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Rakhi,thought Chaikhe distractedly, there is a bit of Chaxal in your blood after all. You sound like Ashakh, or Chimele.
Sit down,he ordered rudely, and remember that Tejef hasarastiethe enough to choose his own moment. What chance has he of outlasting us, withAshanome overhead? He knows that he must die, but he will try to make the terms not to our liking. This is not the moment for tempers,nasith-tak.
She flared for a moment, but acknowledged reason when she heard it, and sca
“Quite true, nasith-tak.”
And at this point even Ashakh could not keep this ship functioning,she continued bitterly. Chimele knew my power on this world and she knew Tejef’s, and she drew back one ship that we might have had down here. She might have made me capable of attack, not only of defense. Am I only bait,nasith? Was I only a lure, and did she deceive me with half-truths as she did Khasif and Ashakh?
“‘Impertinence!’” Chimele judged, when Rakhi conveyed that to her; and the impact of her anger was unsettling.
Did you deceive me?
“ ‘Your question was not heard and your attitude was not perceived, nasith.However I use you, I will not be challenged. Follow my orders.’ ”
Tell her my shields are failing.
“ ‘Continue in my orders.’ ”
Hail Chimele,she said bitterly, but Rakhi did not translate the bitterness. Tell me I am honored by her difficulty with me. But of course I am going to comply. Honor toAshanome, and to the last of us. Walk warily, Rakhi. May thenasul live.
Rakhi stopped translating. Akatasthe ought to show more respect for one who can destroy her or exile her forever. Be sensible. The Orithain’s honor isAshanome’s. Are youtakkhe? Au, Chaikhe, are you?
I amdhisais! she raged at him. I amakita! Not even Chimele has power over me.And Rakhi fled for a moment, struggling with the impulses of his own body. His blood raced faster, his borrowed fierceness tore at his nerves, tormented by Chimele’s harachia.
“We shall both be fit for the red robes,” came Rakhi’s slight mind-touch, his wonted humor a timorous thing now, and soft. “Chaikhe, do not press me further, do not.”
About the ship the shields flared once more under attack, shimmering in and out of the visible spectrum as they died, an eerie aurora effect in the late morning sun. Chaikhe shuddered, feeling the dying of the ship, wild impulses in serachand to death at war with the life in her.
Think!Rakhi’s male sanity urged.
Tesyel:her mind reached for the idoikkheof the kameth of the base ship, a last message. I shall leave you power enough to safeguard yourself and get offworld. I do not require you forserach. A world will be quite enough. See to your own survival.
“Are you hurt?” His kalliran voice came through with anxious stress. Tesyel was a good man, but he had his people’s tendency to become personally involved in others’ crises. Perhaps in the labyrinthine kalliran ethic he conceived that he had suffered some sort of nisethin being shown inadequate to ward off the misfortune of Ashanome, m’metanethough he was. In some situations a kallia had a fierce m’melakhiaof responsibility.
I am not injured,said Chaikhe, and you are without further responsibility, kameth. You have shown greatelethia in my service. Now I return you to thenasul. Do nothing without directly consultingAshanome.
“I am honored to have served you,” murmured the kameth sadly. His voice was almost lost in static. “But if I—”
The static drowned him out. In the next moment the shields collapsed. The control room went black for a few seconds. Chaikhe sought desperately to restructure the failed mechanisms, bypassing safety devices.
The attack resumed. Overheated metal stank. Light went out and dimly returned. A whining of almost harmonic sound pulsed through the ship’s structure. Power was dying altogether.
Chaikhe mind-touched the doors through to the airlock, desperately seeking air. Reserve batteries were fading too, and she fought to reach the door in the dark and the roiling smoke, choking. She fell.
Long before she knew anything else she was aware of Rakhi’s frantic pleading, trying with his own will to animate her exhausted body.
And then she knew another thing, that someone trod the i
“Chimele forbids,” Rakhi told her, and that stu
Forbids? What is she about to do?
Her senses reeled. Her eyes poured water, stung by the smoke, and she hurled herself blindly down the corridor.
A squat amaut shadow stood outlined against the smoke-filled light from the airlock. Chaikhe had never felt real menace in a non-iduve before: this being radiated it, a cold sickly m’melakhiathat came over her crisis-heightened sensitivity. It was repugnant. She had received from kalliran minds before, particularly in katasukke;it was a talent suspect and embarrassedly hidden, e-chanokhia.Kallia held a cleanly muddle of stresses and inhibitions, cramped but intensely orderly. This creature was venomous.
“My lady,” it said with a bow, “ BnesychGerlach at your service, my lady.”
Chaikhe felt the almost- takkhenesof the child in her. Her lips quivered. Her vision blurred at the edges and became preternaturally clear upon Gerlach’s vulnerable self. She could crack his brute neck so easy, so satisfyingly. He would know it was coming; his terror would be delightful.
No!Rakhi cried. Chaikhe, rule yourself. Control. Calm.
M’melakhiafocused briefly upon her asuthe, sweet and satisfying, full of the scent of blood.
I am you,he protested, horrified. It is not reasonable.
He suffered; their arastiethewas one, and to live they each must yield. The situation defied reason.
Leave me,she pleaded, aware of Gerlach’s eyes on her, a shame that Chimele’s orders left her powerless to remedy.
He lacked the control to break away. Their joined arastiethemade him fear her fear, suffer shame with her, dread injury to the child, feel its takkhenoiswithin his own body—things rationally impossible.
Is this whatm’metanei mean bym’melakhia one for the other?Rakhi wondered out of the chaos of his own thoughts. Au, I am drowning, I am suffocating, Chaikhe, and I am too weary to let go. If he touches you, I think I shall be ill.
Gerlach was beside her. Fire had leapt up in the corridor, control room systems too damaged to prevent it, smoke choking them as the ship deteriorated further. Gerlach seized her arm and drew her on. The collapse of systems with which her mind was in contact dazed and confused her.
Let go,Rakhi urged her, let go, let go.
Her mind went inward, self-seeking, dead to the outside. She saw the paredreof Ashanomebriefly; and then Rakhi performed the same inwardness and that vision went. She knew her limbs had lost their strength. She knew Gerlach’s coarse broad hands taking her, a loss of breath as she was slung across his shoulder. For a moment she was in complete withdrawal; then the pain of his jolting last step to the pavement jarred her free again.
Kill him!Rakhi’s voice in her mind was a shuddering echo and re-echo, down vast corridors of distance. Chimele’s strong nails bit into his/her shoulder, reminding them of calm. Other minds began to gather: Raxomeqh’s cold brilliance, Achiqh, Najadh, Tahjekh, like tiny points of light in a vast darkness. But Chaikhe concentrated deliberately on the horror of Gerlach, his oiliness, the grotesqueries of his waddling gait and panting wheezes for breath, learning what m’metaneicalled hate, a disunity beyond e-takkhe,a desire beyond vaikka-nasul,a lust beyond reason.