'Hmm,' Flick murmured. 'What interest does a Zigane have in you, how did she know about you and how did she manage to call you? There are a lot of questions here, Lee.'

'I know, but all I can care about at the moment is lying down and going to sleep.'

The safe house was little more than a sprawling shack high in the mountains, surrounded by ancient trees. At one time, it might have been a logger's cabin. Leef said that Varrish patrols used to scour these mountain forests for refugee humans. He didn't relate the fate of those unfortunate captives.

The cabin had fallen into disrepair somewhat, but there were still bunks and blankets within, running water, and chopped logs stacked outside for firewood. Leef and Chelone didn't appear at all tired and set about lighting a fire. Lileem went straight to the nearest bunk, threw herself onto it face down and was snoring in minutes. Four beds were in one room, a further six in another, more than enough for a competent Varrish patrol. Ulaume and Flick went into the other room and pushed two of the narrow bunks together so they could sleep wrapped in each other's warmth. There was no way either of them wanted to undress: the beds looked gritty and mouldy.

'Is it safe to sleep?' Flick wondered aloud.

Ulaume sniffed in distaste at the damp mildewy blankets. 'If the Parsics think so, then yes,' he said. 'You can tell they're antsy about pursuit, but they obviously feel safe here.'

The Parsics allowed them to sleep for only five hours. Flick and Ulaume must have dropped off straight away, because they hadn't heard Leef and Chelone come into the room and lie down on two of the other bunks.

Lileem had recovered considerably and went outside with Mima to hunt for breakfast. Leef went to prepare the horses and Chelone left the cabin to bring in more wood for the fire. Flick and Ulaume used this time to corner Tel-an-Kaa. They wanted to know about her connection with Lileem.

'I can't tell you yet,' she replied to their low-voiced questions. 'The Parsics are too close. Know only I have Lileem's best interests at heart, and yours also. Mima falls under my protection as well.'

'Mima did not hear a call like Lileem did,' Ulaume said.

'No,' said Tel-an-Kaa, 'and that is unusual, but she is still what she is.'

'That being?' Ulaume asked.

Tel-an-Kaa smiled. 'Once we are free of the Parsics, I will explain everything to you all. Once we are at sea.'

And unable to get away from you, Flick couldn't help thinking. He liked Tel-an-Kaa, and did not feel particularly uncomfortable around her, but there was something nebulous he felt unsure about and he sensed Ulaume felt the same. It was almost as if she wasn't quite real, that at any moment the illusion might shatter and reveal something entirely different. Also, Flick didn't like the way the Zigane seemed to think Lileem, and Mima too, were now her responsibility. He wondered how much of the truth they would eventually get and couldn't help wondering whether the influence of Immanion was somehow, deep down, at work here too. Flick couldn't help thinking. He liked Tel-an-Kaa, and did not feel particularly uncomfortable around her, but there was something nebulous he felt unsure about and he sensed Ulaume felt the same. It was almost as if she wasn't quite real, that at any moment the illusion might shatter and reveal something entirely different. Also, Flick didn't like the way the Zigane seemed to think Lileem, and Mima too, were now her responsibility. He wondered how much of the truth they would eventually get and couldn't help wondering whether the influence of Immanion was somehow, deep down, at work here too.

'Are you human?' Ulaume demanded unexpectedly Flick noticed Tel-an-Kaa wince a little. 'What do you see?' she asked.

'Someone who won't answer my question,' Ulaume said. 'Well?'

She hesitated, then said, 'Not exactly. I will explain. You have my word.'

Leef came back into the cabin, which curtailed any further exchanges. It was apparent to Flick that the Zigane was relieved about that.

'If we can reach the eastern boundary of the forest by nightfall, there is another cabin we can use,' Leef said. 'It isn't that far. From there, we could take the eastern road to the coast. It's about a week's ride.'

'Shouldn't we keep off well-used roads?' Flick asked.

'My guess is that if the Gelaming are looking for you, they'll begin their search to the west,' Leef said. 'They won't imagine you'll head east, especially across the ocean, because that is where Almagabra lies. They'll think you'll want to melt back into the Unneah wilderness.'

'I hope you're right,' Flick said. 'I can't help thinking that if Thiede's involved, we can't hide anywhere.'

Leef smiled mordantly. 'Look on the bright side,' he said in a sarcastic tone. 'I would.'

For the rest of the day they rode up steep hills and down into plunging valleys. The Parsic horses seemed tireless, even though they must have covered three times as much ground than if they'd been travelling across a level landscape. By sundown, the cabin Leef had spoken of had not yet materialised, and Flick was beginning to worry they'd have to spend the night outdoors, but the Parsics insisted they keep travelling and about three hours after the sun set, they rode into the tiny clearing where the cabin lay. This place appeared to have been used more regularly than the last one, and Chelone explained that hunters from tribes on the lower plains no doubt used it all the time. Thankfully, it was not occupied at the moment.

The most fortunate discovery inside the cabin was a stock of home made sheh, which must belong to the hara who used the place regularly. Leef and Chelone obviously now felt they were not in danger of capture by Gelaming, because they joked about how tonight, the harish hunters would be stripped of some of their moonshine liquor. Flick felt compelled to leave some of the currency Swift had given him in its place.

There was indeed a faint but definite celebratory air to the late evening meal. They cooked three rabbits that Mima and Lileem had caught earlier in the day and Ulaume found a barrel full of old potatoes, sprouting but still edible, in a shed behind the cabin. Flick saw to the meal, which conjured back a comforting sense of familiarity. In the cabin's main room, there was a blackened old pot-bellied stove. Leef helped Flick build a fire within it. 'This reminds me of old times,' Leef said, 'when I travelled with Swift and Cal.'

'Oh? You travelled together?'

'Yes,' Leef said bitterly. 'We were looking for Terzian, who had vanished, but instead we delivered Cal into the hands of his enemies.'

'You were a friend of Cal's then,' Flick said. 'A rare creature.'

'Cal had friends among the Varrs,' Leef said. 'I hated him for a time, because he took something special from me, but you get to know a har really well when you're on the road with him. We all became very close.'

'Who did he take from you?' Flick asked, knowing full well it wouldn't be a 'what', not if Cal had been involved.

Leef glanced at him, then fed more twigs into the fledgling fire. 'Swift,' he said.

'That's a big 'who'!'

Leef shrugged. 'I was chosen for Swift's feybraiha, it was all organised, but then... well, you know Cal, so I don't think I have to explain.'

'No,' Flick said. 'I can imagine.'

'I wasn't Swift's first, as I'd longed to be,' Leef said, 'but it wasn't really Cal's fault. He just has this effect on hara. Anyway, ultimately, it didn't matter, not until we went to the Gelaming camp of Imbrilim and the Incomparable Seel came into the picture. He played with Swift like a cat with its prey. He was vicious, in my opinion.'

'Go on,' Flick said, eager for details.

'Thiede made Seel take a special kind of aruna with Swift. He wanted them to conceive a harling, and they did. Swift was smitten from the start, and eventually it seemed Seel reciprocated his feelings. Who can tell? He is prominent in both the House of Parasiel and Immanion now. He hasn't come out of it badly at all.'

'You know I lived with him once?'

'I kind of gathered, yes. You were the cause of some pretty meaty gossip at Shadetide.'

'Well, there's one thing you should know, which may be useful when you return to Forever Forever,' Flick said, 'and that is that Seel has been in love with Cal since they were human. He was jealous of Pellaz even before Pell became har. And you say that Swift was close to Cal too? Draw your own conclusions. Seel professes to hate Cal, but he's just furious because Cal isn't interested in him. Whatever Seel says to the contrary, don't believe a word of it.'

Leef laughed. 'I'll remember that.'

Flick took a deep breath. 'I can't believe I've just been so catty, but it felt really good.'

Leef reached out and briefly clasped his arm. 'I didn't hear anything bad, I just heard the truth.'

The cabin was larger than the last one they'd stayed in, and had two bedrooms as well as a main living area. Chelone built fires in all three rooms and by the time they sat down to eat the place was quite homely and cheerful. Flick was strongly aware that he must remember this time, because it was another important moment. It was, perhaps, the lull before the storm. They did not know where Tel-an-Kaa was taking them. They had no idea whether the Gelaming would come after them or not. Tel-an-Kaa had a.s.sured them they'd find peace in the east, but Flick could not be sure of that.

To some extent, the alcohol and the warmth banished Flick's anxiety and fear. For some hours, it was possible simply to be, with no future and no past. Leef sat beside him, on the floor before the stove, and when he took Flick in his arms to share breath, Flick didn't pull away. He could feel Lileem's curious scrutiny, Mima's hot discomfort and Tel-an-Kaa's somewhat weary resignation. Across the room, Chelone was running his fingers through Ulaume's hair, and when Flick glanced at them for a moment, he was sure he saw that hair slowly lifting and falling of its own accord. Perhaps it needed the caresses to remember itself once more. Ulaume sat cross-legged, with his head thrown back, basking in the attention. It would only be a matter of time before Chelone leaned forward to kiss the column of his throat. For a moment, Flick felt sad for Mima, but wasn't this the way hara were supposed to be, giving of each other unconditionally? Whatever she was, Mima was not har. She could never be part of something like this.

Leef took Flick's hand and said, 'Shall we go to the other room?'

'It might be best,' Flick said, and Leef laughed softly.

As they pa.s.sed Chelone and Ulaume, Chelone looked up and caught Leef's eye. Leef made a discreet gesture. Flick saw Chelone glance at Mima and back to Leef. Some unspoken dialog was going on here.

In the bedroom, Leef said, 'Chelone wants to help Mima, but he's afraid. He thinks maybe we could help him together.'

'I don't think...' Flick began, but Leef didn't want to hear it. He was drunk with desire and it was infectious.

Flick thought that maybe it would all work out fine, maybe this was what was meant to be, but in the event, he need not have concerned himself about it. When Chelone and Ulaume joined them in the bedroom, they were alone.

Chapter Twenty Six.

Mima realised that the worst pain in the world was having to watch someone you wanted desire someone else. From the moment Chelone had turned up with the others at the oak tree, a maelstrom of conflicting feelings had consumed her. From that point on, her entire being had been absorbed in fantasising conversations and possible outcomes, none of which had come to pa.s.s. She couldn't bring herself to look Chelone in the eye, but had spent a lot of time gazing longingly at his lean back.

Jealousy and misery filled her up when she realised that Chelone planned to spend the night with Ulaume. It was so unfair. He'd cast her off as if she was something repellent, and maybe she was to him now, but at one time, he'd liked her. Then, the moment had come, after Leef and Flick had left the room, when Chelone just turned to her and spoke her name. She was so surprised; she must have stared at him like an idiot.

'Would you like to join us tonight?' he asked. Just that. No explanations, apology or any attempt to disguise the offer. So harish. But she could see, from the expression in his eyes, that he truly wanted her with them. Perhaps he'd needed to get drunk to face this. The situation was so enormous, Mima could barely breathe. It was as if she was out of her body, floating somewhere near the ceiling, watching a person who looked like her saying, 'Yes.' She even watched this person begin to stand up.

But then Tel-an-Kaa's right arm whipped out like a striking serpent. The Zigane grabbed hold of one of Mima's wrists and suddenly she was back in her body, surrounded by the falling dust of a shattered dream.

'No!' said the Zigane.

Chelone stared at her coldly. 'What business is this of yours?'

'I have to speak to Mima. It is personal and private. You go and have your fun, har. Leave Mima out of it.'

Chelone looked as if he was prepared to fight, and attempted to stare Tel-an-Kaa out, but it was he who dropped his gaze first.

Mima was frozen. She couldn't speak for herself, even though she wanted to. She had to watch Chelone and Ulaume go into the bedroom and close the door.

Once they'd left, she recovered her wits and pulled herself out of the Zigane's hold. 'Excuse me,' she said coldly. 'I don't need anyone to make my decisions for me.'

'Stupid creature,' murmured the Zigane. 'You clearly do. You are no longer a girl, so stop l.u.s.ting after beings you perceive as boys.'

Mima was so shocked Tel-an-Kaa had realised she was not an ordinary har that she sat down again. 'What did you say?'

'You heard. You are not Wraeththu, Mima, no matter how much you might think you want to be. Have you taken aruna with a har?'

'That's none of your concern,' Mima said.

'Answer me. It is important.'

'Yes,' Mima said, 'because I am har too.'

Tel-an-Kaa shook her head. 'You are a fool, and lucky to be alive. You have no idea what a risk you took. You and Lileem are something other than har, and now I wish to speak of it to you. This is between the three of us. You must respect that, but I think that once you know the truth, you will.'

Lileem sidled closer. 'What are we?'

'I know what we are,' Mima said. She was still wondering whether she dared to stand up and go through to the other room.

Tel-an-Kaa ignored her remark. 'I am not human,' she said, her voice so low that both Mima and Lileem had to lean close to hear her. 'I am not quite how I appear. I can make myself look like a human woman, because it is my chosen disguise. It enables me to help surviving human women who need it. It allows them to trust me.'

'What are you?' Mima demanded.

'I am Kamagrian,' she replied softly, 'as are you.'

'What's that?' Lileem asked in a rather staged whisper.

'Wraeththu believe that only males can be incepted, but this is not so. Females can be changed also, if not exactly in the same way. This is what has happened to you, Mima. The circ.u.mstance has arisen since Wraeththu learned how to procreate. Certain individuals born to hara are different as Lileem is and these individuals can incept human females. We are a species hidden within Wraeththukind. They do not know how many of us there are, and when we do appear, we are feared, because hara do not understand what we are. They are afraid that the birth of a Kamagrian among them signals that somehow inception is being reversed, that Wraeththu might come to an end. This is not the case.'

'How are we different?' Lileem asked. 'Ulaume thinks we're just freaks of nature.'

'The main difference is that the first Wraeththu devoted himself to incepting others, to creating a new species. The first Kamagrian, on the other hand, isolated herself from the world, which is perhaps one of the reasons why Wraeththu are more prevalent than Kamagrian. My personal view as to why she made this decision is that is it easier for human males to accept being Wraeththu, because they do not change that much physically. What makes them different is hidden, and the one thing that marks them indelibly as inhuman, namely procreation between hermaphrodites, can be ignored for some time.

'For a Kamagrian, from the very first moment they open their eyes after althaia, the world shatters, and I think this is why our progenitor at first chose not to pa.s.s her difference on. After inception, for a woman, gone are the things that made up her ident.i.ty. She has male organs, developed to a greater or lesser degree, but far more shocking than the discreet soume-lam. She loses her cycles of menstruation, and for many this feels as if they have been unwomanned. They lose their female shape somewhat: the b.r.e.a.s.t.s wither, the hips become narrower, fatty tissue is redistributed around the body. In the old world, a boyish shape might have been desirable for a woman, but the reality of actually having a boy's body is something else entirely. It feels as if something terrible has been imposed upon them, that they have mutated into monsters.'

'I have felt some of this,' Mima interrupted, 'but I have striven to be har. It is is what I am, I'm sure. The problem I have is with thinking of myself as 'he', which of course I'm not, but it did not feel right to me simply to shift gender in terms of how I thought of myself. I have to, in day-to-day life, because of course to do otherwise would be stupid, if not dangerous. But the problem lies in the words, just the words. Surely, we should just think up a new term between us, that is neither he nor she, then we can all live together comfortably.' what I am, I'm sure. The problem I have is with thinking of myself as 'he', which of course I'm not, but it did not feel right to me simply to shift gender in terms of how I thought of myself. I have to, in day-to-day life, because of course to do otherwise would be stupid, if not dangerous. But the problem lies in the words, just the words. Surely, we should just think up a new term between us, that is neither he nor she, then we can all live together comfortably.'

'There is some truth in your observations,' Tel-an-Kaa said, 'but the other reason why you can't think of yourself as truly har lies beyond mere terminology. It is because aruna between Kamagrian and Wraeththu is not possible.'

'It is,' Mima said.

'Really,' said Tel-an-Kaa flatly. 'Then tell me your experience of it. Did it progress as normal aruna should?'

Mima felt a defensive wall spring up within her. 'How should I know? There were... well, the har concerned knew there was something different about me, but everything worked. I could be ouana with him.'

'Of course you could, but physical aspects aside, what was your experience?'

Mima was silent for a moment. 'The world went a bit peculiar. I felt I could have been sucked out of it.'

'Exactly. The essence of Kamagrian and Wraeththu do not mix. It causes anomalies in reality. In effect, it can break reality down, to the point where you are taken from it. Forever.'

'Where do you go?' Lileem asked.

'Nowhere you can return from,' Tel-an-Kaa said. 'We don't know exactly, because no one has come back to tell us about it. Therefore, we can only look upon it as death.'

'So,' Mima said, 'you're saying that a har gave birth to the first Kamagrian, and that even though she came from Wraeththu, she is somehow set apart from it? That doesn't make sense. It doesn't sound like nature.'

'The first Kamagrian did not come from a har,' said Tel-an-Kaa. 'It had nothing to do with nature.'

'Then where where did she come from?' did she come from?'

'The same place the first Wraeththu did. We have no proof, and neither do Wraeththu, but the most enlightened among us all believe that humans created both Wraeththu and Kamagrian. They were genetic experiments. Wraeththu is a refined form of Kamagrian, which we think came first. It would make sense for someone wishing to create a hermaphrodite to use the female as a template, as all human embryos begin life as female. Who knows what genetic c.o.c.ktails were concocted?'

'But if the first Kamagrian was created in the same way as the first Wraeththu, why was one known as 'she' and the other 'he'?' Mima asked. 'It doesn't make sense.'

'We can only conjecture,' Tel-an-Kaa replied. 'For all we know it could have simply been an executive decision. As females, among humanity, gave birth, perhaps it was decided that a hermaphrodite would be better referred to as 'she'. Also, as you probably already know, the ouana-lim is not as developed as it is in hara. Kamagrian children appear virtually female; it is only after althaia or feybraiha that the male aspect tends to become active. In some Kamagrian, this hardly takes place at all. There is no normal physical condition for us, merely a place on a scale. Certain other feminine aspects remain, in rudimentary form, which hara never have.' Tel-an-Kaa shrugged. 'As I said, we know so little. Whoever created us all is either dead or has purposely abandoned their creations. Perhaps the first Wraeththu was also created from female material. We really don't know that either. All we can do is observe the results. Kamagrian are part of Wraeththu, yes, and sometimes they are born to Wraeththu, like throwbacks maybe, but until someone discovers the truth about how both species were created, we are in the dark.'

'But why were we created?' Lileem asked. 'Why would humans do that?'