by E L Stricker
“Maybe it's the right thing,” Charlie said. Illya's eyes widened, he studied Charlie's face. The man did seem proud, if a little unsure. He reached out for his son. Carefully, Illya placed the infant in Charlie's arms.
“Ezekiel Soil-Digger,” he murmured. “Wonder what Leya will think of that.”
“It has a nice ring to it,” Conna said.
Charlie glanced up at Illya.
“We've thought you were right from the start, you know,” he said, and Illya nodded. He hesitated before continuing. “It does have a nice ring, come to think of it,” he said and gave Illya a somewhat forced smile.
Charlie went back to his hut to give Leya a chance to feed Ezekiel, who had begun to try to eat his fingers. The villagers dispersed, seeming to be mollified by Charlie's acceptance.
They were subdued. Though a few laughed and joked with each other again, it was a far different scene than it had been before he made the announcement.
Conna slapped Illya on the back.
“Nice,” he said.
Illya nodded, distracted. They didn't look happy and proud, not really at all.
***
He didn't have time to worry about it for long. Before the sun had reached its height, the entire village was rejoicing with the announcement that raspberries had been found ripened on the mountain slopes. He, along with most of the rest of the people, joined the gatherers when they went out after the midday meal. He still was not talking to his mother and avoided the side of the patch where she was picking.
Surrounded by the smell of sweet berries, they filled baskets with the tiny, soft fruit, eating nearly as many as they saved. Raspberries were a rare treat and didn't stay fresh for long. There was no doubt that there would be feasting that night.
Once again, he had made a change for the better and been rewarded by a good sign. The people hadn't liked it. He had almost lost control of the beast, he knew. But berries coming was one of the best omens they could have had. Reassured, he told himself that no matter what they all thought he had been right after all.
They took all of the ripe berries, leaving a good amount that would be ready in a few more days. Illya ate and picked, becoming steadily giddier with the sweetness of them and the beauty of the day as the afternoon went on. Soon, he forgot that he had even been afraid that morning.
Above the slopes, granite crags shot straight upward to the sky. Far below them, the river roared into a white cyclone as it raced down the gorge. It crashed from rock to rock, some of the water dissipating into mist in the heat of the air while the rest continued down in a torrent.
The rocky slopes were perfect for berries. From his vantage, Illya could see three more types besides the raspberries that were good to eat, also near to ripening. They spread across the hillside as far as he could see, in every direction he looked. Bright and dark little jewels hung below broad green leaves or clustered up in the sun. If there was a heaven, he thought, this must be it.
The bounty of deep summer would soon be replaced by the fading time. Always, the little death that was winter marched forward, faster than they could prepare for it. Even with enough food for the body to survive, they still faced the strain of the fear that wore away at the mind year after year.
After the first hard freeze, when the plants had been well and truly laid low and would not return, there was a moment when one felt relief. After the frenzy of the gathering season, there were no more preparations to make. All there was left to do was sit in your hut and know you had done all you could.
This relief would last only for a little while. As you stayed inside day after day, the snow piling up outside, inevitably it gave way to uncertainty then fear. With nothing to do but obsess, or make nervous calculations in your mind about your food stores and how long they would last, worry became your constant companion. Hunger would come more and more frequently and last longer. People thinned, and you began to hope with desperation that none would thin past the point of survival.
You hunted then, trudging through the deep snow, burning valuable energy and usually coming back with nothing. There was no other choice after all. “Try or die,” Benja liked to say.
The thought of his cousin made Illya frown. He remembered the scowl on Benja's face that morning, when he had made his announcement, and pushed the thought aside.
This year would not be like that. When the fading time started, they would harvest. That was a new word.
Harvest. When you had so much food that you had to devote an entire season to picking it all. This year, when the snows swirled deep, there would still be food. He tried to think about what that would be like, a winter with no thinning time.
He wondered what they would do with all of their time. They would make songs, or poetry, or tell stories. Maybe Ban would invent new things.
The gatherers descended from the slopes, hauling baskets heavily laden with berries. Illya followed with his basket, keeping a little distance from the rest of the people, still lost in thought. When they re-entered the village, he took the path leading back to the Enforcers' camp and his new hut.
It would be good to read them something from the book after they had feasted. It would remind them of how happy they were and why. Inside, the light was dim compared with the brightness of the afternoon sun. Illya fumbled under his pile of furs, where he had hidden the book, feeling rather than looking for it as his eyes adjusted.
He felt only the softness of the furs and reached farther, irritated. His fingers brushed against the rough dirt of the floor.
He kicked over the whole pile of furs and started picking them up, one by one, his heart racing.
He knew he had left it here, carefully stowed in its plastic box, safe from any danger.
He rubbed his fingers across his face and through his hair and growled. He sat on the floor of the hut with his heart thumping and tried to think if he could have left it anywhere else. But there was no way; he had always kept the book nearby.
Without the book, he was nothing. He knew that the people's fragile trust would crumble if it were shaken at all, especially after this morning.
He heard a soft sound on the other side of the room and jerked his head up.
Someone was in the hut with him.
In the shadowy corner behind the door, two figures crouched. The light was dim, but Illya's eyes had adjusted, and he saw one of them clutching the straight lines of the box. He lurched forward and pulled the figure into the light.
“What's going on here? You…” His mouth fell open, and he felt as if the air had been sucked out of the room.
“Benja?”
He gaped at the sight of his cousin's miserable face and the book that he was holding. His chest felt tight, and he swayed on his feet as he stared, disbelieving. Benja had taken his book. He had been about to leave with it when Illya had come in. A second figure crouched in the shadows behind Benja. Illya blinked at it, slow to register what he was seeing. It was Impiri.
He staggered backward, looking wildly from Benja to Impiri, Impiri to Benja, and to the book, undeniably clasped in Benja's hands.
Benja straightened his back and stared Illya down. A beast inside Illya’s chest had woken and was roaring, setting his head on fire and his entire body to shaking with the sound of it.
The roar built up in his chest and tore out of him. He ran at Benja, hot tears streaming down his face, and tackled him to the ground, throwing all of his pain at his oldest friend.
The tears dripped off his nose and ran into the corners of his mouth. Illya tasted salt. He sucked in air, gasping because his throat was tight. He couldn't get any more sound to come out, but he pulled back his fist and hit his cousin in the face over and over again. Benja didn't fight back; he tucked his head into his chest and brought up an arm to protect his nose and eyes, one arm still around the book.
The door swung open, and light rushed into the dim room, blocked quickly by Conna's entry. He pulled Illya off his cousin. Benja was lying on the floor, curl
ed around the book. His nose was bleeding, and bruises were already forming on his face.
“What happened?” Conna demanded. Illya couldn't speak. He wiped his face with his shirt and spat a glob of bile-tasting spit on the ground. Benja groaned.
“You have to stop this,” Benja said, gasping. He sat up and staggered to his feet, glaring at Illya, and said, “This book is turning you into someone you aren't. Locking people up, naming people's kids for them. Look at yourself! What are you doing?
“I said before that we should look at it, but not that we should do everything it says. You aren't this guy. Maybe this jerk is, but not you.” He lurched toward Conna with a wild swing of his fist. Conna stepped out of range coolly.
Impiri chuckled in the corner. “I told you this would happen,” she said.
“Shut up,” Conna snapped at her.
“You were going to steal the book?” Conna said and picked up Benja by the fabric at the front of his shirt. “Betray your own cousin?”
Illya still said nothing. He gasped, unable to find his breath. He watched a stream of blood running from Benja's nose down his chin and did not feel sorry.
Benja had been his best friend for as long as he could remember. He had been there through everything, when Illya had lost his father, when he had learned to read, through every dream and sorrow and joy of his life.
The idea that Benja could align himself with some scheme of Impiri's was incomprehensible. It felt like Benja had stabbed him with a knife. He wrenched the book from his cousin's hands.
“You don't know me at all,” he sputtered.
“Treason,” Conna said. “That's what it is to steal from the Leader. No matter who you are, family or not, it's treason. You should be thrown out of the village for this.”
Illya stared down at the cover of the book, shaking with relief that it was in his hands again. He ran his fingertips across the smooth paper, barely listening to Conna.
“But prison instead, I think,” Conna said. He tied Benja's wrists together. Benja glared but didn't struggle.
“Not banishment. We haven’t banished anyone, and we won’t start now. We will show everyone that their Leader is merciful, even for the greatest crime,” Conna said and turned to Impiri. “You too. You've been nothing but trouble since the beginning. We should have known you were planning something like this.” He pulled her to her feet and tied her wrists similarly.
She grinned at him, showing all her teeth. There were black gaps where some of them had fallen out, reminding Illya of the jagged boulders that stuck up into the sky at the top of the mountain above the berry slope.
Conna looked at Illya as if for confirmation. Illya opened his mouth soundlessly and closed it again. He was feeling so many things at once that he couldn't form a thought.
He nodded, vaguely registering the sight of Benja's face. Bruises were forming under his eyes. The blood flowing from his nose had dripped onto his shirt. Illya looked down at the book and nodded again. Almanac, it said, in scrolling letters, embellished with vines and flowers.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
IT WAS NOT yet sunset. Illya watched from his doorway as Conna pushed Benja and Impiri towards the central fire. Everyone was already there, feasting on the raspberries. Beyond the fire, towering over the huts, was the roof of the stone house, where they would join the rest of the prisoners.
He would leave it to Conna; he couldn't face it. Illya wondered for an awful moment if the prison was getting so full that they would expand into the second half of the cellar. Maybe Benja would be locked in the muddy little pump room that they had carried the pipes from together, not so long ago.
He turned to a bush outside his door and lost all of the berries he had eaten. Shaking, he wiped his mouth and leaned back against the wall, hugging the book. A tear dripped off the tip of his nose and splashed on its cover. Hastily, he brushed it off. It left a smear of moisture across the second half of the word “Almanac.”
He glanced at the fires and saw that Conna had already disappeared into the crowd with Benja and Impiri. Someone was coming up the path toward him. He wondered for a moment if Conna had sent an Enforcer back for him. But as the figure got closer, he recognized his mother.
His stomach twisted. The tears, which had been hot running down his face, flared cold in the evening breeze, suddenly feeling like ice on his cheeks.
Illya started to duck into his hut but, seeing the sun was not quite at the lower edge of the sky, changed his mind. Nothing would stop her from coming in after him, but he still had a good hour of light. At the fires, everyone was absorbed in what Conna was saying. Illya turned towards the gates and ran.
By the time he reached the river and the place where the water wheel was set up on the bank, he was sobbing. He looked back over his shoulder, but no one was following. Illya ran on, stumbling over roots and uneven ground, barely looking where he was going.
Benja.
The realization of his cousin's betrayal hit him in waves, fading as he focused on keeping his footing, only to crash over him with new intensity moments later. His heart had become a hollow cavern, empty of all but the thought of what had happened; it pulsed through him again and again, unchecked by substance. Benja had been his best friend for his entire life. How could he have done it? He remembered making faces in the mirror together in the old city and stopped, sagging against a tree, gasping.
Illya punched the tree as if he could punish it for what he had lost. His lungs burned; his entire body ached. The sun had sunk low enough to touch the horizon. His tears were spent, leaving behind a deep weariness and a pounding head. His escape had been too brief, but he knew that he should turn back, no matter what was waiting for him in the village.
He sagged against the tree, not caring for once. The Terrors, or his mother; it was hard to know which would be worse.
In his aimless run, he had come a long way. Looking around, he realized that he was in a familiar pine grove far downriver, very close to the place where he had found the seeds.
He wanted nothing more now than to crawl into the furs in his hut and let the oblivion of sleep take him. He turned back, wanting to run, but found that he had no more energy. He turned off his route, taking the short detour that would lead him to the place where he had found the seeds. If he ever needed something to cheer him up, it was now.
At the clearing, he thought that he had come to the wrong place.
Where there should have been a tall stand of nearly grown sunchokes coming into flower, there was nothing but a mat of shriveled leaves. He picked through the dead foliage on the ground and found a desiccated, heart-shaped leaf attached to a withered stem. Covering it was a thin layer of white fuzz.
His heart started racing before his mind fully comprehended it. He looked around, his eyes focusing on the knobbed-edged squirrel hole in the tree on the edge of the clearing where he had found the seeds. There was no mistake; it was the same place.
He thought of the waist-high plants back at home. His palms went clammy. Heat and cold flashed through him, and he had to sit down to keep from falling over. If these plants had a disease, wouldn't his plants, which had come from them, have it too?
Forcing his breaths to slow, Illya told himself that there was no need to panic yet. After all, it could be just this plant. Besides that, it was the roots that mattered. That was the part they would eat.
He looked around more, pushing aside a layer of pine needles and dirt. There had to be other plants here. In fact, there had to have been a plant healthy enough to produce seeds at some point. If it had been able to make seeds, perhaps it had not been affected like the others. When he pushed aside a layer of deadfall, he found more stems, just as withered as the first, spreading out all across the clearing.
Each one had the same heart-shaped leaves clinging to it, coated in white. Mostly they were immature, but after a bit, Illya found a plant that had matured enough to produce a flower before the disease had overtaken it. Slowly, and feeling as if
time was somehow moving at a different rate, he ran his thumb across the rough center. The dusty white covering flaked off and fell to the ground.
Underneath, barely matured, were seeds. Illya pinched one between his thumb and forefinger and carefully plucked it out of the flower-head, already knowing what he would find. It was a whole seed. Wedge-shaped and gray, just like the ones he had found months before.
His heart dropped into his stomach. This plant had made seeds, but it was months away from having roots that were mature enough to eat.
Illya staggered to his feet, backed out of the clearing, and then took off at a run toward the village. There had been nothing wrong with the plants that morning, but his mind swam with images of dried leaves and flaking white frost.
***
His heart was still racing when he reached the edge of the forest. At the gates he made himself stop and breathe. There was no reason to give up yet, he told himself. Maybe there would be no white spots now or ever. Their plants could be perfectly fine.
It was sunset, and he met no one as he approached the field. He wondered if his mother had seen him running away. He felt a fresh pang of regret, but it was pushed aside by fear when he saw his plants in the distance.
They looked every bit as healthy as they had been that morning when he had passed by them carrying Charlie's baby. Waist high and swaying gently in the wind, a few of them had the beginnings of flower-heads. They were probably the same size that the parent plants had been when the disease had taken them down.
He walked into the field and bent down among them. Carefully, he picked up one of the leaves and turned it over in his hand.
There were no white patches; not on the stem, the leaf, or the unopened flower. He sank to his knees, trembling. The plants were healthy. He had worried for nothing.
He closed his eyes but couldn't shake the vision of the white-frosted leaves below the squirrel nest.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR