“Bad dream,” Shervet said, in annoyance. “Why let it bother you?”
At the behest of Shervet, Dinah did not persist in taking late night walks. If Dinah got into serious trouble, it was said that a second relocation would be in order—this time, not to a school for lytes who were precocious, but to a penal farm for lytes who were truly mischievous. Those lytes would be denied motherhood, as well as a companion. They would become short-lived workers like the trogs themselves. Kept away from the rest of the country, in a kind of exile for women who did not or would not behave. Something Shervet feared greatly, because she knew that she and Dinah were treated as an informal unit. If Dinah were to be punished, it was likely Shervet would pay the price too—as an accessory.
Occasionally, Dinah and Shervet would indulge in the touch. Or rather, Shervet would visit Dinah’s bed, and initiate—with Dinah going along to get along.
But there was an unsatisfying quality to the act, now. Something was most definitely missing, though Dinah couldn’t put her finger on what it was. Which simply frustrated Shervet, who seemed to have no such problem enjoying the moment. Until it became clear that Dinah could not reciprocate.
A distance grew between them, which words alone could not close. No matter how much Dinah apologized.
Then one day, after Shervet had demurred to attend class—on account of not feeling well—Dinah returned to their room, to discover that Shervet and all of her things were gone. Even the small chest kept under Shervet’s bunk.
When Dinah rushed to tell Mother Uroz, the older woman simply wrapped an arm around Dinah and guided Dinah into Uroz’s learning chamber, at the back of the now-empty classroom. Uroz slowly shut the learning chamber’s door, and then sat down at her large instructor’s desk. An aquarium filled with brightly-colored fish, sat at one corner of the surface, while ancient-looking bound-paper books were arranged between bookends on the opposite corner.
Dinah’s chair—across from Mother Uroz—felt uncomfortable, despite padding.
“I don’t understand,” Dinah said, sniffling at a piece of tissue which Mother Uroz had offered.
“I could see it coming,” Mother Uroz said. “Even before your arrival here. We don’t often get paired lytes, but when we do, it almost never lasts. Sooner or later, one of the two tires of the relationship, and requests to be separated. The pain will be something you have to deal with in your own time, and in your own way. I would tell you not to take it personally, but that’s impossible. I know for a fact.”
“How?” Dinah asked.
“Within a year of coming here, when I myself was a lyte, Mother Cedra—then Lyte Cedra—moved out of our room. And she didn’t even tell me why. I just... came back to the room, and she was gone. Moved to a new class with a new instructor, too. We seldom talked after that. I seldom talk to her, even now. It’s just something I’ve learned to live with. You will too.”
Dinah drew her knees up to her chin, and hugged them tight.
“It hurts,” she said. “Everything hurts.”
“And it will keep hurting,” Mother Uroz said. “Even many, many years from now. You just... learn to live and be happy, despite the hurt.”
“But it’s not just about Shervet,” Dinah said hotly, staring across the desk with watery eyes.
“I know,” Mother Uroz said.
“How?!” Dinah barked, surprised at her temerity in addressing a mother without using the expected manners and deference. But given the rawness of her heart, Dinah did not, in that moment, particularly care about being well-behaved. She wanted answers.
Mother Uroz steepled her fingers. “So much like I was,” she said softly, as if to no one in particular.
The older woman reached a hand under her desk, and there was a slight snapping sound—as if a switch had been thrown. The bubbles in the aquarium suddenly grew in number, until their noise was practically an irritant. There was something else, too. A kind of low, electronic pitch. Just loud enough to be detectable, but underlying the frenetic burbling of the aquarium.
“A necessary distraction,” Mother Uroz said. “To mask our conversation. Because what I am about to tell you, cannot leave this room. There are more ears here, than ours. Will you swear to me now, on your own life, that what is divulged between us, stays between us?”
“I swear it,” Dinah said.
“Do you promise it by your very blood?”
“By my blood, I swear it!” Dinah said, leaping out of her chair and extending her hands across the table.
Mother Uroz took them—the older woman’s grip reassuringly strong—and then she released Dinah’s fingers, and told the lyte to sit back down. And listen carefully.
“We travel the same path, you and I,” Mother Uroz said. “Many of the questions that now crowd inside your skull, once crowded inside mine as well. I was not an easy student for the senior mothers to deal with. It seemed like I was always half a step from exile. But I managed to stay just this side of their expectations. Eventually they sent me here, and here is where I learned the truth.”
Dinah had forgotten all about the tissue in her hand. She barely breathed, as Mother Uroz continued to speak.
“There was a time, long ago, when trogs and lytes lived amongst each other. Before the war which ended all wars. Before the companion, and our longevity as mothers. The trogs were in charge of the world, then. Yes, I see the shock in your eyes. It’s historical fact, nonetheless. Hundreds of countries across the Earth, were all run by trogs—with very few exceptions. They could never stop fighting with each other. They still can’t keep from fighting. That’s why we created the betas. To keep order and discipline. But there were no betas then, nor mothers. We lived with the trogs, and they lived with us. We did the touch—trogs and lytes with each other—and made billions of babies.”
“Shervet was right,” Dinah said, almost gasping.
“Oh, you both more or less figured it out. All you needed was confirmation. Yes, to this day, we still need the trogs—to make lytes. And they need us to make trogs. When a mother gives birth—her one and only child—the female babies are put into the communal nurseries, to become lytes. The male babies are turned over to the betas, who make them into trogs. Which are kept separate, so that they can be properly harnessed and controlled—and their violence can never again rule the world.”
Dinah’s face expressed her horror at what she’d been told.
Mother Uroz quickly continued.
“Or at least, that’s the logic our society has relied upon since the wall was erected many long years ago. It’s the fable we tell ourselves, to justify maintaining the status quo.”
“But how can we call ourselves superior?” Dinah demanded. “We treat them as animals, but trogs are... they are people too!”
“Not all of us agree with the law,” Mother Uroz said. “Which is why I do the work that I do. So as to identify and shepherd lytes who will bring sorrow to themselves, by knowing and asking too much—then expecting things to change.”
“But they should change!” Dinah said emphatically. “I mean, Mother Evlun has been doing the touch with a trog, right under your noses! A law isn’t a law, if it’s conveniently broken by people who should know better!”
“Mother Evlun? Really? I didn’t know that.”
“I’ve heard them several times.”
“You’ve been busy paying attention to other womens’ personal business. If I were one of the other instructors, I’d have you punished for it. But I won’t. What got you curious about Mother Evlun, anyway?”
“Because nobody tells lytes anything. You give us half-truths, and expect us to wait for the rest of the story—and you act like we’re just supposed to accept this.”
“That’s because most lytes do. Most. Which again, brings us to this conversation in this room. You’re right. A law isn’t a law, if it’s broken without consequence. I can’t expect you to understand yet, because you’re not a mother. When you’re of age, one of the secrets that is final
ly shared with you, is that doing the touch with trogs is not only allowed, it’s expected.”
Dinah’s mouth hung half-open.
“How else do you think the egg is fertilized,” Mother Uroz said. “By magic? With another egg from another mother? No. The trogs complete the procreation puzzle. We provide the eggs, but the trogs provide the sperm. You are offered a choice: artificial insemination, or direct mating with a trog. Some women try the latter, don’t like it, and resort to the former, until pregnant. Other women try the latter, like it, and become pregnant in the ancient way. And out of those women, a few cannot let it go. They enjoy it too much. So that, long after the birth is over, and long after gaining a companion, these women yearn again for the experience. Enough to risk violating the law. So they make arrangements. Yes, it’s against the code of our country, but are we going to throw every mother—who secretly has a trog on the side—into exile? No. It’s a tolerated violation. We don’t openly talk about it.”
“Even when something goes wrong?” Dinah said.
“Like what?”
“Like when a mother becomes pregnant for the second time.”
Mother Uroz tapped the metal disc below and behind her ear.
“The companion sees to it that no mother, so quipped, need ever worry about becoming pregnant again.“
“But what about when a life is in peril?”
Mother Uroz opened her mouth to say something, then seemed to catch Dinah’s drift, and frowned for several seconds—before continuing.
“I don’t know the specific reason why you found a dead trog outside the wall. But I can guess. Liaisons with trogs are supposed to be short-lived, like the trogs themselves. I am wagering whichever mother was partaking of the trog who jumped to his death, she’d let it go on too long. Allowed herself to become attached. Or, worse yet, allowed the trog to become attached. When she tried to break it off, the trog despaired. So he ended his life.”
“I can’t imagine anyone—trog or no—choosing suicide, simply because he’s losing the touch with some mother,” Dinah said. “But I can imagine choosing suicide, if the trog has fallen in love; and gets hurt.”
“A trog can feel in such a sophisticated way?” Mother Uroz said, raising an eyebrow.
“You tell me!” Dinah said loudly. “You have all the answers!”
Suddenly, Dinah began to weep again. But this time, it wasn’t just sniffling. It was a hard, unrelenting ache in her stomach, that caused her to lean forward and wail openly. For Shervet. And, in a sense, for Gebbel too. Because it was Gebbel—the picture in her mind, of his lovely face, of imagining his hands on her skin, his lips on her lips—which had distracted Dinah enough to ultimately drive Shervet away. One relationship, carelessly shattered. Another relationship, unfortunately impossible.
In the space of a single year, the whole world had stopped making sense.
Mother Uroz waited patiently. When Dinah collected herself—more tissue being offered from Uroz’s hand—the older woman reached for one of the books on the corner of her desk. She opened it, and removed a piece of paper. She slid it across her desk, and Dinah took it.
There were words arranged on the single page. Lyrics.
“You know all the hymns officially sung in school,” Mother Uroz said. “But this is one of the forbidden hymns.”
“Forbidden? Why?”
“This hymn tells of the time before the wall. Before trogs, and lytes, and betas. When there were simply boys and girls, and women and men. The hymn hints at a legend—about another nation, which survived the war, very far away from our own. Where men and women live and work together still. As equals. I’ve been on expeditions which were sent to find this country. We were never successful. But some of us still believe it exists. Maybe you will be the one to find it?”
Dinah stared into the fish tank, watching the colorful creatures dart to and fro—disturbed by the increased turbulence from the bubbles.
“Finding such a place,” Dinah said, after a long pause, “would not change anything inside the wall.”
“Maybe, maybe not. But we have to hope. Meanwhile, you must learn to have two lives. There is the life that you live, for the outer world. Where you show the other mothers that you are a good, proper member of our society. Then there is the life you live for you. That you share only with similar minds. There are not many of us, but we do exist. And we work together to prepare for a time when there may be a real opportunity for change. Without it needing to be a war.”
“You expect me to be happy living and speaking a lie?”
“No,” Mother Uroz said, matter-of-fact. “But none of this is about your happiness, Lyte Dinah. It’s about your survival—preparing you for the reality of the universe in which you live. I could just let you go, and see you eaten alive in exile. Or I can offer you the outstretched hand of camaraderie. It’s not an easy way, this thing I am offering you. But it is a way. And in time, you will help others to also find the way. Perhaps, beyond anything either one of us can now expect. Are you willing to walk that road?”
Dinah held the piece of paper in her hand, and silently read the words to herself. As Mother Uroz had promised, the hymn spoke of a far-away land, where males and females built a new nation—together. A place where some of the learning and artifacts of the time before the war, had been preserved. Of a life utterly unlike the one Dinah knew inside the wall.
Her hand began to tremble. Could it be? Was there such a country? She imagined walking down a boulevard, with Gebbel at her side—no need for ducking and fearing any armed betas. Dinah pictured Gebbel with a smile on his face. Perhaps, even a child at his feet? No, more than one. Several children. Theirs. Made with the touch.
“Show me,” Dinah said finally, and reverently placed the paper back onto the desk. “Show me everything, Mother Uroz. I am ready to learn.”
The older woman smiled broadly—the first time Dinah had ever seen such an expression on her instructor’s face—and clapped her hands together with satisfaction.
BY HIS COCKLE HAT AND STAFF
By
John C. Wright
What if the life we really want does not come from the changes we think we want?
“And how should I know your true-love
From many another one?”
O, by his cockle hat, and staff,
And by his sandal shoon.”
“O lady, he is dead and gone!
Lady, he’s dead and gone!
And at his head a green grass turf,
And at his heels a stone.”
The Friar of Orders Gray—Thomas Percy (1729–1811)
-1-
There are much easier ways than killing yourself.
We have all heard the endless argument about the best method of insertion, and I know the advantages of taking over your self’s life in the new world. You have his clothing and his money, for one thing, not to mention opposable thumbs, and you can start to bend history back into the right direction, the way things should have gone had Hell never broken the world, nor Mesmer.
But consider the disadvantages.
-2-
I am ashamed to admit that, at first, the idea that I was a sleepwalker amused me. It was the kind of thing one reads in romances by Wells or Wiene, but never sees in life. In our peaceful and unexciting world, the idea of being a somnambulist seemed so… exotic.
The first time was when I woke up at midnight, roused by the barking of a dog right outside my dressing room window, to find myself on my feet, facing the full-length looking glass. I was barefoot, but otherwise completely dressed in trousers, waistcoat, jacket and tie. But the tie had been tied improperly. A polite knock came at the door.
“Come!”
“Just me, sir. Was there anything you needed, sir?”
It was my valet, Roberts, blinking and yawning.
“Why are you awake at this ghastly hour?” for the church steeple of Saint Anne’s was ringing midnight, coming across the waters of Lake Quinsigamon
d. “Good God! Why am I?”
“That, I cannot say, sir. I heard you moving about.”
“Moving?”
“In the wine cellar, up the back stair, down the servant’s hall, front hall, kitchen, pantry. You do know that the boards creak more loudly when you tiptoe? If you don’t mind my saying, sir.”
“Why was I tiptoeing? It’s my house!” This house had stood here in Regatta Point Park since my grandfather fled to America with all his wealth, changing his name from von Wardszawaschwig-Glücksburg to Ward and left all the dynastic insanity and warfare of Europe far behind. There have been three wars in Europe since then, in 1912, in 1939, and again in 1985 when the last Czar fell and the Kaiser of Greater Germany claimed all the Russian lands as his; but American was involved in none of them.
“You woke Mrs. Ferris, too, but she, kind soul, will say naught. She heard the drawers opening and shutting in the library. Your desk drawers. And then the sound of rattling the roll top, as if you’d forgotten where you’d put the key. I thought I would ask?”
“Well, if you find an answer, Roberts, by damn, tell me. I was asleep in bed. I was dreaming about a world where I lived in a grey box that shouted at me all the time—” It had sounded a lot more sensible when I was asleep.
That was not the last episode of sleepwalking, nor the worst.
The worst was when I was absent for two days in March. The servants reported that I rose as normal, spoke as normal, but instead of going to the Tool and Die, told Roberts that I was visiting relatives, summoned a hansom, and vanished. I woke up, remembering none of this and thinking it was March 27th on the 30th.
The hansom was an automatic, and, since this is not Germany, the company keeps no trip record in the autodriver.
The last episode—that I recall—was when I woke, this time properly dressed, at the Grafton train station, with a ticket to Rhode Island in my hand. The station was an echoing and empty cathedral around me, and I felt like a ghost. Evidently I was waiting to catch the midnight train.
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