“Yes?” A boy of nine stared up at Talora. His nose dripped just the littlest bit and he wiped the back of his hand under it. The back of his hand was then summarily wiped on his robes. He had huge blue eyes inside a dark, round face and he stared open mouthed at Talora with the slack expression of a child not terribly interested in their visitor.

Once he learned what it was Talora wanted, and who she was, he still stood on the threshold of indecision. He looked back towards the interior of the house. Hmm. Mistress Maeri was out but Master Amiti was home...the boy gave Talora a suspicious look. Master Amiti had warned him that women were tricky and not to be trusted. The boy had taken this to heart and Talora looked very tricky.

”This way,” he said and swung away from the door. On the gorgeous mosaic tile floor, there was a place for Talora to remove her sandals and leave them with the family’s shoes by the door. The servant boy waited for her to do this and then he brought out a shallow basin with water to quickly scrub her feet clean of the sand and grit and dust she’d have picked up from the streets. After that, she was being led through the house.

It was a nice house, full of graceful rounded arches and large, comfortably lit rooms. To her immediate right was the dining room where the low table stood bare for the time being. Colorful cushions of blue and green and yellow surrounded it. The hallway then opened a room off to their left which was a sitting room. This, too, had low couches facing each other and another low table that wasn’t meant for eating on, but for playing games. He did not take her into this room, either.

They came to the end of the hallway where it immediately extended right and left, forcing one of those two directions. The boy turned to the left and around a sharp corner where he knocked on a closed door. The way the Jaffe house was made up, its hallways would always lead one in a circle around the house so it was impossible to get lost.

“Come,” Amiti called. He sat behind a huge desk. The room was large but made to feel cozy and enclosed by the bookshelves that lined every single wall. There was only a break in the shelves for the one large window that faced the street. In the room’s center was a large plush carpet that absolutely everyone who entered this room had to tread on barefoot and with clean feet. It was a valuable rug and an old one.

Because he was not expecting visitors, Amiti did not look up from the text he was reading. The scroll was unfurled on his desk and he used a traditional pointer to keep his place. Its tip slid across the parchment quickly and within a second or two, he’d forgotten his servant was there at all. The boy looked up at Talora and gestured her inside but he didn’t introduce her. He forgot that part. Then he was withdrawing and shutting the two of them in together.

Amiti knew there was a presence in the room with him but as the boy hadn’t bothered to introduce the person, he figured it was Maeri or maybe his cousin. That being the case, he could finish the paragraph he was reading and then give Maeri his full attention. Except that it wasn’t Maeri’s voice who broke the comfortable silence. It was a voice that made him pause in its foreignness. Brown eyes rose and Amiti blinked in surprise to find Talora standing there. He frowned and said nothing right at first, confused entirely that she was even with him in the room. And alone.

“I came to see Maeri, but your boy didn't say that she wasn't... home.”

“Is she not?” he asked, still trying to reconcile what she was doing here in his office. Why hadn’t Malachi shown her to one of the rooms with comfortable cushions? Where she could sit on one of the couches and be served food and drink? While he could keep reading? Then, before she could answer the question, he shook his head. “No, I suppose she wouldn’t be if he showed you in here.”

“If you are busy I could just come back the next time that my mother and I visit Damascus. Or... I could wait?”

Amiti truly, from the bottom of his heart, wanted to walk her to the front door and tell her that this wasn’t a good time, he was terribly busy, so sorry he couldn’t visit and chit chat...but he could not. How would it look if he was abysmally rude to his wife’s family? More than that, he fully expected that Talora was just such a person as to tell her best ‘gal pal’ or whoever about perceived ill treatment. Hmph. Women.

“No, please,” he smiled and gestured to one of the seats in front of his desk. “Sit.” While she was doing this, he set down his pointer and rose. Crossing the room on quiet bare feet, he opened the office door and poked his head out into the hall. “Malachi? Bring food for our guest, and new wine.” New wine being non-alcoholic and in no way would put Talora at some sort of disadvantage in his presence. Amiti was always terribly careful not to be caught in any sort of situation that might raise eyebrows.

Leaving the door open so that all may pass without suspecting something was secretive in the room, he came back to his chair and looked at Talora. Oh no. He hadn’t thought about this part. This part meant that he had to say something while they waited...he pulled at his beard and observed her. “You look well,” he told her. Though she did look slightly pale and flushed at the same time, though the refreshments would see to that. “What was it you wished to see Maeri about?”