Stewards of the Flame

by Sylvia Engdahl

  “Thanks, Olivia.”

  “The drug’s been slow to affect his mind, too. In fact he seemed better this morning than yesterday. Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone else—Peter warned me that outsiders mustn’t get the idea that the dosage is too low.”

  It was not a matter of dosage, Carla knew. Jesse had discovered something. He’d learned that there were compensations. Not that the trade of normal life and rationality for enhanced telepathic ability was one he’d willingly choose—but the drug had to be responsible for the unprecedented distance over which they’d communicated.

  With reluctance, she pulled herself together and went back to work, wondering moment by moment when Jesse would contact her again. Could that happen even after she left the building? If not, how could she ever go home? What would she do during offshifts? And how could she work and communicate with him at the same time? It was pure luck that no one had come by her desk while they were conversing; to an observer she’d have appeared to be spaced out. . . .

  At the end of the workday, she was afraid to leave. She could not bear to think that he might try to reach her and fail; his time sense, his connection with the real world, might be so impaired that he couldn’t keep track of her schedule. In desperation, not knowing what to do, she returned to Peter’s office.

  It was dim; the drapes had been pulled. Carla switched on the light and to her astonishment, saw Peter slumped over his desk. Slowly, he raised his head. His face was white, frozen, and his mind was shut tight against her probing. She had never seen him look so shaken, not even when they’d first faced awareness of Jesse’s condemnation.

  There was only one thing she could think of that would affect him so profoundly. “Has Ian died?” she asked gently, assuming that he must have. Was it coincidence that Jesse had dreamed of him, or had he somehow sensed his passing? Ian floating in space could have been a dream symbol of death.

  “No. Not yet.” The emotion she perceived in Peter was something between elation and anguish. “Carla,” he went on quickly, “Jesse’s going to be released.”

  “Released?” She wasn’t sure she was hearing it. This second shock seemed so unreal that she wondered if she was hallucinating—in an altered state, perhaps, through which what she’d needed for sanity was being supplied. Perhaps the whole day, even the conversation with Olivia, had been some sort of waking dream.

  “Yes,” Peter confirmed. “Tomorrow he will be free to go. He’ll recover in a few days.”

  But if this were true, Peter should be smiling. “How?” she asked.

  “I can’t speak of it now. I—I need time to adjust.” He started to rise, but sat down again as if his legs would no longer support his weight.

  Bewildered, Carla burst out, “Aren’t you glad about it?”

  “Glad? That’s too mild a word. The joy I feel for Jesse, for you, is unlimited—and for the hope we now have of saving the Group, it’s more like awe. But it has come at a terrible price.”

  “What price?”

  “You don’t want to know now, Carla. Believe me, you don’t. Go to Jesse tomorrow, and be happy. Don’t ask for more pain; it will come to you soon enough.”

  “Peter . . . you haven’t sacrificed yourself in some way—?” It was apparent that he’d suffered a blow, that it was a struggle for him to keep his composure.

  “No. No act of mine could have accomplished this; it was taken out of my hands. And now . . . I have a responsibility. We have to carry on, all of us—it’s more important than ever before. Something’s happened that . . . obligates us.”

  “To keep the Group going? Of course.”

  “To fulfill Ian’s dream.”

  “That means Jesse . . . tell me, Peter! What will Jesse have to do?” He’d just been given back his life through some miracle. She did not want him handed new obligations.

  “I can’t tell you, or anyone, before I tell him—in principle, he has a right to refuse, though I don’t think he’ll want to. And he won’t be in shape to make that choice for several days yet.”

  “Will what you’re planning put him danger?” she asked fearfully.

  “We will all be in danger,” Peter said frankly. “It will be no worse for him than for the rest of us.”

  “Of course it will be worse! You can’t let him risk being subjected to psychiatric drugs a second time!”

  “No. It won’t be that sort of danger.”

  She turned white. “Not . . . like Ramón!”

  “Oh, no, Carla—not that. Not stasis! God willing, in the future none of us will ever risk that again.” He shuddered, as if Ramón’s death loomed even more vividly in his memory than in her own.

  “Well, it can’t be anything as bad as either of those,” she concluded with relief.

  “Jesse will welcome the plan,” Peter told her. “One reason I didn’t tell him about it sooner was that I didn’t want to raise his hopes before I was sure it could be tried. But there will be very great difficulties.” He sighed. “I’m not up to dealing with them now, I’m not thinking straight. But we’ve got to make a start. There’s a lot I need to explain to you, a lot you too will have to accomplish—”

  “Me? Anything, Peter, just so it doesn’t keep me from Jesse.”

  “His safety, and the Group’s, will depend on you, Carla. On your hacking ability, especially during the next few days.”

  She drew breath. “More data to be faked?”

  With evident effort, Peter pulled himself together. “Though Jesse has been cleared of the worst charges, he’ll remain on probation for destroying Zeb’s body. After his release from the Hospital, he will be required to report to me weekly as an outpatient. That’s okay as long as I don’t lose control of his case. It will even help us, because he’ll have a legitimate reason to see me regularly in private. The problem is that he’ll be microchipped—”

  “Dear God.”

  “We’re all supposed to be microchipped eventually; to Jesse it will simply happen sooner. What it means, though, is that outside the Hospital he can’t ever go anywhere I’m known to go. Including the Island—it’s no longer possible for him to hide there.”

  “Oh, Peter. He loves it so.” And so do I, Carla thought, yet I won’t go without him. . . .

  “In the long run it won’t matter,” Peter said cryptically. “But right now, we have a dilemma. Jesse must go to the Lodge once, later this week. A meeting of the Group will be held, and it’s essential to the plan for him to be present. So you’ve got hack the system to keep his location from being detected.”

  “But Peter, it can’t be done! That’s why we can’t get people out of residential care units.”

  “I know you can’t defeat the tracking system permanently. If you could, universal microchipping wouldn’t threaten the Group’s survival. All the same, just this once you have to make it look as if he were somewhere else—on Verge Island, maybe, so you won’t have to tamper with transmission from most of the flight. And if at all possible you should set it up in advance so that you can go with him.”

  “What if I fail?” she whispered. Location tracking was a real-time operation; planting time-activated code to alter incoming data would be far harder than merely hacking into files and changing values manually, as she’d done in the past. It was well within her programming capability, but still . . .

  “They’re likely to watch his movements for at least a week after his release. If they tie them to mine, I’ll be taken off his case and placed under suspicion. You know what that could lead to.” Peter sighed. “I may be asking the impossible. Yet I can’t believe that after all that’s happened—all the sacrifices that have been made—we can be defeated by this one small obstacle. Not when the Group’s future is at stake, which it is.”

  “I’d better get started tonight. I don’t dare log on remotely; we’ve never risked using an identifiable Net address. Yet I’ll need to stay home with Jesse while he recovers.”

  “That’s another thing,” Peter said. “Since you�
��re my assistant, it can’t become known that he lives with you—he can’t ever go back to your apartment. I’ll arrange for him to have his own, in one of Xiang Li’s buildings, since their association is already accepted. Kira will take him there tomorrow; the Hospital knows she sometimes works as a private nurse and it’s reasonable for me, as his doctor, to engage one. You’ll have to sneak in after dark and make sure you’re not observed.”

  “Always?” If they could never go to the Island and never be seen together in the city, how were they going to manage year after year?

  Don’t worry about that now, Peter advised, exhaustion once again overtaking him. Aloud he said, “I’ve ordered sedation for Jesse tonight. Go tell him that when he wakes he’ll be freed from this place—I’m not up to seeing him. Then get some rest while you can. Tomorrow will be time enough for the hacking.”

  “Peter, I can’t leave you like this,” Carla said, longing to rush to Jesse, yet aware that for the first time within memory, Peter’s strength might not hold. Jesse would be all right now. Peter was obviously near collapse.

  “I have to be alone for a while,” Peter declared. “You can’t help me. Stay with Jesse until he’s back to normal, and wait for a summons to the Lodge. When I get there, I’ll be fit to take on the role I’ve inherited.”

  ~ 52 ~

  When Jesse came fully awake, he was in a strange bed, a wide bed he vaguely recalled having shared with Carla. She was standing near him, silhouetted against a sunlit window. Disoriented at first, he assumed for a moment he must be dreaming again. “What happened?” he asked. “How did I escape?”

  “You were released,” Carla told him. “I don’t know why; Peter wouldn’t tell me. It’s official, though. You were cleared of the most serious charges.”

  “But they saw me burn Zeb’s body—”

  “Yes, so you’re still on probation. You can’t be seen with me except when you visit Peter’s office as an outpatient. And—you are microchipped, Jesse. The authorities will keep track of where you are; that’s why you’re here in your own apartment instead of in mine.”

  “Microchipped?” he echoed in dismay. “Permanently?”

  “Yes, but it’s going to happen to us all, soon, Peter says. He’s got some long-range plan for dealing with it.”

  “He told me that once, too. I guess I can’t complain about being the guinea pig, after what I’ve been saved from.” He flexed his hands, savoring their release from the heavy bandaging that had been necessary to conceal their healing. “I don’t see why the Meds let me go. Did they find evidence against the real arsonist after all?”

  “I just don’t know, Jesse. Peter said there was a—a terrible price for your freedom. I don’t think he meant money. If the authorities could be bought, he’d have gotten you out sooner. He said that we’re all now—obligated. And he was more upset than I’ve ever seen him, despite being happy for you.”

  “Oh, God. What have I done to the Group by letting myself get caught?”

  “You mustn’t think that way!” Carla declared. “You saved Kira, probably Peter and Ian, too—maybe even the rest of us. Everyone admires you for what you did.”

  “Am I—normal, Carla? Was I given enough of the drug to damage my brain?”

  “You’re fine now. You’ve been recovering for nearly four days—Peter said you should sleep it off, so Kira sedated you hypnotically. That’s why you have no memory of her bringing you here.”

  “The last thing I remember clearly was our minds joining when we were separated. When I was locked up alone and you were somewhere else, but it didn’t matter, we came together anyway . . . was that real?”

  “Yes. Kira said that by lessening your capacity for normal awareness, the drug must have put you into a state that enhanced your telepathic power. It was awesome, Jesse, though hardly a method we’d have chosen.”

  “There’s a better way to enhance telepathy,” Jesse agreed, reaching out to her. Carla took off her clothes and got into bed with him. They made love in relief and gladness, sharing their bodies and minds fully. Afterward they both slept, free of the past week’s anguish.

  Late in the afternoon Carla’s phone woke them. While she was talking Jesse rose and showered, feeling not merely normal but great. When he came out of the bathroom he saw right away that the respite from stress had been brief. “Are you well enough to fly?” she asked. “We’re wanted at the Lodge—now. Ian died this morning. Kira said that Peter wants everyone to come.”

  Jesse felt a surge of grief. His dream of Ian was still clear in his memory; it was as if the contact with him had been as real as his telepathic contact with Carla. Knowing that he was gone hurt, just as it must hurt those who’d been privileged to be among his longtime friends.

  They dressed quickly and grabbed sandwiches to eat in the plane. It had been moved from the dock near the burned house, where it might be watched; Xiang Li, as the lien holder, had arranged for it to be moored in a basin closer to the apartment. Carla could not go in the water taxi with Jesse, she explained, and she disguised her face with heavy makeup when she set out to walk, hiding her hair under a tightly-wrapped scarf. By the time she got there, he had completed the preflight check and was having the power cells recharged.

  Taxiing away from the recharging station, Jesse could scarcely believe that the bad time had happened. He was totally himself in the air. It didn’t seem possible that he had, for a few days, been less than himself. Now all his senses, all his perceptions of life, were suddenly illumined, and he knew that he would never again take its wonders for granted. Despite the happiness he’d found on Undine, the old emptiness and futility had not, until now, been completely behind him. It had taken the near-loss of his mind—and the discovery of its imperishable essence—to show him that Peter was right in insisting, we win simply by being who we are.

  Carla spoke over the hum of the engine. “There’s something you have to know, Jesse. I didn’t want to spoil your joy sooner than I had to—but this is our last trip to the Island. The microchip reveals where you go, and so avoiding medical telemetry’s no longer enough to conceal your presence there. More than ever the Island’s not safe, if Ian has died. Peter owns it, now.”

  He stared at her, for a moment crushed. Never to go to the Lodge again? Never to walk on the shore or swim in the places they had swum together, never to sit side by side before the fireplace where they’d first made love? It would be hard. And yet, it was a small deprivation beside the one he’d just escaped; the pain of mere exile could not touch him.

  “My joy’s not spoiled,” he told her. “I have my mind back—and I have you. There are other islands, Carla—dozens of them! I saw a lot of nice ones when I was flying with Zeb. We could build a cabin of our own—”

  “You’re forgetting that I can’t be known to associate with you,” she said sadly. In the plane she’d removed the grotesque makeup, but it would have to be reapplied.

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” he said. “Since I’m not under suspicion anymore, knowing me won’t endanger you. If the only reason you can’t be seen with me is that you’re Peter’s assistant, maybe you should quit your job—marry me legally and pretend to hate him for what he did to me while I was hospitalized. I have plenty of assets to borrow on; you don’t need to work. We could live full time away from the city, just go in once a week when I have to report to him as an outpatient.”

  “I never thought of that!” Carla exclaimed. “Oh, Jesse, we could—except I have to be on hand for the hacking, you know. Speaking of which, the only reason we can go to the meeting tonight is that I hacked the tracking system. I coded the patch to activate when we reach Maclairn’s coordinates. It will show you’re on Verge Island; that’s close enough for our flight path to seem right. But I put a timer on it, because it’s not safe to leave a routine like that running too long. It will self-destruct, so we have to leave for Verge at sunrise.”

  “Carla, it doesn’t sound safe for you to have done it at all! Much as
I want to see the Lodge once more, and to take part in Ian’s burial—”

  “Peter said it was important. He wants you for more than the burial; this Group meeting was set up even before Ian died. I think . . . he’s going to reveal the secret he’s been keeping from you all this time.”

  “You mean Ian’s dream?”

  “You already know about that?”

  “Not what happened in it. But in the Hospital, when I . . . wanted to die, he told me Ian had dreamed about me. That if my brain were to be damaged it couldn’t have meant what they thought, and yet Ian believed it did. That I shouldn’t lose hope of a miracle.” Awestricken by abrupt recognition of what this signified, he added, “Carla, Ian was right! There was a miracle, so his dream must have showed the future!”

  “But what about the other one, the recurrent dream that was keeping him alive because he thought he had something important left to do in life? That didn’t come true—he’s gone now.” She frowned. “After all the weeks he lingered, I wish he hadn’t died today, of all days. I’m worried about Peter, Jesse. He was already suffering from some burden too terrible even to tell me about, on top of the ordeal he went through with you. Mourning for Ian at the same time may be more than even he can bear up under.”

  “Never doubt Peter’s strength,” Jesse told her. “The worse things got in the Hospital, the more I drew on his courage—and he was always there for me, telepathically, in spite of what he was forced to do to me. I knew it was agony for him, but he wouldn’t back away. I could feel the steadiness in him, and knew I could rely unconditionally on it. He’s not going to fold, no matter what happens.”

  The sun had set by the time they reached the Island. There were more planes moored than he’d ever seen there; he had to find a spot far out in the bay. A small boat approached; Bernie was shuttling arrivals to the dock. Well over two hundred people were gathered on the beach in the moonlight—just sitting, subdued and silent. “What’s everyone waiting for?” Jesse asked.