That question too he would have liked to ask, and for bis peace and Duncan's… declined.
Duncan sat down and pulled on his boots, gave a deep breath when he had done and rose shakily, belted on his weapons and his Honors. Niun stood and resumed the visored headcloth and Duncan did likewise, until there was only the difference of the face and Duncan's lesser stature between them.
"You think " Duncan said then, as if it were something which had been biding speaking a long time. "You think these stranger-kel'ein would go back with us to the ship?”
"That is not for Kel to say.”
"The she'pan said that she would consider. What is she considering?”
"The Sen deliberates." Niun felt exposed in the hedging, ashamed; there were times that Duncan could meet a stare with the look of a kath'en and the steadiness of a kel-Master. "Did I not teach you patience, without questions?”
"They have been deliberating die second day now.”
"Sov-kela.”
"Aye," Duncan answered him, glancing away. Niun made a bundle of the clothing they had shed, knotted it and rose again; he set his other hand on Duncan's shoulder, turning him back toward the main aisle of the camp, and Duncan for all his disquiet reached and took the cord of the bundle, carrying the burden with a courtesy automatic as one born to it. Niun regarded that, and felt the more uncomfortable himself.
"Do you doubt the she'pan?" Niun asked. "Do you think she would not do the best thing?”
"There are thoughts I cannot say in the hal'ari, that I am not good enough to say." They walked slowly, boots crunching on the wind-scoured sand beside their outward footprints, already wind-dimmed. "If you would hear if you would remember human language for a small moment, and let me say in human terms “
"Veil," Niun cut him off. "Do not breathe the wind. Manners do not apply to the sick.”
Duncan did so, and was silent
"You had years on the ship to talk to us," Niun said. "You are the speech you would make, and it is already well-made." He took a pass of the veil across his own mouth, for courtesy between them, not to make Duncan conspicuous, and mindfully shortened his long strides. "It is all said, Duncan.”
The morning haze fell kindly about the tents, touching them all with the tranquility of the hour. Even the black fabric of kel-tent and the patchwork tent adjoining had a little of gold on their coarse surface; and gold stained the paler hue of that of the she'pan and of the others. The trampled center of the camp was alive with blue-robes, goings and comings of the children, women working by Kath in the morning light, cookflres burning. But of gold there was none; and of black-robed figures but one, and that one vanished into the main kel-tent as they approached; others came out then, jamming the doorway, and sudden apprehension gathered at Niun's belly, the morning dimmed ... he opened his mouth to warn Duncan and did not. Duncan was wise on his own, and some things were too evil to suspect aloud.
They walked as close to the doorway as they might with the Kel blocking their way. Hlil was there in the center of matters, unveiled; some were and others were not.
"The she'pan has called half-council," Hlil said. "Ours and theirs together.”
It had come, then. Niun dismissed his worse suspicions with a profound shame. "Aye," he told Hlil and started away with him at once. But a few steps away he delayed, still with that vile feeling crawling at his belly. He looked back and caught Duncan's eye, who stared after him.
"The dusei," he said to Duncan. "It concerns me… where they are. You might call them.”
If you need them, he meant He thought that Duncan took his meaning; that sort of glance went between them, and there was a touch of apprehension in Duncan's eyes, but no panic. He turned then and went with HliL
Kel'ein settled about the doorway, showing no disposition to enter the tent… ja'anom, but not all ja'anom; kel'ein of the other Kels hovered about the edges, and more and more arrived, strolling up casually. The door was blocked, inconvenient to reach, and it was dark inside, lacking witnesses. Duncan settled on the sand in their midst, his back to the tent, the black bulk of which served to shelter him and them from the slight wind. He kept his head bowed, doing as Niun had suggested, thinking on the dusei, but when time passed in the quiet and extraneous conversation of those near him, he dismissed his more vivid fears and glanced furtively at the ja'anom, wondering if he understood anything at all of what game they were playing. One was old Peras, a quiet one and civil to him; he could not think evil of him. There was Taz… Taz's unwontedly expressionless face gave him no comfort; he had never seen the boy but that he was alive and alight to every need about him, and he was withdrawn now, watching. And Ras… Ras and Niun did not agree; he had sensed this thoroughly, even without the dusei. She came now and settled slightly behind him, so that she could see him and not otherwise.
Silence fell in the group. Most withdrew inside, strangers as well as ja'anom, not into their proper tent; and that was unwonted. Others stayed sitting. Duncan glanced down rather than appear to question this movement, reckoning silence the best course. Niun needed no trouble of his making; trouble there was already, and he reckoned that a portion of it had maneuvered to take him in. He knew names more than Peras and Taz and Ras, but few more; there were ja'anom whose names and reasons he ought to know, and did not, so short a time he had been among them before. If they had helped him live now, it was out of some sense of honor, or something that Niun had the power to make them do; not for love; he had no illusions of that.
The kel'en on his right touched his sleeve. Tsi'mri," that one said, but as if it were fact, not a calculated insult, "you say nothing.”
He looked up perforce, met the unveiled face of that man and of others, young and old, male and female. None of them showed expression. All those left had the kel-scars, the setaal, time-faded on the faces of some, new and bright on others. "Perhaps there are some who do not wish me welL What do you wish, kel'ein?”
Silent glances went from one to the other, and Duncan followed these exchanges with anxiety he did not allow to his face.
"You are wise," said a kel'e'en, "always to keep to someone's shadow.”
. Duncan felt the wind, felt his back naked without Niun, and bowed his head to them, which was all his recourse.
"We see what is toward," another said. "Best you sit here.”
He cast a look toward the aisle, toward the she'pan's tent, into which Niun had vanished, and all that he could see was a wall of stranger-kel'ein, listening silently on the fringes. Almost he rose to walk away from them all, to go settle at the she'pan's door in safety, but a grip on his sleeve advised him otherwise before he could make the move. He looked back at them. An old kel'e'en touched the scars on her face, mark of a skill he lacked. "You are tsiseta. Who would challenge you but another unscarred? And there are none such here.”
"What is happening?" Duncan demanded of them, knowing that they meant something by this, and not knowing even who ranked highest in this complex of skill and birth and seniority of mingled tribes. He scanned from face to face, lost and betraying it ... settled last on old Peras, whose lean, seamed face indicated at least reverence owed, and whose eyes perhaps showed something of sympathy. "What is happening? The Council… is that it?”
Tsi'mri kel'en, there is division in the camp. Yonder stand other tribes; ours and others come and go. They ask us questions. And while you sit here with us in this circle there is no one free to make a mistake.”
That disparaged him; it was also the land of insult any without rank in the Kel had to accept as a matter of course.
"Sir," he murmured humbly, which was always the right answer to a warrior who had won the seta'al, from one who had not
"Keren," Peras responded, which was more courtesy than an elder needed use.
"He speaks weD," said one of the out-tribesmen, settling near. "It is remarkable.”
Others behind him nodded, and one laughed a breath. "This is a wonder," that one said, "to sit and talk with a tsi'mri.”
The word, Duncan reflected placidly, studying his hands in his lap, also applied to the dusei.
"He is mannered," another said.
The old kel'e'en reached and touched at his sleeve. "Veil, kel'en. The air does you harm; there is courtesy and there is stupidity.”
He inclined his head in thanks and did so, headcloth and twice-lapped veil.
And now and again in the silence which followed, he glanced in the direction of the she'pan's tent, for one by one the standing kel'ein settled; he was anxious, for himself and for what manner of maneuvering might have encompassed Niun as well and for what passed in Council among those who had power ... all that he had tried to do, all that he had paid his life for, and now he could not even merit to sit at the door to hear judgment passed on his offering to them. He sat, in their long silence, and fretted, aware finally of another presence responding to his distress.