Страница 112 из 133
“Will you come up?” Daniel asked.
“Go,” Tejef ordered. “Put yourself in the hands of one of the kamethi and he will escort you there at your asking.”
“Yes, sir.” Daniel bowed with quiet courtesy and walked away to the lift. It was kalliran, Tejef realized belatedly, and was warmed by the fact that Daniel had chosen to pay him that respect, for humans did not generally use that custom. It filled him with regret for the clean spaciousness of Ashanome,for familiar folk of honorable habits and predictable nature.
The lift ascended, and Tejef turned away toward the door of the dhis,troubled by the harachiaof the place where Margaret had lain, a dent in the metal paneling where her fragile body had hit. She had often disadvantaged him, held him from vaikkaagainst humans and amaut, shamed him by her attentions. It was not the deference of a kameth but the tenacious m’melakhiaof a nasith-tak—but of course there was no takkhenes,no oneness in it; and it depended not at all on him. She simply chose to belong to him and him to belong to her, and the solitary determination of her had an arastietheabout it which made him suspect that he was the recipient of a vaikkahe could only dimly comprehend.
He was bitterly ashamed of the grief his perverted emotion had brought her in all things, for in one private part of his thoughts he knew absolutely what he had done, saw through his own pretenses, and began now to suspect that he had hurt her in ways no iduve could comprehend. For the first time he felt the full helplessness of himself among a people who could not pay him the arastiethehis heart needed, and he felt fouled and grieved at the offering they did give him. The contradictions were madness; they gathered about him like a great darkness, in which nothing was understandable.
“Sir?” Arle was in the doorway again, looking up at him with great concern ( arastiethe? Vaikka?) in her kallia-like eyes. “Sir, where’s Daniel?”
“Gone. Up. With Margaret. With Dlechish. He can talk for her. She has great avoidance for amaut: I think all humans have this. But Dlechish—he cares for her; and Daniel will stay with her.” It was one of the longest explanations in the human language he had attempted with anyone but Margaret or Gordon. He saw the anger in the child’s eyes soften and yield to tears, and he did not know whether that was a good sign or ill. Humans wept for so many causes.
“Is she going to die?”
“Maybe.”
The honest answer seemed to startle the child; yet he did not know why. Plainly the injuries were serious. Perhaps it was his tone. The tears broke.
“Why did you have to hit her?” she cried.
He frowned helplessly. He could not have spoken that aloud had he been fluent. And out of the plenitude of contradictions that made up humans, the child reached for him.
He recoiled, and she laced her fingers together as if the compulsion to touch were overwhelming. She gulped down the tears. “She loves you,” she said. “She said you would never want to hurt anybody.”
“I don’t understand,” he protested; but he thought that some gesture of courtesy was appropriate to her distress. Because it was what Margaret would have done, he reached out to her and touched her gently. “Go back to the dhis.”
“I’m afraid in there,” she said. The tears began again, and stopped abruptly as Tejef seized her by the arms and made her straighten. He cuffed her ever so lightly, as a dhisaiswould a favored but misbehaving child.
“This is not proper—being afraid. Stand straight. You are nas.” And he let her go very suddenly when he realized the phrase he had thoughtlessly echoed. He was ashamed. But the child did as he told her, and composed herself as he had done for old Nophres.
“May I please go up and stay with Margaret too, sir?”
“Later. I promise this.” The prospect did not please him, having her outside the dhis,but the illusions must cease, for both their sakes: the child was human, and there was no one left in the dhisto care for her. The time was fast ru
“Are you going there now?” Arle asked.
“Yes,” he conceded. He looked back at her standing there, fingers still clenched together. “Come,” he said then, holding out his hand. “Come, now. With me.”
Most of the lights in the paredreof Ashanomewere out save the ones above the desk, but Chimele knew well the shadowy figure that opened the hall door, a smallish and somewhat heavy iduve who crossed the carpets on silent feet. She straightened and lifted her chin from her hand to gaze on Rakhi’s plump, earnest face.
“You were to sleep,” he chided. “Chimele, you must sleep.”
“I shall. I wanted to know how you fared. Sit, Rakhi. How is Chaikhe?”
“Well enough, and bound for Weissmouth. We considered, and decided it would be best to pursue this adjustment long-distance.”
“But is the asuthithekkhebearable, Rakhi?”
The nasithgave a weak grin and massaged his freshly scarred temple. “Chaikhe bids your affairs prosper, Chimele-Orithain. She is very much with me at this moment.”
“I bid hers prosper, most earnestly. But now you must close down that contact. We two must talk a moment. Can you do so?”
“I am learning,” he replied, and leaned back with a sigh. “Done. Done. Au,Chimele, this is a fearsome closeness. It is embarrassing.”
“O my Rakhi,” said Chimele in distress, “Khasif is gone. Now I have sent Ashakh in his place, and to risk you and Chaikhe at once—”
“Why, it is a light thing,” he said. “Do not mere m’metaneiadjust to this? Is our intelligence not equal to it? Is our self-control not more than theirs?”
She smiled dutifully at his spirit. It was not as easy as Rakhi said, and she did not miss the trembling of his hands, the pain in his eyes; and for Chaikhe, katasathe,such proximity to a half sramale must be torment indeed. But of the three remaining nasithi-katasakkethis pairing had seemed best, for Ashakh’s essentially solitary nature would have made asuthithekkhemore painful still.
“Chaikhe is really bearing up rather well,” said Rakhi, “but I fear I shall have Ashakh to deal with when he sees her on Priamos and knows that I have—in a ma
“Well, you must advise Chaikhe to avoid harachia.Ashakh must remain ignorant of this arrangement, for I fear he could complicate matters beyond redemption. And do not you fail me, Rakhi. I have been confounded by one dhisaismale human, and if you develop any symptoms I insist you warn me immediately.”
Rakhi laughed outright, although he flushed dark with embarrassment. “Truly, Chimele, asuthithekkheis not so impossible for iduve as it was always supposed to be. Chaikhe and I—we maintain a discreet distance in our minds. We leave one another’s emotions alone, and I suppose it has helped that I am a very lazy fellow and that Chaikhe’s m’melakhiais directed toward her songs and the child she carries.”
“Rakhi, Rakhi, you are always deprecating yourself, and that is a metanetrait.”
“But it is true,” Rakhi exclaimed. “Quite true. I have a very profound theory about it. Chaikhe and I would be at each other’s throats otherwise. Could you imagine the result of an asuthithekkhebetween Ashakh and myself? I shudder at the thought. His arastiethewould devour me. But the direction of m’melakhiais the essential thing. Chaikhe and I have no m’melakhiatoward each other. In truth,” he added upon a thought, “the m’metaneimisinformed us, for they said strong m’melakhiaone for the other is essential. I shall make a detailed record of this experience. I think it is unique.”