“The Mnankrei have him?” Oelita was incredulous.
“We know only that the Mnankrei took his ship and fifteen of his band. He may have been killed.”
“You lie!” she said hotly. “He and two of his men were with me in Sorrow too short a while ago. I’ve travelled at night afraid that he was at my back.” She watched a profound look of reaction cross Gaet’s face. What was it? Astonishment? Hope? Relief? Such a response made her afraid again. This stranger was no enemy of Joesai.
“Was he with a woman when you saw him last?”
Ah, I cannot trust this man. He loves Teenae. “She was stabbed. They took her up the coast somewhere to recover. Wherever Joesai might be, she is not in Soebo.”
“Thank our God.”
“Joesai sent you?”
“Hardly. We’ve had no word from him. Hoemei of Aesoe’s staff bid me escort you safely into Kaiel-hontokae. Hoemei is purveyor of the relief program to the coast. We have sketchy information that a famine approaches. What say you?”
“The underjaw ravages the land. The Mnankrei burn our stores. We need help.”
“It is fortunate that we have met.”
“The price you will ask for your help is too high.”
Gaet laughed a short burst and trailed off into silence. He began to turn his soupbowl with extended fingers, staring at it. She noticed that he only had nine digits. A little finger had been amputated. Over the soup, the aromatic vapors rose and dissipated like thoughts forming and unforming. “This pottery — pleasant design, eh?” he began. “I like the mix of cavorting moon-children who chase each other as if the chase was all. Do you like it?”
“I’ve never seen such shape before or such pure subdued color.”
“A fine glaze. The pieces chip easily. It’s not stoneware. These pots are common in Kaiel-hontokae, perhaps not so common on the coast. They are fired in a small mountain village and I mention it only because of a Kaiel bargain made long ago that created the markets. Did we ever need the pottery? Hardly. The village was suffering and this was the way out. Did we strike a hard bargain? No. We could have. We had and have the power. But we Kaiel see the future with almost the clarity of dreams. A hard bargain struck while we have advantage leads always to strife in the future, always, always, always. We make bargains in hard times, yes, for that is our skill, to mute misfortune, to merge leg and arm and head and heart and liver and anus into harmonious marriage, but we do not consciously forge bargains that have no use when times are better.”
“You will offer us food for rule — just like the Mnankrei,” she said bitterly.
He shook his head. “We cannot even offer you food in the weight that can be shipped from the Mnankrei islands. The mountains and the distance are great obstacles, but we offer you sounder rule. It is not the Kaiel who blended human gene with underjaw body so that children will not have the wheat that has been nourished by the sweat of their parents.”
“They did that? That, too?”
“Someone did.”
“You found human genes in the underjaws Nonoep sent to Kaiel-hontokae?”
“Yes.”
“That’s criminal! That’s horrible!”
“It is power gone awry as power will. When a priest needs power more than he needs to be a craftsman of human destiny, such things happen.”
She saw the burning silo at Sorrow, saw the arrogant sea priest Tonpa clearly by its light. Yet were the Kaiel more honest?
Annoyingly, he went on to disparage others in the hope of making his own kind look good. “The Stgal have failed you. You should be rich and you are poor. You have more wealth in your land than Kaiel-hontokae. Sorrow should have fleets of ships to match the Mnankrei but it is a minor maritime center. Does Soebo have a better harbor than Sorrow?”
She had had enough of his sly boasting. “And you will bring your creches with you and fill our meat markets!”
His answer was easy, glib, as if he had spoken it a thousand times before. “Only the Kaiel have creches. It is the way we breed for leadership. We do not interfere with the breeding rules of any other clan. In times of famine the clan groups who have sworn us allegiance accept our will. They are free to move and swear their blood to a better priest clan.”
“When I see the blood in the temples, I think we might do without the priest clans!”
Gaet shrugged. “It has been tried. And those who tried it did not survive their famines.”
She had a moment’s memory of her children, carrying them to the sea in her packsack because their legs were useless. Bright eyes they had, watching a nest of sand beetles. She felt tears. Her hand took Gaet’s. “Do not quarrel with me.”
“Your interests are mine,” he said comfortingly, reading her thoughts.
“How will you possibly get wheat through these mountains? I was not awed by them when they were only words to me and a hazy jag along the horizon — but here I am and I’m awed.”
“Come.” He kept her hand and led her outside into the wind that howled along the gorge. Her skirts flapped. He endured the cold, shivering. The world seemed dreadful and dark with Scowl-moon eclipsed by the mountain peaks.
“We’ll freeze out here!”
Gaet brought her body closer to his own, maneuvering her around to the back where the wind clawed less, sheltered as the spot was by a craggy wall of rock. They came to a filigree machine with three fine wheels partly buried in the drifting snow. “A new device. It looks fragile but it amplifies the power of an Ivieth enormously. It can’t carry more than a one-man wagon but it moves much faster. We’re rebuilding the roads to take them. Wheat can move west in such vehicles which can then return people eastward to famine camps in the foothills above Kaiel-hontokae.”
She saw the swift Mnankrei ships and the good harbor at Sorrow, and at the same time she saw the Wailing Mountains and the treacherous trail through the Valley of Ten Thousand Graves. Was he aware of how absurd his challenge appeared — a frail vehicle against this frightful terrain? “Let’s go back inside.”
“You don’t seem impressed?”
“How could I be?”
“Neither am I,” Gaet said, subdued by her coolness. “It’s the best we can do.”
She invited him to her tiny room and he built a fire for her, then rummaged about finding a quilt to warm her back. It was a lesson to her. All the Kaiel were different. This one was not violent like Joesai. He had an easy compassion. “I must ask you one more question.”
Gaet nodded while feeding another bush trunk to the blaze.
“Were you sent here to get the crystal from me? I do not have it with me.” There was defiance in her voice.
He looked up at her, the flickering light playing over the scars of his face. The face revealed nothing, no surprise, no alertness. He was merely waiting for her to go on. He had not understood what she said, and so perhaps it was true that he had not been in contact with Joesai.
“The crystal that Joesai called A Voice of God,” she explained.
“You have one of those? Yes, that would catch Joesai’s fancy. I know little of such things.”
She was disappointed. Gaet did not react at all as Joesai had. His disinterest frightened her. She was staking her safety on the value of that crystal to the Kaiel, for whatever superstitious reason they might want it. “It is of no value to you? I thought I might exchange it for wheat.” That had seemed like a good idea once. Now it sounded foolish.
“I’ll introduce you to a woman who will be extremely interested.”
“You’re still insisting on escorting me?” She did not feel so safe now.
“I must. This is Kaiel territory. You have no choice.”
“I have been challenged by the Kaiel to a Death Rite. I wish that ridiculous game to be cancelled. I wish protection from such nonsense.”
“Joesai?”
“I’m afraid of him. I feel haunted by him, as if he is following me through the mountains.”