Earthfall (Homecoming) (39 page)

He was taken to Volemak’s house. Rasa saw at once what was happening, and she did not take it calmly. “You were always a snake, Elemak, but I thought you learned long ago that imprisoning Nafai accomplishes nothing.”

“Nafai’s not my prisoner,” said Elemak. “He’s just another citizen, doing his duty to the community.”

“What, am I supposed to have the good manners to pretend that I believe your lies?” asked Rasa.

“Lady Rasa,” said Elemak, “Nafai is my brother. But you are
not
my mother.”

“For which I give thanks to the Oversoul, you may be sure.”

Nafai finally broke his silence. “Mother, please. Keep peace. Elemak thinks he rules here, but this world belongs to the Keeper, not to him or any man. He has no power here.”

In another time, Elemak would have flown into a rage at those words, would have blustered and threatened, or lashed out in fury. But he was a different man now, a tempered man, a man of discipline and quiet, ruthless wisdom. He said nothing, merely watched until Nafai went into his father’s house. Then two digger soldiers were left to stand guard at the door.

Rasa went to the ship, to Shedemei. “I don’t think Elemak knows that you have the cloak now, Shedemei. You could use it to stop him, to strike him down.”

Shedemei shook her head. “I don’t know how to use it that well yet. I’m learning. It’s a terrible burden, this cloak. I don’t know how Nafai bore it.”

“Don’t you see that he’s helpless here? Elemak is going to kill him, probably tonight. He won’t let Nafai live till morning.”

“I know,” said Shedemei. “I received a message from Issib, through the Index. I hear him directly now, you know, wearing the cloak. He says that Luet dreamed a true dream last night. In the dream she saw all the digger soldiers asleep, and all those who follow Elemak. Asleep while you and Nafai and all the loyal men and women and children journeyed up the canyon, and then onward, higher and farther, to a new land.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

“I think—she thinks, and so does Issib, and so says the Oversoul—that it was a true dream. The Oversoul has power enough to put the humans to sleep. But since the dream came from the Keeper, perhaps we must trust that she, too, has the power to put her people to sleep.” Shedemei looked away. “I’m not familiar with this sort of thing. I wasn’t one to have visions. Just one dream, really, of a garden.”

Zdorab was sitting sourly in a corner. “She won’t take me with her,” he said. “She insists I have to go with Nafai and help start another damn colony.”

“You don’t
have
to,” said Shedemei.

“Or stay with Elemak—do you really think that’s a choice?” said Zdorab. “Reason with her, Rasa. I’m a librarian.”

“I’m just doing what the Oversoul advised,” said Shedemei. “She says that Zdorab will be needed.”

“But what about what I
want
?” demanded Zdorab. “Lady Rasa, haven’t I kept my oath to Nafai all these years? Haven’t I stood by him?”

“Perhaps now,” said Rasa, “is your chance to repay him for his forgiveness of your mistake during the voyage.”

Zdorab looked away.

“Can’t you take him with you?” asked Rasa.

“I want to,” whispered Shedemei. “But the Oversoul says not for now.”

“Then tell him that. Tell him it’s not for now,” said Rasa. “He thinks that it’s forever.”

From the corner Zdorab spoke again, and he was weeping. “Don’t you know, Shedemei, that I love you? Don’t you know that I don’t want to live without you?”

Tears came to Shedemei’s eyes, too. She whispered to Rasa, “I never thought he’d….”

“Love you?” asked Rasa. “You never think anyone will love you, but we do. Let him go with you, Shedemei. The Oversoul doesn’t know everything. She’s just a computer, you know.”

Shedemei nodded gravely, knowing perfectly well that Rasa did not believe for a moment that the Oversoul was nothing more than a machine. “Zdorab,” said Shedemei, “will you take the ship’s launch, to carry Lady Rasa and the heaviest burdens up the canyon? And then use it to take Issib and his chair, and Lady Rasa again, and bring them to the new place where the Nafari will start their colony?”

“I will,” said Zdorab.

“And then, when Nafai tells you he has no further use for the launch, would you be kind enough to bring it back to me here at the ship, so we can lift ourselves into orbit?”

He smiled. He embraced her.

“You know that the cloak will sustain my life,” she said. “Longer than is natural. And I intend to hibernate a lot, too, so I can have the time to study many generations of life and gather a great deal of data over time.”

“I don’t mind dying before you do,” said Zdorab. “In fact, I rather prefer it that way.”

“It’ll be work all the time,” said Shedemei.

“So you’ll need a secretary and librarian all the more.”

“And the salary is low,” she said.

“I’ve already been paid,” he answered her.

When darkness fell, the digger soldiers outside the door of Volemak’s house fell asleep. Nafai stepped out almost at once, and began going door to door, speaking quietly to his loyal supporters and gathering them at the forest’s edge. They were not silent, though they tried to be; there was no way to keep the little children from talking or, occasionally, crying or complaining. But no alarm was raised.

Chveya stood beside Nafai, looking at the ties still binding him to the people he was leaving behind. “If they’re asleep,” said Chveya, “doesn’t that mean the Oversoul doesn’t want them to go with you?”

“It doesn’t matter what the Oversoul wants this time,” said Nafai. “I’m taking anyone who wants to join me.”

Chveya nodded. “Well, then, I must tell you that you are still bound to Eiadh and three of her children.”

Nafai nodded. “But I don’t need to speak to her,” he said. “See? She’s coming.”

And it was true. She was accompanied by the young men Yistina and Peremenya and the young woman Zhivoya, the one who had been kidnapped twenty years before. Yistina and Peremenya had their wives with them, but Zhivoya’s husband, Muzhestvo, had not come. “He’s asleep and I can’t waken him,” she explained with tears in her eyes.

“You can stay with him,” said Nafai. “No one will blame you for that.”

She shook her head. “I know what he is,” she said. “I didn’t when I married him, but I know it now. He’s one of them. In his heart and soul, he’s one of them.” She put her hands on her stomach. “But the baby is mine.”

Eiadh touched Nafai’s arm. “You don’t have to take us, Nafai. I know the danger it puts you in. He’ll never forgive us for this. He’ll believe that you and I—”

“He’ll believe that you and I have done what he and Kokor and he and Sevet and probably he and Dol have already done.” Nafai nodded. “But you and I know that we haven’t and that we never will.”

Eiadh smiled wanly at the gentle way he made it very clear that she was coming as a fellow-citizen, and not as a lover.

“Then we’re all here,” said Chveya.

“No we’re not,” said Nafai. “I have to invite my sisters.”

“They’re sleeping with
him
, Father,” Chveya said. “Not to mention that they aren’t the most trustworthy people in the world.”

“Are we only taking the strong and virtuous?” he asked. “Their husbands are dead, and as you said, their morals have never been their best talent. But they’re my sisters.” He walked away, back into the village.

It was a ghost town, the doors standing open, the people gone or, in just a few of the houses now, deeply asleep. But when Nafai came to the door of Sevet’s house, there she stood in the doorway, looking sleepy and surprised. “I had a dream,” she said, when Nafai approached her. “I don’t even remember what it was, but it made me get up and here you are.”

“We’re leaving,” said Nafai. “Before Elemak has a chance to kill me, we’re leaving, everyone who would rather not live under his rule. We’re taking all the angels with us, and going to a new place far away.”

“He’ll track you down and kill you if he can,” said Sevet. “You don’t know how much hate there is in him.”

“Yes I do,” said Nafai. “Will you come with me?”

She began to weep. “Would you really take me, after all I’ve done?”

“Would you really come?” he asked. “Would you really stand with me now?”

“I’m so afraid of him,” she said. “And my Vasnaminanya and my Umya, they think the sun rises and sets with him.”

“But Panimanya is with us,” said Nafai.

“So am I,” said Sevet.

They went to Kokor’s door. It stood open, but she was not standing there as Sevet had been. They came inside, quietly, and found that she was not alone in her bed. Mebbekew lay beside her, naked and sweating in the damp heat of the night. But Mebbekew was asleep, while Kokor’s eyes were already open when they came inside.

They said nothing, for fear that Meb might come awake. Kokor looked at them in the darkness, blinking. Nafai nodded to her, beckoned, and then led Sevet outside. They waited several paces from the house. Soon she came out, still arranging her clothing. “You’re leaving,” she said softly. “I dreamed it.”

“Will you come with us?” asked Nafai.

Kokor looked at Sevet, her eyes widening. “Us?” she asked.

“You can stay with him if you want to, Kokor,” said Sevet. “I think he does love you.”

“He doesn’t love anybody,” said Kokor.

“I didn’t mean Meb,” said Sevet.

“I know,” said Kokor. “But can’t I come with you if I want to?”

“There’s no going back,” said Nafai. “And in our new city, we’ll respect the law.”

They understood what he was telling them. “I think perhaps we’ve had our fill,” said Sevet.

Kokor rolled her eyes. “I will never have my fill,” she said. “But I know it won’t be Basilica. I’ll be good.”

“Are you sure you wouldn’t be happier if you stayed?” asked Nafai.

“Don’t you want us to come with you?” asked Kokor.

“Of course I do,” he answered.

“Give us some credit, Nafai,” said Kokor. “We can tell the difference between you and Elemak. We know steel from cheap tin when we see it.”

“Then let’s go,” said Nafai. “There’s a long journey ahead of us tonight.”

Oykib was already leading the long procession out onto the forest path, so that only a few remained when Nafai got there, among them Rasa and Zdorab on the launch. Shedemei was there, too.

“Seal the ship,” said Nafai. “They can’t get in if you don’t let them.”

“I know,” she said. “The ship will be safe.”

“Don’t try to be heroic,” said Nafai. “We’ll be fine.”

“You need more than one night’s head start,” said Shedemei.

Nafai shook his head, obviously intending to argue further. But she reached out a hand and touched his lips to silence him. “Nyef, my dear friend, I’m the starmaster now. You go lead your colony into the wilderness. I will tend the ship and decide how the powers of the cloak are to be used.”

Shedemei embraced Rasa and Zdorab and then waved as the launch rose into the sky and soared over the tops of the trees, passing all the other travelers who were trudging along the road. Then she embraced Nafai and returned to the ship.

Nafai was the last to set out on the road. He thought he was alone, when suddenly he found himself surrounded by a dozen diggers. His first thought was that the Keeper had failed, that while the Oversoul was able to keep his human enemies asleep, the diggers had been able to awaken. This is how I’ll die, he thought.

Then he saw that they weren’t armed, and half of them were women.

“Take us with you,” said one of them in digger language.

Nafai wasn’t as fluent in that tongue as Oykib was, but he could understand them. “And live among the angels?” he asked. “They’ll never trust you.”

“We would rather be servants to the…angels,” said the woman who was speaking for them all. Nafai noticed that she did not say
skymeat
, but rather struggled to form her lips and tongue around the strange sounds of the angels’ own word for
people
. “Fusum is the most terrible god.”

Nafai nodded. “It will be hard for you among the angels,” he said, “but you have my protection, and I will trust you unless you teach me that I can’t. Do all of you take an oath to obey me and harm none of my people, humans or angels?”

They took the oath, and so he let them follow him. There was consternation among the angels when they arrived, but Nafai’s assurances and their own humble pleas won the grudging acceptance of the angels. It was still dark when they left the angel village empty, and set out into the new country to build a new city, of a new kind.

When, after many days of travel, they reached the place that Nafai had chosen years before, knowing that this day might come, pTo and Poto held a little ceremony. “A place must have a name,” they said. “And since we will always be known as the Nafari—” the word their lips pronounced was more like Dapati, but they were understood “—then we think this must now be called the land of Nafai—” Dapai “—and you are the one we choose to lead us all.”

The voices rang out so loud in approbation that Nafai could only smile and say, “No man could be more happily praised than to have his friends choose to name their home after him.” But despite the modesty of his words, they all knew what the naming meant. Nafai was their king. Their war king. And they would gladly die for him.