And there were children.
I felt sick at the sight of them, here, in this place, but they were everywhere—dressed in bright colors, though in similar patterns to what the adults wore. I remember the feral children I’d seen in Colorado, but there was no evidence of that abuse here; these boys and girls ran and played happily. A guardian (or teacher) followed groups of them, but it didn’t appear to be a sinister sort of caretaking.
It took me a few moments to spot the underlying pattern, but when I did, the dread grew stronger. The groups of children were not, as I’d first assumed, random. No, they were all composed of the same numberof children—eight—and within each group there were four sets, two wearing blue, two wearing orange, two wearing green, and two wearing a golden yellow. They weren’t organized by age, either; I saw older children and younger wearing the same color. Nor were they organized in any way by the gender of the child. In some groups, boys and girls were evenly distributed, but in others there was a predominance of one or the other.
I went back to the colors—blue, orange, green, gold.
Blue for water—Weather Wardens. Orange must be Fire, and green reserved for Earth.
But that left gold. And I didn’t know what it meant.
We reached the lodge marked with our number, and entered. Inside, it was exactly what I’d expected—a long, low building, filled with two-level cots. Each cot was neatly made, and contained exactly the same things—sheets, a pillow, a blanket, and a small black pouch hanging from the end like a saddlebag. There were warm woven rugs on the bare floor, and gooseneck lamps at each bed. The windows were plentiful, and sunlight poured in to make the room feel almost comfortable. It smelled pleasantly of herbs and soap.
A middle-aged woman came forward, wiping her hands on a red-checked towel, and smiled as she offered me her hand. Her grip was firm and a little moist. “Hello, you must be Laura Rose. And Oriana?” She repeated the handshake. “Wonderful to have you join us. Please, come with me. I’ll show you your bunks.”
Our beds were near the middle of the room, and each of us had been given a top berth. It occurred to me that placing us so, in the middle and up high, made it very difficult for us to do anything unobserved, or to easily slip out. Their warm welcome to the contrary, they didn’t yet trust us.
Under other circumstances, I would have approved of their caution.
On each bed was the same black saddlebag that I saw slung at the foot of each of the others in the room, but ours were sitting squarely in the center of the bed, and each had a small bouquet of flowers leaning against it.
“My name’s Willa,” our greeter said. “I’m the manager of the lodge, so if there’s anything you need, anything you see that needs to be fixed or causes you concern, please come to me. Just ask anybody for Willa; they’ll know me. Oh, and your kit there has soap, toothbrushes, toothpaste, deodorant, lotion, washcloths, towels. There are robes and slippers in the lockers at the back, so find some you like and put your name on the door. Any personal items you don’t have that you need, let me know—that includes medications, okay? We have a library in the center of the camp if you need reading material.”
Oriana looked nervous, but she said, “My doctor says I should take vitamins.”
“Of course. What kind? I can pull them from the stores.”
While Oriana stammered out her requests, I opened my saddlebag and examined the contents. One thing that Willa hadn’t mentioned was that they had included feminine hygiene in their welcome kit, and—surprisingly—a pack of condoms. I took it out, examining it, and held it up to show Willa. She laughed.
“We’re not prudes,” she said. “And we’re not crazy. Our rules are against people getting hurt, that’s all. If you meet someone special here, you should be able to enjoy that.”
Curious.
I dropped the condoms back into the saddlebag, closed it, and draped it at the end of the bed, fiddling until it matched the others in the room. Then, when Oriana turned away, I said, “So what do we do now?”
Willa was making a note on a clipboard, but she glanced up to say, “What do you want to do?”
“Sleep,” I said, and yawned to prove it.
“Then you should go ahead. You can always start your orientation tomorrow, if you’d like. I’ll wake you up for dinner.”
Willa did not seem the harsh taskmistress I’d expected. Oriana tentatively said that she, also, would like to rest, and Willa readily agreed to that as well. I took off my shirt and pants and shoes, and climbed up on the bunk. It was comfortable enough—better than I’d expected. The blankets were thick and warm, and the pillow soft, and to my surprise, I was almost immediately sleepy. It had, in fact, been a hard few days, and here, despite that low-level tingle of power, I felt ... peaceful. There was none of the ever-present noise that I’d come to associate with the modern human world; here, there was silence, except for Willa’s footsteps and the creak of metal as Oriana climbed up to her own rest. I heard the wind against the roof, and the sighing of trees. The distant murmur of voices, and laughter.
Before I slipped off into the darkness, I reached out and located Agent Rostow. It was more difficult connecting with an ungifted human at this distance, but I’d taken care to memorize his aetheric signature. I didn’t waste a lot on the report. Arrived, I vibrated the tiny bones in his ear to say. No trouble.I couldn’t think of anything more to say. If he had questions—and I was sure he would—I wouldn’t be able to hear them in any case.
After that I fell asleep without any hesitation.
I woke to the sound of murmurs and a gentle hand shaking my shoulder. “Time to wake up,” a voice said. Willa, coming to wake me as she’d promised. “Dinner.”
“Thank you,” I said, and sat up. The air was cool now, and I shivered as I put on my shirt and pants and slipped on the canvas shoes. Willa had draped a sweater over the end of the bed, of nubby gray material, and I put it on to cut the chill. I smelled spices, meats, fresh breads, and it made my stomach rumble in frustration. Willa had moved on to rousing Oriana, and as I hopped down from the bunk, she said, “Go on out. The food hall is next door; just follow your nose.”
I stepped outside. While I’d been sleeping, the day had slipped into twilight, and the sky was a translucent dark blue, with the black shapes of trees outlined against it. More surprising, though, were the streams of people moving past the lodge—gray-dressed men and women of all ages, all races, laughing and talking as they headed for their dinner break. I had expected a certain paranoia, a pervasive atmosphere of oppression, but it wasn’t so, not at all. Somehow, these people seemed ... happy.
I stood there for a moment, an outsider to the general feeling of community, and my gaze fixed on a man walking with a small group. Like all of them, they were animatedly talking, but there was something about him that caught my attention. A nice, mobile face, a little too firm in the jaw, and piercing gray eyes as he glanced my way. He had shaggy brown hair, and he was tall, with strength in the broad shoulders. I couldn’t guess his age immediately—anything between thirty and fifty, though I guessed closer to forty, based on the slender strands of gray in his hair.
He slowed, and indicated me to his friends, then broke off to walk toward me. I was standing on a step that led up to the lodge, but even so, we were almost at eye level. “Welcome,” he said. He had a deep, warm voice, and his smile had a sweetness I didn’t expect. He held out a hand to me. “I’m Will. Very pleased to meet you ...”
I was surprised by the warmth of his grip, and it took a moment before I could order my thoughts enough to say, “Laura Rose.”
“Laura,” he repeated, and somehow, he gave my name a beauty that I didn’t think it should have possessed. “On your way to dinner, Laura?”
“I suppose.”