The Domination

Chapter Two

BAIAE SCHOOL

DISTRICT OF CAMPANIA

PROVINCE OF ITALY

DOMINATION OF THE DRAKA

SEPTEMBER 18, 1968

It was full dark now on the beach, and the driftwood fire crackled, sending sparks flying up with sharp popping sounds. The flames were blue and red and orange, a white-crimson over the bed of coals below; the smell was dry and hot. Inland, the trees and shrubs rustled, shadows dark and moving against the lesser dark of the sky. The waves were breaking in a foam of cream, glittering in starlight and moonlight, surge and retreat. The sound of them was like heartbeat in her ears, like lying beside some huge and friendly beast. Out beyond, her friends were still diving and playing, flashes of white bodies otter-sleek among the water. Their voices dropped into the warm night, no louder than the cicadas and night birds.

Yolande laid her head on her knees and wiggled her toes over the edge of the blanket. The powdery white clung to them like frosting; she tapped her feet together and felt the grains trickle down her insteps, tickling or clinging where the skin was still damp from her swim. Looking up, the moon path lay on the water like silver, almost painfully bright. The stars were sparse around the moon, abundant elsewhere; the lights of men were far too few to dim them. A faint glow west across the bay was Naples, and she could make out the long curve of the coast by the wide-scattered jewels that marked the towns and manors of her people.

She lay back on the striped wool and smiled, stretching her arms above her head. Stars . . . there was a trick to that. A mental effort, and the velvet backdrop with its glowing colored lights vanished; instead there was depth, an endless dark where great fires hung burning forever amid the slow-fading hydrogen roar of creation. Her lips parted, and she felt a sensation that might have been delight, or a loneliness too great to bear; she forced herself to hold the wordless moment, mind suspended in pure experience. Moisture gathered slowly around her eyes, trickling in warm salt streaks down the wind-cooled skin of her temples.

“Woof!” Mandy’s voice. “I’m turning into a prune. Come on!”

Yolande started as the others dashed out of the ocean, wiping away the not-quite tears with the back of her wrist. They ran past her to the freshwater fountain at the edge of the beach, laughing and splashing each other around as they sluiced off the salt. The darkness closed around as they threw themselves down on the blankets about the fire; now it was a hearth, the tribe’s fortress against the night. Myfwany sat cross-legged beside her, leaning back on braced palms. She was still breathing deeply from the swim; from Yolande’s position her face was shadowed against the backlit dark-red curtain of her hair. The drops of water that ran down her flanks glistened with the rise and fall of her chest, changing from blood-crimson to lemon-yellow.

“You’re quiet, ’Landa,” she said. “Head still troublin’?”

“Mmm . . . no. Hammerin’ great headache yesterday, couldn’t hardly move this mornin’. Now it’s just a bit stiff all ovah. No, I’s just lookin’ at the stars and thinkin’.”

Myfwany probed at her neck, tracing the cords down to her shoulders; she shivered slightly at the touch, still cold and wet. “ ‘S right, stiff,” Myfwany said definitely. “Maybe swimmin’ wasn’t such a good idea. Muriel, give me a hand? Roll ovah, ’Landa.”

Yolande turned onto her stomach and laid her cheek on her crossed hands, feeling a painful warmth in her stomach. “Thanks,” she muttered. Massage was usually serf’s work, although everybody learned it; it was something you did for close friends, a sign that status was put aside. Two pairs of hands began to work on her, one starting on the soles of her feet, the other where the neck muscles anchored on the base of her skull. She felt uncomfortable for an instant, as the pressure made her aware of soreness she had been ignoring, then surrendered to the sensation.

“Y’all bein’ mighty nice,” she said sincerely. Myfwany snorted, and Muriel laughed and slapped her lightly on the calf.

“You the one bruised the Bruiser,” Mandy said. She was kneeling by a basket across the fire, rummaging within. “Never seen her move so fast; mean of her to thump you head, though.”

“No, that’s the point,” Myfwany said. “Bruiser had to move fast, an’ react automatic-like.”

“Jus’ so—Veronica, watch where you puttin’ that dirt! I’s got scallops in heah!”

The stocky girl had been raising the fine sand in double handfuls, letting it trickle down over her body. She laughed and bent backward from her kneeling position until her head touched the blanket behind her, a perfect bow, stretching.

“ ’Salright,” she said as she rose. A sigh. “Ah jus’ love this time of year. Perfect, just cool enough fo’ a fire, but not cold. Look! There it is!”

She raised a hand. They followed the gesture, and saw a moving star crawling slowly across the southern horizon.

“That our’n or their’n?” Mandy asked. The Domination and the Alliance had both put up another dozen orbital platforms in the last few years; the rivalry was pushing development hard.

“Ours,” Myfwany said, sinking back on her elbows. “Oh, ours.” Her voice became dreamy. “I wonder . . . how do the stars look from there?” To Yolande: “What were you thinkin’ of, starwatcher?”

“Lots of things,” Yolande said abstractedly. “How we can’t see the stars, jus’ the light they sent long ago. Like readin’ a book, hey? An’ . . . how far away, an’ how perfect.”

“Perfect?”

“There’s no right or wrong with them,” Yolande continued, almost singsong, whispering. “No lovin’ or hatin’; they just . . . are.”

They were silent for long minutes, each staring upward past the fire glow and the dancing sparks.

“Well,” Mandy said, her hands moving again in the basket. “Who’s fo’ lemonade, and who’s fo’ wine?”

“Mm, I’ll take the wine,” Yolande said.

“Lemonade first, I’m too thirsty fo’ drinkin’,” Myfwany said. “That enough, ’Landa?”

“Feels nice,” she replied.

Veronica and Mandy were making skewers from a pile of willow switches, sharpening the ends and threading on pieces of scallop and shrimp wrapped in bacon; they handed the limber sticks around, with wicker platters of soft flat Arab bread, and glasses. The five girls drew closer to the fire. Yolande sat up, watching the flames. The breeze had picked up slightly, and gusts of it blew the tongues of colored flame toward her. She sipped at the wine as the bacon sizzled and dropped fat to pop and flare on the white coals; it was cool from the earthenware jug, rather light, slightly acidic. A southern vintage, she thought, probably from Latium.

“Strange,” Muriel said, hugging her knees and leaning back, letting her head fall against Veronica’s shoulder.

“What?” Mandy asked.

“I was thinkin’ . . . here we are. In twenty-odd years our own daughters will be here, or someplace like here. Maybeso raaht here; maybeso doin’ and thinkin’ just what we are. Strange.”

“What brought that on?” Myfwany said. She brought the skewer close, examined the seafood critically, and used a piece of the flatbread to pull it off. “Mmm, these are good.”

“I was . . . I was thinkin’ about history class. An’ about the things Ma and Pa used to tell me, you know, those religion things.” Muriel stuck the butt end of her skewer into the sand and rolled the wine cup between her hands. “I mean . . . if you believes all that, the God stuff, then”—she frowned—“then it would all look different. It would be comin’ from somewheres, and goin’ to somewheres. Like-so a story, hey? An’ if you don’t believe it, then it’s . . . all sort of, well, it just happens.”

“If’n yo believes it, we’re all goin’ straight to hell,” Veronica laughed, giving a light tug on Muriel’s brown curls.

“Pass the wine, will you, hey?” Yolande said. There was a clink of stoneware. “Thanks, Mandy. Well, the way Harris says it, it’s the story of the Race; where we came from an’ where we’re goin’.”

Muriel rested her chin on the edge of the cup. “That sort of depends, don’t it? I mean, the Race didn’t have to happen; Harris says so herself. History’s a story leadin’ up to us, but only on account we happened. If the Yankees killed us all off, then it’d be a story about them, an’ we’d just be part of their history.”

“But we did happen, an’ the Yankees aren’t goin’ to win; we are,” Myfwany said definitely.

Yolande chuckled. “So the story has an endin’ and a meanin’ because we’re tellin’ it.” A pause. “Us here, too. It’s . . . true because we make it true, eh? So we tell history like ouah own story, like we was writin’ it. Like God.”

The others looked at her. “Say, that’s really pretty clever,” Myfwany said.

Yolande flushed and looked down into her wine cup, continuing hastily. “Speakin’ of which, what are we goin’ to do once we’ve conquered the Yankees?”

Myfwany laughed. “My brothah, Billy? He likes the Yankee movies; says the girls look nice. Says he’s goin’ buy a dozen when we put the Yoke on them.”

“Euuu, yuk, boys,” Mandy said. “Oops, this is overdone . . . ”

“Ah thought you liked boys,” Veronica said. She bent her head to whisper something in Muriel’s ear, and the other girl giggled and worked her eyebrows.

Yolande looked at Veronica and flushed again; the Alexandrian girl was no older, but she had definite breasts, and the dark-brown hair between her legs was thick and abundant. It made her conscious of her own undeveloped form again. And . . . strange about sex and things, she mused. When you young, you know about it an’ it isn’t all that interestin’ an’ all of a sudden it’s scary an’ important. She shook her head; at least there was a while before she had to worry about that sort of thing. Freya’s curse, I hate being shy!

“I do like boys,” Mandy said. “At least I sort of like the idea of ’em. But they still sort of yucky, too. You know, my brothah Manfred, he only a year older than me, an’ he’s got ouah cook pregnant? Ma found him ridin’ her in the pantry, an’ cook’s thirty, with a bottom a meter across an’ a mustache. I mean, we’re not planters, we’ve only got a dozen house serfs, but Pa bought him a regular concubine when he turned thirteen, and still he goes an’ does things like that.” She brooded for a moment. “Yucky.”

“My ma,” Yolande began, “says it’s on account of they don’t have enough blood.” She grinned at their blank looks and held out a hand, palm-up, then slowly curled up her index finger. “You know, all the blood rushes to they crotch, their brains shut down fo’ lack of oxygen, an’ they stop thinkin’?”

There was a moment of silence, and Yolande felt a flash of fear that her joke had fallen flat. Then the laughter began and ran for a full half-minute, before trailing off into teary giggles.

“Aii, that’s a good one,” Muriel said. She glanced up at the stars again. “When we’ve beaten the Yankees, we’ll put up mo’ of those power satellites my pa’s workin’ on.”

“Build cities on the moon!”

“Turn Venus into anothah Earth!”

“Give Mars an atmosphere!”

“Hollow out asteroids an’ fly ’em to Alpha Centauri!” The comments flew faster and faster, more and more outrageous, until everyone collapsed into giggles again. Myfwany rose, and pulled out a velvet case from their bundles.

“This is your’n, isn’t it, ’Landa?”

“Yes—careful!” Yolande took the long shape in her hands; they moved toward it with unconscious gentleness. “It’s a mandolin.”

Muriel whistled between her teeth. “An’ Archona’s a city. Old one, hey?”

“My great grandma’s,” Yolande said. She put the pick between her teeth while she arranged the case across her lap, then settled the instrument and slipped it onto her hand. “On my ma’s side, she Confederate-born. Had it fancied up some . . . . ” She tuned it quickly; the strings sounded, plangent under the fire crackle and shhhhh of the waves. The wood was smooth as satin under her fingers, the running leopards inlaid in ivory around the soundbox as familiar as her own hands.

“Well, give’s a song, then,” Myfwany said.

“I don’t sing all that well—”

“C’mon,” Mandy said. “We’ll all join in.”

“Oh, all right.” Yolande bent her head, then tossed it as the long pale ripple of her hair fell across the strings. She swept through the opening bars, a rapid flourish, and began to sing: an alto, pure but not especially strong.

“ ’Twas in the merry month of May

When green buds all were swellin’

Sweet William on his deathbed lay

Fo’ love of Bar’bra Allen—”

The ancient words echoed out along the lonely beach; everyone knew that one, at least. They all had well-trained voices as well, of course; that was part of schooling. Myfwany’s sounded as if it would be a soprano, rich and rather husky. Muriel’s was a bit reedy, and Veronica’s had an alarming tendency to quaver; Mandy’s was like her own, but with more volume. They finished, gaining confidence, and swung into “Lord Randal” and “The Wester Witch.”

“What next?” Veronica said. “How about something modern?”

“Alison Ghoze?” Muriel said.

Mandy made a face.

“Oh, moo. Call that modern? It’s a hundred years old; modern if’n you count anythin’ after the land-takin’.”

“I—” Yolande strummed, forced the stammer out of her voice. “I’ve got somethin’ new, care to hear it?”

The others nodded, leaning back. Calm. Breathe deep. Out slow. She began the opening bars, and felt the silence deepen; a few seconds later and she was conscious of nothing at all but the music and the strings. It ended, and there was a long sigh.

“Now, that was good,” Myfwany said. She half-sang the last verse to herself again:

“An’ we are scatterin’s of

Dragon seed

On a journey to the stars!

Far below we leave—forever

All dreams of what we were.”

“Who wrote that, anyways?”

“I—” Yolande coughed. “I did.”

They clapped, and she grinned back at them. Mandy laughed and jumped to her feet.

“C’mon, let’s dance—Muriel, get you flute out!”

The silver-bound bamboo sounded, a wild trilling, cold and plangent and sweet. Yolande cased her mandolin and joined the others in a clap-and-hum accompaniment. The tall girl danced around the outer circle of the firelight, whirling, the colored driftwood flames painting streaks of green and blue across the even matte tan of her skin and the long wheat-blond hair. She spun, cartwheeled, backflipped, leaped high in an impossible pirouette, feet seeming to barely touch the sand.

“C’mon, you slugs, dance!” she cried.

“ . . . as we dance beneath the moon

As we dance beneath the moon!”

Myfwany came to her feet and seized Yolande’s hand in her right, Muriel’s in her left. “Ring dance!” she said. “Let’s dance the moon to sleep!”

“Oh, wake up, Pietro,” Veronica said, kicking the serf lightly in the side. He started up from the grass beside the little electric runabout and loaded the parcels as they pulled on their tunics and found seats.

“Do y’know,” Mandy said, tying off her belt, “that the Yankees wear clothes to go swimmin’?”

Veronica made a rude noise. “And go’ takin’ baths, too.”

“No, it’s true, darlin’,” Muriel said. “My pa visited there, an’ they do.” She outlined the shape of a bikini. “Like underwear.”

“Strange,” Myfwany said. They settled in for the kilometer ride back to the main buildings; nothing else moved on the narrow asphalt ribbon of the road, save once an antelope caught in the headlights for an instant with mirror-shining eyes. It was much darker now after moonset, and they rode with an air of satisfied quiet.

“Go into Naples tomorrow?” Veronica said. Tomorrow was a Sunday, their only completely free day.

“Fine with me,” Mandy said; Muriel nodded agreement, and Myfwany nudged Yolande with an elbow.

“How ’bout it?” she said casually.

“Why—” Yolande smiled shyly; this was acceptance no longer tentative. “Why, sho’ly.”

The runabout ghosted to a silent halt by the east side entrance. They made their farewells and scattered; Yolande blinked as she walked into the brighter lights of the halls and colonnades. It was after twelve and there were not many about; twice she had to skirt areas where the house serfs were at their nightly scrubbing and polishing.

“Missy?” That was Bianca, yawning and blinking up from a mat by the entrance—Yolande’s own door, looking more familiar now somehow. Machiavelli yowled and circled until she picked him up; the cat settled in to purr as she rubbed behind his ears, sniffing with interest at the shrimp scent on her fingers.

“Jus’ turn down the bed, put this stuff away, then go to sleep,” Yolande said, padding through to her bedroom. How do I feel? she asked herself, with relaxed curiosity. Tingly from the swim, tired from that and the dancing. Relaxed . . . Happy, she decided. Maybe that’s part of growin’. When you were a child, happiness was part of the day, like sadness over a skinned knee or sunlight on your face. Till one day you knew you were happy, and knew that it would pass.

“Tomorrow’s also a day,” she muttered to herself, setting the cat down on the coverlet. She yawned hugely, enjoying the ready-to-sleep sensation; that was odd, how it felt good when you knew you could rest, and hurt if you had to stay up. The bed was soft and warm; she nuzzled into the pillow and felt the cat arranging itself against the back of her knees. “Tomorrow . . . ”