Aiela seized, held to him, shamed by the emotion, shamed to feel when their observers could not. Isande—she, apart, despising, angry. He gained control of himself and forced the dazed human into a chair, stood over him, his fingers clenched into the man’s shoulder.
Calm, be calm,he kept sending. After a moment Daniel’s muscles relaxed and his mind assumed a quieter level, questioning, terrified.
Why are they asking these things?he kept thinking. Aiela, Aiela, help me—tell me the truth if you know it.And then at the angry touch of Isande’s mind: Who is Tejef?
Terror. She flung herself back, screened so violently Daniel cried out.
And the iduve were utterly still, every eye upon them, the nasithigathered close about Chimele, with such a look of menace that they seemed to have grown and the room to have shrunk. Indeed more had come, dark faces frowning with anger, unasking and unasked. Still they came, and the concourse began to be crowded with them. None spoke. There was only the sound of steps and the rustling of thousands of bodies.
“Is this aberrance under control?” Chimele wondered quietly, her eyes on Aiela.
It is not aberrance,he wanted to cry at her. Can’t you perceive it?But the iduve could not comprehend. He bowed deeply. “He was alarmed. He perceived a threat to his species.”
Chimele considered that. Iduve faces, whose eyes were almost incapable of moving from side to side, had always a direct, invading stare, communicating little of what processes of thought. went on behind them, At last she lifted her hand and the tension in the room ebbed perceptibly.
“This being is capable of a certain elethia,” she said. “But he is not wise to think that Ashanomecould not deal with his species more efficiently if their destruction were our purpose. How long ago, o m’metane,did your worlds realize the presence of such ships?”
“I’ve lost count,” Daniel replied: truth. “A year, perhaps—maybe a little less. It seems forever.”
“Do you reckon in human time?”
“Yes.” An impulse rose in him, defiant, suicidal. “Who is Tejef?”
The effect was like a weapon drawn. But this time Chimele refused to be provoked. Interest was in her expression, and she held her nasithimotionless with a quick lift of her fingers.
“Chimele,” said Isande miserably, “he took it from me, when I thought of ships.”
“Are you sure it was only then?”
“I am sure,” she said, but an iduve from the Melakhisstepped into the paredrearea: a tall woman, handsome, in black as stark and close-fitting as iduve men usually affected.
“Chimele-Orithain,” said that one. “I have questions I would ask him.”
“Mejakh sra-Narach, sra-Khasif, you are out of order, though I understand your m’melakhiain this matter. Hold, Mejakh!” Chimele’s voice, soft, snapped like a blow to the face in the stillness, and the woman stopped a second time, facing her.
“This human is not kameth,” said Mejakh, “and I consider that he is out of order, Chimele, and probably in possession of more truth than he is telling.”
“More than he knows how to tell, perhaps,” said Chimele. “But he is mine, o mate of Chaxal. Honor to your m’melakhia.It is well known. Have patience. I am aware of you.”
“Honor to you,” said Khasif softly, drawing that woman to his side. “Honor always, sra-of-mine. But do not notice this ignorant being. He is harmless and only ignorant. Be still. Be still.”
The room grew quiet again. Chimele looked at last upon Daniel and Aiela. “Estimate a human year in Kej-time. Ashakh, assist them.”
It needed some small delay. Daniel inwardly recoiled from Ashakh’s close presence, but with quiet, precise questions, the iduve obtained the comparisons he wanted. In a moment more the computer had the data from the paredredesk console and began to construct a projection. A considerable portion of the hall went to starry space, where moving colored dots haltingly coincided.
“From the records of Kartos Station,” said Ashakh, “we have traced the recent movements of the ships in all zones of the Esliph. This new information seems to be in agreement. See, the movements of amaut commerce, the recent expansion of the lines of this karsh”—the image shifted, a wash of red light at the edge of the Esliph nearest human space—“by violent absorption of a minor karshand its lanes; and the sudden shift of commerce here”—another flurry of lights—“indicate a probable direction of origin for that akitesour instruments indicate over by Telshanu, directly out of human space. Now, if this being Daniel’s memory is accurate, the time coincides admirably for the intrusion of that akites;again, it falls well into agreement with this person’s account.”
“In all points?” asked Chimele, and when Ashakh agreed: “Indeed.” The image of Esliph space winked into the dim-lighted normalcy of the paredre.“Then we are bound for Telshanu. Advise Chaganokhto await our coming.”
“Chimele!” cried Mejakh. “Chimele, we cannot afford more time. This persistence of yours in—”
“It has thus far preserved Ashanomefrom disaster. You are not noticed, Mejakh. Ashakh, set our course. We are dismissed, my nasithi.”
As silently as they had assembled, the nasuldispersed, the Melakhisand the nasithi-katasakketoo; and Chimele leaned back in her chair and stared thoughtfully at Daniel.
“Your species,” she said, “seems to have begun vaikkaagainst one of the nasuli,most probably the vra-nasul Chaganokh.The amaut are a secondary problem, inconsequential by comparison. If you have been wholly truthful, I may perhaps remove the greater danger from human space. But be advised, m’metane,you came near to great harm. You are indeed kameth to Ashanome,although not all the nasithiseem to acknowledge that fact. Yet for reasons of my own I shall not yet permit you the idoikkhe—and you must therefore govern your own behavior most carefully. I shall not again count you ignorant.”
“You deny you’re responsible for what is happening to Konig?”
“ Tekasuphre.” Chimele arose and plainly ignored Daniel, looking instead at Isande. “I think it may be well if you make clear to this person and to Aiela my necessities—and theirs.”
Isande’s quarters, a suite of jewel-like colors and glittering light-panels, had been the place of Daniel’s instruction before the interview; it was their refuge after, Isande curled into her favorite chair, Aiela in the other, Daniel sprawled disconsolate on the couch. Their minds touched. It was Daniel they tried to comfort, but he ignored them, solitary and suicidal in his depression. Regarding the impulse to self-destruction, Aiela was not greatly concerned: it was not consistent with the human’s other attitudes. Daniel was more likely to turn his destructive urges on someone else, but it would not be his asuthi. That was part of his misery. He had no reachable enemies.
“You have done nothing wrong,” said Isande. “You have not hurt your people.”
Silence.
Daniel,Aiela sent, I could not lie to you; you would know it.
I hate the sight of you,Daniel’s subconscious fired out at him; but his upper mind suppressed that behind a confused feeling of shame. “That is not really true,” he said aloud, and again, forcefully: “That is not true. I’m sorry.”
Aiela cast him a feeling of total sympathy, for proximity still triggered a scream of alarm over his nerves and unsettled his stomach; but the reaction was already becoming less and less. Someday he would shudder no longer, and they would have become one monstrous hybrid, neither kalliran nor human. And now it was Isande who recoiled, having caught that thought. She rejected it in horror.