The 97th Step (28 page)

Bolt said, "They have to be turned, like this."

The priest reached up and grabbed two of the bottles and twisted them slightly. Then he moved his hands and turned two more. Pen watched, amazed, as the man rapidly gave each bottle in the rack a similar turn, working in pairs. It only took a moment to move all the bottles. There were about a hundred or so of them in the rack.

"An hour from now, we move them again, this way." He demonstrated. "There is a sequence we use, it's similar in all champagne wineries, though not exactly the same. Here, here, here, then this way, like this, like so."

"What's the purpose?" Pen asked.

"To settle the dead yeast into the neck, next to the cap. In a month, all of the sediment will be there. We quick-freeze the end of the neck, allow the pressure to extrude the plug, add some sugar, and cork the bottle."

Pen nodded.

"Be very careful," Bolt said. "The pressure of the carbon dioxide inside the bottles is between six and eight atmospheres. Jostling a bottle or dropping it might result in an explosion. Such a glass bomb can be very dangerous."

"Why not do this with machinery, then? Surely there are such devices?"

"Yes. But hardly cost effective for such a small operation. Besides, hand riddling is better, no matter what anyone tells you. Machines have no souls."

So Pen learned the sequence for riddling, moving down the row of eighteen racks, twisting bottles. It was not the most intellectually stimulating job, and the near-darkness of the cool cellar was both quiet and, at times, spooky.

The actual turning took less and less time, as he learned the sequence, and Bolt left him alone to his task.

It did not take long for Pen to spend only a few minutes to finish the entire chore; this left large blocks of empty time, waiting for the next turn. He was encouraged to practice meditation during these spaces, and he tried. In the cool dark, he kept expecting to see the shade of some long-dead priest stalking the corridors. No such specter intruded on his boredom, however. Pity.

When he wasn't turning the maturing bottles of sparkling wine. Pen had another job: working with the bonsai garden just west of the gymnasium. He would emerge from the cellar blinking against the tropical sunshine and walk to the miniature forest, feeling like a giant as he moved among the twisted and tiny trees.

Pruning and shaping bonsai were more exacting than turning wine bottles, but slower still. His teacher here was called Agate, and she was, surprisingly, younger than Pen, a woman with a soft voice and a lilting laugh. She had been born here, she said. He supposed that explained her youth. It brought up all kinds of questions, but he refrained from asking. It might be some kind of test. Virtually everything might be a test these days, and he did not want to make any mistakes. He had already done something to make Moon unhappy with him, though he had yet to figure out what it had been.

Agate taught him the subtle method of using heavy wire to wrap and bend the tiny trees, and how to cut the smallest foliage away without damaging the plants. She showed him how to balance the shapes, to mimic the effect of wind or sun, and she drew diagrams of the garden overall, so that he could see the totality of it, as opposed to mere individual trees. There was, Pen saw, a kind of beauty to working in such a small arena. But very slow sculpture, indeed.

"It can take fifty or a hundred years to bring a bonsai to its essence," she said. "One may not live to see the final product."

"That's discouraging," Pen said. He kept his voice light, a half-joke.

Her answer was a poem—he found out later that she was the most accomplished poet among the siblings—and he puzzled over its meaning for a long time.

Anticipation—It's a ticklish thing really, quivering, exciting, waiting, until it dies—killed by its own self—Lost through virtue of being there.

He wondered, but he did not ask, thinking it might be another test. Instead, he bent wire and urged the limbs of the bonsai into new ways under the young woman's direction.

So went his days for the next month, turning bottles and working with bonsai, both endeavors designed, so he often thought, for a man with less than full mental batteries. Neither sediment settling nor photosynthetic adaptation produced much in the way of visible results, and a man who would do such things full time would have to have the patience of a small stream wearing down a mountain of granite.

Still, he did the chores without complaining. At night, he still had Moon, and that made up for whatever mindless drudgery the days might hold. Besides, there was some kind of purpose in the work, some reason Moon had put him to it. Maybe he would figure it out someday.

Almost another year passed.

Pen lay on his bed, alone, staring at the featureless ceiling. Something was missing.

The test had gone well. Pen had known most of the answers to the oral questions put to him by the panel of instructors. His dance of the pattern had been flawless, if he did say so himself. The written exam had been difficult, but no more so than expected, and overall, his score was nearly ninety percent. Not as high as Von's, nor in the same league with some of the early brothers and sisters, but as high as anybody else had scored in the last fifteen years—and that included Moon. Certainly it was something to be proud of.

The ceremony for full enshroudment would be held in the morning. He would be surrounded by his friends and teachers, the
manto
would be draped over his shoulders by the Elder Sister—his lover Moon—and he would be a Full Brother, with all the rights and privileges attached thereto. He had been at the compound for nearly four years. During that time, he had seldom left the grounds, and he had never left the small island of Manus itself, save for short boat trips around the perimeter. He had no desire to ever leave, for this was his home in a way no other place had ever been. Everything should be perfect, and yet-Something was missing.

There was a lack, some feeling or energy or something he could not pin down. Like a mosquito buzzing just outside his reach, it drew his attention, but when he turned to look directly at it, this
thing
, whatever it was, was no longer there.

What was it? He had Moon, he had status, he had a sense of accomplishment unlike anything he had ever done. His knowledge had increased tremendously, his physical powers were at their peak, he had learned to calm his mind and spirit through quiet meditations. Or so he had thought.

He should be at peace, and yet, he was not. Some unrest bubbled in the caldron of his soul, and he could not see or touch or hear what it was. He only knew that it was there.

He would have asked Moon, but she had withdrawn from him. Not physically, and she was as responsive as ever to his questions, but there was a wall there that had not existed before. He was afraid to thicken the barrier by admitting to a flaw, by being less than perfect. If she knew, it might make things worse, and yet, there was no one else he could talk to about it.

Tomorrow should be the greatest day of his life. Full Shroud, entry into the siblinghood, and the respect and admiration of all who aspired to that same state. But that invisible mosquito buzzed and would not be still, and the faint hum of its wings threatened to become the roar of a giant waterfall in his mind, engulfing and drowning him.

There was something he was missing. He was incomplete, somehow, a piece of truth about him lay hidden. It was within him, he felt, beneath the murk of who he thought he was, and he had to find it or he would never be whole. The thought of it frightened him as much as anything ever had. What if, as he suspected, he figured out how to get to the center of who he was, and—his core was rotten? How would he live with that?

And what would Moon do if she knew?

Twenty-Seven

HE STOOD ON the raised platform in front of the other students and instructors as Moon draped the
manto
over his shoulders.

"Not an end, but a beginning," Moon said. It was the ritual statement that always accompanied the cloak.

Now Pen understood at least a part of its implication. He, for one, did not have all of the answers.

The students cheered as Pen wrapped the cloak around himself and fastened the closures. For the first time, he stood completely dressed in the costume of his order, Full Shroud at last. There was a power in it, despite his newly discovered worry about his spiritual lack. It was what he had worked for all this time. He had come much further than ever he had expected. From a farm boy to thief, to vagrant to priest. How odd life was.

Yes
, came his nagging inner voice,
and now what
?

"So, now what?" Spiral asked. "Off to save the galaxy?" Pen sat across the cafeteria table from his friend, who was maybe six or eight months away from earning his own
manto
. A few other students and faculty sat at nearby tables or moved out after finishing their lunches. The smell of roast duck, a special meal prepared in honor of Pen's promotion, wafted through the room.

"I expect I'll stay and teach slow learners such as yourself how to walk the pattern without falling," Pen said.

"Hey, you haven't seen
me
fall in two months, pal."

"Probably only because I haven't been watching you."

"Funny." Spiral paused to chew thoughtfully at a mouthful of duck in cherry sauce. Despite his joking, Spiral seemed to have an inner peace that radiated outward from him. Pen hadn't noticed it before.

"You seem rather calm these days," Pen said.

Spiral swallowed his food and nodded. "Mmm. I've been having some real clear meditation. Sort of dancing on the edge of a real powerful feeling. Like I'm about to cross over into the promised land. But you know all about that."

Pen nodded mechanically. No. He didn't know. His own meditation had never produced those blissful states some of the siblings achieved. You could see them, glowing like spiritual lamps plugged into the cosmic generator. It was called many things:
Relampago
, the lightning; Zen-mind; siddhi-spirit; sa-madhi; the Buddha-Christ-Baba soul; cosmic consciousness. They were, according to the teachings, all the same. His physiology teacher had been more pragmatic, talking about hyper-oxygenated brains and self-hypnosis, but no one who was around a man or woman burning with the cosmic fire could deny their power: they had been touched by the Finger of God.

A delusion, perhaps, but none the less potent for that. And Spiral assumed that because Pen was higher in rank he was also higher in spiritual achievement. It was not so. Part of his problem. Pen knew. He
should
be higher, he felt, but he had somehow failed.

One of the newer students, dressed only in first layer under-shroud, approached their table.

"Pen?" the young woman asked tentatively. Pen smiled under his hood—she had not been here long enough to pierce the shrouds and recognize the people under them. He remembered when he had been unable to do so. It seemed like such a long time ago.

"Yes?"

"Moon would see you in her office, at your convenience."

"Thank you."

The girl scurried off. Pen stood. "I'd better go see what the old lady wants."

"Who told you we call her that?"

"Nobody, to my face. But I'm not altogether deaf."

As Pen started away, Spiral said, "She probably wants to take back your cloak, Pen. It was all a joke, letting you have it."

It was supposed to be funny, but Pen did not feel like laughing. He had thought the same thing, and the fear it brought up was altogether too real.

Moon stood by the window of her office, staring out through the thincris at something Pen could not see.

She did not turn when, he entered.

"You wanted to see me?"

Still facing away from him, she said, "Yes." Then she turned, slowly, and from her body language, he knew whatever it was she wanted was bad.

"You have learned all we can teach you here," she said. Was that a quaver in her voice? No, it couldn't be. Not Moon. "What you need can't be gotten cooped up in our private world. I—I wish that it could."

Pen stood stock still, feeling rooted to the floor. He knew what was coming. His worst fear, that which he dreaded more than failure, more than death itself.

Moon took a deep breath. It was ragged. Almost a sob.

"You have to leave," she said.

Pen's voice, when he spoke, was as calm as deep vacuum. "I see."

Moon shook her head. "No, you don't. That's my fault. I bound you to me, I wanted what you offered, and I allowed myself to lose my own center. I knew better."

"You regret what we have had together?"

"No. Never that. Only my selfishness. I measured what you needed against what I wanted, and I filled my own cup. I warmed myself by your fire."

"So. You made some kind of mistake—not that I understand what the hell it was—and I have to leave because of it?" He felt the anger fill him with heat.

Moon stood silent for a moment, then closed her eyes. "Yes. Now we both pay the price."

"I am being kicked out of my home! What are
you
losing.

Moon?" The rage flowed now, unchecked, a torrent. "
What the fuck are you losing?!"

Her answer, when it finally came, was soft, a single word: "You."

You
. It killed his anger, flash-froze the heat like a bath of liquid air.

You
. The power of a single word, backed by truth of Moon's emotion and he could not deny the love he felt from her, could not protest, for all her soul seemed wrapped in that word.

"Oh, God, Moon!"

She came to him and they embraced, both crying, like children confronted with the death of loved parents. Tears and sobs and mindless groping for comfort. Somewhere in it, Pen felt a moment of empathy. He did not understand why she was sending him away, but he understood that she truly loved him. That making him leave was done from that love, and that it was the hardest thing Moon had ever faced.

He did not understand, but because he could feel her pain, he accepted it.