C. Cherryh - Kutath

Eyes nictitated. There was not a glance or a word among them.

"Will you challenger Melein asked. "Or will you hear?”

There was the sound of the wind whipping at their robes, the whisper of sand moving. Nothing more.

"I need kel'ein," Melein said, "the service of forty hands of kel'ein from each Kel; lend them. Such as survive I shall send back again with Honors which those who did not go will envy.”

"Where will you take them?" asked Hetha'in. "To what manner of conflict, and for what purpose? You have brought us attack, and tsi'mri, and the wasting of our cities. Where will you take them?”

"I am the foretold," Melein said. "And I call on you for your children and their strength, for the purpose for which we went out in the beginning, and I shall build you a House, she'panei.”

There were small movements, a glancing from one to the other, who ought never to look on one another, who were never united.

"We have trailed a tsi-mri among you," Tafa said.

"That you have," Melein answered her. "See, and trust your Sight, she'panei; by the Mystery of the Mysteries, by the Seeing… give me kel'ein who have the courage to fight this fight and sen'ein to witness and record it in your shrines.”

"With tsi'mri?" cried Tafa. "With walking-beasts?”

"By them you know that I am not Kutathi; and by that you know what I am, Tafa of the hao'nath. Seel We are at a point, she'pauei, of deciding. Our ship is gone; our enemies are many; of the millions who went out, my kel'anth and I are the last alive. We two made it home, and do you by your suspicion destroy us, who have survived all that tsi'mri have done? Sit down and die, she'panei; or give me the forces I need.”

Tafa of the hao'nath turned her back, walked away and stopped by her kel'anth. A coldness settled at Niun's belly. For a moment he had hoped… that five she'panei who could unite against an intruder could see farther than most.

The kel'anth of the hao'nath walked forward; Rhian sTafa; Niun moved out to meet him, met the eyes above the veil, of an older man than he, and worn with hurt and dus-poison and the march that had worn them both. There was nothing of hate there now, only of regret. There had been such in Merai's eyes when they had met, that sorrow. He wished to protest; it was double suicide, Tafa's madness… but in challenge they were held even from speaking.

The kel'ein of two tribes should ring them about, shield the other castes from such a sight; here kel'anthein did that office, too few to do more than make the token of a ring.

They drew, together, a long hiss of steel; Khian's blade lifted to guard; he lifted his own, waited, slipped his mind into hand and blade, nothingness and now.

A pass; he turned it and returned, cautiously; countered and returned. He was not touched; Rhian was not. The blades had breathed upon each other, no more. This was a Master, this Rhian. Another pass and turn, a flutter of black cloth, cut loose; his eyes and mind were for the blade alone; a fourth pass; he saw a chance and a trap, evaded it

"Stop!”

Tafa's sharp command; they paused, alike poised on guard. He thought of treachery, of the insanity of trusting strangers. Rut not tsi'mri; mri. Eyes amber as his own regarded him steadily beyond the two blades.

"Kel'anth of the hao'nath," Tafa cried. "Disengage!”

Niun stayed still as the kelanth retreated the one pace which took them out of sword's-distance. "Disengage," Melein bade him. "The hao'nath have asked.”

He stepped his pace back, stood until the hao'nath kel'anth had sheathed his sword; then he ran his own into sheath, steadily enough for all the tautness of his nerves. It was challenger's prerogative, to stop the contest without a death; challenge then might be returned from the other side, without mercy.

It dawned on him slowly that he had won, that this man had gotten out alive, and he was glad of that, for his bravery. He did not relax. They might all try his measure, one after the other. He tried to subdue the pulse which hammered in his veins; one thing to fight well; the greater matter was discipline, not to be shaken by any tactic, fair or foul.

"We lend you your two hundred," Tafa said, "and our kel'anth with them. You might demand more; but this we offer.”

There was a moment's silence. "Acceptable," Melein said. The breath left Niun's lungs no more swiftly, but the pounding of bis heart filled his ears.

"And we lend," said the she'pan of the patha, "our kel'anth and two hundred to stay if they bring fair report of you. We cannot sit under one tent, she'pan; but let our kel'antnein do so, and bring us word again what they have seen, whether to do what you ask or to challenge. This is fair, in our thinking.”

"So," said mari and ja'ari almost at one breath.

"We ka'anomin are out of Edun Zohain, far out of our range. Our allegiance is to the ma'an mri, but we agree unless the ma'an send to recall us. For a hand of days let them observe; and that long we will wait for answer.”

"Agreeable," said Melein, and other heads bowed. "A hand of days or less. Life and Honors.”

She turned away; the other she'panei did so, with their sen'ein. Kel'anthein remained a moment, covering the retreat.

Niun cast a glance at Bhian. A bit of cloth ky on the sand; his, Rhian's, he was not sure. He took down his veil and gave his face to the kel'anthein lately strangers, feeling naked and strange in doing so ... glanced from face to face as they did the same, memorizing them, the fierce handsomeness of Bhian of the hao'nath; the plainness of Tian of the ja'ari; Kedras of the patha was one of the youngest, his mouth marked with a scar from edge to chin; mari's Elan was broad-faced and elder; but oldest of the lot was Kalis of the ka'anomin, her eyes shadowed by sun-frown and the kel-scars much faded with years.

He turned to follow after Melein, and they went their separate ways for the time. He looked up at the slight rise on which his own Kel waited, before the tents, where the four who had come to his support still stood ... for the tribe's sake, he persuaded himself in clearer reason; for pride of the ja'anom and its Holy, that they would not have merged with another tribe in defeat, though much the same distress would attach to merging as the consequence of winning. It was pride. Ras's line in particular… had long defended the ja'anom. It was duty to her dead brother. He understood that And Hlil was kel-second and Seras fen'anth, and Merin a friend of Hlil's. They had their reasons; and their reasons had been fortunate for him and for Melein; he took even that with gratitude.

He walked among them, spared a nod of thanks to either side as they closed behind him and the black ranks of the Kel flowed back into the camp, where anxious kath'ein and sen'ein waited to know the fate of the tribe, lustering about Melein.

"There is agreement," Melein said aloud, so that all might hear. "They will send kel'anthein into our Council; and they may lend us help. Challenge was declined.”

It was as if the whole camp together drew breath and let it go again ... no vast relief, perhaps; they still sat in the possession of a stranger, led to strange purposes. But the ja'anom still existed as a tribe, and would go on existing.

His dus ventured out of kel-tent, radiating disturbance. Niun met it and touched it, tolerating its interference as he stood for a moment staring after the figure of Melein, who retreated among the Sen.

Reaction settled on him like a breath of cold wind. He turned away, the dus trailing him, went into the tent of the Kel, dull to the looks which surrounded him… missed the four to whom he owed some expression of spoken gratitude; perhaps, they thought, they turned away from it. He did not seek them out, to force it on them. He went instead to Duncan's side, settled there, concerned that Duncan slept still, unmoved from the shoulder of his dus, bis face peaceful as death in the faint light which reached them from the wind vents.