Earthseed

objected.
    “No, they won’t,” Ho replied. “Because if they do, their friends will pay for it. The messenger had better make that very clear. Now, who’s going to go?” He frowned. “The troublemaker. Maybe I’ll send her. It’d be easier than having to watch her.”
    Owen said, “She’ll go to Ship.”
    A hand pulled Zoheret’s head up by the hair. She glared at Ho’s face. His eyes seemed reptilian; she imagined him striking at her with his head and sinking his teeth into her throat.
    “Are you going to go to Ship?” he asked. She did not reply and he gave her hair a yank, making her wince. “You’d better consider this, then. I’m going to give you two days, that’s all—you’ll have just enough time to get to the settlement, explain what happened, and get us our supplies. Now, you could go to the corridors, but that’d take time. And Ship won’t help you. Remember what happened during Competition—I won, and Ship didn’t care how I did it. So if you go to Ship, you’ll get nothing, and your friends here will pay for it. Ship doesn’t care what happens in here—it’ll be dumping us soon enough. So don’t use your time doing anything like that.”
    “I won’t.” She had to force the words out.
    He released her. “And don’t think you can come looking for us with a search party. You won’t know where most of my group is, and your friends could get mighty hungry while you look.”
    He cut her bonds with his knife. She stood up on shaky legs, stamping her feet. Covering her with his weapon, Ho gestured at the lake. “Do you know how to row?”
    “A little.”
    “Take the smallest boat there. Go back to the settlement and get our supplies. We need vegetables, dried fruit, some fruit juice, and flour. And clothes—shirts and pants and ponchos. You’d better be generous—if I’m disappointed, you’ll be very sorry.”
    She peered at her rope-burned wrists. “We don’t have as much as we did before you burned our field.”
    He scowled. “Don’t blame me for that. Some of my friends got carried away.” He glanced at Owen. “Just get us what we need—the settlement’ll get by.”
    “Do I come back here?”
    Ho shook his head. “No. When you get the stuff, put it in the boat and row toward the island, near the other shore.” He pointed. “I’ll be waiting. And you’d better come alone. We’ll be watching, and if you aren’t alone, we’ll shoot.”
    “Give me three days.”
    “No.”
    “I need time to explain, and to get the supplies together. It might be hard to talk them into it.”
    “You want time to plan something. You can’t have it. Two days. Be persuasive.” He smiled.
    She looked toward her friends. Tonio glowered at her, as if resenting her sudden freedom. “Please feed them while I’m gone,” she begged. “There’s plenty of food in our packs—they can eat that.”
    “If you want them to eat, get back on time.”
    “You won’t hurt them.” She narrowed her eyes. “I know what you’re like. You’d better not hurt them.”
    “If you don’t want them hurt, do what you’re told.”
    He led her toward the boats. She wanted to strike him, to seize his weapon, but the odds were against her, and she could not count on her friends to join the struggle. She looked back at them. With their bowed heads and slumped shoulders, they already seemed beaten into passivity.
    “You’ll let them go after I get back. You will let them go, won’t you?”
    “I’ll have to see. We might need more supplies later on, and holding your friends is one way to get them. I might let one go. Maybe you could pick the lucky one. It could be a contest.” He pushed her. “Get in the boat. We’ll be watching until you’re out of sight.”

    As she rowed toward the river, keeping close to the shore, Zoheret considered her choices. She could still try for the corridors; Ship might not help, but maybe the people there would. She rejected that idea. She did not know them, kindly as they seemed, and she wondered what Ship might do if it found out about their conflict with Ho. It might decide that they could not be trusted to leave it, ever.
    There was another difficulty as well. Ho might be watching to see that she didn’t try for the nearest entrance, and the other entrances were too far away to reach in time. He might be expecting her to try for the corridors.
    She could ask Lillka what to do. But Lillka might feel that the settlement as a whole was more