by Amy Thomson
The story over, Teller sat there in silence, listening to the ponderous, comforting waltz of Abeha's hearts, her thoughts held in silent sympathy by the harsel.
"Their lives blew out like candle flames," Teller remembered. "Gone, just like that." She pinched her fingers together in the darkness, as though snuffing out a candle. "I should have been grateful that Barbara lived, but every day, and all through the night, all I could think of was what I'd lost." Teller closed her eyes in remembered pain. "I was becoming a living ghost. You took me away and helped me remember what living was like. If you hadn't done that . . ." She shook her head.
"I can't DO it again," Abeha whispered in her mind. "you have to let me go."
"I know," Teller admitted, "but you're the only one who remembers. What will I do without you?"
"let the boy help," Abeha advised her. "samad loves
YOU. HE NEEDS YOU."
"He's helped already, Abeha. I would have drunk a lot more at Kyrenia, but he was always there, watching. Even when he was up in our room, I knew he was worried about me," Teller said. "But I'm afraid of what will happen without you. What if I forget everything?
"other harsels will hold my memories," Abeha reassured her "you can remember with them."
"But they won't be you!" Teller protested.
"perhaps not, but our memories will live on in
THEM."
Teller shook her head. "Nothing will replace you, Abeha," she said, laying her hand on one wall of the harsel's hold.
"I KNOW, TELLER, AND I'M SORRY."
"Oh Abeha, we've lived such a good life together," "yes we have," Abeha agreed, "and my people are
GRATEFUL FOR WHAT YOU HAVE BROUGHT TO US. YOU OPENED OUR EYES TO THE REST OF THE UNIVERSE, AND YOU BROUGHT OTHER HUMANS TO SHARE OUR WORLD WITH US."
Teller smiled and shook her head. "They brought themselves."
"with your help," Abeha reminded her. "without you,
WE MIGHT NEVER HAVE FORGED THE COMPACT."
"The Compact isn't enough," Teller said. "Humans are greedy and forgetful. Given a chance, my people would destroy the very things that make this world so unique and precious."
"WHICH IS WHY YOU MUST LIVE ON AFTER I DIE. MY CHILDREN WILL NEED YOU."
"Everyone dies, Abeha. My response to rejuve is incredibly rare. I'm one of the oldest humans in the universe. But even I won't live forever." Teller thought of the long, empty years stretching ahead after Abeha's death. "I'm not sure I want to live without you, Abeha. I'll be so alone!"
"you have samad. he needs you, teller."
"It isn't enough, Abeha."
"it will have to be. in honor of all we've shared, you must try to stay alive. thalassa still needs its
PILOT."
"I'll try Abeha. I promise I'll try."
"thank you, teller," Abeha said, "your promise
FREES MY HEART."
The two of them spent the rest of the night in a bittersweet communion, remembering their long, intertwined lives. When the pale, watery dawn came, Teller dressed and went up onto Abeha's broad back, and the two of them watched the sun come up, sharing the view through each other's eyes.
CHAPTER 7
THEY SPENT THE NEXT COUPLE OF MONTHS sailing slowly northeast toward the mating grounds. Abeha fed greedily, fueling the development of her eggs, and storing up fat to feed her offspring after they hatched. As her fat reserves grew, Abeha rode higher in the water. Her leeway increased, and she began to roll and wallow in high seas.
The harsel's approaching mating and eventual death made every day seem precious to Samad. He sometimes found himself doing everything as slowly and deliberately as possible, in an attempt to stretch out their remaining time together.
They sailed among the wild harsels, far from the usual lanes of shipping traffic. The harsels, hearing of Abeha's decision to become female, sought her out, to honor her and share memories of her life. A great fleet of wild harsels usually surrounded them. The sea resounded with their
singing. At night their mindsongs rang through Samad's dreams.
The wild harsels were extremely curious about Abeha's humans. During calm weather, Samad was often invited to ride on the wild harsels' backs. At first, Samad had difficulty understanding the wild har. He was used to Abeha's almost human use of words. The wild harsels communicated in images and sensations; only a few of them were able to use words. They were fascinated by life on land and longed to know everything about it.
When he was with the wild har, Samad found himself having incredibly vivid memories of the oddest things. Sometimes the memories were long and involved. He remembered a trip through the countryside with Teller, seeing every flower, smelling the scents of dust and crushed grass as though he had never experienced them before. Sometimes the memories were only extremely vivid sense impressions: the taste of bread still hot from the oven, or the smell of hay and manure in a barn. The wild harsels drew these memories from Samad's mind like a magician pulling silk scarves from the empty air.
It should have been scary, but the harsels never retrieved unpleasant, personal, or frightening memories. Often Samad would spend what felt like ten minutes involved a pleasant daydream, only to discover that he had been sitting there for a couple of hours.
He spent several afternoons sharing his memories with a harsel named Haiea. Then Haiea wove a memory song from Samad's favorite memories. It wasn't until the song was done that Samad realized that they were the focus of intense concentration by nearly a hundred harsels.
"you should be honored," Abeha told Samad when he came aboard after Haiea's concert, "haiea is one of the
FINEST MINDSINGERS OF HIS GENERATION. THIS IS THE
FIRST TIME HE'S COMPOSED A MEMORY SONG ABOUT HUMANS."
"I thought it was wonderful," Samad said. "But I didn't realize that it was a performance."
"the song is a masterpiece." Abeha told him. "centuries FROM NOW, HARSELS WILL BE SINGING THOSE MEMORIES OF YOURS."
Samad looked back at Haiea's sail, receding into the distance. "How can I thank him?" he asked Abeha.
Abeha's laughter rang through his mind, "haiea creates MINDSONGS BECAUSE THEY BRING HIM JOY, NOT FOR THANKS. HE SINGS WHETHER NO ONE IS LISTENING OR EVERYONE IS LISTENING. BESIDES, HE KNOWS HOW YOU FELT ABOUT THE SONG. HE LISTENED TO YOU AS YOU WERE LISTENING TO HIM."
If the harsel fleet passed an island with a suitable harbor, they would stop while Teller and Samad donned diving gear to clean the harsels' bottoms and holds. After working on the harsels/Samad and Teller rowed ashore to explore the islands. They cooked their evening meal over a driftwood fire while the sun set and the stars came out. If the weather was clear and warm, they would sleep there on the beach under the moons and stars.
Once, while exploring one of the deserted out-islands, they discovered a gnarled grove of ancient mango trees. Though they were covered with vines and epiphytes and scarred by storms, the trees still boasted a heavy crop of ripe fruit.
Teller climbed up and bounced up and down on a thick tree limb, sending a shower of ripe mangos thudding down onto the leaf litter below.
"It's not every day that you get to eat fruit from a tree that the Pilot planted," she remarked when Samad handed her a relatively unbruised mango.
"The Pilot planted these trees?" he said, looking around at the massive, gnarled trunks of the venerable trees.
Teller nodded. "It's a Verified site. I'll show you on the chart."
Samad wandered from tree to tree, eating the sweet, sticky mango. When he glanced back, Teller had finished her mango and was probing a cluster of stones, half-buried in the thick humus of the forest floor. He came over to help her shift the stones. Then she picked up a stick and began stirring the dirt, disturbing a swarm of many-legged bugs. Samad stepped back to avoid the scattering insects, but he clearly heard the metallic clink that made Teller pause. She scrabbled in the dirt and came up with a small metal ring. She brushed the clinging dirt away from
the ring and then examined it closely.
"Here," she said, handing the ring to Samad. "It's a pull ring from one of the Pilot's ration tins."
"How do you know it was the Pilot's?" Samad asked.
"The colonists' survival rations had different pull rings. It's one of the ways archeologists identify a real Pilot site like this one."
Samad gazed at the silvery ring for a long time before handing it back to Teller.
She waved it away. "I want you to have it, Samad. I know how much the Pilot means to you."
"Really?" Samad said, eyes wide with awe.
The wrinkles around Teller's eyes deepened as she smiled. "Really."
Samad strung the little metal ring on a leather thong and wore it around his neck, a precious relic of the Pilot. He gathered a dozen fairly fresh mango seeds from beneath the ancient trees.
"What are those for, Samad?" Teller asked him.
"I thought I'd plant them on some other island where there aren't any mangoes." he explained to Teller. "If someone gets shipwrecked or settles there, they'll have mangos to eat."
"I'm sure the Pilot would approve," she told him. "Those seeds probably won't breed true, but they come from good trees that have survived everything that Thalassa can throw at them. Who knows, maybe one of them will grow up into a new variety."
For the most part, Teller seemed to be coping by doing her best to pretend that nothing had changed. But it was hard for her to keep up the pretense when surrounded by a fleet of harsels intent on eulogizing Abeha before her death. Occasionally it would all get to be too much, and Teller would need to get away from Abeha and her escorts.
Then Teller would unship the sturdy dory that she kept for longer voyages over the open ocean, step its mast, fuel its hydrogen engine, and head for human civilization.
At Abeha's insistence, Samad always accompanied Teller on these trips. She accepted Samad's company with grudging grace. Leaving the harsel fleet behind, she sailed the seaworthy little boat with unerring accuracy to some tiny island village. Once she got there, she headed for the nearest taverna, where she sat and drank in moody silence.
Watching Teller drink, he remembered his mother, lost in a glassy-eyed drug dream, and wondered if Teller would kill herself with her drinking the way his mother had killed herself with drugs. Frightened, he pushed the thought away, but it always returned to haunt him.
Teller would wake late the next morning, groggy and ill. She wandered through the market, waiting until the bar opened and she could drink. Sometimes, she tried to tell
stories. But her dark mood soured the tales in her mouth. Her jests became sardonic and biting, and her listeners slipped away.
When drinking failed to ease her pain, Teller would take off into the back country. She drove herself hard, sleeping in the open wherever night took her, until at last sheer exhaustion did what drink could not.
After several of these grueling hikes, Samad began to stay behind at the inn. He knew that Abeha wouldn't like his letting Teller go off by herself, but he simply couldn't keep up with her. And Samad knew that one of the reasons Teller drove herself so hard was to wear him out so that she could finally be completely alone. She needed her solitude.
And Samad needed it, too. Being caught between Teller and Abeha was hard. He needed a chance to relax and be a kid again. So while Teller wandered, Samad poked about whatever village they had landed at, playing with other kids or telling them the stories he had learned from Teller.
His storytelling was rough and ragged at first, but under the brutal tutelage of other children's attention, Samad learned to hold an audience with a well-timed pause or a sudden change of pace. Soon he began collecting a few carved buttons and some pieces of candy. Emboldened, he began making up stories himself, embroidering new adventures onto the worn hem of the Pilot Cycle.
One day he was sitting amid a circle of admiring children, telling a rousing story about the Pilot, kidnapped by a gang of off-world pirates, when a shadow fell across his back. Samad, caught up in his story, tried to ignore the shadow, but it was stealing his audience's attention. Finally, unwillingly, he turned and looked behind him.
A man stood there, cloaked in the brilliant, hand-woven short cape worn by male storytellers. He was short and stocky, with a round, firm belly and the wiry strength of
someone who had grown up herding sheep in rough country. Though his face seemed more suited to laughter, his current expression was stern and angry. With a commanding flick of his head, the stranger dispersed the half-dozen children in Samad's audience.
When the other children were gone, the stranger hunkered down beside Samad.
"What were you doing?" the man inquired.
Samad shrugged and looked down. "It was just a story I made up," he mumbled.
"About the Pilot, yes?"
Grudgingly, Samad nodded.
The stranger picked up Samad's cap and examined the contents. There were three or four pieces of candy and a couple of buttons. "Telling stories for gifts, were you?" he observed. "You're not a member of the Storytellers' Guild, I suppose."
"I'm with Teller," Samad said. "She's a Guild member."
"But you are not."
Samad shook his head, hot with anger and shame.
"Where is Teller?"
Samad shrugged. "Out walking the hills somewhere. I don't know when she'll be back." It was a lie; Teller was somewhere in town, buying supplies or maybe loading them into the boat, but Samad wanted to talk to Teller first, to find out just how much trouble he'd gotten her into.
"I see," the man said. "I'll talk with Teller when she returns. In the meantime, no more stories. I'll be watching."
"And who are you to tell me no?" Samad demanded. He was shocked and angry that Teller's name had not carried the day.
"My name is Florio Hakiapulos. I'm the Guild representative for this archipelago. It is forbidden to tell stories for money without a Guild license, or to add stories to an official story cycle without Guild approval. You've done both. I'm surprised Teller hasn't explained this to you. She could get into real trouble with the Guild."
"Teller doesn't know I'm doing this," Samad said, leaping to her defense. "I was bored. So I started telling stories. Teller always asks for gifts, so I did, too."
"I see." The storyteller stood, looking thoughtful. "Please tell Teller to talk to me when she returns." He turned to leave, then paused and turned back with a sudden, sunny smile.
"I'm sorry I had to stop you. It was a good story." He walked off, whistling a tune to himself.
Samad watched the man walk away, his heart roiling with emotions. He didn't know whether to be flattered or frightened. He had gotten Teller in trouble, but Ser Hakiapulos had liked his story.
At least the lie he had told had bought them a little time to figure out what to do next. Samad ran back to the boat. If Teller wasn't on the boat, then he'd search for her in the market, and then the tavernas.
Teller was in the dory, loading the contents of a basket into their small solar-powered refrigerator.
"Hey, Samad," she called as he hurried down the dock. "You're just in time to help me stow the last couple of baskets. You ready to sail?"
"We can't go yet, sera," Samad said. "There's a man from the Guild. Ser Hakiapulos is his name. He wants to talk to you before we go."
"Florio? Florio Hakiapulos?" Teller inquired. "A storyteller? About so tall? Dark? Stocky?"
Samad nodded.
Teller's haggard face split open into a sudden smile. "Florio's here?" she said, clearly delighted by the news. "Well,
let's put this away and go find him!" She reached for one of the two remaining baskets.
"Wait, Teller!" He paused, groping for words amid his own inner turmoil. "There's trouble. I—I—"
"What is it, Samad?" Teller asked, sitting down on a bollard so that they were eye to eye.
Samad felt even worse at this sign of concern and affection from Teller.
He flushed darkly and looked away.
"Samad, please tell me what's wrong."
"I was telling stories," he told her. "For money. It was just for other kids, sera. I'm sorry. I didn't know I wasn't supposed to. And now he wants to talk to you." He stopped, afraid of what she would do. "I'm very sorry I got you in trouble, sera," he added.
The delight drained from Teller's face. She looked sad and tired. "I'm the one who's at fault here, Samad," Teller told him. "I've been too preoccupied with my own problems. If I'd been paying attention, I would have known what you were doing and talked to you about it." She stood up with a sigh. "Well, let's go get this straightened out," she said. "I expect Florio will be at one of the tavernas."
But he wasn't at any of the tavernas. After two hours of fruitless searching, they found him sitting on a gear locker beside their boat, waiting with all the patience of a river-smoothed boulder. He stood as they approached.
"Teller!" he called, holding his arms wide in welcome, his face wreathed in a broad smile.
"Florio!" Teller ran down the dock, into his arms. To Samad's amazement the two of them kissed like long-parted lovers.
"Well, Florio, it appears that we've been chasing each other all over town," Teller told him when they were done. There was a broad, almost goofy grin on her face.
"It's the story of our lives, I'm afraid," he replied with fond regret.
"Your son is handsome, I can see your face in his. Where is his father?" Florio asked her.
Samad blinked, startled but flattered that someone would think he was actually Teller's son.
The wrinkles around Teller's eyes creased in amusement. "I don't know. I never met him."
"What?" Florio said, looking startled.
"Samad was living on the streets of Melilla when we met," Teller explained. "He was such a good guide that I adopted him. He's been looking after me for nearly two years now. His mother was a pilot, and probably his father as well."
"Ah." Florio said, as if that explained something. "He's a good kid. You chose well."
Teller shook her head with a rueful smile. "He chose me. I was just lucky. So ..." she said, stepping back from Florio's embrace. "I understand he's been telling stories behind my back."