Margid Veritt came up and put her arm around the distraught woman's shoulders. "Sara," she said softly, "you're upset. Please, come with me where you can rest—"
The other woman flung her off. "I'm not having a woman's hysteria! As a mother, Margid, think! Jord is your son!"
"Would you have me question what God has revealed to my husband?" asked Margid.
"There is nothing to understand except the bare facts. Rimon Farris has not yet bent Jon to his will; he has not yet gained the boy's soul. When he does, Jon will be like these women—a vessel for selyn, controlled by this sorcerer, and in turn used to control you and lead you to damnation."
By this time, Jord and Willa had moved close beside Abel. Now Jord said, "Mrs. Fenell, this is the second month I have not killed. Does that mean nothing to you? Rimon has taught Willa, who is teaching me—and while I learn, she can keep me free of the kill. Can you not envision a world in which Simes and Gens teach one another to live together in peace?"
"No! If God had meant that, Gens would not die when Simes took selyn!"
"But we don't," said Willa.
"You see, Jord Veritt? This demon has your soul in her grasp. There's no use talking to you. Is there no one here who can see how first the Gens are corrupted, and then used to corrupt the Simes?"
"Sara, please," said Abel, "won't you stay and pray with us? We'll listen to your objections, try to answer your questions."
"I listened to you, Abel Veritt, when you were on God's true path. You taught me well, then. I shall pray for your return to the true way."
Once more Sara Fenell made her retreat from Fort Freedom—but this time far fewer people followed her. Rimon felt Kadi's astonishment, but he understood. Abel Veritt had placed his faith in Rimon, and though all it seemed to bring him was grief, his faith remained unshaken. What do they want of me? Why won't he turn to Jord now? Why won't they all turn to Jord now? But maybe they will when they really understand what Jord and Willa are, maybe then they'll take some of the pressure off of me.
The 'summer ended and the cold rains of fall began again. This time, though, Kadi was not so shut in. They had glass in the windows, and their new stove provided far more heat than the fireplace they had huddled around last winter. Zeth was a constant joy, a good baby who fussed only when there was something wrong, but whose curious black eyes soon followed everything that went on.
They missed Willa's help, and also the girl's sunny personality. Jon shifted from hope to fear to anxiety to pride each time Jord or Rimon drew from him in healing mode, and he would vow that next month he'd be ready to give transfer—but each month, as he grew high-field again, his anxiety grew with it until Rimon again ruled out the attempt.
They spent a good deal of time at Fort Freedom, but when they were home they never lacked company; if Jord and Willa were not there, it would be Del's whole family. Both Owen and Jana learned to ride quickly and loved going places on their ponies. Owen confided, "Jana's almost as much fun as a boy now, but I wish Zeth would grow up so we could play together."
"There are no boys Owen's age at Fort Freedom," Carlana explained, and Rimon remembered that the Fifes, who had a four-year-old son, had elected to stay with Sara Fenell in the half-empty row of houses along the creek. They had also heard that the Fife family had bought a female Gen from Slina and kept her for two months without killing her.
"Do you think they're trying to raise the girl to be like Willa?" Kadi asked Carlana.
"Yes, I think that's what they're doing. I wanted to do it myself, but Del said no."
"And you just let it go at that?"
"No, I—I talked with Mr. Veritt about Del. He said Del is right to make me take responsibility for my own decisions. And I think if I had insisted, Del would have given in. I don't know, Kadi. If anyone can tame a wild thing and make it love him, it's Del. But if he failed, he would hurt more than anyone else. So we'll wait. If others succeed, I will insist."
That was the state of all their friends, torn between hope and fear. And from time to time, especially during the last days before a transfer, Rimon would retreat to Billy's grave, carefully tending the plants and hedges there, the physical labor somehow easing his guilt.
Besides the emotional turmoil, there were simple problems of survival—for the first time, Rimon and Kadi were better off than their friends at Fort Freedom. With their manpower spread thin by the schism during the growing season, their cash crops had suffered. Now they were short of funds. Dan Whelan was working hard to repair all their equipment, but he was running short of metal.
The big argument wherever three men gathered in Fort Freedom was whether to do without the necessary metal or to break one of their most cherished principles and deal with one of the outlaw bands that raided Gen Territory for metal mined from the ruins of the Ancients. But Veritt would not yield on that point. He said there was blood on that metal—the blood of those Gens who mined it, those from whom it was stolen, and the blood of Simes who paid dearly for their raids into the heart of Gen Territory.
Nonetheless, the Year's Turning ceremony was a time of great celebration, as Abel detailed the progress from the year before. Two more children had established, and both had elected to stay with their families, giving their selyn to Rimon each month as Jon did. Even though both had the same problems Jon had, their presence was a ray of hope.
Willa seemed happy, easing Jord's growing tension without causing him to lash out at her. Zlinning Willa, Rimon found none of that tension in her that had bothered him for so long in Kadi. Kadi had had to learn not to hide her true feelings, something it simply never occurred to Willa to do. Nonetheless, around Jord and Willa, he felt a kind of precarious stasis, as if Jord would soon face something similar to what had happened to Rimon last winter, the day of Carlana's miscarriage. When he came through that, he'd be in control or" himself.
Then one snowy day, as what looked like an all-day blizzard began to pile snow around their homestead, they had an unexpected visitor: Risko, the man who worked for Slina, and whom Rimon had healed the very first time he'd ever used his healing mode.
"Rimon, we got problems at the Pens," he explained. "What's wrong?"
"Slina got in a prime Gen a few weeks ago—marked as Farris stock, he is, but I told her she shoulda asked you."
"You think she was cheated?"
"Worse than that. He's sick—and it's spreading through the Pens. We lost three already, and if we can't stop it, well—look at the snow comin' down. You may not need our stock, but everyone else does, and—"
"It's all right, Risko," said Rimon. "I'll come and do whatever I can. Kadi, Jon—you come along and—no, you might catch it. You go to Fort Freedom and tell Jord to come help me."
"Slina's already gone to ask Abel Veritt for help," said Risko. "We heard his son's a healer, like you."
"He'll help," said Rimon. "Everyone in Fort Freedom who can do anything will."
It was not only that they needed Gens to survive; it was that they knew full well that if the Simes in the little border town were shorted, they'd have .no qualms about hunting across the border—and right across the border was the community where Fort Freedom sent their established children.
When Rimon reached Slina's, three wagons were just pulling away—Simes stocking up on Gens with an eye on the gathering storm. Inside, Rimon found both Abel and Jord in the office, Willa at Jord's side.
"Willa, it's a Gen illness," Rimon told her. "You mustn't stay here—see, I didn't even bring Kadi."
Jord shifted closer to his wife, his stance tense. "Willa stays with me. I say where she goes."