Earthfall (Homecoming) (21 page)

Immediately Nafai turned his back on the offering. “Tell them it’s the baby I want, not vengeance.”

“Oh, I’m supposed to do that with sign language?” said Oykib. But he tried, all the same, using the same symbol for the baby, and then gesturing for the four to be taken away.

But the diggers apparently thought the gesture meant something else. At a command from the king, four other diggers bounded out and put the blades of their spears against the throats of the four kidnappers. “No!” Oykib shouted, hearing Chveya’s voice along with his. Nafai turned around and with a single sweep of his dazzling arm he knocked all eight diggers to the ground. Then he seemed to go berserk, pointing at trees, one at a time, until a spot in their branches burst into flame.

“It’s too wet to start a real fire going,” Oykib murmured.

“I’m counting on that,” said Nafai. “You think I want to burn down our village?”

As far as the diggers were concerned, though, this was the rage of the gods and their forest was doomed. The king rushed out and threw himself down on his belly at Nafai’s feet. Then, almost at once, he flipped himself onto his back and flung his arms and legs outward, so his naked belly was completely exposed.

Oykib’s mind was filled with prayers, and now, because the digger king was close, because Oykib now knew something of the context, he was able to understand more of what the king was saying. “He’s pleading with the god—with you—to kill him and spare his people.”

“So he
is
a worthy king,” murmured Nafai. “Tell him we want the baby and nothing else. But first I’m going to respect his offering.” Nafai took a single stride, so he straddled the supine body of the king. Then he reached down and touched the king’s chest with the blade of the axe. “What do you think?” asked Nafai. “They’re a violent people, right? Help me on this, I’m making up a ritual as I go along.”

“No blood,” said Oykib. “That wouldn’t be right. It’s the other king who does the blood rituals.”

“Other king?” asked Nafai.

Chveya was startled, but then confirmed it. “There’s as much loyalty to another as to this one.” Then she frowned. “But there’s someone else, too. Someone that the king himself feels allegiance to. Someone underground.”

“No blood,” said Nafai. “So what should I do?”

“Give him the axe,” said Oykib. “That’s the thing that he hardly dares to hope for, but wants above all else. He’ll give you his spear and his bone necklace.”

Nafai let the handle of the axe slip out of his hands.

“No!” shouted Protchnu behind them. “Don’t give up your weapon! You never give up your weapon!”

“Shut up, Proya,” said Volemak mildly.

The digger king wrapped one hand around the shaft of the axe, then rolled to his belly and rose to his feet. He could lift the axe easily enough, but the handle wasn’t right for his hand and he couldn’t raise the head of the axe while holding the end of the handle. There was no reason to worry that he could use it as a weapon.

The king bent down and picked up his spear, then offered it to Nafai.

“What does it mean if I take this?” asked Nafai.

“I don’t know,” said Oykib. “It’s not like this stuff comes to me with a glossary and footnotes.”

Nafai took the spear. The king now lifted the bone necklace over his head and held it out to Nafai. “I don’t like the bones of this thing,” said Nafai, hesitant to take it.

“I don’t either,” said Oykib. “I think it’s time to demand Zhivya again.”

“And why do you think that?”

“Because I don’t like the way he’s praying for you to take the necklace. He really, really wants you to take it, but I don’t think it’s because he loves you.”

“All right,” said Nafai. “Tell him I want the baby.”

Oykib stepped between Nafai and the king, effectively blocking the transfer of the necklace. The king rocked back on his haunches, looking—what? Was that anger? It looked like anger to Oykib. He made the sign for the baby, then shouted—no, screamed—right in the king’s face. “Bring us Zhivya or we’ll kill every last one of you ugly naked pink-skinned bastards!”

“Since they don’t understand you anyway,” said Chveya, “couldn’t you use language that we won’t have to explain to the little boys later?”

“He’s trying to communicate rage,” said Nafai. “Is it working?”

“Oh, it’s working,” said Chveya. “You and he are definitely gaining control over the situation. They don’t like you, though.”

“I’m heartbroken,” said Nafai.

“Break the spear,” said Oykib.

“What?” said Nafai.

“That’s what he’s afraid of, as he stands there holding the axe. He’s afraid you’ll break the spear.”

Nafai broke the handle of the spear across his knees. The crack of the breaking wood rang through the air.

At once the digger king took the axe in both hands and tried to break the handle. He couldn’t. It was too thick, too well-tempered.

“Do something else he can’t do,” said Oykib. “He has to fail twice.”

Nafai reached down and took the end of the spear that had the head on it. Using the tip of the spear as a knife, he cut quickly and deeply across his own belly. Blood immediately sprayed out onto the digger king’s face, and for a moment Oykib saw, to his horror, that Nafai had cut all the way through the muscle and exposed his bowels. In moments, though, the cloak of the starmaster began healing the wound, and as the diggers watched, the wound closed without a scar.

The digger king took the head of the axe in his hands, as if he contemplated his own disembowelment.

“I don’t want him to kill himself,” said Nafai. “I don’t have the power to heal him.”

“Don’t worry,” said Oykib. “You did exactly the right thing. The one thing the war king can’t do is shed his own blood for the people. Don’t ask me why, I just know that’s the quandary he’s trying to deal with.”

Chveya interrupted. “Someone else is coming.”

They looked up and saw that the digger army was indeed responding to someone else. “Not the blood king,” said Oykib. “It’s the mother.”

“The queen?”

“I think she’s the war king’s mate, yes,” said Oykib. “But she’s something more than that. They all call her ‘the mother.’”

“What, they have a queen rat?” said Chveya. “Like a queen bee or a queen ant?”

“These are mammals,” Oykib reminded her. “It’s a religious title, I think. Like blood king and war king.” Then, tentatively, he made the sound he had heard in his mind. “Emeezem,” he said.

“What’s that?” asked Nafai.

“Her name. That’s the name they’re calling. And her title is Ovovoi.”

“Say her name again,” said Nafai. “I have to get it right the first time I say it.”

“Emeezem,” said Oykib. “It’s not as if I know for sure
I’m
right.”

Nafai lifted his chin and bawled out her name like a caller in a marketplace. “Emeezem!”

The diggers all fell silent. A single figure emerged from the woods and slowly approached Nafai.

She was obviously female, but the real surprise was that she was hairier than most of the males. She wore no decoration, but the pattern of graying in her hair served the purpose well enough. She looked regal; she also looked frail.

“She is begging the god to forgive her. She didn’t know what the foolish males were planning.”

“I want the baby,” said Nafai.

“She knows that. Her women are searching for the baby right now,” said Oykib. Then, suddenly, he realized what she was straining to see. “Hold your lantern up to Nafai’s face, Chveya.”

Chveya did it, and the digger queen covered her head and curled herself into a ball on the ground. “She can die happy now,” said Oykib, “because she’s seen your face in flesh at last.”

“
My
face?” asked Nafai.

“That’s what it seems to me she’s saying,” said Oykib. “
You’re
the one with the pipeline to the Oversoul. I’m having a hard time making sense of any of this.”

“Don’t get testy with me,” said Nafai. “The Oversoul doesn’t hear the things you’re hearing. Your connection with the Keeper is better than his.”

Oykib felt a glow suffuse throughout his body. Pride and fear, a strange mixture. The Oversoul needs me to help with this—that was the pride. But the fear was stronger: If I make a mistake, there’s no one to correct me.

Emeezem uncurled herself from the ground. “She’s waited all her life for you,” said Oykib, trying to make sense of the images that flashed into his mind—images of herself as a child, of dark underground places. “She thinks it was you that made her queen. Because you accepted her.”

“When could I have done that?”

“When she was a little girl,” said Oykib. “I don’t understand it, but her childhood memories include you.”

“Her bond with you is incredibly strong,” said Chevya. “Stronger than her bond with her husband. It’s really amazing, Father.”

“She’s begging you to spare her husband’s life. He didn’t know about the kidnapping either. It was the blood king’s son who did it.”

Emeezem hissed and sputtered a fierce command to her husband, and he rose to his feet and shouted almost the same words. Moments later, a proud-looking male strode out, casting aside his weapon in a flamboyant gesture. He walked up to stand before Nafai, but he did not bow or show respect in any way.

Emeezem and the war king both muttered commands to him, but he showed no sign of hearing them.

The queen turned to Nafai and spoke a stream of what sounded like horrible invective.

“She’s begging you to strike Fusum dead,” said Oykib. “That’s the young one’s name—he plotted everything even though everyone had been commanded not to harm us.”

“I’m not going to kill him,” said Nafai.

“You have to do something,” said Oykib. “This is the guiltiest one. The war king didn’t dare to touch him since he’s the blood king’s son, so that’s why he gave you the four actual kidnappers. But you’re a god, Nyef. You have to do something to him or—well, I don’t know. Chaos. The universe collapsing. Something really bad, anyway.”

“I hate this,” said Nafai. “How about if I take him prisoner?”

“And put him in our secure prison?” asked Chveya. “Good thing we built a jail first thing.”

“Not a prisoner, then,” said Nafai. “A hostage?”

“Strike him down,” said Oykib. “They’re terrified because you hesitate.”

“All I want is Zhivya back,” said Nafai. “I don’t want any corpses here.”

Volemak strode forward and took his place beside Nafai. “Bow to me,” he said to Nafai. “Or whatever passes for a bow in their culture.”

“Get on all fours and kiss Father’s belly, then,” said Oykib.

“You’re kidding,” said Nafai. “That’s not what the war king did to show respect to
me
.”

“The war king was offering himself as an unworthy sacrifice. You’re greeting Father as your king and father.”

“Do it,” said Volemak. “They don’t have to know that I don’t have the powers of the cloak. They have to see that you, too, are taking directions from someone. That tells them that powerful as you are, they haven’t begun to see our powers.”

Nafai dropped down on all fours. But from that position he couldn’t reach his father’s belly to kiss it. He let his hands off the ground and rose up high enough, then pressed his face into Volemak’s shirt.

At once there was a murmur among the diggers.

“Can you glow brighter than you already are?” asked Volemak.

“Yes,” said Nafai.

“All right, when I touch your head, really light yourself up.”

Volemak reached down with a flamboyant gesture and touched Nafai’s head. At once Nafai seemed almost to explode with light. Even the humans gasped then, as the diggers cried out in terror.

“Well done,” said Volemak. “I figured we needed to juice up the perception of power. Now, knock down this proud little puppy. Don’t kill him, just put him out like these others.”

Nafai rose to his feet, still glowing, and reached out his hand, pointing toward Fusum.

The son of the blood king didn’t cower, didn’t even flinch. He just looked Nafai in the face, defiant. Then the air between them sizzled, his limbs leapt our rigidly, and he keeled over like a falling tree. He lay there twitching.

“You do have a natural sense of theatre,” said Volemak. “Now, tell Oykib to point to all nine of these sleepy little diggers and have them carried to the ship.”

“To the ship?” asked Nafai.

“Don’t let it be seen that you argue with me,” said Volemak sharply. “Just do it. Hostages. And Shedemei can keep them drugged up or even put them in suspended animation while she runs some nondestructive studies on them. Trust me, Nafai.”

“I do trust you, Father. Forgive me for hesitating.” He turned to Oykib and elaborately instructed him exactly as Volemak had told him to.

It felt absurd, at first, for Nafai to repeat to him exactly the words that they had all heard Father say. But as Nafai went through it it took on the power of a ritual. It was the expression of authority. The king. The son of the king. The servant of the son. The diggers needed to see the show. But so, too, did the other humans, especially the boys. Especially Protchnu. This is power and authority, Proya, thought Oykib. This is how it should work, and this is why your father is such a failure—because Elemak could never accept the rule of someone over him. Those who will not
be
ruled are not fit to rule anyone else.

So when Nafai finished his recitation, Oykib made a great deal of ceremony about pointing to each of the unconscious diggers and indicating that other diggers should pick them up and carry them to the ship.

The queen seemed to understand the dance that they were doing. In her turn, she spoke sharply to her husband, the war king, and then he in his own turn addressed the soldiers waiting in the trees. Soon, in groups of four, they gathered around the unconscious ones and lifted them from the ground.

At that moment, other voices called out from the woods. Emeezem called out an answer, and four female diggers emerged from the undergrowth. Each held the corner of a blanket, and in the middle lay Zhivya, who was laughing. She was enjoying the ride.

“Quickly,” said Volemak. “Protchnu, run back to the village and fetch Eiadh. Bring her out here!” To Nafai he said, “Don’t reach for the baby. Make them wait. They’ll deliver Zhivya into her mother’s arms.”