Child of Grass: Sea of Grass, Book Two Read online

  “Jorge remembers them as the biggest problem he ever saw in training. But they had a lot of political backing to get them into the program and apparently the Dome Administration had to send them through the Gate to ensure the support of some of the members in the recalcitrant voting bloc in congress.” She spat sideways, an eloquent opinion.

  “I’ll tell you, Kaer, I didn’t like them. I didn’t mind hearing that they’d died—and it annoys me no end that they didn’t. Two of our Scouts spotted Stephen, Jack, and Andrew in Callo, posing as prosperous merchants. They saw them spreading around a lot of money—all kinds of pelts, gold and silver, and who knows what else—so now they have the best friends that money can buy. And now we know where the stories of fabled Oerth have come from. They’ve become active in the leadership of Callo City. They did what we trained them to do, but they didn’t do it for us.”

  In all seriousness, I asked, “Will I get points taken off if I say what I think of such people?”

  Smiller laughed. “Nah, you’ll probably get a round of applause. But we still have a problem. The Charter limits our actions. But not theirs anymore. And they know it. So they can say and do things that we can’t.”

  I said what I thought.

  Smiller nodded her agreement. “Yes. One of those bas—individuals—identified Jaxin and the other Scouts. Stephen S. Hale-Stone. The S. must stand for snake. Do you know what they’ve done? They’ve put our Scouts on public display. In cages. Suspended above the public plaza in the center of the town!

  “Even worse, they’ve stripped our Scouts naked. The Hale-Stones must have suggested that. So we have no monitors on them anymore. No transceivers, nothing. We have no communication from them at all, and no way to get someone in close enough. A religious hysteria has swept Callo. Pilgrims have traveled from all over the region to see the Oerth-men. Preachers hold daily services. They hold prayer vigils all night long. Crowds surround the cages and mock the prisoners. They throw trash and garbage and offal at them.

  “The only good news in any of this, the swarming crowds have given some useful cover to the last few observers we have who can still move safely through the streets. We have five or six who remain unknown to the Hale-Stones. Your da’s suggestion to use colonists instead of Scouts has proven very wise. Here—” She fumbled in her pack and pulled out some ragged sheets of paper. “Look at these. They’ve circulated handbills and posters identifying almost all of our senior Scouts. At least they’ve done us a small favor here; they’ve let us know who to warn or recall.”

  They were drawings of people I knew. Scouts. Below their pictures, Linnean writing spelled out their names. Across the top, each one said in big letters: Beware of Oerth-folk!

  I paged through them, astonished. “I see you. And Earring—Jorge. I recognize this one, but I don’t know her name. This looks like Byrne. Novotny. I don’t know this one or this one.” I looked up. “These likenesses, all so accurate—they must have used a camera. How could they do this?”

  “Obviously, they planned this for a long time,” said Smiller.

  “I guess so.” I felt sick inside. As if somebody had taken a bulldozer to the home we’d worked so hard to build.

  “The Magisterial Panel will convene in four days—the day after they arrive. We expect a very short hearing.”

  “And then what—?”

  “Jorge says that four armored rail cars arrived this morning. The Callo authorities wouldn’t prepare for such a trip if they didn’t expect to make it. Politics plays a big part here. With such hysteria in the city, the Magistrates can’t afford to dismiss the investigation. Better for them that they should pass the responsibility upward to their masters. If the situation blows up, let it blow up in someone else’s face.

  “So just about everyone believes that the Magistrates will order the prisoners sent east to Mordren Enclave. They’ve already announced how they’ll do it. They’ll send a caravan of rail-wagons east, with armed guards surrounding each one.”

  “Armed guards—?”

  “They expect a rescue attempt,” said Smiller. “The Hale-Stones have warned them that the Oerth-people always try to rescue their own. So the Soldiers of the Church have armed themselves as if for a war. I want you to think about something. We had a good plan to rescue our people from the jail. We moved a team through the Gate, but before we could get onsite, the Linneans moved the hostages to the town square.

  “So we came up with another plan. Let them transport the prisoners, and we catch them on the prairie. Destroy the tracks, stop the rail-wagons, put everyone to sleep, and break the cars open. We start moving more equipment through the Gate. All of a sudden, the Linneans announce they’ll send guards with the train. How do they know so much?”

  “The Hale-Stones tell them?” I offered.

  “How do the Hale-Stones find out?”

  I realized she was waiting for me to reply. I guessed. “Their equipment for making miracles. The person who smuggled it through the Gate probably sees all the other equipment that comes through the Gate. He signals them, I’ll bet.”

  Smiller looked to da, please. “You have a very smart child, Lorr.”

  Da grinned. Smiller turned back to me gravely. “So you see the problem?”

  “Yes’m. All too clearly. They’ve locked us out of our own planet. I mean, they’ve locked us out of the Linneans’ planet. And we can’t protect the Linneans from the Hale-Stones without creating even more uproar, can we?”

  “You got it.”

  Da spoke up then. “Might as well tell the rest of it now, Smil.”

  “It gets worse?” I asked.

  “Yes,” he said sadly. “Do you remember Buzzard Kelly’s bible?”

  I nodded. “Everyone does. Administor Rance nearly threw the Kellys out of the program.”

  Smiller sniffed. “Like the Hale-Stones, the Dobersons and the Kellys both came to us as a Congressional scholarship. Fortunately, the Dobersons disqualified themselves very quickly; but we have suspected the Kellys of the same sympathies for some time. How did they get the chocolate into the dome? And the bible? They must have had some help, obviously. Someone has compromised Dome security somehow. Yes, Administor Rance wanted to expel the Kellys. And she would have, but right now it serves us to keep them in the Dome and watch them carefully and see if we can find out who they work with.”

  “Someone we know?” I looked to da worriedly.

  Smiller shook her head. “I don’t want to say. What if I say the wrong name? What if we have more than one spy? I don’t want to start any gossip about something so serious. But I’ll tell you this—we never thought we’d have this kind of a problem. We never thought anyone would betray the program and leak our secrets directly to the Linneans. The Hale-Stones have caught us totally off-balance.

  “But Kaer, now do you understand why we have such secrecy around this effort? We don’t know who we can trust anymore.”

  Contamination

  We were interrupted then by the doctor. He carried three hot trays of food. “Okay, kids, I’ve been watching your blood sugar levels on the field monitor. You have to stop playing for a while and come in for lunch. I made your favorite. P-Rations and swill.”

  “Ugh,” said Smiller, but she took a tray. So did Lorrin. I took the third and peeled back the lid. Something smelled strange and familiar and wonderful all at once—Earth food! Hamburger! Mashed potatoes! Carrots and green peas! Chocolate pudding! I whispered a Linnean blessing of thanks and started eating immediately. I hadn’t realized how hungry I’d become. Smiller and da exchanged amused glances, but I didn’t care.

  “I don’t think I’ll eat my chocolate pudding,” said da. “You can have it if you want, Kaer.”

  “Yes, please. Thank you, da.”

  “Do you want mine too?” asked Smiller.

  I glanced up. Was I that obvious? “It tastes awfully good,” I said. “And I haven’t had any chocolate in so long—” I stopped abruptly, remembering. I flushed with embarrassmen
t.

  Smiller laughed. “Don’t worry about it, Kaer. You didn’t do anything wrong. We had to discipline you, but that chocolate cake business—you don’t know what a favor you did for us then. That proved something we’d only suspected before—that we couldn’t trust the Kellys. We had to punish you and your family much more than we wanted to, but we had to do it to deflect any suspicions the Kellys might have that we suspected their motives. Administor Rance told me how bad she felt, having to make an example of you.” Smiller turned to da then. “Rance told me that she feared for a few days that your family might drop out, but she knew you couldn’t afford to leave the program, so she had to gamble that you would stay. She really had no choice.”

  I finished the second tray of pudding and—still listening—reached across for the third. Smiller said, “Lorrin, you and your family have proven your trustworthiness. When we finish this job, you will have earned your certification. Indeed, if we get out of this with our skins intact, I’ll happily certify the lot of you as Scouts.” She turned to me. “And no, I do not joke with you, Kaer. You help us rescue Jaxin and Sykes and Val and Corda, and I will make you a Scout. The youngest Scout ever.”

  My mouth was too full of pudding to reply. I could only swallow and gulp and nod. “Okay.” And then, almost in a whisper, I added, “It still hurt at the time.”

  “I can believe that,” said Smiller. “Your da told me how hard you took it. Yes, we’ve talked. He said that of all the people in your family, Kaer, you’ve had the biggest commitment to Linnea. More than anybody else. The thought that you might have screwed things up for yourself and your family—that must have really hurt.”

  “It did.”

  “Administor Rance told me that I should give you her apologies. And she wants you to know that the way you handled yourself afterward made her very proud of you.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “Thank Administor Rance for me too.”

  “You’ll have that chance to thank her yourself when we get back. I feel sure she will have many things to say to you.” Smiller gathered the empty trays then and put them aside. “Now, we still have a lot to talk about. Tell me, Kaer, what do you know about the worship of the Mother.”

  I shrugged. “We go to Church every Threeday. I guess I know as much as anyone can.”

  “Well, you tell me what you know anyway. Start with the eufora.”

  “Um, all right. The Linneans regard the eufora as the most important manifestation of the Mother in all things. And they consider it sacrilege to make images of the eufora, because an image imprisons the spirit in a single form and destroys its freedom to fly.”

  “Good,” said Smiller. “Very good. What else?”

  “Mmm, let me think. I know the Linneans make totems that they use to focus their communication with a spirit, but they only make abstract totems and they burn them afterwards to free the spirits who visited the totem. They won’t make idols of any kind. The whole idea scares them. Because if you trap a spirit into a shape it finds painful it goes crazy. It turns into a wrathful maizlish thing. And it seeks revenge on the one who trapped it. So you won’t ever see a picture or a statue of a eufora. A true spirit manifests itself inwardly, as a feeling or an inspiration. When a spirit visits you, it leaves you changed forever. You get it as a—how did Preacher describe it?—as a humbling wave of emotion, vision, and enlightenment.”

  Smiller looked pleased. Da looked proud.

  “You’ve got it,” she said. And then she added, “Let me expand on that a little. In the scriptures, when the eufora touch a person’s heart, she comes away from the moment as a newborn soul, innocent and free of anger. The Linneans say that the Mother has blessed the individual by washing her in her own tears, cleansing her of all the sin and sorrow she has picked up since her birth.

  “Those who have had such an experience, who have come out of the wilderness washed by the Mother, always speak of how a greater spirit has filled them. They tell how a vision of peace came to them, how they walked in the dreamtime, and came away with a piece of the Mother’s soul living in their own hearts. And most important, they speak not of what they know, but of what they learned in their moment of revelation. The Linneans respect and revere these moments of grace. They believe that all holy knowledge comes from the direct revelation by the Mother of the world.” Smiller looked at me directly. “Tell me, Kaer. What do you think of that?”

  “I don’t feel I know enough about God to judge. And maybe we shouldn’t judge at all. Just listen. I mean, if we lived on Linnea all the time and somebody came out of the wilderness, all ragged and scruffy and transformed by holy revelation, I think I’d have to listen to his or her words and decide for myself if those words sounded like they came from the Mother or not. I know that the Linneans do it that way. I think I’d follow the same wisdom.”

  “And you would do well,” said Smiller. “You should always bring caution to any new idea. And skepticism as well. But suppose, just suppose now—that someone comes out of the desert and says, ‘I have seen the eufora. The Mother has washed me in her tears. I have had a revelation.’ What would you do?”

  “I suppose I would listen to whatever he had to say. I mean, as a Linnean, I would always want to hear about any revelation from the Mother of the World.”

  “Good. So now suppose someone comes out of the wilderness and says, ‘I walked with one of the eufora. It looked like a golden child with great luminous wings. The eufora lifted me up and carried me through the sky. It showed me the joyous rewards waiting for all of us in the City of heaven.’”

  “I’ve never heard of anyone having a revelation like that.”

  “No, neither have I. But now suppose that a week or two after that first revelation, somebody a thousand klicks away has a revelation, and they come out of the wilderness saying, ‘In the City of Heaven, they call the Mother of the World Mary. I have gazed upon the beautiful face of Mother Mary. She loves us all.’”

  I shrugged. “I thought the Linneans didn’t believe in naming the spirits, lest they trap them.”

  “Well, they believe you can identify a specific manifestation of a spirit, but that the spirits change their essences as they flow through the world the same way the river changes shape as it flows through the canyon. Let’s go on. Now suppose, in a third town, someone else comes in with a revelation. And this person says, ‘Mother Mary has a message of salvation for all people. She sends good news for us all. The kingdom of heaven will open to all who love God.’”

  “I think I see a pattern here,” I said.

  “Yes,” agreed Smiller. “And somewhere else, still another person has a revelation. And this person says, ‘Mary, the Mother of the World gave birth to a son. And heaven will open to all who accept him as their savior. . . .’ And it continues, with one person after another reporting these revelations. What would you, as a Linnean, begin to think?”

  “Um—I don’t know. I mean, I think I should doubt this message because I’ve never heard any revelation before that sounds anything like these. But if so many different people have all had the same vision—”

  “Exactly,” said Smiller.

  “All this has happened on Linnea. . . ?”

  “All this has happened on Linnea,” Smiller confirmed grimly.

  “A very interesting phenomenon. . . . We’ve had twenty or thirty separate incidents, all over the western half of the continent, but mostly within three to five days’ travel of an area called Mother Land. A little hard to get to, because of the rivers cutting around it, but well-situated southwest of Callo.

  “Another very funny coincidence too. Several caravans of traders have traveled all over the region, helping to spread the news of these fabulous events. Do their travels somehow coincide with the sightings? It seems that way. Do we know these people, Kaer? James Marcus, Andrew Tyler, Jack Stone, Brent Leslie, Brad Reed, Patty Krueger, Donna Morgan—no, of course we don’t. But perhaps we would know them if they used their former names . . . James Marcus Ha
le, Andrew Tyler Stone, Jack Hale-Stone, Brent Leslie Hale-Stone, Brad Reed Stone, Patty Hale, Donna Stone. . . .”

  I felt nauseous. I had known all along that Smiller was leading up to this news, but it still made me sick to hear it.

  “I don’t get it. Linnea has so much beauty and so much to learn from. Why do they want to change it?”

  “Why does anyone want to take over the world?”

  “It sounds like they want to turn Linnea into a world where Revelationism rules.”

  “Exactly.”

  “But we have laws against that.”

  “Yes, we do. The Linneans don’t. They don’t see any difference between religion and law, so they don’t make laws the way we do. But if someone could change the religious core of the society, they would also change the law that flows from it.”

  I stared glumly at my hands. I felt like crying, I didn’t know why. “We all worked so hard to learn how to fit in. . . . I feel so bad. For us. For the Linneans.”

  “We all do.”

  “What kind of people would do such a thing?”

  “Very selfish people, Kaer.” Smiller looked as unhappy as I felt. “We’ve since gone back and reviewed their histories of what they did in the time before they went into training. Andrew and Jack worked as propagandists for a commercial corporation. James and Stephen held high positions in the New Revelationist Church. Donna and Patty worked as political organizers within the Church. They all married together only a few months before the Dome Authority opened the first Linnean training program, and several ranking legislators leaned on the Administration to get them accepted. I don’t think that any of this happened by coincidence. I think they planned it from the very beginning.”