She had spent the days waiting for the Zealots” expedition trying to raise a fighting force from among the Hams. But she had quickly learned that it was impossible to turn these huge, powerful, oddly gentle creatures into anything resembling soldiers — not in a short time, probably not if she kept at it for ever. She had hit at last on the notion of making the assault a hunt, the one activity where the Hams did appear to show something resembling guile.

But even now she didn’t know how many of them she could count on. She, and Joshua, had managed to enthuse a few of the younger men to join the battle. But when she approached them the next day even the most ardent would-be warriors would have forgotten all about the project.

Another problem was that the Hams” only notion of actual combat was hand-to hand: just yesterday she had seen three of the men wrestle an overgrown buck antelope to the ground with their bare hands. It was a strategy that had worked for them so far, evidently, or the cold hand of natural selection would long ago have eliminated them — even if they paid the price in severe injuries and shortened lifespans. But it wasn’t a strategy that would work well in a war, even against the disorganized and weakened rabble she hoped the Zealots would prove to be.

In the end, she realized, the Hams would fight (or not) according to their instinct and impulse, and they would fight the way they always had, come what may. She would just have to accept that, and deal with the consequences.

Joshua turned the rock over in his hands, running his scarred fingertips over the planes he had exposed, gazing intently at it. Unlike her, he wasn’t fretting about tomorrow. She sensed a stillness about his mind, as if it were a clear pool, clear right to the bottom, and in its depths all she could see was the rock. It was as if Joshua and the rock blurred together, becoming a single entity, as if his self-awareness were dimming, as if he were more aware of the microstructure of the rock even than of himself.

With her head echoing as ever with hopes and fears and schemes, Emma couldn’t begin to imagine how that might feel. But she knew she envied him. Since starting to live with the Hams she had often wished she could simply switch off the clamour in her head, the way they seemed to.

Now Joshua lifted his worn bone hammer — the only possession he cherished — and, with the precision of a surgeon, tapped the rock. A flake fell away. It was a scraper, she saw, an almost perfect oval.

He lifted his head and grinned at her, his scarred tongue protruding.

The Zealots” attacking army had drawn up in rough order outside the stockade, armed with their crossbows and knives and pikes. There looked to be fifty men and boys, and they had been followed by about as many Runner bearers, all of them limping, their arms full of bundles of weapons and provisions.

Emma watched the soldiers prepare, curious. The pikemen, in addition to their immensely long pikes, had leather armour: breastplates and backplates, what they called gorgets to protect their throats, and helmets that they called pots. They carried provisions in leather packs they called snapsacks. There was even a cavalry, of sorts; but the soldiers rode the shoulders of men, of Runners. They were marshalled by an insane-looking cleric type, in a long robe of charcoal blackened skin — and by a hominid, a vast, hulking gorilla-like creature with rapid, jerky movements and swivelling ears. Was it a Daemon? At least eight feet tall, it looked smart, purposeful; Emma hadn’t seen its like before.

Not your problem, Emma.

The army, its preparations nearly done, sang hymns and psalms. Then a man they called Constable Sprigge stood on a rock before them, and began to pray. “Lord, you know how busy I must be this day. If I forget Thee, do not Thou forget me…” Emma found the wry soldiers” prayer oddly moving.

And with that the army marched off through the forest. The Zealot fortress was as weakened as it would ever be.

She crouched by the stockade gate, her heart beating like a hammer drill, clutching the shortest, sharpest thrusting spear she could find. She surveyed her own motley army. In the end, only the big man, Abel — Joshua’s brother — and the oddly adventurous girl Mary had elected to join her and Joshua on this expedition. Three Hams counted physically for a lot more than twice as many Zealots. And she was planning nothing more than a smash-and-grab raid, a commando operation, a mission with a single goal. But still, there were only four of them — three child-people and herself, and she was certainly no soldier.

She was frightened for the Hams, already guilty for the harm they would surely suffer today — and, of course, profoundly frightened for herself, middle-aged accountant turned soldier. But this was the only way she could see to get to Malenfant. And getting to him was the only way she was ever going to get out of this dismal, bizarre place — if he really was here, if he was still alive, if she hadn’t somehow misunderstood Joshua, fooled by his damaged tongue and her own aching heart. And so she put aside her fears and doubts and guilt, for there was no choice.

She kept her Hams quiet until she was sure the ragged Zealot army was out of hearing.

Manekatopokanemahedo:

The compound was calm, quiet, orderly. Workers trundled to and fro over the bright yellow floor of Adjusted Space, pursuing their unending chores.

But not a person moved. They stood or sat or lay in a variety of poses, like statues, or corpses, arrayed beneath the huge turning Map of the world. The core activity here was internal, as each person contemplated the vast conundrum of the Red Moon.

After two million years of continuous civilization, nobody rushed.

But to Manekato, after her vivid experiences in the forest, it was like being in a mausoleum. She found a place of shade and threw herself to the ground. A Worker came over and offered her therapeutic grooming, but Manekato waved it away.

Nemoto came to her. She carried her block of paper, much scribbled-on. She sat on the floor, cross-legged, and regarded Manekato gravely. “Renemenagota of Rano represents a great danger.”

Manekato snapped her teeth angrily. “What do you know of the hearts of people? You are not even a person. You are like a Worker…”

But Nemoto showed no distress. “Person or not, I may perceive certain truths more clearly than you. I see, for instance, that you are troubled on a deep level. You are human, but you are still animal too, Manekato. And your animal side is repelled by the cold efficiency of this place you have built, and is drawn to the dark mysteries of the forest. Perhaps my lesser kind have a better understanding of the shadows of our hearts.” But there was defiance in her pronunciation of that word lesser.

Manekato felt shamed. Hadn’t she just taken out her own distress and confusion on a weaker creature — this Nemoto — just as Without-Name had punished the hominids she had captured? She propped herself up on her elbows. “What is it you want?”

“I have a hypothesis,” said the little hominid.

Manekato sighed. More of Nemoto’s theories: partial, immature, expressed badly and at the pace of a creeping glacier — and yet suffused by an earnest need to be understood, listened to, approved. She nodded, a gesture she had learned from Nemoto herself.

Nemoto began to spread pages of her paper block over the floor. The paper bore columns labelled Earth, Banded Earth, Grey Earth (Hams), and so on, though some columns were headed by nothing but query marks. And the paper was covered with a tangle of lines and arrows that linked the columns one to the other.

“I have elaborated my views,” Nemoto said. “I have come to believe that this Red Moon has played a key role in human evolution. Consider. How do new species arise, of hominids or any organism? Isolation is the key. If mutations arise in a large and freely mixing population, any new characteristic is diluted and will disappear within a few generations. But when a segment of the population becomes isolated from the rest, dilution through interbreeding is prevented. Then, when a new characteristic appears within the group — and provided it is beneficial to the survival of the group and the individuals within it — it will be reinforced. Thus the isolated group may, quite rapidly, diverge from the base population.