Ender in Exile (Ender's Saga 1.20)

"It's a good idea," said Ender. "Why don't you organize it, Signora Toscano?"

"Please call me of Dorabella."

"There's no 'of' in that sentence," said Alessandra. "There isn't in Italian, either."

"English has so much 'of,' everywhere 'of,' except where I put it!" As Dorabella laughed, she touched Ender's arm. Probably Dorabella didn't see how he suppressed his instinct to flinch--Ender didn't like being touched by strangers, he never had. But Valentine saw it. He was still Ender.

"I've never seen a play," said Ender. "I've read them, I've seen holos and vids of them, but I've never actually been in a room where people actually said the lines aloud. I could never put it together, but I'd love to be there and listen as it happens."

"Then you must!" said Dorabella. "You are governor, you make it happen!"

"I can't," said Ender. "Truly. You do it, please."

"No, I cannot," said Dorabella. "My English is too bad. Il teatro is for young persons. I will watch and listen. You and Alessandra do it. You are students, you are children. Romeo and Juliet!"

Could she possibly be any more obvious? thought Valentine.

"Mother thinks that if you and I are together a lot," said Alessandra, "we'll fall in love and get married."

Valentine almost laughed aloud. So the daughter wasn't a co-conspirator, she was a draftee.

Dorabella feigned shock. "I have no plan like such!"

"Oh, Mother, you've been planning it from the start. Even back in the town we came from--"

"Monopoli," said Ender.

"She was calling you a 'young man with prospects.' A likely candidate for my husband. My personal opinion is that I'm very young, and so are you."

Ender was busy mollifying the mother. "Dorabella, please, I'm not offended and of course I know you weren't planning anything. Alessandra is teasing me. Teasing us both."

"I'm not, but you can say whatever it takes to make Mother happy," said Alessandra. "Our lives together are one long play. She makes me...not the star of my own autobiography. But Mother always sees the happy ending, right from the start."

Valentine wasn't sure what to make of the relationship between these two. The words were biting, almost hostile. Yet as she said them, Alessandra gave her mother a hug and seemed to mean it. As if the words were part of a long ritual between them, but they no longer were meant to sting.

Whatever was going on, between Ender and Alessandra, Dorabella seemed mollified. "I like the happy ending."

"We should put on a Greek play," said Alessandra. "Medea. The one where the mother kills her own children."

Valentine was shocked at this--what a cruel thing to say in front of her mother. But no, from Dorabella's reaction Alessandra wasn't referring to her. For Dorabella laughed and nodded and said, "Yes, yes, Medea, spiteful mama!"

"Only we'll rename her," said Alessandra. "Isabella!"

"Isabella!" cried Dorabella at almost the same moment. The two of them laughed so hard they almost cried, and Ender joined with them.

Then, to Valentine's surprise, while the other two were still hiccuping through the end of their laughter, Ender turned to her and explained. "Isabella is Dorabella's mother. They had a painful parting."

Alessandra stopped laughing and looked at Ender searchingly--but if Dorabella was surprised that Ender knew so much of their past, she didn't show it. "We come on this colony to be free of my perfect mother. Santa Isabella, we will not pray to you!"

Then Dorabella leapt to her feet and began to do some kind of dance, a waltz perhaps, holding an imaginary full skirt in one hand, and with the other hand tracing arcane patterns in the air as she danced. "Always I have a magic land where I can be happy, and I take my daughter there with me, always happy." Then she stopped and faced Ender. "Shakespeare Colony is our magic land now. You are king of the...folletti?" She looked to her daughter.

"Elfs," said Alessandra.

"Elves," said Valentine.

"Gli elfi!" cried Dorabella in delight. "Again same word! Elfo, elve!"

"Elf," said Valentine and Alessandra together.