The Anything Box

Things
Viat came back from the camp of the Strangers, his crest shorn, the devi
ripped from his jacket, his mouth slack and drooling and his eyes empty. He
sat for a day in the sun of the coveti center, not even noticing when the
eager children gathered and asked questions in their piping little voices.
When the evening shadow touched him, Viat staggered to his feet and took two
steps and was dead.
The mother came then, since the body was from her and could never be alien,
and since the emptiness that was not Viat had flown from his eyes. She signed
him dead by pinning on his torn jacket the kiom—the kiom she had fashioned the
day he was born, since to be born is to begin to die. He had not yet given his
heart, so the kiom was still hers to bestow. She left the pelu softly alight
in the middle of the kiom because Viat had died beloved. He who dies beloved
walks straight and strong on the path to the Hidden Ones by the light of the
pelu. Be the pelu removed, he must wander forever, groping in the darkness of
the unlighted kiom.
So she pinned the kiom and wailed him dead.
There was a gathering together after Viat was given back to the earth.
Backs were bent against the sun, and the coveti thought together for a
morning. When the sun pointed itself into their eyes, they shaded them with
their open palms and spoke together.
"The Strangers have wrought an evil thing with us." Dobi patted the dust
before him. "Because of them, Viat is not. He came not back from the camp.
Only his body came, breathing until it knew he would not return to it."
"And yet, it may be that the Strangers are not evil. They came to us in
peace. Even, they brought their craft down on barrenness instead of scorching
our fields." Deci's eyes were eager on the sky. His blood was hot with the
wonder of a craft dropping out of the clouds, bearing strangers. "Perhaps
there was no need for us to move the coveti."
"True, true," nodded Dobi. "They may not be of themselves evil, but it may
be that the breath of them is death to us, or perhaps the falling of their
shadows or the silent things that walk invisible from their friendly hands. It
is best that we go not to the camp again. Neither should we permit them to
find the coveti."
"Cry them not forbidden, yet!" cried Deci, his crest rippling. "We know
them not. To taboo them now would not be fair. They may come bearing gifts
…"
"For gifts given, something always is taken. We have no wish to exchange
our young men for a look at the Strangers." Dobi furrowed the dust with his
fingers and smoothed away the furrows as Viat had been smoothed away.
"And yet," Veti's soft voice came clearly as her blue crest caught the
breeze, "it may be that they will have knowledge for us that we have not.
Never have we taken craft into the clouds and back."
"Yes, yes!" Deci's eyes embraced Veti, who held his heart. "They must have
much knowledge, many gifts for us."
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"The gift of knowledge is welcome," said Tefu in his low rumble. "But gifts
in the hands have fangs and bonds."
"The old words!" cried Deci. "The old ways do not hold when new ways
arrive!"
"True," nodded Dobi. "If the new is truly a way and not a whirlwind or a
trail that goes no place. But to judge without facts is to judge in error. I
will go to the strangers."
"And I." Tefu's voice stirred like soft thunder. "And I? And I?" Deci's
words tumbled on themselves and the dust stirred with his hurried rising.
"Young—" muttered Tefu.
"Young eyes to notice what old eyes might miss," said Dobi. "Our path is
yours." His crest rippled as he nodded to Deci.
"Deci!" Veti's voice was shaken by the unknown. "Come not again as Viat
came. The heart you bear with you is not your own."
"I will come again," cried Deci, "to fill your hands with wonders and
delights." He gave each of her cupped palms a kiss to hold against his return.
Time is not hours and days, or the slanting and shortening of shadows. Time
is a held breath and a listening ear.
Time incredible passed before the ripple through the grass, the rustle
through reeds, the sudden sound of footsteps where it seemed no footsteps
could be. The rocks seemed to part to let them through.
Dobi led, limping, slow of foot, flattened of crest, his eyes hidden in the
shadow of his bent head. Then came Tefu, like one newly blind, groping,
reaching, bumping, reeling until he huddled against the familiar rocks in the
fading sunlight.
"Deci?" cried Veti, parting the crowd with her cry. "Deci?"
"He came not with us," said Dobi. "He watched us go." "Willingly?" Veti's
hands clenched over the memory of his mouth. "Willingly? Or was there force?"
"Willingly?" The eyes that Tefu turned to Veti saw her not. They looked
within at hidden things. "Force? He stayed. There were no bonds about him." He
touched a wondering finger to one eye and then the other. "Open," he rumbled.
"Where is the light?" 'Tell me," cried Veti. "Oh, tell me!" Dobi sat in the
dust, his big hands marking it on either side of him.
"They truly have wonders. They would give us many strange things for our
devi." His fingers tinkled the fringing of his jacket. "Fabrics beyond our
dreams. Tools we could use. Weapons that could free the land of every
flesh-hungry kutu."
"And Deci? And Deci?" Veti voiced her fear again.
"Deci saw all and desired all. His devi were ripped off before the sun slid
an arm's reach. He was like a child in a meadow of flowers, clutching,
grabbing, crumpling and finding always the next flower fairer."
Wind came in the silence and poured itself around bare shoulders.
"Then he will return," said Veti, loosening her clenched hand. "When the
wonder is gone."
"As Viat returned?" Tefu's voice rumbled. "As I have returned?" He held his
hand before his eyes and dropped his fingers one by one. "How many fingers
before you? Six? Four? Two?"
"You saw the Strangers, before we withdrew the coveti. You saw the strange
garments they wore, the shining roundness, the heavy glitter and thickness.
Our air is not air for them. Without the garments, they would die."
"If they are so well wrapped against the world, how could they hurt?" cried
Veti. 'They cannot hurt Devi. He will return."
"I returned," murmured Tefu. "I did but walk among them and the misting of