Semiosis Page 18

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  If I could write tonight, if I had a pen and paper and the tranquility to write, this is what I would say:

  Day 376. In a way, I feel sorry for Jersey. But not very. Right now, I would be glad to feed her to Stevland.

  I had things to tell him this morning, and the smart fruit makes me impatient because time moves so slowly I can’t stand it. I bundled up to walk to the greenhouse through empty streets as clouds over the mountains glowed faintly pink with the sunrise. Humidity fogged the roof inside the greenhouse. I lit a candle—one that Rose had made—and sat down, prepared to talk about a new idea for investigation, about bringing more people in, but Stevland wrote first:

  “A foraging root of an outpost of mine reports human flesh in the soil.” He explained that the outpost grew near the giant ponytail tree on the route to Lief’s beautiful waterfall in the east mountains. Stevland’s roots, fine as threads, interconnect like a web covering hills and fields well beyond the city. He speculated that the body had been buried some time ago and that the recent rain had washed its scent, as he put it, through the soil.

  It had to be Lief. I left right away so I could investigate the site without anyone asking where I was going. Smart fruit: no patience. I took a shovel, some supplies, wrote a note to my husband, passed the special bamboo flower buds growing near the riverside gate in tribute to Harry, crossed the rope bridge, and passed the statue Harry had made of Uncle Higgins, a boulder carved into a half-human, half-lion figure, laughing, holding a glass of truffle. Behind me in the city, white, fragrant smoke began to rise from the bakery chimney.

  By noon, I saw the tree towering over the forest, the tallest tree in the world, we thought as children, and as far as we know as adults, it’s true. Stevland says it’s the oldest living thing he knows of. It rises from a gnarled gray trunk so big that twenty-five people can ring it hand in hand, and high over our heads the trunk splits again and again into fans that end in sprays of long, fine leaves like human hair with needle-sharp points. Smaller versions grow in our gardens, where they look pretty, rather than grotesquely powerful like the tree. Stevland calls it sluggish and uncurious. It might not notice and wouldn’t care that a human being had been buried near its east side.

  The east side of the tree included a lot of territory. I guessed that one muddy spot behind some bushes near Stevland’s outpost might be the place, but I quickly uncovered enough old tree roots to know better. I tried another spot. I found an old boxer bird burrow with the remains of the bird inside. A section of the path some distance from the tree had an oddly raised area between two big roots, as if someone had built a bit of a bridge over a muddy spot. Burying Lief beneath our feet might have been macabre enough for the killer, and it was. Just beneath the ground were a lot of rocks, none too big for a grandmother like me to haul out. Beneath them was Lief. The remains of his clothing was proof. Face-up. Hands and feet had probably been tied, judging from their placement. Bow and knife alongside the body.

  Not much more could be told. Little remained even to reek. Sponge worms had replaced some of the flesh, and the bones themselves were being drilled away by termite worms for their calcium. I re-covered Lief. If I hurried, I might be home by sunset. Eighty suspects still waited on my list, but at least he wasn’t on it anymore. I began to review the list as I walked.

  A pebble rattled behind me. A dead leaf crunched. A bat settled into a tree, only to be startled again. I turned around and saw nothing. It might be an eagle or other predator—unlikely, though, since hunters try to keep the woods clear. More likely, I was being followed by the killer, since no one else would hide from me. He or she would realize I was investigating the murders. If I hurried to the safety of the city, I would not see who the killer was. If the killer meant to kill me, I might be ambushed.

  I had my steel knife, I had fruit that made me just slightly faster than anyone and, as I understood later, overconfident. I decided to try confrontation.

  I walked back toward the ponytail tree. Its fuzzy green crown rose like a giant tufted head over the other trees. I passed it, and somehow, a kilometer later, the killer had gotten behind me. I heard the distant footsteps again. I stepped off the path behind an empty bluebird reef and tossed a pebble ahead so it might sound like I had continued forward. A few little nine-legged crabs hissed at me from the burrows they had appropriated. I crouched, hoping my dark clothes would look like a shadow.

  Footsteps approached, a bit hesitantly. I squinted around the reef. Jersey tiptoed past, stopping at a curve in the path to peek down it before continuing. Jersey. Jersey?

  Yes. With her mathematics dress, with a bow and quiver of arrows, with all the stealth she could manage.

  I waited, then followed her. Perhaps she thought to trap me, but I knew the path, too. A rainbow bamboo grove grew not much farther along. I paused there, waiting for her to discover my trick and turn around. Stevland’s outpost would see me and send back word.

  I waited, ate a smart fruit, ate some pemmican, emptied my canteen. My hips hurt. I considered what to ask her: Why? Why torture Harry? Why kill anyone? I imagined capturing her somehow and bringing her back to the city—how? I needed to figure that out soon. How would people react? Not well, probably.

  The smart fruit made me impatient. Something, I decided, was going on ahead and I had to know what. I walked for a long way. I found nothing. Suddenly Lux was setting.

  Too late to turn back: smart fruit indeed. A little farther ahead I knew I’d find a shelter built for travelers on the way to the waterfall. It would be stocked with firewood and a few pots and blankets if no animals had filched them. Jersey might be there, but what choice did I have?

  The small, domed fortress stood in a clearing on one side of the path. Stone and brick rose to a double-thick glass roof, round like a house but without bays. Slits high in the walls allowed those inside to peer out and, if necessary, fire arrows or darts. I circled it slowly. The heavy door stood high above the ground, shut tight. The ladder to reach it was nowhere in sight. A tiny owl peeked out of a burrow near the building and bristled. A wisp of green in the sky foretold auroras. No light glowed through the roof. If someone was inside, they hadn’t lit a fire—but was that a hint of smoke in the air?

  I reached up with a stick to scratch at the lower edge of the door like a lizard or tree crab. Silence. I scratched again. Silence. Or not quite. A whine, very faint. Maybe just a moth.

  Then the rasp inside like a foot on a floor. Jersey?

  I didn’t want to spend the night outside and discover what predators might be in the area, but if she was inside I might be safer out there. A grove of bamboo grew on the other side of the path. Stevland’s guard thistles would provide a haven of sorts. Back home, my absence would have been noted, and hers, too. By tomorrow, things would be different—provided I survived the night.

  I took a few steps toward the grove. Something wooden rattled inside the building. A bar being raised on a shutter that blocked an arrow slit? Something squeaked. A leather hinge? She had carried a bow and arrows, hadn’t she? Why hadn’t I noticed? When would the arrow come?

  I stood still—stillness being my only camouflage—and waited. No arrow flew. Finally I turned. The aurora’s greenish glow lit the upper leaves on trees where crabs twinkled. All the arrow slits looked dark and shadowy. I looked down and saw my pale greenish hands floating out of dark sleeves. She could see me. I couldn’t see her. I drew a breath to talk—to say what?

  She giggled and whispered, “You’re trapped, Tatiana.”

  “I can walk away.”

  “Shh. The eagles will hear you. They’re down the path. Listen, you’ll hear them.”

  I listened. Singing bats, barking birds, a howl of a lion at the setting Sun, which suggested that eagles weren’t near, chirping lizards. A breeze in the treetops, followed by a rattle of crabs renewing their claw-holds. But if I played along, she’d stay inside, trapped by her own fear. Something gibbered to the east, probably a mountain s
pider and its cubs come down to fatten on slugs and fish before winter.

  “That?” I whispered.

  “They sing,” she said. “They have a fire. If you beg, I’ll let you in.”

  That was her game: to lure me inside. “Why?” I whispered. “Why did you kill them?”

  She laughed, and I guessed which slit she was talking from. “It will be fun to watch you get eaten. I wish I could come out. I’d tie you to a tree so you couldn’t get away. I hear they like to cook their food by tying it live to a stake and lighting a fire around it.”

  That was pure fiction.

  “You’re afraid, aren’t you?” she said. “And cold. You tried to catch me, but I caught you.” She sounded childlike, as if she were playing a game of frozen tag and could tease the frozen players with impunity. “Did you play fair? Did you play by the rules? Of course you did. You never missed a work assignment. Moderator? I made you moderator. I’ll make you into eagle food.”

  Patient and generous, that was the Jersey I knew. Timid and appeasing at worst. Who was this woman?

  “Think about it,” she said. “Smelly eagles with those big claws. They can hide anywhere. You’ll never see them until they have you. Tomorrow, I’ll say that you tried to kill me. You chased me. I hid, and the eagles rescued me from you. You’re the killer. Everyone will believe it. You’re always sneaking around with all kinds of secrets.”

  When children use that tone of voice, I leave. It makes me crazy. Even as a child, she had never talked like that. But I could change her tone of voice and get honest answers. “At least I have food,” I taunted back.

  “You think you can bribe the eagles?”

  “Not with fruit, but I have it and you don’t. Aren’t you hungry?”

  “What kind of fruit?”

  “Bamboo fruit.”

  “If you don’t give me some, I’ll shout for the eagles to come.”

  “Will you be quiet until dawn?”

  “Absolutely.” She was lying, but that didn’t matter. I threaded four truth fruits on a long twig and held them up to the arrow slit. She snatched them inside. After a moment, she said, “These are weird. They’re poison. They’re going to kill me.”

  “No. They’re new, with vitamins.”

  “Prove it to me. Eat one yourself.”

  I almost said no, but I thought twice. Then answered fast, so she wouldn’t suspect anything. I needed to learn the truth.

  “Sure,” I said.

  One flew out the window and landed on the ground. I stifled my hesitation and picked it up—the smallest one, at least. I hoped I would be emotionally stronger than Roland, or that the smart fruit would cancel out the truth fruit. Or that my habit of never speaking frankly would remain intact. I made sure that she saw me eat the fruit, and I swallowed it in big chunks so I might digest less. It tasted cloyingly sweet and slightly like the iron supplements I took when I was pregnant.

  I waited. I couldn’t spot a moon to judge time with. Another green curtain of light brightened to the north. The aurora rippled and became streaked with red. Crabs and stars twinkled. The spiders continued to jabber.

  I edged closer to the arrow slit. “Is it fun to kill?” The fruit would take effect soon, and when it did, I wanted her to be already talking.

  “You’ll be the most fun of all. I’m not kidding about the eagles. I saw their fire, I heard them. I should call them now.”

  I needed to distract her. “Why your father?”

  Giggles again. The truth fruit hadn’t taken effect or she’d be morose. “I didn’t know how easy killing would be. Or how much fun. I killed kats, but they’re nothing. They don’t beg. Papa begged.”

  “Start from the beginning.”

  “You’re not begging. I thought you’d be the most fun. Tatiana, begging.”

  “Why did you kill him?”

  “But listen, there they are.”

  The jabbering again. It wasn’t spiders. A wind carried a snatch of conversation, of language, full of complex squeaks and squawks. An odd, foul smell. I started to agree—truth fruit at work? I thought hard twice. If she thought eagles were near, she’d call them. “It’s spiders. Spiders hunting fish, teaching their young to hunt.” I could still lie!

  “I saw their fire.”

  I took a deep breath and lied again, each word an effort. “It’s the aurora. You saw it reflected on a puddle.”

  Her footsteps rasped on the stone floor of the building. A shutter hinge squeaked inside. Down the path, something was talking. Could eagles talk? They drummed before attacks, but I heard no drumming. I seemed to smell smoke.

  Jersey came back. “Nothing’s going to kill you, then. I’ll have to kill you.”

  “Why kill me?” The question came easily, since it reflected my true thoughts.

  “No one hurts anyone on Pax. You make sure they don’t. That’s fun, isn’t it? You make people act nice. I can act nice. Imagine making them suffer. Making them dead. I can do that.” Her tone of voice had changed, less playful. “I make them hurt. I surprise them.”

  “I’m surprised. You were never like this.”

  “I was never like this.” She was quiet, then sighed, then was quiet again.

  Don’t stop talking—I wanted to say that. “When did you change?”

  “I don’t know.” Quiet again.

  What was wrong with her? The truth fruit made everyone else talkative. Had she eaten it? “How did you change?” That was an easy, honest question. I waited for her to answer, waited even though I was filled with smart fruit impatience, and was about to ask again when she whined:

  “I wanted to make it stop. To stop thinking.”

  Truth fruit had not made other people more coherent, or her, apparently. “Thinking like what?”

  She whispered an answer so quietly I had to ask her to repeat it. “Hurting people.”

  “Why?”

  “Why? Why hurt my children? I love my children.” She had become morose, finally. “I want to hurt them. I always think about hurting them. I see it. I grab a broom and beat Bram until he’s bloody, his bones break, I knock out his teeth, smash his face … Oh, I hear it, I see it, I smell it. Always, always, always. At the baths I want to drown them. When my husband kisses me, I think I might bite him, chew his throat open. I think it, I feel it, taste it. That’s all I ever think about. I dream about it. I want to make it stop. Stop.”

  I couldn’t recall her so much as looking angrily at her boys. She was telling the truth, though, wasn’t she?

  “To make it stop?” I repeated.

  “I never feel right. No matter how good I am, no matter how I treat the boys, how good, no matter how good I treat my husband, I can’t stop thinking about hurting them. I keep my house neat, I do my work, and it doesn’t do any good. I can feel a knife in my hand and how it would feel to shove it into my husband’s chest. Blood, lots of blood. I see this and I feel this and I worry about this all the time, all the time, when I wake up, when I’m writing to Stevland, when I’m asleep, sometimes I dream about it and it’s all mathematical, an equation about how many times I can hit Bram until he dies. The maximum number.”

  “But you haven’t hurt your children,” I said gently.

  “No. But I couldn’t make it stop. I tried. I tried. It didn’t work. I killed kats. I killed Papa and the others. It didn’t work.”

  I kept all trace of accusation out of my voice: “You thought it would help if you killed them.”

  “If I did it to someone else, I wouldn’t do it to the kids.”

  “You killed your father.”

  “I didn’t plan to. I was looking for a bluebird reef to set fire to and I found him by the ponytail tree. He had fallen and broken his leg. I know you think I hate him, and he was mean when I was young, and I thought I hated him. I thought … I thought I wanted to hurt my children because of him, that’s what I thought when I saw him lying on the ground. I tricked him. I told him I’d make him more comfortable and then get help, and I didn
’t. I piled rocks on him, one by one by one by one until he couldn’t breathe anymore. He begged and suffered and it was everything I thought it would be like. And I thought, I’ve done it. I won’t have to think about doing it to my children. I was free.”

  The truth fruit and smart fruit in my veins made me want to interrupt and tell her she should have gotten counseling. There’s a good counselor at the clinic, Lightning. I swallowed my impulse and waited for her to talk more. “I’m listening.” I forced myself to sound understanding. “You were free.”

  “No, I wasn’t! I still thought about killing my children and my husband. And about Papa. I lived it again and again. Every stone. It was better than thinking about my children. And then I thought about other people, about killing other people. Anyone who was around me. And I thought, if I do it again, then I’ll feel better, I’ll have more to think about. I thought, if I pick someone special and do it horribly, then it will be even better. Harry. Everyone loved Harry, and his work was so important. It would be perfect to kill him.”

  I knew what I needed to know. But truth fruit makes a person talk. I had to stand there and listen to what I didn’t really want to know.

  “It felt good to watch him die so slow. It was better than I imagined. When the slugs came, they took a long time. I was afraid they would go for his eyes first and he couldn’t see and be afraid, but they didn’t. But the next day, I thought about how much I would enjoy tying down my children for the slugs, how I could pile rocks on my husband. I don’t want to, but I can’t stop thinking about how I would do it and enjoy it and I couldn’t stop myself because it would be so much fun.”

  “Then you killed Rose,” I interrupted.

  “I didn’t plan that, but I got the chance, and she’s important, and I thought that if I killed someone who was important, who could tell me what to do, then I could tell myself what to do and what not to do. And if I kill you, you’re the one chasing me. You’re the one who makes me feel guilty. You’re bossy, you’re always pushing people around. If I kill you, then I’ll feel better. I won’t have to worry about being found out. And if I can rest, I’ll have time to change. That’s all I want. I want to stop thinking. I want to stop thinking about you, about Papa, Harry, about my family, about everything, everything, everything. I want to stop!”