Chapter Six
Joseph
I watched on a viewscreen as the fliers rose up in a burst of power and color and left our party standing on the ground, staring up at them. The angle of the cameras made them seem small and insignificant against the vastness of the remade moon. Even though Fremont was a planet and Lopali had started its life as a moon, the flier’s home was far larger.
I couldn’t see well enough to make out their expressions, but Chelo bounced Caro on her hips, and Kayleen and Paloma had their heads bent near each other in conversation. Ming walked beside Marcus, looking up even though the fliers were almost invisible now.
It was tough to make out much of Lopali from the spaceport. We rested near the edge, on one of many large pads. Cargo ships occupied most of them, squat and ugly and shaped like bricks. Beyond the ships, the careful shapes of fields cut up the land, and beyond that, trees, and here and there the sparkling blue of streams. The largest road by far headed east, toward the city.
Dianne and Bryan sat on either side of me. Dianne stared at the screen as if she daren’t miss any nuance, and Bryan sat as still, except that he flicked his nails in and out almost absentmindedly. I watched them, not wanting him to slice my flesh by accident. A strategist, a strongman, and a maker. Marcus hadn’t said it, but surely if he trusted the fliers completely, he wouldn’t have left us three behind. As soon as they returned, Marcus drew us all together into a meeting. We were passengers rather than pilots on Harbinger, so there were no gleaming meeting rooms full of viewscreen walls available to us. Harbinger was sparse and utilitarian, but it did have a single big oval room designed for gaming and working out, and we gathered in the mismatched and comfortable chairs there, surrounded by video screens and weights and machines. The edges of the room hosted an indoor running track and, on the walls, a pull-gym for low-gravity workouts.
The children stuck close to Chelo and Paloma, and Liam sat beside Kayleen, an arm across her shoulder, whispering in her ear. At my side, Alicia kicked her feet and twisted her hands in her lap.
Marcus sat on a black bench, his legs splayed out on either side of it. “We’ve about a half hour before we need to leave. Questions?”
“What was the feather about?” Chelo asked.
“Flier’s feathers can be very valuable. We could buy passage home for all of us on a comfortable ship with the one Matriana gave me, because it’s a pinion feather—one of the long ones from the end of her wings. Those molt once every few years at most. They’ve got a reputation for bringing luck.”
Paloma looked intrigued. “Do they?”
I thought Marcus was going to burst out laughing, but he just said, “It’s not been proven. The longest flier feathers are a valuable trade good everywhere, including Islas.”
He hadn’t said no about the luck. Interesting.
Alicia started pacing the edges of the group, holding her arms in, watching Marcus primarily, but also everyone else who knew about Lopali: Jenna and Tiala, Ming and Dianne.
Ming lifted a beautiful, shapely arm and waited for Marcus to nod before asking, “What did she want us to have luck in?”
He smiled. “Give a prize to the dancer. She wants us to help her people have babies.”
I knew what he meant, but Chelo looked puzzled. “What?” Marcus answered her. “We know how to make fliers … the Wingmakers from Silver’s Home designed them for Lopali. Years ago. A subset of the Wingmakers, the Moon Men, made Lopali. Fliers can only have babies when the Wingmakers make them. Every year a ship comes with babies, only it’s never as many as are wanted. It’s not even close.”
“Why can’t the fliers have, or at least make, their own children?” Paloma asked.
Marcus stood up and walked around as he answered her. “They’re sterile, so they can’t have children. The processes that make them are owned, and secret. The fliers have beauty, and power, and by now a history. Lopali is almost five hundred standard years old—that’s almost as old as the civilization on Islas, and older than Joy Heaven or Paradise. The fliers have been living here for almost four hundred years. The Moon Men are long gone now. Those that could, turned into fliers or died trying. That’s what they hired the Wingmakers for—they were something else then, too, and took the name after they failed here.”
“After they failed?” Alicia stopped pacing. She stared at Marcus. “It looks like they succeeded to me.”
Marcus stopped in front of her. “If they’d succeeded, the fliers would be able to have babies, and humans everywhere could fly if they wanted to.”
Her eyes widened.
“But they failed, and yet they became rich because they failed. Generations ago, they gave up even trying to succeed anymore. They charge the fliers dearly to make them children, which are really just new, young, fliers. There is no real genetic link to the parents.” Marcus’s tone was tinged with scorn. Once, I had stood by Jenna when she lectured Alicia and Bryan and me about how unfair the fliers had it.
The look on Paloma’s face said she might get sick, and Chelo looked green. Alicia was curious; Bryan showed no emotion at all, which meant he was still thinking about it, and given the situation, probably seething inside. Whoever designed us made us so injustice drove us nuts.
As Marcus told the tale, I watched Chelo’s face. When he said, “Many flier children die before they reach puberty,” her mouth thinned into a small line, and she narrowed her eyes and then raised her hand. He waved her hand down. “Some live, and stay in town. You’ll see them.” He grimaced. “It is unfair. But fliers are prized for their beauty and grace, and Lopali is a spiritual haven. People come here to meditate, to fly, and to learn to balance joy and sorrow like the fliers. For that, a high price has been accepted.” He sounded bitter even though his pacing and delivery were matter of fact. His eyes looked dark and angry. “Death of the fliers’ children, and early death as well—the oldest fliers are only a few hundred years old.” He paused and looked around. “Finally, the fliers want to change their situation, stop being at everyone else’s mercy.”
I suspected he had something to do with their new attitude.
“They can’t keep killing children!” Chelo hugged the two children to her chest.
“Shhhh … I agree with you. That’s why we’re here. They want Joseph to help them create their own children.”
Huh?
“It will be a test for Joseph.” He caught my eye and grinned at me, then added, “I’ll help.”
“You’d better.” What did I know about creating fliers? The last day Marcus had talked about my ability to create the way he could, he was teasing me about almost killing simple plants.
Alicia stopped pacing and stood near me again, facing Marcus. “Why Joseph? Why not you? He has no experience in genetics.”
“Hey!” Actually, I had a little.
“It’s got to be hard!” she said.
Marcus laughed. “I just told you I’d help. There are two reasons. Joseph is stronger than me, and he can hold more data than I can. And you’re right, this will be … a challenge. Kayleen will also help. So will the fliers’ own geneticists.”
Alicia looked even less happy.
Jenna’s voice sounded biting. “Silver’s Home likes their power over Lopali.”
“You mean the Wingmakers,” Tiala clarified.
“It is the same thing,” Dianne broke in, uncharacteristically animated. “The Wingmakers have too much power and are allied with those who make ships and gain from war. Which is why Lopali stays neutral. They won’t side with Silver’s Home while they’re enslaved by your people. We’ve agreed to set them free.”
“Not my people,” Tiala retorted, giving Dianne a sharp look.
Liam frowned. “What’s to keep them from going to Islas if we free them?”
Dianne said, “Fliers hate control. Islas is the essence of control, and the fliers shouldn’t join them. But you’re right. No outcome is certain. Maybe they’ll stay neutral.”
“I wouldn’t blame them,” Alicia asserted.
“Is that bad?” Chelo asked.
“We need their fleet,” Marcus said, resuming his pacing. “Islas is more war-ready than Silver’s Home, and Lopali has agile ships.”
Chelo still looked puzzled. “Do we have permission from Silver’s Home? To do this?”
Marcus’s laugh suggested that time would run backward first. “Neither the Planetary Police nor the Port Authority owns the fliers’ genetics. And yes, powerful people want to stop us. That’s where the bounty came from. But we’re doing the right thing.”
Chelo sighed. “Sometimes that’s all you can do.”
I noticed he hadn’t named our enemies.
“Agreed.” Marcus stood, and motioned for Alicia to sit down. She did, as close as she could, leaning back into me, warm but still quivery with excitement.
Marcus cleared his throat. “We’ll leave for town soon. Take everything you brought with you.” He grinned. “And be sure to have easy access to your best clothes. We’ll be going to a formal event, and while we’ll look shabby beside the fliers, we should look our best.” He clapped his hands and everyone scattered to get their gear.
Alicia and I shared a cabin. We’d both already packed, so I pulled her down next to me on the single bed, breathing in the sweet salty scent of her. She reached a hand up and stroked my face, tracing the outline of my nose and jaw and forehead. “Can you imagine flying?”
A risk-taker’s heaven—flight on a new planet. “I guess—sure. I’d like to try it. But I already fly ships—so I guess I feel like I know how to fly.”
“Silly. With wings of your own. Can you imagine being so beautiful?”
I shook my head. “Maybe with the wings they’ve made for people. But I’ve heard that humans who try to become fliers as adults die. A lot of them, anyway. It changes everything about you.” And suddenly I knew that was really what she meant, that she wanted to sprout wings and be free. A shock of fear for her made my hands shake. “Don’t do it. I couldn’t bear to watch you die.”
“But imagine me with wings.”
“You are already more beautiful than any of the fliers.” I touched her face and then her breast and belly. “You’re perfect.”
She rolled over to face me. “If you can truly help the fliers have children, then you can help me fly.”
I swallowed. “I can’t even do the first thing. And I won’t risk losing you trying the second.” Maybe no one would help her. I certainly wouldn’t. Could I keep her from trying? Might as well force the wind not to blow. “Promise me you won’t try to make me do this, and you won’t try it on your own. Settle for flying with the kind of wings you can take off afterward.”
She said nothing.
“I love you. I even love the way you take risks. But this is too big. Promise?”
“I promise not to do it right away.”
A small victory. Very small. I brought her to me and kissed her. She tasted of chocolate col and ship’s air and salt, and she fit perfectly in my arms.
Maybe she’d like fake wings well enough. Maybe she’d find something else to want more. Maybe the wind would stop forever.
I’d seen Chelo’s dance through the viewscreen, and after I walked out from the ship into a sky for the first time in years, I understood it. Lopali smelled of rain and life and death and rebirth. It smelled like the windborn scents of fecund flowers and the sweat of a real climate. Even though it didn’t smell like Fremont, it smelled like home.
Belongings in hand, we stood at the edge of the road, waiting with a few of the crew from the Harbinger. A big, slow-wheeled vehicle stopped and picked us up, cramped with us and the crew and everyone’s belongings. The cargo carrier was simple; wheels and a flat surface, the whole thing made of shiny ship’s silver, and thus unscratched. Rows of seats looked out in all directions, and a tarp covered them all, shading us from the sun. In the middle, a raised cage held our stuff, the boxes and duffels rattling together as the wheels bumped along. Whatever propelled us was as silent as a starship.
We drove slowly through a patchwork of fields: grains, vegetables, and some fallow. Everything looked far tidier than Fremont’s fields. From time to time, another wheeled cargo carrier of some kind passed us, and once we swerved around a small cart. Occasionally, a group of fliers went by overhead, paying no attention to the ground. Chelo leaned over near me and said, “That’s why there’s no skimmers. They might hit fliers.”
She was probably right. We turned onto a road that circled closely scattered low and medium-sized buildings. Twice, the vehicle stopped and people clambered off, walking toward the center of the circle. The third time we stopped, Marcus gestured us all off. “We’re here. Follow me.”
The one common thing about ship’s quarters is they’re small. My body had been cramped into tiny beds forever. As much as I love ships and flying, it cheered me when Marcus led us to a tall house with big windows and long balconies. Inside, half the building was open air with high ceilings. At least four stories of stepped rooms and hallways and living spaces hugged the walls inside, like blocks stacked artfully inside a much bigger room. The wide stairs had low handrails. Most floors and doors and window-ledges looked like wood, with some smoother substance painted on the walls. The gold guesthouse wasn’t gold, except for the roof. Inside, the ceilings were sky blue, the walls off-white, and the floors brown and tan, the colors muted and restful.
Alicia stopped right behind me in the doorway, blocking Dianne and Ming so they frowned at her. She looked reverent. “It was designed for fliers.”
Easy to see she was right. “But the furniture will fit regular people.” For example, the kitchen table, which was in front of us, had normal chairs that made no provision for sweeping wings.
Alicia took a deep breath. “It smells good. Like garden and fresh air and wood.”
“Go on.” Ming’s voice was edged with irritation. “Don’t block the door all day.”
“Oh, sorry.” Alicia sounded as distracted as Ming sounded driven.
I took her by the arm. “Come on, let’s choose a room.”
“I want a window.”
“Fine.” And so we ended up with the top room, which would take the longest to get to and from, and be the most awkward for taking Sasha out in the middle of the night. A floor-to-ceiling window felt part of the sky. The bedroom had a door that closed, but the sitting room beside it was so open a flier could probably just land in it.
When we got behind the closed door, I nuzzled the back of Alicia’s neck, but she just made a little mock-moan and started unpacking. So I settled for watching her get dressed in midnight blue leggings with a silver shirt I’d never seen before. It appeared to be shot through with multicolored threads, and I realized they were data receivers like the physical data threads I’d needed earlier in my life. The material felt soft and pliable under my fingers, but strong, so it would take a knife blade to rip.
“I got it while you were with Marcus.” A slight sadness crept over her face. “The threads are just decorative. They’d work at home, but not here.”
“It looks good on you.”
I picked my blue captain’s coat, even though it was a little worse for wear. That way, we would complement each other.
An hour later, Marcus led us, now clean and well-dressed, into the late afternoon brightness. We headed through wide streets toward a park in the center of town. Or maybe it was the town. We approached an open expanse of grass. Trees like the ones at the edge of the field near the spaceport ringed the area, for defense or privacy or maybe even convenience, since fliers sat on them here and there, deep in conversation. I touched a copper-brown trunk as we passed under an archway, and found it hard, and oddly warm. Engineered living thing or simply made thing? I couldn’t tell. Because Marcus had asked me to, I kept myself too tightly shielded to read its data signature.
Through the archway, perches and sculptures lay scattered about. Even though their bodies were our size, or at most a head or two taller, the fliers took up far more space, needing room above and below for their wings to rest, and at the side to spread them. If this was their home, it was big and open and roomy, but not very private.
Marcus hadn’t exaggerated their finery. As he led us, weaving toward the center of the gathering place, Alicia and I gaped at the jewels and glittering robes all around us. Green and gold ribbons. Blue ribbons. About half had long hair braided with more ribbon and beads and various charms, and the other half had short hair, probably in both cases to keep it from covering their eyes when they flew. Up close, their wings were even more varied in color and shape than they had appeared when in the air, some nearly translucent and others thick and dark, almost oily looking.
Apparently the people who designed them experimented regularly. The thought made me stiff with anger, but I hid it as well as I could. Beauty and freedom were not the same thing.
The air smelled like water and nuts and the thick perfume of flowers, which grew or stood in vases in every direction. The fliers seemed obsessed with flowers.
Caro raced up to a man with iridescent green wings. He shook them softly, so that a small feather fell out, just the size of a child’s fingers. He smiled as Caro picked it up and clutched it to her chest. It was thin and fine, fluffy, and certainly nothing like the long pinion Matriana had so reverently handed to Marcus. But all the same, maybe it would bring Caro luck.
Although a few fliers sat silently, probably linked into data given the vaguely vacant looks on their faces, most were engaged in animated conversations. When we came close, their melodic voices fell and slowed, and they watched us with curious eyes and hopeful faces. I remembered the fliers I’d seen walking free on Silver’s Home. People had flowed around them as if they were rocks, with no real acknowledgement of the stiff-gaited beings with the beautiful faces wearing sour, pained expressions.
Here, in this place which had been designed for them, the fliers looked more like the joyful statue we’d seen in the memory garden near the spaceport at Li, the day I’d first met my father. Alicia clutched my hand as we walked, her gaze darting here and there. Her eyes were wide, and I hoped she didn’t already regret her promise. The fliers were so beautiful I understood her desire, but so alien that the idea of transforming from mere humanity into fliers seemed unimaginable.
If it was supposed to be a feast, I didn’t see anyone eating.
Marcus led us up a hill so steep there were occasional steps, five or ten risers at a time, between the flatter parts. The population of fliers was greater here and, if possible, even better decorated. And of course, since this was a genemod world, almost all of them looked young. I glimpsed one flier with gray hair and droopy pale blue wings, but generally we might have been surrounded by a flock of teens.
There were no children except for ours. There were plenty of wingless humans and surely they had children, but not with them. Although none of the fliers was quite as obvious as the one who’d dropped the feather for Caro, heads followed the children’s movements.
The last set of steps stopped at a large flat expanse with circles of evenly placed perches, almost all occupied. Below the perches lay row upon row of tables piled high with trays of food: steaming hot dishes, bowls of vegetables and meats, soups, nuts, plates of bread, and sparkling colored drinks. The brightest green and gold grapes I’d ever seen, practically glowing with juice. Even though most of the tables were tall, with what amounted to raised walkways for the convenience of fliers, there was one at human height, decorated with sprays of blue, violet, and yellow flowers between the dishes.
Here and there, humans stood near the tables, obviously waiting for something.
For us?
As soon as we got close, Matriana and a male flier landed on low perches, wings cocked up to keep the tips from trailing on the ground. She pointed to her fellow flier, who was dark-haired and light-eyed, with skin the color of cream. His wings were pale orange with striking maroon tips. He stood taller than Matriana, taller than any of us, and he reminded me of Marcus—he was comfortable in his skin, and powerful, and he knew it. “This is Daniel.”
Marcus nodded formally. “Pleased to meet you.”
Daniel spoke equally formally, “Welcome, Marcus.”
He looked at me next. “And this is Joseph.” A statement of fact, not a question.
I nodded, struggling to return his gaze as calmly as I could. “Pleased to meet you.”
“And who is Chelo?” Daniel asked.
Chelo stepped forward. “Me.” She cocked her head at the flier but stood her ground, and I would bet I was the only one in our group who could tell by her stance and voice that she was nervous. Her response was unusually bold. “Why do you want to know? What am I to you?”
Matriana smiled, and her eyes softened. “If you hadn’t been left behind, and your brother hadn’t rescued you from your father’s war, you all wouldn’t be here today. It is not often an unknown young woman causes such big events. It is like a fairy tale, yes?”
Chelo stiffened and gave the majestic flier an even and slightly disapproving look. “If it is a legend, it is a sad one. Many people died.”
“We all have pain.” Matriana turned to Marcus. “And who else have you brought to Lopali?”
As soon as every single person in our party had been painstakingly introduced, and sorted as from Fremont or from Silver’s Home, at least by introduction, Matriana gestured toward the low table. We took plates and filled them, following Marcus past the tables to a ring of mixed seats, short for humans and tall for fliers, with single or double steps they could walk up so they sat with their wing tips above the ground.
Other humans, built like the fliers but wingless, joined us at the table.
The human seats were benches fit for three or four at a time, and Marcus gestured for me and Kayleen to sit beside him, for Chelo and Liam and the children to take another bench, and from there Alicia and Induan joined Jenna and Tiala. Dianne and Paloma sat together on their own bench, heads together, talking in low tones. I puzzled over Marcus’s last choice, pairing Bryan and Ming. Bryan had been fascinated with Ming on the way to Fremont, in the Creator, when we first woke her after her stowaway job. We hadn’t trusted her then, and he’d volunteered to watch her anytime. Now, they sat closer to each other than they needed to, heads bent in quiet conversation. He did seem to be watching her, but it wasn’t exactly with suspicion. Other memories surfaced. This wasn’t new; I’d been distracted. Maybe it wasn’t good. I needed to ask Chelo about it.
Wingless humans stood in a quiet ring around us.
After years of ship’s food, the variety of smells and textures felt overwhelming. The grapes were as good as their bright, translucent skin promised and the bread melted in my mouth. While we ate, the tall benches around us remained eerily empty. Fliers began to fill them only after the waiting wingless whisked our empty plates away and filled our hands with glasses full of cool amber liquid that smelled of honey. The arriving fliers were given glasses, too.
Marcus whispered into my ear, since I was still shielded and couldn’t talk silently to him. “This is the Convening Council of Lopali. The primary decision makers. They’ve come from all over the planet.”
I looked closely at them. Most appeared friendly. One woman waved. A few looked simply appraising, like we were a curiosity. One or two seemed bored.
A tall blonde flier who chose a seat beside Bryan and Ming glared in our direction, her lips a fine, pursed line and her brows drawn together. Because the flier’s eyes were wide-set it was hard to tell if she was specifically looking at us, or if her malevolent gaze was meant for Matriana, who sat close to Marcus. Either way, it made me shiver. I tried to memorize her distinguishing features: long blonde braids, blue eyes that matched great round blue circles on her wings, which were otherwise a pale purplish blue. I would recognize her if I saw her again.
When all of the perches were full, Matriana held up her glass, and the other fliers held up their glasses. I started to raise mine but Marcus hissed, “Watch me.”
His hand was down.
Matriana’s voice was amplified by something I couldn’t see, maybe even loud enough to be heard across all the space between here and the ring of perch trees. “We welcome strangers into our midst tonight. Most importantly, we welcome Joseph, Chelo, and Kayleen from Silver’s Home, who are renegade and cast away, and have landed on our shores after a long flight.”
The fliers answered her back, each softly but together a thicket of voices. “Welcome.”
All the fliers sipped.
Matriana continued. “We dream that these three will help us take away the pain in our heart. We dream they will help us fill our emptiness.”
The actual pain that tinged her voice, the yearning, made me want to help her more than anything.
The answering chorus sounded bittersweet and hopeful. “May they remove our pain.”
Kayleen grasped my hand. Marcus raised his glass, so we all did, Kayleen and I still holding hands and using our free ones for the toast. Across the circle from us, Bryan and Ming were in the same pose. Marcus’s voice was as amplified as Matriana’s as he spoke. “In the name of peace, we hope our skills will help make you whole.”
He leaned down and whispered in my ear, and Ming whispered in Bryan’s, and Chelo and Liam simply followed along. “In the name of peace.”
Chelo smiled broadly. It was a good toast for her.
Matriana’s voice rang out again. “Once we are free, we will fight in the name of peace.”
“Once we are free.”
“We will win peace for us all.”
“Once we are free.”
“In the name of peace.”
We drank. The liquid was thick and sweet, but not alcoholic, missing even the sweet clarity of col.
Of all the fliers in the circle around us, only the blonde with the blue eyes and blue-eyed feathers looked sour. But one sour face made a difference, and I could almost feel an exhalation of relief when she pushed up off her perch and made a great showy circle above our heads before flying off, her light wings visible like mist for a long time until the dusk sky folded her up inside of it, and we all finally looked back at each other.
Music sprouted from somewhere over near the tables—drums and wind instruments and a deep hum that seemed to set the inside of my bones vibrating. Small talk started to rush across the circle, and it finally began to feel like a party.