"The trouble is," Said Amid. "if the soldiers begin making an organized sweep through here, they're almost certain to catch sight of Cee, because she'll come to look at them. If she wanted to, she could probably dance all around and through them and none of them would know she was there. But she - won't realize the danger of being seen. She won't realize that with enough people, acting in concert, there's a danger that she can be surrounded and caught." "And there's no way for us to make her understand this," said Artur.
"Any thoughts on the matter, Hal?"- Amid asked. Hal shook his head. "Short of' our capturing the girl first, ourselves-," he began.
"No," said Artur and Onete simultaneously. "She'd never recover from that," Artur added. "Amanda was right." "Then I haven't anything to suggest," Hal said, "at the moment, at least."
"We may just have to wait and hope," said Amid. " However, a little knowledge of what the present situation is wouldn't do any harm. You're the tactical expert here, Hal. I'd like you to go down with the foragers just as you were supposed to do. But don't stay with them. When they get down, break off by yourself and take a look around the area as far as you think you can in the time you've got to give it. You might consider delaying your normal turn at the circle so that you could put in the whole day down there?"
"Of course," said Hal. "Thank you," said Amid. "Thank you," said Artur, almost simultaneously...There's nothing needing thanks in that," said Hal. "As far as that goes, I'm walking the circle in the back of my mind all the time I'm awake anyway - and for all I know most of the time when I'm sleeping." "Are you?" said Amid. "That explains why we now have two of you, Old Man and yourself, who walk the circle without saying the Law aloud as they go. It's interesting. That's exactly what Old Man told me, when I asked him why he didn't repeat the Law aloud as he walked. I'd been obliged to ask him because others in the Guild had asked me if it was correct for him to do that. Old Man said the same thing - he didn't need to say the Law aloud. It repeated itself in his head all the time, no matter what he was doing. Jathed would never have stood for either one of you walking in his circle and not repeating the proper words. "But you will," said Hal.
Amid smiled. "I will, because I think my brother Kanin would have. Kanin had a tremendous admiration for Jathed - as I may have said, Kanin was his chief disciple. But Kanin, like any true Exotic, had a mind of his own."
Hal's ear had been picking up the slight sounds of voices beyond the closed outer door of the building. "I'd better be going," he said. "it sounds like the others are ready, outside." "I'll go too." said Onete, also rising, "since we'll be traveling the same way for the first part of it. Unless there's some reason for me to stay awhile yet, Amid?" "No. Go ahead." "Thanks."
Hal and Onete went out, joined the rest of the foragers and they all started down the mountainside. "Where's your gathering bag, Friend?" one of the men in the mixed group asked Hal. It occurred to Hal that he had become so used to answering to the name "Friend" that he had almost not recognized his own when Amid had used it during the conversation just a few moments past. He had been planning to pick up a bag after speaking to Amid - but there was no point in doing that now.
"I've been given a separate job," he said. "Oh..." They were too polite, both its Exotics still and as Guild members, to question him about what the task might be.
When they reached the forest below they split up, the foragers spreading out to the north and Hal and Onete going together southward, down toward Porphyry. "I never did get to ask how you're getting on with Cee. " Hal said once the two of them were alone. "I'm in a kina progress." Onete smiled. "What a magnificent little thing she is! I used to wonder how she could survive down there all by herself. But she really owns that forest. She knows every foot of it. I'll bet she could run through it blind if she had to. But what you want to know is have I got her to come really close to me?" "That's about it." said Hal. "I have," said Onete. "Oh, I don't mean close enough to touch, though if she'd stand still for it, she comes near enough to me, nowadays, so that I could probably stand up, reach out and touch her. But that's not what I'm after. It's curiosity that brings her close, you know. She wants to touch my clothes, and me, as much as I'd like to touch her, but she doesn't dare. She doesn't trust me enough yet. Artur grabbed at her, eventually, well, you know that, and of course she's expecting me to do the same thing. She's going to have to actually come up and touch me and walk away again without my moving, a number of times, before she'll begin to put me in a different category. Poor Artur!"
"Yes," said Hal. "He couldn't help it, of course. He'd wanted to hold her so long, that he just didn't have any patience left, when she came in reach. I can tell how he must have felt, by the way I feel myself, and she's not part of my extended family, the only part that's left. But I'll wait. I think if I wait long enough, Cee'll not only initiate the touching, she'll start to lead me around and show me things. Then, I can perhaps see if she'll let me lead her places, and so finally I can bring her up to the ledge and safety." "But not before these soldiers come," said Hal. "You think they'll really make a search through here?" Onete looked up at his face as they walked. "Yes," said Hal.
He did not say to Onete what he had also not said to Amid only because Artur and Onete had been there, which was that he was afraid it was because of him that the search would come.
CHAPTER 21
Yes, thought Hal, Bleys would indeed come. The Other had his own, personal version of intuitional logic, as he had told Hal when the two had talked together briefly in the cold and misty tunnel through the phase-shield, soon after the shield had gone up. Intuitional logic, or its counterpart, would not tell Bleys where Hal was, but he would be able to read from the general situation that Hal was up to something and probably not on Earth. Undoubtedly, on all the Younger Worlds, right now, the police, the military and all other paramilitary under the control of the Others, were looking into formerly closed files and commencing to examine groups and areas left unexamined for some time.
Particularly on these two Exotic worlds. A little serious thought, let alone an intuitional logic, would rule out one by one the other worlds beyond Old Earth. Hal would not return to either of the Friendly worlds, where he was too well known. There would be no reason that was likely to take him to the mining world of Coby or the older worlds of Mars and Venus, which had been settled early and never fully developed. Newton, the scientists' world, almost alone among the Younger Worlds, held no groups actively resisting the Others, from which Hal could get aid and protection. Also, Newton and its counterpart, Cassida, were sterile for the purposes of Hal's aims, at this time in history. There were no strong historical forces among the populations of Ceta, St.Marie, New Earth and Freiland, and there was no point in Hal's returning to the all but empty world of Dorsai. By default, therefore, there were left only Mara and Kultis, either one.