The Lawgivers: Gabriel Read online

  They merely stared at her blankly when she questioned them about what had happened, however. It wasn’t that they didn’t know. She could see from the flicker in their eyes that they knew something, maybe everything, but they weren’t about to tell her.

  And it wasn’t from fear, not entirely anyway.

  It was because she’d arrived with Gabriel. She knew that with sudden, blinding certainty when she caught some of the glances they divided between her and Gabriel.

  That frightened her, enough that she was relieved when Gabriel told her that he would take her back to the others. She was too caught up in worrying over that circumstance and her misery that they’d failed to find any of her siblings to even think what returning her meant until she discovered that Gabriel had left her.

  She didn’t even know when he’d left.

  They’d landed near the edge of the encampment and Gabriel had escorted her to the woman he called Phil-a-shee. She didn’t know what had passed between them but their conversation certainly hadn’t been cordial. Regardless of the even tone of voice both used, their expressions were so far from friendly Lexa had no doubt that it was a disagreement of some kind. She just didn’t understand what it was about because she couldn’t understand their language.

  Phil-a-shee had finally turned her attention to her, though. “Come with me,” she said briskly.

  Lexa glanced at Gabriel, but he seemed distracted. Since he didn’t contradict Phil-a-shee’s order, though, or try to interfere, she allowed the woman to escort her away. She glanced back at Gabriel once. He was watching her, but he looked away when she turned back, focusing his attention on the others in the encampment.

  Stumbling from her inattention to where she was going, Lexa caught herself, and, embarrassed by her clumsiness, she didn’t look for Gabriel again until Phil-a-shee deposited her with a small group of people seated on the ground around another udai. When she looked for him again, she discovered he was gone.

  Dismay that seemed to surpass any that she’d ever known immediately enveloped her. She felt like she was drowning in it. Her chest felt as if it would cave in and it was a struggle even to draw breath. She thought if it wasn’t for that she would’ve burst into tears. She could feel them gathering in her eyes, could feel the painful need to expel her sorrow in racking sobs.

  Fortunately, the udai she’d been turned over to distracted her before she could betray herself so blatantly.

  “You! What name are you called, human?”

  Lexa jumped, but it still took her a moment to figure out that the udai man was speaking to her. Her voice came out as a croak when she spoke. “Lexa.”

  “Pay attention! I’m instructing.”

  She gaped at him for a moment and then glanced around at the other people in the group. She discovered two things at that moment that made listening nearly impossible—none of the people in the group were familiar and every single one of them was looking at her as if they hated her. It chilled her to her bones.

  * * * *

  Lexa was relieved when the udai finished ‘instructing’ and told everyone to get up and follow him … until she discovered that Phil-a-shee had returned to collect her. “You missed orientation,” she said sourly. “You’ll come with me.”

  Lexa had no idea what she meant by orientation, but the way the woman looked at her when she said it made it fairly clear that she knew why Lexa hadn’t been there and what she was doing instead of ‘orientation’. She was too miserable and too embarrassed and too uneasy to object, however.

  She saw why none of the people in the previous group had looked familiar to her when Phil-a-shee had left her before, though. As they crossed the wide field, she saw another group of people arriving. She thought at first that it was Gabriel leading them and quickened her step, nearly outrunning Phil-a-shee until they were close enough she discovered that the udai man leading the new group wasn’t Gabriel.

  “Gather around!” Phil-a-shee said sharply, waving her arms at the people who’d just arrived. “Quiet! Settle down!”

  Everyone in the newly arrived group gaped at her and then each other and finally sat down, staring at the woman.

  She smiled sourly, nodding her approval, and went to stand beside the udai man Lexa had mistaken for Gabriel—though she didn’t know, now, why she had. She knew Gabriel had left for one thing and it wasn’t logical to think he could’ve returned with more people in the space of time since she’d seen he was gone. For another, once she got a closer look at the man Phil-a-shee referred to as Lawgiver Raphael, she saw that he looked nothing like Gabriel in the face and beyond that he was both taller and broader than Gabriel.

  “This forest,” she began, gesturing toward the thick trees that edged the open space of the field, “was husbanded by the udai when we came to this world two decades ago. The plants here—all that you see—are native to this world just as you are and from what we have discovered forests like this once covered much of the world we now call Sho-dan, which in our tongue means blue gem—for the vast oceans that cover so much of this world that you natives once called Earth.”

  Lexa stared at the woman, wondering how she could know any of the things she was telling them if they had only come to it two decades before—whatever decades were.

  The Lawgiver, Raphael, leaned closer to Phil-a-shee and spoke and she nodded. “A decade is a measurement of time—something you will be taught. It is the world’s natural clock that will be important to all of you in rebuilding the civilization your people once had. You must know the seasons and be able to count the passing days and seasons in order to grow food.”

  Despite her misery, excitement flooded Lexa at that. They were going to teach them how to farm? How to make plants grow so they could have plenty like Sir had told her? She’d had no idea that that was what Gabriel had meant when he’d said his people were going to teach hers how to have a better life! Truthfully, she hadn’t been completely convinced, before, that that was what the udai intended.

  “This forest, as I said, is the result of husbandry—taking care of the land, nurturing it. The forest had already begun to grow when we came, but it was in need of nutrients—food. The soil was poor and acidic. We had to achieve balance in order for the plants to grow strong.”

  Lexa lost interest about halfway through the speech and allowed her gaze and her mind to wander. There were too many words the woman used that she didn’t understand for her to really grasp what the woman was telling them beyond the fact that she was claiming they, the udai, had made the forest.

  Everyone else had begun to shift restlessly and a low murmur of speech began to make it difficult to hear the woman anyway.

  “Silence!”

  Lexa jumped when the woman abruptly called that out in a commanding voice.

  “You’re here to learn and to learn you must listen!”

  Resentment flickered through Lexa and apparently she wasn’t the only one who felt it. She could see from their expressions that many of those around her were also affronted.

  “The first lesson will be in erecting a proper campsite. This is where you will build your new village.”

  Everyone in the group turned to the people around them and stared at them blankly.

  “We already got a village,” someone, a man, called out.

  Phil-a-shee’s face tightened. “Did you build it?” she snapped.

  Everyone stared at her blankly. “Mostly it was there,” someone else volunteered.

  “Scavenged! Food and shelter are the basics of survival and learning how to provide for yourselves is the foundation of civilization. No one knows exactly how long you people have survived by scavenging from the civilization that collapsed, but there is a limit to those resources and it’s past time you learned to provide for yourselves.” She cowed anyone else that might have thought to comment by glaring at them for several minutes and finally turned to the man with her, smiling. “Thank you, Lawgiver Raphael. I’m sure they appreciate your help in bringing them he
re as much as we do.”

  Lawgiver Raphael gave her a sardonic look. “Yes, they do look overjoyed,” he murmured. “I’ll leave them with you.”

  Phil-a-shee reddened, her smile turning a little brittle. When he turned and strode away, she stared at his back for a long moment and finally glanced at the people seated on the ground and then turned to look back at the sea of activity on the field, waving imperiously. Two udai men detached themselves from the mass and started toward them. “Tur-ic, Ka-den—divide them up and assign each group a task.” She turned to look at them again. “The sooner you perform the tasks set, the more comfortable you’ll sleep tonight.”

  That part was almost inspiring after the miserable trek they’d had—except that they were exhausted already and too weak from very little water and food to want to do anything but drop where they stood. That, they quickly discovered, however, wouldn’t be allowed.

  Lexa was part of the group Phil-a-shee assembled to gather food. She then marched them away from the rest of the group, lecturing them every step of the way on which plants were edible and which weren’t, and that selection should also be made carefully to ensure that they didn’t destroy as they were collecting so that there would be more food to collect later.

  Lexa couldn’t speak for anyone else, but she was so exhausted by the time they’d put together a camp Phil-a-shee found satisfactory and gathered food and found water that she had no interest in doing anything but sleeping.

  That wasn’t allowed either. They had to eat to gain the strength to work more the following day.

  They worked from dawn till nightfall, an endless cycle of work, eat, sleep, only to get up the next day at dawn to do it all again. Lexa lost all track of time rather than gained a better understanding of it. She didn’t have a clue of how what they were doing was supposed to help them build a civilization. It seemed to her that the vicious, repetitive cycle was nothing more than a means unto itself, possibly aimed at working them to death but not likely to get them anywhere else.

  They were ‘allowed’, translation ordered, to clear a patch of dirt to begin a garden that would eventually, they were told, sustain them without the need to hunt and gather. Phil-a-shee produced seeds with the air of a magician and emphasized their great value until everyone began to think that, maybe, the seeds were magical.

  They didn’t magically plant themselves, however, or magically clear the ground needed to plant them or magically water and tend themselves. All of that was a new task added to the tasks they’d already been given and everyone got the chance to experience that joy.

  When everyone began to grumble, the angels—the udai—merely drove them harder.

  Lexa didn’t know about the others, but she was pretty outraged when Phil-a-shee finally informed them that they were struggling for the next generation and the one after that.

  Their struggles would build a world of plenty and comfort—for somebody else.

  Even Phil-a-shee seemed to realize that that wasn’t much to inspire the people she was driving like slaves, so she revised it to point out that it would improve their lot, also—in a few growing seasons.

  * * * *

  As Lexa straightened from the task of dumping yet another wicker basket full of clay for the cabin they were building, she caught a glimpse of a woman heading toward the forest and her heart seemed to stand still in her chest. She forgot to breathe for several moments.

  The woman was nearing the edge of the thicket of woodlands when it occurred to her to call out to her. “Maura?”

  The woman turned toward her and Lexa saw her full in the face. A mixture of joy and disbelief filled her. Before she thought better of the impulse, she dropped the basket and raced toward the woman.

  There was no sign of recognition on the woman’s face. Instead, she looked for many moments as if she would run, but Lexa knew it was her. The closer she got the more certain she was. She’d changed. Her hair was darker than it had once been. Her face had lost the roundness of babyhood. She was taller and thinner, but it was her. She looked so much like their mother, Lexa knew it to the depths of her soul. “Maura!” she gasped breathlessly. “It’s me, Lexa!”

  Just as dismay and doubt began to war with the joy and excitement of moments before, she saw the woman’s eyes widen, saw the emotions flit across her face that she’d felt herself. “Lexa?”

  Lexa laughed with sheer joy. “Yes! It’s me! Maura!”

  They collided in a tangle, laughing and crying at the same time and squeezing each other with bruising force.

  “I never thought I’d see you again!”

  “We thought you were dead.”

  “I can’t believe it! It’s like a dream!”

  They stopped exclaiming their wonder and disbelief at almost the same moment, pulling apart to examine one another, to note the changes they saw, to grin at one another. “You’re so grown up now,” Lexa said with a chuckle. “I was afraid it wasn’t you. I was so afraid, but I knew it was you.”

  Maura laughed. “You didn’t think I’d be a baby forever? I have babes of my own now.”

  Releasing her hold on Lexa, she turned and gestured toward two children Lexa hadn’t noticed, a boy that looked to be nearing puberty and a girl about half his age. “John, Sara, come and meet my big sister … your Aunt Lexa.”

  They both stared at her distrustfully, their eyes round with both hunger and uneasiness. It hurt to see them like that, to think of all the time she’d missed never knowing they even existed. She smiled at them hopefully. “I don’t look that bad, do I?” she said jokingly.

  The little girl giggled, but it was more a nervous laugh than a carefree one. The boy’s face lightened, but he didn’t quite smile. They moved closer. Lexa wanted to grab both of them and hug them as she had her sister, but she knew better. Instead, she crouched a little lower so that she wasn’t towering over them.

  Well, she didn’t tower over John anyway. He was at that stage where he was shooting up very quickly.

  “Where did you get that hair?” It was Sara who’d asked.

  Surprise flickered through Lexa, but the question reminded her instantly of Gabriel. A sharp shaft of unhappiness went through her. “Gabriel told me it must be from my father.”

  “Here now! What’s going on? You won’t get things done standing around! Were you not assigned tasks?”

  All four of them jumped at the sharp intrusion and whirled guiltily to gape at the udai woman marching toward them.

  Maura grabbed her arm and leaned close. “Meet me at the stream after supper,” she whispered.

  When she straightened, she met Lexa’s gaze for a moment. “Moon rise,” she added and then summoned the children and rushed away. Lexa watched them go with a mixture of unhappiness and resentment. She hadn’t seen her in so long! She didn’t want to let her go.

  When she saw the udai woman was nearly upon her, though, she rushed past her and retrieved her basket once more.

  She discovered her exhaustion had vanished. Excitement and anticipation threaded her veins. Questions filled her mind when she wasn’t reliving the experience over and over. Inevitably, weariness began to take the upper hand long before dusk fell, however, and the anticipation began to wane with her energy.

  She was almost afraid to eat when she was allowed to, fearful that she would lapse into the exhausted coma that generally overtook her when she was finally allowed to sit down and fill her achingly empty stomach. Instead, she decided to compromise, to eat just enough to ease the pain and save the rest for after her visit.

  It wasn’t difficult to slip away. Despite the fact that the udai always kept a watchful eye on them, they were encouraged to go down to the stream and bathe before settling on their pallets. Not that many people did. The fear of fouling the water and making it undrinkable was ever present and far too ingrained for them to take the udais’ word for it that merely bathing the dirt off wouldn’t contaminate it.

  It was pretty much the only thing about the udai that gave
Lexa any sense of kinship—echoes of her mother’s reminders that bathing was a necessity, that cleanliness helped prevent sickness. It didn’t cause it.

  Unless of course the water was foul or poisoned.

  Fortunately, since it was almost too dark to see her hand in front of her face beneath the trees, a narrow path had been cut, or worn down, between the field where they were building their new village and farms and the stream that supplied them with water. It seemed to Lexa—well everyone had grumbled—that it would have made more sense to build next to the stream, but the udai had berated them for laziness at the suggestion and pointed out that living ‘on top’ of the stream and disposing of all of their waste in it would contaminate the water far faster and irreversibly than bathing in it. Waste was disposed of on the other side of the clearing—all waste.

  The first time one of the udai saw one of the men pull his dick out and piss where he was working, Lexa had thought they might kill the man on the spot. The udai had flown into a righteous rage. They’d all been berated as stupid, disgusting animals and lectured for hours on the poisons they fed into the soil every time they urinated or defecated, reminded them that their water supply was close enough to be contaminated beyond use if they all decided to expel body waste practically on top of it, and that their food supply would become poisonous. By the time the furious lecture was over no one knew whether they most wanted to kill the man who’d tried to poison their water and the food they’d spent backbreaking hours and days trying to grow or the udai. It might not be reasonable to blame the udai for the incident, but resentment of the udai was growing by leaps and bounds, their fear of the ‘superior beings’ slowly but surely being eroded and replaced by a hatred powerful enough to submerge all other considerations.