The Soul Garden

by Cege Smith

  Samuel had never heard the Head Master speak like this. It was as if they were sitting in a confessional. "Sir, we don't question your rules. You know more than all of us combined. You saw the destruction of Before. We trust you to lead us in whatever way you've see fit. I know that your intentions have always been for a safe and prosperous life for all of the Residents of Malm."

  "Ah Samuel, you are the most loyal acolyte that has ever served me. Your faith warms my heart. But you don't see that unwavering devotion like yours is something that is a thing of the past. I have seen the seeds of discourse take root. I was a foolish man to think that I could ignore it. And now, the time of change stands on our doorstep, and there is nothing to be done. I should have prepared you. I have failed." Tears streamed down the Head Master's face.

  Samuel knelt at the Head Master's feet. "What can I do, Head Master? Tell me what I need to do to help. I will do whatever you require." He felt the Head Master's hands on his head. It reminded him of the day he had sworn his pledge of service to the Office of Souls, which had been the best day of his life. A rush of warmth and peace swept over him.

  "I was wrong to lay these dark thoughts at your feet, Samuel. But it is important that you understand because it will be your duty to hold the line against the forces of darkness. Will you still serve faithfully in the face of evil?"

  Samuel had no idea what the Head Master's words meant, but he would do his duty in the fight against any adversary of the Light. That had never been a question. "Of course, Head Master. My life belongs to the Office of Souls." He felt a warm shock of electricity pass through him, and he looked up into the Head Master's face. What just happened?

  "You will know what to do when the time comes. Get up, Samuel. I can dally no longer," the Head Master said as he stood up.

  Samuel stood up as well. He thought again of how frail the Head Master looked; like a strong gust of wind would blow him away. He watched the Head Master look to his right, at a low shelf on the far wall. Samuel saw that a book was missing. All books were required to stay in the library, and today was not a day that anyone would be engaged in casual reading. Everyone had a purpose on Soul Distribution Day.

  The Head Master shook his head and sighed. "Someone once told me that the easiest way to hide something important was to disguise it in plain sight. I fear that wisdom has failed me. Our enemies are always around us. Come, Samuel. We must finish our preparations and then it will be time to meet the Chosen at the gate."

  He turned and started to walk away. Samuel had idea what the Head Master was talking about, but he had no choice but to follow.

  MALCOM

  They turned slowly into the parking lot, and Malcom realized that he was holding his breath. Although there were spaces for hundreds of cars, there were only about twenty in the lot today. Malcom had heard that many years ago, the Residents of Malm would gather at the Office of Souls compound in hopes of being admitted into the garden for worship and prayers. To what purpose he had no idea. He wasn't even sure that was the truth. It was creepy being around all of the white-robed acolytes when they visited town for supplies. While today Malcom felt fortunate that they lived so close to the compound, he could see the appeal of living out in the perimeter towns. Out of sight, out of mind.

  "It's kinda freaky, isn't it?" Eve said.

  Malcom could hear the strain in her voice. Neither one of them had been to the compound since their own soul implantation days, when they were much too young to remember anything. It would have been easy to forget that the compound was even here, if it hadn’t been for all the mandates and rules that affected every aspect of their lives emanating from deep inside the walls.

  "It's essentially just a really big ranch," Malcom said. He was determined to keep his cool today. Eve was the one prone to panic, and so one of them had to keep their wits about them, for Cameron's sake.

  Malcom pulled up to a row that had several cars already lined up, and slid the car into a parking spot. He could see now that the majority of the cars in the lot had the Office of Souls logo on the side. There were just a few that looked like they belonged to Residents.

  Malcom looked over at Eve. "Well, it's about time to go in. We don't want to be late."

  He saw her nod, but she didn't move. Her chest was rising and falling faster than before, and she clutched the Official Handbook of Soul Implantation Procedure like it was going to jerk and try to get away from her.

  "I'll get Cameron," he said.

  Malcom got out and opened the back door. The baby seat faced the back of the car, and he could see immediately that she was fussing, albeit quietly. Her red-rimmed eyes caught his movement and her head swung towards him. She opened her mouth and a short caw came out.

  "Is she hungry already?" he asked Eve.

  "She's always hungry," Eve said sarcastically as she got out of the car.

  Malcom had no idea what that meant. He wondered if they had time to give Cameron a bottle before the ceremony started. He had no desire to have an ornery baby on their hands during the most important hour of her life.

  "Eve, did we bring a bottle?"

  He slid Cameron out of her restraints and pulled her into his arms. That seemed to settle her a bit, but she was still opening and closing her mouth rather insistently.

  Eve snorted and went around the back of the car. What the hell is the matter with her? He heard her digging into the diaper bag, and then she was by his side with a small bottle of wheat germ formula.

  "Thanks," he said as he took the bottle and stuck the nipple into Cameron's mouth.

  "There's two more for the ride home, just in case," Eve said as she pulled the bag from the back and turned toward the compound entrance. "Let's go."

  Malcom knew there was something he was missing, but Eve didn't seem to be interested in enlightening him. He looked down at Cameron, who finally seemed content as she sucked hard on the bottle.

  He took a few moments to study the compound up close as they approached the gate. Walls stretched on either side of the entrance as far as he could see. The histories said that the walls stretched all the way to the perimeter, just to make sure that Residents never accidentally stumbled into the garden. They were at least twenty feet tall and were a shining white even in the overcast afternoon. Malcom wondered who in their right mind would ever consider trying to breach them.

  When they arrived at the gate, they found two other couples waiting off to the side. One of the women carried a baby that he easily could have mistaken for Cameron. He was surprised to see the other couple holding the hands of a small soulless toddler. The toddler's father immediately read Malcom's expression and his face hardened.

  "No, they don’t get any cuter as they get older," the man said. His wife elbowed him in the ribs and took the toddler a few feet further away.

  Malcom shivered as he looked into the toddler's vacant eyes. He had wondered what they would do if Cameron's name wasn't called until well after she had started to grow. He imagined it would be a nightmare. He looked at Eve and saw his thoughts reflected in her eyes as she watched the toddler as well.

  "Hey, we're here," he said reassuringly. "It's almost over."

  Eve didn't reply. Instead she opened the Official Handbook of Soul Implantation Procedure and turned away.

  Malcom looked through the narrow opening of the gate. It looked to be made of cast iron, and the spikes at the top made it stand even taller than the walls. Malcom could see a courtyard on the other side and a long pathway that looked like it led to a large building in the distance. He couldn't see anything on either side. Just the courtyard, the path, and the building.

  The other couples were keeping to themselves, and occasionally Malcom heard a low whisper pass between the adults, but he couldn't make out what they were saying. He looked down and realized that Cameron had finished her bottle and was starting at him intently. It unnerved him to see how adult she looked. It was as if she were looking at him under a microscope. The expression was akin to curi
osity, but of course, soulless ones didn't have such an emotion. Eat, drink, defecate, sleep. That was all a soulless knew according to the handbook; nothing but the most basic human instincts.

  Ten minutes passed and he shifted back and forth feeling anxious. He looked at his watch. The Office of Souls was getting a late start.

  "Anytime now," he said. It was louder than he anticipated, and the others looked over at him. Eve, with her nose in her book, grimaced. But he thought he saw the shadows of a smile on one of the father’s faces. Residents were usually friendly and outgoing with everyone, and he thought it was only the strangeness of the situation that put everyone on guard.

  He walked over the couple with the other infant. "Hi, I'm Malcom. That's my wife, Eve, and this is Cameron. How are you folks today?"

  He saw the couple exchange a look, but he felt some of the tension seep away.

  "I'm Brian," the man finally said. He had the accent of someone who lived further toward the perimeter. "This is my wife, Emily, and our daughter, Cecile."

  "Pleased to meet you, Brian. Where are you in from?" Malcom asked. He hoped that the generic questions would put the couple at ease.

  "Jonestown," Brian said.

  Malcom whistled. "You're a long way from home." Malcom and Eve had traveled three hours from West End, which was the closest town to the Office of Souls compound. Jonestown was three days out, halfway to the perimeter.

  Brian shrugged. "Not a lot of choice in the matter."

  "We're from Outer Bijou," said a voice behind them.

  Malcom and Brian both turned and found the father of the toddler standing there. "I'm Mark. My wife is Tabby, and that's Joe." He kicked his thumb back towards his family. "He's our third."

  Malcom whistled again. "Your third? In West End we get one shot at procreation, if at all."

  "Things are a bit different in Outer Bijou." Mark sniffed. "The Office of Souls expects some of us to serve at the boundaries of Malm, and they are willing to bend the rules a bit."

  Malcom blinked. He had never considered that. "What do you do, Mark? It must be pretty important if your work keeps you all the way out on the perimeter's edge."

  "It's not important," Mark deflected. "It's just necessary."

  Malcom wondered why the man wouldn’t answer the question. Every Resident's station and occupation was listed in the territory's census data, which was publicly displayed in every town hall. The Office of Souls not only monitored the population, but ensured that there was a body for every necessary job to keep the wheels of progress moving.

  Malcom had grown up hoping that he would be assigned to be a doctor, but at his adult initiation announcement, he had drawn accountant. It wasn't glamorous, but it was a necessary function. He wondered if Mark had wanted to be something else too.

  "I'm a farmer," Brian said. "Emily and I have a soybean farm just outside of Jonestown."

  That made sense to Malcom. Between West End and the perimeter, there was a wide swath of farms and cattle ranches.

  "We've just been called again in the procreation lottery as well. I'm glad Cecile is getting her soul today, because I think two at the same time would be a bit much for Emily to handle," Brian said as he put his arm around his wife.

  "I didn't realize that the outer towns had lowered restrictions on procreation," Malcom said. Residents didn't talk about procreation much at all, and Malcom had a feeling that the Office of Souls liked it that way.

  "It makes sense when you realize that amount of work that is being expected," Mark said. "You inner town folk don't realize what it's like to be so far away from the core of the territory."

  Malcom was annoyed with the man's tone. It wasn't like he was an uneducated shmoe. "Eve and I feel fortunate to have Cameron, but honestly I don't think that we would ever want more children in any case."

  He watched the other men closely. There was definitely discomfort there, and once again Malcom felt like he was missing something.

  "So you've done this before," Brian asked Mark.

  "A-yup," Mark said. "It'll be like slipping on an old hat, won't it, Tabby?"

  "A-yup," was the quiet reply.

  Malcom noticed the woman didn't move closer, though. The toddler was staring at him from behind her skirts. And he was opening and closing his mouth in the same way that Cameron did when she was hungry. Were these soulless always hungry?

  He turned and saw that Eve had moved further away from them and was staring up at the tall walls. He wondered what she was thinking. Ever since Cameron had been born, he had felt a distance growing between them. Sometimes he felt like he was married to a stranger, a pale wisp of the woman that he had fallen in love with.

  "Eve," he said to get her attention. He hoped that her strangeness was not as apparent to the other parents as it was to him. "Can you take this bottle and put it away?"

  He thought for a moment that she hadn't heard him, that she was communing with some other entity he couldn't see. Just as he was getting ready to say her name again, her head swung towards him and he saw her eyes focus on him. She slowly walked over and took the bottle from his outstretched hand, capped it with a top that she pulled from the diaper bag, and stowed it back inside.

  "How old's your little one?" Emily asked her.

  Eve cleared her throat. "Cameron is six months old."

  "Cessy just turned seven months today," Emily said. She smiled fondly down at the infant in her arms. "We are hoping that at her adult initiation she'll draw a dancer. I was a dancer before I married Brian."

  Eve looked bored and Malcom was embarrassed. He wondered if being sequestered with Cameron for the last six months had robbed her of her social skills. He realized with a start that he couldn't remember the last time he had seen Eve interact with anyone aside from him since right after Cameron was born.

  "What did you do before you were married?" Emily persisted.

  It was common practice that women gave up their occupation as soon as they submitted their name for marriage approval. It made things easier for everyone if the couple was chosen to procreate. Children were cherished in the territory, and it was the parents’ duty to ensure that they became well-adjusted and active residents. That was no small task.

  Life in Malm had many rules and customs that dated back to just after the collapse of Before. Residents were very proud of the world that they had built since then. It was what made them special, especially when compared to what they heard about other territories beyond the perimeter. Residents were not permitted to travel beyond the perimeter into the other territories without permission from the Office of Souls, but no one who Malcom knew had ever even wanted to. They were lawless, wild lands out there, no place for the civilized.

  The Office of Souls protected them from those places and bore that burden so the Residents were safe. So it seemed a small ask that the Residents obey the commands and orders of the Head Master. He had never let them down. Even thinking that thought made Malcom feel like a sheep. That blind acceptance was something he had always struggled with.

  "I was a chemist," Eve finally replied after what seemed like an uncomfortably long silence.

  "A chemist? That sounds awfully important," Emily said with wide eyes.

  Malcom wondered how the pairing of a farmer and a dancer ever came about, but it wasn't his place to question. Emily must originally have been from West End or one of the other inner ring towns. The mid-outer ring towns had little use for entertainment like the ballet. The people there worked the land hard and went to bed early.

  Eve shrugged. "It was something I was good at. I even worked for Mabel Coffey for a while."

  Malcom knew that chafed Eve most of all. Mabel Coffey produced all of the finer fragrances, colognes, and higher-end cosmetics in the territory, and given their reputation they were highly selective of the staff. Eve's appointment had been surprising, given how close she had been at the time to being eligible for marriage. Eve had asked to stay on after she and Malcom got engaged, but Mabel Coff
ey was a very traditional institution and well-connected to the Office of Souls. It wasn't unheard of for allowances to be made in other organizations, but it wasn't encouraged.

  "We don't have need for fancy things in Outer Bijou," Mark said.

  Malcom had almost forgotten that the perimeter couple was there.

  "Tabby was a nurse assistant before we married. Now that's a skill she can use with our children. The Office of Souls would do better to funnel women into occupations that have social benefit to their families once they enter their marriage years."

  Malcom felt Eve stiffen beside him, and he could hardly blame her. This strange man was getting more offensive by the moment. He spoke with the fervor of a Traditionalist, and Malcom had little patience for Traditionalist ideals. While he felt many of the territory's rules made sense, there were more than a few that felt antiquated to him.

  He was just starting to say something to that effect when he felt Eve tug on his arm.

  "Look," she said, nodding at the gate.

  Two men stood on the other side. The younger one wore the white robes of an acolyte, but the older man with gleaming white hair on his head and on his face was wearing a majestic shade of purple. Malcom knew that he was standing in the presence of the Office of Souls’ Head Master, Supreme Ruler and Chief Justice of the territory of Malm. The appointed hour had arrived.

  BISHOP

  Bishop knew something was wrong as soon as he stepped outside the garden. He had been around long enough that he could sense such things. He had the nose for it. Bishop could smell a shrub that needed to be pruned from the moment a leaf started to die. It didn't matter if it was halfway up the outer boundary on the far side of the garden. Once he knew it was there, it was just a matter of hunting the offending rot down.

  He liked to think of himself as a topiary detective rather than a mere gardener. No one else could do what he did. Sometimes late at night when he couldn't sleep, he'd wonder if he had really ever had parents, or if the Office of Souls had grown him special just to tend their garden. The thought reminded him how much he didn’t know or understand about his employer, and that made him queasy.