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.""Then please, Kta, these people.these people of mine.they are innocent of the fires.Whatever.whatever your people say.they try to make us out responsible.but it is a lie, a-""Calm yourself, Bel.Cast no words to the winds.I beg you, take charge of these people and get them to help or get them out of this area.The Indras fleet is coming down on Nephane and we have only a little time to restore order here and prepare ourselves.""I will try," said Bel, and cast a despairing look at the frightened people milling about, at the dead men in the street.He went to the archer who lay in the center of the cobbled street, knelt down and touched him, then looked up with a negative gesture and a sympathetic expression for someone in the crowd.There came a young woman-the one who had screamed.She crept forward and knelt down in the street beside the dead man, sobbing and rocking in her misery.Bel spoke to her in words no one else could hear, though there was but for the fire's crackling a strange silence on the street and among the crowd.Then he picked up the dead youth's body himself, and struggled with it toward the Sufaki side."Let us take our dead decently inside," he said."You men who can, put the fires out.""The Indras set them," one of the young women said."Udafi Kafurtin," said Bel in a trembling voice, "in the chaos we have made of Nephane, there is really no knowing who started anything.Our only identifiable enemy is whoever will not put them out.Kta-Kta! Have these men of yours put up their weapons.We have had enough of weapons and threats in this city.My people are not armed, and yours do not need to be.""Yours shoot from ambush!" shouted one of the Indras."Do as he asks!" Kta shouted, and glared about him with such fury that men began to obey him.Then Kta went and bowed very low before t'Nechis, who had a cousin to mourn, and quietly offered his help, though Kurt winced inwardly and expected temper and hatred from the grieving t'Nechis.But in extremity t'Nechis was Indras and a gentleman.He bowed in turn, in proper grace."See to business, Ktat'Elas.The t'Nechisen will take him home.We will be withyou as soon as we can send my cousin to his rest." By noon the fires were out, and the Sufaki who had aided in fighting the blaze scattered to their homes to bar thedoors and wait in silence.!Peace returned to the Street of the Families, with ] armed men of the fleet standing at either end of the street and on rooftops where they commanded a view of all that moved.The scars were visible now, hollow shells of buildings, pavement littered with rubble.Kurt left Lhe t'Nethim sheltered in the hall of Elas, the Indras grim-faced and subdued to have set foot in a hostile house.He found Kta standing out on the curb.Kta, like himself, was masked with soot and sweat and the dim red marks of burns from fire fighting."They have buried t'Nechis," Kta said hollowly, without looking around.They had been so much together it was possible to feel the other's presence without looking.He knew Kta's face without seeing it, that it was tired and shadow-eyed and drawn with pain."Get off the street," Kurt said."You are a target.""T'Ranek is on the roof.I do not think there is danger.Fully half of Nephane is in our hands now, thank the gods." |"You have done enough.Go over to Irain.Aimu will be I anxious to see you.""I do not wish to go to Irain," Kta said wearily."Bel will be there and I do not wish to see him.""You have to, sooner or later.""What do I tell him? What do I say to him when he asks me what will happen now? Forgive me, brother, but I have made a compact with the Indras, and I swore once that was impossible; forgive me, brother, but I have surrendered your home to my foreign cousins; I am sorry, my brother, but I have sold you into slavery for your own preservation.""At least," said Kurt grimly, "the Sufaki will have the same chance a human has among Indras, and that is better than dying, Kta, it is infinitely better than dying.""I hope," said Kta, "that Bel sees it that way.I am afraid for this city tonight.There has been too little resistance.They are saving something back.And there is a report t'Tefur is in the Afen."Kurt let the breath hiss slowly between his teeth and glanced uphill, toward the Afen gate."If we are fortunate," he said, "Djan will keep control of the weapons.""You seem to have some peculiar confidence she will not hand him that power.""She will not do it," Kurt said."Not willingly.I could be wrong, but I think I know Djan's mind.She would suffer a great deal before she would let those machines be loosed on nemet."Kta looked back at him, anger on his face."She was capable of things you seem to have forgotten.Humanness blinds you, my friend, and I fear you have buried Mim more deeply than earth can put her.I do not understand that.Or perhaps I do.""Some things," Kurt said, with a sudden and soul-deep coldness, "you still do not know me well enough to say."And he walked back into Elas, ignoring t'Nethim, retreating into its deep shadows, into the rhmei, where the fire was dead, the ashes cold.He knelt there on the rugs as he had done so many evenings, and stared into the dark.Lhe t'Nethim's quiet step dared the silent rhmei.It was a rash and brave act for an orthodox Indras.He bowed himself in respect before the dead firebowl and knelt on the bare floor.He only waited, as he had waited constantly, attending them in silence"."What do you want of me?" Kurt asked in vexation."I owe you," said Lhe t'Nethim, "for the care of my cousin's soul.I have come because it is right that a kinsman see the hearth she honored.When I have seen her avenged, I will be free again."It was understandable.Kurt could imagine Kta doing so reckless a thing for Aimu.Even for him.He had used rudeness to Kta.Even justified, it pained him.He was glad to hear Kta's familiar step in the entry, like a ghost of things that belonged to Elas, disturbing its sleep.Kta silently came and knelt down on the rug nearest Kurt."I was wrong," said Kurt."I owe you an accounting.""No," said Kta gently."The words flew amiss [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]