Yuan and the rest were returning from the stream. Leaning on one of the Simes, Yuan came toward Azevedo, and the old man went to meet him halfway. They discussed what to do next while Shanlun slipped his arm inside Laneff’s so their forearms lay alongside each other, him gripping her wrist.
"You know why he's willing to take you with us?" asked Shanlun rhetorically. "Because he feels responsible for what happened to you at the funeral oration. His intuition—an Endowment of a sort—told him to come right over to me at the rotunda when you were talking to Mairis, and to insist I give him transfer, Tecton and Zeor notwithstanding. Then you'd have been on the platform with Mairis, out of reach of those terrorists."
She couldn't quite picture even Azevedo breaking through a security cordon and wreaking havoc with a Tecton Controller's transfer schedules. "Why didn't he do it then?"
"Because I refused him. So, you see, it's back in my lap again. If I hadn't been unable to control my nager, or if I cared for you less so it would have been easier to keep my attention off you, then you and Mairis wouldn't have had to decide to put you in that box."
There were other considerations, Laneff remembered. But he started her thinking, and as they formed up to move north together, she mulled it over and decided that many people had made responsible decisions contributing to the disasters they'd suffered. When she put it to Shanlun, he replied, "Yes, we've all had a hand in making this mess, and we've all got to pitch in and clean it up."
"Let's get out of here before the Tecton is back with ground patrols!" said someone, and without further argument they marched, Yuan's group accompanying them to the Sime~Gen border. The long, hard walk wearing House sandals made Laneff’s feet hurt. And they were all hungry and tired when they reached the border, here marked only by a thick hedgerow set in a barren corridor between vineyards. It was raining, soaking and chilling everyone. But at least it kept the bees and flies down.
One by one, they wriggled through a small rabbit run through the hedgerow, snagging hair, clothing, and skin on the brambles. In the center it was dry, and Laneff was almost tempted to curl up and sleep. But she crawled out the other side and came out headfirst in Sime Territory.
Yuan and Azevedo were standing in the middle of the muddy road circling the fields. They'd walked together most of the day, conversing quietly. Now Laneff heard them at last in agreement. "Then," said Azevedo, "I'll be sending our messenger to you on the regular schedule."
"Not that there'll be anything to report. My organization can't be a voice in world politics again for a long time to come."
"Yuan, you're not certain the Diet also destroyed your other centers. You won't be until you get back in touch. Now, are you sure you can make it to Bayerne?"
Yuan glanced from his two Simes to where Jarmi stood beside Laneff. "We can make it," he assured Azevedo. "Laneff, I didn't deliver on all my promises. I can't hold you to yours. It could be a year before I could again provide you lab space." He eyed Jarmi. "Though we could still provide your transfers—and you might live long enough to use that lab."
He wanted her to come with him. And there was a part of her that responded. Her hand sought Jarmi's fingers. The Gen tightened her grip reassuringly. Jarmi didn't want to betray Yuan, but her nager told Laneff that Jarmi's first loyalty was now to her. On the march, Shanlun had explained that Thiritees held labs as well equipped as Yuan's, if older, and Azevedo had the authority to emplace her there. Shanlun was sure he and Azevedo could provide her the pure killbliss transfer she craved, and he'd pledged to stay with her, letting Mairis and the Tecton presume him dead. Labs now, and probably good transfers against labs later and only Jarmi; Yuan had lost his best channel, and she had been virtually useless to Laneff. Suddenly, Laneff was unable to stomach such a cold-blooded calculated decision. She asked, "Yuan, are you going to pull out of the alliance with
Mairis?"
"Now it won't be necessary. We're going to disappear and let the world think we're all dead. At least for a while. That should help Mairis's political position. And, frankly, we couldn't help him much right now, anyway."
"You're going to rebuild—and so will the Diet."
"But it'll be years before they can do any damage. If Mairis's elected, by the time the Diet's organized again, there won't be a Gen in the world who doesn't have a Sime friend or business partner. The Diet's line doesn't work where people know each other."
"Do you still hate them?"
"Right now I'm too tired and hungry to hate anything but this rain."
Zlinning, she realized that his essential nature remained unchanged, though his spirits flagged now. Shanlun was glued to Azevedo's side, awaiting her decision tensely. He wouldn't go with Yuan. And she couldn't see herself chancing that, either. With only Jarmi–no. She turned to the Gen, squeezing her hand, "I'm sorry." Then to Yuan, she said, "I've got to go with Azevedo and Shanlun."
Yuan's shoulders slumped further, but he only nodded.
Jarmi looked to Azevedo. "Do you think you could take me along?"
Laneff found a smile blooming on her face, a grinding tension in her midsection letting go.
The channel answered, "It'd be awkward for you, Jarmi. Gypsy tribes don't mix with outsiders. You'd have no friends."
Jarmi shrugged. "If I have Laneff, it's enough. And, I do know my way around her lab work. I can be useful."
"She could," declared Laneff, surprised she hadn't thought of that. "It would take a lot of time to train a new assistant." But she also knew there was no way Jarmi could be trusted with the secret of the Endowment and all the rest. "But, Jarmi, once there, you'd probably have to stay for many years. They won't let you go back to Yuan– after I die."
"Maybe you won't die."
"You've got to adjust to that idea, Jarmi. Think. After I'm gone, will you be glad to have left your life behind?"
Jarmi stared down at the mud with a pained expression, and Laneff realized everything Jarmi cherished had been brutally destroyed just
hours before. Yet with an air of real decision, Jarmi said, "Yes. I want to be part of what you're doing." She looked apologetically toward Yuan.
Azevedo had zlinned her deeply as she spoke, and now he said, "Then I'll permit you to come with us."
As the two groups parted, trudging in opposite directions, Jarmi clung to Laneff both for balance in the slick mud and for security.
Laneff said, "I know why I'm glad you're coming. But why are you so happy, Jarmi? This is going to be hard on you."
"Laneff, you came back for me. It would have been saner for you to go directly to the hangar from the lab, but you went all the way back into the residence wing for me. I've never known anyone who'd do such a thing for me. I couldn 't turn my back and walk away from you —not even with Yuan."
They trudged through the unrelenting downpour, some of them resorting to bare feet when their shoes were soaked. At dark, the Simes each took the arm of a Gen, enduring the increased hunger, cold, and aching muscles. Shanlun walked with Azevedo, and Laneff had Jarmi, zlinning the path through trinrose fields, apiaries, and clumps of houses.
Twice, Tecton patrols flew overhead, and once they crossed a road where buses whizzed by at speed. Then they came to a slideroad bed and had to wait for a train to pass. Later, they followed a road, taking to the drainage ditch when cars approached.