by Martha Wells
Deciding this was a greeting, Moon got up and moved closer, sitting near enough so the Amifata could touch his hand. Its long narrow fingers had multiple joints and suckers along the underside. Its skin felt soft and a little damp. It rubbed gently at the groundling skin on the top of Moon’s hand. “We know of Raksura. Stories only, of the life of the mid-forest, high above.” It leaned down to study his skin more closely with its left eye, then started to fall over sideways.
Moon caught it by the shoulders and lifted it carefully upright again. “Thistle, just what kind of simples have you and the Kek been giving them?”
“We’ve had to try different things,” Thistle said, an air of protest in her voice. “It’s hard, when you can’t put someone in a healing sleep. The Kek have a lot of simples and some of them were stronger than we were really expecting and—We didn’t want them to be in pain.”
“I don’t think it’s in pain.” Moon steadied the Amifata until it could hold itself up again. In Kedaic, he said, “Do you know anything about a small groundling, a small creature, maybe a pace and a half tall, who can camouflage itself so it’s almost invisible to many species?”
It turned the eye to face Moon again and its gaze sharpened. “Yes, we call them the Onde. We were sent here to find them.”
“Sent here?”
“By a trader of the mineral basins. Some number of turns ago, the Onde traded with both the mineral basins and the moss canyons. But one turn they failed to appear, and as far as anyone knows, nothing has been heard of them since.” The Amifata tried to move, and let out a half-groan, half-gasp. Its vocal apparatus almost fell out, and it lifted a hand to awkwardly tuck it back in. Thistle leaned forward to watch curiously, and Moon just sat there. At least that answered the question of whether it was a natural part of the Amifata’s mouth or not. At least, he thought it did. It adjusted the apparatus, and continued, “We were asked to find them again.”
That matched Elastan’s version well enough, though Moon didn’t understand why she had been so reluctant to speak. The Amifata didn’t seem to consider it a secret. “So you found them?”
“Yes, though it was difficult, and a longer journey than we had believed. We reached the old trading ground, where we were told to go, and put out the trading signal. It is a plant device, that releases a specific scent. Some time later, an Onde appeared. Elastan saw it through its concealment.” It looked down at the others. The one that had seemed conscious had closed its eyes again. Then the Amifata seemed to realize that one of the group was missing. “Where is Elastan?”
“She was hurt too, but she’s in another shelter.” Moon asked, “Why is she with you?”
The Amifata angled its left eye toward Moon again. “She brought us the offer to search for the Onde, and gave us the map and the old trading signal. We don’t normally venture to these dry spaces, among the roots. We are of the moss canyons. We trade with the mineral basins, but we met her in the trading assemblage of the moss routes.”
And Elastan didn’t mention any of that. “She said you were explorers.”
The Amifata’s left eye rotated. “We explore and study the territories around the moss canyons.” It tapped its mouth. “We use translators, and carry speech between species who cannot understand each other. We help them to trade with each other. We have not come so far before, but it seemed worth it, to find the Onde again.”
Elastan had been oddly cagey about whose idea the trip had been. Moon still didn’t understand why, unless it was some matter of territory between the mineral basins and the moss canyons that no one outside those two places would understand or care about. “What happened after Elastan saw the Onde?”
“We tried to speak with it, then Elastan cried out …” The left eye blinked slowly. “That was when I was struck down.” It turned its eye down on the others again. “I remember nothing else.”
Moon set his jaw and didn’t hiss. If Elastan had had time to cry out, she must have seen what had attacked them. “We think the thing that attacked you came here last night, and tried to get inside our colony. You don’t have any idea what it is?”
“I did not see.” The Amifata’s left eye went unfocused and the right eye started to rotate. “I did not see the others struck down …” It started to lean over sideways. Moon caught it and steered it upright again. As if it hadn’t noticed, it said, “I hope we will see home again.”
“We’ll help you all we can,” Moon said. “We’ll make sure you get back there.” He had no idea where the moss canyons were, but as long as it was somewhere in the Reaches it should be possible to get to it relatively easily, if they ended up having to fly the Amifata back. But there didn’t seem to be anything wrong with the leaf boat. If the Amifata recovered fully, they might be able to make their way home on their own.
Its left eye rotated again. “That is … That is …” The Amifata started to fold over and the Kek healer jumped up to help Moon guide it down to the pallet.
As Moon got to his feet, Thistle moved around to sit next to the Amifata. She handed the Kek healer a small container made of woven leaves and asked Moon, “Did you find out anything?”
“I found out I was talking to the wrong people,” Moon said. He climbed out of the shelter into the clearing. Clouds must have moved in somewhere high overhead, because the dim light had faded almost completely and the chorus of insects and treelings rose and fell in waves of sound. There was movement all around, but it was mostly Kek, shifting their stores of plant matter around, herding smaller Kek toward the center of the village. The air about five paces above the ground was filled with small flying lizards and frogs, catching the insects drawn by the moss-lights.
A little distance away, Kof stood with another Aeriat in groundling form; it took Moon a whole heartbeat to realize it was Stone. “You found something?” Moon said, too startled and relieved to make a better greeting.
“Not as much as you found,” Stone said. His clothes were covered with mud and moss stains; he must have had to shift to fit into some narrow places. “Sage says the colony was invaded by an invisible groundling? I was only gone for half a day, what’s wrong with you?”
Kof rattled his staff at Stone and headed off, presumably to get the full story from the Kek who had gone along on the hunt. Moon said, “Are Bone and the others all right?” Stone’s tone never gave away much, but Moon didn’t think the hunt had been successful. A dramatic find would have meant an earlier return; he suspected that they had returned now because the change in weather had made it too dark for further searching.
Stone stretched and rolled his shoulders. “Everyone’s fine. I sent the others inside, and Bone’s gone to tell Pearl about it, if he can find her.” Moon knew that last part wasn’t a criticism. Considering how Pearl had behaved when Moon had first come to the court back at the old colony to the east, the idea of her taking an active part in anything must still be a welcome relief to Stone. He continued, “We tracked whatever it is to a lair in the roots of the next mountain-tree to the south. It must have hidden there after it saw us move the leaf boat into the Kek village. We didn’t find much evidence of a camp, just a place where something slept for the night. We kept looking, but we couldn’t pick up its trail. Then the clouds came in and Bramble says her bad shoulder is predicting heavy rain.”
That wasn’t encouraging. Moon doubted the thing had given up after all this effort; the idea of what it might be doing out there as the light failed made his groundling skin creep. He said, “We know why the groundlings were here now. And I think I know why the thing—whatever it is—wanted to get into the colony last night. It was after the Onde.” He told Stone what had happened while the hunting party was gone, and what Elastan had said and her account’s key differences from the Amifata’s version.
Stone looked up at the flickers of color flashing through the air, as the lizards fed on the insect cloud. He said, “This Onde must have been hiding in the leaf boat. When we found it, the Kek plant hunters were too upset about
their dead to pay much attention to it, and none of them looked inside.”
Moon thought Blossom and Chime were right. Whatever was after the Onde hadn’t been able to see it either, so after searching the boat unsuccessfully it had just sat there with the dying groundlings and the Onde trapped in the leaf boat, waiting for the Onde to give in or die too. The Onde’s faint scent, mixed in with the scents of all the plant matter, the leaf boat itself, and the Amifata’s blood, must have been indistinguishable even in the confined space. The creature had killed the Kek who had happened on it, then must have fled when Stone and the others arrived. It had followed when they had brought the leaf boat here, the Onde still hiding inside. The Onde must have realized it couldn’t avoid a whole village of Kek, and had left the leaf boat and hidden in the brush. When the Arbora had opened the root doorway, the desperate Onde had slipped inside, using the noisy tired warriors as cover. And whatever was after it had somehow tracked it to the colony. “And Elastan is lying. She did see what attacked them.”
Still watching the flicker of the lizards’ wings, Stone’s eyes narrowed. “So let’s have a talk with Elastan.”
The Kek and the Arbora had built the smaller shelter for Elastan about a hundred paces further into the village, closer to the trunk. Moon and Stone picked their way among the Kek’s arrangements of plant matter under the hanging huts to reach it. The shelter was lit by moss spelled for light as well, and now that Moon knew to look, he could see Merit was right, the Kek seemed completely indifferent to the brighter light.
The shelter was smaller and with a different design, with the reeds woven to form a circular structure, though the platform base was the same. It was guarded by a group of Kek and Arbora hunters. There were a couple of warriors as well, and Moon asked Stone, “You want to send someone to tell Pearl?”
“I want to send someone to tell Pearl after we know what this groundling’s lying about and why.” At Moon’s look, he said, “What, is she in a good mood about all this?”
He was right, it was probably better to wait until they had something definite to report.
One of the hunters, Blaze, came forward to meet them as they crossed the foot-trampled mold in front of the shelter. She asked, “Did something happen?”
“Maybe.” Moon looked toward the lit doorway of the shelter. “Has she tried to get away?”
Blaze flicked her spines in agitation and followed his gaze. “No. She hasn’t really done anything, except eat a little fruit and sleep. She hasn’t tried to tear her bandage again. Thistle warned us about that. I can speak Kedaic, but she won’t talk to me.”
“Hmph,” Stone commented.
Moon ducked under the reed cover and stepped into the shelter. Elastan sat in the center, on a pallet of cushions and blankets brought from the colony, softening the Kek’s grass mats. There was a water skin and a plate of half-eaten fruit and bread, and a covered jar that from the smell was acting as a temporary latrine. It was still hard to read expression on her face, but she didn’t look happy to see him.
When Stone stepped in behind Moon, she gasped and covered her eyes. “What is that?”
“That’s our line-grandfather.” Moon sat down on a mat, folding his legs under him. Stone had to be a strange sight for someone who could see both Raksuran forms at once. His winged form was too big to fit into this shelter. “He’s been out hunting the thing that tried to kill you.”
Elastan lifted her head a little, looking away as Stone sat down in the doorway. Blaze and a couple of the Kek peered in behind Stone, crouching on the edge of the platform, and Moon didn’t tell them to leave. Maybe Elastan would be more intimidated by a bigger audience. He said, “The Amifata are awake.”
That made her look directly at Moon. He wondered if her strange sight could tell her if he was lying. Since he didn’t need to lie, that wasn’t a disadvantage. “The Amifata say you were the one who wanted to come out here, you had the map, you had the old trading signal.”
She wasn’t surprised or angry to hear it. She said, “They lie. They are afraid of you.”
Moon had thought he had plenty of patience for this, but suddenly he found it rapidly draining away. It was growing darker and a breeze scented with rain moved through the reeds. If Bramble’s bad shoulder was right, the weather would turn worse, ruining what little visibility they had tonight. “We found it.”
Her pupils got smaller. It might or might not mean shock, but it was a dramatic reaction. After a betraying hesitation, she said, “Found what?”
“The Onde. We’re like the Amifata, it’s almost impossible for us to see it. But the Kek are like you; they can.”
Her eyelids fluttered and she took a sharp breath. Moon made sure none of his relief showed. We were right to believe the Amifata. She is the key to this. He added, “Is that why the three Kek who found your leaf boat are dead?”
“I don’t know.” That answer came quickly. At least she had decided not to dispute the existence of the Onde; Moon didn’t think he could have sat through that without doing something drastic. She moved her hands restlessly. “I didn’t see what happened to those Kek. I told you I was injured, dying.”
“So the thing that attacked you was waiting while you and the Onde and the Amifata were slowly dying in the leaf boat, and when the Kek stumbled on you and tried to help you, it killed them. Why won’t you tell us what it is?”
Elastan said, “I don’t know—”
“We know you saw it.”
Elastan looked away. Then she reached for the bandage at her waist. Moon said, “Touch it, and I’ll rip it off myself and throw you out in the undergrowth for the carrion eaters.”
Elastan went still, except for the flutter of her eye membranes. She cautiously snuck a look at him. Whatever she saw must have convinced her. She carefully removed her hand from the bandage.
Moon had to take a deep breath and let it out, managing not to hiss or growl. Getting angry wasn’t helping. He was beginning to think Elastan wasn’t very intelligent, or at least not very good at thinking her way out of difficult situations. She had revealed her strange eyesight when she had said she could see two of him; if she hadn’t done that, no one would have realized her connection to the Onde. “Tell me what that thing out there is. It tried to kill you once already. You have no reason to protect it.” If she couldn’t see a way out for herself, he had to find one for her. “The Amifata still think you’re their friend. If you tell us what we need to know, you can leave here with them, and they can take you back home.”
Elastan made a choking sound. She pressed her hands over her face for a moment. “I did not mean for them to be injured. I didn’t mean for myself to be—I did not think this would mean anyone would be hurt. It wasn’t what I was told. I thought we were meant to ask the Onde for trade again, that was all.”
She shuddered, but Moon almost thought it was from relief. Maybe the idea that she would be trapped out here, that the Amifata would abandon her, was what had frightened her more than the thing stalking her. “Who told you what to do?”
“He was a trader called Tsgarith. He is a Kithkal, and he came to the trading port at the mineral basins and found me. I was not … I am separated from the pods of the basins and was alone. I work where I can, hauling bundles for traders up the walls of the third basin. It isn’t good work. He needed a Sourci to see something for him. This isn’t uncommon; our vision is meant for the sea deeps, where we first came from. We can see things other species can’t. But I am not reputable so none of the other traders have ever wanted to hire me for seeing. But this was a long journey into the forest depths and no one else would go.” She choked again, and swallowed it back. “I didn’t want to go out of the basins, into the swamps and the gorges, but he offered me great wealth.”
“To find the Onde?”
“To hire the Amifata and travel with them, and tell them where to go with a map he gave me. The Kithkal do not trade with the moss canyons. He wanted the Amifata to be occupied, away from the mark
ets, so he could take their trade contacts. I thought it would not hurt them, and if we did find the Onde, then the Amifata would profit anyway.” She rubbed her palms together anxiously. “But the map wasn’t wrong, and we did find the Onde. It was concealing itself but I could still see it, though the Amifata couldn’t. I tried to speak to it. Then I saw Tsgarith in the undergrowth. He had a weapon. I called out, but he fired on us and two of the Amifata were struck by darts. We ran for the leaf boat, dragging them with us, and the Onde was trapped in the clearing and ran after us. But Tsgarith kept shooting and I was hit. I don’t remember anything after that.” She took a deep breath, and there was a gurgle in her throat. Her voice thick, she finished, “I did not know he intended this. I do not know why. It makes no sense. I feared … I feared the Amifata would blame me, and leave me out here. I am not one of them.”
Moon realized he had been leaning forward and sat back. He accidentally elbowed something warm and scaly; Blaze had moved forward until she was right behind him. She wiggled back a little. He said to Elaston, “Describe Tsgarith.”
“He is like all the Kithkal. They are a swamp species, like the Amifata, but their limbs are different.” She made a waving gesture. “More joints.”
Moon was glad he didn’t have to pick Tsgarith out of a crowd of other amphibians based on that description. “Can his species make forest predators avoid them? Are they shaman?”
Elastan blinked. “No.”
“So … He followed you here through the forest? On foot or did he have a leaf boat like the Amifata?”
“I don’t know.” Elastan spread her hands as if that was obvious. “He must have, he was here.”
This didn’t make sense. Moon wished he thought she was lying now, but he had the terrible feeling she was telling the truth. “If he wanted to hurt the Amifata, why wait till now, why not do it when you were a few days travel away from your settlements?”
“I don’t know!”