Trinarvil looked at him as if he'd gone into Renewal madness, and he thought she would overrule him. But she sighed and went after the group around the ephemeral intruder. "I'll go get a Historian to let us in. Wait."
Jindigar turned to his Oliat, leading them back into the Temple. "I don't want to convene and search the colony's situation, but I think we must interview Storm. The debriefing room is the only place in here where we can talk comfortably. I don't want to go into the outer court."
"Jindigar—if we have to..." repeated Darllanyu.
"Don't be too quick to become a martyr," he cautioned, but inwardly admired her courage.
"I want to come with you," said Krinata.
"Not necessary. I can talk to Storm."
Venlagar offered, "Llistyien and I can come too. Zannesu and Eithlarin could stay with Dar."
It was too logical to be argued with—Center, Receptor, Emulator, and Outreach teaming to deal with the external while Inreach, Protector, and Formulator dealt with the internal. Standard practice. Why urn I resisting? He didn't know, so he said, "Come, then." But we are not going into the field again.
They dressed against the growing evening chill and went over to the debriefing room, which was now lit with the new candles that gave off a better light for Dushau eyes. Two apprentice Historians stood guard over the equipment while Trinarvil watched Storm sitting nervously on the end of one of the couches. Seeing Jindigar, Storm rose.
Jindigar waved him back to his seat and perched on the edge of an instrument panel opposite him, adopting an informal, friendly tone. "I couldn't invite you into the Temple. But I'm glad you came."
"I didn't want to come into the compound at all—I know you don't like it. But they wouldn't deliver my notes to you– I knew they weren't getting through."
"If they had," he admitted brutally, "I doubt I could have responded. Things have not been good for us."
"I figured they would have told me if you'd Dissolved."
"Krinata would have come." If she survived. "Now tell what has happened. Every detail."
The trained observer rendered his report in crisp, terse, factual sentences that elaborated on the summary he had given before and ended with a message from Terab, sent both as friend and committee executive. "She said to tell you that unless some Dushau can help, before the colonists all starve, they will storm the Dushau compound—even the inner one. I don't believe that, Jindigar, but she said I was too out of touch, working for you. She says you have to come and talk to them."
Terab knew as much about Renewal as any ephemeral, except perhaps Krinata. She knew what she was asking.
He looked around at the room, still ready for him to resume work with Threntisn. But there was nothing they could do until the Historian recovered.
In sudden decision Jindigar stood, summoning strength from somewhere deep inside. "Right now, then." He wasted no energy dissuading his officers from accompanying him, and Storm, as always, had anticipated their needs. The Outriders were waiting for them at the gate. Jindigar inspected Cyrus dubiously but noted how Storm accepted him into the working order without comment. But Cyrus favored the knuckles of his right hand, and one of the human Outrider trainees had a matching bruise on his jaw. On closer scrutiny it seemed that all the human Outriders had been in a brawl recently.
Storm noticed Jindigar's appraisal and offered, "Humans have their own methods of problem solving. I'm not worried. They've been behaving as the best of friends for the last two days. I judge we can trust them—now."
They sent a runner ahead to warn Terab, and they all started out across the settlement to the Council offices at the center of the cluster of dwellings.
Terab arrived just as they did, stood back warily until Storm had announced the Oliat adjourned, then invited them into her office—a room almost identical to Storm's quarters. Jindigar noticed the slate-rock and chalk set up at one end of the porch where daily work assignments were posted. At one side of the door there were message pigeonholes for the group leaders and, on the other, a board for posting official announcements.
Inside, Terab's office had two desks, seating for different species, charts covering the walls, and some record storage cases. An open door in the rear wall led to a porch that ran the length of the back of the building. A fireplace at one side held a banked fire that Terab poked to life and built up as the Outriders helped by lighting candles.
Terab turned from the fire and straightened, her two upper hands joined while her middle hands fidgeted with her loose-fitting jacket. They had all lost too much weight this winter. But there hadn't been any rationing riots.
"Jindigar—I never thought to talk to you again," she said, coming to the desk doing him the honor of remaining up on her hind limbs.
Jindigar returned the honor by seating himself on a floor throw. For long, serious conversations Holot preferred to sit on the floor. She scuffed another floor throw into position before him and dropped to four legs, lowering herself with the creakiness of age as Jindigar gestured the others to chairs and said, "Storm tells me you fear for all our lives."
"The Oliat made a terrible mistake. No one here has ever heard of an Implant Oliat making such a mistake. Some are saying it was done on purpose because the Dushau are planning to leave, abandoning all of us to this world. Some are saying that this world is unlivable—and you knew it all along."
That sounded like the rumors the Emperor had been spreading about the Dushau in the final days of the Empire. "These 'some'—are they the soldiers?" asked Jindigar.
A detachment of the Emperor's own troops had tracked Jindigar's party to Phanphihy and had attacked the settlement a year ago. But Phanphihy itself had defeated the troops, inducing in them nightmares and debilities until their own fatigue-generated errors destroyed their equipment.
"It started among the soldiers," admitted Terab. "But it's spreading. The medic has been reporting an increased call for sleeping aids. If we don't do something soon, we won't live to starve. Phanphihy will lash out at us, like it did before."
How could things have become this bad in only a few days? When he had decided to Dissolve the Oliat, the colony's situation had been precarious but stable.
Terab couldn't follow his thoughts, he reminded himself. He had to speak aloud. "Tell me, do you think the concept of the multicolony is not viable? Are the others unable to understand the Dushau requirements or to accept our contribution of knowledge and skill as sufficient?"
"It's not that, Jindigar. What the Historians have accomplished so far, in resurrecting basic technology and teaching it to us, surprises everyone. We never knew your Historians were useful. But colonists have come to think of an Implant Oliat v as the only key to success. Now they feel betrayed and abandoned. Some of them don't understand that Dushau are just flesh and blood, fallible mortals like the rest of us."
"What would it take to convince them that we're committed to this world in our own life-or-death struggle?"
"Nothing short of a graveyard filling as rapidly as ours." . True, fewer Dushau had died so far, and more than half the colony's number was Dushau. Yet Jindigar knew that a higher percentage of Dushau were in critical condition, struggling with the countertides of Renewal and world-alienation. "It just takes us longer, Terab. But in the end the toll will be heavier on us."
"The end will come faster if something isn't done to silence the cynics. They need a graphic demonstration of Dushau loyalty to this colony. They're blaming all our troubles on you folk—even our being here."