Earthfall Page 0,44

had willingly submitted to being tied like this, so that his little ones would be unharmed. For the first time, Chveya really understood how powerless parents were. Only people without children were really free to act on their own best judgment. Once you had little ones to care for, you could always be controlled by someone else.

"Can't you loosen the cord?" Chveya said. "You don't have to twist him up like that."

"No, I don't have to," said Elemak. "But I want to.

After all, I'm evil and terrible and violent." He eyed her steadily. "The Index, Chveya, or your mother goes down on the floor beside him. It doesn't hurt him, not really, because the cloak heals him, but it won't heal her."

Chveya could feel how Mother stiffened beside her. "You won't," said Chveya.

"Won't I? Since you and Oykib and Father have already got everybody hating me, it won't make things any harder for me. And if I prove that I can treat a woman just as badly as a man, maybe I won't have to put up with any more interference from big-mouthed little bitches like you."

"Tell him," said Father. His voice sounded like defeat.

She had heard it from his own mouth. There was nothing more to accomplish by resisting. "I'll take you," said Chveya. "It's in the centrifuge. You'll have to wait until it spins down, though. You can't get it out while it's moving."

"Inside the works, then?" Elemak said. "All this bother-and I would have thought of it eventually anyway. All right, get out, all of you, I'm locking this door behind me, and I'll post a continuous watch here, so don't even imagine that you can sneak down here and untie him. You're lucky I haven't killed him already."

For a moment Chveya wondered: Why hasn't Elemak already killed him? He tried before, didn't he? It has to be the cloak. Father can't be killed, not that easily. Not while he's inside the ship, or even near it. Elemak probably can't even touch him, let alone do violence to him, not unless Father permits it. And if Elemak tried to kill him, it might not even require a voluntary response on Father's part to strike back. The cloak would probably lash out automatically. Or maybe the Oversoul controls it. But that's automatic, too, isn't it? Because the Over-soul is really just a computer.

Chveya blushed. She let Elemak herd her and the others out of the room, remembering only at the last moment to call out, "Father, I love you!"

At first Elemak insisted on getting the Index out while the centrifuge was still moving, but when he saw for himself that the Index could not possibly be removed without running a serious risk of dropping it and breaking it under the wheels, he glumly waited while the machine ran down. Then, with it stopped, he sent Obring into the opening to get it. Chveya understood why. Elemak dared not get completely down into the opening, because he then couldn't be sure that someone wouldn't slam the door shut. He could get out soon enough, through one door or another-there were openings leading from the roadway out into the rest of the ship-but not before somebody could make it to Father and untie him. He couldn't trust anyone now. So it was Obring who went down through the maintenance hole, and Obring who handed up the cloth-wrapped Index to Elemak.

"I can't believe she got it in there while the thing was moving," Obring said.

Elemak didn't respond, but Chveya was defiantly proud of the compliment. She had done well. And even though Oykib, for whatever reason, had told Elemak almost at once who had hidden the Index, she had managed to weaken Elemak's position and visit her father as the price of telling where it was.

Now Elemak lifted off the cloth and held the Index in his hands.

Nothing happened.

He turned to Issib. "How does it work?" he demanded.

"Like that," said Issib. "Just what you're doing."

"But it's not doing anything."

"Of course it's not," said Issib. "The Oversoul controls it, and he's not speaking to you."

Elemak held it out to Issib. "You do it, then. Make it do what I tell you, or Hushidh ends up with Nafai on the storeroom floor."

"I'll try, but I don't think the Oversoul will be fooled just because I'm the one holding it. It's still not going to submit to you."

"Shut up and do it," said Elemak.

Issib sank lightly