by Sharon Hinck
I stepped closer. “I should report you to the saltars.”
He tossed back his head and laughed. “And confess that you spoke with a castoff?” With the speed of a harrier prey bird, he pushed away from the wall and grabbed my arm. He tugged me close. He smelled of the sweet ocean . . . an aroma I hadn’t known in years.
My heart pounded an unsteady rhythm.
His voice was a low growl. “You may think you could expose me, but you’d do well to remember I’m an equal danger to you. You forgot to treat Alcea as invisible. One word about this, and you’ll be the next hobbled castoff.” He shoved me aside and strode away from the Order toward the uneven buildings of Middlemost, careless of where he placed his feet.
I rested a hand against the cool stone of the outer courtyard wall, shaking. He was right. I’d breached a primary rule. I didn’t dare speak of any of this. But what if he was a danger to the Order? There were rumors of enemies from the rim seeking to disrupt our work.
Drawing on my discipline, I uncurled my spine, lifted from the center of my head, and found my alignment. My lips would remain sealed for the time being, but I would stay alert and watch for any sign of Brantley lurking nearby. Meanwhile I needed to remain focused to prepare for my test.
Hurried footsteps approached from the courtyard. An irritated prefect appeared, his hair damp with sweat. “Saltar Kemp is calling for you. Her office.”
I gave a submissive nod, hoping to hide my fear.
He didn’t wait for a response, but walked away, expecting instant obedience.
Before following the prefect inside, I let my gaze travel up to the building encircling our world’s center. Dozens of windows on the outer ring overlooked the courtyards and the tangle of Middlemost below. A huge brass telescope perched on the rooftop parapets. It was as though I was on stage, every misstep on display. Someone could have seen me talking to the dismissed novitiate. Was the destiny to which I’d given my life about to crumble?
We all dreaded a summons here. As I stood on the threshold of the saltar offices, an attendant pushed past me and deposited a heavy bound book of parchments onto the table in front of Saltar Kemp. The saltar sighed and rubbed the back of her neck, but didn’t see me. I hugged the doorway while cobbling together a defense in case anyone had reported seeing me speak to the castoff novitiate.
Attendants hurried from table to table. To the left, High Saltar Tiarel’s private office door stood open. Her large desk was covered with books, papers, and brass tools for measuring stars, winds, and waves, shining symbols of her power. Ignoring the activity in the large outer office, she stood by her picture window looking out at the dancers in the center ground. Balconies allowed other people glimpses of their work from above, but only the High Saltar enjoyed a direct view from her office. From the stiff set of her shoulder blades, whatever she saw didn’t please her.
“A pattern should never be disrupted once it begins,” Saltar River shouted at Saltar Tangleroot, drawing my attention to the opposite side of the room. A young, sharp-edged teacher, Saltar River bore no resemblance to the flowing pattern for which she was named. She terrorized the students in form five, and I still cringed when I remembered her classes. She was the tallest saltar, a detriment for a dancer when uniformity was prized. Yet somehow she’d risen swiftly through the ranks of dancers. Now she towered over Tangleroot, peering down her hooked nose.
Saltar Tangleroot shrunk into herself but stood her ground. “The High Saltar is never wrong. This storm will be too severe if we don’t contain it. We can’t wait.” She paced to the window facing the courtyard and studied the sky. Their arguing created a harsh contrast to the peaceful tapestries adorning the walls.
“Calara Blue, where have you been?” Saltar Kemp’s gruff voice made me flinch. My reckoning was at hand.
She beckoned me toward her table.
I tiptoed forward. How could I convince her to let me stay?
When she registered my worried expression, she gestured toward the window. “Don’t let this ruckus concern you. The High Saltar will make a wise choice. She always does. Although I question this directive.” She picked up a massive book and opened it with a thump.
An attendant brought Saltar Kemp a mug of water and retreated. She sipped it and winced, the tiny wrinkles around her mouth bunching. “Needs more filtering.” She offered it to me. “Here. Taste this.”
I obediently took the mug and sipped. A hint of sweetness and citrus lingered in the water.
“I’m correct, am I not?” she asked.
“You are.” She wouldn’t ask my opinion if she were about to cast me out, would she?
A beleaguered attendant passed behind her chair, and Saltar Kemp grabbed his arm with her arthritic fingers. “Return this to the kitchen and get me some drinkable water.” She leaned back. “The first-form prefect reported that you did an excellent job teaching this afternoon. The saltars have recommended that you continue to work with the first form, taking over their final class of the day.”
The commendation startled me so much, I swayed back on my heels. “I’m . . . I’m honored.”
Saltar Kemp rubbed the bridge of her nose. “I objected of course.”
Disappointment squeezed my ribs. She’d been my greatest advocate in my progression through the ranks and my favorite teacher, yet she didn’t trust I could teach the first-form girls?
“I’m sorry I haven’t earned your faith,” I said quietly.
She drew her chin back and frowned. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m sure you’ll do fine. However, it’s unfair to add duties the week before your final test. You need to rest and review the patterns.”
Her fingers traced illustrations on the open pages before her. “You can refer to these lesson plans. Tomorrow the class is scheduled to study the history of the Order.”
Relief poured over my muscles like warm liquid. She still believed in me. Yes, the task would add to the mounting pressure, but I could handle it. I smiled. “I’m happy to help.”
She handed me the book and studied my posture. It must have held too much confidence because she leaned forward, planting both hands on her desk. “I suspect there may be some on the panel who hope you fail your test. I won’t be able to protect you. You’ll have to be flawless.”
I knew that already. The problem with perfection is that it wasn’t a fixed point. Each time I neared it, it danced away, tantalizing and mocking.
The book weighed heavy in my arms as I plodded up one flight to my dormitory. Recruits too young to begin training were housed on the upper floor with their keepers. At the age of seven, they entered the first form and moved down to the fourth floor beside the second and third forms. Every few years, I had celebrated the move to the next level down—nearer to the ground and nearer to my destiny.
Flickering torches lit the hall with yellow light. My feet glided over stone floors polished smooth by generations of novitiates. Everything about the Order spoke of perfection. I followed the curved hall, bypassing several balconies that overlooked the center ground. The steady beat of drums guided the dancers below through perpetual patterns. They’d work faithfully through the night, holding storms at bay and keeping our world turning.
I hugged the book to my chest, visualizing my deepest hope. In one week, if I proved worthy, I would join them.
Farther down the hall, I opened the door to the sleeping quarters for the fifteenth form, women of about one and twenty. Our beds were made of shredded cattail plants stuffed inside lumpy ticking. Dozens of these mats covered the floor around the edge of the room, leaving the center area open. Damp leggings hung from rope strung across the rafters. Dancers sprawled throughout the room, stretching their splits, bandaging blisters, and massaging aching knots in neck or calf. Windows supplied the natural light of dusk, and a few torches gave extra illumination in preparation for the night. Their smoke combined with wet wool and the perfume of flowering branches someone had set on the windowsills.
Conversations rose and
fell, more subdued than usual. Today’s dismissal had frightened us all, which was probably Saltar Kemp’s intent. Did she really feel a need to remind us of the seriousness of the upcoming test?
Several women saw me enter and called out.
“Calara, you weren’t at supper. I was worried.”
“One of the prefects was looking for you. Did he find you?”
“Where were you?”
I offered vague answers. The women of our form became sisters as we lived, worked, studied, and danced together. But in class we competed against each other, determined to prove our worth. We’d also been trained to report any infractions. When any careless word could be recounted to a prefect or saltar, our trust for each other remained tenuous.
I eased to the floor beside my friend, Starfire Blue. Free of her hood and the tight regulation braid, her auburn hair swirled around her face like torch flames. I marveled—and rejoiced—that she’d risen through the forms in spite of her irrepressible and sometimes irreverent view of life. She sat in a straddle stretch, resting forward on her elbows, but she popped up to tap the book in my lap. “Were you assigned extra study? You didn’t make any mistakes in class, did you?”
“Saltar Kemp asked me to teach the first forms this week.”
Her eyebrows drew together. “Has the saltar been soaking her head in sweet water? How will you manage?”
I rolled my shoulders. “I’ll be fine. If I don’t know the patterns by now, no review session will fix that.”
A break in the rhythm rising from the center ground caused all of us to turn our heads toward the door. High Saltar Tiarel must have made the radical decision to interrupt a pattern before it was complete.
“The storm must be worse than it looked,” Starfire said. Two women raced to close shutters, deepening the darkness in the room. A new drumbeat began, full of nervous triplets.
I didn’t have time to indulge my worry about the coming storm. Instead, I took up a spot on the floor near one of the torches, struggling to read the history lesson notes in the weak light of the flame.
Much later, when my sister novitiates had retired to their mats, I rubbed my burning eyes and put aside the heavy book. I slipped out to the nearest balcony. Overhead, angry clouds blocked the stars, releasing bursts of rain. Uneasy groans rose from the lowest level of the stone tower as the wind stirred deep waves far beneath us. We’d always endured occasional storms, but harsh weather had become more frequent and severe in recent months.
In the center ground, rows of white-clad dancers sculpted precise lines and angles. Their arms urged the storm past, while their feet trampled the earth that turned muddy beneath them. Their movements were powerful, beautiful. I usually drew comfort from watching them, but not tonight. Was Alcea out in this storm, or had she found shelter somewhere in Middlemost? Was Saltar Kemp feeling even a flicker of guilt for sending her out? And Brantley’s outrageous accusation . . . Had someone really wounded her? Or had he?
“I thought you’d be here.” Starfire slipped up beside me and held a hand out to catch the rain. “Hard to believe we’ll be dancing out there in a week.”
The thought once thrilled me, but now turmoil whirled through my mind, as if borne by the harsh wind. “Star, have you ever heard rumors about what happens to the castoffs?”
She shivered and backed into the alcove where the rain couldn’t reach her. “It was sad today, yes?” She tugged me away from the edge. “You’re getting soaked.”
“I know we’re supposed to erase them from our thoughts, but . . .”
Starfire gave me a quick embrace. “You’re too tenderhearted. Remember Saltar River’s favorite proverb. ‘Distraction will approach like carrion birds at the worst times . . .’”
“‘. . . Wave it off and keep your focus true,’” I finished. “Thanks. You’re right. I have too much on my mind already.” I took a calming breath of the chill wet air and followed Starfire back inside. While the drums progressed through the storm pattern, I pictured each step and imagined myself on the field with the other dancers, pouring myself out on the center ground to keep the world turning.
Late-afternoon suns heated the upper-floor hall. After a full day of training, it took all my effort to gather energy to teach. A prefect I didn’t recognize stood by the doorway, his brutish forehead emphasizing a perpetual glower. Sweat prickled along my scalp as I fought off my worry about what he might report to the saltars.
I managed a welcoming smile to the seven-year-olds sitting on the floor around me. Their scarlet tunics were a bit rumpled, and halos of fine hair escaped from their braids. Yet their backs were tall as they sat, feet drawn up, soles together, and knees pressing to the floor as if their legs were little wings.
“Our world, Meriel, appeared one day on a vast ocean with no boundaries. For generations this island world rode the currents, unstable and ever-moving underfoot.”
The girls stared with mouths gaping like fountain fish. Were they excited and eager to learn, or weary from their long day of chores and instructions?
I opened the book Saltar Kemp had lent me and showed them a drawing penned by a saltar from generations past. “Then the Order learned the secret to keep our world in place, rotating around itself. They created the center ground where the ripples are the most subdued, and built this wondrous edifice as a huge ring of protection. They coated the surrounding land with brick and stone to steady it.”
I turned a page and held up the next illustration for the girls to see.
“Every day the dancers’ feet touch the land, teaching it what to do. Each pattern was inspired by a crucial element of our world and can be used to nourish those very things. A flower, a vine, a star, a river. When you came to the Order, you were given your new name. Each year you succeed, you earn a new designation color that becomes your second name. You’ve been chosen among all others to study the patterns. One day, if you work very hard, you’ll join the dance.”
“Have you danced in the center?” one of the little girls piped up, scooting a few inches forward.
I stood and gently slid her back into place, keeping the curved rows of students concentric and even. “Not yet, but that is my deepest hope. I take my test in six days.”
The girls’ intakes of breath reminded me of the wind gusts yesterday afternoon.
“Are you scared?” one of the girls asked. A smattering of freckles adorned her cheeks, and her fiery hair reminded me of Starfire.
I weaved around the semicircles of students, touching a slumping shoulder here, coaxing a chin up there. “I can trust my training. As can each of you. Each year you will have a saltar to teach you. They are the most experienced and wisest of the dancers. If you listen to them carefully, you’ll learn all the beautiful patterns that govern our world.”
I returned to my place at the front of the class and lowered to my knees, turning another page of the book. “Here you can see the oceans that surround our world. Nothing but dangerous sweet water stretching into infinity.”
“I like the sweet water. I liked to swim in it.” A girl with golden hair and a particularly messy braid spoke wistfully, directing her gaze out a window.
Her mention of swimming made it clear she came from a rim village, and she was one of the youngest of the group.
I shot a nervous glance at the prefect in his blood-red tunic. His glower darkened as he listened for my response. “But now you know the truth,” I said firmly. “The sweet water is harmful. We capture clean rain or purify what we gather from the ocean wells.”
She looked ready to argue so I kept talking. “As I was saying, after our world appeared—”
“It didn’t just appear. Meriel was made.” The same girl leaned forward slightly.
“No, it simply appeared.”
Her mouth pursed, and she shook her head. “My grandmother told me there are old stories about a Maker. She told me—”
I interrupted before she could make more injudicious statements. “What’s your name?”
<
br /> “Nolana Scarlet.”
“Well, Nolana, the Order is a special place. When we come here, we put aside our past. We don’t speak of our families, our villages, or any part of those old lives.”
I continued with the history lesson, rushing through pages of the book to give no more opportunity for questions. We covered all the material but still had time left before the end of class.
“You’ve all done a wonderful job listening today. As a reward, I think we could use the remaining time to learn part of a pattern. What do you think?”
Around me, the girls scrambled to their feet, fidgeting and scuffing small bare toes against the floor. Getting them into position was like catching needles as they shook loose from trees and spun to the ground. Was this why my first-form teacher was always so grumpy?
Once I had them positioned correctly, I picked up a hand drum from the side of the room and beat the fern rhythm. “First, close your eyes and listen. Hear how the drum speaks to your feet. In the same way, your feet will one day speak to the earth. Today we’ll only learn the first eight counts, because they need to be perfect.”
I scurried around, coaching, correcting, demonstrating the proper shape of the foot, the stretched line of the leg, the generous arc of the arms. With careful repetition, the girls established the curling frond shape, and practiced the traveling turns moving out from the center line until one girl lost her balance and bumped against another.
The girls giggled, and I laughed with them.
From the doorway, the prefect cleared his throat and crossed his arms. I hurried the students back into position, resenting his reminder of the strict standards of the Order. The sense of fun fled from the girls’ eyes. After scurrying into place, their once-limber muscles now tightened with anxiety.
At last, a bell from the dining hall rang three times from the first floor. The girls lined up by the door. I was tempted to collapse in an exhausted heap, but instead I picked up the history book. As the girls filed out, the prefect grabbed Nolana’s arm. Her scarlet tunic disappeared against the bulk of his crimson garb. “You’re not going to supper. You’ve already been warned about heresy.”
