"Came from the east." Metoy's harsh voice was weak and hoarse. "I guess they were." After a while he said, "They want to cross the river."
Esdan thought about this for a while. His mind still did not work well at all. "Who does?" he said finally.
"These people. The field hands. The assets of Yaramera. They want to go meet the Army."
"The invasion?"
"The liberation."
Esdan propped himself up on his elbows. Raising his head seemed to clear it, and he sat up. He looked over at Metoy. "Will they find them?" he asked.
"If the Lord so wills," said the eunuch.
Presently Metoy tried to prop himself up like Esdan, but failed. "I got blown up," he said, short of breath. "Something hit my head. I see two for one."
"Probably a concussion. Lie still. Stay awake. Were you with Banarkamye, or observing?"
"I'm in your line of work."
Esdan nodded, the backward nod.
"Factions will be the death of us," Metoy said faintly.
Kamsa came and squatted down beside Esdan. "They say we must go cross the river," she told him in her soft voice. "To where the people-army will keep us safe. I don't know."
"Nobody knows, Kamsa."
"I can't take Rekam cross a river," she whispered. Her face clenched up, her lips drawing back, her brows down. She wept, without tears and in silence. "The water is cold."
"They'll have boats, Kamsa. They'll look after you and Rekam. Don't worry. It'll be all right." He knew his words were meaningless.
"I can't go," she whispered.
"Stay here then," Metoy said.
"They said that other army will come here."
"It might. More likely ours will."
She looked at Metoy. "You are the cutfree," she said. "With those others." She looked back at Esdan. "Choyo got killed. All the kitchen is blown in pieces burning." She hid her face in her arms.
Esdan sat up and reached out to her, stroking her shoulder and arm. He touched the baby's fragile head with its thin, dry hair.
Gana came and stood over them. "All the field hands are going cross the river," she said. "To be safe."
"You'll be safer here. Where there's food and shelter." Metoy spoke in short bursts, his eyes closed. "Than walking to meet an invasion."
"I can't take him, mama," Kamsa whispered. "He has got to be warm. I can't, I can't take him."
Gana stooped and looked into the baby's face, touching it very softly with one finger. Her wrinkled face closed like a fist. She straightened up, but not erect as she used to stand. She stood bowed. "All right," she said. "We'll stay."
She sat down on the grass beside Kamsa. People were on the move around them. The woman Esdan had seen on the terrace stopped by Gana and said, "Come on, grandmother. Time to go. The boats are ready waiting."
"Staying," Gana said.
"Why? Can't leave that old house you worked in?" the woman said, jeering, humoring. "It's all burned up, grandmother! Come on now. Bring that girl and her baby." She looked at Esdan and Metoy, a flick-glance. They were not her concern. "Come on," she repeated. "Get up now."
"Staying," Gana said.
"You crazy housefolk," the woman said, turned away, turned back, gave it up with a shrug, and went on.
A few others stopped, but none for more than a question, a moment. They streamed on down the terraces, the sunlit paths beside the quiet pools, down towards the boathouses beyond the great tree. After a while they were all gone.
The sun had grown hot. It must be near noon. Metoy was whiter than ever, but he sat up, saying he could see single, most of the time.
"We should get into the shade, Gana," Esdan said. "Metoy, can you get up?"
He staggered and shambled, but walked without help, and they got to the shade of a garden wall. Gana went off to look for water. Kamsa was carrying Rekam in her arms, close against her chest, sheltered from the sun. She had not spoken for a long time. When they had settled down she said, half questioning, looking around dully, "We are all alone here."
"There'll be others stayed. In the compounds," Metoy said. "They'll turn up."
Gana came back; she had no vessel to carry water in, but had soaked her scarf, and laid the cold wet cloth on Metoy's head. He shuddered. "You can walk better, then we can go to the house-compound, cutfree," she said. "Places we can live in, there."
"House-compound is where I grew up, grandmother," he said.
And presently, when he said he could walk, they made their halt and lame way down a road which Esdan vaguely remembered, the road to the crouchcage. It seemed a long road. They came to the high compound wall and the gate standing open.
Esdan turned to look back at the ruins of the great house for a moment. Gana stopped beside him.
"Rekam died," she said under her breath.
He caught his breath. "When?"
She shook her head. "I don't know. She wants to hold him. She's done with holding him, then she will let him go." She looked in the open gateway at the rows of huts and longhouses, the dried-up garden patches, the dusty ground. "Lotsalot little babies are in there," she said. "In that ground. Two of my own. Her sisters." She went in, following Kamsa. Esdan stood a while longer in the gateway, and then he went in to do what there was for him to do: dig a grave for the child, and wait with the others for the Liberation.