He didn't hear the door open. Nor did he hear the second set of footsteps pad almost silently across the tiles toward him. But a movement in the girl in front of him—the slightest tensing of her left hand where it rested on his knee—made him open his eyes suddenly and look up, his gaze going to the mirror.
Tender Willow was almost upon him, the knife already raised in her right hand. At once he kicked out with his right leg, pushing Sweet Rain away from him, and lurched forward, out of the seat.
It was not a moment too soon. Tender Willow's knife missed his shoulder by a fraction, tearing into the silken cushioning of the chair, gashing the wooden beading. Wang turned quickly, facing her, twice her weight and a full ch'i taller; but still the girl came on, her face filled with hatred and disgust.
As she thrust the knife at him a second time, he moved forward, knocking her arm away, then, grabbing her neck brutally, he smashed her head down into the arm of the chair, once, then a second time. She fell and lay still.
He stood there a moment, his breath hissing sharply from him, then turned and kicked out at Sweet Rain again, catching her in the stomach so that she wheezed, her breath taken from her. His face was dark now, twisted with rage.
"You foxes . . ." he said quietly, his voice trembling. "You foul little bitches. . ."
He kicked again, catching the fallen girl fully on the side of the head, then turned back and spat on the other girl.
* "You're dead. Both of you."
He looked about him, noting the broken bowl and, beside it, a single white jade pin, then bent down and recovered the knife from the floor. He straightened up, then, with a slight shudder, walked to the door and threw it open, calling the guards.
PART 2 | AUTUMN 2206
Shells
Between the retina and the higher centers of the cortex the innocence of vision is irretrievably lost—it has succumbed to the suggestion of a whole series of hidden persuaders.
—arthur koestler, The Act of Creation
That which we experience in dreams, if we experience it often, is in the end just as much a part of the total economy of our soul as is anything we "really" experience: we are by virtue of it richer or poorer.
—friedrich nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
CHAPTER FIVE
The Innocence of Vision
BEN CAME UPON the cottage from the bay path, climbing the steep slope. At the lower gate he turned, looking back across the bay. New growth crowded the distant foreshore, masking where the fire had raged five years earlier. Only at the hill's crest, where the old house had stood, did the new vegetation end. There the land was fused a glassy black.
The tall seventeen-year-old shook his head, then turned to face the cottage. Landscott was a long low shape against the hill, its old stone walls freshly whitewashed, its roof thatched. A flower garden stretched up to it, its blooms a brilliant splash of color beside the smooth greenness of the lawn. Behind and beside it other cottages dotted the hillside, untenanted yet perfectly maintained. Shells, they were. Part of the great illusion. His eyes passed over them quickly, used to the sight.
He looked down at his left hand where it rested on the gatepost, conscious of a deep, unsatisfied itch at the join between the wrist and the new hand. The kind of itch you couldn't scratch, because it was inside, beneath the flesh. The join was no longer sore, the hand no longer an unaccustomed weight at the end of his arm, as it had been for the first year. Even so, something of his initial sense of awkwardness remained.
The scar had healed, leaving what looked like a machined ridge between what was his and what had been given. The hand itself looked natural enough, but that was only illusion. He had seen what lay beneath the fibrous dermal layer. It was much stronger than his right hand and in subtle ways, much better—far quicker in its responses. He turned it, moving it like the machine it was rather than the hand it pretended to be, then smiled to himself. If he wished, he could have it strengthened and augmented, could transform it into any kind of tool he needed.
He let it fall, then began to climb again, crossing the gradual slope of the upper garden. Halfway across the lawn he slowed, then stopped, surprised, hearing music from inside the cottage. Piano music. He tilted his head, listening, wondering who it was. The phrase was faltering at first, the chords uncertain. Then, a moment later, the same chords were repeated, confidently this time, all sense of hesitation gone.
Curious, he crossed the lawn and went inside. The music was coming from the living room. He went to the doorway and looked in. At the far side of the room his mother was sitting at a piano, her back to him, her hands resting lightly on the keys.
"Mother?" Ben frowned, not understanding. The repetition of the phrase had been assured, almost professional, and his mother did not play.
She turned, surprised to see him there, a slight color at her cheeks. "I. . ." then she laughed and shook her head. "Yes, it was me. Come. I'll show you."
He went across and sat beside her on the long benchlike piano seat. "This is new," he said, looking down at the piano. Then, matter-of-factly, he added, "Besides, you don't play."
"No," she said, but began anyway—a long introductory passage, more complex than the phrase she had been playing; a fast passionate piece played with a confidence and skill the earlier attempt had lacked. He watched her hands moving over the keys, surprised and delighted.
"That's beautiful," he said when she had finished. "What was it?"
"Chopin. From the Preludes." She laughed, then turned and glanced at him, her eyes bright with enjoyment.
"I still don't understand. That was excellent."
"Oh, I wouldn't say that." She leaned back, staring down at the keyboard. "I'm rather rusty. It's a long while since I played."
"Why didn't you play before now?"
"Because it's an obsession."
She had said it without looking at him, as if it explained everything. He looked down at her hands again, saw how they formed shapes above the keys.
"I had to think of you and Meg. I couldn't do both, you understand. Couldn't play and look after you. And I wanted to bring you up. I didn't trust anyone else to do the job."
"So you gave up this?"
If anything, he understood it less. To have such a gift and not use it. It was not possible.
"Oh, there were plenty of times when I felt like playing. I ached to do it. It was like coming off a drug. A strong, addictive drug. And in denying that part of me I genuinely felt less human. But there was no choice. I wanted to be a mother to you, not simply a presence flitting through your lives."
He frowned, not following her. It made him realize how little he knew about her.
She had always been too close, too familiar. He had never thought to ask her about herself, about her life before she had met his father.
"My own mother and father were never there, you see." Her hands formed a major chord, then two quick minors. It sounded familiar; yet, like the Chopin, he couldn't place it.
"I was determined not to do to you what they did to me. I remember how isolated I felt. How unloved." She smiled, reaching across to take his right hand—his human hand—and squeeze it.
"I see."
It awed him to think she had done that for them. He ran the piece she had played through his memory, seeing where she placed emphasis, where she slowed. He could almost feel the music. Almost.
"How does it feel to be able to do that?"
She drew in a long breath, looking through him, suddenly distant, her eyes and mouth lit with the vaguest of smiles; then she shook her head. "No. I can't say. There aren't the words for it. Raised up, I guess. Changed. Different somehow. But I can't say what, exactly."