Dissension

by Stacey Berg

  The priest cleared his throat. “Speaking of difficulty, Patri,” he began, then broke off with a nervous glance at Hunter.

  “You may speak in front of Echo, Jozef.”

  “Yes, Patri. I am sorry to have to tell you, but another magnifier broke today.”

  “Can you repair it?” There was a sharpness in the Patri’s question, quickly smoothed. “If there’s a way I’m sure you’ll find it.”

  The priest ran a hand through his thin white hair. “We will try, of course, but I’m afraid not. The lens itself cracked. As you know we’ve been trying to make more, but there is something missing from our technique. We’ve been searching the prints, but so far . . .”

  Hunter had often seen the priests, dozens of them, pale-­eyed and soft as Jozef, hunched over the tables in the nave, where the walls were lined with thousands of volumes, lovingly preserved, like the one Hunter had found. Besides the Saint, those prints were the greatest treasure of the world.

  “I understand, Jozef. I thank the forebears who thought to put all those words on paper before the last machine died, of course, but we can wish they had printed us an index, yes?” He laughed ruefully.

  Jozef’s thin lips curved, without, Hunter thought, much humor. “Yes, Patri. Meanwhile we will try our best with the repairs, of course.”

  “I know you will, Jozef. We should let you return to your work.” He gestured, and Hunter, with a last look through the lenses, surrendered the seat back to the priest.

  The Patri laid a hand on her shoulder as they left the laboratory. “You did well to bring her back.”

  Hunter thought of the broken girl lying in the dust. It isn’t her.

  It is the part of her that mattered, she told herself fiercely. She knew it too. Do not shame her with your weakness. “I did what the Church required, no more.”

  “The Church requires a great deal sometimes.”

  She stared at the priests manipulating the tiny plates. “We are made to serve, Patri.” It was the earliest truth a hunter learned.

  The Patri studied her face. Her heart quickened. He would see, surely he would see. “Do you never wish it could be otherwise, Echo?”

  “No, Patri,” she said, too quickly. “Of course not. The Church is all the world has left. The Saint. Those are the only things that matter. Without them . . .”

  “Even with them, I sometimes think.”

  She stood still, dismayed by heaviness of his tone. In all the annuals she could remember, nothing had shaken him, nothing challenged the calm and clear-­eyed judgment that sometimes made him seem as much hunter as priest. He read her expression and smiled. “But not very often. I was sorry to lose Ela, that’s all. You are all so precious to me. All those resources that go into your making, and so much we need you for . . . At least you found her in time. It wasn’t a total waste; we can make more.” He stared into the laboratory for a moment, then shook himself. “Go attend to your duties, Echo. You have a difficult task today, and you are late.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Eight pairs of brown eyes met hers unblinkingly across the blank surfaces of the classroom desks. At this stage the hunters were finally recognizing their strengths: everything was a test, in a way the playful scuffling and half-­realized challenges of the younger children were not. The sudden maturation of their bodies sometimes produced erratic moods; it was a dangerous time, for them and everyone around them.

  When Hunter had been this age, one of her batchmates had taken a game too far, and drowned a young priest in the baths. Accidents happened, of course, but this wasn’t one; and the Patri had had that hunter put down. It was more than just a lesson for the remaining 367s. “I’m worried about the line,” Hunter, passing by a cracked door when no one was supposed to be about, had heard the Patri say. “The type is starting to blur. I’m afraid there will be more to cull.”

  “We will do what we must,” the Materna had answered, voice heavy with sorrow. “The Church must be preserved. It is the only hope of the world.”

  “Yes, I know, and yet the world is changing around us. . . .”

  There was more, but Hunter had kept dutifully on her way, not lingering to overhear the rest, no matter how much she wanted to. The words were not meant for her. She had put them resolutely out of her mind and not considered them again until now, when she faced Ela’s batchmates with the memory of the laboratory and the Patri’s strange mood still roiling her thoughts.

  She made sure she showed no uncertainty as she met each girl’s eyes in turn. The atmosphere in the room was disturbed, and most of them looked as if they hadn’t slept, though they were surely exhausted from the long desert exercise. This batch had not lost one of its own in over an annual. It was always a difficult lesson, both to learn and to teach. Often it played itself out in anger.

  One by one she let the girls study her, measure their strength against hers, and one by one they looked away. The seventh, the next to last one left, took longest. Hunter felt the faintest tightening in her belly. When the girl finally blinked it was almost arrogant, a concession but not a defeat. Gem, this number seven was called. An apt name for her, hard and cold. Not at all like Ela. Strange, that those two were the only ones of the batch whose names came easily to Hunter. But then, she spent most of her time away in the desert now, doing the Patri’s bidding.

  When all the girls were staring down at their desks Hunter finally spoke. “You have questions about yesterday’s events. You may ask.”

  They hesitated, exchanging worried glances. She waited with hunter patience. They were shaken; she could not fault them for caution, though in this case it was unnecessary. At last, when no one else volunteered, the fourth raised an uncertain hand. “In the after-­session Priest Dalto said that Ela had to be put down.”

  “Yes. She had fallen off a cliff and was too badly hurt to survive.” There it was, the cold fact. They stared at it as if it were Ela’s body laid before them.

  The sixth asked, “Are you the one who found her?”

  “Yes.” Anger flickered across some of the faces, fear across others as they processed her answer. If she had found Ela, she had put Ela down. Hunter faced them calmly, letting them picture the scene, imagine themselves in Ela’s place. See Hunter leaning over them, strong, hard hands reaching out, not to save them but to finish everything . . . They had seen death before, of course, but not a killing. One looked away, out the open shutters towards the desert, though the high Church wall blocked the view from here.

  “What was her error?” the first asked, managing to sound calm despite whatever emotion widened her dark eyes. Hunter nodded approval.

  “That is a good question, but it assumes she made an error.” She paused to let the young hunters chew on that. They didn’t like the taste. It was one thing when someone made a mistake, no matter how dire the outcome; the rest always assumed they would perform better themselves. But if Ela had died through no fault of her own, perhaps the same could happen to any of them. Not all of them had thought of that possibility before. Now they would never forget. When Hunter was sure, she said, “In this case you are correct. Ela let discomfort override caution; she slipped seeking water. It was unnecessary.” The threat of her own anger caught her by surprise; she dispelled it with a deliberate breath. “What else would you like to know?”

  “Did—­did she say anything?” It was the sixth again, voice trembling. Hunter hid a frown. Tears, like temper, were not uncommon among hunters of this age, but this was not the place. Perhaps the girl had paired with Ela. The attachments among hunters at this age burned hot, but the girl should have developed better self-­control by now.

  “She made her report. That was all the time there was.”

  “Was . . .” The girl broke off. Fay, Hunter finally remembered.

  “If you have a question, Fay, ask. This is a time to learn.”

  Fay swallowed. “Was she frig
htened?”

  Ah. This was an important part of the lesson. She had not expected to be able to address it so directly. “What do you think?”

  A little ripple of unease stirred the girls. “I would be,” Fay said in a low voice. Hunter raised her estimate of the girl; it was a difficult admission for a juvenile to make, especially in front of the rest of her batch.

  Gem barely tried to hide her disdain. “If she was, she deserved to be put down.”

  “That is an ignorant answer,” Hunter retorted. “We are all afraid from time to time.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Then you deprive yourself of a weapon, which is also ignorant. Properly managed, fear is useful; it sharpens the reflexes. It increases strength for a short time. It can save your life.”

  “Was Ela afraid?” Fay asked, still too wide-­eyed.

  The calm white face rose in Hunter’s memory, as it would in her dreams when she could sleep again. “No.”

  “Did she fight you?” That from Gem, of course.

  “No.”

  “I would have. And I wouldn’t have been afraid.” Not a boast, but a statement of fact. Hunter believed her.

  “Then one of us would die, Gem Hunter 378.” Gem held her hard stare for a long moment before she finally blinked. The girl leaned back in her chair, unchastened, merely looking thoughtful. She might have been reconsidering her judgment, or thinking about the noon meal. When she next met Hunter’s eyes, her face showed nothing beyond a satisfied half smile. And Hunter felt a chill, that had nothing to do with the desert breeze drifting through the window.

  CHAPTER 4

  The fugitive Saint was afraid.

  The girl sat on the bare sand next to the pitiful remnants of a fire, grubby robe pooled around her, skinny arms wrapped protectively around her knees. She looked like a lost child. “How did you find me?”

  Hunter drew the scanner from her belt. It must have looked like a weapon; the Saint flinched. Hunter shook her head. “It doesn’t hurt.” She ran the bluish ray over her own palm to prove it. She gestured, and the Saint reluctantly held out her hand. The green glow of her skin was startling in the gathering dark. “The priests tagged you with it when they made you.” Hunter looked at the thin, dirty girl in front of her, swallowing dismay. “We have to hurry. The old Saint is dying. City systems are already beginning to fail. Cityens will die, if you don’t ascend soon.”

  “Yet look at me, hiding in the desert like a rabbit. You must be very disappointed.”

  Hunter could only stare back at her without answering.

  “See? You don’t believe I can do it either. Pretend you never found me. No one will know.”

  For an instant, looking at the frightened child, Hunter wavered. Then: “We are all made to serve. I have to take you back.”

  The Saint hugged herself tighter. “I don’t want to go.”

  The refectory was warm already, although the enormous fans, broader than a hunter was tall, pulled fresh air through the walls on either end. The nuns took up three long tables in the middle of the massive room, laughing and chattering away like the cityen girls they were, while the weanling 388s stalked each other around their legs. Perhaps twenty of the nuns had babies at breast—­the 390s, those would be—­and another dozen or more were gravid, by the looks of them ready to deliver in weeks, another batch of hunters for the Church. There would be no Saint among these births. The priests made those singly, far from the hunters and nuns. And none would be needed for a long time yet.

  The nuns sat spread legged in their loose robes, patting their ponderous bellies while a pair of the newer girls, tithed late last year, took their turns bringing the steaming bowls from the kitchen and passing heavily laden platters. Hunter paused, smelling greens, a luxury she had missed in the desert. The oblivious nuns carried on their conversation, apparently gathering information from one of the new girls who had sat down with them.

  “He did that?”

  “Yes. My cousin told me. And didn’t ask for anything in return.” The women’s eyes were round with admiration.

  “I heard something like that too,” another one put in. “When Yeral was sick, that Bender who runs the melter, he sent some men to help until Yeral got well again.”

  “A Bender?” the first woman asked dubiously. “Why’d he help them? It’s not even his same clave.”

  “Don’t know. Got to take care of each other, I’ve heard some say, but I don’t see why, when we’ve got the Church already taking care of us. If the Benders’d asked, a medical priest would’ve got Yeral better before they needed the Warder’s help. Don’t know why they didn’t send for one. Maybe—­Saints, Luida, watch that child!”

  It was too late: a 388, reflexes not as advanced as her ambition, misjudged a pounce and fell with an un-­hunterlike cry, startling a nursing baby whose flailing limb knocked over a glass. There was a tinkling crash, and another peal of laughter as the serving girls scurried to clean up before the weanlings could make it worse.

  Hunter kicked a bit of glass off her boot. She would not be sorry when the Patri sent her back to the peace of the desert. Dodging the worst of the mess, she made her way towards the farthest table, where a group of hunters were consuming their meal in a somewhat more orderly fashion. They noticed her coming, of course, and their conversation stilled, then resumed, a pause just brief enough for her to wonder if she had imagined it. She took a seat with a nod she hoped passed for companionable, and focused on the plate the breathless young nun put in front of her.

  “Echo Hunter 367!”

  Even in a crowd of like-­sounding hunters she would never mistake that voice. She rose to face the woman just arriving. “Criya.”

  “It’s good to see you.” Criya reached out to clasp her shoulders briefly—­more demonstrative than hunters usually were, but in this case it was permissible. The 367s had had bad luck, six lost at once when their aircar crashed in the chaos while the old Saint was dying, and now there were none left except herself and Criya. Even now Hunter still half expected to see Delia or Freyn, who had lined up for so long on either side of her that they seemed to have grown from her shoulders like extra arms. Sometimes, when they were first gone, she’d wondered what it would feel like to stand with other batches, the 370s, for instance, between Dava and Fallon. But they had their own fifth, Evlin, and that would never be Hunter’s place.

  Criya was right, it was good to see a surviving batchmate.

  And annuals ago they had been close. Hunter reached back in memory, trying to recall the attachment they had shared; found instead Fay’s face, and Ela’s. What would it have been like if Criya had died when they were that age?

  But Criya was here, speaking to her now. “Well done with Ela. You were always good at finding things.” She grinned, pulling up a stool; the poor serving girl brought yet another plate. “I hope if I’m ever lost they send you to look for me.”

  Before Hunter could answer, a dry voice said, “Not much chance of getting lost in the city, is there, Criya?” It took Hunter a moment to place the speaker: Indine, a 362; Hunter had spent little time with that batch. Another of them, Nyree, looked on with a cold smile.

  “More than staying here watching over nuns and weanlings, Indine. There are new habited areas all the time. I don’t know why cityens can’t stay put where it’d be easier to watch over them. They’ve spread out so far we can hardly keep order everywhere at once. Although,” Criya added, laughing at the commotion yet another 388 was causing, “you still might have the more difficult task.”

  Hunter let the banter sail over her head. Hunters used it for practice, the quick exchanges, probes and thrusts no different from any other kind of sparring. There were rarely serious injuries, and even if there were, one learned. It had never been Hunter’s strongest skill, and today she had no heart for it. She concentrated on her greens and was reaching for a second portion whe
n the fans stopped turning.

  She was half out of her chair, hand on her belt where a static wand would be if they carried them inside the compound, when the power came back. It hadn’t been more than a second or two, but that should have been plenty of time for the others to react as well, readying themselves to face the threat.

  Instead they sat in their chairs, eyeing her as they would a small piece of equipment that had malfunctioned unexpectedly, more curious than alarmed. The nuns and tiny hunters seemed not to have noticed anything at all. “It’s a bad circuit,” Indine said around a mouthful. “They reported it at teachings.”

  Hunter sat back down, chagrined, and the others resumed their conversation where she had interrupted it, ignoring her, but she knew they could sense the heat in her skin, mark the effects of the fighting hormones coursing wastefully through her blood. “Is something wrong?” Criya whispered, leaning close.

  “I didn’t know about the circuit, that is all.”

  “Things break from time to time, Echo. There is no reason to be so alarmed; this isn’t the desert. The priests will fix it.”

  The fans hitched once more, then caught, turning steadily through the rest of the meal. Hunter hoped no one noticed that she had lost her appetite. But Criya, each time Hunter looked, was watching her.

  Hunter watched Ela’s batchmates practice with projtrodes under the careful tutelage of Tana Hunter 337. She wanted to confer with Tana, but she had no excuse to interrupt the exercise. The juveniles were working in the modeled ruins of a city building that had been assembled in the farthest corner of the compound. It was a good day for a lesson, the hot sun recharging the trodes nearly as soon as they were empty and giving the targets plenty of power to pop up lifelike from within the rubble. Tana had been training batches since Hunter was younger than these juveniles were now.