The Book of Flora

by Meg Elison

  Etta smiled back, lips barely curving. “Good.” She touched Flora’s elbow briefly as she rose from the table.

  “Flora.” Alma’s voice floated over them warmly as she made her way to them. With two babies slung and seemingly endlessly nursing at her breasts, she was too wide for the aisle and a little awkward. Still, her hair hung in shining ripples and she seemed to give off the warm glow of health. “So good to have you back.”

  Behind her, Sister Joan had her hands pressed together. “Please say you’ve got good news.”

  Flora swallowed a large mouthful. “My bag is filled to bursting. The library in Demons is in really good shape.”

  Joan’s blue eyes lit up and she clapped her hands. “I’ll come and get them tonight!”

  Flora nodded, tucking back in.

  “Flora, may I speak with you after you’ve had your honeycake?” Alma’s voice was thick and self-satisfied as silk.

  As if on cue, a plate of dripping honeycake was set before her by a redheaded boy, who was gone before Flora could say thanks. It was a generously cut piece.

  “Of course. Where should I meet you?”

  “The library,” Alma said breezily. Her skirts whispered against the floor as she walked away.

  Alice looked at Flora, her unasked question clear on her face. What could Alma want with Flora that had to be discussed in private? Flora shrugged and ate her cake in a few large, rapturous bites.

  “Should we set up the fireside?” Kelda was inching closer to Alice, but Alice held her a little away.

  “Yeah, that probably won’t take long.” But as she watched Flora go, she wondered.

  There were three firesides in Ommun. The largest and best was, of course, Alma’s alone. It was a large-enough room that everyone could gather there, with a brown dais two steps up and a fireplace that a full-grown man could stand in. A few times a year, Alma would seat herself in the enormous, throne-like leather chair there and tell stories, coming around eventually to their meaning for the community. After the fall of Estiel, she had held one.

  It had been Ina who had explained this ritual to the refugees.

  “It’s their religion,” she had said, her voice forever coarsened from her ordeal in Estiel. “It’s in the Book of the Unnamed, remember? The same folks. The Mormons. These are just more of them.”

  That was generally accepted among those who knew the story of Jodi and Honus, but Ina was not done.

  “They tell old stories as a way to make sense of what’s happening now. We don’t have their stories, but we have ours. We should do the same thing.”

  Ina was the oldest person who had made it out of Nowhere. Her suggestion was taken as a directive.

  The second fireside belonged to the Leaf. They used it to tell stories and give guidelines to the men of Ommun. Alma was careful to allow no man power over the whole community or over the children, but over one another she declared it fitting and fair for them to have their own order. Tommy and Heath had found the little room and asked the Leaf if there was another.

  “There’s the one in the east wing,” a Leaf member had told them. “But like most of the east wing, it’s a mess.”

  With general enthusiasm and many hands to make light work, the fireside had come together in no time. The leather chair was cracked and peeling apart, but it had been patiently re-covered in fabric and sewn back into shape. The chimney was cleared, and preliminary tests showed the smoke would travel safely up through and out of Ommun.

  Kelda led Ina to the east fireside now, holding her hand when they were in the seldom-used and dark east hallways. The rest of the loyal Nowhere contingent followed soon after, building the fire and lighting candles, setting the room.

  “I don’t know why Alma only does this sometimes,” Kelda said as the room began to warm up with the golden firelight. “Now that we’ve got the idea, we do it all the time.”

  “We’re not like them,” Alice said absently. “We do most things differently.”

  “I’m not one of your we,” Kelda said absentmindedly. “But I’m also not one of them.”

  Alice reached out and touched Kelda’s shoulder. “You’re like me. That’s enough.”

  Ina was the first to settle into one of the old high-backed chairs near the fire. Alice saw how stiffly she moved, how carefully she settled herself. She went and sat on a low cushion at the older woman’s feet.

  “Mother Ina, would you like me to rub your hands for you?”

  Ina sighed. “No, child. But thank you.”

  Alice lowered her voice somewhat. “I can help you, if you’re in pain. Or if you have trouble sleeping.”

  “Don’t you?” Ina fixed Alice with a frank eye.

  Alice winced. “Sometimes. It helps to have someone there.”

  Ina’s eyes flicked over to Kelda and back again. “I suppose it does.”

  “Didn’t any of your Hive make it?” Ina’s Hive had been vast; Alice couldn’t recall any specific members.

  “Sure, a few. I don’t want them, though. I don’t want anything, child. Truth told, I can’t seem to really want a goddamned thing. Mostly, I want to be left alone, for quiet, and to not be cold.”

  Alice reached over and patted the top of Ina’s foot, wanting to comfort her without invading her space.

  “I understand that. It’ll be a long time before I want a man again, I think.”

  Ina looked at Kelda again. “Mmhmm.”

  Alice fell silent. People gathered and waited. The room grew warmer as they fell to talking in small groups.

  Everyone’s attention seemed to turn to Ina at once. There was no signal, no calling. It just shifted, and she knew it was time.

  She moved from her place at the fire to the big chair they had remade for her. Carefully, she settled herself down.

  “I’ve known most of you all your lives,” she began. “Some of you I remember the day you were born. I know a lot of your stories and some of you know mine.”

  She reached up as if to tap her fingers on her belly, but found it wasn’t there. Ina had worn the wooden shell to mark her as the Mother of a living child ever since Etta was born. She still felt herself incomplete without it. Her fingers moved through the empty air to her own small belly. Her face crumpled.

  “I know my belly made it here from Estiel,” she said distractedly. “But I don’t know where it got to. If anyone knows, please get it back to me.”

  She wove her fingers together and began again. “As I was saying, we know each other’s stories. But more than that, we share a history. We share the story of the Unnamed, and everyone who was with her at the beginning in Nowhere. I’ve thought a lot about the way the people of Ommun do this, the way they take old stories and apply them to their lives today. I think we can do that, too.”

  All around the room, people nodded. They were spellbound. Alice laid her head on Kelda’s shoulder. “Does this make you feel bad?” she whispered. “More like an outsider?”

  Kelda shook her head. “I am always happy to hear an elder Mother speak,” she whispered back.

  Ina held her chin high and spoke to the room. “I have been teaching the story of the Unnamed for many years now. I have shown generations of boys how to copy her story and keep it with us, so that we never forget who we are, or how we began with her.

  “When I was younger, I used to take pride in the idea that we were all her children, though she had no children of her body. It made me feel better, because back then I had none either. When I had my living child, I put that thought aside. I decided that somehow, other connections were less real than that.

  “Children, I was wrong. We’ve all seen so much that no one else has seen. We share stories that no one else knows. We are bound together as a people by what we do, not how we happen to be born, or to whom. Birth is an accident, and believe me when I say that. It nearly killed me; it is something that happened to me and my living child both. Neither of us would have chosen each other.

  “But we chose each other aft
er that. We’re choosing each other now. We’re choosing people from Jamestown and Estiel and Ommun. We have to make this choice every day, because that’s how we decide who we are. Because the choosing never ends. The work never ends. I know that now. Nothing is settled and nothing is won. The Lion won’t stay dead, because men like him always rise. We don’t stay free because of something we did once. We stay free because we fight our way free every day.

  “It’s tiring, my children, I know. I’m tired,” she said, leaning into the last word with every one of her years. “But I’ve got to do it anyway, and so do you. That’s what I learned from the Unnamed. She never stopped. She never quit watching for a baby to be born. She never quit writing in her book. And neither can we.”

  From her place in the back of the room, Etta began to applaud. Ina looked straight to her as others began to join in. It wasn’t an uplifting speech, exactly, but it was true. And that was good enough.

  CHAPTER 19

  OMMUN

  Ommun’s library was a thing of beauty. The mish had worked for years to pack it with books from far away. They had specific instructions on what to bring back so that the collection was full of highly useful nonfiction about husbandry, farming, cloth weaving, and other vital skills. They also collected fiction, but Alma had insisted that it be of the highest spiritual caliber, so many books were rejected upon arrival.

  Still, Flora thought as she looked around. They’ve done very well. I’d never run out of things to read here.

  Since reading the Books of the Unnamed, Flora had become obsessed with diaries. The mish here in Ommun were required to keep them, but many of the others did as well. The result of that custom was that after a few generations in the underground city, journals had their own section in the library; the journals of Ommun were catalogued by year and placed in alphabetical order. Alma was often seen reading the books of the prophets before her, reflecting on their experience.

  She was there now, sitting in a straight-backed chair with a book in her hand. Her babies had been passed off, to nurse with another woman or to be put down to sleep for a while. She looked up as Flora walked in.

  “Flora.” She smiled warmly.

  Flora did not often have the full force of Alma’s charm turned on her, and her knees nearly buckled at the effect. She had heard people say that the Prophet’s eyes were sometimes blue, other times green. Flora saw in the dim light of the library that they were a muddled hazel-gray, and could likely change depending on how you saw her.

  It might not be magic, but she is still beautiful.

  Alma’s entire being was lush and rosy with health, and generously proportioned along her tall frame. Even at the end of a long day, as this had been, she had an air of careless freshness about her.

  Flora looked her over, drinking her in.

  “What can I do for you, Alma?”

  Alma stood and turned her back to Flora, looking up at the shelves, then turned and faced her again. “I wanted to thank you for bringing the additions to the library from Demons. Sister Alice said you brought some on drugmaking that will be most helpful.”

  “Oh, you’re welcome. It was a good trip. I ended up—”

  “And you don’t feel too run down, I see. You came straight to dinner, instead of taking to your bed.”

  Flora noticed the interruption and slowed her speech down. She’s building to something. Give her room to run. “That’s right.”

  “You seem to be doing well. Settled. Finding a place for yourself.”

  Flora walked a few paces away and wrapped her arms across her chest. “I don’t know if I’ve found my place, exactly. But I like to be useful. And I can’t throw silk here.”

  Alma was nodding. “I wonder if you’d be open to courtship, in that case. I know it’s soon and I made everyone wait. But I thought I’d ask some of the women who definitely aren’t pregnant, just to ease some of the tension around here. It’s driving the menfolk crazy.”

  Flora looked around the room, trying to find a way out. “Alma, I’m . . . I’m surprised that you’d ask me that. You know what I am.”

  Alma came forward, reaching for Flora’s hand. She laid it lightly on her own chest, above one heavy, milk-full breast. “Your body is valuable in other ways. There is so much you can do with it, even if you cannot breed. You can become part of Ommun.”

  Eddy told me about this. This is how she does her magic, whatever it is. She lays her hands on you and changes you. She changed Eddy. How will she change me?

  But nothing happened except that Flora’s hand and then her face grew suddenly warm.

  “I don’t think you mean that,” Flora told her. “You call every other woman Sister, but not me. Would you be alright with me adopting a child, to raise as my own?”

  Alma swallowed, pushing Flora’s hand away. “I don’t think that would be good for a child. I wouldn’t want them to stumble in their understanding. But you can be useful to a man. You’re almost a woman.”

  “I am a woman,” Flora said. “And I am not yours to give. I don’t lie with men, anyhow. Not unless I have to. I’ve only ever loved women. Well, and Eddy.”

  Alma’s cheeks flushed and she looked away. “Impossible.”

  “I’m not the only one,” Flora said softly. “You can’t make me into some kind of example for those who don’t fit the way you want us to.”

  “Who else?” Alma asked at once, all gentleness gone from her voice.

  Flora shrugged. “I’m not going to tell you. And you’ll never know, not unless you pull everyone apart and force them to be with men, like the Lion would do.”

  Alma gave a little gasp. “That isn’t . . . I’m not . . .”

  “If you are brokering who should breed and at what time and with whom, you are. That is exactly what he would do. Making people into a harem can look a lot of different ways, Alma.”

  Alma swallowed, composing herself. “You’ve certainly given me a lot to think about, Flora. I thank you for being so forthright. Now I must say good night.”

  She swept from the room majestically, as she always moved. Flora did not turn to see her go.

  I cannot stay here. I wasn’t sure before, but now I am.

  But will anyone go with me?

  Flora did not sleep well. She had not since leaving Estiel, and she had noticed that many others who had escaped the harem suffered the same. She would awaken disoriented, sensing dawn but never able to see it. In the Lion’s high-rise the windows had been blocked and boarded, allowing only slits and pinpoints of light to let them know when the sun had come up, but at least there had been those hints of brightness. Shy had been like a dream between then and now. Deep under the earth, Ommun had no such luck. The electric lights were timed to turn on at full dawn, when the generator crew went to work. It wasn’t dawn down here until Alma said so.

  Flora would creep through the nightlight-illuminated metal hallways, coming upon some other refugee in the night. Often it was Etta, who would leave Kelda blissfully passed out to prowl and pace, guns worn in plain sight. Other times, it was Mother Ina haunting the nursery, holding a doll or hovering over an empty crib.

  Once or twice, Flora had tried to talk to Ina in the semidarkness. Once or twice, Ina had answered her.

  Ina had been somewhat vague since the harem. Flora had come to look on her as a source of support, of unflagging strength and nonjudgmental love. Where Eddy had blamed Flora for her cooperation, Ina sympathized. They had all been induced to perform labor in support of the Lion’s household; Flora was no different. Ina had understood.

  However, since the night of their escape, that strength had deserted Ina. She had begun to show her wounds, and seemed to be aging faster than ever. Flora had first known Ina as a vigorous older woman. Now she seemed withered, bent, and ready to die.

  She would respond to Flora’s gentle questions with vague nonanswers.

  “Trouble sleeping?”

  “Trouble living.”

  “Doing okay?”

&nb
sp; “Still here. Still here.”

  The old woman’s smile was sunken. Her hands had turned into claws. She had no Hive. She slept alone.

  This night, Flora did not find Ina, nor Eddy. She ran into Tommy and his two bather boys, Clay and Fio.

  Tommy was a slight man, long in the torso with muscles like wiry little tree branches. His hair was fair and his face was boyish. Flora could see that he shaved every day. Fio was shorter, dark skinned, with a high forehead that made him look like a giant baby. Clay was bigger, bearded, with a hooded look to his eyes. They made an unlikely trio, but walked always hand in hand, or with arms around one another’s waists. Heath was not with them tonight.

  She ran into them as they came away from the section of Ommun populated by the mish who were still at home. They stopped in their tracks when they saw her.

  “Good woman,” said Tommy deferentially. “What brings you out in the early hours like this?”

  “Same as you,” Flora said.

  “Doubt that,” said Fio, stifling a laugh.

  “You don’t know,” Tommy countered playfully. “There are enough boys back there that are awfully curious about Flora’s potential Hive.”

  The three men laughed. Flora blanched a little.

  “Oh, I didn’t mean anything by it,” Tommy said coyly. “I’m just like you.”

  Flora stared at him.

  “You know. Fancy.” He shot his hip to the side to affect a more feminine stance. “I mean, we all are. But some of us still prefer to act like men.” His smirk was incandescent in the dim light.

  “That’s not what I am,” Flora said.

  Clay gave her a hard look. “We know that, good woman. But you’re not really one of them, are you?”

  Flora shrugged. “Maybe I’m not up for the same reasons as you. I just couldn’t sleep.”

  “Who could sleep with the boys of Ommun right next door?” said Fio, pulling the other two around Flora and down the hallway. She let them pass.

  She walked past the doors from which they had come, hearing furtive whispers and the susurrations of bedclothes rubbing against one another. She walked down to Alice’s laboratory and found her lover exactly where she thought she would be.