Bringing Owen's sister through changeover was the most pleasant duty Zeth had yet performed as a channel. Her breakout came late the next afternoon, and as he gave her
transfer he felt as he had not felt in weeks—competent, fulfilled.
When it was over, Jana kissed both Zeth and her brother, then sat back and examined her new tentacles dispassionately. "But I'm not a channel," she said.
"We can't all be," Owen reminded her. "Congratulations. Now you can really help Pa with the horses!"
She thought a moment. "Yeah, I guess that's what I wanted all along," she said with a smile.
In the excitement of Jana's changeover party—a much appreciated excuse for a happy celebration—Zeth forgot all about moving the border.
From the emotional high of his first First Transfer, Zeth sank into worry about his father's strange hallucinations. Over and over he would call for Zeth—but never recognize his son when he came. Del solved the mystery when Zeth described one of the attacks to him. "It's not you, Zeth—it's the Zeth you were named for. Rimon's cousin—the Sime he killed in first Need. He's in chronic need just like before Kadi established, and he's reliving his First Kill." He sighed. "I wish I knew if it helps to visit him. He doesn't even look at me anymore."
"He knows you're there," Zeth half lied. Rimon's field responded to the ambient . . . but Zeth doubted that Rimon recognized anyone these days.
Nor could Zeth go to Abel with his troubles. The old man was declining toward crisis, and when he was capable of a few hours of alertness, he was most likely to spend them with Jimmy Norton, telling him how he had broken his ties with the Freeband Raiders, encouraging the boy to disjunct, As Abel fully intended to do.
Zeth reached turnover and began the grueling slide into need himself. Owen began dogging Zeth's steps, even going to the ridiculous length of dragging himself out of bed when Zeth had had enough sleep. Soon Owen's temper frayed from lack of sleep, making Zeth even more edgy.
The last straw was the arrival, in the brief interval between storms three days before Zeth's third transfer, of Maddok and Sessly Bron. When Abel forbid Bron his house, the Gen waylaid him in the chapel, the one place Abel made the effort to go these days. Abel's shouting brought Zeth, Owen, Marji, Trina, and Bekka running in from the back of the chapel.
"... agent of the Devil, tempting me to kill!" Abel was raging when Zeth flung the door open.
Bron's field was pure temptation, ringing with the "need to give" of a Companion—but way too low from his last donation. He had spent the interval away from Simes, and was in no manner ready to face a disjunction draw such as Zeth had experienced with Bekka. He only thought he was.
"Owen—Trina—" directed Zeth softly. "Shield Abel. Marji—"
"Abel, God has sent me to dispossess you of the murderous spirit holding you in thrall," Bron insisted, holding his ground.
"Well, you can just do it for someone else!" Zeth said, grasping Bron's arm as firmly as he grasped the fields. "Shen you, you shidoni-doomed fool-, I'd like to toss you—"
"Zeth!" protested Owen. Zeth's anger was grating harshly on Abel's ragged nerves. Where had he found the strength to move at all?
Marji took Bron's other arm, their fields, too, sheltering Abel. The Companions were working on him—but the reason his anger melted so quickly was that he had no strength to sustain it.
"Marji, you and Trina take Abel home. I'll be right there," said Zeth, worried by a discordant thread in the old man's mood, a steely determination stronger than the frail body.
Zeth half dragged Bron into the back hall of the chapel. He slammed the connecting door to the chapel and tugged Bron toward Bekka's schedule board. "Bekka, who's on the schedule? Find me one of the town Simes—someone badly in need of a choice kill."
"Zeth!" Owen gasped in utter horror.
It was Bron Zeth had intended to frighten—but he simply said, "You see? Your demon, Zeth. Even you are susceptible, when your Companion is not protecting you."
Demons aside, the man's words were too close to the truth. What was a channel doing trying to provoke real fear in an untrained Gen? In sick disgust at his own feelings, he snapped, "I'll be with Abel," and plunged back into and through the chapel, the quickest way to Abel's house. Behind him, Bron also returned to the chapel—but he knelt down and remained there.
Zeth, Owen on his heels, caught up to Abel and the two women on the front porch of his house. The old Sime was
protesting that he could walk—but it was obvious he could not.
Margid Veritt opened the door. Zeth felt cold fear grip her—she knew Abel too well to hope that he would accept a kill this time. They put him on the couch. Taking a deep breath to steady himself into healing mode, Zeth remembered when his father had given Abel the first Sime-Sime transfer ever—right in this very room. Then he had no more time to think. He moved in to zlin Abel closely. He wasn't even on the transfer schedule yet, and Zeth was hoping that he was not yet near hard need, that they could keep him resting for a day or two with a Companion at his side, to put him in the best possible condition to attempt transfer—but as soon as Zeth zlinned him, that hope died. He was not only deep into need, but his system was in turmoil, fragmenting much the way lord's did during a voiding fit. But he wasn't exactly voiding. He seemed to be consuming selyn, as if he were augmenting, although he lay still, at peace physically and emotionally. Zeth had never seen anything like it before. In all my vast experience, he thought helplessly. "Get Jord and Uel," he ordered, and never noticed who went.
Zeth extended his show-field to support Abel, drawing his field back to normal consumption rate. The moment he let go, Abel's field went back to augmentation mode, consuming and consuming from his pitifully small store of selyn.
Duoconscious, Zeth saw that Abel's eyes were half closed, his lips moving in prayer, but otherwise he showed no indication of being conscious.
Zeth became aware of Jord and Uel, and looked up. "What should I do?"
Uel fought down his emotions, forcing himself into the channel's professional stance, and said, "What you're doing. I don't know of anything else."
Hank and Jord were little help. They were too close to Abel. No matter what Zeth did, the augmentation would not stop. Abel was far past ordinary hard need and into attrition. Now there was only one thing to do: get selyn into him, even if he suffered nerve-burn. The room was full of people, but not one suggested going for a Gen.
Zeth took Abel in transfer position. Astonishingly, he was conscious and cooperating—but his field was not. When Zeth tried driving selyn into Abel's system, he met the old reflexive rebellion. By exerting all his power, he could just hold the
fields balanced, but Abel was locked against the selyn flow, and his heart wavered under the strain. Zeth had to let himself take the shen backflow as the fields collapsed.
Leaning back against Owen, he gathered strength and tried again—and again—but each time the result was the same. Though he could feel Abel's will accepting the transfer, his body would not.
Clammy with sweat, he let Owen's field soothe him while he racked his brains for an idea. He had been using his very best imitation of Genfear, enticing Abel with the promise of killbliss. Perhaps Jord . . . ?
But when Jord moved forward, Abel twisted away, curling himself into fetal position, rejecting them all.
"Wait!" said Zeth, motioning Jord back and gripping the fields around Abel again so that all the old man would sense would be Zeth's Gen field. He said, "Owen, pretend you're going to give me transfer!"
Owen nodded, closed his eyes, and instantly the strong bond between them activated. Zeth resisted the temptation, to melt into Owen's control and remained in healing mode, taking his texture from Owen now, instead of doing his rotten imitation of fear. He offered that field to Abel, and the Sime responded, coming willingly back into transfer grip.