by Sara Kincaid
The woman was young, her brow smooth. She was clearly from the City, for the heat and sun had not blemished her skin. She did not speak but I saw her glance at me beneath her blonde lashes from time to time.
We approached a small room with a curtain hanging in the doorway. She pushed aside the hemp fabric and beckoned me inside. The walls were a reddish brick and cool to the touch. I was mesmerized by the color and understood immediately that these walls were from a time long ago. In the corner sat a bed with a small lamp that glowed with a harsh light. A few pieces of fabric were artfully draped on the walls in an attempt to give life to the bare room. Even though they had tried to give the room a feeling of domesticity, I still felt trapped and found myself longing for the open spaces of East Farm. The girl gave me a small smile before she disappeared around the corner.
I ran my fingertips over the rough brick, tracing a large crack in the mortar. I followed the crack around the room to the bed and sat down on the pallet-like mattress. It sagged beneath my weight. I remembered my weariness and lay down.
Sleep evaded me and I lay with my eyes open, tracing shapes in the bricks. I knew my body and my mind were tired, but guilt has a way of seeping its way through your pores, leaving you with an ache that builds and expands as an echo reverberates through an empty room. And that’s what I was. Empty.
For two days I lay unable to move and barely able to breathe. If tears flowed, they traced silent paths on my face, finally soaking into the thin mattress. I alternated between sleep and dazed wakefulness.
It surprised me how much Leo’s absence affected me. Somehow he must have punctured the darkness within me. Love burbled forth like blood from the invisible wound he left in my heart.
I awoke sometime later, unsure of the day but acutely aware of my solitude. I could not feel the pulse of the earth and my body throbbed as if a limb had been severed from it. I needed energy. But more than anything, I needed to feel grounded. Sorrow left me feeling off-kilter and it was my habit to use the earth to right myself. I stretched my hands over my head and tried to relieve the aches in my muscles.
New clothes lay across a small, roughly sanded stool and I traded them for my worn pants and shirt that had seen me on my journey from East Farm to the City. The new cloth was soft against my skin and I fingered the hemp fabric. The clothes fit me well and I could tell that someone had altered them quickly to fit me. They had shortened the hems so that the pants tapered just below my knees. The shirt was tunic-like and flowy with a rounded neck. They had even left a pair of ribbons for me to rewrap my feet.
Leo. He would have been pleased that I found my way back to the Undergrounds, his goal achieved. Our trip to the City had been one of triumph for him. I could see it in his step as we traveled ever closer to his home, his family and the Pop den that was a front for the Curare’s cause. But Leo would never smile again nor would he get to talk with his family and his followers, for I had killed him, selfishly draining his life away as if it were nothing and turning my back on him to orchestrate my own escape like a villain and a coward. I doubled over as I thought of him and sank down on the stool. Guilt and shame wracked through my body like lightning. I must go on for him. But how?
I looked at my reflection in a jagged mirror on the wall and my eye caught the winking gleam of the necklace about my throat. The phoenix sat unchanged, a reminder of the ability to rise once more from the ashes, no matter how deep and black they may be. I wasn’t sure how I could follow suit, but I vowed again to see Leo’s cause through to the end. Even if it meant my own death.
I wandered the hallways aimlessly, encountering no one. Red brick gave way to crumbled cement floors, damp and cold beneath my feet. I shivered involuntarily. The hideaway made me uncomfortable. I felt closed in, trapped on all sides. Each path looked the same, with flickering lamps and red brick walls that wound about in incomprehensible patterns.
Overcome with hunger, I reached out instinctively, seeking the earth or plants, anything that would bring relief. If I came across no one who could direct me, then perhaps my own abilities would lead me to the energy I required. Almost immediately I sensed a large green space and my eyes snapped open in surprise. Green spaces of that capacity were not something I expected to find in the City. I left a tendril of thought dangling before me and I followed it, clawing hungrily at the earth energy that drew me.
At the end of a curtained-off hallway, I found a door left ajar and natural light leaking through. Tentatively, I pushed the door open and stepped out into an ornate garden. Immediately colors of all kinds caught my eyes. I was overwhelmed with pinks and purples, colors I had never seen before outside of books or the Net. Flowers like these were not common, even on the farms, and I stared at them, open-mouthed and stricken with awe.
I approached a flower and reached out hesitantly to touch it. Mesmerized by its beauty, I forgot my own poisonous nature and the flower wilted immediately as I made contact. The tiny jolt of energy felt like a drop of water in a great and dry riverbed. I winced and yanked my hand away, chagrined. I stepped away from the flowers and followed the stone path to a bare grassy space. I could feel the energy calling to me. Its song was strong and my knees weakened. Somehow, this energy seemed cleaner than the farms and I tried not to think about the Curare who had sacrificed themselves to cleanse it.
I drank hungrily. The grass beneath my bare feet withered away, my body absorbing it in its entirety. When I had my fill, the grass had decayed, leaving nothing but bare dirt behind. But still I stood there, for I could feel the energy of the earth pulsing in the dirt and I drank hungrily and without shame, filling myself with the marrow of the earth.
A rustling in the leaves made me gasp and turn, my face riddled with guilt. A young girl peered at me from a small copse of bushes. She was chewing on a leaf and smiled. Her smile was big and gummy. “What are you doing?”
I stepped back onto the stones and gestured behind me. “I’m eating.”
She glanced past me at the atrocity that I left in my wake. “You eat plants?”
“Well sure. You have one in your mouth right now.” I knelt down on the ground, eye level with the little girl.
She giggled and clasped her hands over her mouth. “It’s just a mint leaf. I don’t really eat it!” she crowed. Her eyes sparkled beneath her stringy brown bangs.
I smiled in return in spite of the guilt that now plagued me. “What is this place?”
“The Inner Gardens. We healed it.”
“You healed this land?” I sat down and crossed my legs. This little girl had healed the land. Her abilities had appeared so young. And she had such control.
“Yes,” she answered. I glanced behind me again and frowned. “It’s okay!” she said quickly. “I can fix it!”
Before I could stop her, she knelt beside me and put her hands on the earth. She looked up at me. “It’s not badly hurt. Not like before.” I watched, amazed as she reached within herself and urged the grass to re-root and grow. In a matter of moments, my destruction had faded. “All fixed! I fixed the flower too!”
“The flower?”
“Didn’t you eat the purple flower?”
“Oh. That was an accident,” I stuttered.
“It’s okay! I fixed it.” Then she was reaching for me and I tried to flinch out of her grasp, but her grip was tight. “Come see!” she cried, her voice filled with pride. I could feel the energy pulsing through her small body as she dragged me back down the path. In spite of myself, I was intrigued by this young girl.
We looked at the purple flower, the color restored as if nothing had happened. The life in this room voiced a song I didn’t recognize. It resembled the beautiful hymn of East Farm, but much stronger. I dug my roots into the dirt, reaching with my mind as far as possible. Down, farther and farther I went, my consciousness bombarded by freshness, cleanliness and health. This small space had been cleaned down to the core of the
earth, or at least as far as I was able to reach. Tied to that piece of earth, I relaxed and I felt whole, even though I did not draw energy from it. I forced myself to turn back to the little girl. “And how do you feel?”
“Good!” she answered with a grin.
“It didn’t hurt you to heal it?” I looked from the girl to the flower and back again.
The little girl became confused and scrunched up her face, trying to understand. “It’s not like the CPA,” a voice answered behind us. I whipped around to see a young woman and sucked in a breath, startled by her resemblance to Leo. She had his same gray eyes, but pale skin. Her hair was long and curly, much longer than Leo’s had been.
“What do you mean?”
“The CPA does not give the Curare enough time to recuperate. The effects of their abilities would not be as severe if they would take care of the resources they have stolen from the farms.”
“Healing the land doesn’t hurt them?” But Trina. And Adem.
“It does. Just…not to the degree you hear about from those enslaved by the CPA.” The woman hugged the little girl close and her voice grew thick with emotion. “You’re Vea, right?”
“Yes.”
“You were with Leo?” Her eyes, those eyes that reminded me of Leo with their depth and their warmth searched my own and I found I could not deny the truth, even though I wanted to.
I looked away. “Yes.”
“Leo was my brother. I’m Kerria. Aster, my grandmother, told me he died.”
I regarded the petite woman with her light brown hair, swirled into impossible curls. Her pants swished around her ankles. Her face was still smooth, but I could see where lines of worry and wear would one day etch into her face and I felt guilty for adding to her troubles. “I...I’m sorry to tell you this. It was my fault.” My eyes filled with tears once more. I bowed my head, trying to reign in my emotions.
When I looked up, Leo’s sister nodded, though I could see that she was holding back her own tears. “He would have given himself up to help you.” She reached out to touch my arm but did not make contact. I tried to make sense of her hesitation, wondering if she feared I would suck her dry, too, or if she was concerned that I did not wish to be touched. We stood like that for a long moment, not touching or talking. I wondered what the correct action was and wished Leo were there to smooth things over in his carefree way.
Guilt, like grief, is a sickness you can’t fight. Even in times of war, when right and wrong are warped, guilt remains, ready with lashes that sting at every reminder. Grief fills the holes that a guilty conscience carves within the crevices of your soul; and they both were my companions that night, bearing arms and bruising my heart with every breath. I relived Leo’s death over and over while trying to keep the song of his blood alive within my soul. The thought of losing that music wracked me with sorrow. I clutched my chest tightly and buried my head under the thin sheet.
Meeting Leo’s sister and hearing an echo of that beautiful ballad raked me over the hot coals of guilt once more. In me, Kerria seemed to see salvation, perhaps someone who could provide an end to her grief, and she sought me out in my room that same evening.
She arrived tentatively, raising a small fist to the doorframe of my room to announce herself before entering through the thin fabric that served as my door. It was late and others in rooms around us slept soundly. When she entered, I was sitting in a small chair, too full of my own thoughts to rest. Kerria, who had Bram’s eyes and his meek nature, turned those unforgettable orbs to the ground in search of confidence before approaching me. I wondered how her grandmother endured the daily reminder of the love she lost in the face of her granddaughter. I also considered how, cruelly, Kerria would be a constant reminder for me of Leo. “I’m sorry…” she began.
“Please. Don’t apologize.”
On the verge of tears, she wrung her hands. Her wiry hair was matted to her narrow face. “I have to know.”
I knew what she wanted. I had killed her brother. It was her right. My breath caught in my throat. “Okay.” Shakily, I told her of our journey out of South Farm, of our time in East Farm, of Trina and, finally, of our journey to the City. When I came to the point of telling her of Leo’s death, I broke down. Though I did my best to describe how my abilities worked, I could not explain to her the devastating feeling of being unable to break the connection, of having to turn away and leave him to die alone.
For her part, Kerria listened in silence, never once interrupting. Even when I finished, she was quiet for a time, though her eyes never left me. “You loved him.” It wasn’t a question. Overwhelmed, I could only nod in reply. This fact seemed a balm to her pain and enough of an explanation that she forgave me my horrific crime. “Will you show me?” She had arrived in the garden earlier only after the little girl had erased my prints on the garden. She wanted to know more. Her question surprised me and for a moment I felt unsure, almost shy. In the end, I agreed.
Before I knew it, we had slipped out the door, the fabric covering my doorway fluttering behind us. Kerria knew her way around the stronghold. Her steps were sure and I followed obediently. Like Leo, she had grown up here, hidden away by her grandmother. Her parents had died when she was young and so she and her brother had been raised by Aster, her paternal grandmother. Bram’s child had been a son, she told me. In the few minutes it took to walk to our destination, she rambled about the cause, the life that Aster had chosen with the Undergrounds following Bram’s death in hopes of both avenging him and freeing the Curare. I knew that the threads she wove for me in that time were precious. The Devlin family did not often divulge their history.
The Inner Gardens were up on the surface and when we neared its entrance, we could hear wafts of City noises from the streets and the Pop addicts reveling in their highs. As we entered the small sanctuary, Kerria kicked off her shoes and walked on the grass, treading her feet and reveling in the feel of it. In spite of her sorrows and our conversation, she smiled through her pain. “I’ve always felt best here. It makes me happy.”
I hesitated in the doorway but proceeded when Kerria beckoned me. The lighting in the sanctuary was dim and there were no windows to the outside world. This was not a place fueled by sunlight. Instead, the resident Curare used their abilities to keep the vegetation alive. Though I had seen the pride that Liza, the young Curare, had taken in this sanctuary, I found myself wondering if the Curare created this place on their own, or if the War Council had encouraged or even mandated it.
As soon as my feet touched the grass, I also felt grounded. “It’s because of your grandfather.” Our eyes met in the soft lights and I knew she craved more. She wanted to understand who she was in this strange history. She carried the legacy of the Curare in her blood and she didn’t even know it; she couldn’t hear it. Perhaps resentment for her lost childhood mirrored my own. “You carry a song within you,” I began, unsure of how to explain something that I innately understood. Talking to another about my abilities was still uncomfortable. “I’m not sure how to explain it.”
“What sort of song?”
“The earth has a beautiful voice, a symphony that seems to synthesize all of the living things. Most people are disconnected from it. But Curare resonate with it. Each song is different, but it harmonizes with that of the earth. Leo had one, too. It was beautiful.” My voice broke then and my body shook, wracked with grief at the memory of that tune.
Moved, Kerria stepped forward, drawn to my sorrow and desiring to give me some comfort. When her feet met the tumult I had caused, she gasped and looked to the ground. I had not prepared her for the destruction. I examined the damage, the dried, shriveling grasses, the parched earth, and I was filled with shame. “This is what I do. This is how I survive. Food does not sustain me. Only the earth.” I declared. Then, with a voice that barely rose to a whisper, “This is what I did to Leo.”
Clearing the remaining space between
us, Kerria grasped my hands firmly within her own. Instantly I was connected to her, sensing her life force, hearing the strange song that sang in her blood, a ghostly reminder of her brother. A cry of agony escaped my lips, but she didn’t relinquish her grip. “Vea, death is as much a part of nature as anything else. In you, nature completed the cycle. From the earth and back to the earth again. As humans, we hate death because we cannot control it as we have learned to control all else around us. But you, you can.” I looked up, moved by her wisdom and reassured by her confidence in the words she spoke. “Nature has chosen you as her savior. You are her greatest weapon, her champion.”
That night, the guilt dried up and the shame I had felt since I was a little girl dissipated, receding somewhat into the little cracks and crevices inside me. When I awoke the next morning, I felt a cool sense of peace. I lay in the thin shadows, staring at my hands, remembering each dead lamb, each life that I stole and made part of my own. I recalled the sensation of their energy coursing through me, leaving them and giving me life. I thought, too, of my own parents who also died, though not by my hand directly, but because of me. Finally, I thought of Leo. Yet this time, no tears fell. Instead, only a feeling of determination remained.
When I decided to leave my bed and dress, I stopped in front of the small, coarse wooden table where the ribbons I used to cover my feet lay curled in a small pile. I reached out, running my fingers over those strips of fabric that had both been a part of my identity and shackles that bound me from embracing wholly who I was. I arose that morning from the ashes of my sorrow, from the coals that lit past guilt, and I was no longer afraid.
Aster,
In my despair, you have brought me light. I passed out late last night, soon after Brandi left. I think it was exhaustion from the encounter and from my latest experiments. I awoke to reporters banging on my door and yelling questions through the cracks. They ask things I don’t know how to answer, questions about the water and my abilities. They even found out my family history, that terrible secret about our East Farm origins; and now, shouts about Chem Sickness ring in my ears.