The Children of the Sky

This question was delivered with shy, almost embarrassed, sidewise looks.

“Ritl?” said Ravna. “She’s able to use Ut’s cloak?”

Amdi gave a nod. He was smiling in a wobbly way.

“Well, good! I mean, I know she caused you problems, Amdi. But the critter was desperate. She didn’t mean to do you harm.”

“Oh, she meant to do me harm all right! She tried to break me up. I was terrified of her. But yes, she was in a desperate situation. Part of me misses her, but all of me is relieved she’s gone. You know, she’s turned out to be the keystone member of Mr. Radio. She makes him smarter and a lot more articulate. I talk to Mr. Radio when he reaches up here. Now that Ritl is not on the make … well, Mr. Radio is really a nice fellow. The story of Ritl and Radio would make a nice Tinish romance novel … if I were into writing romance fiction, I mean. Which of course I’m not.”

Ravna looked around at him. Maybe he really had come up here to make peace with himself. “What about your own problems, Amdi?”

“I’ve … made progress. Being all puppies made me too human. I don’t know how you two-legs can deal with death. The version that packs suffer is bad enough.” Amdi was silent for a moment, mostly looking down. “Ritl made me see that I can’t stay me forever.” He look back up at her. “I learned from Vendacious, too. I learned that death can be the least of your problems. Fooling him wasn’t that hard, but after he started poking out my eyes … finding the courage to continue with my scheme, that was harder than anything I had ever imagined.”

He spoke the words softly, solemnly. Ravna noticed that every one of him was looking at her. It was as though a curtain had been drawn aside. Amdi had been to hell and back. That could happen to anyone with enough bad luck and then enough good luck—but Amdi had engineered his return. During his terrible time with Vendacious, the child in him had become something deep and quiet and strong.

Ravna nodded and gave him a pat. “So what’s next for you, Amdiranifani?”

Amdi looked away, and she sensed that his moment of stark openness had passed. He squirmed around for a moment, then said, “You and me and Jef had some good times, didn’t we?”

Okay, Amdi, and she replied in a like tone: “You mean when we weren’t running for our lives, and when Jefri and I weren’t playing at being enemies?”

“Yes. I would never be your enemy, and Jefri … well, you know Jefri loves you, don’t you?”

“You both loved me when you were little, Amdi.”

“I mean now, Ravna.”

That was what I was afraid you meant. Now it was her turn to look down at the ground, embarrassed. “Oh, Amdi, I—”

Amdi tightened up all around her. The one of him closest to her face tapped her cheek gently. “Shh,” Amdi’s voice whispered. “I hear someone coming.”

Of course Ravna heard no such thing. No one was visible on the hillside below them. Even the glider had flown out of sight, leaving the sky to the birds and the low sun. She gave Amdi an acknowledging pat and leaned back against the rock.

Yes, there was someone coming up the south path, out of sight behind them. The squish-crunch of boots on moss sounded like a single human.

Ravna and Amdi sat silently for another thirty seconds. The footsteps came along the west side of Pham’s rock—but the visitor wasn’t headed here.

It was Jefri Olsndot; he took the path down to the two headstones that sat nearest the end of the promontory. He and Johanna had picked that place for their parents. As much as Pham Nuwen, Sjana and Arne Olsndot had fought the Blight. So Jefri, what do you believe and what do you deny?

Jefri knelt between the headstones. He put one hand on each, and stared out over the glittering sea. After a long moment, he shook himself, like a man waking or remembering an appointment. He stood and turned—and saw Amdi and Ravna watching him from Pham’s rock.

“Hei there, Jefri!” said Amdi. He waggled some noses in a tentative wave.

Jefri approached with measured tread. He stopped three meters from the rock and glared at both human and pack. “What is she doing here, Amdi?” His words were flat and angry.

“Just a coincidence?” The pack looked at Ravna for confirmation.

“That’s what you told me, Amdi.” She glanced at heads that were looking everywhere else. Just now, Amdi reminded her of a way-too-smart teenager. Well, literally, he was a way-too-smart teenager.

There was no good humor in Jefri’s reaction. He closed in on those of Amdi who were farthest from Ravna. “You suggested meeting here. You picked the time. I show up half an hour early, and I find you—and, and her—” a look in Ravna’s direction, “waiting for me.”

“I’m sorry, Jefri!” Amdi’s voice rose, childlike. “I just couldn’t stand the idea that you, I mean that we—” He dithered a second, then his voice took off on a new tangent. Now he sounded a little like the salesman he had learned to be in the circus. “We should talk about this. We really should.” The one on the ledge above Ravna moved aside, and the one that had been resting its head on Ravna’s lap climbed up to fill the gap. At the same time, another patted the space beside Ravna that had just been vacated. “Here, why don’t you sit down and we can all explain this to each other.”

This chatter lost some of its audio fidelity about at the word “explain,” when Jefri grabbed the one who had been patting the open space and shoved him against Ravna.

“Oops, sorry,” Amdi said in an aside to Ravna.

She had seen these two play this roughly, even since their return from the Tropics, but there was no playfulness in Jefri right now. He’d have been taking a chance with his life if he used this kind of force against a stranger pack as big and heavyset as Amdiranifani had become.

“Okay, we’ll have our talk.” Jefri sat down.

Now one of Amdi was sandwiched between him and Ravna. The rest of the pack surrounded them. Altogether, Amdi seemed a bit disconcerted. He looked back and forth at himself for a moment, then patted Jefri gingerly and crept in close to his old friend. When Jef didn’t respond, Amdi continued in his showman voice, the volume turned down to an intimate purr: “Okay, I confess. Though this was a coincidence, I gave it some help. I was pretty sure Ravna would come up here at low sun. If she hadn’t, I would have thought of something else to get us together. We three have been through so much, don’t you know? I didn’t want it to seem to Ravna that Jef and I were sneaking off—”

“What?” said Ravna.

“Amdi, I swear, you have no right—”

“You two are leaving, Jef? I thought, I thought you were staying with the Domain.”

Jefri didn’t look her in the eye. Maybe he was too busy glaring at first one of Amdi and then another. “We aren’t sneaking off. Amdi is just jerking you around.”

“I am not!”

Jefri finally looked at Ravna. “This may seem like another betrayal, but I’ve talked to Woodcarver and Flenser about it, ah, just this afternoon. You and Johanna would have learned soon enough, but I really didn’t want to argue about it with either of you.” And as an aside to Amdi he said, “How could you do this to me?”

“You’re going to Best Hope?” she said. Powers, how I hate that name.

Jef nodded. “But it’s not what you think. I’m not doing any good around here. No one really trusts me. You —”

“I trust you,” said Ravna. As long as you stayed, I could hope. “Why are you going, Jefri?”

Jef hesitated, then: “Okay. You remember when we were on the road, you suggested I look for testable evidence about the Blight. But what could I find, Down Here, ten years later? Now … I think I have a chance. Bili stole equipment from the Lander, equipment that idiot-me never recognized. I know Bili. By now, I even know Nevil. Watching them, watching what they do with this gear—one way or another, I’ll figure out what I have to do.”

“That’s—” insane. “That’s not reasonable, Jefri. After you saved my life, Nevil has less reason to trust you than almost anyone.”