"If we disobey the masters the machines and the trees will not obey us, and there will be no more work and no small ones. For this is the order of the world: some obeying and some to be obeyed. It is visible and plain. When the chain is broken all the chain breaks."
Puna paused, and then repeated the last sentence.
"When the chain is broken all the chain breaks."
"It is true," Cadnan said excitedly. "It is true. Yet there is more truth—"
"There is," Puna said soberly. "We meet again in five days' time. I can count five days, and so the others will know, and you will know. At this next meeting you will be told more truths." His smile was thin and distant. "Now eat."
Cadnan reached numbly for a leaf and, without thinking, began to nibble. The world had been set in order: he had no more questions now. Instead, he felt empty spaces, waiting to be filled with the great knowledge of Puna and of Gornom and all the others, at the next meeting.
And at other meetings, after that....
He put that thought away: it was too much and too large. The one certain thing was that in five days' time (whenever that was) he would know more. In five days they would all meet again.
He hoped five days was not too long.
As matters turned out, of course, he need not have worried. The meeting he was waiting for never happened.