On the second night of Jules’s withdrawal, Diut returned to the Mission colony.
Alanna had spent most of the day sitting with Jules. He was in pain now, perspiring, vomiting, tossing. But at that, Neila said he was having an easier time than Alanna had had. Still, Nathan wanted someone with him at all times. Alanna had not minded the duty. Neila had her regular housework to do. Alanna had broken her watch only to take food to the Tehkohn prisoners. Finally, though, Neila had relieved her and sent her off to bed.
She went to her room sleepily, carrying a lamp and feeling strangely alone now that she was cut off from the sounds of Jules’s suffering. As much as she hated to see him in pain, she realized that it was easier to be with him and be able to see for herself that he was still alive.
She put her lamp on the chest near her bed and turned to close the door. Not until it was closed did she realize that she was not alone in the room. She froze, ceasing even to breathe, every sense alert to pinpoint the direction from which the first warning sound had come.
Somewhere in the shadows, Diut said her name.
She identified the voice and the direction from which it came in the same instant and turned just in time to see him materialize from a wall.
She crossed the room to him quickly in silent relief and joy. He caught her by the shoulders and looked at her for a moment, holding her away from him. Then she struggled free of his hands and buried herself in his fur.
Mentally, she gave him all her trouble—her heavy responsibility to the colony, the doubted loyalties, the Garkohn danger. Let him hold them for a while. He was accustomed to such things. It was only a game played within her own mind, but she felt as though she had shed a great weight, as though she could relax completely for the first time since her return to the settlement.
She spoke finally, softly. “You’ve been home?”
“Yes.”
She drew back from him now, waiting. They sat down together on the bed.
“The defeat was bad,” he said, “but not as bad as it first seemed. The escape passages were created to be overlooked by invaders. Most of them were.”
She nodded, remembering that she had fled into one of these passages herself when Garkohn invaded the dwelling. She had run to the inner apartments where the young children were left in the care of artisan families. But somehow, despite the deliberately confusing maze of corridors, the Garkohn had gotten there ahead of her and it was too late.
As though responding to her thoughts, Diut said, “The people waited until I returned to hold the ceremony for Tien.”
She looked at him but he would not meet her eyes.
“Our trade families had already painted her,” he continued softly. “Blue. A good blue. All who were left alive came to see her. Even the injured.”
She lowered her head, eyes closed. She had not meant to cry again. She had shed no tears since her first night with Jules on the trail back to the settlement. Jules had thought then that she cried with relief at her rescue.
But now she found herself weeping soundlessly against Diut. She was glad that she had not been able to attend the Tehkohn funeral rites. The Kohn had no concept of life after death and such rites were held solely for the benefit of the living. The dead were judged by those likely to know the best and worst sides of their character, the families with whom they traded—families from clans other than their own. If a hunter was lazy or dishonest, no one knew it better than the farmer with whom he traded. Thus the trade families judged and gave honor or dishonor through the color of the dye they used to cover the mottled yellow of death. The reputation of the surviving blood family could be helped or injured by one of these judgments. But of course, Diut’s infant child would be painted blue to honor Diut. It would not be the unique Hao blue, but the trade families would approximate it as closely as they could. And Diut said they had done well. The funeral would have been a time to show pride in the honor done. Expression of grief was a private thing—one of the few private things in Kohn life.
Diut held her until her spasm of weeping passed. He spoke no words of comfort, but in the Kohn way, he allowed his coloring to fade to the rare gray of grief and mourning. The color, like the emotion it symbolized, was a private thing. It was an admission not only of inner pain, but of helplessness and human vulnerability. A Hao was the personification of Kohn power, a being who must show only strength before his people. But now, alone with one who shared his pain, he was free to admit his own vulnerability, free to let Alanna know that she did not grieve alone. To her, his coloring said as much as words could have from a Missionary man, and she had long ago realized that she preferred the silent Kohn ways to the Missionary groping for words.
After a while, she regained control and ceased crying. She knew that Diut had other things to tell her, and that for the sake of the settlement, she had to compose herself and listen.
“You have made plans while you were away,” she said. “Tell me my part in them.”
His coloring slowly returned to normal. He gave her a long quiet look. “I have heard that your father is in withdrawal.”
“So. I was with him all day. My mother is with him now.”
“Only your father? No others?”
She shrugged. “Me. I have withdrawn.”
“I know of that.” He touched her throat briefly. “It is harder to break away without the ceremony. I knew what I asked of you. But I believed that you were strong enough to do it.”
She accepted this as the combined apology and compliment that it was and acknowledged it with a nod.
“How is your father?”
“Well. We may have found a Missionary counterpart for the returning ceremony.” She told him briefly of the experiment with hypnosis. He seemed to understand.
“Verrick tests this way then. But if it works as he hopes, will he order other Missionaries to use it now or will he wait until he has moved them north?”
Alanna thought for a moment, realized that though she had not considered the question before, she knew what the answer had to be. “I think he will wait, because of Natahk. I think he will not want the people exposed to Natahk’s anger—as he will be exposed himself s” She told him of Natahk’s recent arrogance and its cause. By the time she finished, he had yellowed slightly.
“Verrick must choose his own way,” he said. “But if he waits as you say, the Missionaries will be able to carry little more than the supply of meklah that they will need when they leave. Meklah enough for the trip over the mountains and enough to last until they find a place to settle again. They will have to abandon many more of their possessions to the Garkohn than should be necessary.”
Alanna knew he was right, but then, so was Jules in his way. She said nothing.
Diut changed the subject abruptly. “Have you been able to see the captives yet?”
She told him of her visits to the prisoners, of how they had at first refused to eat. That brought more yellow to his coloring.
“And do they all eat now? Has Cheah satisfied them?”
“Most ate today. Tomorrow, I think they will all eat.”
“Then you know how careful you must be. Once their Garkohn guards see that they are all eating, they might decide to tamper with the food whether Natahk has ordered it or not. And he probably has. Deception is easier and safer than force.”
“When will you free them?” she asked.
He thought about it. “I would have done it tonight, had you not managed to get food to them. But now… They will be better able to co-operate with their rescuers when they have all eaten. Also, it would be better if I gave Verrick time to finish his withdrawal. He will need his strength to face the Garkohn when Natahk learns of the escape.” He paused for a moment. “I will wait three days more.”
She felt cold suddenly as she realized that by feeding the prisoners, she had probably saved Jules’s life. If Natahk lost his prisoners and found the leader of his captive Missionaries in the process of breaking free of the meklah, he might
be angry enough to kill. But in three more days, Jules would surely be through his withdrawal. Perhaps he would even be strong enough to pretend that the withdrawal had not taken place. At least, he would be strong enough to face Natahk. Alanna had made it possible for Diut to give him that much. Now if only Diut could give him the other thing that he and the Missionaries needed so desperately: A new start.
“How will it be for them in the north?” she asked. “Very bad?”
“Drier,” he said. “Colder. They will live if they want life badly enough.”
“But there are no people there?”
“None.”
“They will live then.” She meant it. The Missionaries were resourceful and their Mission drove them. They could win a struggle against the elements as they and their ancestors had won many such struggles on Earth. Here, as on Earth, it was the struggle against more numerous other peoples that had stopped them.
Diut looked at her. “If Verrick wishes it, I will send a few Tehkohn with him to teach him the best ways of living there.”
She did not have to think to realize that such help could save many lives. She lifted her hand in quick gratitude to lose it in the fur of his throat. He covered it for a moment with his own.
“I did not know how you would greet me when I came here tonight,” he said softly.
She looked at him, startled.
“I wondered whether you would relearn your old way of seeing me, as a distortion of what should be. I looked at you with your Missionaries and tried to see you as one of them.”
“So? And what did you see?”
“That you feared for them. That you were much interested in saving them.”
Alanna met his eyes. “I am, yes. How could I not be?”
“You are one who bargains, Alanna. Are you bargaining with me now for the safety of your people?”
“Yes.”
He stared at her for a long moment without speaking. Then he lay back on the bed. There was white suddenly in his coloring. Amusement. But she knew him now and she was not surprised. “You will never say what I expect you to say. You don’t change.”
“I’ve changed,” she said.
“What do you want of me? Only help for your Missionaries?”
“What should I want of you? We’ve made a child together, you and I. What should I want of my husband?”
He sat up and pulled her close. “Tahneh spoke to me before I left the mountains.” This was the other Hao, the old woman. “She comes with her advice, you know. She said, ‘Let her go with her people if she wants to go. Show her yellow if she wants it and leave her. Let her go or stay of her own free will.’”
“She knew I wouldn’t go,” said Alanna. “She wanted you to know.”
He said nothing.
“In a way, it will be harder for me now,” she continued. “The Missionaries will be so far away… But I couldn’t leave with them. I’m less one of them now than ever. And there is no man for me among them.”
“I have already seen that.”
She glanced at him sharply.
“All right,” he said, reading her expression. “I’ll leave you to insult them yourself.”
“I wasn’t insulting them. I only meant…”
He put a hand over her mouth, his coloring fading to white. “They are blue people, Alanna. All blue. Wholly admirable.”
Alanna sighed and shook her head. He could be as condescending, as patronizing, toward the Missionaries as most Missionaries were toward the Kohn. But now was not the time to argue with him about it.
He smoothed her hair. “And worthy people that they are, they no longer need you.” His tone changed, became more serious. “It would cause no real hardship among them if you left them now—went with the prisoners when they escape.”
She spoke quickly, concealing her alarm. “No, Diut. It would cause worse than hardship. Natahk would tell Jules where I had gone and why. And whether Jules fully believed him or not, he would be in no mood to trust you when you visited him again.”
“Natahk will speak eventually regardless of what you do. If he tells what he knows while you’re here, the Missionaries will kill you.”
“I know the risk,” she said. “And I’m not eager to take it. But I don’t want the Missionaries to die because my going made them too suspicious to trust you.”
“It is not likely that they will. Verrick will not like having to trust me if Natahk plants suspicion in his mind, but he will have no choice. He can escape this valley only by co-operating with me. He will understand that—as you understand it.” He looked at her silently for a moment. “You know your work here is done. Why do you resist leaving?”
“I cannot go until I know they are safe.”
“You mean you will not go.” There was a slight harshness to his voice.
“They can still make mistakes, Diut, with the Garkohn and even with you. Mistakes that can destroy them. Mistakes that I can help them avoid.”
“They are not children, Alanna. You have set them on the right path. If they cannot follow that path now, without you, then perhaps they do not deserve to survive.”
“I cannot desert them. For a while, they were my people.”
“Perhaps they are still your people. Perhaps you were too quick to reject Tahneh’s words. Are you so certain that you would not prefer to leave with them when they go north?”
She felt a rush of bitter anger. “I’ve already answered that. Why do you ask again? Do you want me to go?”
There was a long silence. He showed no yellow in his coloring, but she knew she had angered him. She hoped she had also made him feel ashamed. At first, she thought she had. His voice was mild when he spoke again.
“I have humiliated Natahk by walking away from his hunters as though they were blind and deaf. I will humiliate him again by taking the rest of his prisoners from him. Do you know what he would do to you to avenge himself if he learned that you were my wife?”
She stared at the floor, knowing and not wanting to know. “He will not find out.”
“You will go with the prisoners tomorrow. You will leave your helpless Missionaries to me, and you will take yourself out of danger. Otherwise, I will abandon your Missionaries and let them fend for themselves.”
She listened, dismayed. He had her. He had found the right weapon. However much she believed she could help the Missionaries, they did not need her nearly as much as they needed him.
“I will obey,” she said softly. “But if the Missionaries are killed as a result of some foolishness that I could have helped them avoid, what will we do, Diut, you and I. We will not have a marriage. What will you have saved me for?”
“You have said enough.”
“Not if I have failed to convince you! You were the prisoner of foreigners once—desert people. Didn’t you decide then that it would be better to die than to serve them at the expense of your own people?” This was something that had happened when Diut was little more than a boy. It had been his first success after coming of age as the Tehkohn ruler. He had arranged a tie with the tough desert tribe and brought them and Tahneh, their Hao, to the mountains as allies against the Garkohn.
“You are not a prisoner,” he said.
“Since we came together I have not been. But now…” Her voice trailed away and he said nothing for several seconds. He was not accustomed to people arguing with him when his decisions were already made. There was a time, Alanna remembered, when he would simply have slapped her and demanded that she obey. But he was changing.
“You are not a prisoner,” he repeated softly.
“So?”
He sighed. “The Missionaries are still your people. You know it. They are like you, and that is important.” He put his arm around her, toyed with her hair. “You want to be with them as long as they are here because you know that when they leave, you may not see them again.”
She nodded, agreeing, glad he had understood. For a moment, she was overwhelmed by the thought that she would not
have put into words herself. No more Earth-human faces. Ever. “If I can see them leave the valley,” she whispered, “and know that they are free, then I will be free. I’ll go home with you and be what both you and I want me to be.”
“If you live.” He grayed bleakly. “Stay. Do what you must do.”
“And you will help?”
“So.”
Gratefully, wearily, she leaned against him. After a while, she lifted her head, flattened his fur out of the way, and bit him just at the throat.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Diut
We had to learn to understand each other, Alanna and I—understand why there were times when neither of us seemed to react properly to the other. I knew, for instance, that she was more impressed with my size and strength than with my blue. On her savage homeworld where people preyed on each other freely and where coloring had little significance, sire and strength were important. She told me that a male of her kind who was my size would eat well and would be given a wide berth by smaller people.
“And a female?” I asked.
She curved her mouth in a way somehow different from the way she did it when she was amused. “Women fought more,” she said. “Even those who were large and strong. If we lived, it was often because we were more savage than most men. Sometimes we were caught without warning though, and a man or many men would force us to mate with them. That was perhaps the least that could happen to us. Most often we survived it if we were not too badly beaten—and if there were not too many men. And if the men were not diseased.”
“It happened to you?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said bitterly. “It happened.”
“And thus your anger with me when I demanded a liaison.”
She said nothing. I had brought a little of her anger back, I think.
That was the way of her former home. She had learned all her respect for the blue since coming to us. I understood this with my mind, but somehow, I never completely accepted it. Respect for the blue was inborn with us. No one questioned it. It seemed impossible not to value it. I had grown up knowing myself to be highly valued for my blue. Even enemies like the Garkohn would have valued me. Natahk and a few of his higher hunters pretended to be unimpressed by the blue but I would have gambled that they could not maintain their pretense before me or any other Hao. They knew better than I did how much they needed a Hao to unite them and make them a strong people again—a people worthy of respect.
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