"Who?" asked Luet.
"You know, the councilor who looked at me. And I said, you can't blame people for thinking about my dream of the Zenifi when they see me. Not everybody has true dreams. And then he said-listen, Luet-he said, Nobody does."
"Nobody?" Luet laughed, then realized that Edhadeya didn't think it was funny. "Dedaya, I've had true dreams, you've had true dreams. Mother's a raveler. Mon has his truthsense. Father dreams true, and- this is absurd."
"I know that. So I asked him why he said it, and he wouldn't tell. I pinched him, I tickled him-Luet, Ominer can't keep a secret from me. I've always been able to torture it out of him in five minutes. But this time he pretended he didn't know what I was talking about."
"And you think it has something to do with Akma and Mon?"
"I know it does. Luet, the only way Ominer could possibly keep a secret from me is if he was more frightened of someone else. And the only two people he fears more than me in the whole world are-"
"Your father?"
"Don't be silly, Father's as sweet as they come when he notices Ominer at all-which isn't often, he blends in with the walls. No, it's Mon and Aronha. I think it's both of them. I watched this morning, and all four of my brothers ended up with your brother and whatever they're talking about or planning or doing-"
"It has to do with the idea that there are no true dreams." Edhadeya nodded. "I can't go to Father with this, they'd just deny it."
"Lie to your father?"
"Something's different. It made me feel dark and unpleasant and I think they're plotting something."
"Don't say that," said Luet. "It's our families we're talking about."
"They're not just boys anymore. Because we're still studying, we sometimes forget that we're not really in school, none of us but Khimin, when you come down to it. We're men and women. If Akma weren't your father's son, he'd be earning his own living. Aronha plays at soldier, but he has too much leisure, and so do my other brothers- they make priests work, but not the sons of the king."
Luet nodded. "Father tried to make Akma start earning his way when he was only fifteen. The age when laborers' children-"
"I know the age," said Edhadeya.
"Akma just said, ‘What, are you going to stand over me with a whip if I don't?' It was really vicious."
"Your father wasn't his taskmaster in those terrible days," said Edhadeya.
"But Father forgave the taskmasters. The Pabulogi. Akma hasn't, and he is still angry."
"Thirteen years!" cried Edhadeya.
"Akma feeds on it the way an unborn chick feeds on the yolk of its egg. Even when he's thinking about something else, even when he doesn't realize it, he's seething inside. He was my teacher for a while. We became very close. I loved him for a while more than I loved anybody. But if I came too close, if I touched his affection in just the wrong way, he lashed out. Sometimes it shocked me the way Elemak and Mebbekew must have felt when Nafai knocked them down with lightning from his finger."
"Melancholy. I thought he was just a moody sort of person," said Edhadeya.
"Oh, I'm sure that's it," said Luet, "it's just that when he gets into that mood, it's my father that he rages at."
"And the Pabulogi."
"They don't come around often. When the priests come in for their meetings with Father, Akma makes sure he's somewhere else. I don't think he's seen any of them for years."
"But you've seen them."
Luet smiled wanly. "As little as possible."
"Even from her deathbed, as she calls it, Mother gets all the gossip, and she says that Didul looks at you like... like. ..."
"Like my worst nightmare."
"You can't mean that," said Edhadeya.
"Not him personally. But what if he did decide he loved me? What if I loved him? It would be quicker and kinder if I just slit Akma's throat in his sleep."
"You mean this childish melancholy of Akma's would keep you from the man you love?"
"I don't love Didul. It was just a hypothetical situation."
"Lutya, my friend, isn't life complicated here in the king's house?"
"It's probably just as complicated for the poorest peasants. Down in their holes in the ground the most powerless ex-slaves probably have exactly the same problems. Grudges, loves, anger, fear, hate-"
"But when they quarrel in their tunnels, the whole kingdom doesn't quake," said Edhadeya.
"Well, that's your family. Not mine."
Edhadeya picked another worm off another leaf. "There are people eating holes in the kingdom, Lutya. What if our brothers turn out to be among the worms?"
"That's what you're afraid of, isn't it? Deny the Keeper. Then we don't have to associate with diggers and angels and-"
"Mon loves the angels. It would kill him not to be with them."
"But does he love the sky people more than Akma hates the earth people?"
"When it comes down to it, Mon won't give up his love for the angels."
"Still. It would be a terrible thing if they started-"
"Don't even think about it," said Edhadeya. "Our brothers would not commit treason."
"Then you're not afraid," said Luet.
Edhadeya sat on a bench and sighed. "I am afraid."
A new voice came from behind them. "Of what?"
They turned. It was Chebeya, Luet's mother. "Done already?" Luet asked.
"Poor Dudagu is exhausted," said Chebeya.
Edhadeya snorted.
"Don't make that sound in the woods," said Chebeya, "or a jaguar will find you."
"I don't see why you think it's so unnatural for me to despise my stepmother," said Edhadeya.
"Your father loves her," said Chebeya.
"A sign of his infinite capacity for love," said Edhadeya.
"What were you talking about when I came out here?" asked Chebeya. "And don't deny it was important, I could see how you were bound together."
Luet and Edhadeya looked at each other.
"Trying to decide how much to tell me?" asked Chebeya. "Let me make it easy for you. Start with everything."
So they told her.
"Let me watch them a little," said Chebeya, when they were done. "If I see them together, I can learn a lot."
"How can Mon not believe in true dreams?" asked Edhadeya. "He knows when things are true-he knew my dream about your family was a true one."
"Don't underestimate my son's powers of persuasion," said Chebeya.
"Mon isn't any man's puppet," said Edhadeya. "I know him."
"No, not a puppet," said Chebeya. "But I know Akma's gift."
"He has one?" asked Luet.
"The little sister is the last to see," said Edhadeya.
"He has the same gift as me," said Chebeya.
"He's never said so!" cried Luet.
"No, because he doesn't realize it. It's different with men, I think. Men don't form communities as easily as women do. Human men, I'm speaking of-angels aren't like this. Or maybe they are, it's not as if I've had much experience. I just know that when a man has the raveling gift, he doesn't see the connections between people the same way. What he does is he starts unconsciously finding ways to gather up all those scattered threads in his own hands."
"So he can't see the web of people," said Luet. "He just becomes the spider?"
Chebeya shuddered. "I haven't explained to him what it is he does. I'm afraid that if he ever becomes conscious of it, it'll be much worse. He'll become more powerful and... ."
"Dangerous," said Edhadeya.
Chebeya turned away from her. "He gathers people up and they want to please him."
"Enough that Mon would give up his love for the sky people?" asked Edhadeya.
"I'll have to see them together, with that in mind. But if Akma really cared about something and needed Mon's help, then I think Mon would help him."