“The men live entirely alone?”
“According to Gregory, yes. The women say the men are bad-tempered. They don’t like company.”
“Oh, yeah? It explains what happened to Harrison.”
“Uh-huh. I warned Derek and Santha. Yvonne is going to talk to her hostess. She’s the ideal informant: a tribal historian who never stops talking.”
I made the gesture of agreement, then grinned and said, “Yes.”
“You talk to Nia. Ask her about the men in her society.”
I said I would, but I didn’t. Nia was never easy to talk with. Often she would stop in the middle of a sentence and stare off into space or else change the subject. I got the impression she had lived alone for a long time. She had forgotten how to carry on a conversation. I concentrated on prying information about grammar out of her. Questions about folkways could wait until later.
One morning Nia reached into the rafters of her house. She pulled down two axes.
“Come,” she told me. “We are going to get wood.”
We spent all morning in the forest. Nia felled a tree, maybe ten meters tall. The trunk was straight. The branches were bare, except for a few shriveled leaves. The tree was obviously dead and had been for some time.
When it was down, Nia said, “Make it into pieces.”
“I’ll do my best.”
I started chopping. Nia went off. When I paused to rub my hands, I heard her axe a short distance away. She was felling another tree.
At noon we rested.
“What is this for?” I asked.
“Charcoal.” She chewed on a piece of bread. “This wood is dry already. Tomorrow we put it underground. It will burn for nine days, ten days, slowly, underground. Then it will be charcoal.” She got up, stretched, and rubbed her palms along her thighs. “Time to work.”
I groaned and got my axe.
A few minutes later the blister on my right hand broke. I put down my axe and looked at the blister. There was blood. I was going to have to spray it. I walked back to Nia’s house and opened my pack.
Should I wash the wound? I decided not to. It looked clean, and I didn’t know what kind of microbe lived in the streams, especially the streams close to a village. In theory, nothing on this planet could live off me. Our genetic material was too different. No local virusoid could use my DNA for replication. No local bacteroid could use my cells for food. Still and all—
I got out the bandage can and sprayed on a small thin bandage. It stung. That would be the disinfectant. I sat down and waited for the bandage to dry. It was shiny and dark brown: flesh-colored, according to the label on the can, and made in the South African Confederation.
“Nia!” a voice cried.
I looked up. Yohai came out of the forest, walking quickly.
“Where is Nia?”
“There.” I pointed. “You can hear the sound of her axe.”
“Bad news! I must tell her.” Yohai ran off.
I thought about following her, but decided no, put the can of bandages away and did a little housework. The mess was beginning to drive me crazy. I hung up Nia’s clothes and arranged the furs we slept on in two neat piles. When I was done, I went outside. I couldn’t hear the sound of chopping or anything except the rustle of leaves. The sun blazed overhead, almost as bright as Sol. The air was hot. I sat down in the shadow of a wall and waited. After half an hour Nia and Yohai came.
“It is time to tell you what is going on,” Nia said.
“I would like that.”
They squatted down. Nia laid her two axes on the ground, then scratched her nose. “Nahusai lies in bed. She cannot get up. She cannot eat. Hakht says, you have done this. Hakht says, you must be driven away. If not, Nahusai will die and then other people. You will make songs. The songs will do harm. They will steal breath out of the mouth. They will make the blood in the belly get hard like a stone.” Nia glanced at Yohai. “This is what you said.”
Yohai made the gesture of agreement. “I think Hakht made the songs. She is the one doing harm. My mother is old. She cannot defend herself. I have no power. The people who are no longer here do not talk to me. I cannot defend my mother.”
Well, this was pretty clear. Nahusai was ill. Hakht was accusing me of putting a spell on the old lady. I was a witch—according to Hakht, anyway.
“Why is Hakht doing this?”
Nia answered me. “She cannot wait. She wants to be the most important woman in the village. She will be, when Nahusai goes…” Nia paused, then patted the ground. “Nahusai taught her. Nahusai said, this is the one who will come after me. But she cannot wait.” Nia frowned. After a moment she said, “There are people like this.”
I made the gesture of agreement.
“She tries to put herself in the middle of everything. If Nahusai says ‘yes’ to anything, this woman says ‘no.’ Nahusai made you welcome. Because of this, Hakht says you are a demon.”
“This is true,” Yohai said.
“What do we do?” I asked.
“I can think of only one thing,” Nia said. “We must wait. If Nahusai gets better, she will make Hakht be quiet. If she does not—” Nia made a gesture I did not recognize.
“What does that mean?”
“Who can say?”
I was going to repeat my question, then I realized Nia had answered it. The gesture—the hand held out, then tilted from side to side—meant “who can say?”
Nia stood. “Yohai, you go home. Li-sa and I will be careful. Thank you for the warning.”
Yohai made the gesture of acknowledgment. She left. I waited till she was out of sight, then looked at Nia. “Do you think she is right?”
“In what way?”
“Did Hakht make this happen? Did she harm Nahusai?”
Nia frowned. “I do not know if songs do anything. Or if the people who are no longer here listen to anyone. But a woman like Hakht knows things to put in food. This is a bad situation.” She clenched one hand and hit the wall above me. “I hate this place! I am tired of the dark trees. I am tired of the people. They are always telling stories about one another. They are always making plans to do one another harm.” She bent and grabbed an axe, then walked away. A bit later I heard the sound of the axe. Nia was chopping down another tree.
I thought of calling Eddie, then decided no. Ten to one, he’d want to pull me back up to the ship. I didn’t think the situation was dangerous, and I wanted to see what would happen next.
I went to the bank of the stream and did my yoga exercises. Then I meditated, watching the rushing water. At twilight bugs appeared—little ones, like gnats. They didn’t sting, but they got in my nose and eyes. I got up and went back to the house, feeling relaxed. My mind, usually busy and a bit anxious, seemed as empty and clear as the sky above me. I stopped outside the door and looked up. There was a moon above the forest: a narrow sickle, less than a quarter full. It was pale yellow, bright with the light of vanished sun. All at once I was full of an intense joy. At any moment things were going to make sense. I would see the pattern in—or beyond—observable phenomena. I would understand the mystery of life, the secret of the universe.
Then the feeling was gone. The moon was only a moon. I shrugged. Once again I hadn’t gotten through. To what, anyway? I wasn’t really sure these moments of almost revelation meant anything.
I went inside and found Nia making dinner: a thin gruel with berries mixed in. Her movements were abrupt, and her body looked tense. She was still angry. I decided to keep quiet. We ate and went to sleep.
I woke, hearing a noise: a soft tum-ta-tum. It came from outside. A drum.
“Nia?” I called.
She scrambled out of bed. A moment later she was at the door, pulling it open. Gray light shone in. Nia stood in the doorway. She was naked, and she held an axe.