Fledgling(101)

“I know nothing about the killing of those families,” he said in response to my question. “My family had nothing to do with any of that. We would never take part in such things.”

I ignored this. “Did you help other members of your family collect humans in Los Angeles or in Pasadena, humans who were later used to kill the Matthews and the Petrescus?”

“I did not! None of us did. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that your male and female families destroyed each other.”

Russell winced, but Alan didn’t see it because he was glaring at me.

“Is that what you believe?” I asked. “Do you believe that my mothers and sisters and my father and brothers killed one another?”

He began to look uncomfortable. “Maybe,” he muttered. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know what you believe?”

He glared at me. “I believe my family had nothing to do with what happened, that’s what I believe. My family is honorable and it’s Ina!”

“Do you believe that my families killed each other?”

He looked around angrily, glancing at his new advocate, Ion Andrei, who had apparently decided not to get into this particular foolish argument. “I don’t know what they did,” he muttered angrily. He held his hands in front of him, one clutching the other.

I sighed. “All right,” I said. “Let’s see what you believe about something else. Several humans were used to kill my families. How do you feel about that? Are humans just tools for us to use whenever we find a use for them?”

“No!” he said. “Of course not.” He looked at me with contempt. “No true Ina could even ask such a question.” He suddenly swung his arms at his sides, then held them in front of him again, as though he didn’t know what to do with them.

“What are human, then. What are they to you?”

He stopped glaring at me and looked uncertainly at Russell.

Russell said, “What do his opinions of humans have to do with the deaths of your families?”

“Humans were used as the killer’s surrogates,” I said. “What do you think of using them that way?”

“Me?” Russell asked.

“You,” I said.

“Have you finished questioning Alan, then?”

“I haven’t. But you did jump in and it’s my time to ask questions. You’ve had yours. If you would like, though, I will question you as soon as I finish with Alan.”

He looked both confused and annoyed. Since he didn’t seem to know what to say, I returned my attention to Alan.

“Are humans tools, then? Should we be free to use them according to our needs?”

“Of course not!”

“Is it wrong to send humans out to kill Ina and their symbionts?”

“Of course it’s wrong!”

“Do you know anyone who has ever done that?”

“No!” He almost shouted the word. The sound of his own voice magnified by the microphone seemed to startle him, and he was silent for a moment. Then he repeated, “No. Of course not. No.”

Every one of his responses to my questions about humans were lies. I suspected that his brothers lied when I questioned them. I wanted to believe they were lying. But my senses told me that Alan, with his little twitches and his false outrage … Alan was definitely lying.

If I could see it, anyone on the Council could see it.





Twenty-seven

When the second night of the Council ended, I was exhausted and yet restless. I wasn’t hungry, and I couldn’t have slept. I needed to run. I thought if I circled the community, running as fast as I could, I might burn off some of my tension.

I got up from my table and joined my symbionts. I walked outside with them, and we headed back toward the guest house.

“What’s to stop Katharine Dahlman from escaping?” Wright asked. “She could decide to join her symbiont in Texas or wherever he is.”

“She won’t run,” Joel said. “She’s got too much pride. She won’t shame herself or her family by running. Besides …” He paused. I glanced back at him. “Besides,” he said to me, “she might believe that she has a better chance of surviving if she stays here and takes her punishment.”

I said nothing. I only looked at him.

He shrugged.

At the guest house, the four of them went straight to the kitchen. While they were preparing themselves a meal, I went out to run. I didn’t begin to feel right until I’d had done not one, but three laps around the community. I was the only one running. Everyone else, Ina and human, had trudged back to their meals and their beds.

When I came in, I avoided the kitchen and dining room where I could hear all four of my symbionts and the six Rappaport symbionts moving around, talking, eating. I went upstairs and took a shower. I was planning to spend the night with Joel. My custom was that I could taste anyone anytime—a small delight for me and for my symbionts, a pleasure greater than a kiss, but not as intense as feeding or making love. I made sure, though, that I took a complete meal from each of them only every fifth night.

Now it would have to be every fourth. I would soon have to-get more symbionts, but how could I think about doing that now?

Dry and dressed in one of Wright’s T-shirts, I somehow wound up in Theodora’s room. I wasn’t thinking. Her scent drew me. I sat down on her bed, then stretched out on it, surrounded by her scent. I closed my eyes, and it was as though she would come through the door any minute and see me there and look at me in her sidelong way and come onto the bed with me, laughing.