The Memory of Earth (28 page)

All of them are, thought Nafai. But none for the right reason. None is eager to get there because of a desire to help with the Oversoul’s plan.

Nafai found himself by the water’s edge, gripping a bough that was ten centimeters thick, bending it between his hands, bending it like a horseshoe. It fought him, but it also gave under the strength of his grip.

“Don’t break that,” said Father.

Nafai turned, startled. He let go of the branch, and it whipped upward, out of control; some leaves slapped him in the face.

“It took so long for it to grow,” said Father.

“I wasn’t going to break it.”

“It was on the verge,” said Father. “I know plants. You don’t. You were on the verge of breaking it.”

“I’m not that strong.”

“Stronger than you know.” Father sized him up. “Fourteen.” He laughed a little. “Your mother’s genes, not mine, I fear. I look at you and I see—”

“Mother?”

“What Issib might have been, body as well as mind. Poor boy.”

Poor boy. Why don’t you look at me sometime, Father, and see
me
. Instead of some imaginary child. Instead of a little boy who makes up visions, why don’t you see what I am: a man who heard the voice of the Oversoul, even more clearly than you.

“I’m afraid,” said Father.

Nafai looked his father in the eye. Is he teasing me?

“I’m sending you into something more dangerous than I think your brothers understand. But
you
understand, don’t you, Nafai.”

“I think.”

“After what you’ve seen,” said Father. But it was as much a question as an answer. What was he asking, whether Nafai knew the truth about Elya and Meb? It couldn’t be that, because Father didn’t know about them himself. No, Father was asking whether Nafai really saw visions.

Nafai’s first reaction was to be furious—hurt, offended. But then he realized that he was wrong to feel that way. Because Father had a right to ask, a right to let it take time to believe in his visions, just as Issib had said. He was
trying
to accept the idea of Nafai as a fellow servant of the Oversoul.

“Yes,” said Nafai. “I’ve seen. But nothing about the Index.”

“Gaballufix won’t let it go,” said Father. “In the vision he did, but the Oversoul can’t see everything. The Index isn’t just something you borrow. It’s very powerful.”

“Why? What can it do?”

“I don’t know what it can do, of itself. But I know that it means power. I know that among the Palwashantu, the one who keeps the Index is the one who has the trust of the clan. The greatest honor. Gabya won’t give it up. He’ll kill first. And that’s where I’m sending my sons.”

The look on Father’s face was angry. Nafai realized: He’s furious at the Oversoul for requiring him to do this.

And then, as Nafai watched, Father mastered his rage, and his face grew calm. “I hope,” said Father quietly, “I hope the Oversoul has really thought all this through.”

“Father,” Nafai said, “
I’ll
go and do whatever the Oversoul has asked us to do. Because I know that the Oversoul wouldn’t ask us to do it without preparing some way for it to be accomplished.”

Father studied his face for the longest time. Then he smiled. Nafai had never seen such a smile on his father’s face. The relief in it, the trust. “Not an act, is it,” said Father. “You’re not just saying what you think I want to hear.”

“When have any of your sons said anything that they thought you wanted to hear?” asked Nafai.

Now Father laughed, tossed his head back and roared. “Never!” he cried. And then, just as suddenly, the laughter stopped. Father took Nafai’s head between his hands, his large hands, callused and wiry and horned and rough from years of handling bark and leather harnesses and raw stone, and holding those great palms on either side of Nafai’s face, he leaned forward and kissed him on the mouth. “My son,” he whispered. “My son.”

For a moment they stood there together, beside the tree, beside the water, until they heard footsteps and turned. It was Elemak, his face still sour and angry. “Time
to go,” he said. “If we’re going to make any kind of progress today, anyway.”

“By all means go,” said Father. “I wouldn’t delay you for a moment.”

In a few minutes they were on their camels again, heading back to the city.

Basilica was not in sight yet, but Elemak knew the road. Knew it as well as he knew the skin of his own face in the mirror, every mole of the surface, every peak or declivity that snatched at the razor and bled. He knew the shadows of every hour of the day, where water might be waiting after a rain, where robbers might hide.

It was to one of those places that Elemak now led his brothers. They had not been on the road itself for some time, but till now had always kept it in sight. Now they left it behind, and soon the ground grew rough enough that he made them stop, dismount.

“Why are we stopping here?” asked Mebbekew.

“The floats are working,” said Issib. “That’s how close we are, I can move without the damn chair.”

Elemak eyed his crippled brother and shook his head. “Not reliably. We’ll dismount the chair—you’ll have to use it.”

Issib was usually so compliant, but not now. “Use it yourself, if you think it’s so comfy.”

“Look at you,” said Elemak. “It’s intermittent at best, with the float. You’ll start losing it and fall over and we can’t have that. Use the chair.”

“It’ll get better as we get closer.”

“We aren’t getting closer,” said Elemak.

“Then what are we doing?” demanded Mebbekew.

“We’re going down into this arroyo, where the magnetics of Basilica certainly do
not
reach, and there we’re going to wait until nightfall.”

“And then?” asked Mebbekew. “Since you seem to think you’re in command here, I thought perhaps I’d ask.”

Elemak had faced this kind of thing many times before from fellow travelers on the road, even sometimes from hired men. He knew how to handle it—brutal suppression, instant and public, so no doubt was left in anyone’s mind of who was in charge. So instead of answering Mebbekew he took him by the arms—thin, womanly arms, an
actor
, by the Oversoul!—and slammed him back against a wall of rock. The sudden movement spooked one of the camels. It stamped, spat, blatted out a protest. For a moment Elemak was afraid he would have to go calm the animal—but no, Nafai had it, was calming it. The boy was actually useful for something besides sucking up to Father. Not like Mebbekew, who was reliable only in his unreliability. Why Gaballufix ever confided in him, Elemak never knew. Surely Gabya knew that Mebbekew would let something slip. Even if he didn’t tell Father directly about the plot, he surely told
someone
—how else could Father have known?

There was raw panic in Meb’s eyes, and pain, too—his head had smacked sharply against the stone. Well, good,
thought Elemak. Think about pain a little bit. Think hard before you question my authority on the road.

“I
am
in command here,” Elemak whispered.

Meb nodded.

“And I say that we’ll wait until dark.”

“I was joking,” Meb whined. “You don’t have to be so
serious
about everything, do you?”

Elemak almost hit him for that. Serious? Don’t you realize that there inside Basilica, the most powerful, dangerous man in the city is almost certainly convinced that we betrayed him and warned Father to flee? To Mebbekew, Basilica was a city of pleasure and excitement. Well, there might be excitement indeed inside those walls, but of pleasure not a speck.

But Elemak did not hit Meb, because that would be excessive, and provoke resentment instead of respect among the others. Elemak knew how to lead men, and knew how to control his own feelings and not let them interfere with his judgment. He eased his grip on Mebbekew and then turned his back on him, to show his absolute confidence in his own leadership, and his contempt for Mebbekew. Meb would not dare attack him, even with his back turned.

“At nightfall, what will happen is simple enough. I will go inside the city, and I’ll speak to Gaballufix, and I’ll bring out the Index.”

“No,” said Issib. “Father said we should all go.”

Another insubordination—but not a serious one, and it was Issib, the cripple, so a show of force was completely out of the question. “And we all
have
come. But
I know
Gaballufix. He’s my half-brother—as much my brother as any of you. I have the best chance of talking him into giving us the Index.”

“You mean we came all this way,” said Issib, “and
you’re going to make me stay here, in this metal coffin of mine, and never get any closer to the city than this?”

“Better your chair than a real coffin,” said Elemak. “I tell you that if you think going into the city will be fun, you’re a fool. Gaballufix is dangerous.”

“He
is
,” said Nafai. “Elya is right. If we all go in together, then a failure might mean all of us killed—or imprisoned—or anything. If only one goes, then even if he fails the rest of us might still be able to accomplish something.”

“If I fail, then go back to Father,” said Elemak.

“Right,” said Meb. “I’m sure we’ve all memorized the road.”

“It can’t be you,” said Issib. “Of all of us, you’re the only one necessary to lead us home.”

“I’ll go,” said Nafai.

“Right,” said Elemak, laughing.
“You,
the one who looks most like Lady Rasa. I don’t think you get the picture, Nyef—one look at you and Gaballufix is reminded of the one humiliation he’s never been able to avenge—Lady Rasa lapsing his contract after two daughters and within a week making a new contract with Father—which she hasn’t broken yet. Walk into Gaballufix’s house alone, with no one in the city even knowing you’re there, Nyef, and your life is over.”

“Me, then,” said Mebbekew.

“You’d only go get drunk or find some woman,” said Elemak, “and then come back and lie and say you spoke to Gaballufix and he said no.”

Mebbekew seemed to toy with the idea of getting angry, but then thought better of it. “Possibly,” said Mebbekew. “But it’s a better plan than I’ve heard from anyone else.”

“What about mine?” said Issib. “
I
go and ask. What is Gaballufix going to do to a cripple?”

Elemak shook his head. “Break you in half with his bare hands, if he feels like it.”

“And you were
friends
with him?” asked Mebbekew.

“Brothers. We’re brothers. We don’t get to choose our brothers, you know,” said Elemak. “We just make do with what we get.”

“He wouldn’t hurt a cripple,” Issib said again. “It would shame him in front of his own men.”

Elemak knew that Issib was right. The cripple might be the best one to get into and out of an interview with Gaballufix alive. The trouble was that Elemak
couldn’t
let Issib or Nafai talk to the man. Gaballufix might say something that would compromise Elemak. No, it had to be Elemak himself, so he could talk to Gabya alone, maybe smooth things over, persuade his brother that it wasn’t him that warned Father of the plan to kill Roptat under circumstances that would implicate and discredit Wetchik. If they ever learned of this, Meb and Issya and Nyef wouldn’t understand that in the long run it was the best plan for Father’s own sake. If they didn’t neutralize Father this way, then eventually it might be Father who died under mysterious circumstances.

“I’ll tell you what,” said Elemak. “Since we all disagree about who should go, let’s let the Oversoul decide. A time-honored tradition—we draw lots.”

He reached down and scooped up a handful of pebbles from the ground. “Three light ones, one dark one.” But as he spoke, Elemak made sure a fourth light-colored stone was tucked out of sight between two of his fingers. “Dark stone goes into the city.”

“All right,” said Meb, and the others nodded.

“I’ll hold the stones,” said Nafai.

“Nobody holds the stones, my dear little boy,” said Elemak. “Too much chance of cheating, yes?” Elemak reached up to a shelf in the rock, out of sight where they
were standing. There he again made a show of mixing up the four stones. “When I’m through mixing them, though, you can mix them yourself, Nafai,” he said. “That way we know that nobody knows which stone is which.”

Nafai immediately strode forward, reached up to the shelf of stone, and mixed the stones. Four of them, of course—Elemak knew he would feel four stones and “be satisfied. What he couldn’t possibly know was that the dark stone was now between Elemak’s fingers, and the four stones on the shelf were all light.

“While you’ve got your hand up there, Nyef, go ahead and choose a stone.”

Nafai, poor fool, came away with a light-colored stone and frowned at it. What did he expect? He was playing at a man’s game. None of these boys seemed to realize that a man with Elemak’s responsibilities would never have lasted on the open road if he didn’t know how to make sure that drawing lots always turned out the way he wanted.

“Me now,” said Issib.

“No,” said Elemak. “My draw.” That was another rule of the game—Elemak had to draw early, or somebody might grow suspicious and check the rocks and see that there was no dark one there. He reached up, made a show of fumbling with the rocks, and then came away with the dark one, of course—but with the extra light one also tucked between his fingers. When they checked, they’d find only two stones left there on the shelf.