Seeing Sebura hitting Sam had upset many of them, but they also kept a fearful watch on the family, worried what they would do in retaliation.
Alki swung around to glare at Robert. “Do you dare claim Samantha will fail?”
“You can feel him patera, he is incapable of feeling love or pity.”
“My granddaughter will not fail.” Alki was being aggressive because he too was suffering at seeing her being treated so badly, so Robert kept quiet.
As they drew closer to the town some men walked out, with women and children carefully staying behind them. They were less than a hundred metres away when Sebura took a few steps away from Sam and carefully inhaled. He staggered back, gasping as he tried to breath.
The people from the town had stopped and were silently staring at them. A woman called to the men, “They have the pale sickness, kill them before they bring it to us.”
The men had wooden poles but they felt it was safer to attack from a distance and threw stones. One of them hit Sam just above her left ear and she collapsed to her knees. Sebura felt the air changing. Quickly he took a deep breath, picked her up and ran, his body protecting her from the stones. He grunted as a few hit his back, but kept running.
He stopped halfway back up the slope and turned to check. They were not chasing after them, but they were gathering stones, placing them in what looked like leather aprons folded into pouches. He put down Samantha, checked the new wound on the side of her head, decided she would live and collapsed beside her. Her eyes were open, but he could see she was dazed by the pain. He thought to himself that with her powers she was not used to pain, that was why she felt it so keenly. She’d just have to get used to it, he decided, as he saw more men join the stone throwers. They slowly but deliberately started walking up the slope. He felt like running down to them with his knife and thrusting into as many as he could before they killed him. At least he would die as an Orati rider. Unfortunately, having to keep Sam by his side meant he would not get even halfway to them. Angrily he jerked at her.
“If you don’t want another stone in your face you better get up and run, I can’t carry you with them chasing us.”
He kept a hard grip on her arm as he ran and she managed to keep her feet moving for a few minutes. As she became a dead weight, collapsing to the ground he swung her onto his shoulder and started a slow run that he knew he could keep up for long. He ran parallel to the river, wanting to keep it in sight. The men did not try to catch up with them but stayed close enough to be within stone throwing distance within minutes if he stopped running. He saw a rocky outcropping and aimed for it. He put Sam down and started collecting stones.
Sam opened her eyes and stared at the men running after them. “Will surround us, mus’ ge’ away. Other side of rive’. Mus’ cross it.”
He turned on her in a fury. “You run to it and I’ll keep up with you.”
She made an effort to get up, swayed and fell to her knees. By then it was too late for running, the men were close by, fanning out in a half circle. They began to throw rocks and Sebura waited until he was confident he could hit one of them. He threw as hard as he could and it hit the man. The attackers paused to consider this new development. They deliberated and spread until the two were enclosed within a circle. Stones flew at them from all directions.
Sebura waited until he was confident he could kill, stood up, swung his arm to throw his knife. A stone hit him in the face and his arm swung wildly and the knife fell a few metres in front of him. Sam saw they did not have a chance of escaping and wondered what Meli had planned. She was almost willing to die so as to get out of this world and heal herself. She raised her hand and saw how it was trembling. It angered her. She gripped a stone, stood up and pulling Sebura to follow her she came out from the rocks. She carefully spat on the stone, rubbed her spit all over for them to see.
Terrified they pulled back. Sebura was quick to understand and started spitting on the stones he was holding. The men pulled further back. He grinned at Sam. “That was clever. Let’s walk out of this trap before they become brave again.”
“To the river. Sebura, we must cross it.”
“Why?”
“They will not follow on the other side. You’ll see.”
He was so used to her being right that he gave in without an argument and clinging to each other they walked downhill. An odd rock now and then fell close to them but the men kept their distance so they were not hit. When they reached the river bank, Sam kept on walking so he followed. They were almost on the other side before they stopped to drink and wash their wounds.
“What is this sickness they think we have?”
“It’s my fault.” He stared, trying to understand. She held up a hand. “It is my white skin.”
A look of fury and hatred twisted his face. “Even here…I’ll kill you for this!”
They hid behind some bushes and waited for the day to end. Sam was hungry and needed time to recover. Since his own face hurt, Sebura did not press her and he decided the nearby farms would be a good source of food.
“Why are we here and who was that demon that sent us? For how long will we have to stay, will we return?”
“We call him grandfather, we think of him as our rock. Not because of his strength as much as because of the way he loves us. He is not an evil demon Sebura, he is good - more good and wiser than I am. He saw that you and I have not been open to each other and forced us to take this time to try and understand how the other thinks.
Your dreams of power, they are not evil. Why you dream them is. You want power for yourself, not so as to help and protect your people. Just as you did not love Efineh because her heart is a treasure that would have brought beauty to your life, you wanted to use her to become the power that rules through her love for you. If I had any powers here, I would send to you what her love for you felt like in her innocent heart and I wonder if it would mean anything to you. For some reason you cannot love anyone except yourself. That is sad, for you are on a road that does not lead anywhere.
Sebura, do you remember when we first arrived, you advised me to go to another town because the elder is softer than Ashema? Do you know why Ashema is such a difficult old man? It is because he loves his people more than he loves his own dreams. For him, his position as elder does not make him more special than his people, he thinks of them as special and he is there to serve them. If I tell you something that will shock you, maybe anger you, will you try to think of what I said calmly and look for the truth?
You are potentially an Ashema. You are as clever as him. With time you will grow as wise as him for you use your mind and try to learn. You are a man of courage, as you have proven to me. All that is missing from you is the ability to love. Tell me, if you find yourself a female that pleases you and she has your children, do you think you would love them?”
“Of course!”
“My people need a strong man to lead them to greatness. They are Orati and should rule all the lands.”
Sam thought for a while, wondering how much she should divulge. Sebura thought her silence was because he’d spoken a truth she could not refute. “You have been to Freddie and to our world. You have seen people that do not look like us, that come from other worlds. You have seen how powerful they are. Did you notice the ship in the air that looked like it was made of glass? That ship has a weapon so powerful that it can blow up a sun - we have seen it used and it was terrifying.
There are people on other worlds who have lived longer than your world has existed as you know it. They have spent those years learning and are far wiser than any of us and they have powers you cannot imagine. You have seen the Gnolats. They had a horrible power and yet it did not exist for a bad reason. A teddy changes into a Gnolat only when it feels the need to protect other teddies. Unfortunately they are not wise and like animals use their powers without understanding what is good and what is bad. Can you compare yourself to any of them? Even as elder of all Orati, as elder of the entire world, can you ever be as powerful as any of those you’ve seen among the Cherinians? You could be.”
“How?”
“It depends on how you think of power. What it means to you. If you see a child fall and hurt itself and it cries and you pick it up and help soothe the pain and make it happy again, that makes you as powerful as Robert, the most powerful of all Cherinians.”
“He is the most powerful? Even those others who do not look like people?”
“Yes. That ship that looks like glass, it is nothing compared to Robert. He could destroy that ship with just a thought.” She closed her eyes. “There was a time when Robert first found his powers, that he did not dare to fall asleep. He was afraid that a bad dream would make him destroy our world. We have talked about powers Sebura. Let us talk about weakness. Who do you think is the weakest man of all the worlds?”
“You are going to say I am.”
She smiled. “No, you are not weak in the ways you should be. The man that all the worlds have accepted as their leader, the one who is the most powerful of all, he was not accepted as leader because he is powerful. They chose him because he is the weakest of all of us. I’m talking about Robert.”
“You speak nonsense to confuse me.”
“When I first took Efineh away while she loved you, she told me that if you had grown up on our worlds and been given all the knowledge our people have, you would have been the cleverest of all of us. I did not answer her with the truth because she would not have heard me, she was seeing you with the eyes of a child who loves. Sebura, you would have known a lot, but you would not have been wise. Wisdom cannot come to anyone if they cannot feel pain for others.
You think I am being foolish, talking like the Samantha you have listened to for years? You listened, but did you ever really hear what I said? Let me ask you a question. Are there any Orati you admire? Are they only those who are best at fighting or do you admire anyone for his wisdom?”
“There are a few I look up to. Not all are riders.”
“You like the way they find the right answers?”
“Do you think they can because they are clever or is it because they understand their people? How can they understand people if they do not care for them?” She sighed. “Enough about you. Tell me, why do you think I am here? What do I have to learn from you?”
“Perhaps you are here because you became a creature of evil and hurt my riders?”
“That might reflect part of the problem, but is not the reason I am here. I think I have to learn something from living here with you.”
Sebura turned from her to watch the farmers as they walked from their fields back to their homes. As the sky darkened he saw lights appear in windows and envied the men who were returning to the comforts of food and drink after a day of work. He’d listened to Sam, thinking that her vulnerability and weakness would open her so that she would give away some of her secrets, giving him information that would show him how to become strong enough to fight her back home. He’d already come to the conclusion that they would return, for her family would not have so quietly sat by if they were losing her forever.
He saw that he had been foolish. When they returned and she had her powers again she would make him pay for hitting her and treating her so roughly. He decided he would make up for it by looking after her. He kept his smile hidden as he also came to the decision that the best way for him to earn her forgiveness was by encouraging her to talk. She loves talking and if she feels he is listening and arguing his way towards understanding her, she will be pleased and forget or forgive his earlier violence.
Sam looked up at the peaks and said, “I think we have to cross the mountain.”
“Why? Will the air be better there?”
“I don’t know why, I just have a feeling something is waiting for us on the other side.”
“We better steal a lot of food if that is our way, there will be little to eat among the rocks.” She was surprised that he did not argue.
She chuckled and he turned to look at her. “Have you realised our bodies have been changed in another way? Neither of us have felt the need to urinate.”
He was still angry about having his manhood stolen so he kept quiet a moment to control his anger. “Why? Why did he have to change us? Will we be like this when we return?”
“I think it was to stop you from trying to have sex with me. That would have really angered Robert.”
He thought about it. He still hated feeling the way he did, but at least he understood. He acknowledged to himself that he would have raped her as a way of avenging himself and was almost grateful to the old man. He knew that nothing would have saved him if he had.
They crossed the river and chose which plants to steal once it is dark.
“Wait here.” Silently he vanished in the darkness. He crept close to the house and searched for bags to place the food they had to carry. He was delighted when he found a stoppered skin for carrying water. He startled Sam as he reappeared by her. He handed her a sack and she worked to fill it. By dawn they were already climbing towards the mountain.
“This not good. We need meat.”
“Maybe the plants in this world have everything our bodies need. I did not see any animals on the farms.”
She grinned at him, careful not to split her lip again. “This woman also likes meat, but I don’t think I could eat it raw.”
Speaking of food. Nobody wanted to miss one moment from the screens and Cherinians were needed for ‘sending’ the thoughts/emotions/physical feelings. Every hour that passed, more Orati arrived from other towns and we had a potential problem if it was not handled immediately.
Robert jumped, brought Freddie to the void of this reality, arranged with those on board to supply Maria and brought her to cook. About a hundred volunteers joined her, but they did not know how to cook so she would prepare the pots and instruct them how often to stir and when to remove the pots from the fire. A lot of food was burnt because both the volunteers and Maria kept on forgetting the food as they became fascinated by what they now could also share. Still, we all had something to eat.
Robert also had to create portable loos to prevent the area surrounding the crowds from stinking as people slipped away to relieve themselves. The Orati were fascinated by the idea of a loo that they could sit on and even the men sat down to urinate. Will they consider those who install something similar in their house decadent?
We were all relieved that Sebura had gone past the stage of needing to hurt Sam, but we were also saddened by his inability to open himself to emotions. I think Meli must be fed up of everyone asking her what is over the mountains.
As with most mountains, the ascent up the mountain was not direct. They would climb hills to find they had to climb down again to climb up again. About a quarter of the way up they reached the top of a hill and saw below them a narrow valley. It had a small river and was lush with vegetation. They saw odd patches of almost bare ground, but did not pay them any attention.
“This might be a good place to rest while you regain your strength.”
“Thank you.”
They were close to the valley floor when they saw movement. A small animal walked out from behind a yellow bush. It stopped, cocked its head to stare at them, flicked out its tongue as if tasting the air and then bent to graze. It was about the size of a Dama dama with silky hair, yellow and brown.
“Meat!”
“It is not afraid of us. Will you eat it raw?”
“I have a stone.” (He was talking about a flint, an item all riders carry with them.)
“I don’t see any dry wood.”
“Then I eat it raw. You have never eaten the liver of a freshly killed deer while it is still warm? It strengthens you so that your blood flows with power.”
“Uh, no thanks.”
They literally walked up to the animal without it running away. As they came close it moved nervously, sniffing the air, not liking the bubble of air Sam was surrounded by. Sebura feared it might run away so he kicked hard at a spindly leg. It cracked audibly. The animal screamed from the pain, but did not try to run away. It started to cry. It sounded just like a baby and tears ran down as it sobbed.
“Oh god!” Sam tried reaching for her healer but nothing happened. She put her arm around its neck, wanting to soothe it. Sebura’s hand flashed out and his knife slit its throat, blood spurting all over Sam.
“I’m sorry, I wanted to wash the blood off.”
“Let me eat first!”
Sam walked into the river with her clothes on. Sebura had no such inhibitions and started to strip when he realised Sam would see his now sexless body. Embarrassed, he ran into the water with his clothes on. They lay on the soft grass for the sun to dry them. After a while Sam turned over. She looked at the grass, slipping it through her fingers. “Look at the grass! It looks and feels like silky hair!”
“You are not eating enough.” He stared at her profile. “Tell me more about Robert. Is he your husband or father?”
“Females are weak in ways that men can see, but men are weak in ways that women cannot see but only know.” Though impatient of her rambling he waited. “Before I tell you about the men of my world and of Robert, I want to explain how it is with us.
As with your people, the men were the hunters and warriors, the women were the nurturers…the women looked after the children. The men formed governments and they thought they were a separate species from the females. They gave themselves all the rights while for the women there were almost none.
With time, things were invented that made life easier in some ways. Women started to work like the men, but they were given less for their work. They started to complain and demand they have the same rights as the men. There are in every society those men who are deep thinkers and fair. They saw the women were right and argued for them. Our people slowly changed. Sadly even after so many years, the women still do not have the same rights. By law they do, but not in real life.
You have a rule that the hunter who kills gets an extra piece for himself and his family. If the hunter should be a woman, she should not get her extra piece? Those demands by women were good and fair, but many women forgot that they are women. They wanted to be treated exactly the same as the men in everything. They forgot what I first told you: Females are weak in ways that men can see, but men are weak in ways that women cannot see, only know.
You are laughing at me in your mind, thinking I am wrong, men are not weak. Sebura, it would be a terrible thing if that were true. It is your weaknesses that make you human beings, just like us females. How else could men and women come together and become one, sharing their lives?
Women have always known, maybe it is an instinct, that they have to treat their men in a certain way. The man needs to feel that his female admires him for those things that make him a man. If you were to bed a female and she admired your sex, telling you it is so big, so strong looking, you would feel more of a man and enjoy having sex with her. If she were to take a look at it and start laughing, telling you it is so small, so ugly and weak looking, could you have sex with her? Would it not shrivel to become as she said it is? If you had sex with your female for years, thinking you are a good male partner and please her, but came home without her seeing you and you heard her tell another woman that you have never pleased her, that you are no good in bed, would you ever want to have sex with her again?”
“You are telling me Robert is not a man, in sex?”
She burst out laughing. “We’ll get to Robert just now. I was trying to explain that women have ways of making a male feel small so that he loses his confidence. A lot of women on my world forgot. By demanding to be equal in all ways they said and did those things that stopped a man from wanting to be with a female. Do you understand what I am talking about? Have you seen some women in your towns who belittle their men and steal their manhood from them?”
“Yes.”
I have noticed you are hard with your riders, always expecting more of them so that they give you the best of themselves. That is good. However, I noticed there is one rider you do not push so hard. Why is it that with him you are softer and spend time talking with him?”
“You speak of Siletu? You are right. Maybe it is because he is different. He is useful to me in other ways.”
“He listens to what you think and tries to understand?”
“That is so. He is a rider Samantha, he will go into battle and fight without fear but…he is softer. He does not like to kill or hurt others.” He suddenly laughed. “He is like you want to make me be.”
“Is that so terrible?”
“It would not be right to say it is, but he is not Sebura, I cannot be Siletu.”
“Imagine thousands and thousands of Siletu’s. Men who are decent, kind, sensitive - and they find there are only those women who need to prove they are better than the male. Could such a man be happy with or love such a woman?”
“No, he needs a gentle woman.” His eyes widened. “All this to tell me about Robert?”
“Okay, let’s talk about Robert now. I had to give you some background first if you want to understand what shaped the man he became. When he was a small boy, his father was a cold man who never showed he loved his son. The boy adored his mother who is a beautiful woman with a lovely smile and a gentle heart. The mother could not live with her cold male anymore and wanted to take her son with her. The father forced her to leave without their son. He told the little boy that his mother is dead.
The boy grew up without any love. You know from what I’ve done what a school is. Where Robert lived they have schools that have rooms for the children to live there. He watched the other children go home to families while he had to stay alone. Then he made a friend and that boy arranged for him to go to his home. That was where Robert first found out what it is like to be part of a family.
As he grew into a man he fell in love with the sister of his friend. She did not love him and he was in pain, feeling bitter and alone. Then a little girl came to live close to him and they became friends. That little girl was Cherine. Robert did not trust women, he knew that to love a woman would hurt him, but he thought he was safe loving a child. He did not know Cherine was special. She taught him to open his heart and new powers grew between them as they loved each other more and more. That is how the Robert of today was formed.”
“You are saying that loving a child gave him his powers?”
Sam nodded. “He felt he had to protect her.”
“Why are no other parents like him then?”
“Aiee!”
She laughed. “That is exactly how I feel sometimes.”
She left him to his thoughts and dozed off. His thoughts were confused. She had not really answered his questions, but he did not notice, he had too much strangeness to digest as it was. He turned to look at her, saw she was asleep and he stared for a while. He decided her nose is too thin, as his people say about him, her skin, though tanned, too pale, and she was too skinny. He wondered what it would be like for a man to be loved by her and for a moment he had a funny feeling in his stomach. He nearly laughed when he realised that what he’d felt was fear.
They spent two days in the little valley. Many took the opportunity to return home to change clothing, take care of other personal matters or to sleep. Sam did realise that Sebura was struggling to understand all she’d told him so she mostly stayed quiet. From our side it was funny watching Robert as he felt the eyes of all upon him as they speculated on what Sam had revealed about him.
Sebura sat crossed-legged facing Sam. “I was wrong to attack you. I am glad to see you have healed well.”
“You attacked me with fists, I attack you with words. Which hurt more?”
He shook his head, refusing to be part of that kind of discussion. “It is time for us to leave. Do you feel strong enough?”
“Yes. We better collect some food. Please don’t kill another one of those animals.”
He shrugged. “They are afraid of me and stay too far away.”
They went searching for fruit and other plants for carrying with them. Sam was the first to see a tree with large fruit. They looked like big lemons, the texture of the skin rougher, but they were a greenish yellow colour. She picked a fruit and dug her thumb in to peel it. As she punctured it she heard gas escaping. She put it to her nose to smell and gasped.
“Sebura, come see this, these fruit will free you.”
He did as she told him and as he placed the punctured fruit by his nostrils she stepped away. He inhaled, looked up, saw she was out of range and inhaled from the fruit again. She stepped closer again.
He smiled. “How can it free me? I would not live for long on any fruit I can carry.”
“I meant that if you need to hunt, for a short distance and time you could leave me behind.” Pleased, and since they had almost no weight, he carried as many as he could in his shirt.
Until they reached two thirds of the height, the climb was easy, with only a few difficult spots. After that it became progressively more difficult. Not only because the slopes were steeper, but because everything was damp and slippery with a kind of slick moss. They came to a place where the rocks were jagged and they found themselves blocked by a cliff. It was not high, about fourteen metres, but with everything being so slippery they worried about trying to climb it. A fall on the sharp and jagged rocks below could be fatal.
“You climb ahead of me so that I can help you up.”
“I’m just behind you.” His arm came over and he tried to dig into the soft moss and soil. He thought he had gained purchase that was firm enough and he raised himself to grab with his other hand and pull himself over. His hands started slipping. Without thinking Sam grabbed hold of his hand. She felt his weight dragging her to the edge. She dug her toes and other hand as deeply as she could, slowing her slide. He managed to catch hold of a ledge on the cliff face and shouted for her to let go.
He shouted from the bottom, “I’ll find another way up. Wait there for me to help you.”
Sam realised he would be hours and she would become too tired to hold on. Carefully, inch by inch, she turned herself so that she was facing upwards. She panicked when she realised she had slid further down and her one foot hung over the edge. She dug in, even gripping a tuft of moss in her teeth as she pulled up her leg until her foot was higher up than the other one. She dug her toes in and raised the other foot.
By the time Sebura appeared above her, among some rocks, she had moved about two metres away from the cliff edge. Holding a fruit to his face he stared down at her.
“You cannot climb much further, it gets too steep for you to hold on. I’m going to my left to see if it is easier on that side, can you hold on?”
“Be quick.”
She managed to inch up another two feet by the time he reappeared. “It is even steeper on that side. I’ll have to come down for you.”
“No! You are too heavy, you’ll slip down.”
“I have to, you’ll die if I don’t.”
“Don’t! If you slip you’ll knock me down also. Can you slowly slide your knife to me?”
Sebura felt foolish and cursed himself as he tied his belt to the knife and slid it down. Once he was holding the belt from the one end he saw the knife was halfway to her. He let go the belt. It slid about a foot and stopped. He’d thought the belt would slow the knife, he had not expected it to stop it.
Sam giggled. “If my strength holds out it will take me another two hours to get to the knife. Have you got enough fruit?”
“Yes. You won’t make it, I’m coming down to push the knife to you.”
“Come down feet first.”
He carefully slid out onto the moss, his fingers holding onto a slimy rock. He felt his feet touch something and he kicked. The belt crumpled, slid and the knife moved. It stopped just inches above Sam.
“Go back, the knife is by me.”
He was safely on firm ground when looking back he saw she had not moved. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m too tired to move and I’m scared to let go to climb.”
“You have to, do it now while you can.”
Peevishly she answered, “What makes you think I can! I can’t even feel my fingers anymore they hurt so much.”
She was exhausted to the point where even slipping over the edge did not frighten her that much, it was as if she was not all there anymore, more of an observer to her own impending death, yet she had to giggle at his Orati way of encouraging her. She raised her head, saw the blade and reminded herself not to grab it, to try the extra few inches to reach the handle.
Sebura watched as she reached the knife, raising it even as her fingers folded around the handle. She slammed the blade into the ground and wrapped his belt around her hand. Her head lay down on the moss.
Urgently he called, “Don’t fall asleep!”
All the Normals forgot she was not in a real world, if they ever truly understood that, and cheered, women weeping from relief as Sam pulled herself close enough for Sebura to pull her to him and safety. Not that we were in much better condition. Poor Alki kept on whispering to himself that she is a pallikari, as tears wet his cheeks.
They decided that though the saddle between the peaks was closer, it would be safer to walk around to a point where the pass is lower. As they lost sight of the land they had crossed, the mountain side dried and other vegetation appeared. They saw little streams ahead of them so they did not fill the skin as it was heavy to carry.
“Tomorrow we see why we had to cross?”
“Why did you listen to me?”
“It was better than staying there.”
“Oh, I thought you were going to say you did it because I asked you to, because you like me.” He glanced at her face, saw her cheeky look and surprised himself when he laughed.
When they reached the other side, all they could see was a blanket of mist below them. Sebura was the first to notice. “More green plants here.”
Sam found a nice spot with a view of the mist, wiped the rock clear of small sharp stones and sat, with her legs swinging in the air. “Let’s eat.” She opened her bag and pulled out a very limp looking plant. She pulled a face and bit into it. “Yuck! I think it is dead.”
“Dead?”
She passed it to him. “Try it.”
He took a bite, chewed and spat. “Yuck! It is dead!”
She laughed. “Careful Sebura.” He was startled by her stern voice. She smiled. “You might convince me to start liking you.”
“I think we have to bring them back. I think he is starting to fall in love with her.” Meli said. We’d also sensed it and agreed with her. It was never Sam’s intention to make him suffer that way.<br/i>
“No, first tell us, what they find in the mist, will it help open him to emotion?”
“Under the mist. I think so.”
“Then they stay.” Robbie looked at Efineh who was cuddled up against Irfan. “Sorry. It’s your decision.”
