Lanefenuu saw these expressions clearly when Vaintè approached and accepted them as was her due. Her advisers drew back to make room for Vaintè in the attendant circle.
“An uruketo has arrived with reports and questions,” Lanefenuu said. “The thought of it stirs me and I feel the need to once more breathe the air of sea-girt Ikhalmenets. I have been too long here and my nose-flaps close at the stench of ustuzou and smoke that drenches this city.”
“It will be cleansed, Eistaa, just as you cleansed the city of the ustuzou who befouled it.”
“Gracefully said and appreciated. Ukhereb will remain here and will oversee that process. It is a scientific one and not a political one so it will be her responsibility. Yours will be to watch and guard and preserve the city for the Yilanè. Is there clarity of meaning here?”
“With certainty, Eistaa. We shall not rule together but work together, one to build, one to guard. There is only one ruler here.”
“Agreed. Now tell me of the ustuzou.”
“Those that fled north are all dead. Though we are on constant guard, keeping watch in all directions always in case some are in hiding, for they are as deadly as serpents when concealed by the forest.”
Lanefenuu signed agreement and understanding, with more than a trace of unhappiness.
“How well I am aware of that. Far too many Yilanè are dead who should have lived to see this city theirs again.”
“Good meat cannot be prepared without the death of a beast.” Vaintè offered this, with overtones of understanding, in an attempt at solace. But Lanefenuu’s temper was short this day.
“There were just a few too many deaths, far more than you led me to believe. But that is in the past — though I still grieve for Erafnais who was close to me. There is a gap in my existence that she and that great uruketo filled.”
The way the Eistaa shaded her meaning it seemed almost as if the loss of the uruketo, not the commander, was the more important. The listening circle stood motionless and obedient. As she reminded them, quite often, Lanefenuu had commanded an uruketo herself, before her elevation to Eistaa, so her feelings could be appreciated. When Lanefenuu silently touched thumb to arm in cognition of sadness-loss they echoed the motion sympathetically. But the Eistaa was too much a Yilanè of action to brood long. She looked at Vaintè with a query.
“Your ustuzou then, they are all gone?”
“Fleeing in fear and despair. We watch them at all times.”
“None are close?”
“None. To the north, death. To the west — death follows and retribution waits.”
“And you are sure of their destination?”
“I know where they go for I have been there before, seen it for myself. Their city will be their trap, their death. They shall not escape.”
“They did last time,” Lanefenuu said with brutal frankness.
Vaintè moved with remorse and acknowledgment of truth, hoping that her signs were strong enough to conceal her more than slight feelings of anger at this reminder. “I know this and accept the Eistaa’s rebuke. If there is any value in past defeat it is preparation for future victory. This time the attack will be more subtle and more prolonged. The vines of death will grow about their city, throttle and kill it. There will be only corpses.”
“That is acceptable — as long as they are ustuzou corpses. You were profligate with fargi on your last visit there. It will take an efenburu of males at the birth-beaches to replenish them.”
Vaintè, like the others, stated only motionless acceptance. The Eistaa could be as vulgar as a low crew member when she wanted to be — but she was still Eistaa and could do just as she wished.
“After I leave you will command Yilanè and fargi of my city — and I hold each one of them dear.”
“Their existence respected,” Vaintè said, “guarded with my own life. My gratitude is great that you will permit me to pursue and kill these creatures before they can return and attack again. I will do this as I have been bid, filled with awareness of the preciousness of all Ikhalmenets lives to you.”
There was no more to be said on the subject and when Vaintè asked for respectful withdrawal a motion of the Eistaa’s thumb released her. She left the ambesed without unseemly haste, but once out of sight she moved faster in the gathering dusk. It was almost nightfall and she was most anxious to hear what Naalpè had to report.
The uruketo had been secured to the wharf where its cargo was still being unloaded. Its commander stood to one side, but when she saw Vaintè approach she signed one of her officers to take command and went to meet her.
“Greetings, Vaintè,” signs of greatest respect. “Information to be conveyed, privacy important.”
They moved out of sight of any watchers before Naalpè spoke again.
“As requested I stopped at Yebèisk upon our return voyage from Ikhalmenets. I spoke with many there and it was easy to learn of the one whose name you gave me because none talk of any other matter.”
“Clarification of meaning requested.” Vaintè was polite and concealed her growing impatience.
“This Enge, the Daughter of Death of whom you spoke, she went boldly to the eistaa and told of her beliefs, and for this she was imprisoned with others of her kind…”
“Excellent, most excellent and warming information, kind Naalpè—” She broke off as she saw the commander’s signs of agitation and alarm.
“Not like that, not at all. How it happened does not seem to be clear, the details confused by time-elapsed and many opinions. What did happen I can vouch for with sincerity, because I myself talked to the commander of the uruketo. She spoke to me as she would to no other since ours is the same labor, told me what happened.”
“But — what did happen?”
“The Enge you inquired after, she and all of the others, the others being all of the Daughters of Death in the city of Yebèisk, they boarded the uruketo and left. They could not be followed. No one knows where they have gone.”
Vaintè froze, incapable of speech, her thoughts racing in circles of unknowingness. What could it mean? How had they done it? Who had aided her? How many were they? Gone where?
She spoke this last aloud but there was none to answer her.
“Gone… but where!?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
This island in the river delta was low-lying and half swamp. But a cypress tree had taken root on the southern tip, grown high and wide, its leafy branches creating a welcome pool of shade and relief from the blistering sun. Most of the Daughters were assembled here now, luxuriating in close study of Ugunenapsa’s words. The circle of intent students sitting rigid with the effort of concentration, following Enge’s every gesture and sound. When she had finished her explanation there was only silence as each looked inside herself, seeing if Ugunenapsa’s words were hers as well.
“Questions?” Enge said.
Long moments passed before one of the students, a young, slim Yilanè, a recent convert, tentatively made a motion of attention. Enge signed authority-for-speaking. The student sought for clarity of expression, then spoke.
“Before Ugunenapsa recorded her thoughts, made this momentous discovery, were there others who, perhaps, contribution-of-effort…” She stumbled over her question and Enge came to her rescue.
“Are you asking if Ugunenapsa, our teacher was first in everything — or did she learn from earlier teachers and thinkers?” The student expressed grateful agreement. “If you study Ugunenapsa’s works closely you will find her discussing just this question. She did seek guidance from all the Yilanè thinkers who were concerned with the questions of life and death, but found none to aid her, no prior reference to the problem of its possible solution. When she sought for an explanation of this, for she was humble and would not think that she alone had been graced with singular knowledge, she reached a certain conclusion. What lives and what dies? she asked herself. A Yilanè may die, but a Yilanè city lives forever. Yet at just this time a Yilanè city had died, the first one ever recorded for she searched and searched and found no mention of any other. Yet a city had died of the cold. Then she turned the question over and asked it from the other side. If a city can live and not die — why cannot a Yilanè live and not die? A city had died, just as a Yilanè dies. She was humble and did not believe that the city had died just to lead her to her discoveries. But grateful also in that from death she had discovered life…”