The black tinge in Guo’s mantle darkened.
“I may be forced to harshness.”
This time, the words came as one, loudly:
“We are yours to command, Great Mother.”
Guo stared at them. She was—surprised. She had thought it would be more difficult. (For all her unusual capacity for combat, Guo was not really a warrior, and did not fully understand the minds of warriors. On the day after the Battle of Lolopopo, Guo’s flankers would have stood with her against the Kraken itself.)
The black in her mantle faded. For a moment, a green wave rippled across. Then Guo turned, and resumed the march.
Hours later, they entered a huge clearing in the swamp. Many other warriors were already in the clearing. Still more were trickling in from several directions—all in small groups, led by a swamp-dweller guide.
The word was passed along by couriers:
We rest here tonight. Tomorrow the tribe assembles.
Before they slept, Guo and her preconsorts dug a little grave, into which they lowered the body of Abka. It was strange, then, the anguish which she felt, for the loss of a husband she had never known.
Yet she grieved, and deeply; and found, in the pain, a well of courage and resolve.
The assembly began early in the day, and raggedly. There were no clan leaders to begin the deliberations with the customary religious rituals. Those rituals were brief and, in truth, not much more than perfunctory. But they had always served, in the past, to allow the assembly to come to order in a set and certain manner.
Guo saw that Kopporu was going to make no attempt to substitute herself as the leader of the rituals. The infanta thought Kopporu’s decision was wise. Better to begin the assembly by bluntly demonstrating the truth to all.
Kopporu herself was standing toward the center of the clearing, on its northern side. She was weaponless, and her personal guard were not nearby. Guo was relieved. She had been concerned that Kopporu might attempt to intimidate the tribe. Such an attempt would not have worked; it would simply have inflamed the hotheads. Instead, by taking her stance, Kopporu was making clear to one and all that she accepted the authority of the tribe.
Still, Guo noted that Kopporu had subtly weighted the situation. Her personal guard was not standing nearby, true. But they were not all that far away, either.
Guo examined them. As hard-bitten a collection of old warriors as you could find anywhere on the Meat of the Clam. The scars crisscrossing their collective mantles were literally beyond counting. There could be no doubt in any gukuy’s mind that Aktako and her group would deal ruthlessly with anyone who tried to take matters into their own palps. Not even the rashest young warrior would casually match flails with them.
But there was more. Guo saw that the Opoktu warriors were gathered not far from the center of the clearing, on the same side as Kopporu. The Opoktu were still outnumbered by the surviving Kiktu, by a factor of four to one. But the Opoktu had saved their entire tribe, except for those warriors who had fallen in combat. Their own two mothers, and four clan leaders, were standing prominently to the fore. In every nuance of the Opoktu stance, a subtle but clear set of messages was being conveyed to all who observed:
We are still a tribe with leaders, united.
We are so, because we chose the course of flight.
We stand with Kopporu.
Then, there were the swamp-dwellers. There were many eights of them, gathered together some little distance from Kopporu. Again, not near the battle leader. But near enough to come to Kopporu’s aid, if necessary. And while the swamp-dwellers were not warriors, the still-healing scars on their own mantles demonstrated that they lacked neither courage nor willingness to fight. They were clanless outcasts, but their status had inevitably risen in the eyes of the Kiktu over the past days. Whatever their prejudices, the Kiktu were warriors—for whom courage counted much.
And, there was this: Any Kiktu had but to look about them, to see that they were in the middle of the Lolopopo Swamp. Lost, without their guides. And the guides were making clear, without effrontery, that they too would stand with Kopporu.