Exile's Return Page 9

  “Now, if someone would peel these apples for the pie, we just might have dinner ready for Sarrett. The chicken’s roasting.” He unceremoniously thumped a scrap pan in front of her and placed a paring knife beside it. With as much good grace as she could muster, Doyce attacked one of the wind-falls piled in the pottery bowl at the table’s center.

  “Bard, just don’t stay away too long,” she pleaded. “We need you, we need you both. There’s no one I’d trust more than you and M’wa out riding circuit, quelling rumors, learning the truth before innocent people are hurt.” Her eyes blurred, making it hard to thin-peel the apples. She continued working by touch, feeling the knife blade approach her thumb, bite too deep and fast for her to stop it. “Ouch! Please, Bard!”

  Blinded by tears, she let him lead her unresistingly to the pump, the plash of cold water on her hand bringing her back to herself. “Khar, talk to M’wa, tell him how much we need them. I know there’s sorrow, pain at the loss, but make them understand they have to work through it, you can’t run from sorrow and grief. ”

  Khar and M’wa exchanged glances at what had already been set in motion. Best Doyce not know for her own safety’s sake. Even Bard didn’t yet know the role he’d been assigned to play, a part of a tale that the ghatti couldn’t rewrite although it hadn’t even happened yet.

  Dinner concluded, all chicken scraps suitably disposed of—in the bellies of three hungry ghatti—Khar waited for Sarrett and Doyce to start on the dishes as Bard sat back and smoked a pipe. Sure at last that the humans were properly occupied, Khar motioned M’wa and T’ss to join her at the door. Aware something was afoot, although he didn’t know what, the white ghatt with the black stripings and bright blue eyes jittered with youthful impatience. Without realizing it, he anxiously merowed aloud.

  Pushing gilt-pale hair off her forehead with damp hands, Sarrett laughed. “Impolite beast,” and scolded as she opened the back door. “All you had to do was ask, and not aloud! Others teaching you bad habits, are they?”

  Scarcely chastened, T’ss butted her leg before dashing out the door after the others.

  M’wa checked his flight with a rough but good-natured shoulder bump. “Exquisite vocalization, I’m sure. Now behave, you’re too old for that.”

  Slipping through gusty autumn darkness toward the plaza in front of Headquarters, they saw they weren’t the first to shelter around the statue of Matthias Vandersma and the ghatta Kharm. Other ghatti streamed toward them, some clearly visible in the moonlight of the six Disciples, others shadow-wreathed, near invisible as they padded closer. Since the plaza served as a traditional ghatti communal spot, no one would pay them any great heed, comfortable with such comings and goings, their flocking together at this place. At length twenty ghatti of all ages sat or stretched at length around the statue.

  “Birds of a feather Cock together,” Mem‘now chuckled from the statue’s base. “A glee of ghatti, T’ss. Welcome all.”

  Khar settled at a polite distance. “You know what I would ask tonight.” So curiously formal, almost demure, but he could read the aching want within her, wondered, not for the first time, if this course wound crooked or straight. Well, they’d know soon enough.

  “Yes, but others here and nearby may not. May I link all in the mindnet?” With her permission he could direct his thoughts to any distant ghatti within range of his powerful mindvoice, sustained and enhanced by the individual strengths of the nearby ghatti. Ghatti over near-half of Canderis could participate, though never had Mem’now attempted a linking of such magnitude, but these were strange, unsettling times. “As many as possible should know, share in the decision. Indeed, I ask those at my mindvoice’s limits to contact those beyond, join in our communing tonight.”

  Needful, yes, but a demeaning exposure. A little shudder rippled her fur, a naked vulnerability at revealing her quandary so far and wide. Couldn’t Mem’now just get on with it? And while ghatti etiquette demanded this collective asking, a still higher power was mandated. The Elders must be convinced as well. Was she strong enough not just to contact them but to truly hear their answer? For Doyce she’d attempt anything, do anything that might help, because she dared this not only for Doyce, but for the land and the ghatti themselves, their place in the land, their role in society.

  The voices homing in, floating outward touched gentle, curious, unraveling the innermost truth of the situation. Never, ever before had they agreed to commingle so deeply with a human mind, to reveal a part of their private heritage to a human. No surprise, then, to hear first Rawn’s familiar bass mindvoice, followed by Saam’s; Rawn reassuring, admitting he and Jenret ran late, and Saam’s distant voice from the Hospice urging, “Try. All we can do is try. Believe and you can do anything.”

  “I can try, but I can’t do it alone,” she confessed to the assembly at large. “My wisdom lacks depth unless I’m accompanied by someone with greater experience on the Spirals.” Eight turnings, eight spirals of ascending knowledge encompassed each ghatti life, some gained early, some not at all, despite the age of the individual ghatti. True in life as well, some never learned completely, accepted and matured to their full capacity and capability. Still, impolite to question any individual as to the level of attainment in the collective Mind Spiral, past and present, of the wisest ghatti of all, the Elders. Khar herself had painstakingly progressed to the Fourth Level on the Spiral and that, she feared, might not be enough.

  Mem’now harrumphed, treaded his front feet uneasily. “I can’t spiral and keep the mindnet intact. One or the other, I’m not a juggler, you know.”

  “Nonsense! I distinctly remember once seeing you toss two voles simultaneously. Such dexterity, such paw work!” Khar recognized Terl, the night damp turning his mindvoice as rusty as his once dark coat. “I’m slow, not as agile as I once was, but mayhap we could support each other through the turnings, take heart from each other, boost each other along the way, my beauteous Khar’pern.”

  Unable to directly acknowledge his generosity, she took a deep breath and began the upward gliding, secure in her following, letting him set the pace: Upward, ever upward, gliding through the first Spiral, swooping into the second, Elder voices, some near, some far, chiming in her ears. Distant yet soothing, past wisdom and present combined, nothing lost or omitted, nothing forgotten or set aside as useless, if she had wisdom enough to hear and comprehend.

  “Ah, little Khar’pern, welcome! And welcome to your guide, oh puissant Terl! So long since either of you’ve ventured here we thought you might have forgotten ...” the voices chuckled, lapped away in an ebbing tide, “forgotten us. Amazing what they re ... col ... lect ... lect when they wish a favor, isn’t it?”

  Unperturbed, Terl swept on, Khar drawn in his wake. The top of the Fourth Spiral, her limit, and she prepared to wait, gasped as she smoothly drifted up yet another. “Didn’t even realize you’d accomplished it, did you, girl?” Terl asked. “Should make you lead. Such modesty.”

  “Modest Khar‘pern. Curious Khar’pern.” Ripplings of laughter, indulgent, sprinkled over her until she was star-dusted. “At last ready to listen to the past, eh?X”

  With a surge of relief she halted at the Fifth Spiral. “To listen to the past and to share it with another, to share the truth so that past mistakes don’t live on.”

  “Mistakes? Surely never?” A hint of anger seething through the collective voices in a low, bubbling boil. “Always truth! Never untruth!”

  But Terl’s voice floated to her, implacable, from some loftier vista. “Set Doyce Marbon, Bondmate of the ghatta Khar’pern, loose on the path of the past. Let her learn, profit from our wisdom, that is what we ask.”

  “A mere human, fond of her as we may be?” The voices, haughty now at being prodded, and Khar feared a sudden slide down the Spirals, smooth as a banister, unable to catch a claw to halt her descent.

  “My human, Elders! And perhaps our hope and salvation, unless you’d relish communing strictly amongst yourselves. If ghatti have no pla
ce in this strange new world approaching us, you’ll learn naught of the future, of the frailties and foibles of humankind, their thoughts withering and dying, uncollected, because we cannot report to you. Unwanted, unloved, unneeded!”

  “Rambunctious, undisciplined, overzealous as ever,” an Elder sniffed.

  “And right on target,” Terl shot back. “What good is the past if it’s forgotten, unloved, unwanted, and we cannot learn from it? What hope without a future?”

  Aggrieved, “What do you propose to tell this human? How much of our tales shall she hear?”

  “The First Spiral, the First Major Tale, of how we came to be a part of each other.” Greatly daring, Khar placed her request. “I’m not sure why, but I think it’s important they understand the similarities and the differences to what we face beyond tomorrow’s shadows.”

  “Ah, she would hear the resonances, then? Not just the Resonants?” a hint of mockery to the words. “How will she cope when unknown, misunderstood fears tinge her mind, counterpoint the real ones around her? Is she strong enough for that?”

  “We had all best be strong enough for that, just as Matthias Vandersma and Kharm were, despite their fears,” Terl interrupted. “We thank you for your consideration, but we, who humbly lack the Elders’ wisdom, can only hope for the best. After all, are we not your children?”

  “So tell her, then.” Mindvoices grumbled in distant thunder. “And remember, you reap what you sow. Just so no untruths are heard.”

  Khar nodded, unable to speak, unsure whether to be relieved or frightened. “Not in an especially charitable mood tonight,” Terl remarked. “Ruffled their collective fur, we did,” as he began to descend, nudging Khar ahead of him. “Oh, won’t that be something to tell the ghatten about!”

  Appalled at the enormity of what she’d done, what she’d asked, Khar trembled. “Doyce ... Doyce won’t be hurt, will she? They wouldn’t allow that, would they?”

  “There’re all kinds of hurt, all kinds of pain, and some are salutary, as well you know. Now move along, I need a warm fire to soak their mindchill out of my old bones.”

  Silence shrouded the study where Sarrett and Bard traded canny stares across the chessboard while Doyce, hands clasped behind her neck, sank back in her easy chair and observed the fire. Or as much as she could over her mounded belly. Not bored, exactly—she wiggled her toes—but restless. The lack of conversation didn’t bother her, good to have companionship without needing small talk. Enough of that and more at dinner as they’d touched on past and present sorrows, hesitantly mapping the future. Or rather, others’ futures, not their own—a taboo topic tonight. As if they could mold it to their whims!

  Ears cocked, hoping against disappointment, she half-listened for Jenret’s footsteps on the brick path. Instead, a faint scratching at the door and Khar’s mindvoice tickled her. “In, please!” Levering herself up, she wandered in stocking feet to the front door, glad of the ghatti’s company as well.

  Khar, M‘wa, and T’ss marched through the door, although T‘ss bounded as if a mini-demon rode his tail. No matter his age, T’ss would always be an overgrown ghatten. The other two looked smugly satisfied but tired. Despite her resolve, she opened the door wider, staring into the dark. No, no sign of Jenret and Rawn, though both would be near invisible against the night, Jenret with his black pantaloons, tunic, and tabard, and Rawn so ebony black.

  The shabby leather book she’d left on the hall table diverted her as she latched the door. She swooped it up, held it for comfort. Perfect! Just the thing to occupy her mind, diminish—if not demolish—her preoccupation over Jenret’s return. Let the others play chess as long as they liked. And reading, she couldn’t help grinning, beat knitting booties. Knitting ranked as one of the most boring things imaginable—mainly because the garment never grew fast enough to hold her interest. For that much finger-twisting, stitch-counting effort she demanded immediate gratification.

  The three ghatti strung themselves along the hearth, M‘wa and Khar compact and loaflike while T’ss sprawled, feet treading air. Pouring a glass of water from the carafe, she settled it on the arm of her chair, squirmed once for comfort, and cracked the book open with care. Before she dove into it, she glanced around the room, stared into the fire, a hypnotic swirling of flames capturing her attention. A part of her registered that all three ghatti now sat, alert, staring almost through her, as if willing her to reach through the patterns of the fire. Khar’s amber eyes widened to swallow her, narrowed, widened again, and she was engulfed, adrift in the reflected images. She touched the coarse paper of the page, and gasped, hand crushed against her mouth.

  The book forgotten in her lap, she continued to stare, watching as the flickering scene gained shape and definition.

  Matthias Vandersma huddled near the fire, the larchcat sprawled across his lap while he stroked it. Purring ripples vibrated its body, transmitted themselves to his hand, and he could sense them going ragged, slow-fading as she drifted toward sleep. And sleep, he prayed, would end the ceaseless, inquisitive cataloging of his mind, every thought inventoried, inspected, while her brain dashed on to embrace the next, and the next, many he wasn’t even conscious of until she revealed them, proud as a kitten depositing its first kill in front of its human. Fright crushed his chest like a vise, though he tried not to show it, rhythmic shudders washing over him despite his efforts to remain still. Best not catch Granther’s attention now, give him something else to worry about.

  Done tucking Henryk into bed, the old man turned to place the boy’s spectacles on the stool beside the bed. The mismatched lenses, one yellow, one green, sparkled jewel-like in the firelight, as they must have long ago, warning lights on the Spacers’ navigation console. The white of Ryk’s sling glowed dully white against the boy’s pale body, livid scratches on his torso painted with wide streaks of red-orange disinfectant. Pulling a worn afghan from the back of his rocking chair, the old man draped it across Matty’s shoulders, wrapped it around him, deft and tender.

  “Ye cannot keep her, Matty.” He sat heavily, a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “We’ve been over it again and again. She’s a wild thing, a wild beast. Needs to be with her own.”

  “I’ll take care of her, Granther,” he pleaded. “She won’t be any trouble, I won’t let her be! She’s too little to be out there alone without her mother to look after her. She’ll die if I let her go!” And something within him would die as well. How did he know that? How could he say it?

  “Living and dying is nature’s way, boy, and it’s not up to us to interrupt it or circumvent it. Can’t anymore—the high tech’s gone.”

  The ghatten, Kharm, he’d named her, or more accurately, that was what she’d named herself, half-rolled in his lap, tiny belly distended from milk and a thin mash of cooked vegetables and meat. What did “ghatten” mean? Tiny claws pricked his bare chest, demanding his attention. He shushed her, shielded her from his granther. The voice echoed in his mind and he jerked, almost convulsed.

  “’Fraid? Afraid of me. Why?” And seemed to answer her own question. “Not always enough food. True. Can hunt my own! I am Kharm, mighty ghatten, clever ghatten. Oh, no!” she continued as if responding to another question, “won’t hunt, won’t hurt, won’t steal what isn’t mine, silly furries in hutches, squawky scratch-feet. Not take unless given!”

  Matty felt dizzy, as if he heard her answer two conversations, unheard within his grandfather and the other within him where the ghatten’s voice resided. Now, rather than feeling chilled, he was flushed, wave after wave of feverish heat radiating from his body, the afghan stifling, sticking to sweaty skin. “Bad luck? Silly, silly ! Super ...” she stumbled over the new word, “super-squishious? Super ... stitious. Best luck in the world to share with one of the ghatti, best luck for both of us. True? Truly!”

  He felt her arguments as a prompt, priming him with the answers, rehearsing him in some strange way. Manipulated as easily as the Killanin boys manipulated him, but what he did absorb was an ov
erwhelming love, not hate. Love surrounded him, cocooned him, made him safe and secure, except for the headache pounding at his temples. His lips silently mouthed her words, clamped down on any stray sounds trying to escape.

  His grandfather’s face swam into focus in front of him, sad blue eyes—so much like his own—above the full white beard. A hand rocked his shoulder and he allowed it, his body boneless. “Matty, Matty,” the voice crooned inside him, then more insistently, “Matty! Talk to him. No wobble! Too limp, too scary!”

  He stiffened against his grandfather’s hand, halting the movement. Best say something, anything, distract his grandfather’s worry, the fear swamping his eyes. What he yearned to ask was “What’s truth, Granther? How do you know what you hear is true? How do you know what you say is true, not just what you believe is true?” But he didn’t dare ask, couldn’t begin to explain why it mattered so much. Blinking as if he’d been almost asleep, he licked his lips, smiled at his grandfather. “What’s love, Granther? Why does it hurt so much?”

  He took refuge behind the question, a part of what he wanted to ask—why had he come to love and need this larchcat so much in such a short time? To weigh in his heart and soul the essential rightness or truth of their connection, even though fearing it. An unknown like so many other unknowns, a way of proving him different when he wanted to be like everyone else, not provide another damning reason to judge the Vandersmas as “touched,” “odd,” “queer in the head” in some mysterious, indefinable way.

  His grandfather’s eyes cleared, his body relaxed. “Love? Is it the little Houwaert girl, that little Nelle who toted Henryk back to the house? A fine, well-built girl, that Nelle.” A tiny lip smack of innocent pleasure, the hint of a wink.