“Where’s the baby? What happened to her? Where’s Norit?” He reached after Hati’s hand and held it, held it fast. “I passed-by Tarsa. I was there! The captain’s men never got that far. I asked. Her husband has another wife. He let the baby go.” He wanted to see Norit with the baby. He wanted that desperately, but he could not lift his head. He remembered. “My father shot her, with me.”

“She’s fevered. The bullet went through her leg. But she may have makers of her own. She should have died, and she’s mending.”

“I bled into her,” he said. “Our makers overwhelm everything the Ila put into us. That’s what Luz says.—Damn!” The pain overwhelmed him. “Is Patya all right?”

Hati gave a nod over her shoulder. “She’s there. She’s not left you. Norit’s with the baby. So’s Patya.”

“Good for Patya.” He tried to glance that far, but it hurt his side and his back.

He was due for a night and a day of misery, at least, healing at his ordinary pace. He expected a long, long misery.

But after that the pain began going away, and Hati grew quite dim, and he could not move his hand from hers.

“Has he fainted?” Patya asked, leaning over him. “Is he all right?”

“I think so,” Hati said. “I think he’ll be well now. The makers are working. Go take the baby. Norit’s left her.”

There was so much sharpness in that tone. So much he wished he could mend. He had rather have the pain back than to have his mind racing, and his body numb.

His eyes were still open. He saw Hati take Lelie from Patya’s hands, and saw Hati hold her, and rock her, and talk to her, because Norit had walked away. The baby was as still as he was, and perhaps heard everything.

Luz! he tried to shout, but could manage not a word. Luz, let the woman alone! You call the Ila cruel… damn you, let Norit alone! This isn’t a time to talk to her…

But Luz gave no evidence she heard him, and Norit stood in the edge of his vision, staring at the wall of the tent, alone with Luz, the two of them talking, numb to Lelie’s pain and Lelie’s distress.

“Lie still,” Patya told him. “Hati, he’s sweating so much. Is he all right?”

“He will. It’s what we crazy people do when we heal. Don’t be afraid for him.”

Not be afraid for him. Not be afraid for Norit, or Lelie, or Hati? There was a great deal to fear.

The star fell from the heavens, again and again and again, and hit the sphere, and the ring of fire went out from it.

Again and again and again.

Chapter Twenty-One

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