Maia полностью

Bayub-Otal, wiping the sweat from his face, pointed towards it.

"That's the Olmen. With luck we'll cross it tomorrow; then we'll be in Urtah."

"We got to go much further today, then, my lord?"

"No; we'll get down off this crest and find somewhere to lie up for the night. We daren't risk a village-not in a place as frequented as the plain. We're still in Bekla province, you see, and likely enough there's a price on our heads by now. We'll make for those trees: ought to be some shelter there."

The woodland which they were approaching covered

most of the rocky slope below. Soon they found themselves among outskirts of scrub oak, long-leaved nakai and evergreen sweetspires, several growing almost horizontally out from the faces of steep little bluffs. A few of these were precipitous, and more than once they were forced to go some distance along a sheer edge before they could find a way down.

Maia, at the end of this second long day, was feeling weary, due partly to the rough going, but mainly to her increasing anxiety and uncertainty. Normally, her instinct in such a situation would have been to do what she was told and leave everything else to her older and more experienced companions. But these Subans-she was their secret enemy. If in some way or other they were to find out the truth, they would probably kill her. Not for the first time that day, the idea occurred to her, "Why not tell them? Tell them I was forced into it-that I'd got no choice?" But what would they do then? They might not kill her, but obviously they would unburden themselves of her in one way or another; and what had she to hope for, left alone in unknown country?

Rapt in these dismal meditations and in the listlessness of fatigue, she did not notice, until Bayub-Otal called out to her, that he and Pillan had stopped at the foot of the last bluff they had descended, and were sitting among the rocks. She went back to them. Bayub-Otal nodded over his shoulder. "That cleft-there's quite a fair-sized cave inside. If you don't mind sharing it, I think it'll do us very well. There must be water somewhere fairly near, and we can cut branches and scrub to sleep on. Have a look and tell me what you think."

She smiled. "I'm not used to being asked what I think, my lord."

"Then you can get some practice now," replied Bayub-Otal.

She felt irritated. Whether or not he really supposed he was giving her any power of choice she had no idea. As far as she was concerned he had as good as told her what they were going to do. Why couldn't he have said so and left it at that?

Except for the narrow opening, which made it gloomy and dark, there was nothing wrong with the cave. It was all of thirty feet long, with plenty of room for her to sleep apart. Bayub-Otal set off with the water bottles while she

and Pillan began cutting scrub-willow and oleander branches for pallets.

Later, when they had eaten and drunk, she made her own way down to the brook, washed and bathed her feet.

"I don't think we should make a fire, do you?" Bayub-Otal was saying to Pillan as she returned. "We don't want to risk anyone knowing we're here."

"Wood burns that quick, my lord, we'd never be done gett'n enough."

"I'm afraid we'll have to take it in turns to keep watch, though," went on Bayub-Otal. "You can start, Pillan, and then wake me; and I'll wake you, Maia, an hour or two before dawn. You needn't be afraid: animals are easily scared off even without a fire, and you can always wake us if you think anyone's coming."

Once she had lain down she found herself more comfortable-or else more tired-than she had expected, and slept without stirring until Bayub-Otal woke her.

The moon was almost set. She felt stiff and cramped from the hard floor. He'd left her late, she thought. He'd given himself the most inconvenient watch, too; the one that broke a night's sleep in half. She wished he wouldn't always be so scrupulously courteous and considerate. From a man who had rejected her it came cold, and only made her feel inferior and ill-at-ease.

For a while she sat just outside the cave, wrapped in her cloak and listening, in the yellow moonlight, to the innumerable small noises all around her-patterings, rustlings and the quiet movement of leaves and branches. With moonset, however, it grew very dark and a chilly wind got up from the east. She began to feel shrammed. After a time it occurred to her that since she could see nothing and her watch now consisted only of listening, she could do it as well inside the cave and out of the wind. She went back to her pallet near the cave-mouth and lay prone, her chin propped on her hands: but still she felt cold. She shivered, hunching her shoulders.

Further back in the cave, Pillan lay stretched asleep on the stones. She could just hear his breathing in the darkness. Moving slightly, he muttered an unintelligible word or two and was quiet again. She made a little joke in her thoughts: "Does he say more awake or asleep?"