Rejoicing. There was no doubt in her mind that this was a new one-the blunted tips of its quills had been bright and crisp. “Who is it this time, Tatep?”
    Tatep