Wright had not spoken since the burial, nor had Pakriaa. They kept
together; Paul was with them sometimes. Behind them Mijok carried his
shield. It was Elis who heard the bleat of asonis and stole off to
bring back meat for an afternoon meal. It was Elis, before that, who
said, "We have done what we could, Paul. We could not have made these
people retreat in time to save themselves. If we had abandoned them
Lantis would have left no more than a fire leaves in the
Red-Moon-of-Dry-Days. Pakriaa is too sick to understand that, yet. She
carries a grief like a little one swelling in the womb: it must grow
greater before she is delivered of it."
In the afternoon halt, it was Elis who tried to make Wright eat
something and sleep, but Wright could do neither.
The giant women Elron and Karison also refused the meat. They sat
apart with stout brown Tejron. She was eating, keeping close to her
the still unconscious Vestoian, whom the pygmies had given no more
than disgusted glares. Tejron might be listening to Karison's
undertone--it was in the monosyllables of the old language. The girl
Elron held her eyes downcast, fondling the rifle. She and Karison had
been much together in a peculiar loneliness since the children were
flown to the island: Karison was old, her children grown and gone away
before the Charins came; Elron was too young to have given birth.
Three of the children at the island were Tejron's; the others were
children of Muson and Samis and of a mother who had died in the old
life. Tejron wiped her lips and grunted impatiently; she took up her
charge in careful arms and left the two. Paul sensed what was to come
when Elron set her cherished rifle at his feet. Karison approached
Wright, humble but determined: "We must leave you."
Before Wright could speak, Mijok answered her with a sullen anger Paul
had never heard from him: "I brought you from the jungle with empty
heads. We gave you the words, the beginning of the laws we must make
together. You lived like the uskaran, furtive and cruel--"
"No," Wright said. "Mijok, no...."
Karison had winced, but she repeated: "We must go. The old way--we
need it."
"Then you must go," Wright said, his spread fingers white-nailed on
the ground. "And remember always that you go with our good will."
"That is so." She was torn two ways. "But the old life--"
Elis rumbled: "Elron, come here." The girl would not. "I hoped that in
the next Red-Moon-before-the-Rains--"