“The Guide will watch over us,” Matthew continued, “but you must take her place. You must join us. You'll see we were right.”
“Very well.” Her voice sounded hoarse. He kissed her lightly on the forehead, then beckoned to the others.
* * * *
Chimene moved toward her room in a daze, trying to keep her mind as blank as possible. She took a breath as the door closed behind her, then quickly shed her clothes before removing her shroud from a drawer.
I mustn't be afraid, she told herself. She was loved; that was why they wanted her with them. The Guide would watch over her, and Matthew would be there; surely sharing the rite in the presence of the others could not be that different from the times they were alone. But maybe Matthew did not expect her to go to him; perhaps this was another test for her, to see if she could reach out to another while he was present.
She steadied herself. The rite was what mattered; which man shared it with her did not. She had to be willing to love any of her brothers in Ishtar.
Chimene covered herself with her shroud. The dark cloth reached from the top of her head to the floor. She swayed a little on her bare feet, then opened the door.
Four shrouded figures waited for her at the end of the corridor. She caught a glimpse of one golden-skinned foot before its owner drew it under her shroud; that had to be Josefa Huong. Eva Danas was the tallest of the women; her shroud hid her form, but not her height. “The Spirit is with us,” another woman whispered; she recognized Kichi's voice.
Chimene felt nothing. Galina Kolek had told her that this was when she felt closest to the Spirit, that the rite always freed her from herself. Faith came so easily to some.
She followed the others into the common room. The ceiling light panels were dim. Through the dark fabric concealing her face, Chimene saw a blurred image on the screen, a vista of high mountain peaks topped by snow and covered with evergreens, overlooking a wide, grassy plain—Ishtar Terra as it would be.
The men were waiting for them. Each man was clothed in a long dark robe and stood by the mats in the center of the room. One shrouded woman seated herself in front of the screen as the men opened their robes, then let them fall.
The three women with Chimene did not move. Were they waiting for her to make her choice? She shivered, wanting to bolt from the room. Matthew was standing next to Boaz Huerta, his pale skin a contrast to the other man's darker hue. Lang Eberschild's head was bowed; his graying hair hid his eyes. Yusef Deniz lifted his bearded face and gazed directly at the shrouded women.
For a moment, Chimene felt a stirring inside her mind, as though something outside herself was trying to touch her thoughts. Could it be that she might feel the Spirit now? She emptied her mind, giving herself up to the dimly felt sensation; she would let it guide her, whatever it was.
She lowered her eyes and moved toward the men; the soft padding of the other women's footsteps followed her. She stopped before one man and touched him lightly on the hand, then looked up at Boaz's dark eyes.
She tensed as he drew her down onto a mat. She caught a glimpse of Matthew, only a few paces away on another mat, as he embraced another shrouded form, and then Boaz stretched out at her side. His hands roamed over her, feeling her body through her shroud. She was the Spirit of Venus to him now, the Spirit of the world still veiled in thick, dark clouds and hidden by the Parasol, as she was by her shroud. He had to appease her, placate the Spirit of the world they were transforming. His touch was gentle at first, as if he feared that she might not accept him. He reached under the cloth and caressed her belly and thighs.
Did he know who she was yet? He had shared the rite with the others before; had the unfamiliarity of her body already revealed who she was? It made no difference; she was all of his sisters now, only another aspect of all those who would be united by the Spirit.
His fingers explored her; she heard herself gasp. Another woman was moaning; a deeper cry answered hers. Boaz lifted Chimene's shroud above her hips, then lowered his head. His lips brushed against her belly; she opened her legs wider as his tongue found her slit.
She was ready for him more quickly than she had expected to be. He lifted her hips as she guided him into her. It was time to remove her shroud, to imagine the day when the clouds of Venus would finally part and the land below lay open to the sun. She drew the shroud up and lifted it from her face.
His arms tightened around her. She saw the delight in his eyes as he gazed into hers, his joy that the Spirit had guided her to him. This was the reason for her beauty—to make men even stronger in their devotion to Ishtar; Kichi had told her that. She embodied the Spirit of this world, demanding their love, reflecting the beauty this world would have when it was transformed. She was Ishtar as she moved under him, accepting his offering to Venus, certain once again of her purpose.
Matthew was groaning; she recognized the sound. Josefa was kneeling astride him; her black hair swayed as she threw her head back. Chimene hoped the others were feeling the joy she felt, Boaz was thrusting more rapidly inside her; she caught a glimpse of the Guide as she glanced past Boaz's brown shoulder.
Kichi's head was bare, her shroud draped around her shoulders. She was looking at Chimene with a cold, distant stare; a strange, almost mocking smile played about her lips. Chimene faltered, and then Boaz lowered his head, hiding Kichi from view. She clawed at his back and surrendered herself to him.
Twenty-one
Dyami sat at the edge of the grassy plain, just beyond the trees. From here, he could see the entrance to the residence where the Habbers working in the west dome lived. Once the windowless circular structure had sat at some distance from the nearest dwellings, but more houses had been built, and the walls of a few more were rising on the plain. Ten Habbers lived in that gray-walled house now; soon most of them would be gone. Some would go to their Habitat; two or three might stay on the Islands or go to work in the Freyja Mountains.
Bartai would be leaving; she had told him so a couple of days ago. She had said she would miss their talks, but she didn't seem unhappy about going home. Habbers were like that; they didn't get too attached to anyone here. Risa told him that was their way, but it seemed to him that it was partly the settlers’ fault, too, since they avoided the Habbers whenever possible.
His parents would not want him to be here, but he couldn't see that sitting here was actually disobeying them. He wasn't visiting the house, which they had forbidden; he was only looking at it. If Sef or Risa asked him where he had gone today, Dyami would tell them that he had been in the community greenhouses helping out, and that would be the truth.
Theron had taken his students there earlier, since their classes wouldn't begin again for another week, and had turned them over to the adults in the greenhouses. The children had been put to work checking the water gauges, weeding some of the tiers, and packing produce. One man had instructed them in how to put on the face masks and rebreathers anyone working in the large greenhouses had to wear. The plants flourished in an atmosphere with a higher percentage of carbon dioxide, and the man had been very stern about telling the children to make sure their masks were on tight. Alicia Hamlyn-Kateri clearly hadn't been listening; after she had fainted and was revived, the children were lectured about safety before being allowed to leave a bit early.
Bartai might come to the Habber house soon, or maybe she was inside and would decide to take a walk. He would not be disobeying his parents if he spoke to the Habber woman outside the residence; he wouldn't have too many more chances to talk to her. He wondered if she was leaving because of all those people in Ishtar who couldn't stop talking about how creepy Habbers were, the ones like his sister Chimene.
He glanced at the timepiece he wore on one finger and decided to wait another hour. If his friend Teo Lingard got here before then, he might wait a bit longer, but then he would have to head home before the light began to dim. The patrol was always out early along the main road that ran behind the Habber residence, and they usually que
stioned anyone who was loitering nearby.
Dyami did not like the patrol. They were nosy, always asking where you were going. Once, one patrol volunteer had asked him if he had seen one man leaving the Habber residence. Dyami had, but refused to admit it. The volunteer had muttered something about “offenses to Ishtar,” whatever that meant, before sending Dyami on his way. He hadn't seen the man doing anything wrong; therefore, he did not have to say anything about him. People on the patrol sometimes seemed much too curious without a good reason.
Almost all of the patrol volunteers were in Ishtar, even though most of the people in Oberg weren't members of the cult. Dyami had once asked Kolya why people put up with the patrol. “They're annoying sometimes,” Kolya had replied, “but they've prevented some trouble, and we're all probably safer because of them. You can say what you like about Ishtar, but at least they can get people organized when something needs to be done.” It was the way adults thought; they would put up with something they didn't much like, while telling themselves it was for their own good.
In the distance, a passenger cart was rolling along the main road; it stopped and a dark-haired boy jumped out. Dyami lifted a hand and waved as Teo Lingard ran toward him across the open expanse.
Teo was panting by the time he reached Dyami. “Sorry I took so long.” He threw himself onto the grass. “I had to get the goat shit cleaned up and into the sterilizer, and then my uncle had to go to a friend's, so he told me to take my cousin over to the nursery before I went anywhere. Seen Bartai yet?”
Dyami shook his head.
“She's really going?”
“Yeah.”
“Don't feel too bad about it.” Teo stretched out on his back; Dyami lay down next to him and gazed at the dome overhead. The disk of light was beyond the trees behind him, but a paler halo of light surrounded it. The dome was a vast, banded bowl, white at the center, then blending into yellow, gray, and at the edge, where it met the low wall that circled the settlement, black.
Teo said, “I wonder what a real sky is like, with clouds and all, I mean one where it isn't always dark the way it is outside.”
“Take a mind-tour and find out.”
“Maybe a real sky's very different.”
“My grandfather told me a little about it,” Dyami said. “He says it looks different, depending on where you are. In some places, you've got all these tall buildings and hills, so you can see only a little bit of the sky, but in others—” He slipped one arm under his head. “He met my grandmother on the North American Plains. He said that there the sky was sometimes like this huge kettle over the Earth.”
“That makes it sound like a dome,” Teo muttered.
“A lot bigger than a dome, and blue, with all kinds of different clouds. You know what it's like when you're in the middle of this dome and you can't see the edge? It's sort of like that, he says, except that you think you'll never get to the end of it. And it changes—sometimes the clouds seem close to the ground and sometimes there're hardly any clouds at all. And the wind—he says sometimes it would howl for days.”
“Sounds scary.”
“I guess it is, if you're not used to it.”
“It's always the same here,” Teo said, “except for the quakes. I wonder when the next one's going to hit.”
A quake had been predicted days ago. “They can't always pinpoint it—you know that.” Dyami thought of the little he had already learned. Earth's seismologists knew much more about the home world's fault lines and the patterns quakes followed there; here, prediction was somewhat more uncertain, since the planet's tectonic plates had only recently begun to shift. The landmass of Ishtar Terra was on one such plate. The Maxwell Mountains were far enough away from fault lines to make it safe to build settlements here, but they often trembled to the vibrations of powerful distant quakes. Dyami was used to the tremors, which usually did no more than shake the ground a little.
“I heard a good one yesterday,” Teo said. “My father told it to my uncle. Why do women in Ishtar wear shrouds during the rite?”
“I don't know.”
“Because they want to make sure the men will go through with their offering.” Teo chuckled. Dyami smiled tentatively, not sure he understood the joke, although he did know something about what happened during the rite. Maybe Teo didn't really get it either, but he was nine, a year older than Dyami, and seemed to think that extra year made him more knowledgeable.
“I heard another one, too,” Teo continued. “Why do men on patrol always carry wands?”
“The women do, too.”
“Come on, Dyami—it's a joke. Why do the men carry wands?”
“I don't know.”
“Because if the Spirit fails them during the rite, they've got something they can use.”
Dyami did not bother to laugh at this one. He sat up and peered toward the Habber house; the door opened as a man stepped outside. He sighed.
“Maybe you don't think they're funny,” Teo said, “with your sister and all.”
“Come on—you know what I think about that.”
“My father says it'd almost be worth joining if he could get close to her, but he didn't say it in front of my mother. How long are you going to wait for Bartai?”
“Not much longer.”
“We could make the rounds.”
“You know we haven't got time for that,” Dyami replied. Making the rounds was a game some of his friends played. They would go to the tunnel that led to the main dome, race through it, catch a passenger cart there, ride it to the tunnel that joined the main dome to the southeast dome, and keep going in the same manner until they were through the southwest dome and back at the point in the west dome where they had started. The object of the game was to get through all of Oberg's four domes in the shortest amount of time, which required running along the main roads if a cart didn't show up immediately.
Teo folded his arms across his chest, apparently prepared to wait. The slender black-haired boy was like Dyami, curious about things others said they shouldn't be curious about. He sometimes joined Dyami in his room for talks with Bartai over the screen, but not because he was particularly interested in engineering design; he was curious about Habbers.
Teo was unlike him in being more reckless. Dyami thought of their latest adventure, when Teo had dared him into sneaking out of his house after dark. Dyami had waited until the household was asleep before leaving by the side exit in his wing; he still remembered the sharp, almost pleasurable stab of fear he felt when meeting his friend outside.
The object of this venture was to cross the dome and get to the digger and crawler bay without being seen by the patrol. They got only as far as the lake before seeing two sashed volunteers talking to a man. The boys had hunkered down behind a shrub.
Dyami recognized the man then. He was Lucas Ghnassia, one of his neighbors, and even in the dim light, he could see how frightened Lucas was. What could the patrol want with him? Lucas Ghnassia was so respectable that he was often the topic of jokes; he was a chemist who spent most of his spare time doing chores around the house he shared with his sister's family. Dyami had never known him to smile or waste time visiting with his neighbors. Some of his schoolmates often loitered around Lucas's greenhouse, knowing that he would soon come out and, in his odd, rasping voice, lecture them about idling. His bondmate, Sirisa Wallis, was a pale, pretty woman as reclusive as he was; even Grazie had never been able to lure Sirisa into a session of gossip.
“We know where you've been,” the female volunteer said.
Lucas drew himself up; his hands trembled as he looped them around his red and black sash. “I was visiting a friend,” His voice was even more raspy than usual.
“And we know just what kind of friend. Did you think we wouldn't find out? We know what goes on—where you meet, what you do.”
“You must be mistaken,” Lucas replied. “Unless you have a reason to detain me, I must be on my way home.”
“We have to look out for you
,” the male volunteer said. “You're our brother in Ishtar now. Don't you want to move closer to the Spirit? What you do affronts Her. Did you think that donning the sash and practicing a deception would protect you from the consequences of your offense?”
Dyami frowned. The patrol was supposed to keep order, not pry into someone's personal business. If Lucas posed no threat to persons or property and was on his way home, why were they bothering with him?
“I've done nothing that concerns the patrol,” Lucas said; apparently the same thought had occurred to him.
“We have to love you,” the woman said, “but you're making it very difficult to do so. Very well—we'll try to forgive you this time. Even those close to the truth can occasionally fall into error. But the patrol will be looking out for you, and if you persist in your affronts, it may be time for you to confess them at a meeting. The fellowship will still love you if you're truly repentant, but others may not be so kind—many here would despise you for what you do.”
Lucas covered his eyes. “Go home,” the male volunteer said, “and open your soul to the Spirit. Reflect on your errors and gather the strength to resist them.”
Lucas stumbled away toward the path that led to his house. Dyami held his breath as the man passed; he heard a choked sound and wondered if Lucas was weeping. The man and the woman watched him in silence, then walked away along the shore of the lake toward Andrew Dinel's house.
“Shit,” Teo whispered when the two were out of sight. “Shit.” Dyami saw that his friend was trembling. “I wish I was anywhere except here.”
Dyami touched his arm. “Lucas could complain to the Council,” he said. “Yakov Serba would be on his side—the patrol isn't supposed to—”
“Don't be stupid, Dyami. Even if he did, those two would just get a reprimand, and then he'd be in even more trouble with them.” Teo wiped at his face. “We'd better go home.”
Venus of Shadows Page 39