Lanefenuu snapped her jaw with anger. “End of boredom! Something out there is causing death in my city. I want you to find out what is happening. End of mystery — then end of deaths.”
“It shall be as you order. Suggestion of increase in armed guards at all times. More plants of poison to be sown about the walls.”
“Do that. And report daily what you see on all sides.”
The scientists signed obedience and loyalty and left. They walked slowly, deep in thought.
“There has been peace since we returned to the city,” Ukhereb said. “Has killing started again? Have we not had enough? Is it possible that ustuzou of death caused this?”
“They will be searched for. If they are close they will be seen and watched. We would know better if Vaintè were here. She was the greatest killer of ustuzou.”
Ukhereb signed acceptance/rejection. “You served her, I know. She saved your life, you have told me. But death was her only eistaa and that was whom she served. Enough new death now, favor requested, name of Vaintè to be put aside from thoughts.”
For Vaintè all days were identical. They blended together and could not be told apart. The sun in the sky, the fish in the sea, the approach of night. Nothing ever changed.
Now there was a change and she did not like it. The fargi were upset. They came out of the ocean, looked back at the waves, came higher up on the beach and hurried past her. She queried them, she was disturbed herself now, but of course received no reply. Velikrei who was somewhat Yilanè was too distant to hear her, was moving with the others up the beach and under the trees into the swamp. This had never happened before. Vaintè turned from them to the ocean, looked out across the breaking waves to the dark object on the horizon.
Was there something there? Impossible. Nothing, other than the fish and other sea creatures, was ever in the sea. Larger fish, long-toothed and beaked predators came some times, but there was nothing so large that it could be seen emerging high above the water. She felt the fear the others felt now, turned and looked back to the refuge of the trees.
Felt a sudden spasm of anger. She was not one to be afraid. This was a disturbing thought, mostly disturbing in that it made her think again. Something that she was not used to doing. She was upset, hissed with anger and raked the claws of her feet into the sand. Angry at the sea, at the thing in the sea. She looked for it and found that it was closer to the beach now.
And it was familiar. She knew what it was. That was why she felt the surge of sudden hatred, for its presence brought back the anger she had last felt here on this beach.
Deserted.
Cast out.
Left for dead.
An uruketo.
Now she could stand and look at it coldly for the brief spasm of anger was finished. It had really been the memory of an anger long gone. What was there to fear in an uruketo?
She studied it calmly, seeing the black height of its fin, noting the heads of Yilanè who were standing there on its summit. A splash in the sea close by, then another. The enteesenat of course. Lifetime companions of the great living craft. Accompanying it, feeding it, always there.
The uruketo was so close to the shore now that waves were breaking over it, rolling off in sheets of foam. A Yilanè was climbing down to the fin, standing on the creature’s back, water surging about her legs. Something, Vaintè could not tell what, was passed down to her. When the next wave washed about her she dipped the object into the water. That was all she did before climbing back up the fin.
What had she been doing? What was the uruketo itself doing here? The unaccustomed thoughts made Vaintè shake her head in anger. Why was she thinking about these things? Why was she angry?
The uruketo was standing out to sea now, getting smaller. No, it was not heading out to sea but was moving off along the coast. That was important.
But why important? This scratched at her thoughts, made her irritable, so much so that one of the returning fargi fled when it saw the angry movements of her body.
The uruketo had gone north, that was what it had done. That direction was north, the other was south. But it had gone north. The importance of this escaped her for a long while. It was almost dark when she saw Velikrei coming from the sea with a fish, striding with long steps through the surf.
Velikrei had walked like that when she had first arrived with the other fargi. And they had come from that direction too. From the north.
There was a city out there. A city with beaches, where these fargi had been born. A city that they had gone to when they had emerged from the sea. Later they had deserted the city that had deserted them, turned their backs and swum away from it and had come to this beach.
Vaintè stood staring north until it was too dark to see at all any more.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
It was like awakening after a long sleep, the sleep of an endless night. Or perhaps was even more like cracking out of the egg, of leaving the long first night of life and being born into the world. These were the thoughts that Vaintè had. First she puzzled at these thoughts-then wondered why she was puzzled.
One day when she bent over to drink from the pool of fresh water she saw her reflection and blinked with uncertainty at it. Held up her hands and spread her thumbs wide, looked at the mud caked there. Then plunged them into the pool, shattering her image and wondered yet again why this bothered her.
Each morning she would look out to sea and search for the uruketo. But it never returned. This upset her because it was a change from the rhythm of the days that she had grown so used to. Sleeping, eating, sleeping. Nothing else. She was no longer at peace and regretted this greatly. Why was she upset? What was bothering her? She knew — and put the memory from her. It was very peaceful on the beach.
Then one day she awoke. She was standing on the beach and one of her companions was before her, waist deep in the sea. Fish, the fargi signed with a color change of her hand. Then fish yet again.
“What fish?” Vaintè asked. “Fish where? More than one fish? How big, how small, how many? Answer commanded.”
“Fish,” the stupid, gap-jawed, bulge-eyed creature signed yet again.
“Lump of worthlessness-rock of stupidity-mountain of incoherence…” Vaintè stopped because the fargi had dived in panic, swam away as fast as she could. Within a moment all of the other fargi who had heard her outburst were in the water. The beach emptied and her anger grew and she spoke loudly, vehemently, writhing with the passion of her feelings.
“Insensate, stupid and mute creatures. Knowing nothing of the beauty of speaking, the flexibility of language, the joys of coherence. You swim, you fish, you bask, you sleep. You could be dead and there would be no difference. I could be dead…”
She was awake now, fully awake and fully rested, for her sleep had been a long one. She did not know how long, knew only that days and nights, many of them, had passed. As the little waves broke and surged around her legs she thought about what had happened and began to understand a small amount of it. Deserted, deprived of the world she knew, stripped of her city, her rank, her power, she had been dumped on this beach to die. Lanefenuu had wanted her dead, hoped for her death — but that was not to be. She was not a witless fargi that could be ordered to die, who would instantly obey.
But it had been very close. Yet her desire for survival had been so great that she had retreated within herself, lived a life that was a shadow of life. No more. The dark days were behind her. But what lay ahead?
Vaintè was an eistaa, would always be one. Would lead and others would follow. But not on this beach.
Surrounded by swamp on three sides, the ocean on the other. It was nothing, no place to be, no place for her any more. When she had come here she had been ill. Now she was well. There was no reason to stay, nothing to remember, none to speak to in parting. Without a single backward glance she slipped into the sea, dived under and cleansed herself, surfaced and swam north. It was in this direction that the uruketo had gone, this was where the fargi had come from.