Wild Seed

by Octavia E. Butler

  “Why did your wife leave?” she asked.

  “Why do you think! I couldn’t keep out of her thoughts any more than I can keep out of yours. I tried not to let her know, but sometimes things came to me so clearly… I’d answer, thinking she had spoken aloud and she hadn’t and she didn’t understand and …”

  “And she was afraid.”

  “God, yes. After a while, she was terrified. She went home to her parents and wouldn’t even see me when I went after her. I guess I don’t blame her. After that there were only … women like you that Doro brings me.”

  “We’re not such bad women. I’m not.”

  “You can’t wait to get away from me!”

  “What would you feel for a woman who was covered with filth and sores?”

  He blinked, looked at himself. “And I guess you’re used to better!”

  “Of course I am! Let me help you and you will be better. You could not have been this way for your wife.”

  “You’re not her!”

  “No. She could not help you. I can.”

  “I didn’t ask for your—”

  “Listen! She ran away from you because you are Doro’s. You are a witch and she was afraid and disgusted. I am not afraid or disgusted.”

  “You’d have no right to be,” he muttered sullenly. “You’re more witch than I’ll ever be. I still don’t believe what I saw you do.”

  “If my thoughts are reaching you even some of the time, you should believe what I do and what I say. I have not been telling you lies. I am a healer. I have lived for over three hundred and fifty years. I have seen leprosy and huge growths that bring agony and babies born with great holes where their faces should be and other things. You are far from being the worst thing I have seen.”

  He stared at her, frowned intently as though reaching for a thought that eluded him. It occurred to her that he was trying to hear her thoughts. Finally, though, he seemed to give up. He shrugged and sighed. “Could you help any of those others?”

  “Sometimes I could help. Sometimes I can dissolve away dangerous growths or open blind eyes or heal sores that will not heal themselves …”

  “You can’t take away the voices or the visions, can you?”

  “The thoughts you hear from other people?”

  “Yes, and what I ‘see.’ Sometimes I can’t tell reality from vision.”

  She shook her head sadly. “I wish I could. I have seen others tormented as you are. I’m better than what your people call a doctor. Much better. But I am not as good as I long to be. I think I am flawed like you.”

  “All Doro’s children are flawed—godlings with feet of clay.”

  Anyanwu understood the reference. She had read the sacred book of her new land, the Bible, in the hope of improving her understanding of the people around her. In Wheatley, Isaac told people she was becoming a Christian. Some of them did not realize he was joking.

  “I was not born to Doro,” she told Thomas. “I am what he calls wild seed. But it makes no difference. I am flawed anyway.”

  He glanced at her, then down at the floor. “Well I’m not as flawed as you think.” He spoke very softly. “I’m not impotent.”

  “Good. If you were and Doro found out … he might decide you could not be useful to him any longer.”

  It was as though she had said something startling. He jumped, peered at her in a way that made her draw back in alarm, then demanded: “What’s the matter with you! How can you care what happens to me? How can you let Doro breed you like a goddamn cow—and to me! You’re not like the others.”

  “You said I was a dog. A black bitch.”

  Even through the dirt, she could see him redden. “I’m sorry,” he said after several seconds.

  “Good. I almost hit you when you said it—and I am very strong.”

  “I don’t doubt it.”

  “I care what Doro does to me. He knows I care. I tell him.”

  “People don’t, normally.”

  “Yes. That’s why I’m here. Things are not right to me merely because he says they are. He is not my god. He brought me to you as punishment for my sacrilege.” She smiled. “But he does not understand that I would rather lie with you than with him.”

  Thomas said nothing for so long that she reached out and touched his hand, concerned.

  He looked at her, smiled without showing his bad teeth. She had not seen him smile before. “Be careful,” he said. “Doro should never find out how thoroughly you hate him.”

  “He has known for years.”

  “And you’re still alive? You must be very valuable.”

  “I must be,” she agreed bitterly.

  He sighed. “I should hate him myself. I don’t somehow. I can’t. But … I think I’m glad you do. I never met anyone who did before.” He hesitated again, raised his night-black eyes to hers. “Just be careful.”

  She nodded, thinking that he reminded her of Isaac. Isaac too was always cautioning her. Then Thomas got up and went to the door.

  “Where are you going?” she asked.

  “To the stream out back to wash.” The smile again, tentatively. “Do you really think you can take care of these sores? I’ve had some of them for a long time.”

  “I can heal them. They will come back, though, if you don’t stay clean and stop drinking so much. Eat food!”

  “I don’t know whether you’re here to conceive a child or turn me into one,” he muttered, and closed the door behind him.

  Anyanwu went out and fashioned a crude broom of twigs. She swept the mounds of litter out of the cabin, then washed what could be washed. She did not know what to do about the vermin. The fleas alone were terrible. Left to herself, she would have burned the cabin and built another. But Thomas would not be likely to go along with that.

  She cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and the terrible little cabin still did not suit her. There were no clean blankets, there was no clean clothing for Thomas. Eventually, he came in wearing the same filthy rags over skin scrubbed pale and nearly raw. He seemed acutely embarrassed when Anyanwu began stripping the rags from him.

  “Don’t be foolish,” she told him. “When I start on those sores, you won’t have time for shame—or for any other thing.”

  He became erect. Scrawny and sick as his body was, he was, as he had said, not impotent.

  “All right,” murmured Anyanwu with gentle amusement. “Have your pleasure now and your pain later.”

  His clumsy fingers had begun fumbling with her clothing, but they stopped suddenly. “No!” he said as though the pain had to come first after all. “No.” He turned his back to her.

  “But … why?” Anyanwu laid a hand on his shoulder. “You want to, and it’s all right. Why else am I here?”

  He spoke through his teeth as though every word was hurting him. “Are you still so eager to get away from me? Can’t you stay a little while?”

  “Ah.” She rubbed the shoulder, feeling the bones sharply through their thin covering of flesh. “The women take your seed and leave you as quickly as possible.”

  He said nothing.

  She stepped closer to him. He was smaller than Isaac, smaller than most of the male bodies Doro brought her. It was strange to be able to meet a man’s eyes without looking up. “It will be that way for me too,” she said. “I have a husband. I have children. And also … Doro knows how quickly I can conceive. I am always deliberately quick with him. I must take your seed and leave you. But I will not leave you today.”

  He stared at her for a moment, the black eyes intent as though again he was trying to control his ability, hear her thoughts now when he wanted to hear them. She found herself hoping her child—his child—would have those eyes. They were the only things about him that had never needed cleaning or healing to show their beauty. That was surprising considering how much he drank.

  He seized her suddenly, as though it had just occurred to him that he could, and held her tightly for long moments before leading her to his splintery shelf
bed.

  Doro came in hours later, bringing flour, sugar, coffee, corn meal, salt, eggs, butter, dry peas, fresh fruit and vegetables, blankets, cloth that could be sewn into clothing, and, incidentally, a new body. He had bought or stolen someone’s small crudely made wagon to carry his things.

  “Thank you,” Anyanwu told him gravely, wanting him to see that her gratitude was real. It was rare these days for him to do what she asked. She wondered why he had bothered this time. Certainly he had not planned to the day before.

  Then she saw him looking at Thomas. The bath had made the most visible difference in Thomas’ appearance, and Anyanwu had shaved him, cut off much of his hair, and combed the rest. But there were other more subtle changes. Thomas was smiling, was helping to carry the supplies into the cabin instead of standing aside apathetically, instead of muttering at Anyanwu when she passed him, her arms full.

  “Now,” he said, happily oblivious to Doro’s eyes on him. “Now we’ll see how well you can cook, Sun Woman.”

  That stupid name, she thought desperately. Why had he called her that? He must have read it in her thoughts. She had not told him it was Doro’s name for her.

  Doro smiled. “I never thought you could do this so well,” he said to her. “I would have brought you my sick ones before.”

  “I am a healer,” she said. His smile terrified her for Thomas’ sake. It was a smile full of teeth and utterly without humor. “I have conceived,” she said, though she had not meant to tell him that for days—perhaps weeks. Suddenly, though, she wanted him away from Thomas. She knew Doro. Over the years, she had come to know him very well. He had given her to a man he hoped would repel her, make her know how well off she had been. Instead, she had immediately begun helping the man, healing him so that eventually he would not repel anyone. Clearly, she had not been punished.

  “Already,” Doro said in mock surprise. “Shall we leave then?”

  “Yes.”

  He glanced toward the cabin where Thomas was.

  Anyanwu came around the wagon and caught Doro’s arms. He was wearing the body of a round-faced very young-looking white man. “Why did you bring the supplies?” she demanded.

  “You wanted them,” he said reasonably.

  “For him. So he could heal.”

  “And now you want to leave him before that healing is finished.”

  Thomas came out of the cabin and saw them standing together. “Is something wrong?” he asked. Anyanwu realized later that it was probably her expression or her thoughts that alerted him. If only he could have read Doro’s thoughts.

  “Anyanwu wants to go home,” said Doro blandly.

  Thomas stared at her with disbelief and pain. “Anyanwu … ?”

  She did not know what to do—what would make Doro feel that he had extracted enough pain, punished her enough. What would stop him now that he had decided to kill?

  She looked at Doro. “I will leave with you today,” she whispered. “Please, I will leave with you now.”

  “Not quite yet,” Doro said.

  She shook her head, pleaded desperately: “Doro, what do you want of me? Tell me and I will give it.”

  Thomas had come closer to them, looking at Anyanwu, his expression caught between anger and pain. Anyanwu wanted to shout at him to stay away.

  “I want you to remember,” Doro said to her. “You’ve come to think I couldn’t touch you. That kind of thinking is foolish and dangerous.”

  She was in the midst of a healing. She had endured abuse from Thomas. She had endured part of a night beside his filthy body. Finally, she had been able to reach him and begin to heal. It was not only the sores on his body she was reaching for. Never had Doro taken a patient from her in the midst of healing, never! Somehow, she had not thought he would do such a thing. It was as though he had threatened one of her children. And, of course, he was threatening her children. He was threatening everything dear to her. He was not finished with her, apparently, and thus would not kill her. But since she had made it clear that she did not love him, that she obeyed him only because he had power, he felt some need to remind her of that power. If he could not do it by giving her to an evil man because that man obstinately ceased to be evil, then he would take that man from her now while her interest in him was strongest. And also, perhaps Doro had realized the thing she had told Thomas—that she would rather share Thomas’ bed than Doro’s. For a man accustomed to adoration, that realization must have been a heavy blow. But what could she do?

  “Doro,” she pleaded, “it’s enough. I understand. I have been wrong. I will remember and behave better toward you.”

  She was clinging to both his arms now, and lowering her head before the smooth young face. Inside, she screamed with rage and fear and loathing. Outside, her face was as smooth as his.

  But out of stubbornness or hunger or a desire to hurt her, he would not stop. He turned toward Thomas. And by now, Thomas understood.

  Thomas backed away, his disbelief again clear in his expression. “Why?” he said. “What have I done?”

  “Nothing!” shouted Anyanwu suddenly, and her hands on Doro’s arms locked suddenly in a grip Doro would not break in any normal way. “You’ve done nothing, Thomas, but serve him all your life. Now he thinks nothing of throwing away your life in the hope of hurting me. Run!”

  For an instant, Thomas stood frozen.

  “Run!” screamed Anyanwu. Doro had actually begun struggling against her—no doubt a reflex of anger. He knew he could not break her grip or overcome her by physical strength alone. And he would not use his other weapon. He was not finished with her yet. There was a potentially valuable child in her womb.

  Thomas ran off toward the woods.

  “I’ll kill her,” shouted Doro. “Your life or hers.”

  Thomas stopped, looked back.

  “He’s lying,” Anyanwu said almost gleefully. Man or devil, he could not get a lie past her. Not any longer. “Run, Thomas. He is telling lies!”

  Doro tried to hit her, but she tripped him, and as he fell, she changed her grip on his arms so that he would not move again except in pain. Very much pain.

  “I would have submitted,” she hissed into his ear. “I would have done anything!”

  “Let me go,” he said, “or you won’t live, even to submit. It’s truth now, Anyanwu. Get up.”

  There was death frighteningly close to the surface in his voice. This was the way he sounded when he truly meant to kill—his voice went flat and strange and Anyanwu felt that the thing he was, the spirit, the feral hungry demon, the twisted ogbanje was ready to leap out of his young man’s body and into hers. She had pushed him too far.

  Then Thomas was there. “Let him go, Anyanwu,” he said. She jerked her head up to stare at him. She had risked everything to give him a chance to escape—at least a chance—and he had come back.

  He tried to pull her off Doro. “Let him go, I said. He’d go through you and take me two seconds later. There’s nobody else out here to confuse him.”

  Anyanwu looked around and realized that he was right. When Doro transferred, he took the person nearest to him. That was why he sometimes touched people. In a crowd, the contact assured his taking the one person he had chosen. If he decided to transfer, though, and the person nearest to him was a hundred miles away, he would take that person. Distance meant nothing. If he was willing to go through Anyanwu, he could reach Thomas.

  “I’ve got nothing,” Thomas was saying. “This cabin is my future—staying here, getting older, drunker, crazier. I’m nothing to die for, Sun Woman, even if your dying could save me.”

  With far less strength than Doro had in his current body, he pulled her to her feet, freeing Doro. Then he pushed her behind him so that he stood nearest to Doro.

  Doro stood up slowly, watching them as though daring them to run—or encouraging them to panic and run hopelessly. Nothing human looked out of his eyes.

  Seeing him, Anyanwu thought she would die anyway. Both she and Thomas woul
d die.

  “I was loyal,” Thomas said to him as though to a reasonable man.

  Doro’s eyes focused on him.

  “I gave you loyalty,” Thomas repeated. “I never disobeyed.” He shook his head slowly from side to side. “I loved you—even though I knew this day might come.” He held out a remarkably steady right hand. “Let her go home to her husband and children,” he said.

  Without a word, Doro grasped the hand. At his touch, the smooth young body he had worn collapsed and Thomas’ body, thin and full of sores, stood a little straighter. Anyanwu stared at him wide-eyed, terrified in spite of herself. In an instant, the eyes of a friend had become demon’s eyes. Would she be killed now? Doro had promised nothing. Had not even given his worshiper a word of kindness.

  “Bury that,” Doro said to her from Thomas’ mouth. He gestured toward his own former body.

  She began to cry. Shame and relief made her turn away from him. He was going to let her live. Thomas had bought her life.

  Thomas’ hand caught her by the shoulder and shoved her toward the body. She hated her tears. Why was she so weak? Thomas had been strong. He had lived no more than thirty-five years, yet he had found the strength to face Doro and save her. She had lived many times thirty-five years and she wept and cowered. This was what Doro had made of her—and he could not understand why she hated him.

  He came to stand over her and somehow she kept herself from cringing away. He seemed taller in Thomas’ body than Thomas had.

  “I have nothing to dig with,” she whispered. She had not intended to whisper.

  “Use your hands!” he said.

  She found a shovel in the cabin, and an adz that she could swing to break up the earth—probably the same tool Thomas had used to dress the timbers of his cabin. As she dug the grave, Doro stood watching her. He never moved to help, never spoke, never looked away. By the time she had finished a suitable hole—rough and oblong rather than rectangular, but large and deep enough—she was trembling. The gravedigging had tired her more than it should have. It was hard work and she had done it too quickly. A man half again her size would not have finished so soon—or perhaps he would have, with Doro watching over him.