“But—”
“Leave me, Hresh!”
“As you wish,” he said, and turned and walked slowly back toward the settlement.
When he was out of sight Koshmar huddled down, shivering, while wave after wave of agony swept through her. After a little while the spasm passed, and she sat up, drenched in sweat, her pounding heart gradually calming.
The boy means well, she thought. He is so serious, so deeply concerned with high matters of destiny and purpose. And very likely he is right that the People should leave this place to seek the fulfillment of their destiny somewhere else. Whether we are humans or monkeys, Koshmar thought — and she had no doubt of which the People were — it can do us no good to remain in Vengiboneeza for many years more. That was clear. Eventually we must go forth, we must make a place of our own.
But not now. To leave now would be giving in to the Bengs. The tribe’s departure must not seem to have come about under pressure from them, for that would be a stain on the courage of the People and on her own leadership throughout all the rest of time. Hresh must be made to see that. And anyone else who was impatient to leave. Taniane? She might have put Hresh up to this, Koshmar thought. Taniane was an impatient girl, full of hot ambition. It might even be that she was ready to lead a second secession. Taniane and Hresh were in close league these days. Perhaps, Koshmar speculated, Hresh came here just now with the hidden warning that I must begin to countenance a change in policy, or else a change would be imposed against my will.
Nothing will be imposed against my will, thought Koshmar, in rage. Nothing!
Then she closed her eyes and crouched down again.
I am so very tired, she thought.
She rested, letting her mind go empty, letting her spirit drift in the soothing darkness of the void. After a long while she blinked and sat up once more, and saw that yet another visitor was approaching. The distinctive white-striped figure of Torlyri came into view, walking toward her, waving, smiling.
“There you are,” Torlyri called. “Hresh said you had gone this way.”
You too? Koshmar thought. Coming to plague me with this business?
“Is there some problem?” she asked.
Torlyri seemed surprised. “A problem? No, nothing at all. The sun shines brightly. All is well. But you’ve been gone half a day. I missed you, Koshmar. I longed to be with you, to feel you close to me again. To enjoy the pleasure of being near you, which has been the highest joy of my life.”
Koshmar could find no delight in Torlyri’s words. They had a leaden ring to them, the ring of insincerity, of outright falsehood. It was hard to think of warm good Torlyri as insincere, she who had always been the soul of love and truth; but Koshmar knew that Torlyri spoke now out of guilt and uneasiness, not out of the feelings she once had had for Koshmar. That was ended now. Torlyri had changed. Lakkamai had changed her and her Helmet Man had finished the job.
She said, “I had some heavy thinking to do, Torlyri. I went off alone to do it.”
“I was worried. You’ve seemed so weary lately.”
“Have I? I’ve never felt better.”
“Dear Koshmar—”
“Do I look sick? Has my fur lost its sheen? Is the glow gone from my eyes?”
“I said you’ve seemed weary,” Torlyri said. “Not that you were ill.”
“Ah. So you did.”
“Sit here awhile with me,” said Torlyri. She sank down on a smooth slab of rose-pink marble that rose at its far end in the form of a grinning sapphire-eyes face, all jaws and teeth, and beckoned Koshmar down beside her. Her hand rested lightly on Koshmar’s wrist, rubbing back and forth.
“Is there something you want to tell me?” Koshmar asked, after a while.
“I want only to be with you. See, what a brilliant day this is! The sun rises higher and higher as we move deeper into the New Springtime.”
“It does, yes.”
“Kreun is carrying an unborn, the child of Moarn. Bonlai bears Orbin’s child now too. The tribe grows.”
“Yes. Good.”
“Praheurt and Shatalgit will have their second one soon. They have asked Hresh to name it for your mother, Lissiminimar, if it’s a girl.”
“Ah,” Koshmar said. “I’ll be glad to hear that name again.”
She wondered how it went between Torlyri and her Helmet Man these days. She never dared ask. Somehow Koshmar had managed to withstand Torlyri’s involvement with Lakkamai, even her mating with Lakkamai; but a man like Lakkamai, who hardly ever spoke and seemed to have nothing within him, could not have been any threat to her. It was all bodily pleasure between Torlyri and Lakkamai. But this, with the Helmet Man — the animated look about Torlyri whenever she and he were together, the way she moved, the light in her eyes — and the long hours she spent off at the Beng settlement — no, no, it was different, it was a deeper thing by far.
I have lost her to him, Koshmar thought.
Torlyri said, after another silence, “The Bengs offer us another of their feasts one week from now. I bear the word of that from Hamok Trei this day. They want us all to come; and they’ll open their oldest wines, and kill their best meat-animals. It is to celebrate the high day of their god Nakhaba, who I think is the greatest of their gods.”
“What do I care what the Bengs call their gods?” Koshmar snapped. “Their gods don’t exist. Their gods are fantasies.”
“Koshmar—”
“There will be no feasting with the Bengs for us, Torlyri!”
“But— Koshmar—”
She swung around sharply to face the offering-woman. An idea came to her, so suddenly that it made her head spin and her breath go short, and she said, “What would you say if I told you that we’re going to leave Vengiboneeza in two or three weeks, a month at most?”
“What?”
“And therefore we’ll need all the time we have between now and then to get ready for our departure. We can’t spare any of it for Beng feasts.”
“Leaving — Vengiboneeza—”
“There’s nothing but trouble here for us, Torlyri. You know that. I know that. Hresh came to me and said, ‘Leave, leave.’ I wouldn’t hear of it. But then my eyes saw the truth. Then my path became clear. I asked myself what we must do to save ourselves, and the answer came — we must go away from this place. It is death here, Torlyri. Look, do you see the stone sapphire-eyes grinning at us there? The joke’s on us. We came here just to dig around and find some useful things of the former world, and we have stayed — how many years is it, now? In a city that never belonged to us. In a city that mocks us in its very stones. And now a city that is full of arrogant strangers who wear absurd costumes and worship imaginary gods.”
Alarm flickered in Torlyri’s dark eyes. Koshmar saw it and realized miserably that her ruse had succeeded, that she had drawn from Torlyri the truth, that which she had dreaded but which she had desperately needed to know.
“Are you serious?” Torlyri said.
“I’m having the order drawn up, and I’ll announce it very shortly. We’ll take everything with us that may be of value to us, all the strange devices that Hresh and his Seekers have collected, and off we’ll go, into the warm southland, as we should have done years ago. Harruel was right. There is poison in this city. He couldn’t get me to see that, and so he left. Well, Harruel is rash, and Harruel is a fool; but in this case he saw more clearly than I. Our time in Vengiboneeza is over, Torlyri.”
Torlyri looked stunned.
With rising energy now Koshmar reached for her. A passion that she had not felt for weeks, for months, had begun to burn in her. Hoarsely she said, “Come, now, beloved Torlyri, dear Torlyri! We are alone here. Let us twine — it’s been so long, hasn’t it, Torlyri? — and then we’ll go back to the settlement.”