"Your people have Healers and you are not traitors," came a voice (translated by Akor). "The first is a gift of the Winds, the second but the lack of a weakness, and neither of them true achievements of your Kindred. What else have you to recommend your kind?''
"Generosity and courage!" I shouted back. "I know you have heard how near I came to death. I saved the lives of Mirazhe and her son, I drew the child—the youngling—our of her body with my hands when I already knew that pain would be my only reward."
I stopped a moment. "Why do you think I did that?"' asked calmly. I turned to Akor. "Even you, Akor my hear-Why do you think I did what I did?"
He drew breath to answer, changed his mind, stood in what I guessed was Curiosity and said,
"I do not know, littling. Why did you?"
"She is besotted with you, Akhor, she would throw herself into the fire if you asked her," growled Rishkaan from behind me in the speech of the Gedri.
"No, I would not!" she cried. Her eyes were blazing, were she one of us she would stand in Defiance and Instruction, "I am no child. I am a woman grown, no young fool to kill myself for love. Not even for one so dear to me as Akor." She glanced at me briefly as I translated, almost an apology, but her warrior's blood was afire and she had no time for delicacy.
"I helped Mirazhe because I wanted to, not because Akor asked me. I have learned the midwife's skills with the females of my race, I have helped bring forth newborns before. I would do the same for any soul who suffered in childbirth. It was because I saw Mirazhe as a fellow creature in need that I risked burned hands and sickness to save her and her littling."
She lifted her voice, all her frustration and anger ringing in the Council chamber. "Who among you would do as much for one of my own? And how? You could not, you cannot assist so, your hands are made for rending and killing. Those claws, so formidable as weapons, can barely touch one of my people without wounding. That is a thing you must learn, O people of my beloved. How to touch without destroying!"
The murmur of discontent grew swiftly louder, the unsettling melody now easily heard. My people began to stir, fluttering their wings in anger. ''How dare you speak so, we are the Eldest of the Four Peoples and have you in our charge!"cried Rishkaan in truespeech, ignoring Shikrar's commands to be silent. "All know it. Why else are you made so much smaller and weaker, with only your short lives to live and no re:membrance of others to guide you? You should hold us in reverence!''
"Reverence must be earned!" she yelled back. "Let you learn of my people before you condemn. You would have sentenced me to death or exile without ever hearing my voice. How dare you take such judgement upon yourselves! Who made you the keepers of life and death over us? Are we so terrifying, so evil, that we must be killed on sight? Dear Goddess! What courage!
"A few nights past, one of my people was killed for daring to cross the Boundary. Akor tells me the idiot had had dealings with the Rakshasa; I am sure he did, in some way at least— an amulet for luck, perhaps. Perhaps more. But is death the only answer? His name was Perrin, and though I did not know him we had travelled together. He was a youth and foolish in the way of youth. Youth makes mistakes.
''Maybe Perrin deserved death, O Kantri, but maybe he did not. You are so bound by your laws, you creatures of order, they dictate so much of your lives. They are killing you! As you forget how to value time, as you lose sight of the joy of each single day as it comes and passes, I believe you forget how to value life itself. Even—especially—your own."
Her eyes blazed as she stood tall and faced the Kindred, her courage bright around her, her heart as high and fierce as any of the Kindred that ever lived. "Every time the Harvesters have come, I would guess that there is at least one who crosses the Boundary against the treaty. Is that not so?"
"It is,'' I answered her.
"And what is the fate of that one, or two, or however many?''
"By the terms of the treaty they have written their own death in the crossing,'' growled Rishkaan in truespeech.
"Death! Always death! Yet consider, O ye of the Greater Kindred. In all these centuries, what retribution have the Gedri remanded? What restitution for all those deaths?"
''They are due none,'' Rishkaan replied coldly.
"And if my people claimed that Akor broke the treaty in crossing the Boundary to come to my aid, that he interfered with Marik, destroyed property, and that restitution was required? As I understand it, there is no provision in the treaty for such a thing, though he did what he did in full view of all my people. What if we in our foolishness were to demand his death, as we have paid with death so many times? Do you tell me you would sit calmly and accept it, treaty or no?''
The murmur died down, as many stopped to consider her words. However, from one corner a mind voice rang out.
"You cannot kill us, Gedri, You are not strong enough."
She paused a moment for effect, then said one word, her voice very low and calm.
"Demonlord."
Every soul in the assembly drew back and hissed, but she raised her voice and called above the noise, "All it would take is one demonlord, from among the many thousands of my people. One demonlord, to exact revenge for all the deaths over all the centuries. Yet there have been none!"
"Do you call for Akor's death?" hissed Erianss.
"Sweet Goddess, no! No! Not death! Don't you understand, do you still not understand me? I call for life. Life!"
I smelt the seawater as it ran down her cheeks. "Life for both races, dear people of my beloved, life truly shared between Kantri and Gedri—as when the world was younger, and our two peoples dwelt together in peace." She bowed her head. "Oh, my brothers and sisters," she said brokenly, suddenly spent and weary, "I call for life."
She had no more words. The final echoes of her voice rang round the walls and met only silence.
I had them. One more word and Akor and I would walk free.
Ah, well.
I heard Kédra's voice clearly. "Lanen? Lord Akhor? The Lady Rella whom you left in my charge bears news of the Gedri that you must hear. She says it is urgent.
"How could she have news if she has been in your keeping?" I asked him.
''One came from the camp seeking all of the Gedri, and spoke with her as I kept out of sight listening. She followed after him and was gone for some while, but she has returned.''
I stood motionless on the dais, filled with the fear that I had not reached the Kantri, and aware of a rising dread. What news could possibly have sought her out so far from the camp? Dear Lady, what had happened now?
Kédra's voice was grim when he spoke again. "Lady, it is the Merchant Marik. His order has gone out among your people that you are to leave on the morrow. They are beginning even now. And the Lady Rella says that there is no sign of Marik, and that you will understand when she says that she saw him with the demon master not half an hour gone. She says you will know what this means.''
I did. I knew as if I had heard it from his own lips. I whirled on Akor.
"He got away, didn't he? He got out of the cabin before your battle."
"He did."
I nearly choked on my own words. "Akor, don't you understand? He has already been across the Boundary and returned. He boasted of it to me!" I ground my teeth. "I meant to tell you earlier, but in the face of that demon I forgot. Akor, he and that slug Caderan must have found a way to hide all trace of his passing from you and yours, even the smell of the Rakshasa!"