"I can see that," he said, quietly.
"But, with a lot of luck, we'll blow up and block the shaft of the Core Tap, then outrun the alarm that'll be raised for us after that, and make it back into the mountains with enough of us still alive to carry on as a separate Command. But if our luck's anything less than good, we won't make it back to the mountains; and if anything goes wrong, we'll be wiped out and fail to wreck the Core Tap."
"Don't your people in this part of the continent depend on the power from that Tap to farm and live?"
"Yes." She looked him in the eye. "But so do the Others depend on it for a spaceship fitting-yard, the only one in this northern hemisphere. If we blow it, they'll have to switch all their plans to use the one on South Continent - which is smaller and logistically less practical."
"You're paying a very high price just to put a spoke in their wheels, aren't you?" he asked.
"All prices are high," she said.
The light that had lingered in the sky was going swiftly, now. Over them, a full moon had been above the horizon for a couple of hours already; but in the brighter sky it had been hardly noticeable. Now, the first breath of a night wind moved about them, chilling them lightly. In the dimness Rukh's face was still perfectly visible, but remote, as if the oncoming dark had emphasized her isolation, not only from him but from everyone else in the universe. Deeply moved, suddenly, for reasons he could not explain to himself, on impulse he put a hand on each of her shoulders and bent forward to look down closely into her face. For a second their eyes were only inches apart, and unthinkingly, his arms went around her and he kissed her.
For a split-second he felt her shock and surprise, then a fierce response came, pressing her against him. But a second later she had put her hands on his upper arms and pushed him back from her with a strength that startled him.
She let go of him. In the near-darkness they looked at each other.
"Who are you?" she said, in a hard voice, so low he could hardly hear her.
"You know who I am," he answered. "I've told you."
"No," she spoke in that same low voice, staring at him, "you're more than that."
"If I am," he said - they were like two people trapped by a spell - "I don't know it."
"You know it."
She stared at him for a moment more.
"No," she said, at last, "you really don't know it, do you?"
She stepped back, away from him.
"I can't belong to anyone," she said; and her voice seemed to come almost from a remote distance. "I'm a Warrior of the Lord."
He could think of nothing to say.
"You don't understand?" she said, at last.
He shook his head.
"I'm one of the Elect. Like James," she said. "Don't you know what that means?"
"One of my tutors was an Elect - originally," he said, slowly. "I understand. It means far more than that. It means you're certain of Heaven."
"It means you've been chosen by God. I do what I must, not what I want." Her face was all but lost now in the dimness; and her voice softened. "Forgive me, Hal."
"For what?" he said.
"For whatever I did."
"You didn't do anything." His voice roughened. "It's me."
"Perhaps," she said. "But it's also me. Only - as long as I have the responsibility of this Command, I can't have anything else."
"Yes," he said.
She reached out and touched his forearm. He could feel the pressure of her fingers and he imagined that he could feel the warmth of her hand, even through the rough thickness of his shirt sleeve.
"Come along," she said. "We still have to talk to James, you and I."
"All right," he answered. She turned and they went back through the woods, close together but careful not to touch each other.
They found Child in his own single-person shelter near the center of the camp. He was apparently just ready to go to bed; and in the light of the lamp hanging from the main rib of the shelter his face looked deeply lined and much older than Hal had seen it appear, before. At their appearance in the entrance, he got up from the sleeping sack he was spreading out.
"I'll come," he said.
He stepped out of the shelter and they backed away to let him emerge. Outside, the pinned-back flap of the entrance spilled just enough light into the night so that they could see each other's faces without making them out in any detail.
"James," said Rukh. "I've talked to Howard, and I think he understands now what we're up against, out here."
Child-of-God looked at Hal, but said nothing. Remembering his promise to try to understand the older man, Hal fought back the instinct to bristle that came at the sight of the dark shadow pools that hid the other's eyes, turning in his direction.
"Also, since he's to be credited with helping us gain a number of cone rifles in good condition, I've promised him one of them."
Child-of-God nodded.
"And I've told him in full what our plans are for the next few weeks."
"Thou art in command," Child said. He had turned to face her as she spoke of the rifles. Now the blur that was his face swung back to Hal. "Howard, I am thy officer. From now on, wilt thou obey?"
"Yes," said Hal.
He was bone-weary. The other two must be, also. They said nothing more. He looked from Rukh to Child. They stood at three points of a triangle with space between them.
"If that's all, then," said Hal. "I'll be getting back to my shelter. Good night."
"Good night," said Rukh, from where she stood.
"We are in God's hands," said Child, unmoving.
Hal turned and went. There was no community fire that night, and once he turned his back to the light the camp was lost in darkness. But it was always laid out the same pattern; and as he moved into the darkness his eyes began to adjust until the moonlight was enough to show him the way. He got back to his shelter and found it with the hanging lamp within on its dimmest setting - a glowworm gleam barely illuminating the cold, curving walls of the shelter, once he was inside.
In his bedsack, Jason slept heavily. Hal undressed in silence, turned off the lamp and crawled into his own sack. He lay on his back staring up into the darkness, trapped between sleep and waking. In his mind's eye he replayed the climb up the chimney, his reconnaissance of the Militia position. He saw again the Militiaman in the first nest being slapped on the back by his comrade, and laughing. He pressed the firing button of the needle gun and saw the three men fall. He threw the rigged cone rifles into the enemy nests. He watched the rifle of Child come around to point at the Militia officer, and again he knocked it aside…
He saw Rukh, turning to face him in the twilight…
He squeezed his eyes shut, willing himself to sleep, but for once his mind and body would not obey. He lay there, and the ghosts of three old men came out of his memory and stood around him in the darkness.
"It was his first time," Malachi said. "He needed her."
"No," said Walter the InTeacher, "our deaths were his first time. And there was no one there for him then."
"When we were killed, it wasn't like this," said Malachi. "This time it was his doing. If he's not to go down and down from here until he drowns, he needs help."
"She cannot help him," said Obadiah. "She is at God's will, herself."
"He'll survive," said Walter. It was one of those rare occasions when the Exotic was the hardest of the three. "He'll survive without anyone if he has to, without anything. That part of him was in my care; and I promise you he will survive this, and worse."
"Unless thou art wrong," said Obadiah, harshly.
"Unless is not permitted," said Walter, softly. "Hal, you're not sleeping only because you're choosing not to sleep. All things, even this, are subject to the mind. What can't be mended has to be put aside until some time when it can, if ever. What did I teach you? Choice is the one thing that can never be taken from you, right down to the moment of the ultimate choice of death. So, if you want to lie awake and suffer, do so; but face the fact that it's something you're choosing to do, not something over which you've got no control."