The Shore of Women

by Pamela Sargent

  “Where did you hear the name?”

  I screamed as my bones cracked and somehow managed to clutch at my head with one broken hand, feeling the circlet under my palm. The Lady’s crown was biting into my scalp. I tore off the circlet.

  At once, the aspects vanished. The pain was gone. I was inside my body, which was still whole. I looked down at myself, bewildered.

  I was naked. A clear, slender tube attached to my member curled under the couch on which I lay. A ceiling of light was above me, and my body glittered with metal threads that bound me to the couch as well as to several metallic objects near me. Lights on the surfaces of these strange, square objects winked and flashed. Where was I?

  Two metal arms suddenly appeared at my side and reached for me. I tore at the shiny threads, ripping a few away, and then saw that another man was in the room with me.

  “Tal!” I cried as I recognized him. He did not respond. He was also clothed in metal threads, a circlet on his head, a tube enclosing his organ. His mouth twitched, and saliva trickled into his blond beard. His penis stiffened, flexing the tube. “Tal!”

  What could this mean? Was the Lady showing me that She would also punish Tal for my misdeed? Was this room a place where both body and soul would be tormented? The metal arms seized me and forced me onto my back. I struggled helplessly as one arm pressed against my chest, pinning me with its shiny claw as the other lifted the circlet. I tried to pull my head away, but the claw pressed the crown down upon me.

  My pain returned. This time, I struggled against it, aware that my soul, not my body, had suffered the tortures inflicted on me. But my struggle was useless. The pain was greater than any I had ever known, and I was unable to ward it off.

  “Where did you hear the name of Birana?” the witch-aspect cried. The other aspect’s face was pale as She held a hand to Her lips.

  Punishment and the loss of my soul could not be worse than my present torment. “I shall tell you,” I cried, ready to condemn myself in order to escape the pain. I was weak; Birana had imposed too great a test on me. I had failed Her, and my band would lose Her. I would lose Her, and that thought was nearly as painful as my torment. The pain faded, leaving only dull aches in my limbs and head.

  I told them of my meeting with Birana. Once I began to speak, there was no purpose in hiding anything, and so I spoke of all that had passed. When I was finished, the witch-aspect nodded while Her companion turned away.

  “You have done the right thing by telling Us this,” the silver-haired aspect said, “and you will break the evil spell that bound you.” The mist returned, concealing the aspects, and I waited, wondering what my fate would be.

  After a time, the auburn-haired aspect returned to me. Her eyes gazed at me gently, but I could no longer think of Her as truly kind.

  “Arvil, I must tell you something now about the one you call Birana. She claims to be of the Lady, but she is not. She is an evil one who has taken on the guise of an aspect in order to lead men into wickedness. She seeks to deceive you. If you worship her, or honor her, she will lead you away from good while trying to convince you that she represents holiness and truth. She is not of us but is one who has fallen away. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” I said, as I tried to absorb this new knowledge.

  “Men can easily be led astray, and you should not berate yourself for falling into Birana’s trap. I know you are strong and can resist evil. You have done a good thing by revealing this to Me and will be rewarded for it. I did not want you to suffer, but we had to purge the evil from your soul. You will soon hear how We plan to deal with the one called Birana, but now, receive Our blessing.”

  She faded, and three aspects appeared, one golden-skinned, one dark, a third fair. They touched me, leading me back into the holy state, yet part of me seemed distant from their ministrations, was an onlooker apart from the pleasure the three were giving me with Their hands and lips. I thought of what I had seen after removing my circlet, and it was enough to tell me one thing: The Lady was not what She seemed. I kept that thought deep inside me, refusing even to form it into words. The Lady was not what She seemed, and I was lost in an illusion, unsure of the truth.

  LAISSA

  The sight of the world beyond the wall had altered the way I looked at the city. Glimpses of a landscape on a screen, even the simulated sensations produced by a mindcaster, had not prepared me for what I saw with Zoreen.

  With the mindcaster, I had experienced what it might have been like to walk across a plain, to huddle in a tent near a fire, to journey on foot through a wood, but, however vivid such sensations were at the time, I had known that I was safe inside the city’s walls. I had studied maps but had paid more attention to the locations of cities and shrines than to the land around them.

  The city seemed smaller as I walked along its lanes and streets. I had lived my entire life among three million women. I had solitude when I sought it—in my room, during a nighttime stroll through a park or garden—but I was always within sight or range of others.

  As is true of all of us, my upbringing had strengthened the bonds between me and other women. Even the historians and chroniclers, perhaps the loneliest and most solitary of women, sought to share their insights with one another and with those who were interested. This, I knew, was right and necessary, yet I thought of the outside and wondered what it was like to wander there apart from others, what it was like to hear only the voice of one’s own mind. We hid from the world instead of exploring it; I began to think we hid from ourselves as well.

  I did not seek such absolute solitude. My training and the fear instilled in me of wild, untamed regions had made such a goal seem impossible. Even so, I found myself thinking: If I dwelled apart from others, how then would I see the world? What would I continue to accept, and what would fall away?

  On the day after Zoreen and I returned from the wall, I spoke to Bren, intending to tell her that I was going to pursue general science, but after mentioning that, I heard myself say, “I’d also like to do some reading in history.”

  I saw her frown before I looked down from the screen. “Is this only because you’re now living with someone who’s studying that field?”

  “No. I see things differently now. It’s hard to explain.”

  “Well, then. I hope this isn’t just a temporary change of heart. We’ll see.” Bren stared at the console in front of her, tapped on the keys with her fingers, then assigned me two mentors, Lorell for science and Fari for history. “You’ll be given a list of readings,” Bren went on. “After that, you’ll speak to each mentor, and begin to attend classes and discussions. You’ll have a lot of freedom during this first year—use it wisely.”

  In spite of Bren’s promise, I had very little freedom after contacting my two mentors. The lists of readings were so long that I had no time for anything else, and I spent the next few days poring over my reader while Zoreen did her own work.

  I did not, however, mind the reading. My worries about what my old friends would think about my choice had vanished, at least temporarily. I fed the hunger for knowledge that I had denied in myself for so long, but I was also feeding my doubts. Each document about past events revealed a layer in our society of which I had been unaware earlier, and disturbing questions would rise unbidden to the surface of my thoughts.

  I was in my room, lost in a hypnotic trance as I sought to reinforce what I had studied with the aid of a mindcaster, when Zoreen touched my arm to rouse me, then waited as I removed my circlet.

  “Your mother wants to talk to you,” she said.

  I glanced at my room screen, wondering why I had heard no signal. “Tell her I’ll call her back.”

  “I can’t. She’s here. She says she has to see you.”

  I went to the outer chamber. Mother was sitting on a cushion, legs folded, her fingers drumming against the floor. The sight of her face shocked me. Dark shadows were under her eyes and she had the pallor of a woman recovering from an illness. She had gro
wn thinner; her inner struggle seemed to be consuming her. I was suddenly ashamed of how I had acted toward her.

  Zoreen murmured a farewell and retreated from our rooms, leaving us alone. Mother frowned, as if disapproving of the piles of documents and the lack of furniture; Zoreen’s papers were on our only couch, and a jacket was draped over one of our two chairs.

  “I suppose you came to see how I was doing,” I said. “Zoreen and I are getting along, and I’ve decided to do general science and some history. I guess that surprises you.”

  She said, “I didn’t come here about that.”

  “Why did you come, then?”

  “It’s time.”

  At first, I didn’t know what she meant; then I guessed. “Time to send Button away, you mean.”

  “Yes.”

  “Mother, I…” I paused, not knowing what to say. “You didn’t have to come here to tell me that.”

  “Button’s brother is here—he’s been inside the wall for a few days. He accomplished more than I hoped for—he not only made the journey, he also found a new group of men to live with, so Button has more of a chance to survive.” Her voice was flat. “It’s good that he’ll be with one so resourceful. I was right to wait, wasn’t I?”

  “You didn’t know that ahead of time,” I said. “Well, it doesn’t matter now. Everything will turn out for the best.”

  Her mouth twisted at those silly, useless words. “There’s more, Laissa. I’m going to tell you something you’ll have to keep to yourself. Sit down.”

  I seated myself on the floor in front of her, apprehensive at the expressionless tone of her voice.

  “Your twin, the boy called Arvil—he and his new friends found Birana alive in a shrine.”

  I looked up, startled, unable to believe it.

  “Yvara is dead, but Birana still lives. He said her name just as I was about to disconnect from my mindspeaker. I contacted Eilaan, and we soon got the story out of him. It seems that Birana was able to plant a suggestion in Arvil’s mind and set up a block so that he wouldn’t give her away. It might have worked, too, given his fear of her and his belief that it was part of a test, but something in the tape he was receiving unlocked it―a word, perhaps, or an image that reminded him of her.”

  I felt numb as I tried to imagine Birana alive outside, among men.

  “I may have prevented great harm by finding this out, and that works in my favor. Eilaan isn’t chiding me now.”

  “Birana’s still alive,” I said, marveling at that fact.

  “They worship her. They think she’s an aspect of the Goddess. I had to tell him that she isn’t, that she’s evil.”

  “But why?”

  “Don’t be stupid, Laissa. From her, they can learn more than they should know, and that could lead to dangerous notions.”

  “Oh, Mother. What can men possibly do against us?”

  “We can’t take the chance. The longer she stays with them, the more likely it is that they’ll see things aren’t as they believe them to be. They’ll see that we’re beings like them, that we’re not all powerful. They may learn how to cloak their thoughts successfully. Don’t you realize that if they learned enough, they might find a way to enter the wall and attack us? Our true protection doesn’t lie just in our wall and our weapons, but in what they believe about us.” I knew then that I was hearing Eilaan’s words, even though my mother was speaking them. “Birana has to die.”

  “No,” I said.

  “Do you care so much about her? You didn’t seem so concerned when she was expelled. You’ve been reading history. You ought to know what can happen, how even an isolated event can change much. Eilaan says that Birana presents a problem. She was sent out there to die, and she must. I shall see to it.”

  I had not spoken for Birana before; guilt over that was forcing me to argue for her. “She’s one of us,” I said. “She was punished for her mother’s deed. The Council could have shown some mercy. You can’t just kill her.”

  “She’s not one of us now. An example has to be set. She was supposed to die. She should never have been able to live out there, and yet she’s alive. We’re can’t leave her outside, and she can’t come back here. What’s the difference between sending her out, knowing she’ll die, and acting against her more directly?”

  It seemed to me that there was a difference, but I could not express it. If Birana had somehow survived outside, then hadn’t she earned the right to live? Her life was likely to be short enough as it was, with all the dangers she would face.

  “There’s another way,” I said slowly. “Birana could live in a shrine, and men could visit her with food and other offerings. She could reinforce their beliefs.”

  Mother laughed harshly. “You speak as though we could control her, and we can’t. She has no reason to do anything for us. Having men see her age or get ill, as she inevitably would, is hardly going to reinforce their beliefs. Anyway, it’s too late. The young man has been told that she’s an evil being in the guise of a woman and has to die before she can lead men astray. I’m doing Eilaan and all of our cities a service. That band of men will probably spread their story afterward, and that helps, too. If anyone’s expelled in the future, men will be more likely to think that she might also be an evil one sent to tempt them.”

  I recalled what Yvara had said about a refuge for exiles. Our city had found Birana out, but perhaps other exiles had survived and had not been discovered. Images of women concealed in hideaways in unknown lands filled my mind before I realized how impossible that was. There would be no insemination for such women, and therefore no daughters to preserve such a refuge; the alternative was too repugnant to consider. I had seen the outside; that Birana had lived at all was a miracle. She could never have escaped discovery; a careless word from any man who had seen her, uttered during prayers in a shrine, would have been enough to give her away.

  “How are you going to kill her, then?” I asked.

  “Arvil will do that for us. He’ll be afraid not to. We’ll embed the suggestion in him. By the time he leaves the wall, he’ll be itching to do away with her and save his band.”

  “I see,” I said bitterly. “You want to make sure that no one acts against Arvil’s band, as we could. You want to make certain that the city doesn’t send a ship against them, because then your precious Button wouldn’t have a band to protect him.”

  Her face grew even paler.

  “I’ll bet this was your idea and not Eilaan’s.”

  “Eilaan has her own reasons not to bring this before the Council.”

  “You didn’t want the Council to handle it, either,” I said. “You’d rather send my twin out to kill Birana so that Button still has a chance to live.” I could see by the pained look in Mother’s eyes that I had hit close to the truth. My arguments were pointless and futile; I was only trying to ease my shame at having done nothing for Birana before. “It doesn’t seem right. Birana didn’t deserve to be exiled. She doesn’t deserve such a death. You want her to die and Button to live.”

  Mother’s face contorted. She clutched at her belly, as though I had delivered a blow. I should have understood the struggle going on inside her, how torn she was by everything that had happened; instead, I was thinking that if she had sent Button out earlier and had not summoned Arvil to the wall, she would not be facing this dilemma now.

  “I thought you would understand,” she said hoarsely. “I’ve seen my duty, as you hoped I would. I was thinking of you, too. I didn’t want to see more shame come to you because of my actions. I said I was going to talk to you. Even Eilaan thinks it’s time that you learned about difficult and unpleasant decisions.” She was silent, and then continued in a calmer voice. “I’m taking Button to the wall today. I want you to come with me.”

  “Why?”

  “So that you’ll see what it’s like. So you’ll be prepared when the time comes for you to send a boy of your own out. You were anxious enough to take him there before.”

  I want
ed to refuse. Those were not her reasons; she needed me with her for obscure motives of her own. She wanted to share her deeds and perhaps to punish me in some way. But her cold gaze cowed me, and I was unable to stand against her.

  I said, “I’ll go with you.”

  Button was silent as we entered the tunnel and boarded a car, but when he saw that we were speeding toward the wall, he began to scream.

  Mother raised her hand. The slap reddened his cheek. Mother had never struck him before; she covered her face as if ashamed. Button shrank from us and hunkered down on the floor; he glanced at me and then turned away.

  As we left the tunnel and walked outside, he freed himself from Mother and sprinted away. I dashed after him and grabbed him by one arm, not caring how hard I gripped him. Mother caught up with me and took his other arm; we dragged him to the wall. He shrieked.

  “It’ll be all right,” Mother said as the door opened. “You’re going to have a wonderful time. You’ll meet other boys and learn all sorts of things.”

  Two patrolwomen hurried toward us and took Button’s hands as Mother told them who we were and why we had come. Button screamed and kicked one patrolwoman in the leg. “You didn’t prepare him very well,” she said accusingly to Mother. “Others don’t scream this much.”

  “Let him scream,” Mother said.

  “It’s unpleasant enough without all this fuss,” the other patrolwoman said. We followed them down the hall; I wondered how many others the two had sent out. Button was between them, being dragged backward by his arms; his face was red. “Mother, Mother! I won’t do anything bad, I promise! Take me home! Mother!” He twisted but was unable to free himself.

  “Take a last look,” Mother said to me as we stopped in front of one numbered door. “That’s the last you’ll see of the Button you know.” The patrolwomen dragged him away as the long hallway echoed with his sobs.