“What do you mean?” Aryl demanded.
“Enjoy your peace, Apart-from-All,” the Tikitik advised, then slipped away into the grove.
It couldn’t be this easy. Before she could do more than glance at Marcus—the confusion on his face a perfect match to her own, the Oud spoke again. “Peace goodgoodgoodgood. Come, Triad First. Authenticate. Now. Come.”
Not a word about what had happened, the dead Oud, the dead Tikitik, what she’d done. Did they not care? Or not notice? Different lifecycles Marcus called it.
Different minds, that above all.
“I have to go.” The Human looked grim. “If I don’t, my people will wonder why.”
He’d been so happy before, tripping over himself in his eagerness to see what the Oud had found.
“Comecomecome!”
“I’ll get my equipment.” Calmly, as if he dealt with creatures capable of killing another every day. To her, “Stay here, inside securityfield.”
“Marcus—” Her protest died unspoken. They each had to do what they must. “I have to go back. They need to know what happened.” As much as she could say of it. “Be careful.”
“You, too.” A wistful smile cracked lines through the dust on his face. “It was good soup.”
“I’ll bring more,” she promised.
They were, Aryl decided as she walked away through the too-soft ground, thorough fools.
As for triumph?
They were still breathing.
The Oud hadn’t asked about their dead, but as Aryl jogged the road to Sona, she watched for the place in the rock wall shown by Marcus’ machine. They might not care; she did. A threat to something as large as an Oud was surely a threat to an Om’ray.
And if it had been the Tikitik, she might stop thinking about those she’d watched die.
Nothing helped her stop thinking about the rest. She ran, wishing every beat of foot to stone could turn back time. She’d left this morning, worried only about Oran and Hoyon, when to try her ability again, what to say to the Oud the next time they met. She’d looked forward to surprising Marcus, to learn more about him. Instead…
Instead her footsteps were reminders. Beat beat…dying Tikitik…beat beat…Oud risking the Agreement…beat beat…revealing her ability not to those who deserved it, who needed it, but to a stranger from another world…beat beat…becoming a Chooser?
Aryl misstepped and almost stumbled. Not fair, she told herself. None of it.
She could almost hear her mother’s voice. One handhold at a time. Be sure of your grip.
Be sure? Her laugh echoed, as if the towering rock shared the joke.
The rock could tell her one thing, she remembered, and starting paying closer attention to where she was.
There. Spotting the section of cliff, she left the road. Hard Ones lay everywhere, only a few larger than her doubled fist. She kicked the smallest from her path. After a couple clattered and pinged, the rest began rolling out of her way.
They observed what was around them and reacted to avoid trouble. Or they’d met Haxel and learned to feared all Om’ray.
Aryl slowed as she neared the rock face. Under the bright sun, the shadows at its base were intensely dark, if narrow. She would have avoided such in the canopy, wary of ambush. Stitlers were particularly fond of shadow, since it allowed them to stay close to their traps.
She’d forgotten to be properly cautious on the ground. No more.
Something buzzed by her ear. A biter? It was too cold, too dry.
Another. This time she caught a glimpse of it. A whirr/click.
There were more. They clung to the rock in neat rows, evenly spaced. Every so often, one would shift position. Those nearest would do the same until all had adjusted. Then they were still again.
Weren’t they always with Oud?
Aryl eased forward, a step at a time, checking where she would put each foot before she moved it.
Another step, her hand on the cold rock face, and there. She could see the opening. The cliff was split here, a separate wall of rock standing in front of the ridge itself. It looked weathered and old. Perhaps the Oud had many such doors to their underground world. Or had this one been made when they’d destroyed Sona?
Neighbors now, she reminded herself. Neighbors were always perilous. That was an Om’ray’s life.
The passage between could fit an Oud vehicle. She’d need a light to see tracks.
More buzzing around her ears. Whirr/clicks lined the inside walls. She waved a couple from her face. Biters, crawlers. Even the ones that didn’t like the taste of Om’ray were a nuisance.
Were they waiting for the next Oud?
Aryl trembled and listened. Nothing but faint whirrr/clicks. Nothing but her breathing. Her heart pounding.
She hadn’t asked about water.
The Tikitik—the Hoveny—none of that should have mattered. She’d been there, talking to the Oud’s new Speaker, and hadn’t said a word for her people.
Why?
Her mouth twisted. She’d been afraid. Afraid of what the Oud could do. Afraid to risk it. Like she was now. Willing to leave Marcus to them, while she ran.
Her mother never flinched from her duty. Even when it meant condemning her daughter for the good of Yena.
One handhold at a time. The Oud were in Sona to stay. So was she.
Her toe sank deeper than it should.
Aryl threw herself back and away as the ground in front of her shot upward. Enormous hooklike claws cut through the air, scraped against the rock wall. Pebbles rained down. The whirr/clicks abandoned their perches for the safety of anywhere else.
The hook-claws—there were six, taller and wider than she was—grabbed at nothing one last time, then plunged back under the ground.
She stood up, selected a good-sized Hard One, and heaved it where the hook-claws had disappeared.
The ground shot upward. The hook-claws cut and scraped, one connecting with the Hard One which shattered in a spray of green, black, and glistening yellow. The rest turned in midstrike to plunge into the mess, then sank out of sight again.
Aryl walked very carefully back to the stone road—a construction material that suggested the Sona had known very well what could lurk beneath looser ground. The Oud Speaker must have been shielded, in part, by its vehicle—otherwise, it wouldn’t have left this spot.
So…a natural predator or a cunning trap left by the Tikitik, who used living things as their tools?
At least the hook-claw appeared fixed in place and none-too-bright. The canopy had innumerable such hazards. Once the rest knew, they’d be watchful.
At the thought, Aryl reached, seeking that comfort. There. Her people. After the Oud and Tikitik, even Oran was a welcome taste.
She could be with them before taking another step. All she had to do was picture the warmth and comfort of the meeting hall and ’port herself there.
Who might be watching? A stranger-device, far overhead? A Tikitik, skin matched to stone? What about the Oud…they hadn’t reacted to her use of the M’hir. That didn’t mean they wouldn’t.
Marcus had been right to warn her.
She began to run again.
Interlude
ETLEKA EYED ENRIS.
Putting his hands behind his head, Enris eyed him right back.
Five days of his best behavior. His parents wouldn’t have believed it. For his trouble, his hands bore new calluses from five mornings of catching the hapless denos, as well as cuts from five afternoons of hauling that catch to be cleaned and cleaning it. He’d endured flatcakes at every meal, by now almost inured to the Vyna’s mouth-burning spice. He wore the clothes they gave him: the tunic and pants were cool and comfortable, if snug. No shirt. From the Vyna he’d seen, there wasn’t a size to fit his shoulders.