Alarmed, Jules cut him off. “Now just a moment, Natahk—”
“Be still!” Natahk did not raise his voice but Jules fell silent as though he had shouted. “She does not deny it. Why should you?”
Jules looked at Alanna and she looked back expressionlessly.
Natahk went on. “Your lives are mine. Only I can save them. Only I can deny justice to the twelve families who lost kinsmen last night.”
Jules watched him closely. “You intend to do this then. And this talk of torture is only to frighten us.”
“It is to warn you, Verrick. I will intercede for you now, but I will not do it again. And even now, I expect to be paid for the protection that I give. I expect you to accept yourselves as Garkohn, and then turn and help your people to do the same. I want your word that you will do this.”
“You want too much,” said Jules.
“So? Even in exchange for your life?”
“Shall I give you my word that I’ll betray my people in exchange for my life? Would you believe me?”
Natahk whitened slightly. “What bargain shall we make then, Verrick? What will you give me in exchange for your life?”
Jules watched him silently for several seconds. “Nothing,” he said finally. “I’ll go on doing what I have to do. I can’t promise anyone more than that.”
The white went out of Natahk’s body and his normal green glowed with the intensity of his emotions. “You choose death then?”
Jules tensed. “If that’s the only alternative.”
Natahk stared at him for several seconds. Then he smiled. “I have heard Alanna speak this way. She was lying. I think you are lying too.”
Jules shrugged.
“You Missionaries find it very easy to say you would rather die than do this or that. But you won’t die, Verrick. And you will learn, to obey me. Because each time you disobey, I will kill one of your people.”
“What!”
“I will begin with Alanna.”
Jules turned to look at Alanna.
“Relations between us were much simpler before she was returned to you,” said Natahk. “Without her, they will become simple again. And you, remembering her, will become much more tractable.”
Neila came out of the bedroom where she had obviously been listening, and stood staring first at Natahk, then at Jules. Alanna watched them all as though nothing they said had anything to do with her. Jules was bluffing, feeling himself too valuable to be casually murdered. Natahk was bluffing. He might kill others, but he had no intention of killing Alanna. Not yet. Jules was trying to salvage pride, and Natahk was trying to intimidate. A game then. One miscalculation from either of them, and the people would be destroyed because of the outcome of a game.
“Jules…” said Neila softly.
Jules glanced at her.
“You can’t let him…” She went to stand beside Alanna, put an arm around her protectively.
“You won’t do it,” said Jules to Natahk. “You won’t kill my daughter and then expect me to co-operate with you.”
Natahk stood up, stepped toward Alanna, and Alanna deliberately entered the game on Natahk’s side. She stood quickly, as though frightened, and moved so that her chair was between herself and Natahk.
“Jules!” cried Neila once more.
“All right!” Jules was on his feet. “Stop!” For his daughter, for his pleading wife, he could do what he refused to do for himself.
Natahk stopped, looked at him.
“I’ll do as you say. Leave them alone.”
“What will you do?”
“I’ll… I’ll try to guide my people in the way you want, help them to accept their new lives… and you.”
“You don’t believe what you’re saying,” said Natahk. “But your saying it is a beginning. You will say it again, and again. You will act as though it was true in order to deceive me. You will deceive yourself instead. Your lie will become truth. You and your people are mine, Verrick.”
Jules said nothing.
“In time,” said Natahk more softly, “you will realize that there is no shame in your submission. I don’t rule this valley through weakness. And all who live here submit to me in one way or another.”
Still, Jules was silent.
Watching him, Natahk whitened slowly, then just as slowly settled back to his normal green. “You are First Missionary then, Verrick. Go out to your people and see that no more of them throw their lives away. Take your wife with you. I want to speak privately with Alanna.”
Alanna had not thought anything could bring Jules’s resistance back so quickly.
