Fledgling_ a novel Part 25

Twenty-one.

Iran into Daniel on my way out of the building where the Braithwaites were staying. I got the impression he was waiting for me. "Leave the greeting of guests for a little while," he said. "You and I should talk."

I agreed with him, so I followed him back to his house, enjoying the dark, smoky scent of him. It contrasted oddly with his pale, almost translucent skin and his white-blond hair. There were more people than ever milling around the grounds. Peter and Thomas Marcu and their several symbionts were hauling suitcases into Daniel's guest quarters. Daniel led me past them back toward his own rooms. He kept almost taking my hand. He would reach a little, then catch himself, and drop his hand to his side.

His quarters were two large wood-paneled rooms, a room-sized closet, and a big bathroom. He sat down in a tall chair and said nothing while I explored. In the bathroom was a huge tub-large enough for two, perhaps three people. There was also a huge walk-in shower with a built-in seat and two shower heads. One shower head was fixed to the tile-covered wall, and the other could be held like a hair dryer and directed anywhere. I had no memory of ever having seen such an opulent bathroom, but there was nothing in it that confused me.

The bedroom contained a huge bed in the middle of the floor surrounded by bookcases, a stereo system, and a large television.

I went back to the first room where Daniel waited, looking impatient but not complaining. There was a desk there, a computer, more bookcases, a telephone, file cabinets-like Theodora's office but much tidier. There were other tall chairs. I pulled one of them close to him, placing it in front of him, and I sat down.

"Is there any way for me to be here without tormenting you?" I asked.

"No," he said. "But it doesn't matter. I want you here. I've wanted you here since I first saw you before you lost your memory. You will mate with us."

"I will if you and your brothers still want me."

He seemed to relax a little, to let his body sag in the chair. "Of course we do."

"Hayden says I'm too young to make such a commitment," I said.

He shook his head. "Hayden says a great many things. He says you're too great a risk because you're all alone. He says we should look around, find a family with several unmated females. He says you might leave us with only one son or none. He says he would welcome you in a moment if you had even one sister, but you alone ... He says it's too dangerous for our family."

I drew a deep breath, and I think I sagged a little, too. "I thought he liked me, that he wanted me as your mate."

"Did he say he did?"

"He didn't. But he seemed ... I don't know."

"Preston wants you. He thinks you're worth the risk. He says your mothers made genetic alterations directly to the germ line, so that you'll be able to pa.s.s on your strengths to your children. At least some of them will be able to be awake and alert during the day, able to walk in sunlight. Preston says you have the scent of a female who will have no trouble producing children. His sense of smell is legendary among Ina. I believe him." He paused, leaned forward, took my hands. "My brothers and I will mate with you."

I smiled and answered, "I will mate with you and your brothers." It felt like the thing I should say. It felt formal and right.

Daniel closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Then he opened them and without warning came to his feet, pulling me up with him, lifting me off the floor to wrap me in a rough, hard embrace. Nothing more. It didn't frighten me, didn't even startle me. On some level, I had expected it. I accepted it. I touched my closed lips to his face, his throat, but not his mouth. I gave him small, chaste kisses. I didn't bite him. I was surprised that I wanted to. He was Ina, not human, not a potential symbiont, not a temporary food source. And yet, I wanted very much to bite into the tender flesh of his throat, to taste him, to let the sweet, smoky scent of him become a flavor as well.

I rubbed my face against him, caught up in his scent and my unexpected longing. Then I drew back. He didn't put me down, but held me comfortably against him. "Why do I want to bite you?" I asked.

He grinned. "Do you? Good. I thought you might actually do it."

"Shall I?"

"No, little mate, not yet. Not for a few more years. I admit, though, that I half-hoped you would, that maybe with your memory gone, you would simply give in to my scent, my nearness. If you had, well ... If you had, no one could prevent our union. No one would even try."

"You would be tied to me, wouldn't you? You would be infertile with other Ina."

"I'm already tied to you."

"You're not. I haven't tied you to me. I won't until I'm fully adult. I'll come to you then, if you and your brothers are still unmated and if you still want me. If I live to become adult, then I'll tie you to me."

"Of course you'll live!"

I kissed his neck again. This time I licked his throat. He shuddered and let me slide down his body to the floor. "I'll live if this Council of Judgment is able to stop the attempts on my life," I said. "Can we just sit and talk about the Council for a few minutes, or would it be easier on you if I went to Preston?"

"Stay here," he said. "I'd rather have you with me for a little longer. Here, I can touch you without people thinking that I'm a selfish monster who doesn't care about his family."

I smiled, thinking about the feel of his hands. "You can touch me. You can trust me." He smelled even more enticing than Joel, but I would not taste him.

He sat down, reached out with his long wiry arms, caught me around the waist, and lifted me onto his lap. Wright did the same thing whenever he could, and Joel had begun to do it. I decided I liked it and wondered whether I would someday grow too big for them to be able to do it. I hoped not. I leaned against him, content, listening to the deep, steady beat of his heart. "What will happen?" I asked. "Tell me about the Council."

"I've witnessed seven Councils of Judgment," he said. "Hayden and Preston take me or one of my brothers along whenever they're invited to one. They want us to experience them. We won't be called to serve until we're around their age, but at least we can begin to understand how things work. We can see that our Councils aren't games like the trials humans have. The work of a Council of Judgment is to learn the truth and then decide what to do about it within our law. It isn't about following laws so strictly that the guilty go unpunished or the innocent are made to suffer. It isn't about protecting everyone's rights. It's about finding the truth, period, and then deciding what to do about it." He hesitated. "Have you seen or read about the trials that go on in this country?"

I thought for a moment, hoping some memory would come to the surface, but none did. "I don't remember any," I said. "Except on a fictional show I saw on Wright's TV."

"Good and bad," he said. "Human trials are often games to see which lawyer is best able to use the law, the jury's beliefs and prejudices, and his own theatrical ability to win. There's talk about justice, of course, but if a murderer has a good lawyer, he might go unpunished even though his guilt is obvious. If an innocent person has a bad lawyer, he might lose and pay with his life or his freedom even though people can see that he's innocent. Our judges are our elders, people who have lived three, four, five centuries. They sense truth more effectively than people my age, although I can sense it, too."

He settled me more comfortably against him. At least I was more comfortable.

"The problems arise when friendship or family connections get in the way of honest judgment. That can happen to humans and to us. That's why there are so many on a Council. And that's why everyone on the Council is related to both sides."

"Is a Council ever wrong?" I asked.

"It's happened." He drew a deep breath. "And when it happens, everyone knows it. It's usually a result of friendship or loyalty causing dishonesty. Or the problem might be fear and intimidation. That kind of injustice hasn't happened for over a thousand years, but I've read about it. It dishonors everyone involved, and everyone remembers. Members of the families that profit from it have difficulty getting mates for their young. Sometimes they don't survive as families."

"They are punished?" I asked.

"They are ostracized," he said. "They might survive, but only if they move to some distant part of the world and manage to find mates. Today, with communication so improved, even moving might not work.

"But you need to know procedure and propriety for this trial. Will you remember what I say? Do you have any trouble remembering new things?"

"None at all," I said.

He looked at me for a moment, then nodded. "You will speak after everyone is welcomed and the proceedings are blessed. Preston will welcome them as host and moderator. Then the oldest person present will offer blessing. Then you'll speak. You're making the accusations, so you'll need to tell your story. You must be tired of doing that, but you'll do it one more time, very thoroughly and accurately. No one will interrupt you, and most will remember exactly what you say. The Council will listen. Some of them will just want to learn enough to make a decision based on the truth or falsity of what you say. Others will want to find reason to doubt you so that they can better attack you and defend the Silks. And then there are those who will want to defend you against attack."

"Why should I need to be defended? The Silks need to be defended."

"They will be. And their advocate will probably-"

"Wait a moment. Their advocate? Who's that?"

"You and the Silks will both be asked to choose an advocate from among the Council members. You should think about who you'll want. I suggest you consider Joan Braithwaite, Elizabeth Akhmatova, or either of the Leontyev brothers. We won't know for sure which member of each family will be on the Council until the first session."

"I haven't met Elizabeth Akhmatova at all."

"She's smart, and she was a good friend of your eldermothers'. She or one of the others will help you if anyone on the Silks' side tries to show that because of your memory loss, you may be lying or confused or perhaps not even sane."

I frowned, feeling pulled toward several questions. "Even if I were all those things, it would not make the Silks less responsible."

"But it could, Shori. It could mean that you might not know the difference between lies and truth. You might be delusional, for instance, and able to tell lies that you actually believe. If you're delusional, if you could be shown to be delusional, then anything you say becomes suspect. Anything you've sensed or done may not be as it seems. Tell the complete truth, and remember what you've said."

"Of course. I would have done that anyway. But what about the Silks' lies? If they say they didn't do it, even though they did, how could my being delusional matter?"

"It might not. But you're one small person, one child, and the Silks are a large and respected family. There may be people on the Council who are sorry that your two families are dead and who see the guilt of the Silks, but who don't want to see a third Ina family destroyed. You can count on us-my whole family-to back you up on what almost happened here at Punta Nublada and on what we learned from the prisoners, but you must represent your mothers and your father. You must bring them into the room with you and stand them beside you whenever you can. Do you understand?"

I frowned. "I think so. I wonder, though, if the Ina way is so much better than the one the you say the humans have."

"It's our way," he said. "It's the system you must work within if you're to be safe, if you're to keep your symbionts safe, and if, someday, you're to keep our children safe."

I took one of his long hands and held it in my lap. "All right," I said.

"And don't lose your temper. There will be a lot of questions. Tomorrow, after you've told your story, you'll be questioned by whomever the Silks choose as their family representative, you'll be questioned by the advocate of the Silks, and you'll be questioned by any other member of the Council who chooses to question you. It won't be easy. You shouldn't make it easy on them either. You get to ask questions, too. And you can-should, in fact-call on us to support your memory of what happened here. On the first night, you and the Silk representative will be the ones asking and answering questions. On the second, both of you can call others to support what you've said, and they will be questioned. On the third, the Council will ask any final questions it has, and a decision will be made. This can be flexible. If you or the Silks need to ask more questions on the third day, you can. But that's the way it will go in general." He hesitated, thinking. "It will probably provoke the h.e.l.l out of you. The Council members can question you or the Silks' representative or anyone either of you call for questioning. So if you get asked the same question ten times or twenty or fifty, give the same answer, briefly and accurately, and don't let it bother you."

"I won't."

"And never answer an accusation that hasn't been made. Even if you believe someone is hinting that you're delusional or otherwise mentally damaged, don't deny what they say unless they make the accusation outright."

"All right."

"Someone might offer you pity and sympathy for your disability. Make them state the disability. Make them say what they mean. Make them support it with evidence. If they say that you're delusional or mentally deficient or too grief stricken to know what you're saying-which, I believe, you definitely would be if your memory were intact-make them explain how they've come to that conclusion. Then, by your questions and your behavior, prove them wrong. If, on the other hand, they can't say what it is they're pitying you for, they must be the ones who are confused. You see?"

"I see."

"Someone might pretend to misunderstand you, might misstate what you've said, then ask you to agree with them. Don't let them get away with it. Pay attention."

"I will."

"Everything will be recorded. Every Ina family gets to see and hear Council proceedings these days. It didn't used to be that way, of course, but now that we can keep an accurate audio-visual record, we do. That means you can ask for a replay if anyone tries to insist on a misstatement of anything you've said."

"How likely is that?"

"I don't know. Most of us have excellent memories. That's why your amnesia will cause some Council members to distrust you at first. Just be yourself. They'll know your intellect is all right as soon as they've heard your story. Anyway, it's dangerous for anyone to lie about someone else's questions or answers. I've seen it happen, though. People feel that things are going against them. They're afraid. We have no prisons, after all."

I thought about that and found that I knew what prisons were. Humans often locked up their lawbreakers in cages-prisons. "No Ina prisons? Why?"

"None of us are willing to spend our lives in prison with the lawbreakers. Maintaining a prison isn't quite as unpleasant as being a prisoner in one, but it's bad enough. And levying fines would be meaningless. It's too easy for us to get money from the human population. For lesser crimes, most likely we amputate something. An arm, a leg, both arms, both legs ... If the sentence is death, we decapitate the lawbreakers and burn their bodies."

"Decapitate?" I stared up at him. "Amputate ... ? Cut off people's heads, arms, or legs?"

"That's right. Amputations and executions are also recorded. Amputations are punishments of pain, humiliation, and inconvenience. Limbs grow back completely in a few months, maybe a year or two for legs taken off at the hip. Of course, when it's done, people are given nothing for the pain, and the pain is terrible. It hurts for a long time, although once people are returned to their families, the families can help them with the pain. They're permitted to, not required to."

"You're sure that arms and legs cut off ... grow back?"

He held his left hand in front of me. "I was in a traffic accident ten years ago. I lost three fingers and part of my hand. In about a month and a half, I had a whole hand again."

"That long?" I hesitated, then asked, "Did you eat raw meat?"

"At first. I don't digest it well, though. If I had been able to eat more of it, I probably would have healed faster."

"You probably would have," I said. And I wondered if he would heal more quickly once he was mated with me. I thought I would like to give him that.

He continued: "The Silks won't be having anything amputated, though. What they've done is too serious for that. If the Council condemns them, they'll either be killed-the adults will be killed, I mean-or they will be broken up as a family. Their youngest members will be scattered to any families that will have them, and the older ones will be left to wither alone. They might try anything they can think of to avoid those possibilities."

"They ... they would lose their children?"

"Yes. They would not be seen as fit to raise them."

"That seems cruel to the children. And ... what if they have more children?"

"It might happen. Or their mates might shun them, blame them for the loss of young sons who have been separated and sent to live thousands of miles apart, probably on different continents. Adoption is not cruel, by the way. There are blood exchanges to ease it and seal it. People miss one another, of course, but by letter, phone, and computer, they can keep contact. I hear they tend not to, but they can. Adoptees are truly accepted and accepting once they're in their new circ.u.mstances. But for the adults, it's the end. What adult wouldn't fear such a thing and do almost anything to avoid it?"

"If they had let my families alone, they wouldn't be facing it."

"They must have felt very strongly compelled to do what they did. And ... Shori, if you had been anyone else, they would have succeeded. You not only survived twice, but you came to us with what you knew, and you led the fight to destroy most of the a.s.sa.s.sins and to question the survivors. They thought mixing human genes with ours would weaken us. You proved them very wrong."

We sat together for a while longer in warm, easy silence. I felt that I had known him much longer than the few days that I'd been living at Punta Nublada.

I turned toward him and opened his shirt.

"What are you doing?" He was shocked, but he did nothing to stop me.

"Looking at you. I wanted to see whether you had hair on your chest." He didn't.

"We tend not to have much body hair."

He had very smooth skin. I kissed it and ran my hands over it, loving the feel of him. Then I stopped and slipped down off his lap because I wanted so badly to taste him, drink him, to lie beneath that tall, lean body and feel him inside me.

He watched me, left the decision to me. If I tried to bite him, even now, he would let me do it. And then what? If I died, he, at least, might age and die childless. His brothers might mate elsewhere, but he could not. "How can you risk yourself this way?" I whispered.

"I know what I want," he said.

I decided that I had better protect him from his wants. He wouldn't send me away, and he should have. I took his hands, his broad hands with long, long fingers that were almost unlined, that were like, but unlike, the hands of my symbionts, larger versions of my own. I took his hands and I kissed them. Then I left him.

On the first night of the Council of Judgment, proceedings were to begin at nine.

They would be held in a large storage building a few dozen yards beyond the last house-Henry's-along the private road. The building had been emptied, and the equipment usually stored in it was sitting outside in the cold, rainy weather-two pickup trucks, two small tractors, a small crane that I'd heard called a cherry picker. Lesser tools had been stored in other buildings. Stacks of metal folding chairs and tables had been rented and trucked in. All this had been done quickly and efficiently by the Gordons and their symbionts with my symbionts and me helping where we could.

Attending were all thirteen of the Silks, all ten of the Gordons, of course, and two representatives each from the thirteen other families, all strangers to me, or near strangers like the Leontyevs and the Braithwaites. They would judge the Silks ... and me and perhaps make it possible for me to get to know myself again and get on with my life without having to be on guard every day against another attack.

Could a Council of Judgment really do that? What if it couldn't?

The thirteen families were Fotopoulos, Marcu, Morariu, Dahlman, Rappaport, Westfall, Nicolau, Andrei, Svoboda, Akhmatova, Nagy, and of course, Leontyev and Braithwaite. One representative would act as a Council member and the other as a subst.i.tute. There were six male families and seven female. I asked Preston whether the balance of s.e.xes meant anything.

"Nothing at all," he told me. I was working with my symbionts to set up rows of metal chairs, and he was doing something to one of the video cameras that would be recording the Council sessions. "You heard how the decisions were made. The Silks traded names with us until we had a group that both would accept. We have acted as your representative in this because you no longer know these people."

"Did I know them all before?" I asked.