“They’ve all got temples, now. All eleven settlements. I’m sure they’ll all have Gods before long. Strange.”
“Strange,” she agreed, wishing he would quit talking about the Gods.
“They call each God by the name of some settler that’s died recently. Kind of a memorial, I guess.” He grunted and put his right hand under his arm. “I shouldn’t have eaten anything. Now I’ve got a pain.”
“Shall I call a tech?”
“No, no,” he waved impatiently. “I’ve just been tired these last few days. I’m supposed to have a med-check, but I keep putting it off.”
“Perhaps I’d better run along.”
He turned the full splendor of his smile on her. “Sweetheart, no. If there’s any remedy for tiredness on this whole world, it’s right here next to me.” He reached out for her, and she lost herself in their usual and delightful preliminaries.
Later he went into his bedroom while she visited the bathroom. When she came to him, he was sprawled out on the coverlet, face up, the lights dimmed. She was on the bed with him, snuggled against him, before she realized he was no longer breathing.
• If Horgy had thought the rapid proliferation of Gods upon Hobbs Land strange, Zilia Makepeace considered it ominous. She wanted very much to talk to the survey team from Thyker, but they were all up on the escarpment, looking at odd formations no one had noticed until recently. From what Zilia was told, once Shan and Bombi and Volsa had started looking for them on the aerial surveys, they found others, a similar formation here, a slightly different one there, some protruding high out of the soil, others barely rounding the surface. Though it was not part of their project, the Damzels had decided to uncover at least one of them, just to see what they were, and the three-man team had been augmented by machine operators, techs, a doctor from Thyker, and even a funny fat Baidee named Merthal who was scrupulously polite but stubbornly insistent upon being supplied immediately with whatever-it-was the Damzels thought they needed. Since the project was being conducted under the aegis of the Native Matters Advisory, as Native Matters person upon the planet, Zilia had to see to all of it without being part of any of it, and her paranoia had given way to sheer annoyance and frustrated curiosity.
She had even sought Spiggy’s company, only to find that he, of all people, had been invited by Volsa Damzel to spend some time up on the escarpment. According to Tandle Wobster, who knew everything, Spiggy was enough of a Baidee to be acceptable as a sex partner even if he did eat eggs and didn’t own a kamrac. Since she had little enough else to speculate about, Zilia speculated as to how Tandle had learned this interesting fact and ended with the suspicion that Tandle had probably illicitly tapped all their private stages.
Ruminations and suspicions were disrupted by the unexpected death of Horgy Endure, who, as anyone might have predicted, died in bed with one of his trainees. Zilia could not remember which one she had been until she saw the blonde girl at the memorial service, supported by female associates and obviously still in shock. Horgy had had a large circle of acquaintances, a few of them men, many of whom came to CM for the service. Zilia dressed herself soberly and sat toward the back of the hall, hoping the eulogies would not take long. A young person took the seat beside her, and other young persons filled the surrounding area.
“I’m Saturday Wilm,” said Zilia’s neighbor, offering her hand. “This is my cousin, Jeopardy. We met out at Settlement One when you came there for the visit. All these others are members of the visitation committee that Horgy Endure sponsored.” Saturday sighed, and a tear slid gently down her face to drip, unnoticed, from her jaw. “He was very nice to us.”
“He was very nice to many people,” said Zilia, drily. She herself was almost the only woman in Central Management Horgy had not been intimately nice to. Herself and, possibly, Tandle, though Zilia would not have bet her life even on that. What had Horgy been up to with this child? “So you’ve come for the service.”
“For the vigil, actually,” said Jep. “Our group does that, you know. We keep vigil the night someone is buried. It’s a sort of symbol of thoughtful remembrance. A kindness.”
It was the first Zilia had heard of it. She had not looked at Horgy’s report on innovations, and though Dern Blass had been interested in the proliferation of Hobbs Land Gods, no one had mentioned vigils at recent meetings. “At the grave?” she asked, amazed. Graveside services were unknown. Only the family or those appointed for the duty took bodies to a grave or to whatever other form of disposal was used. This, a Baidee custom which had become accepted Systemwide, was almost never contravened. The Baidee considered the body simply as something to be disposed of, a leftover, not’ something to focus community attention upon. It was customary for families to dispose of bodies, quickly though respectfully, even before memorials were conducted.
“At the grave, yes. So far, the weather’s been very good, so we just bring blankets and sort of sing until the suns come up.” Saturday’s eyes were as limpid and clear as the mountain streams which fell from the escarpment. “Just a remembrance.”
Zilia was not to be taken in by childlike eyes. This was another behavior she did not understand. “I’d like to join you,” she said. “Would you mind an observer?”
There was a hesitation so brief that it went unnoticed. “Why, of course,” said Jep. “We’d be glad to have you. We’ll be getting together at the burying ground around nightwatch two or three.”
Zilia walked out to the burying ground at nightwatch two and a half, splitting the difference. The place lay in an elevated basin, separated from the
