CHAPTER TEN
Var woke several times in the night, beset by the chill of this height. A wind came up, wringing the precious warmth from his back. Only in front, where he touched Soli, was he warm. He could have survived alone but it was better this way.
Every so often the girl stirred but when her limbs stretched out and met the cold, they contracted again quickly. Even so, her hands were icy. Had she slept by herself she would hardly have been able to wield a stick in the morning. Var put his coarse hand over her fine one, shielding it.
Dawn finally came. They stood up shivering and jumped vigorously to restore circulation, and attended to natural calls again, but it was some time before they both felt better. Fog shrouded the plateau, making the drop off unreal, the sky dismal.
'What's that?' Soli inquired, pointing.
Once more, Var was at a loss to answer. He knew what it was, but not what women called it.
'My father Sol doesn't have one,' she said.
Var knew she was mistaken, for had that been the case, she herself would never have been born.
'I'm hungry,' she said. 'And thirsty too.'
So was Var but they were no closer to a solution to that problem than they had been the night before. They had to fight. The winner would descend and feast as royally as he or she wished. The other would not need food again, ever. He looked at the two singlesticks lying across the centerline. A pair but one his, the other hers.
She saw his glance. 'Do we have to fight?'
Var never seemed to be able to answer her questions. On the one hand he represented the empire; on the other he had his oath to Sola to uphold. He shrugged.
'It's foggy,' she said wistfully. 'Nobody can see us.'
Meaning that they should not fight without witnesses? Well, it would do for an excuse. The mist showed no sign of dissipating, and no sound rose from its depths. The world was a whiteness, as was their contest.
'Why don't we go down and get some food?' she asked. 'And come back before they see us.'
The simplicity and directness of her mind were astonishing! Yet why not? He was glad to have a pretext to postpone hostilities, since he could not see his way clear either to winning or losing.
'Truce until the fog lifts?' he asked.
'Truce until the fog lifts. That time I understood you very well.'
And Var was pleased.
They descended on Var's side of the mountain, after retrieving the stick harnesses. The third and fourth sticks themselves had bounced and rolled and been lost entirely, but the harnesses had stayed where they fell. Soli had feared that the underworld had ways to spot anyone who traversed her own slope of Mt. Muse. 'Television pickups can't tell where they're hidden.'
'You mean sets are just sitting around outside?' Var knew what television was; he had seen the strange silent pictures on the boxes in hostels.
'Sets outside,' she repeated, Interpreting. 'No, silly. Pickups little boxes like eyes, set into stones and things, operated by remote controL'
Var let the subject drop. He had never seen a stone with an eye in it, but there had been stranger things in the badlands.
The fog was even thicker at the base. They held hands and sneaked up to the Master's camp. Then Var hesitated. 'They'll know me,' he whispered.
'Oh.' She was taken aback. 'Could I go in, then?'
'You don't know the layout.'
