A shiver of pain moved through the listening Yilanè, sparing only Ambalasei who nodded with grim approval. The Daughters of Life were now as silent as death. Except for Far! of course. Her voice was shrill with emotion, the movements of her limbs erratic with stress. This did not stop her from speaking.
“I hear what you say, Enge, but you are misled. Ambalasei may be a scientist of knowledge, but she is not a follower of Ugunenapsa. That is her fault and her failing. Now she misleads us with talks of an eistaa and of the eistaa’s rule. This we have rejected, and our rejection has led us to this place. We listen to Ambalasei corrupting thoughts and we forget Ugunenapsa. We forget Ugunenapsa’s third principle. The Efeneleiaa, the spirit of life, which is the great eistaa of the city of life and we are dwellers in this city. We must think of that and reject Ambalasei’s crude city with its ambesed and primitive hanalè. She misleads us when she speaks to us of these things. We must turn our backs on her and turn our faces to Ugunenapsa and follow where she leads. We must go forth from this ambesed and seal its entrance, just as we must grow vines over the door to the hanalè for we have no need of either of them. If this city is wrong for us then we must leave this city. Go to the beaches and the forests and live free as do the Sorogetso. We need no eistaa, we need no captive males. We will go to the shore when the young efenburu emerge from the waves. Speak with the fargi while they are still wet from the sea, lead them into the light and the life that is ours under the guidance of Ugunenapsa…”
She stopped speaking, shocked, as Ambalasei made the rudest sound known, spoke the coarsest phrase ever heard, moved her limbs in the most gross insult ever conceived.
“Your thoughts are like the excrement of a thousand giant nenitesk, a single turd of which would fill this ambesed,” Ambalasei thundered. “I ordered you to think — not proclaim your world-filling stupidity. Leave the city? Please do that — to be eaten by the first carnivore to pass this way. Greet the emerging fargi at the ocean’s shore? Do that — but you will have a very long wait since the nearest birth beach is an ocean away.”
She moved slowly about to face every one of the Daughters in turn, her body arched with contempt, her claws tearing great grooves in the ground as she moved in uncontrollable anger.
“I leave you now since I will hear no more of this stupidity. Speak it to each other after I have gone. This city is yours, your lives are yours. Decide what to do with them. You will have all the time you need for I go now to sail with the uruketo up the great river on a voyage of exploration. It is also for my health’s sake for it is being destroyed by you Daughters of Desperation. Now, you, Elem, do you guide the uruketo for me or must I also do this myself?”
In the shocked silence that followed every eye was on the commander of the uruketo. She stood, head lowered in thought for some time. Then she spoke.
“I follow Ugunenapsa wherever she may lead me. I am also a follower of science and follow where that leads as well. Ugunenapsa and science led us here, both embodied in Ambalasei who has made this city and our life possible. Enge, and others here, are wise in the interpretation of Ugunenapsa’s words. I will follow where they lead, so I need not be here while you decide. Therefore I will guide and protect Ambalasei while you consider our future. I think Far! is wrong because Ambalasei speaks only the truth. I say do not listen to her. Find a path into tomorrow that both Ambalasei and Ugunenapsa may tread. That is what I have to say and now I will go.”
She turned and left the ambesed. Setessei hurried away as well for many preparations must be made for the voyage. Ambalasei followed at a more leisurely pace, turning before she left since she always had the last word.
“You hold your future between your thumbs, Daughters of Despair. I think you will all die because you are too stupid to live. So — prove me wrong. If you can.”
Lanefenuu, Eistaa of Ikhalmenets, sat in her place of honor in the ambesed, the great carving of uruketo and waves rising up behind her, and was not happy. Not at all. This was her ambesed, her city, her island. Everything that stretched before her or around her was hers. Cause for pleasure once, cause for blackness of humor now. She looked past the walls of the ambesed to the trees beyond, where they climbed up the slopes of the long-dead volcano. Up to the snowcapped summit, hideously white all of the way through the heat of summer. Her body arched and writhed with movements of hatred, so much so that Elilep who was painting her arms had to move aside quickly or be struck. The other male, who had carried the tray of pigments, shivered delicately at Lanefenuu’s strong emotions.
She saw the movement, looked at him with one eye, then back to the mountain peak. An attractive male, delicate. Perhaps she should take him now? No, not this day, not the day when it all ended.
Elilep was trembling now as well, so much so that the brush in his hands was unsteady and he could not control it.
“Finish the painting,” Lanefenuu ordered. “I wish the mountain and the ocean there on my chest, in the greatest of detail.”
“Great Eistaa, it was said that we leave this island today.”
“We do. Most are gone. When we board the uruketo we will be the last.”
“I have never been in a uruketo. I am afraid.”
Lanefenuu fingered his crest and signed abandonment of fear/reasonless. “That is only because you are a simple male, plucked from the sea, raised in the hanalè, which is the right and proper thing. You have never left this island — but you shall now. All of us. We will cross the ocean and I command you to abandon fear. We go to the city of Alpèasak which is larger than Ikhalmenets, is rich in new/ delicious animals, has a hanalè of pleasurable size.”
Elilep, who was sensitive to others’ feelings, as were most males, was still not calmed. “If this distant city is so fine why does the Eistaa show anger and grief?”
“Anger at the whiteness of winter that drives me from my city. Grief that I must leave. But enough. What is done is done. Our new city awaits us on the shores of distant Gendasi*, a city of golden beaches. Far superior to this rock in the ocean. Come.”
She stood and stamped across the ambesed with the males scurrying after her. Head lifted, filled with pride and strength. Perhaps it was best to leave this ambesed forever, leave this place where the ustuzou had humiliated her, ordered her obedience. She snapped her thumbs at the memory, but remembered as well that there had been no choice. Two of her uruketo dead. She had had no choice. Better the conflict to end. Enough had died. If she had not listened to Vaintè’s counsel none of this would have happened. Her body writhed as strong emotions seized her. It was part of the past and could be forgotten along with this city and this island.
Her uruketo waited, the others had already left as she had commanded. She ordered the males aboard, started to follow them, turned back to look despite herself. The green below, the white above.
Her jaw gaped with powerful emotions — until she snapped it shut. Enough. It was over. Her city was now warm Alpèasak. Winter could come to Ikhalmenets. It was no longer her concern.