“We’re a free people, love. We don’t shackle one another and we don’t let others shackle us. We accept not being able to see the future, having to cope with surprises, having to act on best estimates and best guesses. Even unfree people have had to deal with troubles they couldn’t foresee, though. It’s part of life.”
He chafed her hand gently. “By my lights, the gifts we’ve received from Al and her spouses have been blessings far more than burdens. I have a reminder of my debt to them hanging from my left shoulder. It cost me eight weeks of nasty pain that nothing on Hope could assuage. But Claire told me it would be that way, and I agreed to pay the price. I’d do it again today. I haven’t asked God to remove the memory of the pain. I wouldn’t dream of it.”
He put his hand to the underside of her chin and gently coaxed her to face him.
“Here’s another gift I cherish: you. Al and Martin brought us together. Spooner’s beard, love, Al had to invade Kramnik House and face down about thirty angry Kramniks to make it happen. Not all that long ago, they helped us to afford our medipods, so we can go on being physically healthy and attractive to one another for as long as we please. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love you even if we were both wrinkly and saggy all over—I never want to find anyone else beside me—but this is like being forever young, with the freshness of the first bloom of love and the energy of two brand new lovers who have all the possibilities of life still ahead of them. What’s so bad about that?”
“All right,” she muttered.
“What have I—”
“All right, Bart,” Nora said. He released her chin. “You can stop pushing. You’re right on all counts and I’ve been a little silly about it.” She grimaced. “But silly or not, I won’t pretend I’m all broken up about them taking off tomorrow. I’d like to have a little normality around here, and maybe, with them back in space for a few years, we just might get it.”
He did not reply.
* * *
An hour after dinner, Barton went to the pantry just off the kitchen, drew out a jug of table wine and a fresh loaf of bread, and turned toward the hearthroom. Nora held out her hands for the items, and he shook his head.
“I’ll do it tonight, love.”
She frowned. “Why?”
“The occasion.”
Her eyes and mouth drew thin.
I’m likely to pay for this later.
They entered the hearthroom in silence. The room was packed. It appeared that every resident of Morelon House and no small number from Kramnik House had chosen to attend. He could not remember ever seeing a larger gathering for evening worship.
He scanned the gathering for Althea, Martin, and Claire, and found them standing very close together at the back of the room. Martin’s height made them hard to overlook.
Nora found herself a place near the edge of the throng and stood watching with arms crossed as he set his burdens down, picked up the copy of Teresza’s book, and leafed through it.
John 14...here we go.
“‘Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many mansions; if it were not so I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there you may be also.’
“Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we know not where you go, how, then, can we know the way?’
“Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes unto the Father but by me. If you had known me, you should also have known my Father; and henceforward you shall know Him, for you have seen Him.’
“Philip said, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and it will suffice us.’
“Jesus said to him, ‘Have I been with you so long, yet you know me not, Philip? He that has seen me has seen the Father. How then do you say “show us the Father?” Believe you not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? For the words I speak are not of myself, but of the Father in me; it is He who does the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me, or else believe for the sake of the works. Verily I say unto you, he that believes in me shall do these works also, and greater works yet, because I go to my Father. And whatever you shall ask in my name, that shall be done, that the Father be glorified in the Son.’”
He closed the book, returned it to the table behind him, and smiled at his assembled kin.
“Always there will be the greater and the lesser,” he said. “A sensible man gets used to acknowledging superiors in this and recognizing inferiors in that, and making use of the knowledge when it becomes relevant. That there is One above us all should come as no surprise...though if memory serves, it certainly surprised me.”
A titter passed over the assembly.
“One of the ways we use such knowledge is in delegation. We put tasks into the hands of those best equipped to do them well. We learn from them if and when we can, but in practical matters we follow a very practical rule: Let each do what he does best.
“Good delegation brings good results. One of those results is that persons less suited to doing a particular job get to enjoy the benefits anyway. There’s no shame in that. Our only obligation is to be mindful. For the benefactors, mindful of the responsibilities that come with ability. For the beneficiaries, mindful of our blessings and appropriately grateful for them.”
He glanced briefly at Nora. Her arms had fallen to her sides, and her expression had grown slightly warmer.
“I look over the lot of you, and I don’t think even one of our kindred is absent. I have no words for the joy that brings me. When I married Nora and joined the clan, I hadn’t read Teresza’s book. I’d heard about it, but I couldn’t believe it was at all important. After all, it doesn’t grow corn or keep the machines running, so what’s the use?
“But it does have a use, doesn’t it? It reassures us about our right to a place in the universe. It reinforces our inborn sense for right and wrong, what we must and must not do, and the zone of free choice that lies between them. It does one other thing, too: it allows us to delegate the fiercest of our worries onto shoulders so broad that there’s no burden they can’t bear.
“As above, so below, kinsmen. Just as we delegate our profoundest worries and fears, the ones no amount of merely human ability or capacity can cope with, onto God’s shoulders, so also does He delegate worldly tasks onto the worldly shoulders best suited to them. And so tomorrow at daybreak, we—and He—will send our noblest and best to bring succor to those who suffer on a distant world. Let tonight’s celebration be dedicated to their enterprise. May God be with them every nanometer of the way, may he guide their hands against the forces that have wrought such oppression, and may he return them to our bosom safe, sound, and victorious.”
The silence was perfect as he took up the loaf and raised it high.
* * *
Barton waited for his kin to file out of the hearthroom. Althea and Claire paused to embrace him. Martin shook his hand. Nora looked at him curiously for a moment. He smiled and waved her toward the exit. She grinned ruefully, nodded, and departed with the rest.
He’d intended to spend a while alone, reading Teresza’s book and pondering some of the more problematic passages, but as Valerie Morelon made to depart, her husband Cameron MacLachlan peeled away and came to Barton’s side. He held out a hand, and Barton took it.
“Thank you for that, Bart.”
“What, my silly little speech?”
Cameron nodded. “You reminded us of something important. Something a few of our kinsmen were starting to forget.”
“Hm?”
“The power of envy.”
“Oh.” Barton grinned sheepishly. “You know, that word never entered my thoughts.”
Cameron grinned. “Understandable. You feel no envy of Althea and her spouses.”
“Are you saying that some of us do?”
“A few. I’ve heard a couple of our more recent kindred use the phrase
‘second-class member’ now and then. About themselves, that is.”
Barton snorted. “Lunacy.”
“Hm?”
“Look at us, Cam. We sleep under the same roof. We eat the same food at the same tables. We work in the same fields and workshops...well, most of us, anyway. We share this room and the other common spaces as equals. No one lacks anything. No one’s excluded from anything. Everyone has a medipod now—and you should have heard Patrice scream about the expense of that little exercise in household diplomacy.”
Cameron chuckled. “I did. I think they probably heard it in Kosciuszko.”
Barton grinned. “Well,” he said, “it had to be done, and I did convince her eventually.”
“How?”
“A simple appeal to justice, Cam. Nothing else would have worked.”
Cameron nodded. “You have a feel for that. Not everyone does.” He thrust his hands into his pockets and gazed at the floor.
Barton studied the larger man’s face.
There’s something else. There must be.
“Cam?” Barton gestured at the sofa. “Whatever it is, we might as well sit while we discuss it.”
“Maybe not,” Cameron said. “I’m starting to feel foolish about broaching it.”
Barton smiled reassuringly. “Come on.”
They seated themselves. Cameron hunched forward, elbows propped on his knees. Barton sat back and waited.
Presently Cameron said “The descent records for most Hope families don’t go back before the Hegira. Mine do. My ancestors brought a few items onto A Dream Of Freedom that weren’t exactly survival gear.”
Barton cocked an eyebrow. “What sort?”
“Diaries. The diaries of an unusual man.”
“One of your forebears?”
Cameron nodded.
“He had power, Bart. Not political power, something else. A power to comfort, to dispel fear and self-doubt and self-hatred. To heal a damaged soul. He didn’t use it much—or talk about it, for that matter—but he didn’t try to deny it. He knew it had to be from God.”
“You’re sure these accounts were diaries and not fiction of some kind?”
“Rock solid. After he died, his younger brother had them published. He added a coda to the last volume, assuring the reader that every last word was absolutely, objectively true.” Cameron smirked. “He had to. He was a famous novelist, and it would have been too easy for a reader to assume the tales in those diaries were just more of his fiction.”
“There are other stories of men with special powers,” Barton said slowly. “Maybe some of them are true as well.”
“Maybe,” Cameron said. He stretched carefully and sat back. “I’m beginning to think we’re in one of them.”
Barton frowned. “What makes you say such a thing?”
“Because,” Cameron said, “the few times you’ve been the celebrant at worship, everything has changed for the better.” He looked directly into Barton’s eyes. “Like tonight.”
“Hm? How—”
“Maybe you don’t feel it yourself, Bart. Maybe it’s a gift you give everyone else. But when we’re all together here, and you’re expanding on the reading you’ve chosen, this whole room fills with love and joy. You read from the same book as everyone else who ever officiates. You never tell us anything we didn’t already know, or couldn’t have figured out for ourselves. But the sensation of...transcendence is so great you can practically see it in the air.”
Barton gaped, speechless. Cameron laid a hand on his shoulder.
“It reminded me of those diaries, of what my ancestor was able to do. To judge from what he wrote about it, it frightened him. I can understand that. Something that sets you apart from other men has to be at least a little frightening
“I can see no one else ever told you about your power. But it’s so perfectly obvious and clear that you’d have to learn about it eventually, either through self-discovery or because someone chose to tell you.
“‘Let each do what he does best,’ you told us. It’s easier if you know what that is, and because of my ancestor I figured I was probably the best to tell you. I just don’t want you to be afraid.”
Cameron rose, bowed slightly, and departed.
==
Octember 4, 1326 A.H.
“I remember the first time I wore this,” Claire murmured. She ran her gloved hands slowly down the front of her pressure suit as if comparing its lines and contours to what her touch could remember.
Althea smiled. “I remember when I first saw you in it.”
Claire nodded. “That was a...good time.”
“Happy to be headed back?”
“I am. What about you?”
Althea ran gloved fingertips along Claire’s cheek. “You betcha.”
Martin emerged from their bathroom, fully suited and helmet in the crook of one arm. “Ready to head out, ladies?”
They nodded.
* * *
A solemn-faced Ernest DuBreuill met them at the mansion’s front door, the clan’s hovertruck parked behind him and the keys dangling from his hand. A sizable flexosteel parcel lay in the truck’s cargo bed. He beckoned the trio toward it and climbed into the driver’s station.
“I thought we were completely loaded up,” Martin said.
“Not quite,” Althea said.
“What’s in there?” Claire said.
Althea merely smiled.
The Grenier Air complex was unusually quiet. The four debarked from the truck at the Morelon hangar without speaking. Ernest and Althea toted the parcel to the cargo bay of Freedom’s Horizon and loaded it without comment. Martin and Claire merely waited until Althea resealed the cargo hatch. Ernest offered her his hand, but Althea pulled him into an embrace instead. After a moment he broke it abashedly, strode back to the hovertruck, and drove away.
No one spoke until the truck had disappeared around the curve that led back toward Morelon House.
“Who’s flying today?” Martin said.
“I am,” Althea said. “Take the right seat. I popped up a seat behind me for you, Claire.” She strode to the pilot’s side of the spaceplane, hoisted herself into position, and waited for her spouses to join her.
When all three had taken their places, Althea closed and sealed the cabin hatches, ignited the kerosene engine, said “Helmets on and locked,” activated her suit radio, and engaged the ground transmission. Freedom’s Horizon rolled slowly out of its hangar. Althea taxied it to the runway, positioned it carefully before the huge ceramic baffle that would block its exhaust, killed the kero engine, disengaged the ground transmission, and stopped.
Grandpere?
—Yes, dear?
This is it.
—What do you mean?
It’s going to be a while.
—Yes, I know.
No, I mean...a long while.
—Yes, I understand that.
I’ll miss you. Take good care of Hope.
—I will.
She turned to her spouses and waited until they’d activated their radio circuits.
“I’d rather not take us directly to space,” she said. “Mind if we do a little touring first?”
Martin frowned. “Is everything all right, love?”
She nodded. “Couldn’t be better.”
Claire looked troubled, but she said nothing.
Althea lit the main engine.
* * *
Althea flew Freedom’s Horizon through a swift counterclockwise circuit of Alta. She kept the craft banked to port almost continuously, and gazed out at the landscapes below as much as was safe.
She was tempted to linger over the peninsula that had once been the Hopeless refuge, where she and Martin had spent two cold and hazardous years developing the fuel that made Freedom’s Horizon a single-stage-to-orbit spacecraft. Despite the starkness of the place and the unforgiving climate, they had known much excitement and joy there, huddling in their flexosteel dome. Her memory of their interminabl
e, incredibly dangerous experiments in high-energy anaerobic chemistry was as bright as anywhere else she’d lived.
So many things to miss.
When the circuit was complete, she leveled out and keyed her suit microphone.
“Ready for that working vacation?’”
Martin chuckled. “Do it, space babe.”
“We’ve waited long enough, love,” Claire said.
Althea swallowed, steadied herself, and spoke in a measured cadence.
“Father,” she said, “which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on Hope as it is in heaven. Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who have sinned against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. And Father,” she said, “please bless this enterprise, intended to bring freedom to a badly oppressed people, for we go forth not for...for vengeance, but to make justice as we understand it, for a people that can do nothing for themselves. Amen.”
She pitched Freedom’s Horizon sharply upward and pushed the throttle all the way in.
* * *
The approach to the Relic, the docking maneuver, and the debarkation into their habitat were entirely uneventful. Althea asked Claire to check the control chamber and the air plant while she and Martin saw to the offloading of their cargo.
After they’d brought the subassemblies for the nanofabricator through the cargo accessway, Althea gestured to Martin to remain inside and moved to return to the spacecraft. He stopped her with a touch.
I knew this was coming.
“What’s in the extra package, Al?” His eyes pressed her for an answer.
“Four hundred pounds of anaerobic reactor pellets.” She tried to turn away, but he stopped her again.
“For the spaceplane?”
She nodded.
“Spooner’s beard, Al. That would cover eight launches and re-entries. Why?”
She shrugged. “Contingencies.”
He frowned, but said nothing more.
She unmoored the parcel from the spaceplane’s cargo bay and nudged it toward an unused tie-down loop driven into the Relic's surface. Once she’d satisfied herself that it was out of the path of the spaceplane's exhaust, she fastened it down with care, returned to the planetoid’s interior, removed and stored her pressure suit, and made her way to the control chamber.
Freedom's Fury (Spooner Federation Saga Book 3) Page 20
