Reading the Wind (Silver Ship)

by Brenda Cooper

  Ming, the dark-haired herder, turned and led us out. She didn’t speak until we were outside of the building. Then she spoke to me, her voice quiet and a touch amazed. “Pilot Joseph, you are lucky he is allowing you to leave. Thank Marcus.”

  Why would she say such a thing? What influence did the mysterious Marcus have on these people? Was she implying Marcus was on our side, or even that she was? I nodded at her. “I’ll thank him if I ever see him.”

  A silver skimmer waited near the edge of the spaceport, sleeker than the Burning Void, almost as long, but lower to the ground. “I called you some transport,” Ming said, smiling sweetly and unconvincingly “I added the bill to the total debt of your group.” She glanced at Jenna. “Let me show you how to fly it.”

  Jenna nodded, silent, listening as Ming explained the skimmer’s interfaces. Unlike the one I’d flown at home, it had hand controls and a clear display that showed the long flat stretch of hard surface in front of it. Ming glanced at Jenna’s missing arm, pursing her lips. “Can you fly it?”

  Jenna snorted. “Of course.”

  There were four seats under a bubble of something clear that looked like glass but felt softer as I touched it. Jenna opened the bubble and climbed into the pilot’s seat, gesturing to me to take the other front seat. Alicia helped Bryan ease into the wide backseat behind me and sat next to him. Ming stood silently, watching, a tiny smile brushing the edges of her lips.

  The bubble top closed over us, shutting out the sounds and smells of the spaceport. Jenna followed Ming’s instructions, pushing buttons and pulling a lever. The skimmer jerked twice, getting about two meters away from Ming, then stopping. Jenna cursed and touched her necklace. The skimmer started slowly down the hard path, gathering speed, and then rose smoothly. “Why didn’t the Authority witch tell me I didn’t need the hand controls?” Jenna said to no one in particular.

  What did it mean for us that even Jenna was having trouble navigating here?

  15

  JENNA’S SISTER

  I stared through the bubble as we rose above Li Spaceport and turned toward the glittering city. The sun rode lower in the sky, almost directly behind us, its light bouncing from bright smooth surfaces.

  Alicia spoke from behind me. “Jenna—why can you fly this? You couldn’t fly the other skimmer at home.”

  “Very few of our own data nets ever came up on Fremont—just simple nodes to communicate with the ship from our bases, and a strong local set in the caves. That made us dependent on Wind Readers, but it couldn’t be helped. Here, the ship has a support net. I just give it directions.” She touched her blue necklace. “And we all have plenty of interfaces.” She glanced at me briefly before turning her attention back to the stunning view. “If we’d gotten a really good set of our own nets up, we would have won the war. But the Artistos data net kept our data out of Artistos, for the most part.”

  “So what do you need Wind Readers for here?” Bryan asked.

  She laughed. “All the hard stuff. We have smart communication and smart nets and smart machines, but we limit the ability of machine intelligence to create.”

  I watched the city grow in the window, bright and light and airy. It seemed to me that a machine could do more than I could. “Why?”

  “On worlds where machines were encouraged to create, only the machines lived.”

  That brought silence to all of us for a few moments. “So how do you stop the machines?” I asked. “Don’t you have AIs here on the planet?”

  Jenna didn’t answer at once. “It’s never built into them to create. Just to obey, and sometimes to be creative about the right answer to a difficult problem. But the machines here have no desire to create art or life.”

  Alicia changed the subject. “You won’t trade Joseph will you? What did you think of the Port Authority? How come they were so mean?”

  Jenna grunted. “Of course I won’t trade Joseph. The meeting? We don’t seem to be in as much trouble as I expected.”

  “Ming suggested Marcus had something to do with it,” I said.

  “Maybe.” She glanced over at me. “I’d like to know why.”

  So would I.

  “Who’s Marcus?” Alicia asked. “Are we going to see him? Why does he want to meet Joseph?”

  Jenna didn’t answer. She banked the small skimmer left in a big lazy circle. A river snaked below us, its banks lined with tall buildings and its surface full of movement and color. Artistos had a few small fishing boats, only good when the river ran slow. Below me, boats of every imaginable shape and hue danced on the water like insects. There were so many they should have hit each other, but they didn’t. Jenna finally answered. “Marcus is a lone creator; he belongs to no visible affinity group. Or at least, he didn’t.” She touched the blue necklace, probably giving some silent command. “He was not so powerful when we left.” She shook her head. “I can’t say I know who or what Marcus has become. We should look him up, but not now. We’re meeting my sister.”

  Surely with the power I’d sensed on board the New Making, he could find us if he wanted to. I shivered. He had been so strong.

  Jenna pointed at the river. “That’s new. There used to be hundreds of lakes, and now it looks like a river surrounds the whole city.”

  “Did they make the river?” Bryan asked.

  Jenna swept her arm in front of her. “That’s what drives the economy here. Change. Parts of the city change daily in some ways; the cumulative effect is a lot of change.”

  Alicia leaned forward, one hand on my shoulder. “Are we taking Bryan to a hospital? How will you find your sister?”

  Jenna laughed. “Yes, we’ll get Bryan some better care. All of us. But first, we’ll see Tiala. I know where she lives—she hasn’t moved and I doubt she’s changed much at all. Tiala is—not a risk-taker. She is a researcher for the University of Creation, and has been since she was twenty.”

  “So how old is she now?” Alicia asked.

  “She’s two years younger than me, so that makes her about…” Jenna hesitated a moment, as if adding it up in her head “… one hundred twelve.”

  Silence. Nava had once told Chelo we would outlive the unaltered colonists, but I hadn’t realized by how much. Jenna’s gray hair was the only clear sign of age that touched her. Even with her severe injuries, she was the strongest and fastest person I’d ever seen.

  Jenna kept the tall buildings at the city-center to our right and the wide sparkling river between us and the city. To our left, the buildings were lower, except for a huge misty-looking dome. Bryan pointed at the dome. “What’s that?”

  “Flyspace.”

  I remembered my mother’s drawings of winged people. “Is that where the people with the wings go to fly?”

  “They live there,” Jenna said. “Most of them. Domes hold the kind of microclimates that are too sophisticated to maintain in the city.”

  So they managed microclimates inside the city? Temperature and what else? Could I see one? Activity surrounded the tall buildings: planes flying, boats moving, all of it too far away to really make out details. “How long do people live here?” I asked, squinting at an arching bridge.

  Jenna shrugged. “Life extension is a process, and some people might live forever. Some were born before Silver’s Home was settled over five hundred years ago. But people die here as well. We haven’t engineered away every disease, or every accident.” She laughed softly. “We haven’t engineered away stupidity, either.” She touched her gray hair. “We did get rid of old age.”

  “So what about the people back home?” Alicia asked. “Why don’t they live longer?”

  “What do you think?” Jenna returned.

  Alicia leaned forward, chewing on her bottom lip, frustration showing in her narrowed eyes. I was more used to the way Jenna had always taught us on Fremont. “Because they think it’s noble not to change?” I asked.

  Bryan said, “They’re more scared of changing than they are of dying.”

  Jenna
asked, “Alicia?”

  “Because they think they’re better than us,” she said. Her fingernails dug into my shoulder. “They think we’re not as pure. That’s what my old band used to say. Ruth called me a monster, and most of the band thought we’re all monsters. That our parents were monsters.”

  Jenna laughed softly, agreement rather than contradiction. “All of your answers have some truth,” she said. “Remember that many people are convinced they have the one true way to live. Even here. Try not to be like that yourselves.”

  The craft began to fall slowly through the sky, nudging down on a strip of hard surface beside a long green rectangle of grass. Jenna rolled the craft to a stop near two similar skimmers at the end of the hard surface.

  Structures the size of our buildings on Fremont lined two sides of the park, with ample room between, and a walkway connecting them all. In front of us, a ball the size of a house floated in a flower garden. To my right, a clear square that might’ve been a house let me look right through it to tall trees filled with yellow and orange flowers behind the clear square. Each building appeared fantastic and different from all the others. We had nothing like this on Fremont, nothing even close. And these were small, maybe the least of the wonders here.

  Jenna opened her door, and the scent of grass and various unfamiliar flowers drew a smile from Alicia. The air felt warm, like late spring on Fremont, but this grass didn’t smell dusty like our plains. There was no bitter redberry touching the air, and no clanging metal or acrid burning scent like those of our smelter and mill. Even exhausted as I was, the joy of being on a new planet sang inside me, and I scrambled out of the ship as fast as I could, Alicia and then Bryan on my heels.

  We grinned at each other. Whatever this place might become to us, we were here. We’d flown between stars. The first time I had laid eyes on the New Making, a gleaming silver bullet standing silently on the Grass Plains below Artistos, it had called to me.

  If only Chelo had come, too.

  Alicia stepped back from our circle of three. “Where’s Jenna?”

  Bryan pointed. Jenna raced across the grass, away from us, toward a dark-haired woman who ran toward her. Something gold and orange and red fluttered behind the woman. A bird? They stopped and looked at each other, circling like cats before a fight. Then the other woman enclosed Jenna in a tight embrace.

  Surely this was Tiala.

  The bird—I could tell now that it was bird, but unlike anything I’d seen—fluttered over her head in small, tight circles, making a high-pitched call.

  Eventually, we walked near them, and I heard crying above the sounds of the bird. The two women sobbed, their raw voices blending, full of joy and sorrow and longing. I had never heard Jenna cry, not when chased by people trying to kill her, not hunting, not when we began the short fight for our freedom on Fremont. Never. Her shoulders shook, one strong, one half destroyed. The tiny sliver of her cheek that peeked out from under Tiala’s hand glistened with tears. Her breath came in tight short gasps. Her one arm snaked around Tiala’s back, a strong, stout arm with skin turned white under the sterile lighting in the New Making.

  The bird fluttered above them, its circles wider now. Alicia stared up at it, her mouth open in awe. She took Bryan’s and my hands, standing between us, whispering, “It’s beautiful. So pretty.”

  I pulled her close. “Not as pretty as you.” Its voice alone sang out that it existed for its beauty—rising and falling, pleasant even as it flew, watching as if in some consternation over Jenna’s return. It sounded like bright feathered bells flying above us.

  Tiala and Jenna were the same height, but Tiala looked little older than Alicia, dark hair caught behind her back in a shimmering silver clip. She wore a simple grass-green tunic accented with tiny yellow and orange leaves. Even with eyes red from tears, she was breathtaking. More beautiful by far than any of the women on Fremont, her skin was smooth and clear, her hair nearly perfect. She held Jenna so tightly I would have expected anyone else to break.

  As we neared the two women, Tiala murmured, “Poor baby, poor baby,” over and over. There was no pity in the words, just acceptance. It took a long time for them to even notice that we stood watching them and the bird, openmouthed.

  When they finally separated, Tiala wiped her hands across her damp eyes, looked at Jenna, and laughed through her tears. “I’m so glad you’re home.”

  I breathed out, happy to have some of their shared tears turn to laughter.

  Tiala must have seen our amazement at the bird. “Bell,” she called, a soft command. “Come.”

  The bird settled on her shoulder, its tail feathers trailing nearly to her waist.

  Jenna used the sleeve of her silky golden shirt to wipe her eye and cheeks. She turned, as if to introduce us, then stopped, squinting toward the late-day sun—back in the direction we had come from.

  Then I heard what Jenna had clearly heard first—the soft whine of a skimmer. Jenna glanced at Tiala, who shrugged.

  Jenna’s stance changed subtly, her feet a little wider, her knees bent, the same way she stood watching a clearing for signs of djuri to hunt. Following her cues, I watched carefully. Was it the Port Authority coming back to get us?

  Alicia’s hand found mine and I squeezed tightly, seeking grounding, then opened a little of my ability to read the data flowing by us in the air. Surely it would not be so strong out here where so much more open space surrounded us.

  Wrong.

  Data poured into the small crack I’d made for it as if a thousand snakes hovered in the air outside my skin and turned inward all at once. I quested briefly toward the skimmer, looking for identification, suddenly dizzy. As I slammed my senses closed, I tasted a familiar energy amongst the raw wild data of Silver’s Home.

  I stiffened.

  Marcus.

  16

  MARCUS

  As soon as I recognized Marcus in the dataflood, I slammed every internal barrier I had down again. My stomach dizzied and my hands shook as I watched his skimmer land neatly next to ours. Fancier than what Ming had called for Jenna. A big, silver bug with five legs and a bubble-head.

  Alicia clutched my hand. Bryan stood on my other side, our silent, stoic observer. Jenna and Tiala were just in front of us. Tiala’s bird, Bell, on her shoulder. For the first time since I saw her, Bell was silent, her head cocked to one side, her nearest round black eye fixed on the skimmer.

  A tall, slender man slid onto the grass and started toward us. Sunlight spangled his dark brown hair with reddish tints. He wore simple loose brown pants and a belted white tunic. Except for some indefinable fluidity in his movements, he looked normal. At least until he came close enough to make eye contact. His deep green eyes had the same intensity I’d felt when I met him inside the New Making. Flecks of gold floated in spring-grass-colored pupils that radiated Jenna’s wildness, Lukas’s power, and Nava’s single-minded drive all wrapped up inside one person. Like Akashi, only doubled or tripled.

  I still wore the captain’s coat, a clue.

  He smiled at me. “Joseph. Nice job flying in, especially for a rookie.” His words were silky, laced with warmth. Mothers might give up their babies to that voice.

  “Thank you.” I struggled to keep my voice from shaking. He had power. It rolled from him even now, and I had felt the truth of it deep in the ship’s data flows. “It’s good to meet you.”

  He looked at Jenna, his eyes narrowed in concern. “Jenna. Damn. What happened to you?”

  She ran her gaze up and down his body. She stopped for a moment, looking into his eyes, testing him in some way I didn’t understand. After a moment, the tightness left her jaw and her shoulders relaxed. “A war, Marcus. A stupid war, fought stupidly.” She smiled. “I ended up near the business end of a missile, in the last battle. I got left for dead.”

  Tiala watched her closely, her eyes wide. Perhaps this was new information for her?

  Jenna gestured toward the three of us. “You’ve met Joseph. Alicia and B
ryan were also born on Fremont. I brought them home.”

  Marcus raised an eyebrow as he took in Bryan’s cast. “Did the wrong end of a missile hit you, too?”

  Bryan responded with a wry laugh. “Just the business end of some stupid people’s fists.”

  Jenna added, “But it took a lot of them to bring him down.” I hoped Bryan heard the pride in her voice.

  Bryan shifted uneasily under Marcus gaze, then stuck his hand out. “Pleased to meet you.”

  Marcus returned the handshake. “I hope Silver’s Home is a little easier on you.” He didn’t say he expected it to be.

  Bryan took a step back, watchful as always. “I hope so, too.”

  Marcus glanced at me. He might as well have read my thoughts. “No, I don’t know where your father is. I saw him once after he got back. He insisted the people on Fremont are backward and neurotic.”

  My father was alive! I put my hand in my pocket and touched the data button that held his journal. Excitement flooded me. He’d made it back—he’d probably flown the Journey back, just as I thought.

  I felt lighter, as if I could raise my hands and fly.

  Before I could get a question out, Marcus said, “He’s a pilot. He could be on any one of the five worlds right now.”

  “What about my mother?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “I don’t think I’ve ever met her.”

  Surely she was a Wind Reader, too. I realized with a shock that I didn’t know that. Bitter disappointment laced my elation. After looking at her drawings, I had felt linked to her.

  “Will you tell me about my father?”

  He laughed. “Not now. We don’t have time.” He turned to Jenna. “He has to go with me.”

  I blinked, stunned. Jenna stiffened. Alicia dug her nails into my forearm and blurted out, “He’s not! We just got here.”

  Marcus shook his head. “The Port Authority may have let you go, but they tracked you. I came for you.”