Khe (21 page)

“Could you have done it with any of the machines or only the one you used?”

Pradat takes my arm and casually walks us to the edge of the doumana stream—where fewer can possibly overhear our words.

“Just the one. The machine I used—” Pradat frowns. “This does get complicated, and you may not be happy to know exactly what was done to you.”

Another slow-moving vehicle comes up beside us. We adjust our speed to match it, letting its low hum mask our words.

“For us,” Pradat says, “fertility is triggered by changes in the planet’s magnetic field. The machine created a temporary artificial matching field in the room. I used that field to make the Power’s bits bounce back and forth until they overheated and began to scatter.”

“I felt that,” I say. “Like I was burning inside, and then as if I would fly apart. Did you feel it, too?”

“No,” Pradat says. “We are made up of the same kind of positive and negative elements as the Powers, but we are flesh, bone, blood, and muscle, too. Your body has changed, Khe. My guess is that your bones are weakened, your blood thinned—some of the
physical
parts of you altered into pure energy. The Powers were more successful in making you what they wanted than I’d have thought possible.”

My stomach churns and I want to be sick. My neck burns, but I don’t feel my spots lighting.

“How?” I say. “How could I be changed that way?”

Pradat reaches out to touch my neck, but thinks better of it. The last thing I want is for her to feel sorry for me.

“In the artificial magnetic field, your negatively charged elements were kicked into a faster energy orbit. You are no longer made of the stuff you were, but are now, in some part, made as the Powers are.”

“A bird can’t become a tree,” I say.

I hadn’t realized we’d slowed our pace until the vehicle hiding us suddenly moves on ahead. Four kler doumanas come along side of us, chattering happily. We wait until they pass us.

“Because, Khe, at times we are not so different from the Powers. During Resonance, the planet’s natural magnetic force changes us, knocking our elements into an excited state that is not unlike the Powers’ natural condition. Your elements are now in an even faster orbit than they would be during Resonance.”

“Forever?”

“It’s possible that your elements will quiet. It’s just as possible—” Pradat does touch my neck now, but lightly, just brushing her fingers by. “It’s more likely that your body will continue absorbing high energy levels from the planet’s magnetic fields and making use of that energy.”

Pale-blue is the color of despair. If my spots would light, that’s what they’d show. I knew I’d been changed but had hoped that, away from the lumani’s dreadful machines, I would go back to normal.

We walk a while, the corenta’s walls growing closer, before Pradat says, “Khe, you are still yourself. The core of who and what you are hasn’t changed.”

I sigh and tell myself that body and soul are separate. That one part can change while the other stays true and immutable. I tell myself, but I don’t believe it.

We’re close enough to the corenta that I can see the corenta doumanas inside the open gate. In the kler, all the cloaks I saw were of a single color, like ours at the commune. The corentans’ cloaks have dark blue bodies with hoods in different colors and stripes of a third shade down either side in the front. Maybe the colors represent guilds or show what type of products they offer. Everyone I see is wearing a collar.

My collar feels suddenly tight; I don’t like being this close to the corenta but it lies directly in our path to the wilderness. It’s unnatural, and makes me nervous, until I think that no—the corenta is the most natural living arrangement on the planet. The only way it could be more natural were if males were there too.

I’m tiring and need to rest, but can’t until we are safely away in the wilderness.

Pradat grabs my arm.

“Look, there at the gate,” she says.

Two corentans have come out and are heading toward us.

Pradat’s face tenses. “They hardly ever leave their community. Something’s wrong.”

“Move toward the plain
now
,” I say. “Run, if you have to.”

We angle off, but the corentans adjust their course to match ours. They come slowly, as if they know where we are heading and are waiting until we get around the corner and out of the sight of Chimbalay’s doumanas. I have the uncomfortable feeling that we are being herded where the corentans want us to go.

None of the kler doumanas seem to notice that we’ve turned and are walking alone now—Pradat and I— following the wall and heading away from the corenta’s gate. The corentans still trail us.

We come to the corner and turn. Midway down the long wall, there’s another gate, this one shut. I look around. The corentans have gone. As we come near the closed gate, I exhale a sigh. We’ve hit the halfway mark. Each step now takes us closer to putting the corenta behind us and reaching the wilderness.

When we’re dead center of the gate, it bursts open, thumping against the wall. The sound makes my neck burn and my heart knock against my ribs. A collared corentan steps out, planting herself in front of us.

“A word, if you will, Sisters,” the corentan says. She’s almost as tall as Azlii. Her skin is pale red, her eyes nearly as black and unfathomable as Inra’s.

Two more corentans follow her out. Both have ruddy, red-brown skin. All three wear dark-blue cloaks with yellow hoods and white stripes down the front. All are collared, but I feel their anger as clearly as if I could see the brown-black of their spots. Behind us, I hear the sound of foot casings crunching snow. I don’t need to look to know that the two who were following us now stand at our backs.

“Of course, Sister,” Pradat says pleasantly. “How can we help you?”

The tallest corentan stares. “You are the orindle, Pradat.”

A shiver streams up my breastbone. Do they know her because she trades here, or has Azlii managed to send them word of our escape? Does Azlii know we’ve escaped? Are these doumanas in league with the lumani?

Pradat nods as if she’s completely unconcerned. The two darker-skinned doumanas move to the outer sides of Pradat and me, hemming us in.

“The day is cold. Come inside,” the tall one says.

The other corentans gently push us toward the open gate. I push back, but Pradat lays her hand on my arm and motions for me to go inside.

The gate slams behind us, though no one touches it. There are buildings in the distance, but only open ground where we stand.

“Where are Azlii and the others?” the tall doumana demands.

Pradat spreads her hands, showing her palms. She looks calm enough, but I know the fear in her.

“Chimbalay Research Center One, so far as I know,” Pradat says, then glances at me. “Except for Khe, who is here beside me.”

The corentans pay me no mind.

“Are they alive?” the tall one asks.

Pradat shifts her weight. I feel her hesitancy and her fear click up a step.

“Two were this morning,” she says. “Azlii was.”

I turn and grab her wrists. My voice breaks. “Who has gone to the creator?”

Pradat sighs. “I’m sorry, Khe. It was Inra.”

My neck burns as if a thousand fires roared inside it, but no spots light. I slump over. The lumani have destroyed Inra.

One of the dark-skinned doumanas takes my arm and helps me to stand straight. My bones are water. I lean against her for support.

Inra
.

“Who is with Azlii in the research center?” the tall corentan asks.

“Tanez,” I answer, the name coming out in a choked whisper. “From the hatchling house in Chimbalay.”

The tall doumana looks at me for the first time. I don’t like the way she stares down her broad nose at me. I pull myself up as tall as I can, though I’m still a hand’s breadth shorter than she is.

“You are Khe,” she says. “Who Azlii thought was worth saving. And now you are with this . . .
orindle
?”

“She got me out,” I say in Pradat’s defense. “She saved me from the Powers.” A long tremble shakes down my backbone. Once it starts, I can’t stop shaking. Inra’s dead, and I’d be worse than dead if it wasn’t for Pradat. Perhaps I’m dead anyway—altered by Weast into something horrible. I’m afraid that Weast will give me what it promised, and I will go on a long, long time knowing that once I was a doumana, and now I’m not.

“Saved you from orindles like herself, you mean?” the tall one says. “Maybe saved you for herself, some little experiment she has in mind.”

The harshness in her voice shocks me from my trembling.

“She saved me from the lumani,” I say.

The tall doumana grabs my wrist. “Who told you to say lumani? Azlii? Only corentans know that word. Set-placers say Powers.”

I pull my hand away; I hadn’t realized I used the word. “The Power. It said that was what they call themselves.”

“You have talked with one? How?”

“And seen three of them,” I say. “In the research center. Azlii told me how corentans speak with other sentients. I tried it with the lumani. It worked.”

All five corentans glare at me.

“Why would the lumani show themselves to you?” the tall one asks.

I hunch my shoulders and fall silent, too ashamed of what was done to me to speak of it. Ashamed and afraid. What would these doumanas—who hate the lumani—do if they knew what I’ve become?

Pradat takes a defiant step toward the tall corentan. “You’d do better and accomplish more if you asked me about Azlii. She was already damaged when I left her. I did what I could, but she and Tanez will likely be Returned soon if someone doesn’t go after them.”

There is a long silence.

“Can they be gotten out?” the tall one asks.

“If someone knew where they were, and knew some of the secrets of Research Center One,” Pradat says.

“Secrets you’re going to tell us?”

Pradat nods. “Do you have a stick, anything sharp?”

The doumana who’d helped me stand takes a few quick steps to a nearby tree. She sets her palms flat against the trunk and I hear her think-talk, asking the tree if she may have a branch. If the tree answers, I don’t hear it, but the corentan sends
Thank you
, and pulls off a thin, pointed branch that she hands to Pradat.

Pradat takes the stick and, hunkering down, begins to draw in the thin crust of snow as she explains how she thinks a rescue might, just might, be done and succeed.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Beware the deceiver. No good can come of her scheme
.

--The Rules of a Good Life

Pradat explains her plan and rocks back on her heels, waiting for reactions. I close my eyes and hope for a moment’s rest.

“I can see how that might work,” the tall corentan says, “but I don’t like it.” She wipes her hand across her mouth. “There’s violence and destruction in your scheme. That’s not our way.”

“It is harsh,” Pradat agrees, “but it’s quick and effective. If you want to save Azlii, you don’t have much time left. You won’t get a second chance.”

The corentans eye each other.

“You need a diversion,” Pradat continues. “Setting fire to the research center will force everyone inside to flee. Starting a fire won’t be easy. The outside walls are made of glass and won’t burn unless the temperature is very high. At least one of you would have to get inside and ignite the flames.”

“Even if we manage to get a fire started,” the tall one says, “what’s to ensure that the doumanas inside will take Azlii and the kler doumana with them when they flee? They could leave them inside to burn.”

“They might,” Pradat says, “but I don’t think they will. The orindles and helphands will be too afraid of angering the Powers by leaving them behind.”

The tall corentan rubs the collar around her neck thoughtfully. “I can’t agree to a fire that puts lives in danger. There has to be another way.” The five corentans had all hunkered down beside Pradat. The tall one stands, followed by her sisters. “Come with us. Together, we’ll look for a better solution.”

I shake my head. “You know who we are. You must realize that we’ve escaped from the lumani. If you take us in, you’ll put yourselves in danger.”

The corentan laughs. “The lumani can’t harm you here. They are helpless without someone to physically aid them. Who in the corenta do you think would do their will?”

The five corentans look at Pradat.

“She saved me,” I say. “Not all of the Powers’ enemies are obvious.”

The tall one’s mouth crinkles but she doesn’t smile. She draws her cloak closer around her body. “It’s cold out here. We’ve a warm fire, food, and drink inside. Come.”

The corentans start walking. Pradat looks at me. I shrug and follow after the corentans. Behind us, the gate closes without a touch or a word. It startles me to think that the wall likely shut its own door, and that it had been listening.

Fatigue is catching up with me. My legs feel weak, my mind dense. A voice behind me says, “I remember her,” but when I glance over my shoulder, there is no one there.

The tall corentan doesn’t hesitate in her step, but I see thought grains floating from her and hear in my mind:
What have you remembered, Wall?

Where I saw her before. The medium-red one, as we were arriving, she ran across the plain, chased by beasts. She went into the kler
.

The tall corentan’s chin bobs in the smallest of nods. None of her sisters show that they’ve heard anything.

Good
, she sends.
Thank you
.

A path stretches out from the gate, leading to the interior of the corenta. Most of the snow has been scraped from the path and piled in knee-high banks on either side. Pradat seems unsure of these new doumanas. I’m not afraid, but maybe fear is an effort I’m too tired to make.

The corenta isn’t laid out in circular avenues the way Chimbalay is. The buildings aren’t bunched together in compounds like a commune. It’s haphazard, as though things were set down any place that seemed good at the moment. The path we walk curves this way and that, but we walk fast, toward some specific place.

We take a branch path and head a new direction. There are buildings further down, made of mud, like the wall, and painted bright colors. The buildings are unevenly spaced, as though they sprouted where they wanted, the way wild plants do in untended fields. I sense the buildings watching our swift passage, and hear their soft whisperings as they wonder who the strangers are.