“Midnight, more or less. Listen, Lady. It’s sounds that woke me. People, maybe?”
She held her breath. After a moment she heard it — them — the sounds of voices, wafted to them on a light wind which had come up while she slept. A conversation. No words she could understand, but unmistakably the sound of people talking.
“Where?” she breathed.
He put his hand on her cheek and pushed so that her head turned. As she faced in another direction, she heard them more clearly. “Light,” she whispered.
He already had it in his hand, a torch which shed a dim circle before their feet. He handed her another, and they walked among the trees, through the meadow where the horses grazed with a sound of steady munching, beyond the meadow into the trees once more. Rillibee pointed up. It was true. The sounds came from above them.
She was no longer sure they were people. The sound was too sibilant for human people. And yet…
“Like the sounds in the Arbai village,” she said.
He nodded, peering above him. “I’m going up,” he said.
She caught at him. “You won’t be able to see!”
He shook his head. “I’ll feel, then. Don’t wait for me. Go back to the others.”
“You’ll fall!”
He laughed. “Me? Oh, Lady, at the Friary they call me Willy Climb. I have the fingers of a tree frog and the toes of a lizard. I have stickum on my knees and the hooves of a mountain goat. I can no more fall than an ape can fall when it creeps among the vines. Go back to the others, Lady,” and he was away, his torch slung about his neck, the light dwindling up the great trunk of the tree as he swarmed up it like a monkey.
When the circle of light had dwindled to nothing, she went back the way she had come, certain now that she would not sleep again. Yet when she lay down upon her bed she found sleep waiting for her. She had time only to wonder briefly what Brother Lourai would find among the branches before she was deeply asleep once more.
At the Friary, Elder Brother Fuasoi was sitting late at his desk, angrily turning the pages of a book. Yavi Foosh sat disconsolately on a chair nearby, yawning, trying to keep from nodding off.
“No sign of Mainoa or Lourai, then?” Fuasoi asked for perhaps the tenth time.
“No, Elder Brother.”
“And they didn’t mention to anyone where they were going?”
“There wasn’t anybody there to mention to, Elder Brother. Mainoa and Lourai were all alone at the ruins. The library crew had changed shifts three days ago. Shoethai and me didn’t take the replacement men back until this evening. When we got there, Shoethai and me went to tell Mainoa, but he was gone. Him and Lourai. We looked all through the ruins, Elder Brother.” He sighed, much put upon. He had told the story four times.
“And you found this book where?”
“Shoethai found it, Elder Brother. On Brother Mainoa’s worktable. He thought — since they were gone — there might be something written down somewhere. The book was the only writing Shoethai found. He brought it straight here to you.”
Fuasoi glared at the book, obviously a new one, with only a few pages written in. Oh, indeed there was something written down. All in Brother Mainoa’s own hand. Conjecture about the plague. Wonderment that it hadn’t infected Grass. Conjecture about the Moldies, and whether there might not be some on Grass. And if so, what they might be up to. Interest in the people at Opal Hill, and what they were doing, which was working to thwart the work of the Moldies. Working for Sanctity to stop the plague. To find whatever had kept Grass free of it up until now.
He swore, slamming the book shut. Mere chance had kept Grass free of the plague until now! Mere chance. The virus hadn’t come here until now because… because it was remote. Because it simply hadn’t, yet. There couldn’t be anything on Grass that stopped it.
But… but if there were, no one could be allowed to learn of it. If they learned of it, they might stop the plague elsewhere. Mainoa and those from Opal Hill would have to be stopped. “Elder Brother?” Yavi murmured. “Yes,” he snarled.
“Could I be excused now? I’ve been here for a very long time.”
“Go,” he growled. “Go, for God’s sake, and send Shoethai here.”
“Shoethai, Elder Brother?” Shoethai had been dismissed an hour ago.
“Are you deaf? I said Shoethai.” Not that Shoethai would be of any help, but at least he would listen to Fuasoi talk.
Shoethai surprised his fellow Moldy by having an idea.
“You should send Highbones after them,” the misshapen Brother suggested. “Highbones and Ropeknots and Steeplehands and the two Bridges.”
“Who the devil are you talking about?” Fuasoi blurted.
Shoethai flushed. “The climbers. Those are some of the names they call themselves. Highbones is Brother Flumzee.”
“Why should I send climbers?”
“Because they hate Brother Lourai. Because he climbed better than any of them. Because some of the younger brothers called him Willy Climb.”
“Willy Climb?”
“That’s the name they gave him. It’s a better name than Highbones, even. When they made him climb the towers and he outclimbed them all. He got up and got down again without being caught. But Highbones had a bet he would die upon the towers, so Highbones hates him.”
“It would depend, wouldn’t it?”
“On what, Elder Brother?”
“On where Mainoa is.”
Shoethai shrugged, his gargoyle face twisting into a hideous grin. “Doesn’t matter so long as he’s with Brother Lourai. If he’s at Commons, Highbones would kill him there. If he’s at one of the estancias, Highbones would kill him If he’s out in the grasses…”
Highbones had been one of Shoethai’s most diligent persecutors. Shoethai loved the idea of Highbones out in the grasses, where the Hippae were, and the hounds.
Elder Brother Fuasoi put the book in the drawer of his desk as he mumbled to himself. “If Mainoa is out in the grasses, we needn’t worry about him. No. no. The first thing to do is find out where he went. And the most likely place is Opal Hill. I’ll try that first.”
Elder Brother Fuasoi reached Persun Pollut. Persun Pollut, with a caution which was natural to him, said that he believed Brothers Mainoa and Lourai might have gone away with Lady Westriding and some other persons but he did not know where.
Shoethai mumbled, “The daughter of that house vanished during the Hunt yesterday. Everyone is talking about it. She vanished somewhere near the bon Damfels estancia. Perhaps they went there.”
Elder Brother Fuasoi regarded his assistant with unusual interest as he keyed the tell-me once more Who would have thought that Shoethai had any interest in Grassian gossip? At Klive he reached a subordinate family member who verified that “some people from Opal Hill” had come to Klive and had gone again. “Out in the grasses,” the voice said with a breathless hint of laughter, as though hysteria waited backstage for its entrance cue. “Out in the grasses, to Darenfeld’s Coppice.”
“If they went in the grasses,” Shoethai mumbled, “there will be a trail” He sighed with pleasure. “Send Highbones and the others to follow them.”
“On foot?”
“No, no,” Shoethai amended thoughtfully. “In an aircar. To find the trail in an aircar.” He thought about aircars. It would be easy to fix an aircar so that it would fly quite a long way and then fall. “I’ll get one ready for them.”
“Who did you say?”
“Brother Flumzee. Brother Niayop. Brother Sushlee. Brothers Thissayim and Lillamool. Highbones, Steeplehands, Ropeknots, Long Bridge, and Little Bridge.”
Bones, Ropes, Steep, Long, and Little — who had tortured Shoethai too many times to be forgiven. Who
