might be improving now, that Obring might actually be included in something in this miserable company so dominated by Volemak's and Rasa's children.
"I think it's time we put an end to this whole stupid expedition, don't you?" said Vas.
Obring laughed bitterly. "That's been tried before, and then Nafai pulled his little magic tricks."
"Some of us have only been biding our time," said Vas. "But this is the last chance - the last reasonable one, anyway. Dorova is in plain sight. We don't need Elemak to guide us there. Yesterday I found a route down the mountain. It isn't easy, but we can do it."
"We?"
"You and Sevet and me."
Obring looked over at where their baby, Vasnya, lay sleeping. "Carrying a baby? In the middle of the night?"
"There's a moon and I know the way," said Vas. "And we're not bringing the baby."
"Not bringing the - "
"Don't get stupid on me, Obring - give it a little thought. Our purpose isn't to get away from the group, our purpose is to get the whole group to give up the expedition. We aren't doing this for ourselves, we're doing it for them, to save them from themselves - from the Oversoul's absurd plans. We're going to Dorova so they have to follow us. We couldn't take babies with us, because they'd slow us down and they might suffer from the journey. So we leave them behind. Then they have to bring Vasnya to me and Sevet, and they have to bring Kokor and Krassya to you. Only they take the long way round, so the babies are safe."
"That makes... a kind of sense," said Obring.
"How kind of you to say so," said Vas.
"So if Nafai comes back without meat, we leave that night?"
"Are you such a fool you believe they'll keep their agreement?" asked Vas. "No, they'll find some other excuse to go on - putting our children at risk, taking us farther and farther from our last hope of a decent life. No, Briya, my friend, we wait for nothing. We force their hand before Nafai and the Oversoul have a chance to pull another trick."
"So... when do we leave? After supper?"
"They'd notice it and follow us and stop us immediately," said Vas. "So tonight I'll volunteer for late watch and you volunteer for last watch. A while into my watch, I'll get Sevet up and then scratch the tent for you. Kokor will think you're merely getting up to take your watch and she'll go right back to sleep. There's a good moon tonight - we'll be hours on our way before anybody else wakes up."
Obring nodded. "Sounds good." Then he looked at Sevet. Her expression was as impenetrable as ever. He wanted to get past that mask, just a little, and so he said, "But won't your teats get sore, leaving the baby behind when you're nursing?"
"Hushidh produces enough milk for four babies," said Sevet. "It's what she was born for."
Her words were hardly tender, but at least she had spoken. "Count me in," said Obring.
Then he had a second thought. A doubt about Vas's motive. "But why me?"
"Because you're not one of them," he said. "You don't care about the Oversoul, you hate this life, and you're not caught up in some foolish notion of family loyalty. Who else could I get? If Sevet and I did this alone, they might decide to keep our baby and go on. We needed somebody else with us, to split another family, and who was there besides you? The only other unconnected people are Zdorab and Shedemei, who don't have a baby so they do us no good at all, and Hushidh and Luet, and they're thicker with the Oversoul than anybody else. Oh, and Dol, of course, but she's so besotted with Mebbekew, God knows why, and such a lazy coward anyway, that she wouldn't come with us and we wouldn't want her if she would. That leaves you, Obring. And believe me, I'm asking you only because you're a little less repugnant to me than Dolya."
Now that was a motive that Obring could believe. "I'm in, then," he said.
Shedemei waited until she saw Zdorab head for Volemak's tent. He would be borrowing the Index, of course - with no cooking allowed these days, he had more free time for study. So she excused herself from the group washing clothes, asking Hushidh to pick up Zdorab's and her laundry from the shrubs when it was dry. When Zdorab came through