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what we came here to do. The murgu are dead, their threat is no more. Now you will take your hunters and return to your valley and your people. But I must stay here—though the reasons for this are just now becoming clear. I am Tanu—but I am also of the Yilanè, who are the murgu that grew this place. There are things here of great value, of value to the Tanu. I cannot leave without looking at them, thinking about them, considering them. I think of the death-sticks without which the murgu could never have been defeated." He stopped as Sanone raised his hand for silence.
    "I hear what you say, Kerrick, and begin to understand a little of the many thoughts that have been troubling me. My way has not been clear, but it is becoming more so. What I can understand now is that when Kadair took the form of the mastodon and shaped the world he stamped hard upon the rock and marked his track deep into the solid rock. What we need is the wisdom to follow that track. That track led you to us and you brought the mastodon to show us where we came from—and where we are destined to go. Karognis sent the murgu to destroy us, but Kadair sent the mastodon to guide us over the ice mountains to this place to wreak his vengeance upon them. And they are destroyed while this place has been burnt but not burnt. You seek wisdom here, which means you are following the mastodon's tracks just as we are. Now I can see that our valley was just a stop along the track while we waited for Kadair to stamp out his path for us. We will remain in this place and the rest of the Sasku will join us here."
    While Kerrick had difficulty in following Sanone's reasoning, the depths of the mandukto's knowledge was great and well beyond him, he welcomed the decision enthusiastically.
    "Of course—you have said what I was trying to say. There is more here in Alpèasak than one person could understand in a hundred lifetimes. Your people who make cloth from green plants, hard rock from soft mud, you will know about these things. Alpèasak will still live."
    "There is a meaning to the sounds and movements you make? Has this place been named?"
    "It is called the place of the warm, the shining—I don't exactly know how to say it in Sesek, the sands that lie along the ocean's edge."
    "Deifoben, the golden beaches. It is well named. Although it is sometimes difficult, even for myself who has been trained in mysteries and in the unraveling of mysteries, to understand that murgu can speak—and that those sounds you make are in reality a language."
    Winter in Eden - Harry Harrison
    "It was not easy to learn."
    Kerrick, his thoughts filled with the Yilanè, could not keep all of the pain from his mouth. Sanone nodded with understanding. "That was also a footprint on Kadair's path—and not the easiest part. Now speak to me of the captive murgu. Why do we not kill them?"
    "Because we do not war on them—nor do they wish us any harm. They are males, and have rarely left that building, are in reality prisoners of the females. I can talk with them and they give me a…
    companionship that is different from the ways of the hunters. But that is how I feel inside myself. What is more important is that they can aid us in knowing this city for they are more a part of it than I am."
    "Kadair's path; all creatures are upon it, even murgu. I will speak to the Sasku. No harm will come to your murgu."
    "Sanone is the wisest of the wise and he has the thanks of Kerrick."
    Sanone nodded and accepted the praise as was his due. "I will now speak so that the murgu will be safe.
    Then you will show me more of Deifoben."
    They walked until it was too dark to see the path ahead, then returned to the welcoming fire by the hanalè.
    That day the Sasku who had accompanied them had marveled at the fields of animals—were pleased to discover that only a small portion of them had been destroyed. They ate the fruit until they were sticky with juice, gazed in awe at the nenitesk and the armor-plated