Gatefather

by Orson Scott Card

  “Of course I—”

  “Hermia thought that you weren’t willing to concentrate on the things that are actually pertinent.”

  “The word ‘bitch’ was invented just so she could grow into it,” said Veevee.

  “You gatemages know all the secret facts about words, not me,” said Pat. “I’m going to take you through what Hermia and I did. Step by step. If you’re willing to let me lead you that way.”

  “Whatever it takes, kid,” said Veevee. “If she can learn it, I’m damn well going to learn it too.”

  It took until well after dark, but by then they were in Stone’s house in Washington, DC, and it was Veevee who had led them there.

  “It’s not the regular way,” said Veevee to Stone. “I still can’t do that, but Peter Von Roth, I can move like a gatemage through the world.”

  Peter seemed so genuinely proud of her—and so moved that Veevee had actually come to him to brag about it—that Pat gated herself back to the clearing in the woods so they could be alone.

  It was dark. The snogging party was long since over. Just the night noises of the woods, and some distant traffic noises. And yes, wait, yes, there was a noise of distant cheering. There must be some kind of athletic event down at the school. Or a party. Something. Happy sounds.

  It made Pat glad—glad that other people were happy, and glad that she was by herself, not trapped inside a happy throng.

  Only she wasn’t by herself. Because after only a few moments, Danny was beside her.

  “I didn’t come while you were teaching Veevee,” said Danny. “You were succeeding where I failed—I wasn’t going to interfere with that.”

  “I’m glad you came to me here,” said Pat. And then she burst out laughing.

  “What?” asked Danny.

  Pat told him about Xena and Wheeler.

  “Inconceivable,” said Danny.

  “You keep using that word,” said Pat. “I do not think it means what you think it means.”

  He seemed not to get the Princess Bride reference, and instead of explaining it, she kissed him. Now that this was established as a snogging site, it seemed appropriate, and he went along with it willingly enough.

  12

  Eluik sat by the window on the flight from Dayton to Lexington. He hadn’t asked for the seat, but Enopp told him, “You should be able to look out the window.” Eluik wondered if Enopp was afraid of what he’d feel, looking down from such a height, but no. Enopp thought of it as the best place, and he was giving it to his brother, and Eluik accepted the gift as it was intended.

  The distance was slight—it wouldn’t have taken two hours to cover it by car. There had been so much ritual associated with getting through airport security and getting on the plane that as they walked through the terminal Eluik wondered aloud if it might not be faster for Marion or Leslie to drive them.

  “It would be faster,” Enopp said quietly, “for us to simply go.”

  Eluik saw Leslie, who was walking ahead of them, hesitate a bit. But then she must have realized that nobody who overheard them would have the faintest idea of what they were talking about, so she kept moving and didn’t stop to hush them.

  “Do you know where it is?” asked Eluik.

  “No,” said Enopp. “But Pat or Danny could have taken us. Or shown us where. I know you learned as well as I did how to move from place to place.”

  “I don’t have your reckless confidence.”

  “I’m not reckless,” said Enopp. “I’m very careful not to try to do more than I know how to do.”

  “You just think you know how to do far more than I think I know how to do.”

  “Gating, or just going, whatever we call it,” said Enopp, “is quicker. But I think Marion and Leslie wanted us to experience flying in an airplane. Most people in America have flown, so why shouldn’t we? When we get back home, there won’t be any airplanes.”

  Then they were at the gate, and Leslie gave the paperwork to the gate agent, and then she returned to Eluik and Enopp. “I know you’re going to enjoy this,” said Leslie.

  “Which means you’re afraid we won’t,” said Enopp, “and so you want us to know we’re supposed to enjoy it.”

  “I’m not going to miss your snottiness one bit,” said Leslie.

  “Which means you know you are going to miss it,” said Enopp.

  Leslie turned to Eluik. “Am I really such a liar?” she asked him.

  “You’re just speaking the way adults always speak to children,” said Eluik. “Only a child as snotty as Enopp would be rude enough to point it out.”

  “I hate being a typical adult,” said Leslie, “but I’ll only brood about it constantly while you’re gone. Anyway, it’s time for you to be handed off to the attendant who’s taking you on.” Leslie glanced out the window. “It’s really not much of a plane. But then, it’s not much of a flight, either.”

  “This is just a regional jet,” said Enopp, “and it won’t ever reach a high cruising altitude, so we’ll get a much better view of the ground.”

  “You say that as if it’s a good thing,” said Leslie. “I always like to fly above the clouds so I can’t see the ground. Everything looks so pillowy and soft.”

  In other words, Eluik realized, Leslie was afraid of flying. Maybe he should be, too. Except how could he be afraid, since he and Enopp both had the power to simply go to the ground, if something went wrong with the plane.

  We could probably take the other passengers with us. Or a couple at a time, and then go back for the others. Long before the plane crashed.

  Leslie had been right. It was disturbing to have a clear view of the ground, especially when the plane juddered and jinked in the turbulence. He and Enopp had both looked up everything they could about flying, so they knew the turbulence shouldn’t bother them. But when the plane shifted like that it was disturbing not to be able to see anything holding them up.

  But Eluik had kept looking out the window anyway, to get used to it. It wasn’t the same thing as being trapped in the cave, when it was so hard not to slide down to the cave mouth and start to fall. That had been terrifying. But he had gotten used to trusting that the gate at the cave mouth would always catch him and bring him back up. And he was getting used to this, too. And getting over the feeling that he was as much a prisoner inside this airplane as he had been in the cave, because that feeling was completely irrational. Now he had the power to leave this plane whenever he wanted. So he didn’t want to. Mostly.

  “You’ll get a crick in your neck from keeping your head twisted toward the window the whole way,” said a woman’s voice. In a strange version of the language of Iceway.

  Eluik was startled, but didn’t show it. Slowly he turned his head and then his body until he could see the woman who was sitting in Enopp’s seat. Enopp had gone to the toilet. This woman had not been in the waiting area and she had not boarded the airplane, because Eluik had made a point of memorizing everybody on the plane.

  “When Enopp comes back, he’s going to want his seat,” said Eluik.

  “Since we both know that you and your brother could simply gate yourselves to wherever you’re going…”

  “You must be Hermia,” said Eluik.

  She smiled. “You were warned to watch out for me?”

  Eluik almost laughed at her vanity. “Because you speak a version of the Icewegian language, so you’re a gatemage, and that’s a very short list.”

  “You should really learn English,” she said.

  “Enopp will be back soon,” said Eluik, “and the airplane’s full, so if you have something to discuss…”

  “It’s really quite simple. This airplane is headed for Blue Grass Airport in Lexington, and I can’t think why you might be going there.”

  “That’s where the airplane lands,” said Eluik. “So it seemed prudent to choose the same destination.”

  “Something or someone near Lexington.”

  “If Danny wanted you to know…”

 
“Are you his dog now? On his leash?” asked Hermia. “I know he’s keeping you safe. I know that the Silvermans’ farm isn’t all that safe now.”

  “Because of the games you played with the Wild Gate,” said Eluik.

  “All my fault, I’m so wicked,” said Hermia. “And you lived in a cave for a year or so, weren’t you the silly one.”

  “Not my choice,” said Eluik, “and so you’re claiming that your moving the Wild Gate wasn’t your fault. But I’m a child and had no choice, and you’re … older and definitely had choices.”

  “Just tell me where you’re going,” said Hermia, “so I know whether you pose a threat to me or my Family. It will save me hours of spying, and if I believe what you tell me, it might make it possible for me to keep my Family from interfering.”

  “Just don’t tell them where we are,” said Eluik. “But wait—I’m sure you’d have to tell them.”

  “Or they’d kill my pet kitten,” said Hermia. “As you said, Enopp will be back soon.”

  Eluik thought it through. Hermia’s actions were the reason that all the Families became aware of Silvermans’ farm. Maybe they knew about Eluik and Enopp and maybe they didn’t. But if word was out, and somebody made it to Mittlegard from Westil, then they might be in danger. How would it help to tell Hermia?

  Then again, if she couldn’t be kept from gating into a moving airplane, she probably couldn’t be kept from spying on them wherever they were.

  “There’s a farm near Danville, Kentucky,” said Eluik.

  “Whose farm?”

  “A retired Air Force officer. Not a mage of any kind, but he and Marion are friends.”

  “So they don’t think you need any more protection or training,” said Hermia.

  “Protection?” asked Eluik. “We can do what you do. We don’t need protection. We just need beds and a roof and some food and water.”

  “So here’s the million-dollar question. Are you hiding from your enemies on Westil, or is somebody in Mittlegard looking for you?”

  “None of the Families know we exist, unless you told them,” said Eluik.

  “I didn’t,” said Hermia, “because you two were seriously troubled. All better now, I see.”

  “So now you’ll tell?”

  “If I told, word would spread, and some Family would get the crazy idea of kidnapping you and forcing one of you to gate them around or they’ll kill the other.”

  “Wouldn’t work,” said Eluik. “We can both do it, so which of us would be the hostage?”

  “This Air Force officer—”

  “Retired.”

  “Can he pilot a jet?”

  “That was never his job. He was in theory and doctrine and history and intelligence.”

  “Just wondering.”

  “Because you need a pilot,” said Eluik.

  “Because I wonder if Danny thinks he needs a pilot.”

  “He needs somebody willing to take us into his home in a remote place and help us stay alive a while longer. But the longer we talk, the more I’m thinking maybe we should go back to Westil so we don’t have you on our back.”

  “I can go to Westil, too,” said Hermia. “No escaping me. But I don’t wish you any harm, and I’ll keep your location secret.”

  “Then you didn’t need to ask me anything,” said Eluik. He turned back to the window.

  “Maybe I just wanted to see if you were really talking now,” said Hermia.

  “Or maybe you just wanted to test your Icewegian accent. You gatemages and your vanity about languages.”

  The plane bounced a little, and the pilot started talking about being on the initial approach to Blue Grass Airport near Lexington, Kentucky.

  “Enopp’s coming back,” said Hermia. “Thanks for the chat. Happy landing.”

  Then she was gone. In a few seconds, Enopp plunked down on the seat and refastened his seat belt.

  “That wasn’t Pat,” said Enopp.

  “Hermia,” said Eluik. “Wanting to know where we were going.”

  “Did you tell her to go … well, I never realized, we don’t have a Westilian equivalent of what I wanted to say in English.”

  “I told her that we were going to stay with somebody who isn’t a mage.”

  Enopp nodded. “True enough.”

  Eluik looked out the window again. “The ground’s a lot closer.”

  “That’s an essential part of landing,” said Enopp.

  The pilot warned them not to use laptops from now on.

  “Do you think we’ll ever go back to Westil?” asked Enopp.

  “To Westil?” asked Eluik. “Probably. To Iceway? Probably not.”

  “Because our father doesn’t need us now. Because Bexoi gave him a son.”

  Eluik shook his head. “Because Mother gave him a son.”

  “Bexoi’s son.”

  “Bexoi’s body’s son,” said Eluik. “And it’s Mother’s body now.”

  “Our half-brother,” said Enopp.

  “I think he should spend a couple of years in a cave, don’t you?” said Eluik.

  “Nobody should spend a minute in a cave that keeps rolling you out into empty space,” said Enopp. “That baby did nothing to us.”

  “Wisely said,” Eluik answered. “The important question is: Do we go right back and tell Silvermans that Hermia found us on the way?”

  “What’s the point?” said Enopp. “She can follow us anywhere. If she wants to tell people where we are, she can.”

  “So if we can’t do anything about it,” said Eluik, “it doesn’t matter what we do.”

  “We keep working on learning how to be mages,” said Enopp. “And I’m not sure how we can, because now I’m in the habit of going places this way instead of using my gates. And we still have no idea what your magery is.”

  “If I’m not drekka,” said Eluik.

  “Drekka or drowther, you can go wherever you want and heal yourself in the process. So we’ll figure out more and more about this new kind of magery, and meanwhile we’ll also try to work on our own natural mageries. If any.”

  “Eloquently said,” Eluik replied. “That’s why I never minded having you speak for me. You always said things better than I could have myself.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t understand that I was the one keeping you silent.”

  “That was the hundredth apology,” said Eluik.

  “Oh, is that my limit?”

  “All apologies after the hundredth have to come in the form of money.”

  “I don’t have any money.”

  “Then that was your limit.”

  Eluik went back to looking out the window, and when the plane gently touched the runway and then slowed down with great suddenness, Eluik marveled as so often before: These machines the drowthers make here in Mittlegard—why didn’t anybody in Westil learn how to make airplanes?

  Different worlds, different ways.

  Colonel Diamond was waiting at the gate for them. He had already shown them his identification, apparently, because he thanked the flight attendant and introduced himself to Eluik and Enopp and that was it, they were racing to keep up with him as he strode through the terminal toward the exit.

  Hermia was standing at the curb when they came outside, as if she were waiting for a ride. Eluik pretended not to know her, and she pretended not to know him. He just hoped she didn’t think it would be funny to pop into the back seat of Colonel Diamond’s car on the way to his farm. He didn’t know how much Diamond already knew about Mithermages. Eluik certainly didn’t want to have to explain people popping into existence and then disappearing again.

  “Can’t wait for you to get out to Persimmon Knob,” said Diamond.

  Eluik gave Enopp a little half-smile. If he really couldn’t wait, they could go there instantly. But of course that was just an expression. An idiom. Eluik didn’t have to be a gatemage to understand that.

  The scenery was trees and hills and blacktop, just like in Ohio. And nothing like Iceway. Eluik lo
oked out the window the whole way. He decided that he didn’t miss the bare-stone craggy cliffs and tors of Iceway. This softer landscape of deep deciduous forest alternating with meadows, pastures, and cultivated fields gave him a greater sense of peace.

  Does this mean that I’m a treemage? That I have some affinity with vegetation, so that in a stony, icy place I feel tense and bereft? Or is it simply an echo of the simple reality that in Iceway, I was always in danger and suffered terrible things, while here in Mittlegard, in America, in Ohio and now Kentucky, I really am more safe?

  Though with that weird Greek woman able to pop in and spy on me whenever she wants—or kill me, if that idea appealed to her—maybe I’m not all that safe after all.

  “What kind of mage are you?” Enopp asked Colonel Diamond.

  Diamond hesitated. Perhaps it took a moment for him even to make sense of the question. Drowthers in Mittlegard weren’t used to the idea of mages, or so the Silvermans had warned them.

  “I don’t think I’m a mage at all,” said Diamond. “Not even interested in being one, to tell the truth. I think what people like you can do is cool, in a potentially destructive kind of way. I’ve been hearing that some of the Great Families have been getting involved with our military and some of my friends are scared. But I guess we’ll all just have to get used to a world with these strange abilities in it. Doesn’t mean I want to have any myself, though.”

  Eluik thought that Diamond’s answer showed that he had clearly given the matter some thought. And when he said that he didn’t want any powers himself, Eluik figured that meant that he really wished he had them, but knew it was never going to happen, and therefore kept himself happy by pretending not to care.

  “Maybe if you went through a Great Gate,” said Enopp, “you’d find out that you had powers you never thought you had. Like what happened to Danny’s girlfriend, Pat.”

  “Maybe,” said Diamond, not revealing any particular interest.

  “There aren’t any Great Gates in the world right now,” said Eluik to Enopp.

  “I know,” said Enopp. “But there could be.”

  “You planning to make one?” asked Eluik. “Because the Gate Thief is still very much alive, and lots more powerful than you are.”