Annah and the Children of Evohe

by Clay Gilbert

  He hugged her. Hmm. Maybe I have something here to come back to, too. Maybe. “I already like you, Irie. And if someone hasn’t stolen you away when I get back, then we’ll see.”

  “Thank you,” Irie said. “I will-wish for your safety. Both of you.” Ardan came forward next; clasped Holder’s hand in his, more firmly than before. I think he’s getting the hang of the custom, Holder thought.

  “Be safe, my friend,” Ardan said. “Annah will be terribly worried. And I, too, would hate to lose you.”

  “I will, Ardan. You and Kyrin go ahead and get Promised if you want, but you better wait until I get back for that Choosing ceremony.” “Very well,” Ardan said, and laughed.

  Annah came forward then. She looked to Holder as though she’d been crying, but she smiled when her eyes met his. She came to him, rubbed her face against his, and held him close.

  “Holder,” she said, “I do not know what will happen while you are away. But I know that my feelings for you will not change. And when the cycle has passed, and when you return—we will be Chosen and joined.”

  Holder nodded. “Keep working on your Shaping. You’ll have plenty to teach me when I get home.” “I will,” she said.

  He paused, looking as though he’d just thought of something. “Annah, you’re young. You have a whole life ahead of you. If something happens—if I don’t come back”

  Annah put her finger to his lips. “You are the only one I desire, Holder. There could never be another.”

  “I’m only saying-” Annah smiled. “You are a stubborn man. Hear what I am saying, Gary Holder: when your far-away world is a cold stone, and spins around a darkened sun; when all the lights have gone that we watched dance in the skies as we held each other by our fire; when the stream by the Grove has dried to dust, and even when I go to my rest in the Elder Grove-even then, my dearest-I will still be here, waiting for you.”

  Holder found no more words. He held Annah in silence for one long moment more, kissed her, waved farewell to the others, and then followed Goodman up the entry ramp into the ship. Just before the thrusters lifted the craft starward, Holder heard Annah’s voice in his mind: Keep yourself safe for me. Write down what you see, out there in the Sea of Stars. Be my eyes. And come home to me. Goodbye, my dearest. Goodbye for now.

  I’m a million miles away from you and I still feel like you’re right here beside me. Holder reached out to touch Annah’s face in the miniature holopic Goodman had taken of the two of them just before they’d left.

  “She really looks cute in that picture, man.” Goodman said, coming into the main cabin from the cockpit.

  “She does, doesn’t she?”

  “Yeah. You’d never know that just a few minutes before, she’d been looking like the camera was gonna bite her.” She’d never seen one before, Holder remembered. He didn’t know exactly what Evohe had been like before what Annah’s people called the Breaking, but there wasn’t any technology there anymore, not by Earth standards. But they noticed things; they valued things; they remembered things, and people, without machines to do it for them.

  She’d warmed up to it, anyway, he thought. Once she’d satisfied her curiosity, she’d stood in front of the camera with Holder, her head against his chest, their arms around each other, like a million other pictures of a guy and his girlfriend. We’re just the same as anyone. And we’re different, too. But those differences are part of what makes loving her amazing, even if there are a lot of people who wouldn’t see it that way. If they could, maybe I could be back there with her, right now. Maybe Goodman and I wouldn’t be out here in the black, running like two men racing down a mountain with a forest fire at their backs. “So what’s the word, Goodman?” Holder asked. He’d been asleep for the last several hours.

  Recon jaunts didn’t generally involve long periods in space at a time, and he had forgotten how difficult it sometimes was to sleep out here, with none of the usual signposts marking the borders between night and day. The ship could run itself, but it was a good idea for at least one of them to be awake, just in case something went wrong. He’d already done the same courtesy for Goodman once or twice, generally when he was feeling particularly turnedaround timewise, and wide awake because of it.

  “Another sector went red today,” Goodman said. “This thing keeps heating up. It’s gonna eat the whole galaxy if someone can’t find a way to stop it.”

  “Who’d we lose today?” “Blue 28.” There were a hundred sectors in what, by Homesec reckoning, was considered charted space, from Earth’s atmosphere out to the Edge, in the part of space Evohe occupied.

  And more than a quarter of them, now, had been pulled into the vortex of war. “One hundred sectors in what had been free space; peaceful space.” Goodman sighed. “And now twenty-eight of them are gone.”

  Holder looked at the star-map displayed on the ship’s navigational readout. “Blue 28-well, I guess it’s Red 28 now. That’s awfully close to the Edge.”

  “Annah and her people should be okay, man,” Goodman said. “Homesec’s probably not too worried about the Edge, and we’ve got no proof that they even know Evohe’s out there, anymore. What I’m worried about is running out of places to hide.”

  In the two months they’d been gone from Evohe, Holder and Goodman had searched out every system they could find still outside the conflict. The best of these had been some of the other Edge systems, close to Evohe, where a lot of the inhabitants didn’t know much about Earth, and had never heard of Homesec. How much longer there would be any places like that left was anyone’s guess. There certainly were fewer and fewer of them left.

  “We pick up any Homesec ships on the scanner while I was asleep?” Holder asked. He’d been out for about an hour. Getting used to sleeping in artificial gravity again is kind of a bitch, he thought. And sleeping without Annah certainly is.

  “No. But if sectors keep going red on us, we’ll start seeing them, even if we stay out on the Edge.”

  “So how do two people, especially a couple of outlaws like us, stop a war?” Holder asked. “First of all, by making sure no one in Homesec gets their hands on that marble. Secondly, we need to make sure people know the truth about what happened to Commander Reynolds. It might not end the war. But it’ll give us an advantage.”

  “Any ideas how we do that?” “A few,” said Goodman. “There’s a few planets out in this part of space who weren’t real friendly with Earth in the last war, even if they weren’t enemies, strictly speaking. “

  “And what,” Holder asked. “Makes you think they’ll be friendly to us? We’re Earthers, in case you’ve forgotten.” Goodman laughed. “Come on, Holder. You of all people should know it’s possible to like a few people without getting cozy with a whole planet.”

  Holder nodded, grinning. “Yeah, I suppose you’re right. You got a place in mind?”

  “Yeah. Let me lock in the coordinates. It’s not far.”

  * * *

  “Annah, pay attention.” Serra’s voice came to Annah like an echo from the bank of a distant river. The stones and grass of the heart-place seemed to materialize around her as if she had been floating in space, not merely distracted, and had been summoned back by the sound. Floating in space, she thought. Hmm.

  “Annah,” Serra said, “these exercises will not work if you do not have clarity.”

  Annah nodded, looking down at her feet for a moment. “I am sorry.” she said. “You have been doing very well,” Serra said, sitting down beside Annah on a large, flat stone. “Your visualization abilities have grown tremendously. Maybe that is the problem,” she said, putting her arm around the girl.

  Annah leaned against Serra for just a moment. The elder Shaper had come to be more than just a friend or a mentor in the time Holder had been gone. Annah had come to see her almost like a second mother. Sometimes she thought that it might have been this way with her departed guardian, had there been time. But the First Ones see more clearly than we do, she thought, and have their own purposes f
or us.

  “Do you see him often?” Serra asked.

  “Mmm?”Annah still felt a bit dazed.

  “In Vision. Do you see Holder often?”

  “Not as often as I would like. I cannot go to him in my mind, now, as easily as I could when he was here.”

  “That is to be expected,” Serra said. “You are still young, and relatively untrained.”

  “I just wish it were easier,” Annah said. “I worry about him. Out there. With this war.”

  “Perhaps it is better this way, Annah. If he were in danger, there would be nothing you could do.” Annah kicked at the dirt. “I have spent much of my life feeling out of place; wondering what it is I am meant to do. I felt the most-purposeful-when he was here.”

  Serra stroked Annah’s hair. “I understand. Love lifts us above ourselves. It helps us see as the First Ones see. But Annah, you have a purpose, just as he does. And seeing it, and working toward it, that will make the two of you stronger when you are together again.”

  “Serra?”

  “Yes?”

  “If I felt he was in danger; if I needed to see him-would you be able to see him?” Serra hesitated a moment before she replied. “Yes, I believe I could, if it were necessary. But perhaps, if that time comes, you will be able to see him yourself.”

  Annah sighed. “Perhaps so.”

  “But not,” Serra said, “if you have no clarity. So. Visualization. Ready to try again?” “Yes,” Annah said, though the distant pull still weighed on her mind, just beyond the reach of her perception. Red skies...

  * * * Red skies, thought Holder, looking through the ship’s viewfinder as they descended. “So, they speak Standard here?”

  “Yeah,” Goodman affirmed. “This was a major trade hub before the Portal got put in on Earth. Still is. It’s got one thing Earth doesn’t have, and that’s location. It’s central to getting most anywhere you’re going in long-range travel. The old Earth government—before Homesec came in— apparently used it as a staging area for some of the Big Wars back a lot of years ago.

  Homesec’d like to do that now. I used to hear about it sometimes, back at the office. They don’t like Homesec here, as a rule, though. But they don’t mind Earthers, in general. We’ll be okay.”

  “Should I take a breather with me?” Holder asked. He’d been on Recon missions to worlds where just breathing was like trying to snort tar.

  “Nah. Air’s clearer here than it is on Earth. Red sky’s just from trace minerals in the atmosphere. Harmless. Come on.”

  Join the service and see the world, thought Holder. Isn’t that what the army ads on the vidscreens always said? Join a Recon mission and see the asshole of the galaxy. They should have added that.

  The ship touched down in the wide central hangar of what looked like many other spaceports Holder had seen, only on a larger scale. There were docking bays here for at least a thousand ships, and there were passage-tubes stretching to the north, south, east and west that Holder guessed led to still more landing areas. Most of the ‘ports Holder had seen on Recon trips were military facilities, and disused at that; much smaller, and in far worse shape. This place was brightly lit, filled with people, and the very air seemed alive with sights and sounds of every sort: the shouts of people greeting loved ones as they stepped out from the docking bays and made their way into the station, the intercoms overhead announcing arrivals and departures, and the comings and goings of crowds, making their way from portals and platforms or milling about among the market of merchant stalls that surrounded the landing areas, like orbiting satellites of commerce, waiting to pull newlyarrived travelers and unwary passers-by alike into their frantic gravity.

  The Maestro better have that guy waiting here for us, Goodman thought. He’d spoken to the Maestro while Holder was asleep. He was discovering that the Maestro had connections everywhere. Goodman still wasn’t sure he could fully trust the man, but so far, there was no reason to think he was in bed with the HPF, Caminos, or the new Commander at Homesec—and that made him as trustworthy as anyone in Goodman’s book. And more trustworthy than some. “Holder and I need a contact we can trust,” Goodman had told the Maestro. “Someone who doesn’t like the HPF, but doesn’t hate humans, either.”

  “Like I’d stick ya with one of those,” the Maestro had laughed.

  “Hey, man. I’m just making sure.” “You’ll be fine. This guy, he’s a merchant. Good people skills. Good skills in readin’ em, too. He won’t do you wrong. You’ll find him in the spaceport marketplace, just after you touch down.”

  Yeah, so you said, thought Goodman. I just hope you’re right. “So where is this guy?” Holder asked Goodman, when they’d been walking around the spaceport for close to an hour. Holder had to admit he was enjoying the place, despite the anxiety that had dogged him ever since they left Evohe. He’d had a thing for spaceports ever since the first time he’d been Offworld, and just setting foot in one made his fingers and feet itch for liftoff. Everything about a ‘port gave Holder the feeling of motion: that every passing moment was a nexus of possibility; a convergence in time. Annah would love this place, too, he thought, imagining her wide blue eyes growing even wider; smiling to himself as he pictured her fidgeting with excitement at seeing so many spacecraft in one place at one time. I am going to show her the Sea of Stars, Holder thought. But I have to get back to her first. I promised her that. And Goodman and I have a job to do. “You sure this ‘Maestro’ didn’t yank your chain, Goodman? Maybe even doublecross us?”

  “I’m sure he didn’t,” Goodman said. At least, he better not have. Two hours later, Goodman was nearly ready to concede that Holder had been right, when he felt a hand clutch his arm as the two of them passed down the row of merchant stalls closest to the back of the room. His hand snapped down to the gun at his waist.

  “It’s all right,” the stranger said. “You won’t need that. I believe I have some wares that will interest you both. Come with me.”

  The stranger stepped out so they could see him, and Holder sized him up. A little younger than me. Thirty, maybe a couple years older. The weathered look of his face made it difficult to truly tell. The newcomer had short-cropped, dirty-blond hair and eyes the color of the sky before a storm. His arms were well-muscled—whether from lugging his wares around spaceports like this one or from brawling with the star-trash that probably skulked around the dark corners here, Holder could only guess. He wore faded jeans and a long-sleeved shirt of some fabric Holder didn’t recognize, dyed in a rich blue. Holder dimly recalled having heard somewhere that blue was a merchant color on a lot of worlds.

  They followed the stranger to one of the few empty spaces in the hall. “Keep your voices low,” he told them, “and we’ll be fine here. My name’s Mark Turner. I’m in the Merchants’ Guild, like the Maestro told you. But I’m a part of something else these days, too.”

  “You an Earther?” Goodman asked.

  “Yeah, I’m from Earth. Don’t know that I’ll ever go back there again, though—unless they change the management.” “Know what you mean,” Goodman said. “By the way, Turner, this is Gary Holder. He helped me out of some of my own trouble with the ‘management.’”

  Holder shook Turner’s hand. “Nice to meet you. Just call me Holder. Most do.” He laughed. “Hell, even my girlfriend does.”

  Turner smiled. “Turner’ll do fine for me, too. Lot of that goes ‘round in the military, spacers, even merchants. Lots of Marks out there; not so many Turners.”

  “So,” Holder said, “what’s this ‘something else’ you mentioned bein’into?”

  “Yeah,” Goodman chimed in. “Curious about that myself.” “You can call it a relief effort,” Turner said. “I guess some might call us pirates-and you know what? That’s fine with me. It’s a respectable enough word, I guess.” He laughed. “It’s got a long history, anyway. Bottom line is, what’s happening right now on Earth-the specifics of it—that’s pretty new. But what’s behind it, the HPF and all their-well, c
all it what it is, it’s hate-that’s been going on a long time. And we don’t want it going any further.”

  “Neither do we,” Holder said.

  “Then the Maestro was right to send you to me,” Turner said.

  “Hmm,” Goodman said, glancing over at Holder. “We thought he sent you to us.” Sometimes it surprised Holder how fast he and Goodman had become a team, but he was glad they had. He didn’t make friends easily, and he wasn’t expecting to find one all the way out in space. But he hadn’t expected to find Annah, either. Things happen the way they’re meant to, he thought. He knew Annah would say it was a part of Balance, a part of the Patterns in all things. He knew he could trust Goodman, but he couldn’t yet say the same about Turner. Still, what choice is there?

  “I have some serious questions, Turner,” Goodman said. “We both do.”

  “I’d be disappointed if you didn’t,” Turner said. “But we shouldn’t talk about them here.”

  “Meet us at our ship, then,” Holder said. “You probably know which one it is, already.”

  “I do,” Turner said. “I’ll meet you two on the landing platform in an hour.”

  * * *

  “Can we trust this guy, Goodman?” “You got a better idea?” Goodman asked, eyeing Holder. “Like it or not, we can’t do what we need to do-staying alive, and trying to find an end to this war-without help. I sure as hell trust the Maestro more than Homesec’s new Commander, so if the Maestro says Turner’s on the level, I say we give him a chance. We better keep an eye on the marble, though, until we find out for sure what this guy’s made of.”

  “Agreed.” A short time later, they caught sight of Turner approaching through the crowd, from the area where his merchant stall was set up.

  “All right, boys,” Turner said. “Let’s talk.” “You said you had questions,” Turner told them. “I would too, if I were you. I pretty much was, and not terribly long ago. And I sat right where you were sitting—well, it was another ship, in another place. But I was there, and I had questions, too. And a man called the Maestro let me know what was really going on.”