I thought she was male. Then Kahguyaht, our ooloi, told me Oankali females are like that. ?Plenty of room inside for children,? it said. ?And plenty of strength to protect the children, born and unborn.? Gabe asked what males did if females did all that. ?They seek out new life,? it said. ?Males are seekers and collectors of life. What ooloi and females can do, males must do.? Gabe thought that meant ooloi and females could do without males. Kahguyaht said no, it meant the Oankali as a people would eventually die without males. I don?t think Gabe ever believed that.? She sighed. She had been thinking aloud, not really talking to Akin. She jumped when Akin spoke to her.
?Kahguyaht ooan Nikanj?? he asked.
?Yes,? she said.
He stared at her for several seconds. ?Let me taste you,? he said finally. She could consent or refuse. She would not be frightened or disgusted or dangerous.
?How would you do that?? she asked.
?Pick me up.?
She stooped and lifted him into her arms.
?Would you sit down and let me do it without making you tired?? he asked. ?I know I?m heavy to you.?
?Not that heavy.?
?It won?t hurt or anything,? he said. ?People only feel it when the ooloi do it. Then they like it.?
?Yeah. Go ahead and do it.?
He was surprised that she was not afraid of being poisoned. She leaned against a tree and held him while he tasted her neck, studied her.
?Regular little vampire,? he heard her say before he was lost in the taste of her. There were echoes of Kahguyaht in her. Nikanj had shared its memory of its own ooloi parent, had let Akin study that memory so thoroughly that Akin felt he knew Kahguyaht.
Tate herself was fascinating?very unlike Lilith, unlike Joseph. She was somewhat like Leah and Wray, but not truly like anyone he had tasted. There was something truly strange about her, something wrong.
?You?re pretty good,? she said when he drew back and looked into her face. ?You found it, didn?t you??
?I found
something. I don?t know what it is.?
?A nasty little disease that should have killed me years ago. Something I apparently inherited from my mother. Though at the time of the war, we were only beginning to suspect that she had inherited it. Huntington?s disease, it was called. I don?t know what the Oankali did for me, but I never had any symptoms of it.?
?How do you know that?s what it is??
?Kahguyaht told me.?
That was good enough.
?It was a
wrong gene,? he said. ?It drew me and I had to look at it. Kahguyaht didn?t want it ever to start to work. I don?t think it will?but you should be near Kahguyaht so that it could keep watch. It should have replaced that gene.?
?It said it would if we stayed with it. It said it would have to watch me for a while if it did any real tampering. I
couldn?t stay with it.?
?You wanted to.?
?Did I?? She shifted him in her arms, then put him down.
?You still do.?
?Have you had all you wanted to eat out here??
?Yes.?
?You follow me, then. I?ve got this fruit to carry.? She stooped and lifted the large basket of fruit to her head. When she was satisfied with its placement, she stood up and turned back toward the village.
?Tate?? he called.
?What?? She did not look at him.
?It went back to the ship, you know. It?s still Dinso. It will have to come to Earth sometime. But it did not want to live here with any of the Humans it could have. I never knew why before.?
?Nobody ever mentioned us??
Us, Akin thought. Tate and Gabe. They had both known Kahguyaht. And Gabe was probably the reason Tate had not gone to Kahguyaht. ?Kahguyaht would come back if Nikanj called it,? he said.
?You really didn?t know about us?? she insisted.
?No. But the walls in Lo aren?t like the walls here. You can?t hear through Lo walls. People seal themselves in and no one knows what they?re saying.?
She stopped, put one hand up to balance the basket, then stared down at him. ?Good god!? she said.
It occurred to him then that he should not have let her know he could hear through Phoenix walls.
