take him? It was so hard to keep his mind on what he was doing. Several times he felt as though he had just wakened, though he knew he had not been asleep, and then he shook himself and pushed on, relentlessly heading toward the females, who increasingly arrayed themselves toward the sleeping cliffs.
I have to get behind them, closer to the sleeping cliffs than they are, he thought. I've got to get on the side where the females are.
He began to sidle northward, but he never let his attention waver from the females. And, around noon, he finally found himself where he wanted to be - between the baboons and their sleeping cliffs. The hare had finally fallen silent - but the baboons wouldn't be bothered by the fact that it had already died, since it was alive when it arrived, and besides, they weren't all that fussy, if the meat was warm. So Nafai tossed the hare toward them, aiming for the center of the group of females.
Pandemonium broke out, but things went about as Nafai had planned. Some of the juvenile males made a play for the hare, but the older males stood their ground against Nafai himself, for he seemed, at least momentarily, to be a threat. Thus the hare was back among the females, who easily brushed away the juveniles. The hare hadn't been dead after all - it squealed again as the dominant females tore into it, devouring whatever they could get their teeth into. The fact that baboons didn't bother with killing their prey before eating it had bothered Nafai when he first lived in close proximity to baboons back in the desert, but he was used to it now, and was delighted that his plan had worked and the females had got to the meat first.
As the males began to realize that they were missing out on the treat, they grew more and more agitated, and at last Nafai began to back away, closer and closer to the sleeping cliffs; when he was finally far enough away, the males charged into the group, scattering females and pummeling each other in their struggle for scraps of hare. Some of them did indeed come away with big pieces, but Nafai knew that the females had got more than their usual share of the meat. That made him feel good.
Now, though, it would be best for him to get as far from the baboons as possible. A long way away, up this valley. In fact, it wouldn't hurt if he found more prey up here, to bring back to them.
Gradually, though, as he headed farther and farther away from the baboons, he realized that his reluctance was getting easier and easier to fight off. Daringly, he let himself remember his real purpose in coming here. At once his reluctance to proceed returned - it became almost a panic inside him - but he did not lose control of himself. As he had hoped, the barrier was strongest at the borderline. He could overcome this level of interference - it was more like what he had felt back in Basilica, when he and Issib were first trying to push past the Oversoul's barriers and think about forbidden things.
Or maybe I'm feeling easier about it because the barrier has already pushed me away toward the border - maybe without realizing it I've been defeated.
"Am I outside or inside?" he whispered to the Oversoul.
No answer came at all.
He felt a thrill of fear. The Oversoul couldn't see this area itself - what if, when he crossed the border, he simply disappeared from the Oversoul's sight?
Then it occurred to him that this could be precisely why the force of the resistance might be weaker now. Maybe, without the Oversoul realizing it, this barrier had combined its own strength with the Oversoul's power - at the border. But in here, where the Oversoul itself could not penetrate, the barrier had only its own aversive power to draw on, and that's why it was defeatable.
It made sense to Nafai, and so he continued to head eastward, toward the center of Vusadka.
Or had he been heading north? For suddenly, as he crested a hill, he saw a completely barren landscape before him. Not fifty yards away, it was as if someone had built an invisible wall. On one side was the verdance of the land of Dostatok, and on the other side was stark desert - the driest, most lifeless desert Nafai