Playing God(20)

At last, she closed her eyes and raised her hands. “Obedience first, obedience second, obedience third.”


It was nearly dark by the time Praeis and her daughters were released from the Queens’ presence. Two soldiers Praeis didn't know drove them out of the city and into the working lands. Walls enclosed factories, fields, and orchards, so it was like driving through a cement maze.

Here and there, the walls opened up to reveal distressingly weedy lawns for the crematoriums. Praeis remembered only two on the whole length of road between the city and home. Today, though, she had counted eight, and each one of them had its fire going. The familiar, dreaded, sweet-sour burning scent from the bodies being burned before their ashes were commited to the earth of the Ancestors filled the damp wind. At the smell, both Theia and Res grew quiet and huddled closer to her, and Praeis held them gratefully.

Finally, the road took a sharp corner and the walls opened up again. This time, though, Praeis saw rain damp grass and a few sprawling trees no one had ever bothered to prune.

Then she saw home.

Its walls were smooth white cement. She and her sisters had spent hours scrubbing the cursed things. Any breach of family discipline would get them sent out with hoses and soap. Four adolescents sat on top of the walls, either as lookouts or just looking. As the car drove past the wall, the daughters turned and shouted. Praeis couldn't understand the words.

Behind the walls Praeis could just see the four chimneys and peaked slate roof of the main house. The wide wood and iron gate glided into view. The timbers were a little darker than they had been, and there were flecks of rust on the reinforcing iron bars and hinges, but it remained the entrance to her home.

Their driver braked roughly and gestured to the roadside. “Here we complete our commission.”

Praeis dipped her ears. “Thank you. With me, Daughters.”

Resaime and Theiareth clambered out of the car, fast enough to make themselves clumsy.

“PRAEIS!”

Praeis barely had time to turn around before the gate swung open and the floodwave of family broke against them. Cousins crowded around, becoming a blur of hands and faces as they were hugged and touched and tugged at. Voices laughed and called, and babbled out more questions than could possibly be answered. Praeis felt warmth mounting inside her. With half an eye she watched her daughters. Res and Theia hesitated a little. They'd seldom had such a crowd around them, but they quickly relaxed into it, touching and being touched, laughing, naming themselves and having names called back to them. A fierce happiness surged through Praeis, one she hadn't felt in years. She was passed from hand to hand. She grasped arms and shoulders and ears, shouted names and greetings until she was hoarse. The happiness in her blood and skin filled her with fire and strength enough to make her drunk and dizzy.

Then, she looked up and saw that the hands she held belonged to her sisters. Proud, wide-eyed Senejess, and warm Armetrethe, who'd lost her left arm in a skirmish years ago.

“Armetrethe! Senejess!” Laughing, Praeis threw herself into her sisters’ embrace.

“Praeis!” Their strong arms wrapped around her. They all whooped with love and joy as they held one another, drinking in scent and sound and solid presence.

I'm home. I'm home! thought Praeis, almost delirious with the wonder of holding her sisters.

“Well, come now!” Senejess finally said. “We cannot stand here making riot in the streets. Let's get ourselves indoors.”

With her sisters’ arms tight and strong around her shoulders, Praeis let herself be steered toward the house. The cousins and daughters flocked around them, blocking the view of the grounds and the outbuildings. Here and there, she caught a glimpse of a familiar wall, or cluster of stones in the garden and her heart lifted until she thought it could go no higher.

They spilled through the doors of the main house and into the great room. The family fanned out, dropping onto the sofas arranged in clusters around the tiled space. The vibrant greens, blues, and golds created stylized scenes of sea cliffs and forests to surround them all. The tall slit windows let in the daylight to mix with the mellow light of oil lamps. Praeis inhaled the scent of warm oil with a start. The electricity probably wouldn't come on until after dark. She hadn't thought about power rationing in years.

Still, the room was as she remembered it. It was beautiful. It was home.

She collapsed with Senejess and Armetrethe onto a sofa. Res and Theia dropped straight to the sand-colored mats that covered the floor with a cluster of cousins about their own age, languid and relaxed.

They talked easily for a while, about the colonies, about the daughters. The conversation turned colder and drew them closer to one another as they talked about the plague and the long lists of the dead.