Below the Root

by Zilpha Keatley Snyder

  As he spoke, Neric leaned forward, lowering his voice to a whisper. “It was soon after my own Ceremony of Elevation. I happened to be hiding behind a fall of tapestry in a small assembly room in the far-heights of the grove—a strangely isolated chamber far above the commonly used halls and chambers. Why I was there is unimportant. I was exploring out of curiosity, when I heard voices, and not having permission to be in the chamber, I quickly stepped behind the tapestry. It was not long before I realized that to reveal myself would bring much more serious consequences than I had at first imagined.

  “A number of people entered the room. From my hiding place I could see nothing and hear only a part of what was said. But I heard enough to determine that I was present at a meeting of a secret group of perhaps twelve or fourteen Ol-zhaan who were known to each other as the Geets-kel. The tapestry behind which I stood was very heavy, and the voices were kept cautiously low, but I heard them speak of a place called the Forgotten where something of great importance was kept hidden. I could not identify many of the voices, but there were two that I was certain of, and one or two more that I thought I recognized. It was undoubtedly the novice-master D’ol Regle who spoke loudly and at great length concerning the need to recruit two or three new members into their society—into the Geets-kel—and there was some argument about the qualifications of those who were being considered.

  “They spoke also of those being considered as possible Chosen. It was then that I first heard your name mentioned—and your unusual talents in the skills of the Spirit. The voice of the ancient D’ol Falla was unmistakable—like the sound of dry rooffronds in a high wind—and it was she who spoke in your favor. There were protests—arguments—but she returned again and again to your name, and to the withering of the Root. But later when she spoke for you in a general assembly of all the Ol-zhaan, she did not mention the Root. She spoke only of the need to restore the Spirit-skills. But it seemed to be the Root, more than anything else, that concerned these Geets-kel—that, and the Pash-shan.”

  The Pash-shan. Only to hear the name spoken caused Raamo to shudder, as if someone had plucked his spine like a bowstring. “What did they say concerning the Pash-shan?” he asked.

  “Enough to convince me that something is known about them that has been kept from all except these few—the ones that call themselves the Geets-kel. Something of great importance. Something that might bring an end to life on Green-sky—at least as we know it. There was one whose voice I did not recognize who kept repeating, ‘the end of life as we know it.’ ”

  “But why?” Raamo could not keep the words from sounding like a moan. “Why would they hide such knowledge from the Kindar and even the other Ol-zhaan? Surely if the Pash-shan are escaping, it would be best if everyone were warned of it. Even if there was little that could be done.”

  “It would seem so,” Neric agreed. “There appears to be no reasonable explanation. I have considered every possibility. It is possible, I suppose, that the Geets-kel know that the Pash-shan are, indeed, escaping, and that we are all, Ol-zhaan and Kindar alike, doomed. And since there is no remedy, they might feel it is best not to let us know. To allow us to remain carefree and happy as long as possible. However, I, myself, would not agree with such thinking. I would want to know the truth, no matter how terrible.”

  “And I, too,” Raamo agreed.

  “It has also occurred to me that the Geets-kel might be in league with the Pash-shan, or in some way under their control.”

  “Under their control? How could that be? The Pash-shan are beasts, monsters. How could they control the actions of Ol-zhaan?”

  “They are beasts, perhaps,” Neric said. “But their minds are not the minds of simple animals. We are taught that they are probably capable of Spirit-force greater, in some ways, than our own, though used only in the service of evil. Perhaps they have developed a skill similar to the ancient one of mesmerism, and by its use have made the Geets-kel into accomplices in their evil purposes. But then, again, I have thought—”

  “No,” Raamo said suddenly. “I can’t—I wish to hear no more.” He covered his face with his hands and leaned forward, his body bowed as if in pain.

  For several seconds there was silence, and then Neric spoke again. “Forgive me, Raamo,” he said. “I should have realized that it would be unwise to tell you so much so soon—and on this day when you were already exhausted. But I had waited so long for someone who might help penetrate the secret further. I was afraid to speak to you too soon, for fear that, knowing the truth, you would simply refuse to become an Ol-zhaan, and would therefore be of no use to me. And then, when I felt it was almost time. I was suddenly sent away to Grundbaum, and only allowed to return a few days ago. But I see now I should have waited a few days longer. I should have waited—even if the time left to us may not be long.”

  “The time left to us?” Raamo’s voice shook with exhaustion and despair. “The time left to do what? What is it that you expect of me? What can I do?”

  “Ah,” Neric moved closer to Raamo. “That is what we must discover first. By making use of your ability to pense and—”

  “But I have already discovered that the Ol-zhaan mind-block very carefully,” Raamo said. “And I can not pense those who are mind-blocking.”

  “But surely if you watch and listen constantly there will be moments when someone is careless,” Neric said. “And in the meantime it might be best if you pretended that your skill is less than it is. Or that you suddenly find it to be failing. If they believed that, they might be less careful in your presence.”

  Neric stood suddenly and pulled Raamo to his feet. “But come,” he said. “We will speak again soon. But for now we must get you to your nid as soon as possible. You look like one far gone of the—” He broke off suddenly. “Did you say you have a sister who is ill of the wasting?”

  But when Raamo tried to answer he found that his voice would not obey him. He stared at Neric helplessly, his lips trembling.

  “In mind-speech then,” Neric said, holding out his hands.

  With the aid of palm-touch, Raamo found that he and Neric were able to pense each other with amazing speed and clarity. Like two infants who had attained the highest level in the game of Five-Pense, they sent and received quickly and easily, in distinct words and syllables. And in mind-speech Raamo explained to Neric about Pomma—how it was possible that she was wasting, and how she had twice received some comfort from healing ceremonies that Neric had conducted.

  “I will do what I can for her,” Neric said, “and I wish that I could promise more than that. I cannot say how much I wish it. When my field of service was assigned during my novitiate, it was decided that I should serve as a healer. Not because I had shown any particular force for healing, but only because it was necessary to choose someone and none among the younger Ol-zhaan seemed any better qualified. I did not want the assignment, for I felt I was deceiving the Kindar who came to the ceremonies believing that I was skilled in healing. But then I saw that I could be, at least, of some comfort, and at times when there was strong belief on the part of the ailing, there was, perhaps, some small degree of real healing. I tell you this because I would not deceive you when I tell you that I will seek your sister out and do what I can for her.”

  Raamo answered, “I thank you, Neric, and I will think carefully concerning all that you have told me tonight and—”

  “And we will speak again very soon,” Neric finished, and he led Raamo out of the great hall and, by a secret route that made use of steep narrow branchpaths and ladders of Wissenvine, to the roof of the hall of novices. From there Raamo was able to drop silently to his own balcony and slip unseen into his nid-chamber.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  VERY EARLY IN THEIR novitiates, Raamo and Genaa agreed that the novice D’ol Salaat was a true paraso, given to vanity and self-importance. But they also agreed that on one matter he had spoken with great truth and accuracy. When he had warned them that they should enjoy their year of honor
because the days of a novice were full of work and study, he had, for once, spoken with good reason. This fact became apparent almost immediately.

  It was, in fact, the first morning after the Elevation that Raamo, emerging sleepily from his nid-chamber, entered the common room to find the large-chinned D’ol Birta waiting to begin his instruction. This first class, which D’ol Birta explained was of the greatest importance to the new novice, was called Form and Custom, and it concerned matters of great urgency.

  Yawning and heavy-eyed, Raamo and Genaa sat before D’ol Birta each morning thereafter, either in the common room of the novice hall or in D’ol Birta’s private chambers high in the temple grove, learning long lists of rules and regulations. The rules concerned such things as the proper manner of address and forms of contact permitted between Ol-zhaan and Kindar, as well as between Ol-zhaan and Ol-zhaan. Some of the knowledge imparted by D’ol Birta, such as the fact that relationships of Love and close communion were permitted between Ol-zhaan, but that bonding and parenthood were prohibited, was of sufficient interest to catch the attention of even the scarcely awakened. However, it seemed a poor time of day to require the memorization of long lists and charts concerning the ranks and titles of each Ol-zhaan and the authority vested in each position.

  There were times, during the early days of his novitiate, when it seemed to Raamo that the life of a novice was very like that of a Kindar child during his years at the Garden. Many of the novice classes were quite similar to those taught in the Garden, at least in method and approach. As a Garden child learned the Forest Chant, by imitation and repetition, Raamo and Genaa learned how to conduct an endless number of ceremonies and celebrations—how to administer to the ailing, how to take part in a Vine procession, and how to conduct a public celebration of Peace or Joy. It was necessary, they were told, for all Ol-zhaan to be well versed in many rituals, even though they would eventually be assigned to the one area of service for which they seemed best suited. Thus it became necessary to again spend long hours in memorization, which Raamo found as difficult now as he had during his years at the Garden.

  Not long after the beginning of their novitiates, Raamo and Genaa began to attend a class taught by the novice-master, D’ol Regle, which was, at times, quite different from anything they had encountered before. In spite of Raamo’s problem with memorization, there were times when the words of D’ol Regle, emerging slowly from the deep recesses of his trunklike chest, implanted themselves in Raamo’s mind as firmly as Wissenroot on the forest floor. And this great, if temporary, improvement in his memory was all the more strange in that it occurred in spite of, rather than because of, his firm intention.

  “Within these walls,” D’ol Regle announced on the first day of this class, “you will hear and understand and then think no more of what you have heard, holding it only in the dim depths of your memory.”

  And thus admonished, Raamo, who had forgotten many things with great ease, found it impossible to erase from his memory one syllable of the puzzling and disturbing words of the novice-master.

  “It is the duty and the responsibility of every Ol-zhaan, to hear and understand the tragic story of the origins of our civilization, that they may more fully dedicate themselves to the holy purpose that underlies every institution in our social structure.

  “Learn then, D’ol Genaa and D’ol Raamo, that the first settlement of Green-sky, the mythical flight revered in song and story, was indeed a flight. A desperate flight from a far distant planet, which had been totally destroyed by the terrible curse of war.”

  As Raamo and Genaa exchanged puzzled glances, D’ol Regle wrote the letters of the mysterious syllable on a grundleaf tablet and fastened it to the wall behind him. W A R—the letters were large and clearly printed but were without meaning to the novices until the master began to explain their terrible significance.

  During the days that followed, many other words were posted on the wall behind D’ol Regle’s chair. Words that were, at first, only meaningless sounds. Words like anger—hatred—murder—execute—punishment—violence. The explanation of these words was not only frightening to the young novices but also acutely embarrassing. Reared as they had been in a society where any show of unharmonious behavior was treated as a disgusting obscenity—where a squabble of two-year-olds over a toy was considered a disgraceful indication of defective training—and where in describing human emotions the strongest negative adjectives were words like “troubled” or “unjoyful”—in such a society, the frank definition of the meaning of a word like violence was enough to cause lowered eyes and painfully flushed cheeks.

  Along with the strange new words—not new actually, as D’ol Regle carefully explained, but old and obsolete—the novices also learned many new facts concerning the beginnings of their civilization. They were told how, long ago on a distant planet, a group of learned holy men had managed to escape the destruction of their world. Foreseeing the holocaust, they had prepared for their escape and that of a large group of Kindar who had been entrusted to their care and instruction. The flight from the ravaged planet to Green-sky, Raamo and Genaa were surprised to learn, had taken several years.

  In the beautiful history books of the Garden, the flight had been described but vaguely, and in the embroidered illustrations it was shown as a large group of people gliding through open space, apparently supported only by the wings of their shubas. However, the flight was actually made, D’ol Regle explained, by means of an enormous flying chamber constructed of materials called metals, which were unknown on Green-sky because of the Pash-shan. These materials, which were found beneath the surface of the land, were, of course, inaccessible in a country where such areas were in the control of monsters. For this reason metals existed in Green-sky only in relics of the flight—in the objects of art that lined the central hallway of the inner temple and in certain other ancient tools and artifacts that had been carefully preserved.

  The metal flying chamber having arrived safely on a lush and beautiful planet, the group of holy men set about establishing a new society. Haunted, as they were, by the horrible fate of their beloved homeland, they, who were to become the first Ol-zhaan, dedicated themselves to the development of a civilization that would be free, not only of war, but also of all the evil seeds from which it had sprung.

  Thus it was that these brilliant and learned men, by making use of their great knowledge of the human mind and of their mastery of the skills of the Spirit, were able to banish from the hearts and minds—even from the tongues—of their young charges, every semblance of violence. All the old institutions that had once given rise to hostile feelings were completely abandoned. In their place new institutions were developed in which all natural human instincts and drives were gratified in such a way that the pleasure of their gratification was closely associated with ritualized expressions of peaceful, joyful human communion. As a result, even the first generation in Green-sky had begun to demonstrate new heights of mind and Spirit.

  “But what of the Pash-shan?” Genaa interrupted D’ol Regle’s glowing description of the glorious success of the new society. “We are taught that in the days of the flight the Pash-shan were not yet imprisoned by the Root. Weren’t many of the Kindar lost to the Pash-shan in those early days?”

  “In those early days,” D’ol Regle said, “the Kindar were very few, and they lived high in the grundtops in chambers constructed for them from materials salvaged from the flying chamber. The Pash-shan, who lived far below on the forest floor, did not threaten them during those early years. It was only much later when the Pash-shan, growing strong in number, and jealous of the beauty of the Kindar civilization, became a great danger. And it was then that the great leader D’ol Wissen, famous in song and story, gathered those among the Ol-zhaan most gifted in the art of grunspreking and led them on the first Procession of the Holy Vine. There on the forest floor, amid constant danger from the Pash-shan, these few Ol-zhaan caused the already remarkable root system of a native vine to g
row and spread until it covered the entire surface of the forest floor and at the same time to develop a magical strength, a coldly invulnerable force, which rendered it impervious to any attack made against it. And the evil forces of the Pash-shan were imprisoned in the dark depths of the earth. At that time, the Blessed Vine began also to produce Blossoms and Berries. Thus it was that the Vine brought not only protection from the Pash-shan but also the delicate beauty of the Blossom and the gentle comfort of the Berry to the people of Green-sky.”

  As D’ol Regle spoke, he had grown more and more grandly eloquent, as if he were addressing a large assembly of admiring Kindar. Genaa’s quick glance at Raamo mocked the master’s flowery speech, and her gesture of contrition mocked herself for having asked a question that invited such a grandiose and lengthy response.

  “Yes, D’ol Regle,” she said quickly when the Ol-zhaan at last paused for breath. “We have heard the story of the first procession. I think it is in the fourth year at the Garden that one is required to commit it to memory. It was just that it had not occurred to me to wonder how long after the flight the Pash-shan were imprisoned.”

  “I have a question, also,” Raamo said. “If the Kindar are protected from the evil emotions and deeds of our ancestors by their lack of knowledge of such things—by not even having the words to speak of such things—why must the Ol-zhaan remember? Would it not be better if we Ol-zhaan also could forget?”

  “A thoughtful question, D’ol Raamo,” the master said, “and one that has been debated by the Ol-zhaan in past years. The knowledge of our tragic past is, indeed, a burden. But it has been the judgment of our fellow Ol-zhaan that if the memory of violence was completely erased from our civilization, there would be none to guard against its return. Do you remember the chant In Praise of Good Memory?”