The Kansi cut at the walkers with their brine-soaked razor-tipped stockwhips, trying to drive them back behind the fences.
The landfolk kept walking, children in the middle, ignoring the whip cuts, ignoring the kicks and shoves from the mos, walking and singing, gazing straight before them as if they saw the Three striding there, leading them on their Pakoseo. Prayerbeads rolling thr their fingers, they kept walking South.
After another hour of futile threatening and harassment, each Kansi cut a walker from the crowd, threw him or her across the withers of his mo and rode off.
When the Kansi and their captives were no more than rapidly dimishing dustclouds, there was a collective moan of grief with punctuating cries of grief and loss, but not a single walker turned back. lab ough
CELL 1
The barrier island was a stretch of sand half a meter at its highest above the sea with a skim of gray-green, salt crusted brush and reeds plus a thorny tangle of the ubiquitous amtapishka vine. The boats were pushed up onto the sand on the landside of the island, tethered to the poles which were driven into the sand.
The ocean was a brilliant blue, like sapphire at once liquid and crystalline, restful despite its patterned restlessness. The sky was the same blue, but softer and more diffuse, as empty as the sea. A few cloud puffs intensified rather than diluted that emptiness.
Rohant lay stretched out on the sand, wrapped in one blanket with another rolled up for a pillow. He was asleep, snoring, a gaunt look lying uncomfortably on his broad face. Painfully reddened with flakes of skin peeling off It, his nose jutted like the beak of his hawk, his chin was a minor promontory.
Kikun sat at his feet, a small nub of a man, not sleeping, but huddled in on himself, visibly plumping as if he drew sustenance from the sun's heat and the whip of the wind that blew onshore with enough force to tear the bushes loosed their roots hadn't gone down to bedrock.
Asteplikota lay in the boat, gauze laid loosely over his face to keep off the biters. He was not doing well. He was restless with fever despite the antibiotics Shadith finally took a chance on and fed him, knowing the odds were they'd kill him; they brought the fever down enough to prevent brain damage, but they weren't right enough to do more than ameliorate the infection. He was asleep, moaning in his sleep, but comfortable and warm with a big cat dozing on each side of him. The hawk perched on a thwart, tearing at the body of a small rodent.
Shadith stood looking out across the empty ocean, the wind blowing strongly against her, molding her torn and bloodied clothing against her body, teasing at hair matted into clumps and tangles. There were shadows under her eyes and furrows dug from her nose round the corners of a mouth too wide and too defined to match the childish contours of her face, a childishness that was rapidly melting under the stress of the flight; her cheeks were hollow, emphasizing the Jut of her cheekbones. The delicate rondure of her child's limbs had gone hard and knobby. When she unfolded her arms, her hands shook.
As if she could see the EYE-though of course she could not, that was impossible, the direction of her gaze was chance-she scowled straight at him. "Ginbiryol Seyirshi, hear me. It's your game. If you want us on the board, get your ass in gear and send us some backup." She turned away from him and once more stood staring out to sea.
Ginbiryol Seyirshi was raging, but he didn't let it show. He controlled every nuance of his behavior. He was never caught napping, he was always ready to handle anything that came at him. He took immense pride in his imperturbability, it was an important part of his mystique, it was something he fought fiercely to protect. He could feel Puk the Lute watching him, Ajeri the Pilot was looking sideways at him, waiting for him to react to Shadith's Challenge.
He shook with hatred for that girl with her sneaking Talent, but he couldn't show it. If he railed against her, he called in question his own judgment-and his Luck. He chose to bring her here, it was his decision to let the Avatars run loose for a while. They were doing what he brought them here to do, generating rumor and stirring up the castes, setting the low against the high, and they were doing it very effectively. No one could deny that. At least five hundred Pariahs were dead or dying, the flits had left behind them a swath of destruction thirty km wide. And the Three had moved through that chaos as if they truly were gods, with witnesses in plenty to testify to it and spread word about it. Grace of that oddity who called himself Kikun. There Ginbiryol's luck had served him well. That drunken Dyslaerik Unmate who sold them the information had told the truth, hard as it was to believe. Ginbiryol had a moment's regret that he'd let Puk have the creature to play with before he'd squeezed every drop of data from him about this putative god incarnate, but that was unimportant at the moment; if he wanted more data, all he need do was reach out and take it. He decided all that mattered was Kikun's belief in this absurdity; his conviction would convince others without him doing anything. Especially if they wanted to believe.
Luck. The Lady had brought him everything in one throw of his net. Even though this girl was insolent and probably dangerous, she was quite satisfactory as Virgin God. If he didn't need her in the production, he'd have her as Penitent in a Praisesong none of them would forget; as it was he would have to make do with the end Ayawit had waiting for her. Luck, yes. Kikun was a demigod and the Ciocan with his tied-beasts was perfect for the Hunter. Gathering him up had given Ginbiryol more than a little satisfaction. It was a Ismail earnest of the payment Family Voallts were going to make him for the insult they had put on him when they refused to deal with his agent. There was not a man, woman, or other alive who could say he had put the hurt on Ginbiryol Seyirshi. He did not allow that to happen. If it did happen, he erased it. The Ciocan had felt his hand already, the rest of Family Voallts would be destroyed one by one when he found time to deal with them.
Calming himself by thinking of that and of the Ciocan's inevitable, unenviable end, he produced a smile, chirruped to the Pet and coaxed the simi to his lap. Stroking the round velvety head, he turned to Puk. "We must see that her end is a strong chastisement of her insolence."
Pukanuk Pousli looked wary. "Yes, sir."
He didn't elaborate. It irritated Ginbiryol that he didn't elaborate. He kept his eyes fixed on Puk the Lute, a silent inescapable demand for more. Behind the gaze, though, he relaxed a little, pleased, when he saw Puk's face begin to shine with sweat.
The Lute fidgeted. Finally he said, "You want I should get onto one of our men in Kiscomaskin's camp, say Shipayupal, and have him set up a coast search so he can find them?"
"It would have been more use if you'd alerted him the minute the search and slaughter began."
"Yes, sir. I missed that, I was inexcusably blind to possibilities."
The words were contrite, but Ginbiryol could read a cavil behind them: You didn't think of it either. It was becoming clear that Puk was going to need disciplining and soon. Perhaps even before this operation was completed. He made a note to set a personal, dedicated closeEYE on his Second and check it frequently. "Apologies will not restore Asteplikota if he dies, Puk. If I told you once, I have said it a dozen times…" he relished the fear he saw in his tame killer, the drop of sweat that collected at the end of Puk's nose and splatted onto the arms he'd folded across his ribs in an absurdly childish sketch of self-protection, "… I need Asteplikota alive and ambulatory. See that it is accomplished." He did not wait for Puk to answer him but turned to his scanning of the other cells. Chapter 13. Still running. When do we get to stop?
A touch on her arm drew Shadith out of a restless, hag-ridden sleep. She pushed the blanket away and sat up, brushing the sand off the side of her face. Kikun squatted beside her, waiting for her to get herself together enough to notice him. "What is it this time?" she muttered. She plucked at her hair, grimaced at the knots and the greasy stickiness, smiled as Kikun passed over the comb he'd gotten from her pouch. "Intuition or foresight?"