Free The Ordinary by Jim Grimsley

learn it. So this left the rest in the small room waiting.
    Jedda took the opportunity to share a bowl of dried seaweed with Vitter, who had found a corner for himself near a portrait of Craken the Great, one of the disputed representations dear to the Imyni Faction; the consul was from the Imyni. Vitter had been studying the portrait and greeted her when she sat near him, almost as though he had hoped she would join him. He gestured to the painting. “Imyni clumsiness, to make Craken look like an ape. We were fully evolved when we came to this planet.”
    â€œIf you believe the krys.”
    â€œYou don’t?”
    â€œSome of it. Not all.”
    â€œWhich is your rykka?”
    â€œNadi. I come from there.”
    He nodded. “What do you think this wait is all about?”
    â€œTarma’s upset. She’s letting people know it.”
    Vitter stared into space. “They’ve played their cards, I guess.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œThe Orminy.” When he looked at her again, she could read the decision in his eyes, that he would risk trusting her further, that he would speak. She had to wonder why. “We were sent here to provoke an incident. When we were on stat, my ministry was sending me all the rumors that were flying around Béyoton. The Orminy wanted to provoke an incident here in order to justify sending troops to occupy the cities in the south of Irion. A first step toward colonization.”
    â€œYou said this was one rumor.”
    â€œThis was the most consistent rumor. There’s always a root of truth in the most consistent rumor.”
    Jedda looked into his eyes and found a warm, full presence there. In her way of thinking, this was as good as a kiss. She decided to risk something herself. “Your ministry does not seem to be in agreement with the rest.”
    â€œI’m not in agreement with the rest,” Vitter said, “and many of my colleagues agree with me. We have access to information, in particular, about the movements of our beloved ruling class, and we don’t like what we’re learning.” He paused. His face firmed, became clear for a moment, as if she saw him from fifty years ago. “I work in the Logistical Section of the ministry. We have been allowed a certain freedom to explore our own ideas, in particular, on the subject of Irion.”
    Some of the staff from the consulate were wheeling in trays of food, salad and bread, the fourth meal.
    Vitter looked her in the eye. “I’m taking a chance in speaking to you this way.”
    Jedda nodded. “I certainly might be a spy, I suppose. For someone. I might not even know it myself.”
    â€œWith the stats not working, it’s easier to trust,” Vitter said. “Even though I might regret it later.”
    â€œWhat are your ideas about Irion?”
    He shook his head. “It’s yours I want to know.”
    â€œWhat do you mean, mine? I’m a merchant. I trade here.”
    â€œYou’re also a linguist,” he said. “I’ve read some of your formal uploads on the Ironian languages.”
    She was silent for a while. Those uploads to which he was referring, and the scholarship that they required, were why she lived. To come here and learn, and to set down what she had learned, to try to share some of what she was finding in the structure and grammar of Erejhen, in case it should make a difference to anyone. “I’m pleased to hear that.”
    â€œOne thinks one’s work is lost,” Vitter said, and the music of his voice contrasted with his sharp nose and weak eyes, “because one is only a voice among so many billions of others, not only those of today but the voices of the past as well, still alive in the living data, so very, very many of us. Yet something happens, a gate opens,” he gestured toward the sea, and she knew which gate he meant, “and suddenly the work of one person, a handful