“How many know you and Erutown are in the islands?” Lars asked seriously.
“Nahia has been working very hard lately, Lars,” Hauness said. “She was granted a leave of absence: I took my annual holiday and announced our intention of cruising the coast. There are friends who will vouch for our presence in mainland waters. Besides, who would expect us to brave a hurricane?”
“We boarded the jet from the seaside without being seen the night before she sailed,” Erutown added. “What Elder would suspect Nahia’s involvement with renegades?”
“If they had any sense whatever,” Nahia said in a crisp tone that surprised Killashandra with its suppressed anger, “how could they fail to realize that I sympathize deeply with repressions, frustrations, and despairs which I cannot avoid feeling! With injustices not all the empathy in the world will ease.”
A moment of silence followed.
“Is your woman to be trusted with any of this, Lars?” Hauness asked quietly.
Suppressing a flare of guilt at her duplicity, Killashandra decided that it was time to join the group before Lars perjured himself.
“Here, this should satisfy, Lars,” she said, approaching the others with a purposeful stride. She set before him a generous plate of sandwiches and hot tidbits which she had found in the food storage. “You’re sure I can’t get anything for you?” she asked the others as she began to gather up the used plates and cups.
Erutown gave her a sour glance, then turned to watch the rolling cloud formations of the approaching storm. Theach smiled absently, Hauness shook his head and settled back next to Nahia who had leaned back in the couch, eyes closed, her beautiful face relaxed.
When Killashandra returned with her own serving, Lars and Hauness were absorbed by the satellite picture of the approaching hurricane, displayed on the vdr. It would be a substantial blow, Killashandra had to admit, but not a patch on what Ballybran could brew.
Storm watching could be mesmerizing, certainly engrossing. Theach was the first to break from the fascination. He reseated himself at a small terminal and began to call up equations on the tiny screen. There was a tension to the line of his back, the occasional rattle of the keys that proved he was still conscious, but there were long intervals of total silence from his corner during the next few hours.
“It’s not going to be a long one at its current rate,” Lars remarked when he had finished eating. “The eye’ll be on us by night.”
“Is it likely to make the mainland?”
“No. That is, after all, eight thousand kilos off. It’ll blow itself out over the ocean as usual. You only get our storms when they make up in the Broad, not from this far south.”
So, Killashandra thought, she was in the southern hemisphere of Optheria, which explained the switch in seasons. And it explained why this group felt themselves secure from Mainland intervention and searches. Even with the primitive jet vehicles, an enormous distance could be traversed in a relatively short time.
It struck Killashandra that if Nahia, Hauness, and the others could travel so far, so could the Elders, especially if they wanted to implicate islanders. Or was that just talk? If, as Lars had admitted, Torkes had set him up to assault her in order to verify her identity and was using that assault now to implicate the islanders, would it not be logical to assume that some foray into the islands would be made by officialdom? If only to preserve their fiction?
Killashandra closed her mouth on this theory for she had gleaned it from information she had overhead surreptitiously. Well, she’d find a way to warn Lars, for she had a sudden premonition that a warning was in order. From what she had seen of the Elders, reapplying to the Guild would be a humiliating embarrassment to their sort of bureaucracy. Unless – and Killashandra smiled to herself – they took the line that Killashandra Ree had not arrived as scheduled. How tidy it could be made, the Elders able to suppress any reference to the reception in her honor. However, Lanzecki would know that she had gone, and know, too, that she would not have evaded the responsibility she had accepted. And there would be computer evidence of her arrival – even the Elders would have a hard time suppressing that sort of trail mark. Not to mention her use of the credit outlet on Angel. This could be very interesting!
She must have dozed off, for the couch had been comfortable, the day’s unusual exercise exhausting, and watching the weather screen soporific. It was the lack of storm noise that woke her. And a curious singing in her body which was her symbiont’s reaction to drastic weather changes. A quick glance at the screen showed her that the eye of the storm was presently over Angel Island. She rubbed at her arms and legs, sure that the vibration she felt might be discernible. However, Nahia had curled up on the end of the long couch, Hauness, one arm across her shoulders, was also asleep, head back against the cushions. Theach was still diddling, but Erutown and Lars were absent.
She heard voices and steps on the circular stair and made a dash for the toilet. She distinguished Lars’s distinctive laugh, a bass rumble from his father, and a grunt that could be Erutown, and some other voices. Until the eye had passed and the symbiont had quieted, Killashandra wanted to avoid everyone, especially Lars.
“Carrigana?” Lars called. Then she heard him approach the toilet and rap on the door. “Carrigana? Would you mind fixing some hungry storm watchers more of those excellent sandwiches?”
Under ordinary circumstances, Killashandra would have had a tart rejoinder but catering would solve the more immediate problem.
“Just a moment.” She splashed water on her face, smoothed back her hair, and regarded the blossoms about her neck. Strangely enough they were not dead, their petals were still fresh despite the creasing. Their fragrance scented her fingers as she opened the crushed flowers and spread them back into their original shapes.
When she opened the door, Nahia and Hauness were making their way toward the catering area.
“They only want to talk weather,” Nahia said with a smile. “We’ll help you.”
The others did talk weather, but on the comunits to other islands, checking on storm damages and injuries, finding out what supplies would be required, and which island could best supply the needs. The three caterers served soup, a basic stew, and high-protein biscuits. In the company of Nahia and Hauness, the work was more pleasant than Killashandra would have believed. She had never met their likes before and realized that she probably never would again.
The respite at the storm’s eye was all too brief, and soon the hurricane was more frightening in its renewed violence. Though it was a zephyr in comparison to Ballybran turbulence, Killashandra rated it a respectable storm, and slept through the rest of it.
A touch on her shoulder woke her, a light touch that was then repeated and her shoulder held in a brief clasp. That was enough to bring Killashandra to full awareness and she looked up at Nahia’s perplexed expression. Killashandra smiled reassuringly, attempting to pass off the storm resonance still coursing through her body. As Lars was draped against her, she moved cautiously to a sitting position and took the steaming cup from Nahia with quiet thanks. Killashandra wondered how the man had been able to sleep with her body buzzing.
Other storm watchers had disposed themselves for sleep about the room. Outside a hard rain was falling and a stout wind agitated the rain forest but the blow had become a shadow of its hurricane strength.
“We had orders to wake people as soon as the wind died to force five,” Nahia said and extended a second hot cup to Killashandra for Lars.
“Has there been much damage? Many injuries?”
“Sufficient. The hurricane was unseasonably early and caught some communities unprepared. Olav is preparing emergency schedules for us.”
“Us?” Killashandra stared at Nahia in surprise. “Surely you’re not going to risk being seen and identified here?”
“These are my own people, Carrigana. I am safest in the islands.” Serenely confident, the beauty returned to the catering area.