?Let it be with them,? Aaor supplemented. ?Let them comfort one another. They?ve been apart for days now.?
They argued for a while, their hostility slowly decreasing like a wound healing. In the end Francisco himself freed Jesusa and TomAs. They came out of their prison rooms and took me between them, and the elders and old fertiles watched with conflicting emotions of fear, anger, envy, and fascination.
13
We stayed.
We healed the people in spite of our guards. We healed our guards.
Young people came to us first, and went away without their tumors, sensory losses, limps, paralysis
. People brought their children to us. Jesusa, TomAs, and I shared a stone house with Aaor, Javier, and Paz. Once we were settled, Jesusa went out and found all the people she remembered as having deformed or disabled children. She badgered them until they began to bring their children to us. The small house was often full of healing children.
And Santos began to grow. I gave him a handsome new nose and he went right on talking too much and risking getting it broken again. But people seemed less inclined to hit him.
The first elder to come to us was female with only one leg. The stump of her amputated leg pained her and she hoped I could stop the pain. I sent her to Aaor because I had more people to heal than I could manage. Over a period of weeks, Aaor grew her a new leg and foot.
After that, everyone came to us. Even the most stubborn elders forgot how much they hated us once we?d touched them. They didn?t suddenly begin to love us, but they stopped spitting as we walked by, stopped muttering curses or threats at us, stopped pointing their guns at us to remind us of their power and their fear. They let us alone. That was enough.
Their people, however, did begin to love us and to believe what we told them and to talk to us about Oankali and construct mates.
14
The shuttle, when it arrived, landed down in the canyon. There it could drink from the river and eat something other than the mountain people?s crops. No one was gassed. There was no panic on the part of the Humans. It was a measure of the Humans? trust that they let Aaor and me and our mates go down to meet the newcomers. At the last moment, Francisco decided to come with us, but only because, as he had admitted, his long years had not taught him patience.
Seven families had come with the shuttle. Most were from Chkahichdahk, since that was where shuttles lived when they were not in use. They had stopped at Lo, however, to pick up my parents. The first person I spotted in the small crowd was Tino?and I came closer than I should have to grabbing him and hugging him. Too Human a reaction. I hugged Nikanj instead, though Nikanj did not particularly want to be hugged. It tolerated the gesture and used it as an opportunity to sink its sensory tentacles into me and examine me thoroughly. When it had finished, without a word, it reached for Aaor and examined it. It held Aaor longer, then focused on Javier and Paz. They were watching with obvious curiosity but without alarm. They had already passed the stage of extreme avoidance of everyone except Aaor. Now, like Jesusa and TomAs, they were simply careful.
Neither of them had ever seen an Oankali before. They were fascinated, but they were not afraid.
Nikanj flattened its sensory tentacles to that glittering smoothness it could achieve when it was gleefully happy. ?Lelka,? it said, ?if you will introduce us to your mates, we may begin to forgive you for staying here and not letting us know you were all right.?
?I?m not sure I?ll forgive it,? Lilith said. But she was smiling, and for a time, everything else had to wait until Javier and Paz were welcomed into the family and the rest of us rewelcomed and forgiven. I saw Jesusa reach out to my mother for the first time since their break. The two embraced and I felt my own sensory tentacles go smooth with pleasure.
?The mountain Humans decided to keep us,? Aaor was explaining to the rest of the family. ?Since their only alternative as they saw it was to kill us, we were willing to stay.?
?Is this one of them?? Ahajas asked, looking at Francisco.
I introduced him and he, too, met her with curiosity but no fear.
?Would you have killed them?? she asked with odd amusement.
Francisco smiled, showing very white teeth. ?Of course not. Jodahs captured me long before it captured most of my people.?
Ahajas focused on me. ?Captured??
?No one has captured him,? I said. ?He wants to go to the Mars colony.?
Ahajas went very smooth. ?Do you want that??
?I did.? Francisco shook his head. ?Maybe I still do.?
I looked at him, surprised. He had been one of the holdouts?very certain. Now that the shuttle was here, he was less certain. ?Shall we find mates for you?? I asked.
He looked at me, then did something very Oankali. He turned and walked away. He walked quickly, would have gone back to the steep road and up to the village if Ahajas had not spoken.
?Does he have a female mate, Lelka?? she asked me.
I nodded. ?Inez. She?s an old fertile.? She had joined Francisco after bearing nine children. Now she was past the age of childbearing. Francisco had brought her to me once and asked me to check her health. She turned out to be one of the healthiest old fertiles I had ever touched, but I understood that Francisco?s real purpose had been to share her with me?and me with her. Yet he had truly wanted to emigrate. Until now.
?Jodahs,? Ahajas said, ?I think there are mates for him here, now. Bring him back.?
I went after Francisco, caught him, took him by the arms. ?My Oankali mother says there are people here, now, who might mate with you.?
