Memory

Chapter 8

Kaphiri seemed to forget us. For twenty days there was no sign of him, though I remained vigilant, spending many nights on the wall. No one questioned me. They knew I had a lover, and it was only natural I would want to be alone with him; when the market link was down, it was just as natural for me to choose to be alone in my grief. I was of the age of restlessness and melancholia, and my behavior was easily explained.

That was why I was on the wall one dreary evening, when clouds lay low and heavy over the land. Night was falling early. The vale had become a wide gray shadow and the horizon had taken on the color of old steel, when the headlight of a bike appeared in the distance, racing through the dusk for the shelter of Temple Huacho.

There was no sign of silver that night; no hint that this rider might be a servant of Kaphiri, but I’d been on edge so long I started to my feet, expecting the worst. I wished furiously that I had my hunting rifle in hand, but it was locked up safe in my room. (My mother was accepting of my seclusion, but she would have wanted an explanation for a rifle laid across my lap.)

Then from across the vale I heard a high-pitched cry, “Jubilee!” and I was glad I didn’t have a weapon.

“Auntie Som!” I shouted in return. I whooped and waved, and she waved back at me, the headlight on her bike bright as a star in the gloom. “Auntie Som!” We hadn’t expected her until tomorrow afternoon.

Auntie Som was my mother’s older sister. She was a cessant who’d made a life for herself teaching school in the Ano marketplace. She’d visited us before, first when my brother Jacio was born, and three times since, as each new baby came. This time she had come to stay.

I leaped off the wall and ran to open the gate, while my brothers and sisters bubbled out of the temple, racing one another down through the orchard while Moki dashed, barking, about their feet. My mother followed, carrying Zeyen. She met her sister at the gate and hugged her; and while there were tears in her eyes, there was also a smile on her face.

I closed the gate, then turned to watch them all as they walked back up the hill. Liam had stayed behind too, though I wasn’t aware of him in the deep shadows until he spoke. “I think it’ll rain tonight.”

I jumped, but then I forced myself to laugh at my own edginess.

Liam wasn’t fooled. “Jubilee, are you planning to run away?”

“No!”

The dusk had passed into full night and I could barely see him, though I could feel him thinking, thinking. At last he spoke, his voice hardly more than a whisper, “Anyway, you’re free to go, now that you know your mother won’t be alone.”

I didn’t want anyone up the hill to overhear, so I whispered too. “Do you want to go? Are you ready?”

“None of us ever knows how much time we’ll have.”

I nodded, though I don’t think he could see me in the dark. “I’ve been worried… about Mama.”

“You can stay here,” he said quickly. “You don’t have to go with me.”

“It’s not that.”

He hesitated. “Saying good-bye is the hardest.”

“Liam, will you wait a few more days. Please? Until Auntie Som is settled.” Until I could convince myself Kaphiri would not come again. Why should he come? Jolly was long gone, and there was nothing else here he could want.

Liam sighed. “You’ve been spending so much time out here, I thought you were on the edge of leaving.”

“I wouldn’t run away.”

“All right. I’m sorry.”

“You’ll wait then?”

“A few days. Not longer.”

A drop of rain struck my cheek, and then another.

“Come on,” Liam said. “This is not a night to stay out and wait for ghosts.”

Is that what I’d been doing?

I retrieved my savant from the wall, while the rain became a steady drizzle. Moki dashed after us as we jogged through the orchard, toward the friendly glow of the lanterns that hung in the courtyard.

It was the last night I would spend at home.

I fell asleep listening to the rain and heard it again when I awoke in the morning. A glance out my window showed gray veils drifting over the hills but the clouds that trailed them had grown thin. I guessed there would be abundant sun before the morning was far gone. So I dressed in shorts, a field shirt, and ankle-high shoes. I’d decided to search the hills around Temple Huacho; see what turned up. If I found no sign of spies or wanderers, maybe it would be easier to believe Kaphiri had forgotten us; that he’d sent none of his followers to interfere in our lives; and that my father’s death that night had been a terrible coincidence and nothing more.

I grabbed a jacket and made my way to the kitchen. My mother was there, helping Zeyen and four-year-old Arial with their breakfast, while she chatted with Auntie Som and Emia. Liam was breakfasting at the far corner of the table. He saw me first. “Are you going out?”

The others turned, and suddenly I felt guilty for wanting to spend the day away from them. I gave a little shrug. “I was thinking about it.”

“Eat breakfast first,” my mother said. “And take Liam with you. He’s about to go crazy trapped inside these walls.”

I had just sat down when Jacio came bursting in, with Moki prancing at his heels. “Jubilee! Jubilee! There’s a machine in the forest.”

I was on my feet in an instant. “What kind of machine? Where?”

At the same time my mother demanded to know, “Jacio, what were you doing past the wall?”

Jacio wisely chose to answer me. “It’s a savant,” he panted, his dark hair tousled and his pale cheeks flushed red. “But the shape’s different. It’s not one of ours.”

Jacio was ten, the same age I’d been when Jolly was taken. I’d enlisted him to look for “strange things”—it was the kind of imaginative game he enjoyed, though I’d never expected him to be the first to find a sign of Kaphiri.

I shrugged into my jacket and ran after him out the door, while Liam abandoned his breakfast to follow.

Rain fell in a soft mist as we galloped down through the orchard, all the way to the closed gate. My eight-year-old sister Tezoé had climbed to the top, where she balanced on elbows and belly, her sodden hair lying against her back, glistening with rain. Jacio boosted himself up beside her and I climbed up on her other side. “It’s there,” Tezoé said softly, pointing down at the forest that covered the western side of the hill.

“I don’t see it.”

“It’s on mimic,” Jacio explained. “Here. I’ll show you.” He swung over the gate and dropped to the other side. I jumped after him, rainwater splashing up around my feet. Behind me I heard Liam warning Tezoé to stay inside the wall, and then a heavy thump as he dropped to the ground.

Jacio had found a path through the brambles. He ran silently, half bent over as if he were stalking bush deer. I raced to catch up with him, but Moki was faster. He must have taken his favorite path over the wall, along the branch of a large lychee tree that lay atop the stone. He darted past me, his jackal shape a blur of red as he chased Jacio.

I ran hard in pursuit. The rain pelted my eyes and raspberry thorns raked at my legs, but Jacio still reached the woods ahead of me. He knelt to scoop up a handful of leaves and rain-soaked humus and then, before I could cry out, he flung it into a cluster of low branches.

The dirt wrapped around a quadrangle of reality, a separate world of sharp edges hanging seven feet above the ground. I stared at it, breathing hard, trying to make sense of this vision; and then the shape dipped as the weight of the soil unbalanced it, and suddenly I could see it for what it was: the delta wing of a camouflaged savant. “Do you see it?” Jacio shouted.

“Yes.”

It was only a few feet away. One jump and I could have grabbed it, but that’s not what I wanted—and in that moment of hesitation it slipped away. I sprang after it, and Moki followed. “Go back!” I shouted over my shoulder at Jacio. “Tell Liam to bring the bikes!”

Jacio didn’t listen. I could hear him a few paces behind me, running hard, and Liam behind him, shouting, “Jubilee! What’s going on?”

I had no time to answer.

Liam didn’t know about Kaphiri. He could not guess what was at stake.

Moki kept pace with me, but after a few minutes Jacio fell behind. I think he waylaid Liam and finally delivered my message because after that there was only silence behind me.

I ran on, ducking beneath branches and weaving between trees, with Moki sometimes ahead of me, sometimes behind. I was determined to keep the savant in sight. I had no doubt of its purpose: it was here to spy on my family. And I knew as well who had sent it.

I plunged across a deer-chewed lawn while the savant retreated, its delta wing flickering in shades of dappled green as it glided beneath the branches. The rain was already yielding to bright sunshine, and in that unforgiving light the savant’s mimic skin could not change fast enough to hide it. I trailed it through a stand of bracken, then across a tiny stream and up the farther slope. The ground began to steam around me, and I shed my jacket, tying it around my waist.

How far?I wondered. How far to the master of this machine?

I wanted to find him. Now. This very morning. Early on a day that promised abundant sun. On such a day it would not matter if he summoned the silver. The sun would burn it away before it could harm me; but there would be time for my anger.

I rounded the side of the hill, clambering over a spine of glittering white crystals that thrust out of the ground like the bones of a glass beast. On the other side there lay a swale, filled with the feathery gray foliage of wormwood. The savant became a gray shadow as it glided above the shrubs.

Savants are not known for their speed. Still, they can glide as fast as I can run, so I was surprised to find this one still in sight. Maybe Jacio had damaged it when he’d hit it with the dirt. As I watched, it slipped again under the shelter of trees.

Moki had figured out that I followed the savant. He plunged into the wormwood, but I went around.

My world grew small and tightly focused. I strove to keep the savant in sight, at the same time gauging the ground ahead and dodging the branches that tried to slap me. I’d hunted deer on foot since I was twelve and I was a strong runner, but deer grow tired, while machines do not. Three times I lost my quarry as the savant floated over short cliffs where I could not easily follow. Twice I found a way down the rock face, though I had to make a pack out of my jacket to carry Moki. The third time we blazed a path several hundred feet to the west. Moki scrambled ahead, pursuing the savant on his own, but it took me fifteen minutes just to clear the ravine. When I finally climbed out on the other side my legs were shaking and my lungs were on fire, and I despaired of finding the savant again.

Still, I knew it had been heading generally north, so I kept on that way, and after a few minutes I heard Moki barking in the distance. I hurried on, and half an hour later I broke out into a grassy vale, and there it was: a tiny chip of green, flitting out of sight as it passed over a saddle into the next vale. I could hear Moki’s bark, but I couldn’t see him in the shoulder-high grass.

Again I ran, using my arms to thrust the tall stalks aside, but I had little energy left, and my pace soon slowed. All around me steam rose wherever the sun touched, filling the air with such a density of moisture I could hardly breathe.

That’s when Liam found me. He came over a hilltop to the east, riding his bike fast between the trees. Rizal followed, and Jacio came behind him. They intercepted me before I reached the end of the vale. I waved Liam on after the savant, relieved to see that he had brought his rifle, tucked in its sheath. “Go! Keep it in sight.”

“You want to tell me why we’re chasing this thing?”

“Later. Just catch up with it. Watch where it goes.”

Rizal stopped beside me. He was riding my bike, and he’d remembered to bring my rifle along too. “Get on,” he said.

“No. You get off. Take Jacio home.”

“No way! We want to—”

“Rizal! This is not a game. Take Jacio home. I don’t want him hurt.”

My words frightened him. His freckles stood out against the sudden pallor of his skin. “It’s just a savant,” he said.

My hands were bleeding from the brambles. They were an ugly sight as I grasped the handlebar. “Get off,” I repeated.

This time, he did. Jacio came up then. I seized the handlebar of his bike too, so he couldn’t take it into his head to set off after Liam. I glared at Rizal until he nodded. He told Jacio, “Slide back. We’re going home.”

Jacio fussed of course, but Rizal was four years older, and outweighed him by fifty pounds. There wasn’t much he could do. “I’ll explain later,” I shouted as I took off after Liam. “Just go home!”

I stopped on the rise, long enough to make sure they were heading in the right direction. Then I pushed the bike as hard as I dared all the way across the next vale.

Liam was waiting for me at the top of the next rise. He spun his bike out, blocking my way, forcing me to stop. Behind his sunglasses, his face was hard. “Why are we out here?”

I could see the savant, still half a mile ahead, gliding away across nodding plumes of grass. Moki sat nearby, his tongue lolling happily, looking at us as if he couldn’t understand why we didn’t push on. “To find the owner of that machine!” I shouted, trying to force a way around Liam.

He moved his bike to block me again. “Tell me why we care.”

“Because I met someone on the night Kedato died, and he scared me.”

“Someone threatened you?”

“You could say that.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

I shrugged. “I need to know who owns that savant, Liam.” It had caught a breeze. I could see it scudding through the valley, hastening north.

“You don’t think it’s just a lost savant?”

“A lost savant wouldn’t use its mimic function to hide from us. It wouldn’t run away.”

He drew a deep breath. “All right then.” He rolled his bike back out of my way. I called Moki, and put him in the empty saddle box between my knees. Then I took off.

It was noon before I began to worry. When I’d set out in the morning, I’d expected to find the savant’s owner close by. Now I wondered: how far away might Kaphiri be? The day was getting on. I wasn’t afraid to confront him under the sun, but I didn’t want to find him at twilight.

At last I pulled up on a broad ridge, almost the last outpost of the Kavasphir Hills. Liam stopped beside me. Together we watched the savant retreat across the brush like a slow-soaring owl, its color shifting to match the changing vegetation. Liam asked, “Have we gone far enough?”

“Do you have field glasses?”

He reached into his saddle box and pulled out a pair. Then he searched the land ahead of us. Finally he shook his head. “There’s nothing out there. It’s probably just a runaway after all.”

I’d been so focused on following the savant that I’d allowed myself to think of little else, but now a new thought intruded. Was it possible the savant was deliberately luring us, drawing us out from the shelter of Temple Huacho? “Can you still see it?” I asked. “Has it slowed down?”

Liam looked, but he did not answer right away. His head turned in a slow arc as he searched the land. A minute passed. Then another, and with it went my new theory, for if the savant was a lure, surely it would have slowed down, or shown itself? Giving us some motivation to go on…

“There!” Liam said. “Straight ahead. At least a mile.”

I squinted, trying to make it out. “Has it reached the highway?”

“Not yet. But there’s no one out there. No sign of a truck or a bike.”

“Okay. I’m tired of chasing it anyway. Let’s change tactics. Let’s try to catch it this time.”

He continued to watch the savant through his field glasses. “If you want. But if we go any farther, we won’t be able to get back to Temple Huacho before dark.”

I thought about it. “We could camp. There should be gear in the saddle boxes.” It was our habit to keep the bikes ready.

“Or we could push on to Temple Nathé. Once we’re on the highway, it’ll be easier to reach than Huacho.”

Temple Nathé. Where my father had died. I felt suddenly frightened, but at the same time I wanted to see it. “All right.” I patted Moki’s head. He was still sitting contentedly in his saddle box, awaiting our decision. “Let’s go then, before we lose our quarry.”

The savant changed direction when it reached the highway, turning northeast to follow the line of the road. But even with a strong breeze behind it, it couldn’t stay ahead of us once we were on the pavement. We pushed our bikes to seventy, and within a few minutes we caught up with it: a triangular pane of blue in the air overhead.

Then suddenly, the savant ceased to flee. We brought our bikes to a stop beneath it. It floated, twenty feet overhead. I glared at it, willing it to move on, to show us on to Kaphiri.

“Jubilee, it’s going higher.”

I pulled my rifle. “Don’t lose sight of it.” I would bring it down, before I would let it get away.

The savant was thirty feet overhead. Then fifty. A tiny blue chip, barely discernible. “Liam, it can’t survive up there.”

“I think that’s the point.”

Silver sparks began to boil around the savant’s triangular wing, and then the sparks bubbled into a glinting cloud that completely enveloped its shape, a tiny, glittering silver storm that lasted only seconds before it burned away in the afternoon’s brilliant light, but that was long enough. The savant was gone.

Such was the fate of flying machines. Scholars say there is some dormant form of silver floating as particles high in the atmosphere that will cling like static electricity to the wings of any flying machine. When their density rises to some trip point, these particles will boil into true silver, even in defiance of sunlight. If the flying machine is not destroyed immediately in flight, it could still ignite a silver storm on the ground, which is why no enclave will allow its citizens to even experiment with flying machines.

I sighed and sat down on the side of the road. Moki came to me, nuzzling into my lap. I felt like a fool for running so far after a machine that was (it seemed quite obvious now) lost and crazy. Liam sat down beside me, passing a water cell into my hands. “It shouldn’t take more than two hours to reach Temple Nathé,” he said. “So we’ve got time. Why don’t you tell me why we’re here?”

I nodded. Certainly, I owed him that.