As he had hoped, the courtyard was empty when he returned. He went straight to Father's room, through the public room and the library to the private place where he slept alone. There he lay on the bare floor, without a mat of any kind, his white beard spilling onto the stone. Nafai stood there a moment, imagining the throat cut open and the beard stained brownish red with the gush of blood.
Then he noticed that Father's eyes were shining. He was awake.
"Are you the one?" whispered Father.
"What do you mean?" asked Nafai.
Father sat up, slowly, wearily. "I had a dream. It was nothing-just my fear."
"Someone else had a dream tonight," said Nafai. "I talked to her just now in the traveler's room. But it's better if you tell no one that she was here."
"Who?"
"Luet," he said. "And her dream was to warn you of the meeting tonight. There's murder waiting for you if you go."
Father sprang to his feet and turned on the light. Nafai blinked in the brightness of it. "Then it wasn't just a dream I had."
"I'm beginning to think there are no meaningless dreams," said Nafai. "I also dreamed, and it woke me, and the Oversoul brought me outside to talk to her."
"Murder waiting for me. I can guess the rest. He'll murder Roptat also, and make it look like one of us killed the other, and then someone else killed the murderer, and only then will Gaballufix arrive, probably with several believable witnesses who can swear that the murders took place before Gabya arrived. They'll tell of how shocked he was by the bloody scene. Why didn't I see it myself? How else could he get me and Roptat to the same place at the same time, with no followers or witnesses about?"
"So you won't go," said Nafai.
"Yes," said Father. "I'll go, yes."
"No!"
"But not to the coolhouse," said Father. "Because my dream showed me something else."
"What?"
"Tents," he said. "My tents, spread wide in the desert sun. If we stay, Gaballufix will only try again, in some other way. And-there are other reasons for leaving. For getting my sons out of this city before it destroys them."
Nafai knew that Father's dream must have been terrible indeed. Did it show him that one of his sons would kill him? That would explain Father's first words-Are you the one?
"So we're going into the desert?"
"Yes," said Father.
"When?"
"Now, of course."
"Now? Today?"
"Now, tonight. Before dawn. So we're over the ridge before his men can see us."
"But won't we pass right by Gaballufix's household, where Twisting Trail crosses Desert Road?"
"There's a back way," said Father. "Not the best for camels, but we'll have to do it. It puts us on Desert Road well past Gabya's place. Now come, help me waken your brothers."
"No," said Nafai.
Father turned to him, puzzlement making him hesitate to express his anger at being disobeyed.
"Luet asked-that no one be told it was her. And she was right. They shouldn't know about me, either. It should be your dream."
"Why?" asked Father. "To have three be touched tonight by the Oversoul-"
"Because if it's your dream, then they'll wonder what you know, what you saw. But if there are others, then to them it will seem that we're fooling and manipulating you. They'll argue. They'll resist you. And you have to bring them with you, Father."
Father nodded. "You're very wise," he said. "For a boy of fourteen."
But Nafai knew he was not wise. He simply had the benefit of knowing the rest of Luet's dream. If Meb and Elya stayed behind, they would be wholly swallowed up in Gaballufix's machinations. They would lose what decency remained in them. And there must be goodness in them. Perhaps they even planned to warn Father. Maybe that's why Elya closed the inner gate, so that he'd be wakened by the noise Father made as he left-then he could come out and warn Father not to go!
Or perhaps he meant only to follow Father, so he could be right behind him when he came upon Roptat's murdered body in the ice house.
No! cried Nafai inside himself. Not Elemak. It's monstrous of me even to think that he could do that. My brothers are not murderers, not one of them.
"Go to your room," said Father. "Or better still, to the toilet. And then come out and set an example of silent obedience. Not to me-to Elya. He knows how to pack for this kind of trip."
"Yes, Father," said Nafai.
At once he moved briskly from Father's room, through the library and public room, and out into the courtyard. Elemak's and Mebbekew's doors were still closed. Nafai headed for the latrine, with its two walls leaving it open to the courtyard. He was only just there when he heard Father knocking on Mebbekew's door. "Wake up, but quietly," said Father. Then again, on Elemak's. "Come out into the courtyard."
He heard them all come out-Issib, too, though no one called him directly.
"Where's Nyeft" asked Issib.
"Using the latrine," said Father.
"Now that's an idea," said Meb.
"You can wait a moment," said Father.
Nafai came out of the stall, letting the toilet wash itself automatically behind him. At least Father hadn't made them live in a completely primitive way.
"Sorry," said Nafai. "Didn't mean to keep you waiting." Meb glowered at him, but too sleepily for Nafai to take it as a threat of a fight to come.
"We're leaving," Father said. "Out into the desert."
"All of us?" asked Issib.
"I'm sorry, yes," said Father. "You'll be in your chair. It's not the same as your floats, I know, but it's something."
"Why?" asked Elemak.
"I was warned by the Oversoul in a dream," said Father.
Meb made a contemptuous noise and started back for his room.
"You will stand and listen," said Father, "because if.you stay, it will not be as my son."
Meb stood and listened, though his back was still toward Father.
"There's a plot to kill me," said Father. "This morning.
I was to go to a meeting with Gaballufix and Roptat, and there I was going to die."
"Gabya gave me his word," said Elemak. "No harm to anyone."
So Elemak called Gaballufix by his boy-name now, did he?
"The Oversoul knows his heart better than his own mouth does," said Father. "If I go, I'll die. And even if I don't, it will be only a matter of time. Now that Gaballufix has determined to kill me, my life is worthless here. I would stay in the city if I thought some purpose would be served by my dying here-I'm not afraid of it. But the Oversoul has told me to leave."
"In a dream," said Elemak.
"I don't need a dream to tell me that Gaballufix is dangerous when he's crossed," said Father, "and neither do you. When I don't shdw up at the coolhouse this morning, there's no telling what Gaballufix will do. I must already be out on the desert when he discovers it. We'll take Redstone Path."
"The camels can't do it," said Elemak.
"They can because they must," said Father. "We'll take enough to live for a year."
"This is monstrous, " said Mebbekew. "I won't do it."
"What do we do after a year?" asked Elemak.
"The Oversoul will show me something by then," said Father.
"Maybe things will have calmed down in Basilica enough to return," suggested Issib.
"If we go now," said Elemak, "Gaby^ will think you betrayed him, Father."
"Will he?" said Father. "And if I stay, he'll betray me?
"Said a dream."
"Said my dream," said Father. "I need you. Stay if you want, but not as my son."