Shadows and Smoke Read online

  “Your eyes are fine, we know this. You wouldn’t be here otherwise. Likewise, for your ears and your reflexes. You are physically sound. So why could you not remember a few simple salient facts? Hear a few, clearly shouted words.” She pursed her lips. “Sic semper tyrannis,” she said, enunciating precisely, with a savage grin. “Thus always to tyrants. A battle cry. Words to live by.” She nodded to herself.

  “Your eyes tell you the truth,” she continued. “Your ears hear what happens around you. Your mind is what deceives you. It is always telling itself stories about what it perceives. Most of them are lies, these stories. Your mind is lazy. It seeks shortcuts, and makes up stories. Mistrust your mind and put your faith in what you see.”

  That was Miral. She was also their instructor in the Theory of Minds, which usually happened after their midday meal. But before that were specialized physical training sessions with a rotating set of instructors. Shona was among them. Shona, of the skin so dark it was almost black, and who shone like oiled stone when she sweat under the sun. Miral taught them how to see and think, but Shona taught them how to fight. Shona taught them murder.

  “Again,” she called. Tarl scampered forward, dancing the crossing forward step she’d taught him, that covered ground in quick strides, closing with the enemy. Jin retreated in the counter-step, backing away. Tarl feinted, a quick jab at Jin’s face with his right fist, causing him to slap at it. He spun away, the opposite direction, dropping low and sweeping his leg out to hook Jin’s forward knee.

  His leg swept through air. Jin had known this attack was coming; Tarl frequently led with this, so he had simply waited for it and leapt over it. But Tarl knew Jin knew this, so he continued his twist and rolled onto his shoulder, kicking up with his right leg in a clumsy thrust which caught Jin right in the gut. The wind whooshed out of his mouth, and he dropped like a sack of tubers, clutching at his belly.

  Tarl scampered to his feet and, as Shona taught them, grappled with the still wheezing Jin. He grabbed his head in the proper grip, one hand high on the temple, in the hair, and the other across the jaw, ready to twist. Jin lay still and Shona called out: “Stop!”

  Tarl stopped, rising and helping Jin to his feet. Jin glared at him, and Tarl clapped him on the back. “Good,” Shona said. “A little haphazard, though. If Jin didn’t know you would do that silly spin-kick every time, Tarl, he wouldn’t have opened himself up to that follow-up to the belly. The jump was stupid, in a real fight it would have gotten him killed."

  She turned to the class. "A better response, when the enemy turns his back to you in a spin,” she droned on, grabbing Tarl and forcing him back low into a slow spin, “is to snap-kick him in the face as he comes around.” She demonstrated, her bare foot snapping like a whip just a finger’s-breadth from his face. “Takes the fight right out of them. Again.” She clapped her hands.

  Afterwards was their midday meal. Jin and Tarl usually ate together in the Blue mess, which today, since the weather was favorable, was spread on two wooden trestle tables outside their barracks. The Archivists had the mess-duty today, and Jin nudged him when he noticed their white robes around the tables as they unloaded their baskets of bread and fruit and sliced meats.

  Murn was there. Murn of the flowing ice-white blonde hair and wide eyes. Murnaballa, from the far north and east, she said. Across the great sea. Her people were fishers on an island isolated from the land. They had brought her to the Center the year after he had arrived, and he remembered seeing her, red-eyed from tears, as they mustered out of their Trainee barracks. She was smart and quick and had grown curves that drew stares from the older Trainees. Tarl smiled as she saw him, and his heart thrummed in his chest as she smiled in return.

  He and Jin approached the table. Jin snatched a plate and began filling it, piling it with meat and fruit. Murn motioned to Tarl, and he walked to her. She wore the white of the Archive, with a blue collar band indicating she was a Trainee. She glanced to her left and gestured that they step away for a moment. He waited a breath or two, walking after her as she walked away. The robe was a shapeless, ankle length sack, but the slight breeze in the air pressed it against her as she walked.

  He drank her in with his eyes. Murn was tall, taller by almost a hand than he was. Her skin was the color of honey, her hair so blonde as to be almost white. Her eyes were blue as the sea on a clear day. He found it hard, sometimes, to look at her. He struggled to pull his eyes away. He picked up a plate and absently served himself a slice of meat, a piece of bread, and an apple, before he looked at her again.

  She was waiting, watching him. She held something behind her back. He followed her a few paces away. She revealed what she carried. A small basket covered with a red cloth. She smiled and revealed it with a flourish.

  “Ahhh,” he breathed. Buns, baked to a golden brown. A handful of them, still warm and fragrant. One of his favorites. “You remembered.”

  “I did,” she said, preening. He had told her this was his favorite from the kitchens, usually reserved for the Elders. Sometimes they made their way to the Trainees, but they were usually hours old leftovers by this point. An eastern delicacy from the other side of the world, he had learned. Stuffed with spicy meats and succulent, he was always on the lookout for them. She smiled as he leaned down and smelled them.

  “Thank you,” he said, taking one onto his plate. Then another, at her prompting. He opened his mouth to speak, but Jin had noticed them and come ambling up, chewing a hunk of bread in his hand.

  “Bao!” Jin said, seeing them. He grabbed at the basket, but Murn held it away from him.

  “Ask nicely,” she chided him. “I snuck these out of the ovens.” She looked at Tarl. “So you owe me.”

  “I’ll return the favor happily,” Tarl said, hoping he didn’t sound stupid, saying this. He could never tell, with the words that seemed to spill out of his mouth sometimes.

  But she smiled, eyes twinkling. “Oh, I’ll see that you do.” She glanced back at the table where a larger group of Trainees had approached. “I’ll see you later, in the baths or at the Tree?”

  “At the tree,” he said. “We have the baths tomorrow.”

  “Archivists can go whenever,” she pouted. She loved swimming and had been teasing him lately about the hot baths, which he could only take for a short while. She would lounge in them until the heat beaded her forehead with sweat and then run laughing into the frigid cold pool. The Seeker cadres had scheduled bath time, apart from the others.

  “We have Miral next,” Jin said. “We’ll be at the Tree around sundown, I suspect.” Tarl noted sourly that Jin had just invited himself to join them.

  “Theory of Minds,” Tarl said to her. “It sounds boring.”

  “Oh, it isn’t,” Murn said. “Miral is a good teacher. You’ll see.” She thought for a moment. “I think the Seekers get a different course than we do, more practical than just the theory.” She brightened. “She’s funny, I think. You will like her as you get to know her better.”

  He looked dubious, but she just smiled. “See you later then,” she said, and hurried back to the tables to help serve. Tarl watched her go.

  Jin nudged him. “She’s cute, but why’d she take the other buns with her?” he complained. Tarl glanced meaningfully at his plate, already piled high with food. Jin shrugged. “Just saying,” he mumbled around a mouthful of bun.

  “Wipe your mouth,” Tarl said absently as they settled down in the grass to eat. He looked at Jin. “Why do we get a different course than the Archivists?”

  Jin frowned. “We’re doing different work, I suppose. Or we will be,” Jin said, around a mouthful of food. “We’re supposed to find Minds, or evidence of them.” He swallowed. “Or decide the place we’re sent is on the wrong track. Lack of evidence. It’s different from what they need to know.”

  Tarl considered this as they ate. They sent the Seekers to other threads, other worlds in the Tapestry. These were like their world, but different. They had seen that in their simu
lation training. Some of the places they had studied were bizarre.

  They had spent their most recent session with Arwal following a Seeker, male this time, as he tried to get into a guarded temple complex of some kind. Religion was strange to Tarl, as the tribes didn’t have any gods. Just a few vague stories about ancestors, or the reverence for the Guides who would visit them from the Center periodically.

  “Religion,” Arwal explained, “is a set of codified values and moral instruction on how to live.” He looked around the room, as he and Jin sat with a half-dozen others in lotus position. The simulation chamber was at least cool, Tarl thought. It was high summer, and the air was thick, wet, and hot. They kept the sim chamber dry and cool. He could feel his tunic cooling on his back as it dried. “They usually pass it to children in stories.”

  “The Tapestry,” he continued, “is rich and varied, and nowhere will you find more variation than in the area of faith. Religion is, as I explained, a set of codes by which people should live. This is the realm of the spiritual which usually means the unexplained or unexplainable. The numinous, we sometimes call it this sphere of concerns. Religion usually has incentives, which the faithful receive as awards for correct behavior. And it can have punishment, for acts or crimes which deviate from what they consider good or proper.” He smiled. “One could say that the Center is a kind of church or temple, and I am a sort of priest.”

  He waggled a finger at them. “But this is not a good analogy. Here, we are not guessing.” He smiled. “On other worlds than ours, religion starts as a way people can explain their world. They weave stories into myth, coerce myth into legend and allegory. A King, for example, may be revered. But Kings die, correct?” They nodded and made a scooping motion with his hands, raising something up.

  “People will tell stories of this King, how wonderful he was for his people.” He laughed. “And perhaps he was! Sometimes they are. But humans are opportunists, and stories about that King might pass some of his legitimacy, his people’s goodwill, his power”—he nodded emphatically at this—“onto his son, or his successors.” He regarded them. “Now tell me,” he offered, “what kind of social construct does this sound like?”

  Jin raised his hand, and Arwal nodded at him. “A political one,” he said. “Using the story of a King to gather support for his children is political.” He nodded to himself.

  “Very good,” Arwal told him. “Religion and politics are, we find, usually the same thing. One reinforces the other. Kings use religion to preserve their power. And religions, conversely, use Kings to preserve theirs. Most people in most places are ignorant, untaught, unschooled. They will believe,” Arwal said, “what they are told. Especially if you tell them these things as children. Does this sound familiar?”

  Tarl raised his hand. “They gathered us as children,” he said carefully when Arwal acknowledged him. “And we are schooled from a young age here. How is this different?”

  “Is it different?” Arwal asked. “I can tell you that it is different.” He smiled wickedly at them. “But you don’t know yet, so take my word for it. For now.” He waved at the surrounding room. “But you will learn, as you become Seekers, that what we deal in here at the Center is not a myth, not superstition, but is truth. Religions are guesses and stories and, frankly, self-serving lies.”

  He frowned. “But sometimes lies can comfort us.” He waggled his head. “You will see that too, and this mission you are about to study will show you some of.” He paused thoughtfully. “And it will show you other things. Darker things.”

  They spent the afternoon reviewing the mission, discussing the simulation setup several times before running it. In it, the male Seeker tried to sneak into the inner temple complex in what appeared to be a large city. The city was bewildering to Tarl. It was full of people, more than had ever seen in his life.

  Gray stone buildings towered towards the sky, sheathed with glass so that they glowed in the afternoon light. The streets were broad and crowded with vehicles of all sizes. Clouds glowered on the horizon, as they followed the Seeker down a tunnel at street level, where he waited with others on a platform for a carriage that emerged from a dank tunnel. The carriage was blue and white and had script Tarl couldn’t read emblazoned in a dozen sizes and fonts on its side. Numbers, he could read. “35” was one of them, and he was pleased with himself at recognizing the numbers. This place was, he guessed, of Arabic or Semitic origin, as those numerals were only used in such threads.

  They crowded into the carriage with the Seeker which was disorientating. About twenty or thirty other people crammed in with them, which meant that Tarl found himself half-embedded inside a large woman with a red face the color of meat and pale, mottled skin. She smelled of garlic and sweat, and he was glad when the carriage lurched to a stop.

  “Western Temple Station,” a voice from the carriage announced, and their Seeker exited with most of the others. Tarl saw men in gray uniforms, who carried guns and consulted with flat, slate-like devices that cast a blue light on their faces. These men seemed to scrutinize all who passed them, and he noticed the Seeker turned down paths to avoid them whenever he could. Tarl studied his face, but detected no sign of concern, the man’s features remained as bland and impassive as the rest of the locals they passed in the corners. People seemed to not look at each other, Tarl noticed. They’re scared, he thought. Scared of the guards.

  They followed as the Seeker navigated a warren of stairs and corridors, finally emerging onto a wide plaza surrounded by tall buildings of white stone, fronted by columns of marble tall as trees. A statue of a man dominated the center of the plaza, tall and imposing. He wore a head covering of some kind, capped by a golden crown formed of two intertwined serpents, their heads at each temple. The statue had a long robe, expertly carved from the marble, which bore a golden sigil on its chest, a double triangle that formed a six-sided star. His hand was raised towards them, palm out, two fingers raised. Tarl did not like his eyes, they seemed to watch him as they passed.

  “This is their god,” Jin said, his voice lowered. “It must be, with such a central placement.” There were people crossing the plaza singly and in small groups, but everyone seemed to be heading somewhere and keeping their heads down. Several of them bore black rectangular cases with handles at their sides and wore short-brimmed hats and suits of gray cloth. These men looked grim.

  “Why are you whispering?” Tarl said, forcing his voice louder. “They can’t hear us.” He looked at the statue. “I think this is a religious leader, not the god. An intermediary. Political.”

  “I don’t like this place. It’s…frightening,” Jin said after a moment’s thought. “These guards are everywhere, and there are devices that look like eyes mounted on the buildings.” He pointed.

  Tarl followed his arm and saw the glint of glass high atop the corner of a fold in one building. Optics, he decided. They had studied such tools. They were useful in magnifying and focusing light and were often used by Technological threads to build imaging systems for remote surveillance.

  Their Seeker aimed for a side door, which led onto the plaza. Tarl had just looked that way when another door behind him flew open, and four men dressed in gray jogged out towards them. Three of them had guns raised, and they spread out to the left and right and center of the Seeker. The fourth bore a tablet that had a sort of handle on its rear side.

  This man raised the tablet, holding its screen towards them. Tarl could see the red double triangle that the marble statue bore on its chest. There was a text underneath it, in large block letters, but he couldn’t make it out. The tablet-bearer ran forward ahead of the central gun-bearer. The guns had lenses mounted atop them. Surveillance imagers, he wondered, as the men stalked forward, or aids for aiming. Or both. He noticed their steps were wide and careful, their feet planted steadily before they took their next step. Well-trained warriors, he thought. It made sense.

  The tablet-bearer shouted something. The words came in their native tongue, then f
ollowed by the translation. This was disconcerting, but he forced himself to listen to the translation, which sounded like an elderly voice, husky and halting. This was jarring, as the man carrying the tablet looked scarcely older than Tarl was.

  “STOP,” it breathed, “ON THE ORDER OF THE TEERSHATHA,” then a pause, “uh, LEADER,” the voice continued. Tarl looked askance at Jin, who returned the glance with raised eyebrows. The translation was bad. Tarl dodged around a knot of four women in shawls that veered in front of him. Their ankle-length shawls covered them head to toe, leaving only a slitted gap for their eyes, white with fright.

  Their Seeker stopped, tilting his head back to the sky in resignation. He raised his arms at the shouted commands of the gun-bearers. He went down on his knees and, after more commands, placed his hands behind his head. One man shouldered his weapon and approached him with a thin strip of some flexible material. He lashed it around the Seeker’s hands with quick, practiced motions and dragged him to his feet.

  The Seeker hung his head, as they marched him towards one of the nearer doors. The weapon-bearers shouldered their weapons on short shoulder straps, but the tablet bearer stalked in front of them, the tablet held in front of him. Tarl tapped Jin on his shoulder and jogged forward, getting ahead of their Seeker and his captors to get a better look at it.

  On it was the pulsing image of the six-pointed star, with the block letters scrolling right-to-left on the top and bottom of the bright display. Tarl looked at it but could make out none of the stylized script.

  “You see any of these letterforms before?” Tarl asked Jin, who shook his head. They walked backwards, trying to study the official’s tablet as he stalked through the crowd. The crowd stayed out of his way, Tarl noted, but their heads swiveled towards them, definitely watching. They fear the officials and the men with guns, he thought to himself.