Minya wasn't feeling awkward yet, but there was the sense of a guest building inside her. Ilsa's pregnancy looked ludicrous, a bulge on a straight-edge. Like the others, she seemed to have adjusted to her new status with little difficulty. Once she had told Minys, "We know all our lives that the copsik runners might come for us. Well, they came."
A chain of huts ran along the underside of the branch. Moat of the women preferred to stay inside. They weren't all pregnant. Some were nursing their erstwhile guests. They all had work: knitting, sewing, preparation of food to be cooked at the treemouth.
The quiet was broken by a hurried rustling.
Then four people burst from the tunnel that led down from the examination hut: Jayan and Jinny, the supervisor Dloris, and a Navy man with his arm in a sling. Karal spotted her, ran to her, gripped her aim. She shied from his wildness.
"You're all right." He was gasping. "Good. Minya. Stay under the branch. Don't let anyone…anyone else go wandering."
"We don't tend to. We're too awkward. I thought men weren't allowed…
"I'm not staying. Minya, it's both elevators and at least one man, they're falling from thirty klomters up, and we don't know just where they'll hit. I've got to warn the children in the school complex." He pointed a finger at the tip of her nose. "Stay here!" And he sprinted for the tunnel, wobbling chest heaving.
If something happens, the Grad had said. Something was happening all right, but what? Would Dloris know?
Minya guessed where the supervisor would be. She moved down the line of huts and entered the last one as Dloris came through with Haryet. 'We've been counting," Dloris said. "Gwen's missing. Have you seen her? Three meters tall and pale as a ghost, with a year-old guest?"
"Not lately. What's happening?"
"Get those clothes out and drying and then put the fire out. Do you have lines? Good. Keep them handy." The two supervisors moved on.
Minya turned to Jayan and Jinny. "Give us a hand. Jinny, we're lucky you were around. We're all together now. Do you know what's happening?"
"No. Karal looked scared stiff."
"Is it war'?"
"Better stick to our task till we're sure," Ilsa said.
They pulled the clothing from the vat in a geid mass, manipulating it with poles. Some water remained. They inverted the vat and moved back while the water-glob flowed sluggishly out onto the fire. Live steam didn't rise fast enough in London Tree's feeble tide. It tended to expand in an invisible globe, scalding hot.
Minys had never seen that fire go out. Dioris must be expecting something drastic!
They continued to work. They set the laundry in the press and cranked two great wooden slabs together. Water squeezed out around the edges of the wad of clothing, then began to slide downward.
Something smashed through foliage, somewhere nearby.
They from Then Minya plunged into the branchiets with Jmny and Ilsa behind. They made their way toward the sound. Minya angled above where she thought it had stopped.
There, a trail of broken branchlets. She followed it down to the broken and twisted rempins of what had been a Navy officer. The corpse wore a sword, scabbarded, and a quiver that was still full, though the bow was missing.
"Now it's war," Minya said.
"We'll have to kill the supervisors," Ilsa said.
Minya jumped. "What?" It was as if a stone had spoken. "Never mind, you're right. I thought you were…I thought you'd given up."
Ilsa only shook her head.
West takes you in. In takes you east. At first the Grad held the bow window pointed straight down. They dropped smoothly…faster he swung the cairn to point west and fired aft jets to correct as it drifted away from the trunk.
His passengers were rigid with terror, save for Lawri, who was rigid with fury.
They still had a passenger on the hull.
Anthon's voice wanted to stutter. He wouldn't let it. "I want to point out that we could go back to Carther States now. We've got the silver man and the cairn. These copsik runners don't own anything they value more. We can trade for your copsiks."
That actually sounded sensible. The Grad said, "Clave?"
"Feed it to the tree."
Anthon said, "You want to kill some copsik runners. AU right, I can underst—"
"I want to rescue them myself! I am the Quinn Tribe Chairman.
They are entitled to my protection." Clave spat the word: "Trade! They attacked us, we attacked them. We've got the carm and we'll have our people too. All right, Grad-Scientist — have you got an opinion?"
They were dropping too fast. The Grad swung the carm nosedown and fired forward jets. He said, "Nice of you to ask. We've got the Scientist's Apprentice and the silver suit and the only man alive who can fit into it. Maybe they would trade. We keep the carm."
"Never," said Lawri. "Trade with copsiks!"
Anthon and Clave looked at each other. The Grad said, "Never mind," and they laughed. Lawri's tone of voice said it all.
Minya stopped and looked out through a screen of branchiets.
The supervisors had found Gwen. Haryet was scolding her as they led her toward the huts. Haryet was second-generation copsik, shorter than Minya; she looked tiny beside her very pregnant captive.
They'll have heard us coming Minya thought. Jinny must have realized that too. She stepped out through the crackling foliage, ten meters east of Minya's position. Good! They'll think they heard one not two. Dioris came toward Jinny with thunder in her face. Breaking new paths was strictly forbidden.
Minya emerged behind Haryet and stabbed her.
Gwen turned with her baby in her arms and shrieked. Dloris whirled and stared. Perhaps this place of mothers and babies had given the supervisor a false sense of safety. She reacted slowly. Before she could reach her truncheon, Jinny was pinning her arms and Minya was running at her in long, low leaps.
Dioris flipped forward. Jinny flew over her back: and came spinning at Minya, who lost a moment sidestepping. Then Dioris held half a meter of hardwood at guard, but she faced a Navy sword.
"Wait," she said. "Wait."
"My child will not be born a copsik!" Minya screamed and lunged.
Dloris danced backward. The tunnel was behind her, and Minya knew she bad to stop the supervisor from reaching it. She ran at her, ready to bat the truncheon aside. Then Jayan and Ilsa were moving into place behind Dloris. Jayan held the big paddle well up the haft, blade first, like a two-handed sword.
Dioris dropped her truncheon. "Don't kill me. Please."
"Dioris, tell us what's happening."
"Carther States is all over the trunk. I don't know who's winning."
"Have they got the carm?"
"The cairn?" Dioris showed nothing but astonishment.
They tied her with line. Ilsa wanted to do more; Minya knew Dioris too well to allow it. She wouldn't have killed Haryet either, if…if.
Gavving watched the carm descend in fire. Patry was talking to his box, too far away for Gavving to hear; but the Navy officer looked furious and frightened.
He caught Gavving watching him. "You! All of you! Stay where you are! Move and you'll be shot. Do you understand? Amy, take cover."
The two Navy men disappeared into the foliage. Presently Alfin said,
"We're bait."
"There's only two."
Horse asked, "Do you really think your friends have the carm? What will they do with it?"
"Rescue us," Gavving said with more assurance than he felt. "Alfin, when it comes down, jump for the doors and hope they open."
Alfin snorted. "You've got to be out of your mind. Look at that thing, you want to ride in it?"
"I'll ride anything to get out of here, if I can take Minya."
"You don't have Minya. Listen, Gavving. I remember you with your eyes red and half-closed and crying in rivers. They make their own weather here! Nobody starves, nobody goes thirsty. It's a good, healthy tree with a good crop of earthilfe. I've got a responsible position—"