C f bentley, p.39
C. F. Bentley, page 39
She turned abruptly and marched out of the cave.
Jake’s heart wrenched. He needed to go with her, help her understand and come to terms with this information.
Three seconds later she returned, eyes narrowed in suspicion. “How do you know this?”
For once he had a logical explanation. “Guilliam gave me an old document to read.”
“Get it. I want to read it.”
No, you don’t! The arrogance of the diarist, the cold-blooded contempt for the people who came out of those embryos, would destroy her.
“I will ask Guilliam,” he said instead, hating the lie because he would never ask.
“Tell him I order it.” She stalked away again, head high, determination firming her chin.
“For once I think I need to outstubborn you, Sissy. Though it hurts me not to give you everything you want.”
Chapter 59
Sissy flicked her gaze toward the entrance tunnel of the caves without moving her head. She detected footsteps marching toward her.
Some of her hearing had returned after she’d interpreted the mural—almost like a reward for a lesson well done. No sense in letting the world know about her recovery. Even if it was only partial and Harmony still clanged inside her head, discordant and annoying, telling her things she couldn’t translate or understand.
She’d spent the last week studying all of the murals, taking notes, looking for patterns, seeking more understanding in the symbolism.
She compared skeletons and drew conclusions that shattered her faith and her trust.
The scientists left her alone. She heard them mumbling and grumbling behind her back. They thought she should grieve. They thought she should react. They acted like they were family.
NO!
She firmly closed her thoughts on that subject and drew a thick black curtain across her mind. If she thought about family, she’d remember.
Jake left her alone with a kind of reverent fear. They both knew too much and couldn’t talk about it.
Concentrate. Look for patterns. Follow the symbols. Learn new things.
Only deep within the womb of Harmony did the noise in her ears calm down. With profound concentration and the absence of interruption, she began to understand many things no one taught in school. Complex things that Laud Gregor, in his arrogance, had forgotten. Or hidden.
Slowly, she began to rebuild her faith in Harmony. But on a different level of partnership. Her ancestors had done horrible things. But they had sought out Harmony here for many of the same reasons the Marils had.
For her and for them, Harmony was the center of the universe. True understanding of life began here, in the womb of the Mother.
Eventually, she’d have to return to Harmony City and reopen the Temples. Revise the rituals. Change the lessons. But not yet.
Eventually, she’d have to think about her family.
Not yet. Never. Never. Never.
Jake approached her cautiously. He waited at her shoulder, hesitant to touch her to gain her attention.
She watched him from beneath lowered lids, pretending not to hear him. She let her fingertip trace a shower of stars descending upon Harmony.
Only they weren’t stars.
Finally she looked at him. “What?”
He held up a tablet of paper with a message hastily scrawled across the top sheet. “Guilliam is here.”
She removed the dust mask from her mouth and nose. “Did he bring the document?” “No. Something else brought him.” “Tell him to go away.”
Jake shook his head. Then he scrawled another word. “Important.”
Sissy scraped her filthy hands across her brown coveralls. Then she looked at them. Not much cleaner. Her clothing was as filthy as the rest of her from kicking up the dust of the ages. Her mask was close to clogging. She needed to change it and get back to the story the murals told her.
“I will see him after I clean up.” Slowly she retreated to the outside world, Jake trailing behind her.
She should send him away. He didn’t belong here.
She still needed him.
A decision best postponed.
Like her grief.
“You are angry with me,” she said at the entrance. A momentary pause to allow the dazzle blindness to pass while her eyes adjusted from cave darkness to autumnal sunshine. She took the time to breathe deeply, like a baby taking its first gulp of air after the protection of its mother’s womb.
A pause seemed to stretch forever while he stood too close. And yet never close enough.
He scribbled on the tablet then held it up to her. “Upset. Worried.” He wrote some more. Stopped abruptly and grabbed her shoulders, turning her to face him. “Never angry.” He said slowly, mouthing each word carefully so that she could read his lips.
She didn’t need to.
“Why?” Why upset and worried or why not angry? She didn’t know which she asked. Only that she had to.
He ducked his head and shook it. With a gentle prod he urged her to descend the long and twisted path to the Temple.
Sissy lingered in the shower, reveling in the hot water and how much lighter and freer cleanliness made her feel.
Finally, she could hide no longer. She emerged into her reception room in the guest suite wearing black slacks and tunic top with a black shawl for warmth. Even with a fire in the hearth the seasonal chill penetrated the stone walls far sooner and deeper than in the city. She’d resorted to wearing thick socks and soft furry slippers—also black—to keep the cold at bay.
If she thought about it, she hadn’t been truly warm since that day… “Don’t think about it,” she told herself and put on a calm face to greet Guilliam.
She walked resolutely toward him, ignoring the woman who sat beside him on the double armchair. They were squeezed together intimately, and quite comfortable that way.
“My condolences, Guilliam, on the loss of your daughter. Have you had the benefit of a grief blessing?”
“We have, Laudae,” Guilliam said. He and Penelope rose together and bowed to her. They wore the full black of deep mourning.
Sissy returned the greeting with a lesser bow and took the chair opposite them.
“All very polite and cordial. And utterly meaningless,” Jake muttered from his post by the window, where he could observe the entire room including both entrances.
Sissy heard him but pretended not to. His overt cynicism shocked her. When had he become so bitter?
She knew when. She just would not think on it.
“What brings you here?” Sissy asked.
“Laud Gregor sent me,” Guilliam said and wrote the same on another tablet.
Sissy raised her eyebrows at Penelope.
“I no longer travel without my spouse,” Guilliam wrote on a tablet and held it up for Sissy.
“Spouse? Temple do not marry.”
“Some do. We just don’t allow Laud Gregor to know.” He wrote neatly for all his haste.
Penelope produced a sheaf of papers that she had stuffed between herself and the arm of the chair. She looked at them long and hard, then handed them to Sissy. “Please read,” she said, mouthing the words carefully.
Sissy looked from the pages to Penelope’s face. A lot of the hardness had left her eyes, replaced with lines of sadness. A new sincerity radiated out from her.
Sissy read.
“Forgive me, please.” A large and flamboyant hand. Yet Sissy sensed many more of the curlicues and flourishes had fallen away in the act of writing.
A quick glance at Penelope showed quiet tears slipping down her face.
Sissy read on.
“I was shallow and played mean tricks on you; seeing you only as an outsider with no right to the position promised to me from birth.
“While Marilee lived, we saw her only in moments of glorious pageantry and honor. To this day I do not know if she did any of the work of managing the government and the Temple caste that should have fallen upon her shoulders. My own work overseeing the Temple schools and the religious curriculum for the other castes seemed trivial in comparison.”
Sissy took a deep breath. Penelope suddenly became a real person to her. More than a shallow troublemaker.
“Now that I have studied you—granted, for the purpose of pushing you to abandon the position of HPS—I see that you are the best person for the job. Possibly the only person alive for the job. My beloved spouse has shown me the cracks in our culture that need repair. As our children have grown toward their own priestly roles, I see more depth in our responsibilities than I thought possible.
“Again I beg you to forgive me and make use of me as you will in the hard tasks ahead of us. We fear change. Yet we have changed without realizing it. Now we must change again to come back to the path of Harmony we have ignored and obscured. Yours in Harmony, Laudae Penelope du Marilee pu Crystal Temple.”
Moisture gathered in Sissy’s eyes. She read the pages again.
Guilliam thrust another sheet of paper at Sissy. She took it, not trusting herself to speak without dissolving in tears. This one was written in Guilliam’s neat hand. “With the loss of our daughter, we can only begin to touch on the grief you must feel. We understand. We share it with you. Allow us to perform a grief blessing with you. Please.”
“I…
do…
not…
need… ” She couldn’t continue. A large lump formed in her throat. She tried to swallow it. Couldn’t.
Jake’s hand squeezed her shoulder.
Penelope knelt at her feet.
The papers crumpled in her hands.
Something hard and twisted broke inside Sissy’s chest. All of the pain and emptiness assailed her. Her family brutally murdered. Neighbors maimed. Shanet and her girls. Jilly. All innocent. All unknowing.
The madness of the original survivors had been perpetuated down the generations and grew among them like a cancer.
And Sissy was alone as she had never been alone, even in those first horrible days of separation when she went to Temple.
Alone.
The tears came in great shuddering sobs; racking her body; twisting her heart and her mind. She felt as if her heart was being ripped out. The mountain sighed and sobbed with her.
Chapter 60
Jake grabbed Sissy as she doubled over, gasping for breath. The sobs overwhelmed her body. He reached for the ever-present inhaler.
Guilliam stayed his hand. “The drugs will not help her. She needs to complete the process.”
“How can you be so calm? She’s tearing herself apart!” He cradled her head against his shoulder. His cheek rested against her hair. And still she choked out her sorrow.
“Have you ever lost a dear one?” Penelope asked. She busied herself pouring a glass of water from a pitcher on the side table.
“Yes,” Jake muttered. He had to remember that his Harmonite persona had parents and a sibling back on H6 and not blurt out his continual pain at the loss of both his parents and brother.
His throat tightened.
Let them think he grieved for the out-of-caste lover. Let them think what they wanted.
He wanted to choke on the gaping hole in his soul where his family had been before the Marils bombed their home and sucked all the atmosphere off the planet.
Revenge for a genocidal crime centuries ago. A crime that no one living was responsible for.
He hugged Sissy all the more tightly, burying his face in her dark hair.
They held each other for a long time. At last her body quieted, and she relaxed her clenching fingers across his back. He eased away from her.
Penelope was right there with a tumbler of water, urging Sissy to sip. “Just a little at a time. Don’t want you choking.”
“Now it is time for your own grief blessing, My Laudae,” Guilliam said. “Please allow Penelope and me to share it with you.”
“Will you preside for me?” Sissy whispered looking to Penelope.
The older woman nodded. “I’d be honored. You must come, too, Jake. As odd as it seems to bring in one of another caste, you are part of this family. You need the grief blessing as much as we do. Bring in her acolytes and her siblings. We all need to share this.” She offered her hand to Jake.
He took it, not trusting himself to speak.
They sat on the floor of the chapel, bringing the children into their circle. Penelope drew a series of palm-sized crystals of varying thicknesses and colors out of her pocket and set the array before her crossed legs.
Jake stared long and hard at the center piece, a tall black obelisk that shimmered in the soft lighting as if glowing from within.
He’d seen a similar one on the altar here, once, just after a funeral. Mostly all the altar crystals remained behind a locked cabinet in the altar. He’d been too busy chasing after rambunctious children to notice how different it was from the others, not just in color, but in… in majesty?
Then he realized the crystal had grown in a special matrix with Badger Metal.
He’d heard the wishful thinking of such a rarity. Pammy had told him to watch for one. If it could be grown, in theory, it should provide near instant communication across the galaxy, making the current ansibles obsolete. It would also lock on to any other similar unit like a homing beacon and reduce the chances of getting lost in hyperspace tenfold.
With smaller ones in nav units, maybe, just maybe, ships could communicate instantaneously, fly with avian precision. Avoid taking hits in battle.
Fifty times more valuable than Badger Metal alone.
Taking one back to the CSS wasn’t enough. He needed the process. Better yet, Harmony needed to let the CSS know they had such a marvel. This was their ticket to writing a peace treaty on their own terms.
Harmony and the CSS allied with these crystals guiding their fleets would keep the Marils within their own borders long enough to open a dialogue with them. If they’d listen. After so many centuries surely they needed to end this war as much as humans did.
For the first time in weeks he allowed himself to smile. His future, all their futures, looked a little bit brighter. He just might succeed here after all.
With his own mission, not Pammy’s, as his guiding light.
Penelope tapped the black piece lightly. A clear, sweet tone swelled up from it, caressing the ear and the soul with comfort. It enveloped all of them in the special warmth of uniting their grief, shaping it into a tangible thing that could be molded and tucked behind the heart for storage. The emotion and the music became a necessary and manageable part of them rather than a dominant force eating away at their minds and their souls.
Jake wished that Sissy could hear this.
She sat with her face upturned and a faint smile on her face. “You fraud!” he mouthed. “You can hear.”
She looked at him and cocked one eyebrow as if she had heard his silent words.
Did he expect anything less from his Laudae Sissy? Damn he didn’t want to leave her.
Gregor stared at the pink pills the physicians had given him. Chew two when the acid in his stomach churned and boiled and threatened to burn holes in his throat.
He chomped through four of them. They helped. Some. Getting Sissy back into the Crystal Temple and reopening the HC would help more.
Her actions were unprecedented. And yet well within her rights as spelled out in the copy of the Covenant that sat in the middle of his desk. It was the only document on his desk. Eighteen pieces of old and crumbling paper. The oldest copy he and the archivist had been able to find. The closest to the original.
Strange, the archivist had known right where to find it when asked. “About time you read this, boy,” he’d said as he handed it over.
Gregor fumed.
Sissy had been right. Every copy of the Covenant made a few corrections. Not many. Not serious changes. Accumulated over time, they added up. The most recent copy, made by his predecessor introduced the cutoff from contact with the rest of the galaxy. The one before that introduced the asylums to remove “Loods” from mainstream society. Prior to that, mutations in the caste marks were almost unknown. Now they happened in one in ten births.
Life changed with or without active human intervention.
He’d used the latest Military issue machine to make an exact copy of the newest version and sent them with Guilliam and Penelope. He hoped they would tempt Sissy back home.
Guilliam and Penelope. The thought of them together—-for eighteen years—puzzled him more than the archaic language in the Covenant. From the beginning, the function and the duties of each caste were spelled out. Always Temple and Noble had been above the law, separate from the others. Their need for family alliances and life mating secondary to their need to govern and lead the people morally, ethically, spiritually, and governmentally.
No sense separating Guilliam from Penelope now. Though he’d like to find a way to do it just to spite the man he’d trusted so completely for decades.
What contribution to the Covenant had Gregor made? None. Nothing. He couldn’t even control the mating of his most trusted acolyte and his priestess.
Was Gregor’s destiny to take Harmony back to the original Covenant? Possibly. That might be too shocking to explain to the masses all at once.
He knew of one change he could make. A change more radical than all the others combined. A change that would bring Sissy home.
He could bring Lady Marissa to trial. Have her executed. The thought of the robotic arm swinging its merciless Badger Metal sword to sever her neck sent chills all the way to his bones and upset his stomach again. To die alone, at the whim of a machine, no chance to fight back. The most hideous way to die imaginable.
Alone. No last death ritual. No funerary rights. Ashes scattered on the open sea.
A true deterrent to most criminals. But Temple and Noble were above the law.
He could not order it. That would undermine everything Harmony and the Covenant stood for. A ruling elite above the law, guided by and overseen by Temple.
That was how the High Priestess earned full veto power over the HC.
Time had proved that people were happier when they didn’t have to deal with politics and government. They liked knowing their destiny and the meaning of their lives without having to become philosophers and scholars. They just wanted to lead their lives with minimal interference. The Noble caste governed more effectively and efficiently if they did not have to answer to anyone but themselves.
Jake’s heart wrenched. He needed to go with her, help her understand and come to terms with this information.
Three seconds later she returned, eyes narrowed in suspicion. “How do you know this?”
For once he had a logical explanation. “Guilliam gave me an old document to read.”
“Get it. I want to read it.”
No, you don’t! The arrogance of the diarist, the cold-blooded contempt for the people who came out of those embryos, would destroy her.
“I will ask Guilliam,” he said instead, hating the lie because he would never ask.
“Tell him I order it.” She stalked away again, head high, determination firming her chin.
“For once I think I need to outstubborn you, Sissy. Though it hurts me not to give you everything you want.”
Chapter 59
Sissy flicked her gaze toward the entrance tunnel of the caves without moving her head. She detected footsteps marching toward her.
Some of her hearing had returned after she’d interpreted the mural—almost like a reward for a lesson well done. No sense in letting the world know about her recovery. Even if it was only partial and Harmony still clanged inside her head, discordant and annoying, telling her things she couldn’t translate or understand.
She’d spent the last week studying all of the murals, taking notes, looking for patterns, seeking more understanding in the symbolism.
She compared skeletons and drew conclusions that shattered her faith and her trust.
The scientists left her alone. She heard them mumbling and grumbling behind her back. They thought she should grieve. They thought she should react. They acted like they were family.
NO!
She firmly closed her thoughts on that subject and drew a thick black curtain across her mind. If she thought about family, she’d remember.
Jake left her alone with a kind of reverent fear. They both knew too much and couldn’t talk about it.
Concentrate. Look for patterns. Follow the symbols. Learn new things.
Only deep within the womb of Harmony did the noise in her ears calm down. With profound concentration and the absence of interruption, she began to understand many things no one taught in school. Complex things that Laud Gregor, in his arrogance, had forgotten. Or hidden.
Slowly, she began to rebuild her faith in Harmony. But on a different level of partnership. Her ancestors had done horrible things. But they had sought out Harmony here for many of the same reasons the Marils had.
For her and for them, Harmony was the center of the universe. True understanding of life began here, in the womb of the Mother.
Eventually, she’d have to return to Harmony City and reopen the Temples. Revise the rituals. Change the lessons. But not yet.
Eventually, she’d have to think about her family.
Not yet. Never. Never. Never.
Jake approached her cautiously. He waited at her shoulder, hesitant to touch her to gain her attention.
She watched him from beneath lowered lids, pretending not to hear him. She let her fingertip trace a shower of stars descending upon Harmony.
Only they weren’t stars.
Finally she looked at him. “What?”
He held up a tablet of paper with a message hastily scrawled across the top sheet. “Guilliam is here.”
She removed the dust mask from her mouth and nose. “Did he bring the document?” “No. Something else brought him.” “Tell him to go away.”
Jake shook his head. Then he scrawled another word. “Important.”
Sissy scraped her filthy hands across her brown coveralls. Then she looked at them. Not much cleaner. Her clothing was as filthy as the rest of her from kicking up the dust of the ages. Her mask was close to clogging. She needed to change it and get back to the story the murals told her.
“I will see him after I clean up.” Slowly she retreated to the outside world, Jake trailing behind her.
She should send him away. He didn’t belong here.
She still needed him.
A decision best postponed.
Like her grief.
“You are angry with me,” she said at the entrance. A momentary pause to allow the dazzle blindness to pass while her eyes adjusted from cave darkness to autumnal sunshine. She took the time to breathe deeply, like a baby taking its first gulp of air after the protection of its mother’s womb.
A pause seemed to stretch forever while he stood too close. And yet never close enough.
He scribbled on the tablet then held it up to her. “Upset. Worried.” He wrote some more. Stopped abruptly and grabbed her shoulders, turning her to face him. “Never angry.” He said slowly, mouthing each word carefully so that she could read his lips.
She didn’t need to.
“Why?” Why upset and worried or why not angry? She didn’t know which she asked. Only that she had to.
He ducked his head and shook it. With a gentle prod he urged her to descend the long and twisted path to the Temple.
Sissy lingered in the shower, reveling in the hot water and how much lighter and freer cleanliness made her feel.
Finally, she could hide no longer. She emerged into her reception room in the guest suite wearing black slacks and tunic top with a black shawl for warmth. Even with a fire in the hearth the seasonal chill penetrated the stone walls far sooner and deeper than in the city. She’d resorted to wearing thick socks and soft furry slippers—also black—to keep the cold at bay.
If she thought about it, she hadn’t been truly warm since that day… “Don’t think about it,” she told herself and put on a calm face to greet Guilliam.
She walked resolutely toward him, ignoring the woman who sat beside him on the double armchair. They were squeezed together intimately, and quite comfortable that way.
“My condolences, Guilliam, on the loss of your daughter. Have you had the benefit of a grief blessing?”
“We have, Laudae,” Guilliam said. He and Penelope rose together and bowed to her. They wore the full black of deep mourning.
Sissy returned the greeting with a lesser bow and took the chair opposite them.
“All very polite and cordial. And utterly meaningless,” Jake muttered from his post by the window, where he could observe the entire room including both entrances.
Sissy heard him but pretended not to. His overt cynicism shocked her. When had he become so bitter?
She knew when. She just would not think on it.
“What brings you here?” Sissy asked.
“Laud Gregor sent me,” Guilliam said and wrote the same on another tablet.
Sissy raised her eyebrows at Penelope.
“I no longer travel without my spouse,” Guilliam wrote on a tablet and held it up for Sissy.
“Spouse? Temple do not marry.”
“Some do. We just don’t allow Laud Gregor to know.” He wrote neatly for all his haste.
Penelope produced a sheaf of papers that she had stuffed between herself and the arm of the chair. She looked at them long and hard, then handed them to Sissy. “Please read,” she said, mouthing the words carefully.
Sissy looked from the pages to Penelope’s face. A lot of the hardness had left her eyes, replaced with lines of sadness. A new sincerity radiated out from her.
Sissy read.
“Forgive me, please.” A large and flamboyant hand. Yet Sissy sensed many more of the curlicues and flourishes had fallen away in the act of writing.
A quick glance at Penelope showed quiet tears slipping down her face.
Sissy read on.
“I was shallow and played mean tricks on you; seeing you only as an outsider with no right to the position promised to me from birth.
“While Marilee lived, we saw her only in moments of glorious pageantry and honor. To this day I do not know if she did any of the work of managing the government and the Temple caste that should have fallen upon her shoulders. My own work overseeing the Temple schools and the religious curriculum for the other castes seemed trivial in comparison.”
Sissy took a deep breath. Penelope suddenly became a real person to her. More than a shallow troublemaker.
“Now that I have studied you—granted, for the purpose of pushing you to abandon the position of HPS—I see that you are the best person for the job. Possibly the only person alive for the job. My beloved spouse has shown me the cracks in our culture that need repair. As our children have grown toward their own priestly roles, I see more depth in our responsibilities than I thought possible.
“Again I beg you to forgive me and make use of me as you will in the hard tasks ahead of us. We fear change. Yet we have changed without realizing it. Now we must change again to come back to the path of Harmony we have ignored and obscured. Yours in Harmony, Laudae Penelope du Marilee pu Crystal Temple.”
Moisture gathered in Sissy’s eyes. She read the pages again.
Guilliam thrust another sheet of paper at Sissy. She took it, not trusting herself to speak without dissolving in tears. This one was written in Guilliam’s neat hand. “With the loss of our daughter, we can only begin to touch on the grief you must feel. We understand. We share it with you. Allow us to perform a grief blessing with you. Please.”
“I…
do…
not…
need… ” She couldn’t continue. A large lump formed in her throat. She tried to swallow it. Couldn’t.
Jake’s hand squeezed her shoulder.
Penelope knelt at her feet.
The papers crumpled in her hands.
Something hard and twisted broke inside Sissy’s chest. All of the pain and emptiness assailed her. Her family brutally murdered. Neighbors maimed. Shanet and her girls. Jilly. All innocent. All unknowing.
The madness of the original survivors had been perpetuated down the generations and grew among them like a cancer.
And Sissy was alone as she had never been alone, even in those first horrible days of separation when she went to Temple.
Alone.
The tears came in great shuddering sobs; racking her body; twisting her heart and her mind. She felt as if her heart was being ripped out. The mountain sighed and sobbed with her.
Chapter 60
Jake grabbed Sissy as she doubled over, gasping for breath. The sobs overwhelmed her body. He reached for the ever-present inhaler.
Guilliam stayed his hand. “The drugs will not help her. She needs to complete the process.”
“How can you be so calm? She’s tearing herself apart!” He cradled her head against his shoulder. His cheek rested against her hair. And still she choked out her sorrow.
“Have you ever lost a dear one?” Penelope asked. She busied herself pouring a glass of water from a pitcher on the side table.
“Yes,” Jake muttered. He had to remember that his Harmonite persona had parents and a sibling back on H6 and not blurt out his continual pain at the loss of both his parents and brother.
His throat tightened.
Let them think he grieved for the out-of-caste lover. Let them think what they wanted.
He wanted to choke on the gaping hole in his soul where his family had been before the Marils bombed their home and sucked all the atmosphere off the planet.
Revenge for a genocidal crime centuries ago. A crime that no one living was responsible for.
He hugged Sissy all the more tightly, burying his face in her dark hair.
They held each other for a long time. At last her body quieted, and she relaxed her clenching fingers across his back. He eased away from her.
Penelope was right there with a tumbler of water, urging Sissy to sip. “Just a little at a time. Don’t want you choking.”
“Now it is time for your own grief blessing, My Laudae,” Guilliam said. “Please allow Penelope and me to share it with you.”
“Will you preside for me?” Sissy whispered looking to Penelope.
The older woman nodded. “I’d be honored. You must come, too, Jake. As odd as it seems to bring in one of another caste, you are part of this family. You need the grief blessing as much as we do. Bring in her acolytes and her siblings. We all need to share this.” She offered her hand to Jake.
He took it, not trusting himself to speak.
They sat on the floor of the chapel, bringing the children into their circle. Penelope drew a series of palm-sized crystals of varying thicknesses and colors out of her pocket and set the array before her crossed legs.
Jake stared long and hard at the center piece, a tall black obelisk that shimmered in the soft lighting as if glowing from within.
He’d seen a similar one on the altar here, once, just after a funeral. Mostly all the altar crystals remained behind a locked cabinet in the altar. He’d been too busy chasing after rambunctious children to notice how different it was from the others, not just in color, but in… in majesty?
Then he realized the crystal had grown in a special matrix with Badger Metal.
He’d heard the wishful thinking of such a rarity. Pammy had told him to watch for one. If it could be grown, in theory, it should provide near instant communication across the galaxy, making the current ansibles obsolete. It would also lock on to any other similar unit like a homing beacon and reduce the chances of getting lost in hyperspace tenfold.
With smaller ones in nav units, maybe, just maybe, ships could communicate instantaneously, fly with avian precision. Avoid taking hits in battle.
Fifty times more valuable than Badger Metal alone.
Taking one back to the CSS wasn’t enough. He needed the process. Better yet, Harmony needed to let the CSS know they had such a marvel. This was their ticket to writing a peace treaty on their own terms.
Harmony and the CSS allied with these crystals guiding their fleets would keep the Marils within their own borders long enough to open a dialogue with them. If they’d listen. After so many centuries surely they needed to end this war as much as humans did.
For the first time in weeks he allowed himself to smile. His future, all their futures, looked a little bit brighter. He just might succeed here after all.
With his own mission, not Pammy’s, as his guiding light.
Penelope tapped the black piece lightly. A clear, sweet tone swelled up from it, caressing the ear and the soul with comfort. It enveloped all of them in the special warmth of uniting their grief, shaping it into a tangible thing that could be molded and tucked behind the heart for storage. The emotion and the music became a necessary and manageable part of them rather than a dominant force eating away at their minds and their souls.
Jake wished that Sissy could hear this.
She sat with her face upturned and a faint smile on her face. “You fraud!” he mouthed. “You can hear.”
She looked at him and cocked one eyebrow as if she had heard his silent words.
Did he expect anything less from his Laudae Sissy? Damn he didn’t want to leave her.
Gregor stared at the pink pills the physicians had given him. Chew two when the acid in his stomach churned and boiled and threatened to burn holes in his throat.
He chomped through four of them. They helped. Some. Getting Sissy back into the Crystal Temple and reopening the HC would help more.
Her actions were unprecedented. And yet well within her rights as spelled out in the copy of the Covenant that sat in the middle of his desk. It was the only document on his desk. Eighteen pieces of old and crumbling paper. The oldest copy he and the archivist had been able to find. The closest to the original.
Strange, the archivist had known right where to find it when asked. “About time you read this, boy,” he’d said as he handed it over.
Gregor fumed.
Sissy had been right. Every copy of the Covenant made a few corrections. Not many. Not serious changes. Accumulated over time, they added up. The most recent copy, made by his predecessor introduced the cutoff from contact with the rest of the galaxy. The one before that introduced the asylums to remove “Loods” from mainstream society. Prior to that, mutations in the caste marks were almost unknown. Now they happened in one in ten births.
Life changed with or without active human intervention.
He’d used the latest Military issue machine to make an exact copy of the newest version and sent them with Guilliam and Penelope. He hoped they would tempt Sissy back home.
Guilliam and Penelope. The thought of them together—-for eighteen years—puzzled him more than the archaic language in the Covenant. From the beginning, the function and the duties of each caste were spelled out. Always Temple and Noble had been above the law, separate from the others. Their need for family alliances and life mating secondary to their need to govern and lead the people morally, ethically, spiritually, and governmentally.
No sense separating Guilliam from Penelope now. Though he’d like to find a way to do it just to spite the man he’d trusted so completely for decades.
What contribution to the Covenant had Gregor made? None. Nothing. He couldn’t even control the mating of his most trusted acolyte and his priestess.
Was Gregor’s destiny to take Harmony back to the original Covenant? Possibly. That might be too shocking to explain to the masses all at once.
He knew of one change he could make. A change more radical than all the others combined. A change that would bring Sissy home.
He could bring Lady Marissa to trial. Have her executed. The thought of the robotic arm swinging its merciless Badger Metal sword to sever her neck sent chills all the way to his bones and upset his stomach again. To die alone, at the whim of a machine, no chance to fight back. The most hideous way to die imaginable.
Alone. No last death ritual. No funerary rights. Ashes scattered on the open sea.
A true deterrent to most criminals. But Temple and Noble were above the law.
He could not order it. That would undermine everything Harmony and the Covenant stood for. A ruling elite above the law, guided by and overseen by Temple.
That was how the High Priestess earned full veto power over the HC.
Time had proved that people were happier when they didn’t have to deal with politics and government. They liked knowing their destiny and the meaning of their lives without having to become philosophers and scholars. They just wanted to lead their lives with minimal interference. The Noble caste governed more effectively and efficiently if they did not have to answer to anyone but themselves.
