Sounds came to me dully, as if a crowd was murmuring in the antechamber with their hands covering their mouths. I waited in the near silence, replaying what had happened, not wanting to lose a detail, praying it had been more than a dream.
After a time, I sat up and swung my legs over the edge, but remained wary of standing, still unsteady—like a sailor on a ship in a storm. My stomach growled and my lips were parched, as if I’d been in the dream not for minutes but days. Finally, I stretched my toes to the floor until they touched and eased to my feet, still grasping the lip of the cocoon so tightly my knuckles reddened and went white.
When I felt I could walk without falling, I let go, balancing with both arms spread and tottering like a child learning to walk. Once the room stopped spinning, I grabbed my pack and stumbled out of the chamber.
I staggered down the spiral staircase, clutching the handrail and resting flat-footed on each step before attempting the next. At the bottom, I stared up at the false heavens—a painted dome, nothing more, the giants supporting an illusion.
Yet still the questions remained.
Had I witnessed a miracle or blasphemy? Were these severed minds better off left wandering in the dream or granted their final rest? Why did I value their knowledge so highly, raising them up as saviors of our quest? Was I, as the arch vicar had once claimed, intoxicated by the fruit of the tree of knowledge? Had I become seduced by the darkness?
What if the arch vicar was right? What if the lust to learn more, the yearning to master the world, was a flaw in our nature, destined to lead to disaster? Perhaps behind our wise and caring eyes, we were nothing more than fanged creatures gazing out from the shadowy cave of our skulls.
I could still back off from the precipice, tell everyone I failed and allow Caleb to bring about the end of the dreamers. This side of the ocean would abandon their machines over time and, with our help, become more like Little Pond.
I shook my head, which made me dizzy, and waved a fist at the false heavens.
“No!”
What I experienced was real and mattered. I’d encountered beings wiser than any who’d gone before. Were they flawed? Of course, like all men, but they worked for the betterment of others and strove to be more than they were. Despite their flaws, they brought much good to their people. Perhaps with their help, Nathaniel and I might do the same.
More confident now, I passed through the anteroom with the garden of glass, another wonder not of science but of the creativity of the people of the earth.
The world needed both.
At last, I burst outside into the fresh air and collapsed on the top stair. By my hand, a lone dandelion flowered, sprouting from a crack in the stone, a prelude to the wild flowers that grew in the cracks of the keepmasters’ ruined city. The stream gurgled nearby, while the surrounding forest held still. The gloom of night still cloaked the land as I glanced up at a misty sky, with clouds racing at unimaginable speed like a waking dream, scudding in front of a full moon.
I spun around to a hooting behind me. An owl perched on the shoulder of the earth mother’s statue as she gazed at the black doors, still grieving. The cloud cover above me momentarily cleared and a moonbeam reflected off the owl’s round eyes. Our gazes met for an instant before it took to the air, silently flapping its way to the horizon and beyond, taken by the night. As I followed its flight, I spread my lips into a broad smile, so pleased to find owls here too.
Just like the owls Nathaniel and I had marveled at, growing up as children in Little Pond.
Chapter 32 – Would-Be Warriors
I gazed behind me at the black doors shuttered and closed, and at the stone guards indifferent to my fate. Above me, the clouds still raced, darkening the sky and then clearing to reveal a host of glittering stars, distant and more numerous than my diminished mind could fathom. The largest bloomed just over the horizon, shimmering tremulously white. I recognized that marker in the sky, the morning star, or as the keepmasters called it, Venus, a planet like our own. I wondered if the dreamers had traveled there.
Closer by, the mountain stream sang a soothing song, drawing me to it. I dragged myself over, the soles of my boots barely lifting off the ground, dropped my pack, and knelt to splash my face. The sparkling water, too high up to have been fouled by the people below, brought blood back to my skin, cleansing and purifying me. Once I revived, I cupped both hands and drank, hoping to soothe the burning in my throat, the water so cold it made my teeth ache.
A deep sigh—not a moment more to contemplate the universe, not a minute to admire the view. I had to get back to the city and tell Nathaniel and Kara what I’d found. The dreamers had already suffered one tragedy. I prayed I might stop another.
I set off at a steady pace but not for long. My silver tunic protected me from the night air, but a clammy sweat had formed on my skin from my time in the cocoon. A chilling wind blew down my neck and into my face, making my eyes tear.
As I descended below the tree line, the moonlight bleached the boughs of the pines on either side of the trail into a ghostly sheen, but the path beneath them lay shrouded in darkness. Wary of tripping on a tree root and taking a fall, I slowed to a crawl. After a few minutes of stumbling around, I slipped off the pack and withdrew the mentor’s torch. I switched it on to no avail—its light, like me, had dimmed. So I trudged along, bending low to read the pine-needle strewn ground.
Gradually, even the moonlight vanished beneath the thick canopy of leaves. My pace became more labored as a bone-weariness overcame me. At the next clearing, I collapsed under a beech tree, nearly as broad as the one that guarded the center of the greenie village, and folded the pack beneath my head.
A brief nap, I told myself as my eyelids drifted closed... nothing more.
***
I awoke with a start to the first rays of the sun. Though not fully rested, I scrambled to my feet and began jogging down the trail.
My senses sharpened as I ran, and I saw the world anew. The branches sparkled, their leaves pulsed with green. The tall grass tickled my bare legs, their tips still damp with dew. An apple tree in bloom gave off a perfume that mingled with the raw dampness of the woods. A newly sprouted blossom brushed my face and left its silky kiss on my cheek. Birds raised their voices to greet the dawn.
How wonderful the stirrings of life all around me. How utterly amazing to be alive.
By the time I reached the field of heather, sunbeams spilled across the meadow, setting the wildflowers aglow and making the stream shine like a silver ribbon looping down the slope. I traced it as it wound along the path all the way to the tunnel that formed the back entrance to the machine masters’ city.
What I saw made the hair on the back of my neck stand on end—the dark shapes of men trudging up the mountain, fifty or more bent low under the weight of their tools.
Caleb’s men had broken through.
What should I do? They’d reach the fortress within hours. The stone guards would keep them at bay, but with so many strong arms wielding picks and shovels, they’d soon find a way through. The dreamers’ knowledge gave them tremendous strength, but without allies among the living, they remained powerless in the physical world.
I imagined a zealous Caleb smashing cocoons and demolishing the devices that sustained those minds. I could confront him with proof that the dreamers live, and beg his forbearance, but I’d learned from the vicars—fanatics rarely listen to reason.
Or I could crouch in the bushes until they passed, and then race down to fetch Nathaniel, Kara and the others, but to what end? A battle between strong men with axes and young technos with machines? No winners there—nothing but a new eruption of sorrow.
As I pondered, I caught a second column of would-be warriors emerging from the mouth of the tunnel. I squinted, trying to bring them into focus. Their faces were too far off to recognize, but I couldn’t mistake the repair machines rumbling on their treads, kicking up dust over the uneven terrain—Kara and her children’s army, marching in
to battle.
Of course, the mentor’s spying eyes would have transmitted images to Kara’s bonnet, revealing the zealots’ breakthrough and forcing her to muster her troops.
A quick intake of breath—Nathaniel must be with them. He would have read my note by now. When he found me missing, he’d join with Kara. If the two enemies met, he’d fight by her side.
I set off with a purpose, feeling like the morning we headed into the Little Pond commons to confront the vicars, while our neighbors waited in their ceremonial robes, clutching stones in their hands. Now, as then, I had no choice.
At the point of a switchback, I scampered up a rock outcropping to spy on the landscape below. At last, I distinguished the techno column tramping up the mountain, about two dozen older children and their machines, with some unknown figures straggling behind.
But where had Caleb’s men gone?
I narrowed my focus, tracing each segment of the trail. By the darkened lake, I caught movement in the trees on either side of the path.
I’d spotted the technos from above. Caleb would have done the same. He’d dispersed his men, concealing them in the woods to set up a trap.
To the darkness with exhaustion, and caution be damned... I took off at a sprint.
The trees on the sides of the trail blurred as I ran past, and the path ahead tapered into a tunnel with a single endpoint—the clearing by the darkened lake. They wouldn’t expect someone coming from higher ground. I hoped to surprise them, to burst through their ranks as they stared down the slope. Barring that, I might create enough of a clamor to warn Nathaniel and the others.
As I neared the clearing, my heel gave way on the loose scree, sending pebbles skidding down the trail.
Several zealots turned. For the briefest of moments, they hesitated, surprised by this apparition dashing down the mountain.
Before they grabbed me, I let out a scream. “Nathaniel! Kara! Beware!”
I was now in their grasp, but the deed was done.
Moments later, Kara entered the clearing behind a well-formed wedge of machines, flanked by the tallest boys with sticks pointed at the ready.
As both sides eyed each other, I pulled away from my captors and stepped in between, spinning in circles and pointing up the mountain. “I’ve been there. I met with the dreamers.”
Caleb waved me off and addressed his men. “What she says makes no difference. She found nothing but delusion.”
“You don’t understand,” I said. “They’re aware, alive, and eager to help.”
Caleb came closer, towering over me, but Nathaniel burst from the ranks of the repair machines to block his way.
From around Nathaniel, the zealot leader glared at me, his feet spread wide and his fingers curled into fists, the posture of impending battle. “Did they speak or breathe or move?”
I shook my head. “But I merged with their minds.”
He turned to his men, who fingered their tools nervously. “How could she tell between the thoughts of the dreamers and those of her own imagination? Those who go into the dream become easily confounded?” He gestured to Kara. “Therein lies madness.”
“My parents dwell there,” Kara shouted back, “and you will not harm them!”
“Who’ll stop us? A bunch of arrogant children with their toys?”
Kara glared back at him, her whole body quivering with rage. “We’ll soon find out who is arrogant and who is ignorant.”
She closed her eyes, and a low hum came from the repair machines, almost a growl. Their treads stirred and they inched forward.
Caleb signaled to his men, who raised their tools high and stamped their feet, edging toward Nathaniel and me.
“Stop!”
A gravelly voice sounded from down the trail. All heads turned to watch a half-dozen people bearing a pale and weary earth mother on a litter.
Both technos and greenies paused their quarrel out of respect for this woman, the last of her generation.
The litter bearers set her down between the warring parties. With Devorah and Jacob’s help, she struggled to her feet, looking older than I’d seen her before.
Annabel, the earth mother, former colleague of the machine masters I’d met in the dream, placed a hand over her heart as if to calm its beating, and spoke between breaths. “I never thought I’d climb so high again. I’d forgotten how beautiful the mountain is.” She turned to Kara. “I’m sorry for the loss of your grandfather. Though William and I disagreed on many matters, he was my friend and always did his best for his people. I see you’ve taken on his mantle. May you wear it as wisely as him.”
Her knees buckled, and Devorah rushed to her side. Once she steadied, with one arm draped around the younger woman, she redirected her attention to the leader of the zealots.
“What now, Caleb? Is this what I taught you, to raise your hand against your fellow humans? Haven’t you learned we are all people of the earth?”
Caleb scowled. “It’s not I who raised my hand. We were only doing what you and I both know to be right. You preach that the day or reckoning was the earth’s way of setting things straight, that to download one’s soul into a machine is wrong. You say the essence of the dreamers has flown, and keeping what remains imprisoned in electronics is an abomination. For the good earth’s sake, three years have passed. My men and I were on a mission of mercy to set them free.”
Kara pressed between her machines and stepped within striking distance of Caleb’s axe, unconcerned for her safety. “Set them free? You mean kill them, because their essence lives on. Orah merged with their minds.”
The earth mother turned to me as fast as her weary body allowed. “Is this true, child?”
I nodded.
“A foolish and dangerous errand! I’m happy you survived. Tell me what you found.”
I glanced at Nathaniel, who stared back at me with a mixture of fury and relief.
“I shared their thoughts,” I said. “I met Kara’s parents and others. They’ve taken on a communal identity and are distanced from their physical selves, but they retain their memories and knowledge. They think, they plan, they design, and they seek a purpose, if only they could partner with the living. They can help us make a better world.”
Caleb spat on the ground. “Words, nothing more. A fantasy she made up to give hope to these children, just as their mentor had done before. How do we know it’s true?”
I stepped closer and softened my expression, fixing him with my eyes until he could no longer look away. “They told me about your Rachel, how she gave her life for the research into the dream. How in those early days, they failed to restore her mind to her body. How in the end, they....”
Tears glistened in Caleb’s eyes, but his hands trembled with rage. “They failed to restore...? They defied the laws of nature, tempting her to become their test case. My dear Rachel. For thirty days, I sat by her side as she stared back at me with no mind behind those eyes. Then, despite my pleas, the council decided to end it. They brought her still breathing body to the disintegration chamber like a piece of trash, a failed experiment, a mistake.”
The earth mother brushed Caleb’s arm. “So that’s why you came to us with such rage, why you never told us what happened. What more proof do you need? These living minds have revealed your wife’s tale to Orah.”
Caleb spat on the ground. “Nothing but a trick. The mentor knew what had happened. He served on the council that voted to end her life. Though reluctant to share his shame with the children, he would have told these two—a way to deceive us. She has no proof. Her claim changes nothing.”
Kara dug her fingernails deeper into her palms, and bared teeth that seemed to grow longer. “I’ll bring you proof if you clear the way, and let me go into the mountain.”
“You’ll never reach there.”
“How do you plan to stop our machines, the power created by the genius of my forbearers?”
The machines roared to life behind her. Their arms and pincers snapped to the ready
, and the turrets that cast the red rays swiveled and aimed at the zealots.
In response, axes and hammers were raised, picks and shovels poised.
Caleb lunged at Kara, but Nathaniel and I blocked his way.
A blur flashed from behind. The silent boy, Zachariah, slipped in front in a foolhardy attempt to protect me.
Caleb froze in mid-stride. “Move aside, boy. My fight is not with you.”
Time slowed as I watched Zachariah try to defend me, his slight frame no stouter than one of Caleb’s thighs. At once, I was back in the dream. Out of so many memories, a special one came to me, a gift from the dreamers.
I squatted and took Zachariah by the arms, turning him to face me so I gazed into eyes too big for his head. They’d changed little since he was six.
“I met them, Zachariah, your parents. They asked about you.”
At that moment, the sun broke above the treetops, and a lone beam fell across the boy’s face. His lower lip trembled, but he remained silent.
Then the words came to me, words never spoken but passed directly into my mind. “Your mother said you wrote a poem for her before she left for the mountain, one you read to her aloud. Do you remember?”
The boy blinked. Was that a hint of a nod?
“She told me what you wrote, but my poor memory fails me. I can only remember the first line. If I recite it, will you tell me the rest?”
I stood upright, cleared my throat, and raised my chin so everyone would hear. “Sweet mother... with eyes... that shine....”
I closed my eyes and recalled Nathaniel’s voice beaming from the sun icon on that grim morning in Little Pond. I saw my neighbors with their fingers twitching around stones, much as Caleb’s fingers now twitched around the handle of his axe. I prayed to the true light, wherever and whatever it might be. I prayed for a miracle.
Please, Zachariah. Help me.
Then suddenly, the sweetest of voices arose, one I’d heard before only in song.
“Sweet mother with eyes that shine
The Stuff of Stars (The Seekers Book 2) Page 22