She looks at me like I’ve suddenly turned purple and burst into flames. “No, not that. I mean about the girl. The mutant girl.”
I feel the blood drain from my face and my stomach turn sour. The room tilts and bucks around me, making me sick. I swallow hard and grasp the frame of the bed to steady myself, hoping that my breakfast does not come up.
Freda sees in my reaction that at least some of it is true. Suspicion clouds her eyes, and a frown flits across her brow, but she waits, unmoving, for me to answer.
I want to take her hand, but I’m afraid she’ll recoil in horror. I would if I were her. Her husband loves a mutant girl, a soulless heathen who perpetrated an attack on our people. Well, that at least I can be sure is not true. I take a deep breath, look into Freda’s eyes, and put my hand on hers. She does not recoil. Her suspicion melts into attentiveness.
“There was a girl. But not like Darius says. And she’s probably dead by now anyway.” The image of the ghosts carrying her off in the night comes back to me like a fist slamming into my gut. I swallow back the rising bile.
“Her name is Lupay. She saved my life. She’s not like what you think. She’s not like what I thought at first, either.”
“They say the mutants cast voodoo spells on people.” Freda stares hard into my eyes, searching.
I take both her hands and slide off the bed to kneel in front of her. Our faces are only a foot apart. I can see I need to tell her as much as I dare, to earn her trust.
“I’m not under any spell,” I say, and I shove the memory of my fainting moment out of my mind. That wasn’t a spell, that wasn’t Lupay’s voodoo. That was bad air. Maybe the Radiation
“I am Dane, Linkan’s son. I am sixteen years old and the thirteenth Semper of Southshaw. I am not under any spell.”
I can see I’m catching her, but she’s still skeptical. Obviously, someone really under a spell would think they weren’t. How could I possibly convince her?
“You said she saved your life. How?”
“You won’t believe this.”
“I am having difficulty believing that I was First Wife for five minutes and that Darius is now Semper. I have difficulty believing a lot of things that are true. But I am capable of believing them. If I try very hard.” She turns her hands within mine and holds them. Her fingers are cold, but she’s no longer shivering.
“I was at the bay, on the big lake, where… no, you’ve never been there. OK, I was by the lake, a little more than a day’s walk north along the shore. There’s a beautiful bay there with an island in the middle and a thin beach stretching along the end. I was there, watching the sunset, just sitting among some boulders.
“The girl just appeared, out of the trees. She was hunting a rabbit. She killed it with this amazing—but that doesn’t matter. While she was picking it up, two ghost-men appeared at the far end of the beach—“
“What? Ghost men? What are you talking about?”
“Just like the stories, from when we were children. You remember the stories of the ghosts in the northern borders, don’t you?”
Freda’s eyes have grown wide, and her face has gone pale, and her fingers slip out of my hands and onto her lap. “You’re right. I don’t believe you.”
“Well, it happened. These ghost-men captured Lupay. She saw me hiding among the rocks, but she didn’t tell them I was there. That’s how she saved my life.”
“And they just went away?”
“Yes. Well, sort of. They carried her off.” I feel a sudden need to stand up, to move around. The memories are so clear and intense, and I want Freda to believe me. I pace the room, allow my voice to rise a bit but still speak in undertones. “Something made me follow them.”
“Something like... she put a spell on you?”
“No. No! Nothing like that. Just... I couldn’t let them drag her off to their caves.”
“And eat her up, bit by bit.”
I nod, standing in the middle of the room, facing the small table that huddles in the darkness against the wall. Why did I follow her? Why did I do it? Wouldn’t this all be OK if I had just left well enough alone? “No,” I say, startled by my own voice in the dark room. I look back at Freda. “I see now. None of this would be any different if I had let her go, if I had just come home and forgotten Lupay, and the ghost-men.”
I pace again, but I barely even notice the footsteps. At some point as I talk, Freda stands but doesn’t move away from the bed. “I’d still be right here, in this cell. All I did was give Darius an easier excuse to throw me down here and take power.”
“Dane.” Freda draws my attention back. “What happened with the ghosts?”
“Oh." I stop pacing and face her. "I came upon them and freed Lupay. One of them went on ahead, and I knocked the other one out. He wasn’t a ghost at all. He was a man. Very pale like a ghost, but a man. At least, his ribs sure felt like a man’s when I hit him. Then we ran away.”
“We?”
“Yes, of course. Lupay ran away, and I followed her.”
“You followed the mutant girl into the woods.”
“Well, I couldn’t let it end there, could I?”
“Why not?” Freda puts her hands on her hips, and the blanket slides off her shoulders to the floor. She does not seem to care. But she has a good point. Why did I follow?
“It’s… hard to explain.”
She says nothing but raises her eyebrows.
“But I’ll try?” I ask, and she nods. “I had heard her talking with the ghost-men. And it wasn’t what I expected. She was smart. They were smart. They all talked normally—“
“What, in English?”
“Yes, which was really strange. And… I don’t know. All my life I’ve been taught that the mutants are primitive, stupid, fearful. That they’ve been forsaken by God, doomed to animal lives in the wastelands since the War. You know. It’s like we’re taught. Southshawans are the chosen people, and when the time comes and the Earth has recovered from the Radiation, we shall repopulate the wilds…”
What was it Darius said when Freda and I were being dragged off?
“And this particular mutant girl didn’t seem like that?”
“No, not at all. That’s what made me follow her, I think. I had to find out more.”
“And is she beautiful, this mutant girl?”
“What? No. I mean, she looks different. She’s a Tawtrukker, after all. Dark skin, dark eyes, dark voice… just… dark. You know?”
“No.”
“Anyway, we were walking along and stopped to rest at one point, and that’s where Baddock and his group found us by surprise.”
“And the manner in which they found you?”
“We were sitting on the ground in a clearing in the woods.” I don’t have to tell her everything, about carrying Lupay out of the old well or her carrying me out of the house. “Lupay had twisted her ankle. I was exhausted. We were just sitting there, talking.”
“And the book Darius said you had in your pack? The technology? Those are forbidden, Dane.”
“I know. We—I—found them in an ancient house that had been left sealed up and untouched since before the War. It was really weird.”
“But that’s forbidden, Dane.” Freda looks sad. No, not sad. Disillusioned. I can sense I’m losing her trust.
“I know that. I’m Semper, after all. I know Laws.”
“And Truth. God forbade technology, Dane. You go to worship. You sit in front of the Bomb. You know it only leads to suffering and inequality and war. Technology is what destroyed the Earth.”
“Well… yes, I know that.”
“Then why would you not destroy the technology when you found it?” She’s angry now, whispering in hisses so quickly I have to strain to separate the words as they hit me.
“I guess… I guess that since the ghost-men were real, and the mutant girl was nothing like I’d been taught… I don’t know.”
“Your faith was tested,” she whispers.
“Y
es.”
“And it did not hold.”
“I’d been shown things that proved some of our beliefs are wrong!” She wasn’t there. She doesn’t know like I do. She’s thinking only about how I failed the test of faith. She didn’t see the house with its ancient furnishings. She didn’t hear Lupay arguing with the ghost-men or get to hold the elegant blade made by a Tawtrukk heathen. How could she possibly understand? “No one will understand.”
A creaking and clunking from down the hall is suddenly accompanied by heavy boots clomping along the stone floor. A guard appears around the corner and comes to the door, keys jangling on a big, iron ring in his hand. My mother follows close behind, and beyond her another guard lingers at the corner, watching.
The cell door opens, and Freda and I stand motionless and wait. It occurs to me that perhaps my mother has come to set us free, that somehow she convinced Darius to be lenient.
“Please,” my mother croons to the guard that opened the door, “wait outside.”
“No. I stay here. No visitors for these two. You’re lucky I let you in at all.”
“Yes, I suppose. And you’ll be lucky that I don’t tell my husband, Semper Darius, that you did so.” She’s far shorter than the burly guard, but he steps back slowly as if he’s being pushed by a gentle but insistent hand.
“I see. Thank you, First Wife. I will be just outside. Yell if you need me.” The guard closes and locks the door behind my mother, and he and the other disappear down the hall
My mother waits, looking down the hallway after the guard, until she hears the outer door thud shut. Then she turns and walks directly to Freda. “I am so sorry, my dear. How are you?” She removes her shawl, knit of soft but warm lamb’s wool. She kicks away the horse blanket on the floor and drapes the shawl around Freda’s shoulders.
“I am fine, First Wife,” Freda replies.
“You were never supposed to be part of this, I’m quite sure,” my mother tells her. “Unfortunately, Dane did not follow my instructions. He was to select Suzee Lummon in the Wifing.”
Freda looks at me in wonder, then back to my mother, and then to me again.
“There is no time to explain it all. Darius has told me that you are both to be exiled tonight. It is good that he put you here.” She looks at me and puts her hands on my shoulders. “I don’t know if any of what he said about you and the mutant girl was true, Dane, but the people believe it. Darius has them thinking you are bewitched, and a traitor. They are calling for your execution, but he is demanding exile instead. He wants them to think him compassionate and level headed.”
My heart sinks. “What’s the difference? A fast and clean execution in the square, or being pushed through the wall into the Radiation, to die painfully over two or three days? Do I get a choice? Does Freda get a choice?”
My mother stares hard at me and thinks for a long time. Several seconds pass, and I can see the thoughts flying around in her mind, I can see the concentration behind her eyes. I have learned to wait patiently and silently during these moments.
“Dane, I know you have learned things in the past three days, things that you did not expect. I don’t know what those things are. And that is not important. What is important, is that you understand that there is more to learn.” She glances at the hall, but no sounds come from the guards. She looks to Freda. “You also have things to learn. Some of them I know already. Some I had hoped to learn from Linkan, but he did not have the chance to share them.”
The sound of my father’s name shocks me. “What did my father know?” The words blurt out of my mouth before I can stop them.
“Dane.” My mother ignores my question. “Did you engage in fornication with the Tawtrukk girl?”
“No!” I bark out the word with disgust. As I say it, though, I realize the disgust is with being asked the question in front of Freda. My disgust has nothing to do with the idea of physical contact with Lupay.
Relief spreads across her face, relaxing her forehead and allowing her cheeks to sag into the wrinkles I first noticed this morning. “Good. That would be a complication we do not need. Not yet.”
“First Wife,” Freda says slowly, eroding my mother’s intense internal concentration, “am I to understand that you are not going to try to help free us from this… misunderstanding?”
My mother smiles sadly. “There is nothing I can do. Darius is Semper now, and I was not exaggerating when I said the people would tear Dane apart if they encountered him on the street. Baddock has armed Darius’ allies and is preparing an attack on Tawtrukk.” She sighs and wraps her arms around herself, apparently now feeling the chill in the jail’s cold air. “It is unstoppable.”
“But exile!” I nearly shout the word, and she shoots a severe frown at me to shush me.
“Do not draw the guard. We have only minutes. Be quiet now, Dane. There are worse things than exile.” Briefly she focuses internally again, then shakes her head to bring herself back to the here, the now. She stares hard at me for a few seconds, then looks to Freda. “I am deeply sorry, dear, that you were drawn into this. Things have turned so quickly. Too quickly…” Again she trails off, then has to squeeze herself to break her internal reverie. She releases herself and takes Freda’s hands again. “But I think it is for the best.” She nods, apparently in agreement with some unspoken thought. “Yes, Dane will need you. Please. Please, Freda. All of Southshaw will need you. Even when things are darkest—especially when things are darkest—please stand by your husband.”
This throws both of us off balance, and Freda and I share a glance that contains nothing but questions. We are to be exiled tonight. We are to be taken to the Wall and pushed through the gate into the desolate, scorched lands beyond, where only wild, mutant predators and a slow, painful death from Radiation await us. Is my mother seriously asking Freda, who has done nothing wrong, to willfully and cheerily accompany me through the gate?
I can't let it end at that. “But mother—I’m sorry, I mean First Wife—Freda has done nothing wrong. The marriage could be annulled. I wasn’t even supposed to choose her!” I am growling the words, coming closer to my mother each second. “Do not punish her for my mistake. Talk to Darius. At the least, don’t make me go to my death with the guilt of dooming Freda, too.” I look at her, but she is hiding her face from me by looking away, or down, or anywhere but at me.
“No, Dane, I’m sorry,” my mother replies. “Darius will never absolve Freda, even though the people would accept her back. You were supposed to pick the Lummon girl, and her father is not happy. Darius needs his support for this war. Without Lummon, Darius can accomplish nothing. Lummon requires that Freda be punished.”
“But it’s not fair,” I start, and my mother holds up her hand to silence me.
“I must leave now,” she says loudly, and a moment later the guard clumps around the corner in his heavy boots. “My dears,” she sighs in a saddish way that seems entirely fake to me, “Godspeed to you. May you learn God’s love once you exit through the gate, and may he smile upon you and welcome you into His kingdom.”
The guard opens the door, she leaves, and the door is locked once more.
So that’s it. My own mother, the last hope for either of us, has put us in God’s hands. I know what that means. It means she expects us to die, and she hopes that we maybe won’t end up in Hell for the things I did. I didn’t even do anything wrong. Not really.
“Dane.” Freda’s soft voice floats to me. She’s sat down on the bed again and pats the space next to her. I come to her, sit down beside her. She leans her head on my shoulder, and I hold her hand. We’re quiet together for a few minutes, until she whispers, “It’s not your fault.”
I shake my head. “No, it’s all my fault.”
She squeezes my hand in that way she does that says everything will be all right if I just have courage. She’s never told me that’s what it means. In fact, I’ve never held her hand before this morning, but it feels like such a long time we’ve been together.
It’s only been a few hours.
“That girl, the Tawtrukk girl,” Freda says softly. I am silently grateful she does not use the word mutant. But I tense and wait for the question I know she’s going to ask. Do I love Lupay? I don’t even know the answer to that myself. At moments I think I love Freda, but at other moments Lupay’s image is so intense in me that all I want in the whole world is to see her one more time.
“Yes,” I whisper, and I squeeze her hand back to show that it’s OK for her to ask anything. Anything at all.
“Do you think she did have something to do with the attack on the Home Guard?”
“I—what?” Not the question I expected. “Um, well. I haven’t really had a chance to think it through. But…” The picture of Lupay being dragged off into the darkness, and me unable to chase, with Baddock lying on the ground knocked out by the ghost-men, fills my thoughts. “No. There’s no way she could have had anything to do with it.” I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. “She’s dead. I’m sure of it. I saw the ghosts carry her off.”
“You what?” Freda looks up at me, her soft eyes watery. I realize she has been weeping silently. No sobs, no sniffles. Just tears that dripped from her cheeks onto the shawl wrapped around her shoulders.
“She was carried off. I didn’t get to tell you before. Baddock and his group found us. That night we all camped, and the ghost-men came. They knocked out Baddock and took Lupay off into the woods. I don’t know why. I tried to catch them, but…” That’s all there is to say.
“Oh.”
We sit in the dim room for another few minutes, just holding each other. I feel her warmth seep into my arm and my chest, feel the weight of her head resting on my shoulder. I feel her steady, slow breath making her shoulders rise and fall with a rhythm like waves on the lake. After a while I wonder if she’s asleep. I don’t blame her. Exhaustion and defeat have overcome me and crawled into every corner of my body.
“Freda?” The barest of whispers. I say it, but I can barely hear it myself. It gets lost in the dark space around us.
Semper (New Eden) Page 13