Wild Seed

by Octavia E. Butler

  What was Doro thinking? Did he mean to kill her after all? Would he bury Thomas’ body with the earlier nameless one and walk away clothed in her flesh?

  She went to the young man’s body, straightened it, and wrapped it in some of the linen Doro had brought. Then, somehow, she struggled it into the grave. She was tempted to ask Doro to help, but one look at his face changed her mind. He would not help. He would curse her. She shuddered. She had not seen him make a kill since their trip from her homeland. He did kill, of course, often. But he was private about it. He arrived in Wheatley wearing one body and left wearing another, but he did not make the change in public. Also, he usually left as soon as he had changed. If he meant to stay in town for a while, he stayed wearing the body of a stranger. He did not let his people forget what he was, but his reminders were discreet and surprisingly gentle. If they had not been, Anyanwu thought as she filled in the grave, if Doro flaunted his power before others as he was flaunting it now before her, even his most faithful worshipers would have fled from him. His way of killing would terrify anyone. She looked at him and saw Thomas’ thin face recently shaved by her own hand, recently taught a small, thin-lipped smile. She looked away, trembling.

  Somehow, she finished filling in the grave. She tried to think of a white man’s prayer to say for the nameless corpse, and for Thomas. But with Doro watching her, her mind refused to work. She stood empty and weary and frightened over the grave.

  “Now you’ll do something about these sores,” Doro said. “I mean to keep this body for a while.”

  Thus she would live—for a while. He telling her she would live. She met his eyes. “I have already begun with them. Do they hurt?”

  “Not much.”

  “I put medicine into them.”

  “Will they heal?”

  “Yes, if you keep very clean and eat well and … don’t drink the way he did.”

  Doro laughed. “Tend these things again,” he said. “I want them healed as soon as possible.”

  “But there is medicine in them now. It has not had time to work.” She did not want to touch him, even in healing. She had not minded touching Thomas, had quickly come to like the man in spite of his wretchedness. Without his uncontrolled ability hurting him, he would have been a good man. In the end, he was a good man. She would willingly bury his body when Doro left it, but she did not want to touch it while Doro wore it. Perhaps Doro knew that.

  “I said tend the sores!” he ordered. “What will I have to do next to teach you to obey?”

  She took him into the cabin, stripped him, and went over the sick, scrawny body again. When she finished, he made her undress and lie with him. She did not weep because she thought that would please him. But afterward, for the first time in centuries, she was uncontrollably sick.

  Chapter Nine

  NWEKE HAD BEGUN to scream. Doro listened calmly, accepting the fact that the girl’s fate was temporarily out of his hands. There was nothing for him to do except wait and remind himself of what Anyanwu had said. She had never lost anyone to transition. She would not be likely to tarnish that record with the death of one of her own children.

  And Nweke was strong. All Anyanwu’s children were strong. That was important. Doro’s personal experience with transition had taught him the danger of weakness. He let his thoughts go back to the time of his own transition and away from worry over Nweke. He could remember his transition very clearly. There were long years following it that he could not remember, but his childhood and the transition that ended that childhood were still clear to him.

  He had been a sickly, stunted boy, the last of his mother’s twelve children and the only one to survive—just right for the name Anyanwu sometimes called him: Ogbanje. People said his brothers and sisters had been robust healthy-looking babies, and they had died. He had been scrawny and tiny and strange, and only his parents seemed to think it right that he had lived. People whispered about him. They said he was something other than a child—some spirit. They whispered that he was not the son of his mother’s husband. His mother shielded him as best she could while he was very young, and his father—if the man was his father—claimed him and was pleased to have a son. He was a poor man and had little else.

  His parents were all he could recall that had been good about his youth. Both had loved and valued him extravagantly after eleven dead babies. Other people avoided him when they could. His were a tall, stately people—Nubians, they came to be called much later. It soon became clear to them that Doro would never be tall or stately. Eventually, it also became clear that he was possessed. He heard voices. He fell to the ground writhing with fits. Several people, fearful that he might loose his devils on them, wanted to kill him, but somehow, his parents protected him. Even then, he had not known how. But there was little, perhaps nothing, they would not have done to save him.

  He was thirteen when the full agony of transition hit him. He knew now that was too young. He had never known one of his witches to live when transition came that early. He had not lived himself. But unlike anyone he had managed to breed so far, he had not quite died either. His body had died, and for the first time, he had transferred to the living human body nearest to him. This was the body of his mother in whose lap his head had rested.

  He found himself looking down at himself—at his own body—and he did not understand. He screamed. Terrified, he tried to run away. His father stopped him, held him, demanded to know what had happened. He could not answer. He looked down, saw his woman’s breasts, his woman’s body, and he panicked. Without knowing how or what he did, he transferred again—this time to his father.

  In his once quiet Nile River village, he killed and killed and killed. Finally, his people’s enemies inadvertently rescued them. Raiding Egyptians captured him as they attacked the village. By then, he was wearing the body of a young girl—one of his cousins. Perhaps he killed some of the Egyptians too. He hoped so. His people had lived without the interference of Egypt for nearly two centuries while Egypt wallowed in feudal chaos. But now Egypt was back, wanting land, mineral wealth, slaves. Doro hoped he had killed many of them. He would never know. His memory stopped with the arrival of the Egyptians. There was a gap of what he later calculated to be about fifty years before he came to himself again and discovered that he had been thrown into an Egyptian prison, discovered that he now possessed the body of some middle-aged stranger, discovered that he was both more and less than a man, discovered that he could have and do absolutely anything.

  It had taken him years to decide even approximately how long he had been out of his mind. It took more time to learn exactly where his village had been and that it was no longer there. He never found any of his kinsmen, anyone from his village. He was utterly alone.

  Eventually, he began to realize that some of his kills gave him more pleasure than others. Some bodies sustained him longer. Observing his own reactions, he learned that age, race, sex, physical appearance, and except in extreme cases, health, did not affect his enjoyment of victims. He could and did take anyone. But what gave the greatest pleasure was something he came to think of as witchcraft or a potential for witchcraft. He was seeking out his spiritual kin—people possessed or mad or just a little strange. They heard voices, saw visions, other things. He did none of those things any longer—not since his transition ended. But he fed on those who did. He learned to sense them effortlessly—like following an aroma of food. Then he learned to gather reserves of them, breed them, see that they were protected and cared for. They, in turn, learned to worship him. After a single generation, they were his. He had not understood this, but he had accepted it. A few of them seemed to sense him as clearly as he sensed them. Their witch-power warned them but never seemed to make them flee sensibly. Instead, they came to him, competed for his attention, loved him as god, parent, mate, friend.

  He learned to prefer their company to that of more normal people. He chose his companions from among them and restricted his killing to the others. Slowly, he cr
eated the Isaacs, the Annekes, the best of his children. These he loved as they loved him. They accepted him as ordinary people could not, enjoyed him, felt little or no fear of him. In one way, it was as though he repeated his own history with each generation. His best children loved him without qualification as his parents had. The others, like the other people of his village, viewed him through their various superstitions—though at least this time the superstitions were favorable. And this time, it was not his loved ones who fed his hunger. He plucked the others from their various settlements like ripe, sweet fruit and kept his special ones safe from all but sickness, old age, war, and sometimes, the dangerous effects of their own abilities. Occasionally, this last forced him to kill one of his special ones. One of them, drunk with his own power, displayed his abilities, drew attention to himself, and endangered his people. One of them refused to obey. One of them simply went mad. It happened.

  These were the kills he should have enjoyed most. Certainly, on a sensory level, they were the most pleasurable. But in Doro’s mind, these killings were too much like what he had done accidentally to his parents. He never kept these bodies long. He consciously avoided mirrors until he could change again. At these times more than any others, he felt again utterly alone, forever alone, longing to die and be finished. What was he, he wondered, that he could have anything at all but an end?

  People like Isaac and soon Nweke did not know how safe they were from him. People like Anyanwu—good, stable wild seed—did not know how safe they could be—though for Anyanwu herself, it was too late. Years too late, in spite of Isaac’s occasional pleas for her. Doro did not want the woman any longer—did not want her condemning stare, her silent, palpable hatred, her long-lived, grudge-holding presence. As soon as she was of no more use to Isaac, she would die.

  Isaac paced around the kitchen, restless and frightened, unable to shut out the sound of Nweke’s screams. It was difficult for him not to go to her. He knew there was nothing he could do, no help he could give. People in transition did not respond well to him. Anyanwu could hold them and pet them and become their mother whether she actually was or not. And in their pain, they clung to her. If Isaac tried to comfort them, they struggled against him. He had never understood that. They always seemed to like him well enough before and after transition.

  Nweke loved him. She had grown up calling him father, knowing he was not her father, and never caring. She was not Doro’s daughter either, but Isaac loved her too much to tell her that. He longed to be with her now to still the screaming and take away the pain. He sat down heavily and stared toward the bedroom.

  “She’ll be all right,” Doro said from the table, where he was eating a sweet cake Isaac had found for him.

  “How can even you know that?” Isaac challenged.

  “Her blood is good. She’ll be fine.”

  “My blood is good too, but I nearly died.”

  “You’re here,” Doro said reasonably.

  Isaac rubbed a hand across his forehead. “I don’t think I would feel this nervous if she were giving birth. She’s such a little thing—so like Anyanwu.”

  “Even smaller,” Doro said. He looked at Isaac, smiled as though at some secret joke.

  “She’s to be your next Anyanwu, isn’t she?” Isaac asked.

  “Yes.” Doro’s expression did not change. The smile remained in place.

  “She’s not enough,” Isaac said. “She’s a beautiful, lively young girl. After tonight, she’ll be a powerful young girl. But you’ve said she’d keep some of the mind-listening ability.”

  “I believe she will.”

  “It kills.” Isaac stared at the bedroom door, imagining the favored young stepdaughter turning vicious and bitter like his long-dead half-brother Lale, like his mother who had hanged herself. “That ability kills,” he repeated sadly. “It may not kill quickly, but it kills.” Poor Nweke. Even transition would not mean an end to her pain. Should he wish her life or death? And what should he wish for her mother?

  “I’ve had people as good at mental communication as you are at moving things,” Doro said. “Anneke, for instance.”

  “Do you think she’ll be like Anneke?”

  “She’ll complete her transition. She’ll have some control.”

  “Is she related to Anneke?”

  “No.” Doro’s tone indicated that he did not wish to discuss Nweke’s ancestry. Isaac changed his approach.

  “Anyanwu has perfect control over what she does,” he said.

  “Yes, within the limits of her ability. But she’s wild seed. I’m tired of the effort it takes to control her.”

  “Are you?” Nweke had stopped screaming. The room was suddenly still and silent except for Isaac’s two words.

  Doro swallowed the last of his sweet. “You have something to say?”

  “That it would be stupid to kill her. That it would be waste.”

  Doro looked at him—a look Isaac had come to recognize, a look that gave him permission to say what Doro would not hear from others. Over the years, Isaac’s usefulness and loyalty had won him the right to say what he felt and be heard—though not necessarily heeded.

  “I won’t take her from you,” Doro said quietly.

  Isaac nodded. “If you did, I wouldn’t last long.” He rubbed his chest. “There’s something wrong with my heart. She makes a medicine for it.”

  “With your heart!”

  “She takes care of it. She says she doesn’t like being a widow.”

  “I … thought she might be helping you a little.”

  “She was helping me ‘a little’ twenty years ago. How many children have I gotten for you in the past twenty years?”

  Doro said nothing. He watched Isaac without expression.

  “She’s helped both of us,” Isaac said.

  “What do you want?” Doro asked.

  “Her life.” Isaac paused, but Doro said nothing. “Let her live. She’ll marry again after a while. She always has. Then you’ll have more of her children. She’s a breed unto herself, after all. Something even you’ve never seen before.”

  “I had another healer once.”

  “Did she live to be three hundred? Did she bear dozens of children? Was she able to change her shape at will?”

  “He. And no to all three questions. No.”

  “Then keep her. If she annoys you, ignore her for a while. Ignore her for twenty years or thirty. What difference would it make to you—or to her? When you go back to her, she’ll have changed in one way or another. But, Doro, don’t kill her. Don’t make the mistake of killing her.”

  “I don’t want or need her any longer.”

  “You’re wrong. You do. Because left alone, she won’t die or allow herself to be killed. She isn’t temporary. You haven’t accepted that yet. When you do, and when you take the trouble to win her back, you’ll never be alone again.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about!”

  Isaac stood up, went to the table to look down on Doro. “If I don’t know the two of you and your needs, who does? She’s exactly right for you—not so powerful that you would have to worry about her, yet powerful enough to take care of herself and of others on her own. You might not see each other for years at a time, but as long as both of you are alive, neither of you will be alone.”

  Doro had begun to watch Isaac with greater interest, causing Isaac to wonder whether he had really been too set in his ways to see the woman’s value.

  “You said you knew about Nweke’s father,” Doro said.

  Isaac nodded. “Anyanwu told me. She was so angry and frustrated—I think she had to tell someone.”

  “How do you feel about it?”

  “What difference does that make?” Isaac demanded. “Why bring it up now?”

  “Answer.”

  “All right.” Isaac shrugged. “I said I knew you—and her—so I wasn’t surprised at what you’d done. You’re both stubborn, vengeful people at times. She’s kept you angry and frustrat
ed for years. You tried to get even. You do that now and then, and it only fuels her anger. The only person I pity is the man, Thomas.”

  Doro lifted an eyebrow. “He ran. He sided with her. He had outlived his usefulness.”

  Isaac heard the implied threat and faced Doro with annoyance. “Do you really think you have to do that?” he asked quietly. “I’m your son, not wild seed, not sick, not stranded halfway through transition. I could never hate you or run from you no matter what you did, and I’m one of the few of your children who could have made a successful escape. Did you think I didn’t know that? I’m here because I want to be.” Deliberately, Isaac extended his hand to Doro. Doro stared at him for a moment, then gave a long sigh and clasped the large, calloused hand in his own briefly, harmlessly.

  For a time, they sat together in relaxed silence, Doro getting up once to put another log on the fire. Isaac let his thoughts go back to Anyanwu, and it occurred to him that what he had said of himself might also be true of her. She might be another of the very few people who could escape Doro—the way she could change her form and travel anywhere. …Perhaps that was one of the things that bothered Doro about her. Though it shouldn’t have.

  Doro should have let her go wherever she chose, do whatever she chose. He should only see her now and then when he was feeling lonely, when people died and left him, as everyone but her had to leave him. She was a healer in more ways than Doro seemed to understand. Nweke’s father had probably understood. And now, in her pain, no doubt Nweke understood. Ironically, Anyanwu herself often seemed not to understand. She thought the sick came to her only for her medicines and her knowledge. Within herself, she had something she did not know she had.

  “Nweke will be a better healer than Anyanwu could ever be,” Doro said as though responding to Isaac’s thoughts. “I don’t think her mind reading will cripple her.”

  “Let Nweke become whatever she can,” Isaac said wearily. “If she’s as good as you think she’ll be, then you’ll have two very valuable women. You’d be a damned fool to waste either of them.”