"Physics."
"Physics, then. Show me what you know. I'll find out where to start."
"If an object were traveling at the speed of light, and a man traveled on it to the nearest star-what is that star?"
"Goth."
"And distant-?"
"5 light-years."
"5.1. Be precise for this. And this man was forty; and he left a sister on earth when he went…"
"There's a kind of parasite infests the brains of cattle on the Sgoht river. I remember once seeing one-"
"You were there?"
"Child, I lived nine months on the Sgoht, and I had a village magistrate for a lover. He had a ring threaded so, right through the side of his lip, and it looked odd, I'll tell you, when he smiled. He had been married six times and he had a great notch in his nose where one of his wives took a stick to him, but she was a crazy woman and her daughter was crazier. She took it into her head to sell her mother's land, that's right, without owning it-she was going to sell her expectation of inheriting it to this man she was living with so she could get the money to go downriver and get a husband who owned a grocery, don't ask me why, but I think food was quite all she could think of- she must have weighed two hundred, all of it. Well, the magistrate my lover finally gave her the money to get her out of town, and that fool man she was living with went after my lover with an axe-"
"Gods, Sagot!"
"He did. And chased him round and round the office and out into the street before someone shot this crazy man. Rumor had it the cattle sickness got him, that that woman fed him from diseased animals; but my lover the magistrate said anyone who married that woman was crazy from the start."
"Watch the monitor. This is a simulation game. This is an instrument panel-there's your fuel, do you see, there's your altitude, there's your compass… You remember your ride to the city, don't you?"
"Of course I remember."
"Well, this isn't a copter. It's a plane. Use the toggle and the keys-let me show you. Here's the runway-this is an old-fashioned plane. But we'll start with that."
"Can you fly?"
"Oh, well, yes, I used to. My eyesight's against me now. I stay to the commercial planes."
"Commercial."
"Dear lad, planes go back and forth all over the world all the time, how do you think one would go?"
"Rail."
"Oh, well, it's all mostly freight, nowadays. Let's try taking off again; I'm afraid we've just crashed."
At some time the pain stopped. Thorn woke up one morning and realized he was past the sharpness of it; and that it had gotten to a kind of regret in which he did not have to work so hard at self-control; and finally, at breakfast with Duun on still another day, he hurt with a different pain, that he and Duun had had little to say to each other beyond the necessities of two people living with each other, and Duun's teaching him in the gym. There were no tales in his life but Sagot's; there was no sound in the house, but sometimes in the long evenings he and sometimes Duun played the dkin with indifferent passion-Duun aimlessly or working out long and vexing compositions that frayed Thorn's nerves; Thorn playing gloomy hatani songs or the lightest, most trivial ditties he had known from childhood, like accusations hurled at Duun. And Duun would sit and listen, or retreat to his office for peace and (sometimes, for Duun's side pained him) Duun would take a sedative and close the door of his room.
He was Sagot's ward. Duun only lived with him and went turnabout at fixing meals, and saw to his drill and his practice (but Duun ached when he breathed and even that was indifferent).
(He held me all night, that night. That must have hurt. He could hardly move when he woke up. He never complained.)
(Is it ever going to heal?) In one part of him the sight of Duun reduced to walking into the gym and giving instructions and walking out again gave Thorn satisfaction.
(But he's too quiet. He doesn't talk to me. What's he waiting for?)
(O gods, I wish he'd yell or frown at me or even look me in the eyes. His shoulders stoop. He moves like Sagot does. I'd never have caught him in the first place, but his balance was on his bad side in that pass. If he was younger, if he hadn't ever been hurt, gods, he must have been impossible to beat. I'd hate to have met him then.)
(O Duun, look at me!)
(Why should I care that he took Betan, he took Elanhen, Sphitti, even Cloen, he takes everything I care for, he sent Sagot and someday I'll walk in and he'll have sent her away too, everything, everyone.)
(He spied on me. He's probably tied into the computers there at school, I know he could, all you have to do is put the codes in, we're in the same building. He knew everything, he read everything Betan and I passed back and forth, probably the guards reported to him.)
(O Duun, I don't like this quiet. I don't like you looking like that, it hurts.)
But one noon he came back from Sagot and Duun was in the gym, was waiting for him when he had shed down to his small-kilt and got out on the sand. Thorn waited for instruction, but Duun walked out, swinging his left arm a bit and working it back and forth.
"Duun, be careful."
"Thorn, I don't need you to tell me careful. Just remember what I told you: no all-out strikes. Let's go a fall or two."
Duun took him. It took a good long while, and it was craft that worked Thorn off his center and brought Duun's foot against his back.
"I'm dead," Thorn said, and sat down on the sand. Duun sat down less quickly, breathing hard, licking at his teeth. Thorn panted for breath and leaned on his knees and stared back at him. Grinned suddenly, because getting beaten by Duun was in the nature of the world and made it feel less lonely.
Duun grinned back. No words. It was better after that. Duun played that night, one old familiar piece after the other, and the music brought them back, dkin and drum, not the sad songs but the songs with tricks, hatani humor, subtle and cruel.
Thorn slept that night, and waked about the middle of the dark with the stars giddy about his bed and the air breathing false chill winds as if they came off winter snow; everything was still, and he had some vague terror that he could put no name to.
(Duun was here. He was here a while ago.) Perhaps it was a subtle scent the air-conditioning had dispersed. But the door was closed.
Thorn's eyes searched the room, the dark, seeking outlines and knowing Duun's skill. (Is he still in the room? Is he waiting till I move?) Thorn's heart raced, the veins pounding in his throat. (This is foolish. How could he pass the door? It's noisy; I couldn't sleep that soundly.)
(Could I?)
His heart hammered wildly. (He wouldn't. He couldn't. Not after Betan. He knows I'm mad. I hate him. I hate him that he does this to me.)
He hurled himself out of bed. (Never trust him. Never take Duun for granted-) But there was nothing there, only the false stars in their slow dizzy movement.
Thorn sat down again on the edge of the bed. His heart still slammed against his ribs.
(What's the world like? Full of Sagot's kind? Or Duun's? What's he up to? What was I made for? Why does the government care whether I live or die-enough to call on a hatani to solve my problem? He could kill them. Kill me. He gives me a chance, he says… a chance against what?)
(A hatani dictates others' moves. A hatani judges. A hatani wanders through the world setting things to rights again. A hatani can leave a pebble in your bed-in your drink-can pass a locked door and track you in the dark. He's a hunter… not of game. Of anyone he wants. What else is he?)
(Everything Duun does has a cause. And Sagot's his friend. Maybe-maybe Betan was. No. Yes. O gods, maybe it's all set up. Could Betan take a thing like me by preference? Was she curious? Curious-about what she'd let do that with her?)