meant me no harm. For another thing, the respect he received from the Tehkohn was far beyond anything even Jules could expect from the Missionaries. What would he and his people do to me if they realized how I felt about him? It would be as though the Missionaries had realized that T thought their God was so much air. Yet it was hard for me to control my feelings against Diut—especially now when he was so close to me.
“Find Gehnahteh or Choh,” he told me. “Tell them that your time with them is ended. Then go back to Jeh and Cheah.”
I left him quickly. I didn’t know why he was making the change, and I was worried. But I was so glad to get away from him that I didn’t stop to ask questions. I went straight to the apartment of Gehnahteh and Choh. Only Choh was at home when I went in. He was shaping a heavy stick into a handle for some farmer’s digging prongs. He looked up at me in surprise.
“What has frightened you?”
I told him about the hunter I had hit.
“You fought a hunter?” he asked incredulously. “You fought and won?”
I shook my head. “It wasn’t a fight. And I may have lost more than I won. Perhaps the Tehkohn Hao has some punishment in mind for me.”
Choh put his knife and wood on the floor and came to stand before me. “He’s not one to delay punishment, Alanna. If he had been angry with you, you would know.” Choh paused. “Alanna, you are a friend.”
He was saying good-bye to me. I touched the back of my hand to his face in the friendship gesture. I had seen others use the gesture but this was the first time I had used it myself—the first time I had wanted to use it. He covered my hand for a moment with a furry paw, then spoke once more.
“I will tell you a thing that perhaps I should not tell you because I’m not certain.”
“What is it?”
“The Tehkohn Hao has decided that you are a fighter. We told him you were, but he said, ‘Wait. Let her prove it.’ I think now you have proven it.”
“You told him?”
“You had already proven it to us.”
We looked at each other for a long moment, then I smiled. He had asked me once, “Do all your people bare their teeth to show pleasure?” I went to get the spare clothing I had accumulated and my few toilet articles.
“You have worked as one of us,” said Choh. “We will miss you.”
And I would miss them, I thought as I left him and walked out into the dim corridors. But as long as I was not to be punished, I did not mind returning to Jeh and Cheah—except for one thing. Jeh and Cheah did live in the fighter section of the dwelling. They lived near the outside where raiders would come first if they got past the guards, and they lived near the Tehkohn Hao. I would be seeing more of Diut and I would have to make a greater effort to get used to him.
Cheah welcomed me to her apartment, her small body blazing white.
“Ah-la-naaah!” she cried exuberantly. “I heard you fought Haileh—that you beat him to the ground!”
I stared at her in surprise. “You’re glad?”
“Glad! That one was an animal! He tried to humiliate you because he thought you were weak. He tried it with me once because I’m small. I almost broke his neck!”
I laughed because I could picture her doing exactly that. She was not the kind of person who would let her smallness make her a target for other people’s frustrations.
“You are back where you belong,” she said. “Jeh told Diut that you were a fighting woman.” She led me across the room. “Put your things here. We will make a pallet for you. Come!”
I spent five days with them. Easy days compared to what I had been used to. I had the work of the apartment to do—cooking and cleaning—because without any blue at all, I was the lowest-ranking person in the apartment. As I had relieved Choh, now I relieved Cheah. I didn’t like it particularly, but it kept me busy. And Cheah chattered and Jeh and I listened, amused. Jeh said once, “I take her with me to trade with the lake people, Mahkahkohn. She talks and talks and they are all white and at ease and she trades them out of their fur.” I believed it.
Then came the day when Jeh brought home gifts for me. There was a long robelike garment of fur dyed blue- green. It was made from the skin of a single large animal. The fur was coarser than Kohn fur but it was thick and the garment looked warm and comfortable. And there were new shoes of the same ankle-high boot type that I had been wearing, but these were fur-lined, and colored blue-green to match the robe.
“Put them on,” said Jeh. “They are yours.”
“You give them to me?”
“Diut gives them to you.”
I froze. “Diut?” In spite of my fears, I had hardly seen the Tehkohn Hao since moving back with Jeh and Cheah. And I did not want to see him.
“He made me go with him to get that thing,” said Jeh, gesturing toward the robe. “He said you and I were the same size. I had to put the thing on so that he could see whether it was as long as he wanted it to be on you.”
I stood listening to him, hearing what he was telling me, and what he was not telling me. I strove not to believe it. “Jeh, why is he giving me these things?”
“To please you, Alanna. He gives gifts sometimes, though yours are stranger than any I have seen. Get your other things. Gather them all. He’s waiting for you.”
“I… must go?” I managed to keep my voice almost normal.
“You are afraid?”
