The Wind From a Burning Woman: Six Stories of Science Fiction (20 page)

But Jeshua had other plans. He did as Thinner told him, resting on one of the racks like a cyborg, stiffening as the girl came in from another door and positioned herself several aisles down. He was sweating profusely, and the smell of his fear nauseated him.

The girl looked at him curiously. You know at dis you in fo? she asked.

He shook his head.

The clamps on the rack closed and held him comfortably but securely. He didnt try to struggle. The room was disassembling itself. Panels beneath the racks retracted, and wheels jutted out. Shivering with their new energy, the racks elevated and wheeled out their charges.

The racks formed a long train down a hall crowded with scurrying machines. Behind them, the hall took itself apart with spewed ropes, fresh-sprouted grasping limbs and feet, wheels and treads.

It was a dance. With the precision of a bed of flowers closing for the night, the city shrank, drew in, pulled itself down from the top, and packed itself onto wide-tread beasts with unfathomable jade eyes. The racks were put on the backs of a trailer like a flat-backed spider, long multiple legs pumping up and down smoothly. A hundred spiders like it carried the remaining racks, and thousands of other choreographed tractors, robots, organic cranes, cyborg monsters, waited in concentric circles around Mandala. A storm gathered to the south about Arats snowy peaks. As the day went on and the city diminished, the grey front swept near, then over. A mantle of cloud hid the disassembly of the upper levels. Rain fell on the ranks of machines and half-machines, and the ground became dark with mud and trampled vegetation. Transparent skins came up over the backs of the spider-trailers, hanging from rigid foam poles. Thinner crawled between the racks and approached Jeshua, who was stiff and sore by now.

Weve let the girl loose, Thinner said. She has no place to go but with us. Will you try to leave?

Jeshua nodded.

Itll only mean trouble for you. But I dont think youll get hurt. Thinner tapped the rack, and the clamps backed away. Night was coming down over the storm. Through the trailer skin, Jeshua could see the citys parts and vehicles switch on interior glows. Rain streaks distorted the lights into ragged splashes and bars. He stretched his arms and legs and winced.

A tall tractor unit surmounted by a blunt-nosed cone rumbled up to the trailer and hooked itself on. The trailer lurched and began to move. The ride on the pumping man-thick legs was surprisingly smooth. Mandala marched through the rain and dark.

By morning, the new site had been chosen.

Jeshua lifted the trailer skin and jumped into the mud. He had slept little during the trek, thinking about what had happened and what he had been told. He was no longer meek and ashamed.

The cities were no longer lost paradises to him. They now had an air of priggishness. They were themselves flawed. He spat into the mud.

But the city had made him whole again. Who had been more responsible: the architect or Mandala itself? He didnt know and hardly cared. He had been taken care of as any unit in Mandala would have been, automatically and efficiently. He coveted his new wholeness, but it didnt make him grateful. It should have been his by a birthright of ten centuries. It had been denied by incompetenceand whatever passed as willful blindness in the cities.

He could not accept it as perpetual error. His people tended to think in terms of will and responsibility.

The maze of vehicles and city parts was quiet now, as if resting before the next effort of reassembly. The air was misty and grey with a heaviness that lowered his spirits.

Ere dis you go?

He turned back to the trailer and saw the girl peering under the skin. Im going to try to get away, he said. I dont belong here. Nobody does.

Lissy. I tol de one, T-Thinner to teach dis me... teach me how to spek li dis you. When you come back, I know by den.

I dont plan on coming back. He looked at her closely. She was wearing the same shift she wore when he first saw her, but a belt had tightened it around her waist. He took a deep breath and backed away a step, his sandals sinking in the mud.

I don know oo you are... who you are... but if Th-Thinner brought you, you must be a good person.

Jeshua widened his eyes. Why?

She shrugged. Dis me just know. She jumped down from the trailer, swinging from a rain-shiny leg. Mud splattered up her bare white calves.

If you, dis me, tought... thought you were bad, Id expec you to brute me right now. But you don. Even though you nebanever have a gol before. Her strained speech started to crack, and she laughed nervously. I was tol abou you en you came. About your problem. She looked at him curiously. How do you feel?

Alive. And I wouldnt be too sure Im not a danger. Ive never had to control myself before.

The girl looked him over coquettishly.

Mandala, it isnt all bad, no good, she said. It took care ob you. Dats good, is it no?

When I go home, Jeshua said, drawing a breath, Im going to tell my people we should come and destroy the cities.

The girl frowned. Li take down?

Piece by piece.

Too much to do. Nobod can do dat.

Enough people can.

No good to do in firs place. No tall.

Its because of them were like savages now.

The girl shimmied up the spiders leg again and motioned for him to follow. He lifted himself and stood on the rounded lip of the back, watching her as she walked with arms balancing to the middle of the vehicle. Look dis, she said. She pointed to the ranked legions of Mandala. The mist was starting to burn off. Shafts of sunlight cut through and brightened wide circles of the plain. De polis, dey are li noting else. Dey are de... She sighed at her lapses. They are the fines thing we eba put together. We should try tsave dem.

But Jeshua was resolute. His face burned with anger as he looked out over the disassembled city. He jumped from the rim and landed in the pounded mud. If theres no place for people in them, theyre useless. Let the architect try to reclaim. Ive got more immediate things to do.

The girl smiled slowly and shook her head. Jeshua stalked off between the vehicles and city parts.

Mandala, broken down, covered at least thirty square miles of the plain. Jeshua took his bearings from a tall rock pinnacle, chose the shortest distance to the edge, and sighted on a peak in Arat. He walked without trouble for a half hour and found himself approaching an attenuated concentration of city fragments. Grass grew up between flattened trails. Taking a final sprint, he stood on the edge of Mandala. He took a deep breath and looked behind to see if anything was following.

He still had his club. He held it in one hand, hefted it, and examined it closely, trying to decide what to do with it if he was bothered. He put it back in his belt, deciding he would need it for the long trip back to his expolis. Behind him, the ranks of vehicles and parts lurched and began to move. Mandala was beginning reconstruction. It was best to escape now.

He ran. The long grass made speed difficult, but he persisted until he stumbled into a burrow and fell over. He got up, rubbed his ankle, decided he was intact, and continued his clumsy springing gait.

In an hour he rested beneath the shade of a copse of trees and laughed to himself. The sun beat down heavily on the plain, and the grass shimmered with a golden heat. It was no time for travel. There was a small puddle held in the cup of a rock, and he drank from that, then slept for a while.

He was awakened by a shoe gently nudging him in the ribs.

Jeshua Tubal Iben Daod, a voice said.

He rolled from his stomach and looked into the face of Sam Daniel the Catholic. Two women and another man, as well as three young children, were behind him jockeying for positions in the coolest shade.

Have you calmed yourself in the wilderness? the Catholic asked. Jeshua sat up and rubbed his eyes. He had nothing to fear. The chief of the guard wasnt acting in his professional capacityhe was traveling, not searching. And besides, Jeshua was returning to the expolis.

I am calmer, thank you, Jeshua said. I apologize for my actions

Its only been a fortnight, Sam Daniel said. Has so much changed since?

I... Jeshua shook his head. I dont think you would believe.

You came from the direction of the traveling city, the Catholic said, sitting on the soft loam. He motioned for the rest of the troop to rest and relax. Meet anything interesting there?

Jeshua nodded. Why have you come this far?

For reasons of health. And to visit the western limb of Expolis Canaan, where my parents live now. My wife has a bad lung ailmentI think an allergic reaction to the new strain of sorghum being planted in the ridge paddies above Bethel-Japhet. We will stay away until the harvest. Have you stayed in other villages near here?

Jeshua shook his head. Sam Daniel, I have always thought you a man of reason and honor. Will you listen with an open mind to my story?

The Catholic considered, then nodded.

I have been inside a city.

He raised his eyebrows. The one on the plain?

Jeshua told him most of the story. Then he stood. Id like you to follow me. Away from the rest. I have proof.

Sam Daniel followed Jeshua behind the rocks, and Jeshua shyly revealed his proof. Sam Daniel stared. Its real? he asked. Jeshua nodded.

Ive been restored. I can go back to Bethel-Japhet and become a regular member of the community.

No one has ever been in a city before. Not for as long as any remember.

Theres at least one other, a girl. Shes from the city chasers.

But the city took itself apart and marched. We had to change our course to go around it or face the hooligans following. How could anyone live in a rebuilding city?

I survived its disassembly. There are ways. And he told about the architect and its extensions. Ive had to twist my thoughts to understand what Ive experienced, he said. But Ive reached a conclusion. We dont belong in the cities, any more than they deserve to have us.

Our shame lies in them.

Then they must be destroyed.

Sam Daniel looked at him sharply. That would be blasphemous. They serve to remind us of our sins.

We were exiled not for our sins, but for what we are human beings! Would you kick a dog from your house because it dreams of hunting during Passoveror Lent? Then why should a city kick its citizens out because of their inner thoughts? Or because of a minoritys actions? They were built with morals too rigid to be practical. They are worse than the most callous priest or judge, like tiny children in their self-righteousness. Theyve caused us to suffer needlessly. And as long as they stand, they remind us of an inferiority and shame that is a lie! We should tear them down to their roots and sow the ground with salt.

Sam Daniel rubbed his nose thoughtfully between two fingers. It goes against everything the expolises stand for, he said. The cities are perfect. They are eternal, and if they are self-righteous, they deserve to be. You of all should know that.

You havent understood, Jeshua said, pacing. They are not perfect, not eternal. They were made by men

Papa! Papa! a child screamed. They ran back to the group. A black tractor-mounted giant with an angular birdlike head and five arms sat ticking quietly near the trees. Sam Daniel called his family back near the center of the copse and looked at Jeshua with fear and anger. Has it come for you?

He nodded.

Then go with it.

Jeshua stepped forward. He didnt look at the Catholic as he said, Tell them what Ive told you. Tell them what Ive done, and what I know we must do.

A boy was moaning softly.

The giant picked Jeshua up delicately with a mandibled arm and set him on its back. It spun around with a spew of dirt and grass, then moved quietly back across the plain to Mandala.

When they arrived, the city was almost finished rebuilding. It looked no different from when hed first seen it, but its order was ugly to him now. He preferred the human asymmetry of brick homes and stone walls. Its noises made him queasy. His reaction grew like steam pressure in a boiler, and his muscles felt tense as a snake about to strike.

The giant set him down in the lowest level of the city. Thinner met him there. Jeshua saw the girl waiting on a platform near the circular design in the shaft.

If it makes any difference to you, we had nothing to do with bringing you back, Thinner said.

If it makes any difference to you, I had nothing to do with returning. Where will you shut me tonight?

Nowhere, Thinner said. You have the run of the city.

And the girl?

What about her?

What does she expect?

You dont make much sense, Thinner said.

Does she expect me to stay and make the best of things?

Ask her. We dont control her, either.

Jeshua walked past the cyborgs and over the circular design, now disordered again. The girl watched him steadily as he approached. He stopped below the platform and looked up at her, hands tightly clenched at his waist.

What do you want from this place? he asked.

Freedom, she said. The choice of what to be, where to live.

But the city wont let you leave. You have no choice.

Yes, the city, I can leave it whenever I want.

Thinner called from across the mall. As soon as the city is put together, you can leave, too. The inventory is policed only during a move.

Jeshuas shoulders slumped, and his bristling stance softened. He had nothing to fight against now, not immediately. He kept his fists clenched, even so.

Im confused, he said.

Stay for the evening, she suggested. Then will you make thought come clear of confusion.

He followed her to his room near the peak of the city. The room hadnt been changed. Before she left him there, he asked what her name was.

Anata, she said. Anata Leucippe.

Do you get lonely in the evenings? he asked, stumbling over the question.

Never, she said. She laughed and turned half-away from him. An now certes am dis em, you no trustable!

She left him by the door. Eat! she called from the corner of the access hall. I be back, around mid of the evening.