Onsofruct said in a remote voice, “Purdah always worked well. It allowed troublesome women and girls to be disposed of without anyone knowing. If no one had ever seen your wife or daughters, who would wonder if they disappeared? And then there were nunneries, and witch hunts. I understand religion on Old Earth managed to remove a great many elderly women by claiming they were witches.”
“The most efficient strategy was economic,” said D’Jevier in that same remote, uncaring voice. “Pay them so little they can’t get by, or don’t hire them at all because women belong at home, and then throw them in jail when they turn to beggary, thievery, or prostitution because they and their children are hungry.”
Questioner said, “How fortunate you are that the problem has never arisen here on Newholme.”
“Fewer women than men are born,” said Madame.
“So I have been told,” said Questioner. “But the Hags and I know that isn’t true.”
The silence stretched. The Hags stared at one another, their faces very still and white.
Questioner rose. “I might have excused the slaughter of the Timmys for various reasons, but doing away with half the female babies born on this planet I cannot excuse.”
D’Jevier turned away.
Madame cried, “No! You wouldn’t! Jewy? You couldn’t have?”
Silence. The Hags stared into the distance, saying nothing.
Madame demanded, “D’Jevier, tell me it isn’t true!”
D’Jevier said, “Let us explain … “
“No,” said Questioner. “Do not try to explain. I am, quite frankly, sick of explanations!”
After a lengthy silence, Onsofruct whispered, “What will you do?”
Questioner drew herself up. “Assuming we are left alive to do anything, Revered Hags, I will sterilize the race of mankind on this planet, as I have done elsewhere for less provocation.”
She left them, going out onto the ledge, unwilling to listen to the pleadings that no doubt hung on their lips. It didn’t matter what they said. She didn’t care what they said. Within her, Mathilla, and M’Tafa, and Tiu didn’t care what they said. It was simply more injustice. More repression and torture. It was unforgivable!
Ignoring the tumult at the other end of the ledge, Calvy and Simon were watching the descending monsters. The first of them, one of the great crawlers, had reached the Fauxi-dizalonz, bellowing as it plunged. Behind it, the next one pushed into the liquid, dissolving at the leading edge before the following edge had reached the pond, a pond which lapped at its shores like a living thing, its ripples spreading ever more widely.
The next one in the line was a spherical orb of muscles. “Roll ‘em over,” it cried. From one side Ear dangled, and from the other Tongue flapped, “Roll ‘em over!”
It entered the pond like a cannon ball, with a great body-flopping splash that splatted down in a glistening layer that covered the monster like partially set aspic, dripping from his enormous form as he sank gradually into the goo. Tongue, dislodged by the splash, floated about on the surface, gargling “Help, help, I’m drown-ding … “
Flailing and dragging, Crawly came next, with Old Pete jouncing and throbbing behind him, and it was there that the procession stalled, for Crawly entered the pond so slowly that he dissolved while barely in, leaving no traction to move Old Pete. All the monsters came to a halt, still marching in place, voices calling the cadence: hup, hup, hup. Then from somewhere a great voice uttered, shivering the surrounding soil. Several leggers raced from a nearby cave, disassembled to get themselves into position, then reassembled to push Old Pete into the pond, little by little, to the accompaniment of shouted commands by their own voice boxes. “Grab him by the balls! Catch him higher up! Push him in!”
When the last of Pete vanished in the goo, the leggers broke into their constituent parts and fled while the next rank of monsters, still hup-two-three-fouring, moved forward and into the increasingly turbid Fauxi-dizalonz, whose surface was spreading wider with each addition.
From their position on the ledge, Madame broke the silence. “Up around the first curve, there’s Bane and Dyre, and that’s Thor Ashburn next to them.”