by Elle Hill
A young woman, as tall and blond as Marcus, marched toward the front of the room. She looked, in fact, as though she were determined to hunt down their leader. Behind her, a middle-aged man, stooped with some kind of spinal injury or disease, stopped at the edge of the Great Room. He vibrated on the boundary, unsure whether to proceed forward or retreat back into the dimness of the hallway.
The woman strode forward, her long legs making short work of the distance. “Marcus!” she called, as if she needed to raise her voice to win his attention.
“Kera,” he calmly acknowledged.
How did he do it? She could scarcely remember the name of people with whom she’d had extended conversations.
“This man—” She pointed at the older man, whose face trembled between embarrassed and defiant. “—called me a sinner.”
Josh narrowed her eyes. Yes, now that she thought about it, she recognized the man. He had attended Jeet’s amateur service yesterday.
“Why did you do this, Mirin?” Marcus asked.
The man stepped hesitantly into the Great Room. Just one step. “My name is Merryl,” the man said.
Josh sat a little straighter, suddenly feeling more cheerful.
“Merryl. Sorry. Why did you call Kera a sinner?”
The entire room sat forward, enraptured by the bit of theater that had brightened their otherwise-dull afternoon.
“Well.” Merryl’s gaze skipped across the room. “Maybe . . . no, definitely . . .” He took a deep breath. “Because she is.”
“See?” Kera cried, gesturing grandly at the man standing thirty feet from her. Her strong features had wound themselves into a look of indignant triumph.
“Why do you say this, Merryl?”
Was it her, or did Marcus sound a little tired?
Merryl glanced around, and his eyes rested on Garyn and the other children who sat in a circle around Avery. “Not in front of the children,” he said mildly.
Marcus gestured him closer. A moment later, angry voices buzzed in a room gone quiet as people strove to make out some of the words.
“So what?” Kera cried. No one had to strain to hear that. “It doesn’t say anything in the Bitoran about kissing.”
Josh’s hand spasmed against Blue’s. As always, his face remained smooth, expressionless.
Merryl’s voice droned onward.
So, their group had begun accusing individuals. Approaching someone with concerns about their behavior: It was something an imrabi would do, albeit minus words like “sinner.” In the absence of imrabi or minnabi, it appeared Jeet’s group had taken the duty open themselves.
“Josh,” Marcus called.
She rose and tottered dutifully to the front of the room, helped along by sixty-some pairs of fascinated eyes. She stopped just outside the borders of their three-person huddle. Although she hadn’t heard him follow her, a faint warmth behind her reassured her of Blue’s presence. Really, she didn’t need a bodyguard, but she found his persistent presence somewhat . . . comforting.
Marcus met her eyes for an extra-long moment. If he was trying to convey some kind of message, she couldn’t decipher it.
“Josh, we seem to disagree on whether the Bitoran forbids kissing before marriage,” Marcus said quietly.
Yeah, she’d figured.
She twisted her mouth into a knot. “I have two answers. The scholar in me can’t help but answer the question. No, the Bit’ doesn’t say a thing about kissing.”
“Ha! See!” Kera cried, and punched the air for emphasis. Up close, Kera even looked about Marcus’ age.
“It doesn’t matter,” Merryl insisted, shaking his head. “We all know where kissing leads.”
Josh held up a hand. “I had another part to my answer. Number two, who cares? Even if it did forbid kissing in the Bit’, who are you to act as an imrabi?”
Merryl squinted, burying his eyes in a mass of wrinkles. “Someone who cares about the spiritual well-being of these people.” He nodded toward the silent inhabitants of the room, who gawked unashamedly.
“In the absence of an imrabi, we must be responsible, each one, for our own relationship with Elovah. I don’t see how you or Jeet or anyone is holy enough to judge us,” Josh said mildly.
“This is my community!” Merryl hissed, poking a finger at her. “If a community is only as strong as its weakest member, I will not fall out of grace because of sinners like this girl.”
“I’m not a sinner!” Kera yelled.
“We already discussed th—” Marcus began calmly.
“This should be your job,” Merryl insisted, jabbing his finger toward Josh. “You’re the closest thing we have to an imrabi. But instead you’re associating with sinners and talking about individuality like some kind of Twelve.”
“What I’m talking about,” Josh snapped, “isn’t wanton individuality. It’s putting compassion ahead of small-mindedness and understanding ahead of self-righteousness. As long as no one is hurting anyone else, why should we, average citizens, monitor and judge them?”
Merryl was shaking his head back and forth, back and forth, like some kind of pendulum on a clock. “These people look up to you.” His teeth clenched. “And you set—AAGGH!”
On “you,” Merryl had jabbed Josh with an altogether minor poke. Nonetheless, Blue had grasped his finger, twisting it painfully to the side and forcing Merryl a step backward.
“Blue, let him go,” Josh barked.
He instantly released Merryl’s finger.
“No one will ever touch Joshua in anything but friendship,” he said, his expression and tone as bland as ever. “If anyone hurts her . . .”
“Blue, please,” Josh said quickly. The last thing she needed was him threatening a roomful of tense people. She wished she could scrub her face in frustration.
Marcus, lips pursed, said, “In spite of all the theater, Josh answered the question. If the Bitoran doesn’t forbid kissing, by definition, Kera is not sinning.”
“And even if she was—” Josh began.
“It’s over, Josh,” Marcus said. “Go sit down.”
Good advice, even snicking through the air like scissors as it did. Josh hauled her tired legs back to her spot on the couch.
Blue, of course, followed her.
Lynna plunked down next to them and stared everyone in the eyes until most of them looked away. Maybe she was changing, too.
“That was amazing,” she said in a low tone.
Good thing someone appreciated her part in the Great Drama. “Thanks,” Josh murmured.
Moments later, after everyone had finally grown tired of staring at her, undoubtedly waiting for more outbursts, she turned to Blue. “I feel as though I’ve had this conversation with you a number of times,” she said calmly. “Please stop, you know, beating people up.”
“I didn’t beat anyone up,” Blue said.
“Well, stop trying to protect me. Him poking me like that, it made him look desperate and foolish. You stepping in changed the whole dynamic.”
“He shouldn’t have tried to hurt you,” Blue insisted.
It felt odd, arguing with someone who not only never raised his voice, but who wouldn’t—couldn’t meet her eyes. “I can take care of myself, Blue,” she said. “I may be an unworkable, but I’m perfectly capable.”
His brow furrowed just a bit, Blue slowly said, “I’m sorry if I made you feel bad.”
She sighed. “Not ‘bad,’ exactly. Just, you know, like you don’t think I’m competent.”
“Bad,” Blue said.
Josh shook her head with a frustrated chuckle.
“You and I are two very different people,” Blue said. She looked at him in surprise. “With two different purposes. Yours is to lead and inspire.” She opened her mouth to argue, but he continued smoothly. “Mine is to protect you.”
Josh dismissed her first several responses. Finally, carefully, she said, “Then protect me from threats of death. But not from small and harmless people like Merryl.” She
paused for a minute. “How did you know he poked me, anyway?”
Blue reached for her hand, and she let him grasp it. “Vision isn’t the only sense,” he said with his tiny smile. “It’s not even the most important one.”
Sitting next to him, breathing in his lemony scent while their combined heat pulsed between their intertwined fingers, Josh believed him.
Unfortunately, no new dramas presented themselves for the group’s viewing pleasures, which meant the Tithes slumped their way through the remainder of the afternoon and into the evening. As the evening dragged on, their sentences grew shorter, their eyes brighter, the silences more electric.
Who would be next?
Garyn clung to Lynna, who spoke in cheerful tones about games she’d played as a child. Josh had heard of none of them. RJ sat across from Lynna, her long fingers tapping out some kind of song on her thighs. On Josh’s right, Blue sat, blank and silent.
Our merry band of outcasts, Josh thought.
When the angel came, Josh huddled with Blue under the stuffy darkness of his heavy black cloak. She tasted her heartbeat in the roof of her mouth.
When the lights returned, they found Pius, the man from Barstow who had run from the Tithing festival a week ago, had been taken.
Chapter 9
Toward her shin, hold. Point the toes, hold. Toes toward the shin, hold. Right foot.
While Blue slept, as quiet and self-contained as he was while awake, Josh practiced her leg exercises. It didn’t really matter, she thought, since a healer had told her several years ago that the exercises would help her stay standing for as long as possible. Surely she needn’t bother for a mere sixty extra days of mobility. Still, the exercises had formed the pattern of her morning for nearly five years. Plus, it never hurt to limber up before jumping into the athletic events of standing and walking.
Against her, Blue twitched. She liked his little involuntary movements, the way he flung his arm over her while sleeping on his stomach. He didn’t snore or talk in his sleep, the way she’d read about in books. No, he remained silent and moved very little throughout the night, which is why she treasured these unconscious, unregulated moments.
Clench the thigh, hold. Clench the side of her leg, hold. Right . . .
“NO!” Blue pushed his torso upward, away from the thin mattress. Unfortunately, his left arm pressed into the softness of Josh’s belly, and she gasped.
Blue’s eyes had widened, his brow clenched, his teeth shone in the dim, yellow light from the ceramic lamp. His hair billowed around his head. She’d never seen him look so . . . passionate. Neither had she ever heard him raise his voice.
“Joshua?” he clipped, voice hard.
“Right here,” she said.
Against her belly, his hand clenched, unclenched, and then rubbed her skin through her clothes. He lowered himself back to the bed.
“I hurt you,” he said, still massaging her stomach.
Her belly prickled in a weird, exciting languor. Yeah, he’d hurt her a bit, but heck, if she got this out of it, he could use her abdomen as a springboard as often as he liked.
“I’m okay,” she said. “Did you have a dream?”
“I’m sorry. I never want to hurt you.”
“This bed is too tiny to worry about that,” she replied, smiling. Just keep rubbing.
Before her, his face smoothed from desperation and worry into his usual blankness.
Minutes of tummy-rubbing heaven passed.
“I, uh, I think you bumped my arm, too, when you woke up,” Josh said finally.
Blue’s hand stilled. “I’m sorry, Joshua. I can sleep on the floor—”
“I was kidding,” Josh sighed. “It was my unsubtle and obviously very unskilled way of encouraging you to touch my arm.”
After a brief moment, Blue’s mouth creaked into a full smile. He really should do that more often.
His hand moved to her far arm, which, right in line with her wicked machinations, meant he had to move closer to her. Josh: book lover, Tithe, skilled seducer.
“Do you want to talk about your dream?” she asked.
“No.”
“All right.” Blue was many things, tactful not among them. She didn’t mind. Heaven, she’d always been the one known for her forthright opinions. She loved Lynna for her kindness and charm, but Blue’s inability to lie or dissemble had its own stark beauty. “What time is it?” she asked, rolling her head in a stretch. She’d grown oddly accustomed to his bizarre, innate clock. She remembered what he said about each second abrading his skin . . .
“Around half-past seven.”
“I say we stay in here all day, rubbing stomachs and arms and such.” For a brief moment, Josh froze, reviewing her words. “Uh, I mean, you know what I mean.”
“If you’d like,” Blue said. His fingers tickled up her arm and over the cotton covering her shoulder.
She missed his hand on her bare skin. Perhaps she could lift her sleeve higher, or even pull her shirt up . . .
She sat up with a grunt, grabbing his arm in warm hands. “Bad idea,” she muttered. “Shall we go?”
Shortly thereafter, they entered the Great Room. It felt less inhabited than most mornings, although that could be due to Lynna’s absence. The room felt bigger, dimmer without her beautiful, effervescent friend.
Josh sat down with a sigh next to Avery. “Good morning.”
He smiled broadly at her. “And to you, friend. And Blue.”
“Good morning,” Blue said carefully.
“Is RJ in the kitchen?” Josh asked.
Avery shook his head, sending his ponytail slapping against his neck. “Juss is treating us to one of his culinary treasures.”
“How is the teaching going?”
Avery nodded, smiling. “Very well. I’m grateful to Marcus for sending out people to hunt for more supplies. The last group rounded up a few papers and pens. It’s far more helpful than scratching letters in flour.”
“Garyn thinks you’re the smartest being in all ten towns,” Josh said.
“I think if she had a chance to grow up, we could consider bestowing that title on her.” Avery glanced away.
It must be hard, working with children, knowing the lessons they learned would never shape their future, inform their decisions as an adult.
“We must be giving them quite a show, don’t you think?” Avery continued a moment later.
Josh was silent.
“I imagine them sitting around their desk, ensconced in comfortable chairs, nibbling fruits while waiting for the next fistfight, the next outbreak of panic.” He shook his head again.
“Who are ‘they’?” Josh finally asked.
“The town leaders, of course.”
Josh tried to imagine Eloine Crawsin d’Ijo, sitting with her plump brown legs crossed atop a desk, lipping grapes fed to her by some underling. “Why?”
“Why the leaders?”
“Well, why would anyone do . . . this?” Her finger made a circle in the air.
“My theory? They need some kind of mechanism for controlling us, so they invented this Tithe thing. What better way to get rid of the unproductive or otherwise uncomfortable townsfolk? As for this setup, it wasn’t what I expected, but I can imagine it yields a lot of information and entertainment.”
Josh took a deep, careful breath. “Sort of like an experiment?” He’d mentioned something like that before.
Avery nodded enthusiastically. “Yes! Exactly! Who knows? Perhaps each Tithing has a different theme, a different way of disposing of the Tithes, and they watch the whole time, taking notes. Fascinating idea.” He tugged at his bottom lip, seeming lost in thought. Maybe he was wishing he could sit behind a desk in one of those fruit-filled rooms.
A long moment passed. Finally, Josh couldn’t help it. “Don’t you believe in Elovah?” she asked.
“Between you and me—well, and the ever-attentive Blue, of course—plus anyone else who should be invisibly listening—not a bit, my dear,” A
very said.
“But what about the angels?” Josh all but gasped. Even Lynna believed in them—didn’t she?
“We can melt sand into glass, we run combustion engines, and we clone pretty tasty meat in vats. I don’t think a few ‘magical’ appearances in towns and here would tax their resources.” Avery chuckled, perhaps at the gullibility of the townspeople, perhaps at something else.