Earthfall (Homecoming) Read online

  “Oh, not renewing me, are you?” asked Elemak with a nasty smile. “What do you think of that, Proya?”

  His eldest son, Protchnu, walked to his father. “I think that I have no mother,” he said.

  “How appropriate,” said Elemak, “since I have no father and no wife. Have I also no friend?”

  “I’m your friend,” said Obring.

  “I stand with you,” said Meb. “But Vas here took the oath.”

  “Vas will take whatever oath you ask,” said Elemak. “But his word has always been worthless. Everybody knows that.”

  Sevet laughed. “Look at your friends, you poor man,” she said. “One deluded eight-year-old boy. And then what? Meb! Obring! They were both worthless back in Basilica.”

  “You didn’t say that when you invited me into your bed!” Obring shouted at her.

  “That had nothing to do with you,” said Sevet contemptuously. “That was between me and my sister, and believe me, I have paid deeply for that mistake. Vas knows that since then I have been faithful to him, both in my heart and in my actions.”

  The children old enough to understand what was being revealed here would have plenty of family scandal to talk about later. Obring and Sevet had an affair? And how did Sevet pay for it? And what did she mean that it was between her and Kokor?

  “Enough,” said Elemak. “The old man has made his little play, but you’ll notice he didn’t have the courage to ask you to stand against me now. It was only in some imagined future that he rules over you. He knows, as you all know, that I rule over you now, and believe me, you will never see a future in which I do not.” He turned to Obring. “Stay here and keep everyone in the library.”

  Obring grinned at Vas. “I guess you aren’t going to be giving me orders anymore.”

  “Vas is still a guard,” said Elemak. “I don’t trust him, but he’ll do what he’s told. And now he’ll do what you tell him, Obring. Right, Vas?”

  “Yes,” said Vas quietly. “I’ll do what I’m told. But I’ll also keep all my oaths.”

  “Yes yes, a man of honor and all that,” said Elemak. “Now, Meb, let’s take Father and his wife to visit Nafai. And while we’re at it, let’s bring along the woman who claims she is no longer my wife.”

  “What are you going to do?” asked Rasa contemptuously. “Tie us up the way you’ve tied Nafai?”

  “Of course not,” said Elemak. “I have respect for old people. But for every person who took that little oath of yours, Father, Nafai will take a blow. And you will watch.”

  Volemak glared at Elemak. “I wish that before I fathered you, I had been castrated or killed.”

  “What a sad thought,” said Elemak. “Then you would never have fathered your precious Nafai. Though, come to think of it, I wonder if there was a man’s seed involved in conceiving him. He is so completely his mother’s little girl.”

  A moment later, Elemak and Mebbekew manhandled Volemak and Eiadh down the ladderway and through the corridor to the storage room where Nafai lay. Rasa followed helplessly behind.

  Nafai was not really asleep, not ever during the past few days. Or if he did sleep, it felt as though he was awake, so vivid were the dreams. Sometimes they were his worst fears, dreams of the twins gasping for air until finally they stopped breathing altogether, their eyes open, their mouths agape, and in the dream he tried to close their eyes and close their mouths, but they kept flying open again as soon as he took away his hand. He woke gasping for breath himself from these dreams.

  Sometimes, though, the dreams were of other times, better times. He remembered getting up in the morning at his father’s house and running out under the shower and turning on the cold water. At the time he had hated it, but now he remembered it with fondness. An innocent time, when the worst thing that could happen to you was a shock of icy water on your head and back, when the worst thing you could do to someone else was smart off at them until they got angry enough to stop laughing and start pushing you around. Only now they never laughed at all, they never forgave at all, and the cold water was nothing, would be a pleasure if it could ever come again. How could I have known in those days, he wondered upon waking from such memory dreams, how could I have known that Elemak’s annoyance would turn to such hatred? That such evil days would come upon us? I made smartmouth jokes because I wanted his attention, that was all. He was like a god, so strong, and Father loved him so much. All I wanted was for him to notice me, to tell me that he liked me, that he thought I might someday ride with him on a caravan to some faraway land and come home with exotic plants for Father to sell. All I wanted was for him to respect me and put his arm around my shoulder and say, This is my brother, look at my brother, I can count on him, he’s my right-hand man.

  Who else could have been your brother, Elemak? Meb? He’s the one you chose? Was I so despicable to you, that you chose him over me?

 

  Yes, with the cloak of the starmaster I’m stronger.

 

  No I can’t. The cloak can. You can. But I can’t. I’m tied up here and my wrists and ankles hurt.

 

  He wants me in pain. If he sees my skin chafed and bleeding, maybe that will satisfy him.

 

  So be it.

 

  Stay away from me in my sleep. I want none of your dreams now, and certainly none of your meddling.

 

  I hate the pain of having my brother hate me. And knowing that this time maybe I deserve it.

 

  Oh, and here I thought you were helping me by having us keep those children awake.

 

  Are you really talking to me? Or am I dreaming this, too?

 

  So if this is a dream, why can’t I wake up from it?

  As soon as he said this in his mind, Nafai awoke. Or rather he dreamed that he awoke, for he knew at once that he was still asleep, perhaps more deeply than before. And in his sleep, thinking he was awake, he felt the cords melt away from his hands and he rose to his feet. The door opened at his touch. He walked through the corridors and here and there he saw people lying about, mouths open, panting, none of them noticing him as if he were invisible. Ah, he thought. I understand now. I’m dead, and this is my spirit walking the corridor. But then in his dream he realized that his wrists and ankles hurt and he was having trouble walking straight, even in the low gravity, so he wasn’t dead after all.

  He got to the ladder and climbed up, higher and higher, to the highest level of the starship, where the shielding field was generated. But now the ladder didn’t stop. It went up, and the next opening was not onto the smooth plastic floor of the starship, it now opened onto a stone floor. He stepped out onto the floor, and felt his body weigh heavily, his steps painful because gravity was normal again. It was dark, a cave. He heard footsteps here and there, but none of them came near; nor did they go very far away. Just a scurry of steps, and he walked a little, and then another scurry of steps. That’s all right, he thought. Follow me, I’m not afraid of you, I know you’re there but I also know you won’t harm me.

  He came to a corridor and saw a light burning in a small side chamber of the cave. He walked there, entered the room, and saw dozens of statues, beautifully carved of clay, perched on every shelf of rock and all over the floor. But as he looked more closely, he saw that all the statues were marred, smoothed here and there, the detail lost. Who would deface such marvelous work? Deface it, and yet keep it here as if it were a secret treasur
e trove?

  Then at last he noticed a statue high up and far back from the light, a statue larger than the others, and unmarred. It wasn’t the perfection of the detail work that made him stare, however. It was the face itself. For unlike the others, which were all either animals or gargoyles, this was a head of a human. And he knew the face. He should. He had seen it in every mirror since he became a man.

  Now the footsteps came closer, not scurrying, but slowly, respectfully. He felt a small hand touch him on the thigh. He did not look; he did not need to. He knew who it was.

  Except that it was only in the dream that he knew. In fact he had no idea who it might be, and he tried to make his dream self turn, look down, see who or what had touched him. But he could not make his own head turn; he could not make himself bend over. In fact, he was bending backward, and his neck was caught between two cords, and there were footsteps, loud ones now, not quick scurrying steps, and a light went on, dazzling him.

  He blinked open his eyes. Really awake now, not just dreaming that he was awake.

  “Time for my walk?” he asked.

  A quick whistling sound, and then a sharp pain in his arm. Against his will he cried out.

  “That’s one,” said the voice of Elemak. “Tell me, Rasa, what’s your count? How many took the oath?”

  “Do your own foul business,” said Mother’s voice.

  “Could it be hundreds?” asked Elemak. Again the whistling sound. Again the excruciating pain, this time in the ribs of his back. One of them broke; he felt the bone stabbing him as he breathed. And yet he couldn’t stop breathing, he had to gasp, because he wasn’t getting enough oxygen anymore, he couldn’t breathe deeply enough to get the air to stay conscious.

 

  “I don’t count any of these against the total, until you tell me what the total might be,” said Elemak.

  “Count it yourself,” said Rasa. “It was everybody except Protchnu, Obring, and Mebbekew. Everybody, Elemak. Think about that.”

  “He’s not healing himself,” said Luet.

  Nafai heard her voice and felt a surge of anger against Elemak. Did he think she was so weak that her spirit would break because she saw her husband enduring pain? What was Elemak trying to gain, anyway? It was the Oversoul he had to persuade—or surrender to. Something had happened, though. An oath.

  “I’ve noticed that,” said Elemak. “His wrists don’t seem to get better, or his ankles. I can’t figure out if that’s because the cloak just isn’t working right now, or because he’s deliberately not healing himself in order to look more pitiful so I’ll feel sorry for him and loosen his bonds so he can get free and kill me.”

  The whistling sound. Another blow, this time on the back of his neck. Nafai gasped at the pain that shot up and down his spine; for a few moments he was numb from the neck down, and he thought, He’s broken my neck.

 

  Why doesn’t he just kill me?

 

  Well stop it. Let him kill me. Then he’ll have his victory and there’ll be peace and everybody will be better off.

 

  What, dead isn’t defeated?

 

  Then if you have any decency, tell Volemak to say the magic words and end all this.

 

  I’m too tired to make sense of this. Go away and let me die.

 

  The one on my neck?

 

  Oh, yes. I can feel that.

 

  Don’t do it.

 

  Don’t heal me until he leaves the room. Give me that much dignity.

 

  It’s between him and me. I don’t want him to see how you intervene for me.

 

  This really hurts.

 

  I said not to.

 

  “Look,” said Elemak. “His leg is straightening out. I guess we found out how much pain he could take, and now he’s got his invisible friend to save him.”

  “I’m looking,” said Volemak coldly. “What I see is a coward, striking a bound man with a metal rod.”

  Elemak’s voice rose to a scream. “I’m the coward? I’m not the one with the cloak! I’m not the one who can get magically healed whenever I stub my toe! I’m not the one with the power to give people jolts of electricity whenever I want to bring them to heel!”

  “It’s not the power you have that makes you a coward or a bully,” said Volemak. “It’s how you use it. Do you think that being bound like that keeps the cloak from having the same power it’s always had? As badly as you’re treating him, as badly as you’re treating all of us, Nafai still chooses not to strike you dead where you stand.”

  “Do it then, Nyef,” said Elemak softly. “If you have the power to strike me dead, do it. You’ve killed before. A drunk lying unconscious in the street, I think it was. My older half-brother, I think it was. That’s your specialty, killing people who can’t fight back. But Father thinks I’m the bully. How can it be bullying, to break the bones of a man who can heal himself in moments? Look, I can break your skull and—”

  There was a scream of rage from a woman and the sound of scuffling. Then someone was slammed into a wall; a woman cried. Nafai tried to open his eyes. All he could see was the wall his face was pressed against. “Luet,” he whispered.

  “Luet can’t heal herself, can she?” said Elemak. “She should remember that before she tries to fight with me.”

  “All you’re doing,” said Nafai, “is using up the oxygen that your children need to breathe.”

  “You can end it at any time, Nyef,” said Elemak. “All you have to do is die.”

  “And then what?” asked Volemak. “You’ll just start hating the next best man, and for the same reason. Because he’s better than you. And when you kill him, you’ll find still another better than you. It will go on and on forever, Elemak, because each act of bullying cruelty you commit makes you smaller and smaller until finally you’ll have to kill every human being and every animal and even then you’ll look at yourself with such contempt that you won’t be able to bear it—”

  The rod smashed down right in Nafai’s face. He felt it cave in all the bones of the front of his head, and then everything went black.

  A moment later? It could have been; it could have been hours or days. He was conscious again, and his face was not broken. Nafai wondered if he was alone. Wondered what had happened to Father and Mother. To Luet. To Elemak.

  Someone was in the room. Someone was breathing.

  “All better,” said the voice. A whisper. Hard to identify. No, not hard. Elemak. “The Oversoul wins again.”

  Then the lights went out again and the door closed and he was alone.

  Eiadh was singing softly to the little ones, Yista and
Menya and Zhivya, when Protchnu came to her. She heard him come into the room, the door sliding open and then sliding closed again behind him. She did not stop singing.

  When the light returns again

  Will I remember how to see?

  Will I recognize my mother’s face?

  Will she know me?

  When the light returns again

  Then nothing will I fear;

  So I close my eyes and dream of day

  In darkness here.

  “Singing is a waste of oxygen,” said Protchnu softly.

  “So is crying,” Eiadh answered quietly. “Three children are not crying now because one person sang. If you came to stop my singing, go away. Report my crime to your father. Maybe he’ll get angry enough to beat me. Maybe he’ll let you help.”

  Still she didn’t turn to look at him. She heard him breathing a little more heavily. Raggedly, perhaps. But she was surprised that when he spoke again, his voice was high with barely contained weeping. “It’s not my fault you turned against Father.”

  She had been so stung by his repudiation of her in the library that she hadn’t spoken to him since, and had avoided thinking of him. Protchnu, her eldest, saying such terrible things to his own mother. The boy had looked so savage at that moment, so much like Elemak, that she had felt as though she didn’t know him. But she did know him, didn’t she? He was only eight years old. It was wrong for him to have been torn between quarreling parents like this.

  “I didn’t turn against your father,” she said softly. “I turned against what he’s doing.”

  “Nafai cheated us.”

  “The Oversoul did. And all the parents of those children did. Not just Nafai.”

  Protchnu was silent. She thought maybe she had carried the point with him. But no, he was thinking of something else. “Do you love him?”

  “I love your father, yes. But when he lets anger rule him, he does bad things. I reject those bad things.”

  “I didn’t mean Father.”

  It was plain that he expected her to know already. That he had the idea somehow that she loved another man.