by Bobby Adair
Novice Joseph smiled and looked around to check the distance to the nearest clergy, as though one or two of them might have moved. He lowered his voice to a barely audible whisper. "I know why you're here, and I understand now what Father Winthrop saw in you. I understand why you're the Bishop of Brighton. You're a genius."
How Novice Joseph concluded that Franklin was a genius for having made the mistake of loving a Barren Woman did nothing but underscore how stupid a novice Joseph must be. It made no logical sense. Not one speck.
Novice Joseph studied Franklin's expression for a moment and said, "Don't worry. Your secret is safe with me."
Franklin asked, "What are you talking about?"
"The fast," answered Novice Joseph. "I don't understand how you knew what had to be done, but you did. You knew the other Fathers would be so shamed by your morality and sacrifice that they'd be compelled by their faith in The Word to join you. In doing so, their hatred of you for burning Father Nelson has been forgotten."
"Forgotten?" Franklin scoffed.
"No, no," Novice Joseph whispered, putting a hand gently on Franklin's arm to calm him. "You're right, not forgotten. Perhaps forgiven. I think in joining you, they've learned to respect you. They hated you after you burned Father Nelson. I believe they'd have eventually plotted to have you done away with, if you hadn't started this fast."
A time existed not so long ago that Franklin would not have believed that any Father would dare conceive of such a sin, but Franklin was learning all about the depths of men's and women's animosities and the things they were capable of doing to one another. Franklin said, "They'll always hate me for Father Nelson."
"No," Novice Joseph shook his head. "Not now. They've all heard you speak. You have the gift to move men's hearts with your words. They've all heard and seen. Because of Father Nelson, they've harbored doubts. Now, because of the fast, they believe that your words aren't empty, that they mean to you as much as they mean to The People. The clergy is with you."
Franklin sat up and looked around. Every clergyman who'd gathered from the townships and villages had remained in Brighton after the army marched. They were all in the pews, silently meditating or praying. "All because of my…" Franklin was reluctant to voice the lie, "my fast for The People?"
"Yes," Novice Joseph confirmed. "Every one of them."
Chapter 72: Franklin
With a back aching from sitting in a pew for so many long hours, Franklin got up. Most of the clergymen had retired to their quarters already. Some were snoring on the benches. Aside from that, Franklin heard no sounds in the dark Temple.
He pressed his palm to the wood of his bench, testing its softness, deciding whether to spend another night sleeping where he spent his daylight hours sitting. He'd beaten himself down far enough that he felt like he'd reached bottom. It was time to trudge through the coming days under Tenbrook's rule, until the days turned to months and the months to years. He'd worked so hard, traded so much of his integrity away to stay in Winthrop's good graces, just to have a chance to one day sit in Winthrop's seat and make Brighton better than what it was.
But not now.
Fitz had deceived and used him to serve her ambition, a life sharing her bed with one man rather than sharing it with them all; a councilman's wife pulling his strings like a puppeteer. And Franklin had eagerly let her. And that was the seed of the epiphany: Franklin, regardless of his title, was never destined to be a leader. He'd been Winthrop's novice, then Fitz's puppet, and now Tenbrook's servile dog, just as Winthrop had been Blackthorn's barking pet. And if Franklin shucked off Tenbrook's yoke through some miracle, it wouldn't change a thing. Another strong-willed buffoon would appear, see Franklin's inherent flaw, and take advantage of it.
Franklin would always have a master. That was his fate.
So what did it matter whether the master was Winthrop or Tenbrook?
It didn't.
Franklin stretched his stiff knees and ambled out of the dark Temple, headed down the hall toward his quarters. Fitz would be there in the bed they shared. But she'd be asleep, and Franklin would sleep too, under a warm blanket with a pillow under his head. And tomorrow, he'd eat. No, he'd gorge. And he'd send Fitz to The House of Barren Women to fetch him a new whore, and he'd have his way with whomever she brought. And tomorrow night, he'd sleep in the same bed with Fitz again. He'd do the same the following day, and the next. And he'd make Fitz hate him, and in that hate, she'd learn the price of her treachery. And when she finally ran out of false patience and her anger flared, Franklin would tell her to go back to the whorehouse and spend the rest of her life on her back, or else keep his bed warm at night and pretend to be somebody of importance while she fetched new whores at his whim.
That would be her punishment.
Franklin would never be free of Tenbrook, but he'd make sure Fitz got what she deserved for putting him at Tenbrook's mercy, and he'd enjoy the pleasures of the position for which he'd paid so dearly. He'd never be cold again. He'd never be hungry. He'd never labor and sweat. He'd never look at a woman with unfulfilled desire. He'd have whichever ones he pleased, whenever he wanted.
Franklin quietly turned the knob on the door of his quarters and inched the heavy wooden slab open.
The room smelled of smoke and Fitz, and for a second, his heart fluttered painfully to remind him how deep his feelings for her ran.
He closed the door behind him as he stepped inside.
The fire had burned down to embers that glowed dim red, giving Franklin just enough light to find his way to the bed.
He sat down, took off his shoes, and stood back up and removed his Bishop's robe before sitting back on the bed. That's where he stopped, finding it suddenly too painful to lay down in the bed with her.
He wanted to hate her, but it hurt too much.
"I was giving you space," she whispered.
The words, gentle and apologetic in their sound, were nothing but deceit. Franklin knew that now. But knowing made it worse than he realized, because he couldn't discern the falseness in them. Fitz was good with her lies. No wonder Winthrop had taken such a liking to her when Franklin's job had been bringing him nightly harlots.
"Lay down," said Fitz. "You need to sleep. We don't need to talk tonight. Let me hold you."
Franklin shook his head and stared at the shadow of his shoes on the floor, regretting coming into the room in the first place. He wanted to grab his shoes and sleep in the pews again. He wanted to run through the fields in the dark until he reached the gate through the circle wall, and then run into the woods, taking his pain and humiliation with him into the forest. After that, he didn't care what happened. He just wanted to be free.
Why did it have to be Tenbrook she'd bedded? Why did it have to be the man Franklin hated and feared more than any other?
Suddenly he felt her whore's hand on his back. He shuddered.
"Are you sick?" Fitz asked. "You're shivering."
"I'm not shivering," Franklin croaked. "I just don't want you to touch me."
The sound of the blanket being pushed aside and a pillow being knocked to the floor made it clear that Fitz had sat up in bed behind him.
"What?" she asked, angry, challenging. "You don't want me to touch you?"
Franklin shook his head.
She pulled roughly at his shoulder in an attempt to turn him to face her. "You better look at me and tell me what's going on."
Chapter 73: Beck
Beck and Jingo sat by the fire while Ivory and Melora slept. It had been a long day of walking and only Oliver was still awake with them. As usual, Jingo continued speaking. "The toenail color profiteers chose to change the genetic code of another fungus so that it would kill the fungus that was discoloring the toenails. What they didn't realize at first, what nobody even guessed until a year after they were selling their product, was that that fungus they engineered was the spore that we have today, the one that infects men, twists their bodies and minds and turns them into what you call demo
ns."
"You say it took a year before people realized the fungus was something other than a cure for toenail discoloration. Did they not wonder why demons were running in the streets?" Beck asked.
"That is where we get back to the idea of the spark," said Jingo. "The spark turns into a small fire, which if conditions are right, eventually turns into a large fire. And just like today, no person infected with the spore instantly changes from a human to a demon. It takes months, or even years. Or, in rare cases like me, the person never changes into a demon, but is changed into something else." Jingo rubbed a hand over the fungal lumps on his head. "We all look like monsters, I suppose, but for some of us, the fungus opens our minds to a vast potential rather than twisting it and turning us into beasts."
Beck nodded.
Jingo drew in a deep breath. "In Brighton, as soon as you suspect that a person is infected, you burn them. In ancient times, that was unthinkable."
"What did you do with them, then?" Beck asked.
"At first, nothing. It took a long time for symptoms to show. At first there were what you call the smudges, and people didn't know what to think of them. Our doctors took a long time to discover the cause. At first, nobody knew what the smudges would turn into. By the time the first people looked and acted like the demons we have today, the spore had infected hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions." Jingo put a hand over his mouth and rubbed his lips as though he were trying to capture some particularly vile words before they escaped. "I suppose if we had known at the time where it would lead, we could have done something to stop it. We could have employed the solution you use in Brighton. We could have burned all of the infected and perhaps stopped the spore. But probably not."
"Why not?" asked Beck. "How could that be? If you had guessed, or your scientists had figured it out, then surely you could have done something."
Jingo nodded. "Eventually we did figure it out. We did understand the cause. We did know where the spore infection led. But millions were infected by then. Tens of thousands had died at the hands of the demons. It was a different disease that finished us off."
"Another pitfall?" Beck was shocked. "What was that?"
"Our human nature," said Jingo. "It is hard to send a smudged mother, child, or man to the fire." Jingo paused. "It must be hard for you three ministers—"
Beck nodded. "I've had regrets and uncertainties more times than you could know."
"Imagine what a family would go through if they were to make the decision themselves? How long would the parent of a diseased child wait before putting him in the fire? Would he do it after the warts showed up? Or would he wait until the child killed a sibling? Would he ever do it?"
Beck glanced at a sleeping Melora, having heard the story of her mother and brother as they'd eaten their midday meal during the day's hike. He said, "In some cases, a parent might never do it."
"Imagine the argument?" said Jingo. "A parent wouldn't want to kill an infected child. The neighbors might want to. There would be fights. People would take the law into their own hands. Neighbors would murder neighbors. Others would organize on the side of the infected, in hopes of curing them, or at least handling them humanely. Others would want to destroy them all. Then there'd be the profiteers, looking for ways to make money on the suffering. Worse than that would be the charlatans. They'd profit by selling false cures, and the families of the sick would pay anything."
"And your leaders?" asked Beck. "Why didn't they do the necessary thing? Why didn't that stop the spread of the spore? Why didn't they do something with the sick?"
"For the very same reason leaders often fail," said Jingo. "They are too concerned with protecting their power and fighting with their political rivals. The game of politics consumes them. They lose sight of their purpose, which is to see to the well being of the people."
Beck nodded at that. It was the same in Brighton. It always had been. He feared it always would be.
"Our politicians were never able to come together with a solution, except when it was too late, when billions were infected," Jingo said.
The conversation ceased as Jingo focused on bending and stretching his knee, wincing at some pain that Beck assumed was related to the spore. After that, conversation came to a stop. Beck was overwhelmed by the revelation, and by feeling a weight of guilt because he'd been a participant in a governmental system just as inept as the one the Ancients had, the one that had wiped out their billions through selfishness and incompetence.
Jingo seemed depressed for having relived the memories of all humanity's failures leading up to the fall. Beck was depressed because of the futility that he saw in Brighton's brutal struggle to live. The council inflicted the most painful solutions on The People while doing little to build a better life, at least not in the long run. They were simply bouncing their way from disaster to disaster. As Jingo said, they would think they were succeeding, until a big enough pitfall swallowed them and finished the fall that had started with the Ancients.
They had to think differently. Beck just wasn't sure how.
Chapter 74: Franklin
Franklin stood up and shuffled toward the door. He paused when his hand grasped the knob, stuck on whether to go, or where. The pew in the Temple seemed worse, in its way, than where he was. He turned and walked over to one of the wooden chairs by the fire. The joints creaked as he sat.
Fitz didn't move. She stayed on the bed, propped up on an arm, a sleeping gown draped over her, barely covering those breasts that Tenbrook's dirty hands had taken such pleasure in squeezing.
Franklin glanced at her, but quickly turned back to the fires. He couldn't bear to watch Fitz any longer.
Fitz scooted to the edge of the bed with her feet hanging down to the floor. "You're frightening me."
Franklin snorted at her vulnerable voice. He imagined her melting men's resolve with that voice, all but stealing coins from their pockets after she'd pleasured them.
"Why do you look so disgusted when I speak to you?" she asked. "What did I do?"
"Did you think I wouldn't find out?" Franklin snarled.
"Find out what?" Fitz asked. "Nothing was being hidden."
Franklin laughed harshly. "I suppose not. I'm certain I'm the only one in Brighton who doesn't know."
Fitz hung her head and muttered. "I did it for us."
"For us?" Franklin laughed again through his anger and his hurt, tears burning down his cheeks. "For us? You did it for you."
"That's a lie." Fitz got to her feet. "I risked my life just as you have."
"Risked your life?" Franklin asked, mocking her. "Is that what you were doing?"
"I could end up on the pyre as easily as anyone. More so. I'm just a Barren Woman. I'm nothing." Fitz's tears were starting to flow. "Why are talking to me with such cruelty? Was it so wrong of me to go the market? Was it so wrong of me to seek out allies when you were pouting in the Temple and doing nothing?"
"Allies? Market?" Franklin spat. Fitz was trying to make the conversation about something other than her seduction of Tenbrook. "Pouting?" That part hurt. But why not? Everything else hurt. Why not hurtful words? He'd heard married men and women quarrel before, sometimes in the Temple, sometimes in the market. In the years before he'd been in a relationship, he'd always wondered how people could be so hateful to one another with their words, then find a way to come together and share a bed and raise their children. Now he understood at least some of it.
"Yes, you were pouting," said Fitz, "feeling sorry for yourself because sometimes things are hard."
"I'll have you know," Franklin shot back, "the clergymen have rallied to my side. They all believe in me now. They're not against me."
"Is that what Novice Joseph told you?" Fitz asked.
Franklin looked at the fire. He couldn't face her with the half-truth he was spinning. "They've seen my devotion, and now they believe my words are true when I speak to The People. They believe in me. I haven't given up. I'm doing something."
; Fitz shook her head and added a mean laugh to the discourse. "Simple, stupid Novice Joseph. He doesn't know anything I don't tell him. He doesn't have any idea what the clergymen think. And the clergymen are no better than he is. Who do you think told them that you were fasting for The People? Do you think they came up with that idea on their own? No. I told them, because I had to tell them something, so they wouldn't think the leader of their religion was a pouting child."
Franklin wanted to fight back with something, and he grasped at the first thing that came to his mind, a confirmation of a vile thought that had been growing in his heart since Tenbrook had told him what she'd done. "You manipulate men with your lies, because that's what you do. You smile and hypnotize them with your icy, blue bitch eyes, and your big slutty breasts, and that makes men too stupid to think, and they'll do anything you say."
Fitz shook her head. "Where is all this hate coming from?"
"And you let them dream about what you look like with all your clothes on the floor beside the bed, and you encourage them to dream about you, and when that's not enough for you to twist their minds, you let them."
"Let them?" Fitz hollered. "Let them what?"
"You let them touch you and kiss you and bed you to get your way."
"You are a pig! A nasty, sty-rooting, dung-covered, foul-mouthed pig!" she yelled. "You're no different than any of them. Yes, I've laid on my back to beg for coins, because that's what this god-awful town makes me do. I have to live by the rules that the Elders make, that men like you make. And you shame me for it. And why?" Her voice rose to a screech. "Why?"
Fitz crossed the room and planted herself in front of Franklin, glaring down at him, daring him to respond. She shouted, "You didn't mind that I was a whore when your greedy little hands were all over my skin. You didn't care that I came to your bed with Father Winthrop's stink all over me. Not one bit. You couldn't wait to get my dress off. And now that I've risked my life and gone to the market to rally women, hundreds of them, to our cause because you're too busy pouting to do your part, you come in here and sit by the fire like a spoiled little merchant's boy, because you feel threatened by a woman who isn't afraid to stand up and fight after you've given up."
