At that moment, there was a distant shout, then much shouting from beyond the wall. Garkohn alerting each other that Tehkohn had infiltrated their ranks.
The Garkohn inside, who had been on the verge of overwhelming Diut by fire and sheer weight of numbers, froze where they were. Diut, who had not been startled by the sounds, struck down one of them and ran for the darkness behind the Missionaries’ houses.
A pair of Garkohn hurried to open the gates, but before Natahk and what was left of his party could go out, several more Garkohn surged in, panicked, babbling that the Tehkohn had found allies—that at least two tribes attacked them.
Alanna saw Natahk kill one of his own men in rage, heard him order them back out to fight. “Fools! You’re the only allies that the Tehkohn need! You’ve let them trick you somehow! You’re like children and nonfighters. Go back!”
His commands and threats drove them back, but Alanna wondered if some of the yellow they showed was more in anger at him than in fear of the Tehkohn. Natahk followed his people out, Diut forgotten, and plunged into the battle.
Alanna and Jules moved at the same time to close the gates. The Garkohn could get in again, over the wall, but it would be harder, take longer.
The only Garkohn left in the settlement were the dead, and the one injured man whose leg Diut had broken. “He sat alone on the common, leaning against a tree, his body yellow with fear and pain. He watched them, probably waiting for them to kill him.
CHAPTER TEN
Alanna
The gathering was small. I invited Jeh and Cheah, of course. And I would have invited Gehnahteh and Choh. But Diut said flatly, “This is a time for blue, not yellow. There are other times for nonfighters.”
“But wouldn’t your blue balance their yellow?” I asked foolishly. I had been with the Tehkohn long enough to know better than to ask such a question.
“What balance?” said Diut with annoyance. “This is a time for as much blue as possible to bring luck to the child, and to you. It is the custom. Do you think Gehnahteh and Choh would be grateful to you for inviting them in violation of tradition?”
I sighed and invited Tahneh and Ehreh—their age spots did not seem to count against their blue. And Diut insisted on inviting Kehyo and Kahlahtkai—though not for their blue.
“I want Kehyo’s foolishness to end completely,” he said. “This gathering will tell her what, somehow, my words have never quite communicated to her.” Again there was no arguing with him, but this time I smiled. If nothing else, I approved of the message he was trying to give Kehyo.
I was beginning to see him as my husband, to realize as though for the first time, that I had no real choice but to accept his superstitions and his relatives as I accepted him. It was different, now that I had to view my acceptance as a permanent thing. This was the way I would live. The Tehkohn were the people whose lives I would share. The Missionaries would become only a memory. I could never think of returning to them with a “half-human” child. Nor could I think of abandoning such a child, who would surely be different and as much alone in its strangeness as I was.
I had thought about it and thought about it and thought about it before I told Diut, and I had been afraid. For the first time in my life, I longed to be the wife of some ordinary Bible-quoting Missionary man. Someone whose eyes really were as round as Diut said mine were. Someone furless and human-looking. I was terrified.
Then came anger—at Diut, at the child, at my own body… How could such a thing happen? Most Missionaries had never even considered the possibility. Jules and Neila had—with disgust. They had first seen the overt sexuality of the Garkohn as confirmation that the Garkohn were animals. Then the Garkohn came to understand how easily the Missionaries were shocked and offended. Obligingly, the Garkohn conformed to Missionary custom when they were in the Mission colony. But still, Neila was concerned with their refusal to wear clothing.
“Jules, I’ve seen some of our boys looking at their women,” she had said.
And Jules had made a sound of disgust. “Just about the same ones we would have seen looking at goats and female guard dogs back on Earth,” he had said.
“But what if they…?”
“They won’t. At least not without a lot of co-operation from those bull women. And if a Garkohn woman does co-operate, what’s she got to complain about? I might let the community loose on the first boy who gets caught at it though. It’s something to put a stop to early.”
“You could warn them. Get them together and warn them all.”
“And put the idea into the heads of those who haven’t thought of it yet? No. Unless Garkohn men begin looking at our women, I’m going to keep quiet.”
“Garkohn men… Image of God!” muttered Neila with unmistakable revulsion. “Thank God there’s no possibility of mixed children, no matter what happens.”
She was so wrong, my foster mother. But I hadn’t known how right I had considered her to be until I realized I was carrying Diut’s child. I felt betrayed.
And no doubt, I communicated my feelings to Diut without saying a word. He began to look at me with doubt and concern. But somehow, I couldn’t bring myself to tell him what was wrong. Not until I resolved my own conflicts. I was too solitary a person to ask for help. So by the time I spoke to him, I had already accepted the idea that I was to be the mother of his child whether either of us liked it or not—and that he might not like it very much.
He surprised me though. He got over his shock and disbelief much more quickly than I had expected. And he seemed to feel no resentment when he realized that he was to be tied to an alien or that his child would probably lack some of the physical advantages his people prized. He was content, even proud, merely to have fathered a child. At last.
I began to relax. On the day of the gathering, I went around to each of the three couples and asked them to come that night and share our evening meal. I said no more than that. By that night, we were, all except Ehreh,
