The doors opened. She could see that, but she could not see over the shoulders around her. Sometimes they frightened her, even if it was her they had come to see and even if it was her they were trying to protect.
She was afraid they were going to step on her, that was how close it was; and she was still bruised and sore.
They had driven around and seen the docks and the Volga where it met Swigert Bay, and they had seen the spaceport and places that Ari would have given a great deal to have gotten out to see, but uncle Giraud had said no, there were too many people and it was too hard.
Like at the hotel, where they had spent the night in a huge suite, a whole floor all to themselves; and where people had jammed up in the lobby and around their car. That had scared her. It scared her in the Hall of State when they were stopped in the doors and they started to close while she was in them; but Catlin shot out a hand and stopped them and they got through, all of them.
The Hall of State was the first thing they had really gotten to see at all, because there were all these people following them around, and all the reporters.
It was the way it looked in the tapes, it was huge and it echoed till it made you dizzy when you were looking around at it, with all the people up on the balconies looking down at them: it was real, the way the Court had been just a place in a tape, and now she knew what the room at the top of the steps was going to look like the moment uncle Giraud told her that was where the Nine met.
The noise died down. People were all talking, but they were not shouting at each other, and the Security people had put the reporters back, so they could walk and look at things.
Uncle Giraud took her and Florian and Catlin upstairs where she shook hands with Nasir Harad, the Chairman of the Nine: he was white-haired and thin and there was a lot of him that he didn't give away, she could tell that the way she could tell that there was something odd about him, the way he kept holding her hand after she had shaken his, and the way he looked at her like he wanted something.
"Uncle Giraud," she whispered when they were going through the doors into the Council Chamber, "he was funny,back there."
"Shush," he said, and pointed to the big half-circle desk where all the Councillors would sit if they were here.
It was funny, anyway, to be asking Giraudwhether anybody was a friendly or not. She looked at what he was telling her, which seat was which, and where Giraud sat when he was on Council—that was Science, she knew that: they had driven past the Science Building, and Giraud said he had an office there, and one in the Hall of State, but he wasn't there a lot of the time, he had secretaries and managers to run things.
He had Security push a button that opened the wall back, and she stood there staring while the Council Chamber opened right into the big Council Hall, becoming a room to the side of the seats, with the Rostrum in front of the huge wall uncle Giraud said was made out of stone from the Volga banks, all rough and red sandstone, just like it was a riverside.
The seats all looked tiny in front of that.
"This is where the laws are made," uncle Giraud said, and his voice echoed, like every footstep. "That's where the Council President and the Chairman sit, up there on the Rostrum."
She knew that. She could tape-remember the room full, with people walking up and down the aisles. Her heart beat fast.
"This is the center of Union," uncle Giraud said. "This is where people work out their differences. This is what makes everything work."
She had never heard uncle Giraud talk like that, never heard uncle Giraud talk in that quiet voice that said these things were important. He sounded like Dr. Edwards, somehow, doing lessons for her.
He took her back outside then, where it was noisy and Security made room for them. Down the stairs then. She could see cameras set up down below.
"We're going to do a short interview," uncle Giraud told her, "and then we're going to have lunch with Chairman Harad. Is that all right?"
"What's going to be for lunch?" she asked. Food sounded good. She was not so sure about Chairman Harad.
"Councillor," an older woman said, coming up to them, and put her hand on uncle Giraud's sleeve and said: "Private. Quickly. Please."
It was some kind of trouble. Ari knew it, the woman was giving it off like she was about to explode with worry, and Giraud froze up just a second and then said: "Ari. Stand here."
They talked together, and the woman's back was to them. The noise blurred everything out.
But uncle Giraud came back very fast, and he was upset. His face was all pale.
"Sera," Florian said, very fast, very soft, like he wanted her to say what to do. But she didn't know where the trouble was coming from, or what it was.
"Ari," uncle Giraud said, and took her aside, along by the wall, the huge fountain, and down to the other end where there were some offices. Security moved very fast, Florian and Catlin went with her, and nobody was following them. There was just that voice-sound, everywhere, murmuring like the water.
Security opened the doors. Security told the people inside to go into a back office and they looked confused and upset.
But: "Wait out here," uncle Giraud said to Florian and Catlin, and she looked at them, scared, uncle Giraud hurrying her into an empty office with a desk and a chair. They were going to follow her, not certain what to do, but he said: "Out!"and she said: "It's all right."
He shut the door on them. They were scared. Uncle Giraud was scared. And she didn't know what was going on with everyone, except he took her by the shoulders and looked at her and said:
"Ari, —Ari, there's news on the net. It's from Fargone. I want you to listen to me. It's about your maman. She's died, Ari."
She just stood there. She felt his hands on her shoulders. He hurt her right one. He was telling her something crazy, something that couldn't be about maman, it didn't make sense.
"She died some six months ago, Ari. The news is just breaking over the station net. It just got here. They're picking it up out there, on their comlinks. That woman—heard it; and told me, and I didn't want you to hear it out there, Ari. Take a breath, sweet. Ari."
He shook her. It hurt. And she couldn't breathe for a moment, couldn't, till she got a breath all at once and uncle Giraud hugged her against him and patted her back and called her sweet. Like maman.
She hit him. He hugged her so she couldn't, and just went on holding her while she cried.
"It's a damn lie!" she yelled when she got enough breath.
"No." He hugged her hard. "Sweet, your maman was very old, very old, that's all. And people die. Listen to me. I'm going to take you home. Home, understand? But you've got to walk out of here. You've got to walk out of here past all those people and get to the car, you understand me? Security's going to get the car, we're going to go straight to the airport, we're going to fly home. But the first thing you have to do is get to the car. Can you do that?"
She listened. She listened to everything. Things went past her. But she stopped crying, and he set her back by the shoulders and wiped her face with his fingers, and smoothed her hair and got her to sit down in the chair.
"Are you all right?" he asked her, very, very quiet. "Ari?"
She got another gulp of air. And stared through him. She felt him pat her shoulder, and heard him go to the door and call Catlin and Florian.
"Ari's maman has died," she heard him say. "We just found it out."
More and more people. Florian and Catlin. If all of them believed it, then it was truer and truer. All the people out there. Maman was on the news. The whole of Union knew her maman had died.