Commitment Hour lop-2

by James Alan Gardner

  Supposedly, my violin dated back to those times. Leeta claimed the old tyrant had paid a master violinist to come up-peninsula and settle in the cove, so that the "palace" would always have music. Such an extravagance was typical of the Patriarch — killing innocent Southern peddlers to "cleanse" the cove, then immediately importing a Southerner of his own because it suited his pleasure.

  Still, I shouldn't complain: I was descended from that hired Southern musician… as was Steck.

  Neither she nor I spent much time looking at individual items in the hall; it was more a matter of absorbing the whole ambience, letting our attention wander from the Patriarch's tooled leather saddle to his "coat of many colors" constructed by the Hearth and Home Guild at his dictatorial command. I blanched at a tapestry showing a couple making their marriage vows on the Patriarch's Hand — unbidden, my mind conjured up the image of that hand suddenly coming to life and grabbing the woman by the throat as the Patriarch hissed, "Do you love him? Do you?"

  But I put that out of my mind; I had promised Cappie to Commit female and become priestess. To hell with the Patriarch and all his successors.

  Spinning away from the sight of the tapestry, I nearly bumped into Rashid. He had planted himself in front of a wall-sized painting of the Patriarch during the Harsh Purification: a fierce white-haired man with a blazing torch in his hand. The artist, no doubt working under the Patriarch's eye, had painted the ghost of a halo around the old tyrant's head. The painter had also placed three blackened figures in the background, burning their last in a well-fueled pyre.

  After a long moment contemplating the scene, Rashid turned to me. "What do you think of that, Fullin? About the burnings and the Patriarch and all? Just doing what the gods demanded?"

  I hesitated. "You remember I'm female at the moment?"

  "What does that have to do with it?" Rashid asked.

  Steck snorted. "What do you expect? Men and women have completely different opinions about the old bastard."

  "How can that be?" Rashid said. "When Fullin changes from man to woman, how can his opinions suddenly change? Are Tobers all multiple personality cases, or do they just—"

  "My opinion on the Patriarch," I interrupted, "is that he should have died when he was a baby… like everyone thought he would."

  Rashid frowned. "He was an unhealthy baby?"

  "Too sick to give the Gift of Blood," I replied, "so he was Locked male all his life. Everything else follows from that."

  "Tell me," Rashid said.

  Steck and I met each other's gaze. Perhaps my mother and I didn't have much in common, but I could see that for the moment we were thinking like two women.

  And women who spend time thinking all have the same opinion of the Patriarch.

  May he rot forever in the death-grip of Mistress Want.

  The Patriarch (who erased all record of his real name) was born two hundred years ago — a child of Master Crow and always prick-proud how his parentage made him one half divine. Leeta told all the girls in Hearth and Home that the Patriarch despised people fathered by normal men: whenever he needed to make an example of someone, he chose someone of "thin human blood" to be whipped.

  But that was after he came to power. The Patriarch's story started only a few months after he was born: a baby boy who got sick just before summer solstice. High fever, vomiting, convulsions… when Hakoore preached his annual sermon on the Patriarch's life, he took morbid delight in hissing out the list of symptoms. Hakoore loved to label the illness as the work of devils who wanted to kill our Redeemer before he could save the world; but when I told this story to Rashid, I steered away from mentioning devils.

  I'd come to feel sheepish on the devil issue.

  Anyway, there was no question the infant Patriarch suffered extreme sickness, whatever the cause — the doctor of that day believed the baby wasn't strong enough to give the Gift. Yes, the child would be Locked male all his life… but, "Male is better than dead," as the doctor told the Patriarch's mother.

  ("I'd have to agree," Rashid said.

  Steck and I exchanged "isn't that just so typical" looks.)

  So the Gift was never taken. In time the baby recovered ("…through sheer force of will!" Hakoore preached). The infant even traveled to Birds Home the following summer with all the other children. That was common practice — whether or not the boy had given the Gift, the gods might decide to switch his sex anyway. They were gods; they could break their own rules.

  But they didn't. (They never did.) The Patriarch went out a boy and came back the same way. At that age, he didn't understand why it broke his mother's heart.

  He must have found out soon enough. I didn't grow up with any Locked kids, but I can imagine how Tober children would have treated someone who was so creepily handicapped — with an inconsistent mix of cruelty, pity and indifference, changing from hour to hour depending on the whim of the schoolyard mob. When a boy receives that kind of treatment, the outcome is determined by how he reacts: if he makes himself likable, the other children soon forget he's different; if he tries to make himself likable but isn't, he becomes the school goat or perhaps class clown; and if he fights back verbally or physically, he becomes hated, taunted, and shunned… in other words, a pariah.

  Guess which option the Patriarch took.

  A big-muscled pariah turns himself into a bully; a small one becomes the brat who steals and tells lies to get everybody else in trouble. The Patriarch tried the bully route for a while, picking on kids weaker than himself, but in Tober Cove, little kids often have big brothers (or big sisters with all the instincts of big brothers). The young Patriarch soon realized he couldn't make a success of bullyhood, at least until he became a teenager and could match big brothers in size. Therefore he went the other direction — becoming a weasel, as Hakoore might put it, although the Patriarch's Man never used that term when speaking of our Revered Redeemer. ("The other children spurned him because they were shamed by his inner radiance.")

  Time passed. The boy grew crafty. He learned to ingratiate himself to adults, who were (then as now) easier to manipulate than children. Leeta liked to tell us he had a knack for wheedling perks and privileges out of grownup women — he always had a ready tale of woe, how he felt deprived by never knowing the joys of femininity. It may seem naive that they believed him… certainly in light of how he treated women later on. But you have to understand that no one was used to a child like this. No one back then had ever dealt with a boy who never became a girl.

  It's hard for me to imagine what it's like to have a single, unified soul. When you're just one person, everything that happens in your life can only happen to you; it's always immediate. With most of us… well, when I was a girl of five, I decided I didn't like oatmeal. I don't know why — kids sometimes get attacks of the Stubborns, and then it becomes a matter of honor: no oatmeal would ever pass my lips. I tried to tell Cappie that oatmeal was poison… some complicated tale about the Mishi pirates crossing wheat with poison ivy and getting oats. No doubt I drove poor Zephram to distraction; not to mention, it was all empty pigheadedness after the first few days, just an obstinate refusal to admit I was making a fuss over nothing.

  Then summer solstice came, I turned male, and my old pointless obstinacy seemed like someone else's problem. I had different areas of stubbornness — that was when I began plink-plink-plinking at my mother's violin — but fighting about oatmeal just wasn't worth the headaches. Yes, I could remember that it was important to me only the day before; but I felt as if my sister self had told me it should be important, not that I really believed it myself.

  So I started to eat oatmeal. And by the time I turned female again, it was all a dead issue.

  You see how it works? When you're two people, some of your extreme rough edges get rounded out. Hates, loves, frights… my male half's fear of snapping turtles used to be much worse. He used to be paralyzed with terror at the thought of going down to the dock where he saw the girl get bitten. But the next year, I wa
sn't so afraid — the fear wasn't so immediate. I worked up the courage to go to the waterfront now and then; and by the time I turned male again, I could draw on my female experiences of sitting on the docks with nothing bad happening.

  Only one version of me had the truly intense fear. The other could cope… and the first one could learn from the coping.

  The Patriarch never experienced that restful kind of distancing. His fears always clutched him; his resentments stayed hot at the boil, like a kettle that never gets taken off the stove; his loves (if he had any) never got the chance to mellow and rearrange themselves.

  He was a violin that always played the same tune… and his only possible variation was to play louder and louder.

  The Patriarch's mother made a token effort to expose him to women's culture: sent him now and then to talk with the priestess, for example. It didn't work. "He saw the falseness of women's ways," Hakoore preached… which probably meant that he felt out of place surrounded by girls and made a fierce nuisance of himself until the priestess told him to leave. He never learned womanly skills like cooking, sewing, and tending the sick: skills aimed at helping other people more than yourself.

  But the most crucial lack in the Patriarch's life was that he never gave birth. He never felt a life emerge from him, never felt the needy sucking at his breast soften into contentment.

  Zephram tells me there are plenty of good fathers in the South: men who have always been male, but still cherish and keep their children with loving devotion. I hope that's true. Still, a voice in my mind whispers that Tobers are different. Every father in the village has also been a mother. Every father knows.

  You take bullies like the Warriors Society: even Mintz, the meanest of the bunch. In his last year as female, Mintz wasn't a model mother, but he gave it a genuine effort. He nursed his son; he changed diapers; he sang self-conscious lullabies when the baby wouldn't sleep, and screamed at the doctor, "Make him better!" when the boy picked up a case of the sniffles. Mintz Committed as male because he knew he wasn't cut out for nurturing… but he still cared for his child in a haphazard way. A few times in the previous year, on my way to the marsh for violin practice, I'd met Mintz and his daughter out searching for medicinal herbs — she'd got the idea she wanted to take over as Healer when Gorallin retired. And Mintz, who wouldn't know a medicinal herb if it cleared up his eczema, was out with his kid to make sure she didn't drown in a sinkhole and to let her know, "Yes, I believe you're smart enough to be a doctor."

  No one, not even Hakoore, could imagine the Patriarch getting his shoes muddy for the sake of a child's dream. So ask yourself what a man like that might do in a town where everyone else does have a fierce concern for children.

  There's an old saying that children are "hostages to fate": dependents who make any parent think twice about stepping out of line. And when the person who draws the line is an angry man who doesn't give a damn what happens to kids…

  …you've got the secret of the Patriarch's success.

  The rest of the Patriarch's story you can fill in yourself. Or you could see it in the paintings on the walls of the Patriarch's Hall. The Patriarch taking the oath of office as mayor (after a campaign of bribery and intimidation had eliminated other contenders). The Patriarch posing with his cadre of hand-chosen warriors (stupid teenaged boys who liked seeing fear in adult eyes). The Patriarch being blessed by Father Ash and Mother Dust (while somewhere not shown in the picture, warriors held the Father's and Mother's families in "protective custody").

  But those things are all Male History: public events, with public reactions recorded and private consequences ignored. The facts of Male History are only important if you want to know the exact number of people the Patriarch killed in his efforts to gain power and keep it.

  Numbers like that must have been of great interest to the Patriarch himself. He was that kind of man.

  "Sounds like you detest him," Rashid observed.

  "That's what it sounds like," I agreed.

  "And all Tober women feel the same way?"

  "Fullin's opinion is stronger than most," Steck answered, "but the majority of women have similar feelings. Not that they usually waste the time to think about it."

  "And the men?" Rashid asked. "Men who were also women for half of their youths?"

  "They say it isn't worth getting excited about. The laws aren't so bad, so why tear them down?" Steck grimaced. "And in a way, the men are right. You know what the Patriarch really did to Tober society? In the long run, nothing. He seized power, he ran the place for thirty years, and he laid down laws about the proper 'roles' for each gender… but the instant he died, our village waffled back to comfortable ground. Fullin," Steck turned to me, "has Tober Cove burned anyone since the Patriarch died?"

  "No."

  Steck turned back to Rashid. "See? People swear oaths on the Patriarch's Hand now instead of Master Stone, and Hakoore is called the Patriarch's Man instead of the older title of "priest"… but how much more of the Patriarch's heritage is left? Take the Council of Elders. Before the Patriarch, both men and women sat on the council; afterward, it was men only plus the priestess. But in Tober Cove, that has less effect than you might think. People who are attracted to politics know they have to Commit male, so they do. Same thing with laws like Only men can work the perch boats. If you like fishing, you Commit male; if you like cooking, you Commit female."

  "I never thought of it that way," Rashid said, his brow furrowing. "When I think of laws that dictate men have to do this, women have to do that, my natural reaction is to ask, 'What if a woman wants to be a warrior? What if a man sets his sights on caring for children?' But in Tober Cove, you just decide what you want to do in life and base your gender choice on that. Of course, if you want to be a warrior and you want to be a woman too…"

  "The Mocking Priestess has a saying," I told him. "You can get what you want most in life; not even the gods can guarantee you get your second choice too."

  Footsteps clunked on the floor outside. A moment later Teggeree entered, walking uncomfortably in city-bought boots rather than moccasins. As far as I knew, he had only worn the boots once before, back when Governor Niome of Feliss had made a "diplomatic visit" (two hours of diffident talk about trade, followed by three days of enthusiastic hunting and looking at our fall leaves). Still, our mayor managed to retain his dignity, even in those unaccustomed shoes; he moved with slow composure, like a boat taking its time as it entered an unfamiliar harbor.

  "Any news?" Rashid asked. "Witnesses to the murder?"

  Teggeree sighed. "One man has arrived, claiming to have evidence…" The mayor glanced at me. "It's Embrun."

  "Wouldn't you know," I grimaced.

  Embrun was a strange case, even for Tober Cove. His female half got kicked in the head by a horse when she was five, and had never been right afterward — moody and slow, subject to falling fits at least once a month. Her problems were bad enough to drag down her brother soul too; he had a normal brain, but only got to use it every other year. Other children went to school each fall, and learned their lessons whether they were boys or girls… but poor Embrun could only make progress in class when he was male, so each year he fell farther behind the kids his age. After a while, he stopped trying. Embrun became the cove's hard luck case, even after he Committed male and shed the weight of his ill-fated sister self. He was forever dropping in just before supper to see if you had any errands you'd pay him to run, but could always find a conflicting commitment when someone offered him a real full-time job.

  I could just bet Embrun had evidence to report about the murder. He'd ask Rashid how much such information was worth, but if the Spark Lord actually shelled out some crowns, Embrun would only have useless things to tell: some story about an indistinct figure seen in the distance, or vague rustling sounds he heard near the time of Bonnakkut's death. Embrun wouldn't trump up a tale to implicate someone specific — he was never deliberately vicious — but he would try to make himself seem like an imp
ortant witness, especially if someone would pay him to talk.

  "Let's see this man by all means!" Rashid said. "I'd love to wrap up this murder investigation before Master Crow and Mistress Gull arrive."

  Teggeree gave me another look. I could tell he wanted me to warn the Spark Lord about Embrun — Teggeree couldn't do it himself because it was indelicate for a mayor to accuse a voting citizen of being a conniving opportunist. Before I could speak, however, Cappie quietly appeared in the doorway — slim, almost frail, as she stood beside Teggeree's great bulk.

  "Can we talk now?" she asked quietly.

  Her words stirred up the urge to run away, but her fragility made me want to wrap my arms around her, to protect her from the world and herself. I realized I was male again — changed in the heartbeat of seeing her. Or maybe changed long before and I just hadn't noticed: the boundary between my two selves was blurrier than I'd once imagined.

  Steck looked quickly between Cappie and me, then said, "Yes… you two stay here and talk. Rashid and I can question this Embrun on our own."

  Embrun had only been a toddler when Steck left the cove. She didn't know what he'd become.

  Teggeree gave me one more look, a glance that might have been pleading in someone less self-composed. But Rashid moved toward the door and gestured for the mayor to take the lead. "Show us to this witness, if you don't mind, Your Worship. Embrun, did you say? I suppose he's a reliable sort?"

  The mayor cleared his throat. "Perhaps I should tell you about our Embrun," he murmured.

  Teggeree continued to talk as Rashid and Steck followed him out of the hall. Cappie and I were alone.

  She had changed back into women's clothes: a simple summer dress, styled for loose-fitting comfort and coolness. Maybe Cappie's family had prevailed on her not to scandalize the village; maybe she'd had enough of me "being obvious" as I ogled her in men's clothing.