Earthborn (Homecoming)

by Orson Scott Card

  “Is this your idea of an apology?” asked Akma lightly. “To call me childish?”

  “Not an apology,” said Akmaro. “A warning.”

  “A warning? What, from the man who teaches peace?”

  “You claim that you are repelled by what the persecutors have done. But in all your wisdom, in all your planning, you seem not to realize that the course you are embarking on will cause suffering on a scale that will make these persecutions look like a holiday.”

  “The Elemaki attacked us. Again and again. No, I won’t shed any tears over their suffering.”

  “A schoolboy looks at war and sees maps and flags,” said Akmaro.

  “Don’t tell me about war. You’ve seen as little of it as I have, and I’ve read more.”

  “Don’t you think Motiak and I have talked about war? If we thought it could be done quickly—the Elemaki defeated and destroyed in a single campaign—do you think we would shrink from it? My love for peace isn’t mindless. I know the Elemaki attack us. Motiak feels every blow to his people as if they fell on his own body. The reason the king has refused to attack the enemy strongholds is because we would lose. Without doubt, without question, we would be destroyed. Not a soldier would live to reach the ancient land of Nafai. The high valleys are a death trap. But you’ll never get that far, Akma. Because the Keeper rejects your plan from the start. This land belongs to all three peoples equally. That is what the Keeper decrees. If we accept that law and live together in peace, then we will prosper here. If we reject it, my son, then our bones will bleach in the sun like the bones of the Rasulum.”

  Akma shook his head. “After all these years, do you still think you can frighten me with warnings about the Keeper?”

  “No,” said Akmaro. “I don’t think I can frighten you at all. But I have a duty to tell you what I know. Last night I had a true dream.”

  Akma groaned inwardly. Oh, Father, don’t embarrass yourself even further. Can’t you handle your defeat like a man?

  “The Keeper has chosen you. He recognized you in childhood and prepared you for your role in life. No one has been born before you among the Nafari with such intelligence, such wisdom, such power.”

  Akma laughed, trying to deflect such obvious flattery. “Is that why you treat my ideas with such respect?”

  “Nor has there been anyone with such sensitivity. When you were little, it was turned to compassion. The blows that fell on Luet hurt you more than those that fell on you. You felt the pain of everyone around you, all the people. But along with the sensitivity came pride. You had to be the one to save the others, didn’t you? That’s the crime that you can’t forgive us for. That it was your mother and not you who faced down Didul that day in the fields. That it was I, not you, who taught them, who won them over. Everything you longed for happened—our people were saved, the torment stopped. The one thing you couldn’t bear, though, was that you felt you had nothing to do with saving them. And that’s what your dream of war is all about. Even though the people have already been saved, you can’t rest until you lead an army to redeem them.”

  Mother spoke up now, her voice thick with emotion. “Don’t you know that it was your courage that sustained us all?”

  Akma shook his head. It was almost unbearable, the embarrassment of listening to their pathetic attempts at trying to get him to see things their twisted way. Why were they doing this to themselves? To call him intelligent, and then not realize he’s clever enough to see through their stories.

  Father went on. “The Keeper is watching you, to see what you’ll do. The moment of choice will come to you. You’ll have all the information you need to make your choice.”

  “I’ve made my choices,” said Akma.

  “You haven’t even been given the choice yet, Akma. You’ll know when it comes. On the one hand will be the plan of the Keeper—to create a people of peace, who celebrate the differences between people of earth and sky and all that is between. On the other hand will be your pride, and the pride of all humans, the ugliest side of us, the thing that makes grown men tear holes in the wings of young angels. That pride in you makes you reject the Keeper because the Keeper rejected you, so that you pretend not to believe in him. Your pride requires war and death, demand that because a few diggers beat you and your people when you were a child, all diggers must be driven from their homes. If you choose that pride, if you choose destruction, if you reject the Keeper, then the Keeper will regard this experiment as a failure. The way the Rasulum failed before us. And we will end up like the Rasulum. Do you understand me, Akma?”

  “I understand you. I believe none of it, but I understand you.”

  “Good,” said Father. “Because I also understand you.”

  Akma laughed derisively. “Good! Then you can tell me which way I’ll choose and save me the trouble!”

  “When you are at the point of despair, my son, when you see destruction as the only desirable choice, then remember this: The Keeper loves us. Loves us all. Values each life, each mind, each heart. All are precious to him. Even yours.”

  “How kind of him.”

  “His love for you is the one constant, Akma. He knows that you have believed in him all along. He knows that you have rebelled against him because you thought you knew how to shape this world more wisely than he. He knows that you have lied to everyone, over and over again, including yourself, especially yourself—and I tell you again that even knowing all of this, if you will only turn to him, he will bring you back.”

  “And if I don’t, then the Keeper will wipe out everybody, is that it?” asked Akma.

  “He will withdraw his protection, and we will then be free to destroy ourselves.”

  Akma laughed again. “And this is the being that you tell me is filled with love?”

  Father nodded. “Yes, Akma. So much love that he will let us choose for ourselves. Even if we choose our own destruction and break his heart.”

  “And you saw all this in a dream?” asked Akma.

  “I saw you at the bottom of a hole, so deep that no light reached there. I saw you weeping, crying out in agony, begging the Keeper of Earth to blot you out, to destroy you, because it would be better to die than to live with your shame. I thought, Yes, that is how much pride Akma has, that he would rather die than be ashamed. But beside you in that dark hole, Akma, I saw the Keeper of Earth. Or rather heard him, saying, Give me your hand, Akma. I’m holding out my hand to lift you out of this place. Take my hand. But you were wailing so loud that you couldn’t hear him.”

  “I have bad dreams, too, Father,” said Akma. “Try eating your supper earlier, so your food can fully digest before you go to bed.”

  The silence around the table sounded like triumph to Akma.

  Motiak looked at Father, who nodded once. Mother burst into tears. “I love you, Akma,” she said.

  “I love you too, Mother,” he answered. And to Motiak he said, “And you, sir, I honor and obey as my king. Command me to be silent and I will say nothing; I only ask that you also command my father to be silent. But if you let him speak, let me speak.”

  “That’s what the decree says,” Motiak answered mildly. “No state religion. Complete freedom in matters of belief. Freedom to form assemblies of believers. The leaders of the assemblies chosen however they see fit. No high priest appointed by the king. And a strict ban on persecuting anyone because of their beliefs. So . . . your father tells me that we’ve accomplished all that he hoped for here. You can go now.”

  Akma felt victory glowing in him like a summer sunrise, warm and sweet. “Thank you, sir.” He turned and started to leave.

  As he reached the door, Motiak said, “By the way, you and my sons are banned from my house. As long as you are not among the Kept, none of you will see my face again until you look at my dead body.” His voice was mild and even, but the words stung.

  “I’m sorry that that’s your decision,” said Akma. Then, as an afterthought, he asked, “What will happen to Bego?”

&
nbsp; He saw Bego look to him with mournful eyes.

  “That,” said Motiak, “is really none of your business.”

  Akma left then, closing the door behind him. He walked briskly back toward the library, where Aronha and Mon, Ominer and Khimin were waiting. Their banishment from the house would sting, of course. But Akma knew he could easily turn their dismay into a fresh resolve. Tonight would be triumphant. The beginning of the end for all this foolishness of using dreams to make decisions for a kingdom. And, more important, the beginning of justice throughout the gornaya.

  There will be peace and freedom, when all is done, thought Akma. And they will remember that I was the one who made them safe. And not just safe while I live to lead them in war, but safe forever because their enemies will be utterly destroyed. What has the mythical Keeper ever done to compare with that?

  Shedemei arrived back in Darakemba that day, specifically so she could attend Akma’s first assembly that night. She already knew from what others had told her—with the Oversoul filling in gaps in her knowledge—pretty much what Akma and the sons of Motiak would be saying and what it would mean. But she had come to Earth to live for a while in society, hadn’t she? So she had to experience the great events, even if the thought of what they implied about the nature of people made her faintly ill. Therefore she attended, bringing along a few of her students and a couple of faculty members. Voozhum wanted to come, but Shedemei had to counsel her against it. “There’ll be many there who persecuted the Kept,” she said. “They hate earth people, and we can’t be sure we could protect you. I won’t let any diggers come with us tonight.”

  “Oh, I misunderstood,” said Voozhum. “I heard it was going to be Edhadeya’s brothers speaking. They were always very good boys, very kind to me.” Shedemei didn’t have the heart to explain to Voozhum how much those boys had changed. Voozhum didn’t have to keep up on current events. Her subject matter was the ancient traditions of the earth people, and she could afford to miss tonight’s speeches.

  When the meeting finally began, the order of speakers surprised her. Aronha was the figure of greatest fame and prestige, beloved by the nation since his childhood. Shouldn’t he have been held for last? No. When she heard him speak, Shedemei understood. He was a good speaker of the pep-talk variety, but incapable of making substantial issues clear. Kings didn’t have to be able to teach, only to decide and inspire; Aronha would be a good king. All he said, really, was that he loved his father and respected his father’s religious beliefs, but that he also respected the ancient traditions of the Nafari people and was grateful that now more than one system of beliefs and rituals would be able to coexist. “I will always have great respect for the Assembly of the Kept because of my father’s great love for the teachings of the martyr Binaro. But we are gathered here today to form another assembly, which we will call the Assembly of the Ancient Ways. We are dedicated to preserve the old public rituals that have been part of our lives since the days of the Heroes. And unlike others, we have no desire to make our assembly an exclusive one. We welcome any of the Kept who wish also to honor the old ways. You can believe all the teachings of Binaro and still be welcome in our assembly. All we ask is respect for each other and for the preservation of the patterns of life that made Darakemba great and kept us at peace among ourselves for so many centuries.”

  Ah, such cheers! And how the people murmured about Aronha’s wisdom and tolerance. He will be a wise king, a great king. How many of them understand, Shedemei wondered, that by “old ways” he means the re-enslavement or expulsion of the diggers? No true Kept could possibly join with them in that program—but by inviting them anyway, Aronha was able to create the illusion that their assembly could include everyone.

  And how many realize, thought Shedemei, that the peace within Darakemba was only three generations old, for until the time of Motiak’s grandfather the nation of the Nafari had existed high in the farthest reaches of the gornaya and only joined with the people of Darakemba less than a century ago? And even at that there has always been discontent among the old aristocracy of Darakemba, who felt displaced and devalued by the imposition of the Nafari ruling elite over them. No, there’ll be no discussion of that. Akma may talk about wanting to be strictly honest about history, but he’ll bend the truth however he needs to build his support.

  Mon’s speech was much more specific, talking about the rituals that they would attempt to preserve. “We ask the old priests to come forward over the next few weeks to take their places in these rituals. Some of the rituals, of course, require the presence of the king; those will not be performed until and unless our beloved Motiak chooses to lead us in them.” Not said, but understood perfectly by everyone there, was the fact that if Motiak never chose to lead those rituals, Aronha would perform them when he became Aronak at some future time. “We will keep the old holidays with feasting rather than fasting,” said Mon, “with joy rather than melancholy.”

  That’s right, thought Shedemei. Make sure that people understand they won’t be required to sacrifice anything in order to belong to your assembly. A religion that is all sweetness, but no light; all form, but no substance; all tradition, but no precept.

  Ominer spent his time talking about membership in the assembly. “Add your names to the rolls—no need to do it today, you can do it anytime in the next few weeks. Enrollment will take place in the houses of the priests. We ask you to donate what you can to help us pay for land where we can assemble and to help support the schools that we will establish to help raise up our children in the old ways, as we were raised in the king’s house. One thing you can be sure of—once you are admitted to the rolls of the Assembly of the Ancient Ways, you will never be turned out just because you have a difference of opinion with some priest.”

  Another jab at the Assembly of the Kept. As for donations, Shedemei almost laughed aloud at the cynicism of it. The Kept were mostly poor, and all of them donated labor and money at great sacrifice to pay for buildings and for the teachers in their schools. But they did it because of the fervency of their belief and the depth of their commitment. The Assembly of the Ancient Ways, however, would never get that level of contribution from its common members. Yet they would not lack for funds, because all the wealthy people of business and property would know that contributions to the Ancient Ways would be noticed and remembered by the future king and his brothers. Oh, there would be no budgetary shortages, and the priests who used to be salaried before Motiak’s reforms would find themselves with tidy incomes once again. None of this nonsense of priests working among the common people! This would be a high-class priesthood.

  Khimin, being young, fumbled a little with his speech, but the audience seemed to find his mistakes endearing. He had been relegated merely to affirming his agreement with all that his brothers had said and then announcing that as soon as the Assembly was well organized in Darakemba, Akma and the sons of Motiak would be traveling to every major city in every province to speak to the people there and organize the Ancient Ways wherever they were invited to do so. Unfortunately, they had no money of their own, and it wouldn’t be right to use their fathers’ wealth to sustain a religion that they didn’t approve of, so Khimin and his brothers and their friend Akma would be dependent upon the hospitality of others in those faraway places.

  Shedemei wondered whether they would live long enough to stay a night in every house that would be pathetically eager to take them in. Rich families that would never give a flatcake to a beggar would plead for the chance to show generosity to these boys who had never known a day of want in their lives.

 

  And learned nothing from it, Shedemei said silently.

 

  Among them, the four sons of Motiak
had taken only half an hour. It was plain when Akma rose to speak that the people had no idea of what to expect from him. The sons of the king were celebrities; but Akma was the son of Akmaro, and the rumors about him had been mostly negative. Some disliked him because they resented his father’s religious reforms. Some disliked him because he had repudiated his father’s life’s work—which the sons of Motiak had not done, even reaffirming their absolute loyalty to their father’s kingship. Others disliked him because he was a scholar and reputed to be one of the most brilliant minds that frequented the library in the king’s house—there was a natural suspicion of those with too much book-learning. And others didn’t want to like him because they had heard he didn’t believe in the Keeper of Earth, which was an absurd position for someone to take when he was about to start a new religion.

  Akma surprised them. He surprised Shedemei, for that matter, and she had known from the Oversoul exactly what he planned to say. What Shedemei wasn’t prepared for was the vigor in his way of speaking, the excitement in his voice. Yet he used no extravagant gestures, merely looked out into the audience with such piercing intensity that everyone felt, at one time or another, that Akma was looking right at them, talking straight to them, that he knew their heart.

  Even Shedemei felt his gaze on her when he said, “Some of you have heard that I don’t believe in the Keeper of Earth. I’m glad to tell you that this is not true. I don’t believe in the Keeper the way some have talked about him—that primitive idea of an entity who sends dreams to certain people but not to others, playing favorites with the men and women of the world. I don’t believe in a being who makes plans for us and gets angry when we don’t carry them out, who rejects some people because they don’t obey him quickly enough or don’t love their enemies better than they love their friends. I don’t believe in some all-knowing being who made humans and angels into lovers of light and air, and then demanded that they live nose-to-tail with tunnel-dwelling creatures of grime and muck—surely this Keeper of Earth could do a better job of planning than that!”