by Shannah Jay
‘MOVE FORWARD, PLEASE, KARIALLA.’
She went to stand in front of the screen. The machine began to hum to itself and light flowed around her like a cloak. It flared so brightly it made the shapes outside it seem faint and it went on glowing for much longer than it had with Deverith. What was it doing to her? She couldn’t understand anything in this strange place, but if Deverith wasn’t afraid she would not allow herself to be, either. Well, not much.
After a minute, the cool metallic voice said, ‘IDENTITY REGISTERED. KARIALLA, PLEASE DO NOT
TOUCH ANYTHING YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND INSIDE THE SHIP. IF YOU NEED HELP, SPEAK
ALOUD AND ASK FOR INSTRUCTIONS.’ The light in the wall died down.
‘There’s my brave lass!’ Deverith held out his arms and she fled into them, shaking again.
‘I - I’m sorry. I’m not usually a coward. It’s all so - it’s beyond strangeness. Like being in another world.’
‘It is another world, lass. I still remember how I felt the first time I came here. I was on my own then. I nearly turned and fled several times, I can tell you.’
‘What stopped you?’
‘I don’t know. The voice, partly. It kept speaking to me, reassuring me. But sometimes - just occasionally, I still wish I’d run away!’
His face shuttered down on that remark and she didn’t press for an explanation.
‘Come on!’ He led her through the entrance and inside it they found themselves walking up yet another ramp. When they went through the doorway at the top, he turned confidently to the right.
‘Is this the inside of the spaceship?’ Karialla asked in a hushed voice, awed by the thought that this vehicle had actually travelled across the sky from another world.
‘Yes.’
She gaped around her as they walked, but it was another of those shiny, bare passages. If this was the Forebears’
work, then they hadn’t cared much about beauty. ‘You seem to know your way around, Deverith. And the machine obviously recognises you.’
‘I’ve been here several times since that first visit. But I’ll warn you now: the things you learn here tend to haunt you.
You keep wanting to return and ask the machines just a few more questions.’ He hesitated. ‘Look, lass, we need to talk before I go to the medi-centre. It’s more than time for me to do some explaining.’ His old grin came back. ‘Don’t you want to know about all those things I wouldn’t explain to you before?’
‘I most certainly do!’
‘Let’s go to the canteen, then.’ He saw she was looking puzzled at that word and added, ‘That’s a communal place for eating and drinking. We’ll be able to have something to drink while we talk. They have a beverage here called coffee which I love.’
The canteen was a large room with more of the shiny walls. Its brightness hurt Karialla’s eyes and made her wonder whether their ancestors had had different eyesight to hers to need so much light. Lists of food and drink lit up on the walls as they entered. The writing disturbed Karialla because although she could spell out the letters, she didn’t
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recognise many of the words. She let Deverith order her a fruit juice, which seemed a fairly safe choice. His coffee drink proved to be a dark and bitter brew. When she pulled a face at its taste, he chuckled aloud. ‘Not as good as pure Tenebrak water, eh?’
‘No.’ She looked him straight in the eyes. ‘Deverith, stop procrastinating. You owe me a full explanation now.’
‘Yes, I suppose I do.’ He fiddled with his mug, as if he were finding it difficult to start. ‘Karialla, I haven’t been honest about my age. Lass, I’m - I’m nearly a hundred and twenty years old.’
‘What?’ She could only gape at him. He couldn’t be that old! No one could possibly live that long. But Deverith wouldn’t lie to her about something so important. She knew that.
He was staring down at his hands on the table, but he looked up now with a wry twist to his mouth. Was that fear she saw in his eyes? What was he afraid of? The answer came to her almost as soon as she framed the question in her mind. He was afraid of her rejecting him because of his great age. She reached out to squeeze his hand. ‘Go on, Deverith. Tell me how you’ve been able to live so long and stay so young.’
‘You believe me, then?’
‘Yes, of course.’
He shut his eyes for a moment in patent relief, then opened them to smile at her warmly. ‘I don’t really know how it happened, just that I’m nearly a hundred and twenty years old, hard as it may be for you to believe. Actually, I find it difficult to believe myself, sometimes! I don’t feel that old! I just feel - myself, normal. A man like any other . . . and a man who loves you.’
She continued to hold his hand, feeling her eyes soften into a half smile. ‘I love you too. Your age makes no difference to me. You’re still my Deverith. Go on.’
He sighed. ‘I don’t know why I don’t seem to age like other folk. I think it’s partly because of this place. Those machines can heal your body of things you didn’t even know were wrong. But I have to say, people in my family have always lived a long time, even without such help. Most of us reach at least ninety, when other folk barely reach their seventies.’
She found her voice at last. ‘But you don’t look even sixty, let alone a hundred and twenty!’
‘No. I know that.’
She shook her head in bewilderment. Something suddenly occurred to her. ‘That’s why no one remembered you in Tenebrak, isn’t it? All the people you knew when you were an apprentice must be dead by now.’
‘I’m afraid so. Long dead.’
‘And that’s why you sometimes use words I’ve never heard of before.’
‘Yes. I try to be careful, but they slip out now and then, especially when I’m tired.’
A chime rang and the metallic voice spoke again, sounding just above their heads. ‘YOU ARE REMINDED, DEVERITH, TO VISIT THE MEDI-CENTRE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. YOU WILL NOT BE ALLOWED TO
LEAVE THE SHIP UNTIL YOU HAVE DONE SO.’
‘Yes, yes. I’m just going.’ Deverith stood up. ‘You’d better come with me, lass. I can’t leave you here alone, and anyway, you may as well have a check-up too. I shall probably be there for several hours, I’m afraid, so wait for me afterwards.’
‘Deverith - ’
‘You’ll be safe enough in the ship, I promise you.’
‘But I - ’
‘We’ll talk again later. You’ve enough to think about for now, I’m sure.’ He walked towards the door and she followed hastily. He was right about one thing. She didn’t want to be left alone in this bright, unnatural place.
At the Medi-Centre, they were asked to disrobe. Karialla blushed and looked sideways at Deverith. His smile was back. ‘We’re both healers, used to the sight of naked bodies.’
She nodded but still felt shy as she slipped off her robe and hesitated over her underclothes. She couldn’t help stealing a glance at Deverith’s body. It was surprisingly muscular, even for his apparent age of fifty or so, let alone for his real age. He winked at her and slid his clothes into a chute, then lay down on one of the silvery benches and gestured to another next to him. ‘Put your things in the shute and lie down there, lass. The clothes will come back later, clean. Or we can get new ones, if you’d prefer it.’
‘These clothes are fine.’ She did as he bade her with fear churning in her belly.
Deverith continued to speak soothingly, ‘This place is what healing became for our Forebears. It’s fascinating what their machines can do. But we seem to be following a different path to theirs, a path without machines. I think we were set upon it deliberately by the Forebears themselves. Are you all right, lass?’
‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ But she wasn’t. She was terrified.
He raised his voice. ‘We’re ready now. Karialla needs a check-up as well. Please explain what’s happening to her before each test takes place. She’s never visited a Medi-Centre before.’
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The voice took on a different tone, one of gentle command. ‘INSTRUCTIONS UNDERSTOOD. PLEASE
RELAX, KARIALLA. FIRST, WE SHALL . . . ’
There followed a dizzying period of the voice giving quiet instructions and explanations. After a short time, Karialla lost her fear and became fascinated by what was happening. It seemed that this machine could actually see inside her body - and see in great detail too. As a healer, she could understand the reasons for some of the checks it was making.
Things she had to do by guesswork and her own judgment were done accurately here by machines. There were even fine tendrils that looked like hairs and penetrated her skin quite painlessly. How often had she wished she could look inside a living body!
Finally, the machine asked for permission to rectify a few minor malfunctions.
‘What exactly do you wish to do?’
‘IMPROVE YOUR VISION. REMOVE SCAR TISSUE. CORRECT A PROBLEM IN YOUR
REPRODUCTIVE SYSTEM’
‘What?’ She would have sat up in shock, but she seemed to have no control over her body. ‘Please explain what you mean by problem in my reproductive system before you do anything!’
‘THE CHANNELS WHICH CARRY YOUR EGGS ARE SCARRED AND TWISTED. NO EGGS CAN
REACH YOUR WOMB, SO CONCEPTION CANNOT TAKE PLACE.’
She lay there for a moment, smarting with anguish too deep for tears. So it was her body that was at fault! Pavlin could have fathered children if he’d married someone else. And by a bitter irony, she could now be cured! She almost said, ‘Don’t bother!’ then caught herself up. That would be totally stupid! She might wish to bear children to someone else one day. She didn’t allow herself to think who that someone might be.
Oh, Pavlin, forgive me! she thought, then said aloud, ‘Very well. Do what you think necessary.’ The world receded for a time into a faint haze of colours and humming noises. It was a soothing and dreamlike state, and she felt no pain.
She didn’t know how much time passed, but when the room came into focus again, she could see more clearly than ever before in her life and a scar had been removed from her forearm. Only time would prove whether the internal changes had been successful, she supposed.
‘MEDI-CHECK COMPLETED. KARIALLA, YOU ARE IN EXCELLENT HEALTH OVERALL. PLEASE
CONTINUE TO LOOK AFTER THIS BODY IN THE SAME WAY. YOU WILL NOT NEED ANOTHER
CHECK-UP FOR TWO TO FIVE YEARS, DEPENDING ON YOUR STATE OF HEALTH. DO NOT WAIT
FOR LONGER THAN FIVE YEARS. AND YOU SHOULD CONSIDER BEARING CHILDREN SOON. IT
WOULD BE GOOD FOR YOUR BODY. DO YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS?’
‘No. No questions.’ Questions wouldn’t bring Pavlin back, wouldn’t right the wrong she’d unknowingly done him.
‘YOU MAY LEAVE NOW. PLEASE WAIT FOR DEVERITH IN THE NEXT ROOM. HE HAD MORE
MALFUNCTIONS THAN YOU TO CORRECT AND WILL NOT BE READY FOR A WHILE.’
Still feeling disoriented she got up. The couch next to hers was a blur of misty colours. Presumably the machines were working on Deverith behind those rainbow swirls of light. Strange how beautiful they were, the most beautiful things she’d seen in this sterile world. She hoped he was all right. If he was as old as he said and hadn’t been back here during the Age of Discord, she supposed there would inevitably be problems to sort out.
The smaller chamber nearby had walls in a soft blushbell pink and was furnished with a small table, chairs and several narrow beds. She went and sat down on one of the beds, so weary she ached for sleep.
‘IT WOULD BE BETTER IF YOU ATE BEFORE YOU WENT TO SLEEP.’
She sighed, then realised that even if it was only a machine, it was right, so moved obediently over to the table. Her limbs felt heavy and her eyelids were drooping with fatigue. She jumped backwards in shock as a mug of warm liquid and a piece of what looked like bread materialised inside a slot in the wall next to the table.
‘PLEASE EAT AND DRINK, KARIALLA.’
She swallowed her fear and stepped forward again, reaching into the slot for the mug, which was made of some gleaming lightweight material. When she raised it to take a sip, it tasted of nothing she recognised, but it was hot, sweet and comforting. Taking another sip, she cradled the cup in her hands for a moment or two, then picked up the bread. It was too fluffy, not at all like the substance she knew as bread. But she needed to eat, so she began to nibble it, and was surprised when it tasted delicious, as if it had nuts ground into the flour.
When she’d finished eating, she lay down on the bed, still trying to understand all that had happened to her, and felt herself drifting towards sleep.
She didn’t wake until Deverith joined her later. Something made her open her eyes and she found him staring down at her. After a moment’s confusion she remembered what had happened and where she was. ‘Oh, Deverith! I’m so glad to see you.’
‘Sorry it took so long, lass. That’s what comes of being old.’ He looked at her, his eyes pleading for understanding.
‘How could I have explained all this before, Karialla? You’d have thought me mad. And if we try to tell anyone about
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the spaceship once we’re back in Tenebrak, they’ll still think us mad. We won’t be able to bring them here to prove it, you see.’ Sorrow flickered on his face.
‘Who did you try to bring?’
‘The most important one was my second wife. She was dying of a tumour. I hadn’t learnt to heal properly then, so I could do nothing to help her. And - I didn’t want to lose her so soon.’
‘That’s why you understand about grieving.’
‘Yes. But not just from losing two wives. In a long life you lose a lot of people you hold dear.’
‘Would the machines not treat her, then?’
‘She couldn’t even get close enough to see the spaceship. She kept turning round and walking away. I tried to pull her back, but I couldn’t. And she didn’t even remember why we’d come. She never did remember. She seemed to think we’d just been for a walking trip in the wildwoods.’ He paused for a moment and then added bitterly, ‘She even said the flowers were beautiful and she’d enjoyed herself, though she’d walked back like a blind person.’
Karialla shivered. Had her own mind been tampered with? ‘What was her name?’
‘Marla. She was a tender person, not pretty, but so caring about everyone and everything. I loved her very much.’
‘I can tell that from your tone of voice.’
‘Yours is the same when you speak of Pavlin.’
He rubbed his forehead with one hand, as if to clear the memories away physically. ‘Well, that’s over fifty years ago, now. Sharla and I were together for a very short time, a mere ten years, and she was only thirty-five when she died. It seemed unfair for her to die so young, as if I’d taken her share of life as well as my own.’
‘And your first wife?’
‘She was called Jessan. Goodness, that seems so long ago now! I was only thirty-two myself. We went out to help found a group of settlements. I was the resident healer - I was First Cadre by then - and I wanted very much to have a piece of land of my own. We expected the usual things - home, children - and we had only twelve years together, with no children.
‘Jessan always blamed herself. My family were all very prolific breeders, you see, and hers weren’t. I didn’t blame her.
These things just happen sometimes. But she fretted over it. In the end, a fever took her and she didn’t seem to want to fight it. After I buried her, I left the settlement and started wandering.’
‘Didn’t you ever have any children?’
‘No. Not one. Never. In the end, I assumed I had some ‘malfunction’ as these machines call it, and I asked them to rectify it, but they said there was nothing wrong. So I can’t understand why I’ve failed to father a child. It’s been a source of great sorrow to me. I’d have enjoyed rearing children.’
‘I know how you feel.’ She hesitated, then said i
n a rush, ‘They did find a malfunction in me, so Pavlin could have had children with someone else. I feel dreadful about it being my fault he was childless.’ She had to swallow hard to stop herself weeping. She was glad that Deverith was drinking from his mug and not looking at her.
After a moment she changed the subject. They were getting too close to her deepest pain. ‘You look well now, anyway.’
‘Yes. I feel much better. I always do. Marvellous, aren’t they, those healer machines? But they told me something you’d better know now. This body won’t last me much longer than a decade or two.’
Instantly, she forgot her own concerns and reached out to clasp his hand. ‘Oh, Deverith! I’m so sorry!’
‘Now, lass, I’ve had a longer life than anyone else I’ve ever heard of, and a healthy one, too. It’d be ungrateful to complain because it’s drawing to a natural end, wouldn’t it?’
‘I suppose so.’
He took her hand in his and pressed it gently. She noticed that his finger joints were no longer slightly swollen, raised his hand to study it, then caught him smiling at her in understanding. One never stops being a healer, she thought wrily.
‘There’s one thing more I’d like to show you.’ Deverith’s expression was serious again. ‘It’s important to me, lass, very important indeed. Will you come with me?’
‘Of course I will.’ She’d already followed him into a place that would have struck terror into most people. What could be worse than that?
CHAPTER 19 The Cave
To Karialla’s surprise, Deverith led her outside the ship again and up the hillside behind it. There was a cave there, and when they went inside she realised it had been extended artificially. A gentle light came on as they entered, but it was nothing like the harsh brilliance that filled the spaceship. Where it came from, Karialla couldn’t have said. Another
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mystery on this day of enigmas.
The walls were made of rock which looked as if it had been folded and pleated back to form patterns and beautify the cave. In some parts of the surface, coloured crystals sparkled; in others, the rock itself was dark and lustrous; and in another place it was white with threads of gold glinting through it. How could these different types of rock be here together and in such harmonious designs?