If it was in the hive, it was in the quarters of the herdsmen, where their families lived. I could not go there when the people were there. Perhaps at the morning song, when everyone was gathered behind the doorskins, waiting to go out. Then I could slip inside to look around.
There was a time I would have hated this sneakiness. Was a time I would have considered it beneath me, beneath any Dinadhi. Now I was no longer a person to be concerned with such things. I was an unperson. I did not exist. Who would point the finger at me when they could not even see me?
I returned to the leasehold. Lutha was there, feeding the child. I offered to do it for her, and she handed me the spoon with an expression almost of relief. She went to sit in the window, looking out at the day while I plied the spoon. It was like feeding a little animal. He was too old for the breast, but I had the feeling he would best have liked to suckle, for he could have done that without thinking at all. Certainly he could not keep his mind on the spoon.
He calmed as he grew less hungry. When we were finished, it took a large towel and a bowl of warm water to clean up the boy and the area around him.
“He has always been this way?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, her body stiffening. She did not want to talk about it.
Well then, we would not talk about it.
“There are some good gaufers down there,” I told her. “But I couldn’t find the harness. Perhaps Leelson will find it in a wain. Where has Trompe gone?”
“He’s carrying supplies down the ladders,” she said with suppressed laughter. “Or was. Here he comes, very hot looking!”
As he did, out of breath and considerably annoyed.
“Leelson’s found a wain,” he said. “It’s parked out of sight of the hive, around those stone columns south of the cave. He told me to put the food inside it. Otherwise he thinks it won’t last until we’re ready to leave.”
I nodded. He was right. Any food left where the Kachis could get it would be either eaten or fouled past use. “Was the harness there?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I didn’t look and Leelson didn’t say.” He collapsed onto a sleeping bench and threw one arm across his face. “Lord, that’s a long climb. You Dinadhi must have steel legs and arms, up and down all day as you are.”
“Two trips a day is considered much,” I told them. “One is the usual. When the farmers go to work in the fields, they go down at daylight and return before dusk. They carry their lunch with them.”
“We haven’t talked about how long this is going to take,” he said. “How much food we’ll need … ”
“All we can carry,” I told him.
“Then we’ll need a faster way of getting it down there.”
Silence, broken by the sound of the door. Leelson, returning.
“Harness is in the wain,” he said. “I counted the individual sets, and it looks like enough for six animals. On my way back, however, I overheard several of the herdsman talking. They’re taking the animals up tomorrow.”
Silence again.
“We’ll have to leave before then,” murmured Lutha. “Won’t we?” She gave me a pleading look, as though hoping I could think of some other choice.
“No time for sneakiness,” I said. “Were there panels on the sides of the wain you chose?”
He nodded, his lips pressed tightly together. “Yes. I remembered that part. They make up the pen for the gaufers, I presume.”
“Walls and roof, to keep them safe at night,” I said. “Tomorrow before light, we’ll take all the food from the dispenser, put it in sacks, and drop it into the canyon. We need not carry water. This time of year there will be water along the canyon-bottom trail we’ll follow. We’ll have to be gone before light.” To my own ears, my voice shouted panic, but the others did not seem to hear it. They merely sighed, resolved on the struggle to come but taking no joy in it.