Shon'jir

"Answer.”

Sochil's head went back. Her glistening eyes nictitated and shed their tears, and she turned her back and stalked off.

Her people stood silent. They might have done something, Duncan thought, might have shown her support. But Melein would claim them; they would remain Sochil's only if Sochil would return challenge.

Sochil stopped in her retreat, among the ranks of her Kel, turned suddenly. "A'ani!" she cried. It was challenge.

Melein turned to Niun, and carefully he shed the belt of the zahen'ein, handed the modern weapons to Duncan; then with a bow to Melein, he turned and walked forward.

Likewise did Merai s'Elil.

Duncan stood still, the belt a weight in his hands. Melein laid her hand on his sleeve. "Kel Duncan: you understand ... you must not interfere.”

And she veiled herself and walked away through the en­emy kel'ein, and likewise did Sochil, in her wake. The wall of kel'ein reformed behind them.

There was silence, save for the whistling of the wind.

In the center of the circle and Niun and Merai took up their positions, facing one another at fencers' distance and a half. Each gathered a handful of sand and cast it on the wind.

Then the av'ein-kel, the great-swords, whispered from sheaths.

A pass, in which they exchanged position; the blades flashed, rang lightly against each other, rested. A second pass: and. kel Merai stopped, and seemed simply to forget where he was; and fell. The blade had not seemed to touch him.

But darkness spread over the sand beneath him.

Niun bent and gathered dust on his fingers, and smeared it across his brow… began, as if there were nothing else in the world, as if there were no watching ring of strangers, to cleanse his blade with a second handful of sand.

Then he straightened, sheathed the av-kel, stood still.

For a time there was only the flutter of robes in the wind. Then came a wail from the People beyond the ranks of the Kel.

Duncan stood still, lost; he saw, he heard, he watched the shifting of ranks: Niun also left him. He was forgotten in the confusion.

Men bore away the dead kel'anth, quietly, toward the desert. Soon enough came kel'ein bearing a bundle wrapped in white, and that shook Duncan's confidence: Sochil, he thought, hoping that he was right. How she had died, by whose hand, he had no means to tell. Many kel'ein attended that corpse away. Others spread black tents and made .a camp.

And the wan sun sank, and the wind grew cold; Duncan stood, in twilight, at the camp's edge, and watched the return of the burial parties… sank down to sit finally, for his legs grew numb and he had no more strength to stand in the cold and the wind.

There was a breathing near him: soft-footed, the dusei, when they chose to be. He felt them, and they came and nosed at him, identifying him. One ventured away; he called it back, Niun's dus. It came and settled uneasily with him. He was glad of their presence, less lonely with them, less afraid.

And after full dark he saw a tall shadow come out of the camp, and saw the gleam of moonlight on bronze-hilted weapons and on the zaidhe visor, and knew Niun even at great distance.

He rose. Niun beckoned, and he came, the dusei padding behind him.

There was no explanation, nothing. The dusei caught Niun's mood, that was still tense. They walked, they and the beasts, into the midst of the strange camp, into the largest of the tents.

Black-robes filled it, heads and bodies alike swathed in kel-cloth, veiled and expressionless; at one side was a small cluster of the eldest gold-robes, unveiled, and one ancient blue-robe, that sudden surmise told Duncan would be the kath'anth, senior of the Kath.

And one white, veilless figure seated at the end, that was Melein. Golden skins, golden, membraned eyes, all alike and only the beasts and himself were alien. Duncan walked the aisle Niun and the beasts made toward Melein, his heart beating in a lost, forlorn terror, for the dusei gathered the tension they felt and cast it back to him, and he forbade it to swell to rage: no enemies these, not now.

Nor friendly to him.

The dusei came to Melein's hand before they turned, as Niun took his place by her side and Duncan took the shadowed place behind her; the beasts began to pace back and forth, back and forth, eyeing the crowd with hostility scarcely contained.

"Yai!" Niun forbade them. The little one half-reared and came down again slowly, no play this time. The company did not flinch, but waves of fear were intense in their midst. The dusei snorted and came and settled between Niun and Duncan.

Hlil s'Sochfl, in the front rank of the Kel, rose and un­veiled; so did others. Hlil came bringing a handful of small gold objects, offered them into Niun's hands, and Niun un­veiled and took them, bowed; there was an easier feeling in the company then.

J'tai. Honor medals Merai's. Duncan listened, watched, as there came two kel'e'ein, a woman of years and another younger: to each Niun surrendered one of the j'tai kins­women of Merai, they were, proud and fierce: they touched Niun's hands, and bowed, and walked away, to settle again among their comrades.

More veils were put aside, all the Kel, eventually, yielding their faces to the sight of the Mother that had taken them.

Duncan kept his own, ashamed of his strangeness in this company, and hating his shame for it.

Kel'ein came, nine of them, old and young, to press the hand of Melein to their brows and give their names: Hus­bands, they proclaimed themselves, of Sochil.

"I accept you," Melein said, after all had done; and then she rose and touched Niun's arm. "This is born of a birth with me, and he is the she'pan's kel'en, and kel'anth over my Kel. Will any challenge?”

There was an inclining of heads, and no challenge.

And to Duncan's dismay, Melein took his hand, bringing him forward.

"There are no veils, Duncan," she whispered.

He dropped his, and even kel-discipline could not prevent the looks of shock.

"This is kel Duncan, Duncan-without-a-Mother. He is a friend of the People. That is my word. None will touch him.”

Again heads inclined, less readily. Released, Duncan re­treated into the shadows again and stood next the dusei. Challenge: if it came, Niun must answer it, would answer it. He was not competent for his own defense among them, Duncan-without-a-Mother, the man with no begi

"And listen to me now," Melein said softly, settling again to her chair, the only furniture in the tent. "Listen and I will open a Dark to the understanding of my companions; tell me Where you remember. These are the things that I know:

"That from this world came mri and elee and surai and ka-lath, and in the passing of years, the elee took the surai and kalath, and the mri lived in the shadow of the elee...

"That since An-ehon has stood, mri and elee knew the same cities, and shared...

"That the elee built and the mri defended.

"That as the sun faded and wealth declined, the ships went out They were slow, those ships, but with them the mri took worlds. There was wealth ...

"And war. Zahen'ein wars. Strangers' wars.”

"This is so," said the Sen, and the Kel and the kath'anth murmured in astonishment

"We would have made the folk of Kutath masters. The elee rejected us. Some mri rejected us. We continued the war. Whether we won or not, I do not know. Some of us stayed and some of us parted this world. Slow ships, and ages. Sometimes we fought We took service with strangers eighty and more times. What we have seen in our returning .. . the track of People that went out, ja-anom, is desolation.

"We came home. We thought that we were the last, and we are not. Eighty-three Darks. Eighty-three. We are all that survive, of all the millions that went out.”

"Ai," the People murmured, and eyes mirrored struggle to understand.

The eldest sen'en arose then, a man bent with age. "We have known Darks. That into which you went was one. That in which we remained was another. Tsi'mri came. We did not fall to them, and they did not come back. We had strength then, but it faded. No tsi'mri came again. And the cities died, and in the last years even the elee fought, elee against elee. It was a burden-bearer's war, and wasteful. We had a she'pan then named Gar'ai. She led us out into the mountains, where the elee could not live. Even then some of the People denied her Sight and would not come, and stayed in the elee cities, and died, fighting for bearers-of-burdens. Now the elee are fading, and we are strong. That is because we ca

Melein was silent for a long moment, then swept a glance about the assembly. "From a land like this came we. We do not fold our hands and wait to die. That is not what the she'pan of my birth taught.”

The words stung like a blow. Kel'ein straightened, and the sen'anth looked confused, and the kath'anth sat twisting her hands in her lap.

"Tsi'mri are following us," Melein said. "Armed.”

The dusei surged to their feet. Duncan moved for them flung his arms about them both, whispering to them.

"What have you brought us?" cried the sen'anth.

"A thing that must be faced," Melein snapped, and bodies froze in the attitudes that they then occupied. "We are mri! We were attacked and challenged, and will this remnant deny that you are also mri, and that I am she'pan of this edun, and of all the People?”

"Kel'anth," breathed an old kel'en, "ask permission to ask ... who, and when, and with what arms.”

"I answer," said Niun. "The People have another chance. Another life. Life is coming across this desert of dead worlds. We have it in our wake, and it can be seized!”

Duncan heard, and clenched his fists the tighter on the dusei's loose skin, close to shivering in the fever-warmth of the tent. They had forgotten him. Their eyes were on Niun, on the stranger-kel'anth, on a she'pan that promised and threatened them.

Hope.

It glittered in the golden eye's of the black-robed Kel, ven­tured timidly into the calculating faces of the Sen. Only the old kath'en looked afraid.

"An-ehon has given me its records," Melein said. "I have poured into An-ehon and into all the cities linked with him the sum of all that the People have gathered in our wanderings. We are armed, my children. We are armed. We were the last, my kel'anth and I. No more. No more. A last time the Kel goes out, and this time we are not for hire. This time we take no pay. This time is for ourselves.”