splilching from her clothes and gliberspleting down her legs.
‘I am an Ashdan,’ she said.
But she no longer felt like one.
Then she remembered the forest thing, the thing which Artemis Ingalawa had told her about all those years ago, the man in the forest and the killing, horrible, horrible, she had never though about it before, she had pretended she had never been told, she did not want to know things like that, but ‘It was in me,’ whispered Olivia.
Yes.
Down through the years, Artemis Ingalawa had told and taught Olivia many things, and she knew them even if she pretended she did not know them.
And then Olivia realized the truth.
If that soldier had tried to stop her, she would have killed him. He was a grown man, but he suspected nothing. A single blow between the legs, nicely timed, and then Quietly, Olivia began to cry. All these hideous, ugly thoughts and memories were far, far too much for her to deal with. It was all far too serious, and she was too tired to cope with it.
‘I am an Ashdan,’ she said.
But it was hopeless, the words did her no good at all, and when she tried to say them again she was blubbering so much that the words were quite unintelligible.
Olivia was still crying when she came into the Crab’s cave.
When she had whiled away the nights in that cave in the arms of her dearest Chegory, it had always been dark. But tonight, the Crab’s wind chimes — the copper wind chimes which Olivia had made for the thing — were glowing green. What did that mean? That the Crab did not like to be in the dark, not if it was alone?
‘Are you awake?’ said Olivia, speaking through tears.
No response came from the hulking shadows of the Crab. And Olivia, suddenly furious, thumped on the thing with all her strength, pounding its carapace with her fists.
‘Hey! Hey!’ she shouted. ‘Wake up!’
‘Please,’ said the Crab huffily. ‘I am not a percussion instrument. Besides, even if I was, you are not a drummer, are you?’
‘Is that supposed to be a joke?’ said Olivia fiercely.
‘I do not make jokes,’ said the Crab.
‘That’s just as well,’ said Olivia. ‘Because I’m not in a mood for any jokes.’
‘No,’ said the Crab. ‘By the sound of it, you are in a very bad mood. I recommend a nice soothing walk. Four times round the island should do it.’
‘I’m not here for my health,’ said Olivia.
‘What are you here for, then?’
‘To beat some sense into your thick ugly head.’
‘I am a crab,’ said the Crab. ‘I do not have a head.’ ‘No!’ yelled
Olivia, giving the thing an almighty thump. ‘You don’t have any sense, either. You want to be human? Or don’t you?’
The Crab sighed.
‘I know what you’re on about,’ said the Crab. ‘You want me to get the organic rectifier. It’s in the Temple of Torture, right?’
‘Right!’ said Olivia. ‘So you know all about it! So why don’t you get on with it?’
‘As I told Log Jaris-’
‘I’m not Log Jaris, I’m Olivia Qasaba,’ said Olivia. ‘I don’t care what you told the bullman, I’m telling you now, you have to get the organic rectifier, right now.’
‘If it’s really there to be got,’ said the Crab.
‘Of course it is!’ said Olivia. ‘Otherwise I wouldn’t be here tell ing you all this.’
‘You might be,’ said the Crab. ‘Humans are incredibly duplicitous creatures, as I’ve learnt to my cost.’ ‘Duplicitous?’ said Olivia.
She was so sick with fear, rage, hate and fatigue that she had quite forgotten whether she did or did not know that word.
‘Yes, yes, duplicitous, that’s what they are,’ said the Crab. ‘Che ats, liars and lords of deceit.’
‘Oh, you don’t understand anything!’ said Olivia. Then, abruptly, her animating rage left her. Olivia, deserted by her fury, sat down in a wet, hot, saggy heap. She wept.
After a time, Olivia calmed herself.
It was quiet.
The Crab was saying nothing. Maybe it had gone back to sleep. Some where, a slabender frog was talking to the night. Then, across the wat er, someone screamed.
‘You hear that?’ said Olivia to the Crab. ‘Someone’s getting hurt. That’s Master Ek, that’s what, he’s doing it, hurting people. You could stop him, you know.’
The Crab said nothing.
It remained stolidly silent.
Olivia closed her eyes, and waves of black despair swept over her.
‘Remember,’ she said, ‘you are an Ashdan.’
‘No,’ said the Crab. ‘I am a Crab.’
‘And a big, stupid, silly Crab at that,’ said Olivia, getting to her feet. She bit her lip. Then: ‘Open your claw. This one. Come on! Do what I say! Open it! Come on, silly, we haven’t got all night.’
The Crab’s left claw opened with a slight creaking sound. Olivia held up her right hand.
‘You see this?’ she said. ‘You see this hand? The organic rectifier can make it better. If there really is a rectifier. If I’m not lying. If I’m telling the truth. You grant me that?’
‘If you can choose the axioms, you can win any argument,’ said the Crab.
‘Well what’s that supposed to mean?’ said Olivia. ‘What I say makes sense, doesn’t it? If there really is an organic rectifier, you can get it for me, can’t you? So you can fix my hand. If my hand gets hurt, I mean.’
There was a pause. Then: ‘Yes,’ said the Crab, albeit grudgingly.
‘Well then,’said Olivia.‘Here…’
No.
She could not say it.
But she must!
She bit her lip again. Hard.
She tasted blood.
Her blood.
Blood running from her lip.
Blood of her blood, blood from her lips, and Chegory gasping, and later…
‘I am an Ashdan,’ said Olivia, all expression crushed from her voice while terror fought with discipline. ‘So.’
She put her hand between the chomp-chopper-chuk edges of the Crab’s claw. It was a huge claw, its knobbly biting bits swelling out like globular teeth. Its surfaces were strangely cool against the fever of her flesh.
‘So,’ said Olivia.
She wanted to wrench her hand away.
But she could not.
She must not!
‘So,’ said Olivia. ‘You can crunch my wrist. You can crunch it right off. Do it. If that’s what you have to, then do it. Then you’ll believe.’
So said Olivia.
Then she closed her eyes and waited for the Crab to decide.
