The Light of Reason (The Seekers Book 3)

by David Litwack

  Once we’d finished and had cleared the table, we settled around the fireplace with our hands wrapped around mugs of apple cinnamon tea. Nathanial and I waited, afraid to ask, while our parents seemed afraid to tell.

  At last, Nathaniel’s father rubbed his eyes red as he had that evening when he told me of my father’s death from the teaching—a teaching caused by his betrayal. When he spoke, I struggled to catch his words over the crackle of the fire. “Our lives changed on a single day, one of the warmest of late winter, after the snow had nearly thawed, a day with a clear sky that belied the storm to come. Vicars and deacons spread out across the land, assembling the children of light in their villages, though not yet time for the spring blessing. In Little Pond, we gathered by the altar in the village commons, expecting good news. Instead, the voice from the sun icon announced that the light had ordained a new grand vicar who would replace your old adversary, the former arch vicar. To our surprise, the human embodiment of the light on this earth had been usurped by a man you might recall—the very vicar that brought you and Thomas to your teachings.”

  My stomach fluttered as I recalled my trip to Temple City four years earlier, with the small man with the black beads for eyes. “But he was... no more than a monsignor when we left.”

  “That’s true. Most view him as an upstart, yet many follow him, those who prefer a return to simpler ways, to a time before the three of you discovered the keep. On that day, through the sun icon, he claimed that he’d received a vision from the light, temple magic that told him how your foolhardy quest had ended, with your boat sunk and the two of you drowned.”

  Nathaniel rose from his seat, his fists balled at his sides and his jaw clenched. “Our people should know better. We showed them the truth, that the sun icon was science, a communication device from the past.”

  My mother stood and stoked the fire, a way of not looking at us. “If we’ve learned nothing else, it’s that old beliefs die hard. When people are hurting or confused, they revert to the beliefs of their youth. Even I have my doubts at times. What you found in the keep fails to explain all.”

  I thought of the earth mother, with her lined face and gravelly voice: “There remains mystery in this world, things we cannot explain.”

  My new father continued, his voice softer now. “Some worried that the knowledge you’d found, true or not, had made our lives worse. The vicars fed their grumbling. Others spoke out against them, but fewer than I’d hoped. You see, the vicars feed on fear. It took courage to speak out, so only a few did.” He glanced up, and his eyes met mine. “Thomas was one of them.”

  I waited, breathing in and out until I could wait no more. “What happened to him?”

  “Thomas refused to believe you had drowned, claiming he sensed the presence of his friends since birth, a feeling stronger than magic. He rallied some of like mind to march on Temple City, to protest to the grand vicar that he’d violated the truce. Most returned battered and bruised. Some never returned. No word of what happened to Thomas.”

  “What of those who returned? They must have known.”

  He shook his head and sighed. “Of course they knew, but they were too cowed to tell.”

  ***

  After these revelations, we bid our parents goodnight and retreated to my bedchamber.

  Once we’d closed the door and were alone, the vein along Nathaniel’s temple pulsed, and his lips tightened into a thin and bloodless line, but he said not a word. He withdrew instead to a place within that I’d seldom seen, a dark corner of his soul where his passion for good turned into a smoldering anger, too hot to share with me.

  As we readied for bed, my mood darkened as well, not with anger but sadness. As a little girl, I’d retreat to this room to hide from the world when bad times came. Now, once again I felt like a little girl fleeing a scolding. What harm had I inflicted on my people, what pain on my friend? I fled here now not to seethe but to mourn.

  The window stood open, the evening breeze rustling the white lace curtain my mother had sewn when I was small. I pictured her sitting by the fire and sewing while my father hummed a song. They lived a life of limits but always hoped for more for their only daughter.

  I recalled my father’s words as he lay dying: “Now, little Orah, don’t cry. You have a wonderful life ahead of you. Study hard in school and don’t let the vicars set your mind. Think your own thoughts, big thoughts based on grand ideas, and find someone to love.”

  I’d studied hard and learned so much on our journey to seek the truth, more than he’d ever imagined. I never let the vicars set my mind, and I’d found someone to love.

  While Nathaniel settled into a restless sleep, I lay awake beside him and wondered. Was it enough to seek the truth, or did we also have to battle those who denied it?

  And where is Thomas? What have they done with my friend?

  I glared out the window to the east, where the village commons loomed, and beyond it Temple City. The time for dreaming had ended, and a single thought raged in my mind, a vow taken without reason or plan.

  I’m coming, Thomas, I swear.

  Chapter 4 – A Reservoir of Courage

  I spent the night dreaming childish dreams in what should have been the safety of my childhood home. When I awoke to the glare of dawn, the reality of our situation returned. What good was passion without a plan? Yet how could I plan with so many unknowns?

  In the keep, when faced with as difficult a choice, I’d turned to the helpers for wisdom. Though nothing but recordings from a thousand years before, they’d revealed to me how much had been lost—cures for disease, travel to the stars, an understanding of the universe beyond anything I’d imagined. They showed that foolish girl from the tiny village of Little Pond the extent of the possible, but when I asked for weapons to fight the vicars, they chastised me: “The abuse of knowledge brought the world to its current state.... The Temple of Light needed only ignorance to overturn our world. Let knowledge be your weapon to reverse the damage.”

  They taught me instead more peaceful ways to spread the truth. I learned how to disrupt the vicars’ communication by disabling the temple trees, print hundreds of messages, and make Nathaniel’s voice boom forth from the sun icon, interrupting the grand vicar and starting our revolution.

  Now the keep lay beyond my reach, but better advisors awaited nearby, perhaps the wisest who’d ever lived—the reason we’d borne the black cube from the distant shore. Though I could no longer join with the dreamers, I could consult with them by using the bonnet Kara had designed, and hear their response in my mind.

  Let knowledge be your weapon....

  I waited until the dawn’s early light leaked around the edges of our bedchamber curtain, making Nathaniel’s still form stir, and then grasped him in my arms and pressed my lips to his.

  When we separated, he eyed me, knowing me so well. “What are you scheming now?”

  “Will you come with me to the grist mill, as you did when we were little?”

  “Of course, but what are you afraid of now? We’ve long since learned the folly of believing in demons from the darkness.”

  “The darkness hides in places other than the shadows behind a water wheel. It hides in the corners of our hearts. I’m so angry now, I’m afraid to ask the dreamers for help, worried what they might empower me to do, but I need them if we’re to....” My eyes teared and my voice broke.

  He finished my thought. “...to find a way to save Thomas. But only you and Kara can speak to the dreamers.”

  Kara had offered to make Nathaniel a hat with sensors like the one her grandfather, the mentor, had worn, but he’d claimed my bonnet would suffice since he and I were as one. I knew the real reason—since his first aborted encounter, he’d been uncomfortable communing with those disembodied minds. He’d always preferred passion and action to logic and reason, and so he’d declined the offer.

  I held out a hand. “Come with me. In my anger at the vicars, I once asked the keepmasters for weapons. With
Thomas taken, who knows what demons I might now find in the corners of my heart.”

  He gaped at me a moment and nodded. Not another word need be spoken for friends since birth.

  Hand in hand, we hiked to the mill. Once there, we brushed away the sheaves of wheat and exposed the black cube. I donned my bonnet, much like Kara’s with flaps on the sides like wings, but without the flowers the greenies had embroidered for her. This simple device, tuned to my mind, let me speak to the dreamers.

  I reached out and touched the surface of the cube, though I knew it was unnecessary—this cap could commune with the dreamers from several paces away. The million bolts of lightning flickered faster inside, sensing my presence, and I felt the familiar tingling on my fingertips.

  The dreamers dwelled in a world of pure thought, beyond the realm of language. Speaking with them required no words, as concepts arrived whole into my mind.

  ***

  A stirring of minds, a buzzing like a beehive aroused, and then the myriad of thoughts settled into a series of snippets distinct enough to understand.

  “Orah....”

  “Has the boat sailed yet?”

  “Or are you still on our side of the ocean?”

  “We have no sense of time or place....”

  “You and Kara must be our eyes and ears....”

  I calmed myself to organize my response. Communicating this way differed from joining them in the dream. With my mind separate from theirs, they had no access to my memories unless I directed them, one at a time, through the sensors in my bonnet, much like the way the machine masters sent commands to control their machines.

  “We have arrived home. The boat you designed flew across the waves, much faster than our last voyage. The weather stayed fair but for a few squalls, and with the technology you provided, the ship rocked little when the seas grew high. I experienced nothing of the queasiness that had plagued me on our trip there, and our crew brimmed with hope.”

  Though they remained detached from the emotions of the physical world, I imagined a pride welling up among them. They valued competence, but their thoughts revealed nothing but logic, their purpose to accumulate data from their “eyes and ears.”

  “What of your home world? What did you find?”

  “It’s complicated....”

  The buzzing rose and settled. The primary speaker took charge.

  “Such a tedious way to communicate.... If only we could merge with your mind as before and know in an instant what you’ve learned. Now you must pass through to us in this primitive way what you’ve discovered, one thought at a time. We’ll wait until you finish to respond.”

  I gave a shudder. How could I explain what I’d found, when so much remained unknown.

  “When I at last sighted the granite cliffs in the dim light of pre-dawn, what a scene to behold—a fire flickering from the shore, guiding me home—but nothing was as I expected.”

  I went on to describe our plight—my neighbors afraid, a new grand vicar reasserting control, Thomas missing.

  “Can you help?” I said.

  “Insufficient data....”

  “As our eyes and ears....”

  “You and Kara must bring more information....”

  “Only then will we be able to help....”

  “But know this: the advice you seek is not a matter of logic....”

  “This is how it always starts....”

  “One side feels wronged. The other reacts....”

  “Passions similar to these nearly led to our extinction....”

  “Take care to avoid the downward slope....”

  Their thoughts surged and silenced, a clear signal that they expected me to respond, but I remained confused. “I don’t understand.”

  The buzzing rose and fell, a collective sigh.

  “What we mean is beware the path to violence....”

  “Or what your vicars might call....”

  “...a return to the darkness....”

  ***

  After I finished with the dreamers, Nathaniel and I wandered off to the pond that had given our village its name. We quickened our pace as we drew near, bursting through the trees to the spot we frequented so often in our childhood, a special refuge we sought out when we needed to reflect. Breaks in the branches let the sunlight filter through the leaves, dappling the water with stars. It was the kind of surprise you’d stumble upon after a long hike through the woods, a remote and secret place, so magical you believed you were the first ones to find it.

  We settled on the bank and tried for the moment to forget the rest of the world. I followed the sparrows that flew overhead, fluttering from one tree to the next or gliding down to the water to bathe. How pleasant the moment’s peace, with no wind howling through our metallic sails and no waves breaking across our bow. How wonderful to have no one to lead.

  Oh, why can’t we stay here forever?

  I shook off the mood—the musings of a child—stood up and brushed away the stray bits of grass from my tunic. How I longed to linger, to pretend the world of my childhood remained, but then I thought of Thomas in the clutches of the vicars, and shivered.

  Nathaniel grasped me by the arms and turned me toward him, as if he’d read my thoughts. “The seekers of truth have returned. We’ll rally the people to our cause, and they’ll march with us.”

  I glanced past him to the pond and shook my head. “We’re not warriors. What do we know of fighting?”

  “We’ll learn if need be, and Caleb and his men will help.”

  I recalled the dreamers’ warning—a return to the darkness. “We hoped to make a better world, and now we’ve found a world in shambles—and much of it of our own doing. What if we make it worse?”

  He drew me close and lowered his chin until our foreheads touched. “Don’t let despair drag you down. We’ve faced adversity before. This is our fight, and we’ll overcome it again... together.”

  I pulled away and knelt by the water’s edge, staring at my reflection. How weary I’d grown in the years since coming of age. A still, small voice whispered in my mind that we’d done enough, that our people were unworthy of our efforts.

  Why, once more, must we risk so much to atone for the foibles of man?

  I reached into the pond as if it were a reservoir of courage, and splashed the chill waters of hope on my cheeks.

  The time had come. Though far wiser than the vicars, the dreamers had offered no magic to combat the Temple. No magic at all. Once, Thomas had saved us from a life in prison or, worse, a life apart. Now came our turn to rescue him. Nathaniel was right: the people would follow the seekers of truth, those who had miraculously arisen from the sea.

  I dried my hands on my tunic and turned away from my childhood refuge without looking back. Then, arm in arm, I strode off with Nathaniel to confront our fate.

  Chapter 5 – A Gathering of Elders

  People crammed the commons, more than ever before—neighbors from surrounding farms, representatives from Great Pond and other nearby villages, and of course our newest friends from across the sea. When all had settled inside, the elders closed the doors and shuttered the windows to keep out prying eyes. A lookout climbed the ladder to the bell tower to watch and listen for signals from afar.

  As we waited for everyone to take their seats, an uneasy murmur filled the air, but loudest of all were the unsaid words, the silent fear that flitted among them, the unspoken question etched upon their upturned faces: What will the seekers do?

  Nathaniel’s father held up a calloused hand to call for quiet. When he spoke, he had no need to raise his voice. Not a whisper was heard, not so much as the scrape of a chair on the wooden floor.

  “For these past months, we’ve lived beneath a dark cloud. Those of us who defied the Temple found ourselves outcasts, some like me driven into hiding with a price on our heads—and we’re the fortunate ones who avoided capture.

  “The vicars of the new order have dashed our hope for a rebirth using the knowledge of t
he keep. They insist that what we found is evil, a seductive remnant of the darkness. Those scholars who’ve delved into its mysteries know better, but most of them have been muzzled or have vanished from our midst. The winds from the east carry no word of their fate. Worst of all, we’ve been told those who led this change failed in their quest to find the far side of the ocean and drowned at sea.”

  He waved a hand toward Nathaniel and me. “Here you see with your own eyes the foremost of the vicars’ lies. Much to my delight, my son and new daughter have returned to us alive, and brought back allies and wonders from the distant shore. What other lies have the vicars told to deceive us?”

  A man from the last row raised a hand, a neighbor I recognized from his deep-set eyes and hollowed cheeks, the mark of one who’d been taken for a teaching. Some recovered from teachings in time. Others, like my father, were forever changed. This man bore the same look as when he first returned from Temple City years before—his dreams still ripped away.

  The man stood. While he waited for Nathaniel’s father to acknowledge him, he rubbed his hands together as if trying to scrub away the stains of the past. When he spoke at last, his voice quivered. “We’re glad for their safe return, William, but they mustn’t stay in Little Pond. They pose too much of a danger to our families. If they’re discovered here, the vicars will punish us all.”

  William Rush narrowed his eyes and glared at him. “Then in addition to being slaves to the vicars, have we become cowards too?”

  Shouts echoed from across the room, many people speaking at once, some with the voice of reason, but most with anger.

  Nathaniel’s father waved the crowd to silence, but before he could respond, Nathaniel stepped forward and rose to his full height, as he had that morning when the vicars assembled our neighbors for our stoning. His set his jaw and glared out at the assembled. “You needn’t worry. We don’t intend to stay here long. We plan to march on Temple City to confront the vicars.”