No Other Love (23 page)

In Merin’s mind a blot of fear began to grow,
canceling out the indescribable joy she had just experienced with
Herne. She was going to have to tell him the truth about herself.
His insistent love would compel her to speak. She could not say she
would marry him, or even refuse him, without explaining.

“I don’t know how to have a child,” she
began, fighting back tears.

“We have just been practicing.” Laughing, he
laid a hand on her abdomen. “As a doctor, I will be happy to
provide the intimate physiological details. The child will grow in
here. Shall I demonstrate again how it enters?”

His teasing manner did not disguise how much
he wanted her to say she would agree. Suddenly, she wanted it, too.
For all of her carefully regulated existence the idea of pregnancy
had been a horror in her mind worse even than the contemplation of
the act of love – which had a very different name in the Oressian
language.

Now a new thought occurred to her. The
Oressian Elders had lied about the pain and physical damage caused
by lovemaking. Could they have lied about childbearing, too? Was it
possible that she might be capable not only of carrying Herne’s
child inside her body, but of surviving its birth? A real child, a
natural child, conceived in hot passion, born of love…Herne’s child
inside her, growing…a child….

“I wish it could be,” she whispered, covering
her face with both hands, knowing that once she had told him
everything, he would want that miracle no longer. Not with her.
Never with her.

“I know we’re in danger, and it’s probably
foolish to talk about having a family,” he said, “but knowing it’s
what we both want will give us something to hang onto. I’ll find a
way out of here, Merin. I’m almost certain I can convince Ananka to
send us back.”

“If you can’t,” she began.

“If I can’t, then we’ll leave Tathan anyway.
We’ll go to Dulan’s retreat at Lake Rhyadur, where we know the
Cetans won’t find us, and we’ll live there. We can leave a message
there for Tarik, so he’ll know what has happened to us.”

“It’s a dream,” Merin said. “It can never be.
You won’t want it.”

“It can be,” he insisted. “Whether here, or
in our own time, I’ll make certain you are safe.”

“I cannot marry you.”

“Why not? You can’t deny that you want me.”
When she tried to get off the bed, he reached for her, but she
eluded him. “Merin, answer me. Why won’t you marry me?”

“I cannot bear to tell you.” Tears were
running down her cheeks. She knew he would insist upon knowing
everything, and the thought of telling him was breaking her heart.
She made one last, foolish effort to stop what was inevitable,
taking refuge one final time in the standard Oressian phrase of
denial. “I am forbidden to tell you.”

“I thought we were finished with those old
excuses.” They were both standing now, Herne holding onto her hands
so she could not cover her face again or try to run away from him.
“Merin, I have just asked you to be my wife. For a Sibirnan, that
is no small thing. I deserve a better answer than just, ‘I am
forbidden to tell you.’”

For a long time she stared at the floor
rather than at him, trying to gather her courage while he held her
hands as if they were tethering him to life itself. Then the weight
of the terrible secrets she had been carrying since leaving Oressia
became too great for her to bear the burden any longer. Her
shoulders slumped. She took two steps backward and lifted her head
to look directly at him.

“You are right, Herne. You do deserve an
explanation. Your honest proposal, the love we have repeatedly
made, and the emotions you have made it possible for me to feel,
all have negated my oath never to speak of Oressian customs, just
as my telling you the truth of my origins will dissolve all the
beautiful promises you have made to me, all the sweet and gentle
oaths you thought would bind us together forever. Let me cover my
nakedness first, then I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, for
when I have finished you won’t want to look at me any longer.”

“Wrap yourself in this.” He handed her the
towel she had used earlier. While he was searching for his own
towel, she disappeared into the bathing room. He found her standing
with her back to him, in the doorway to the enclosed garden. She
looked at the plants instead of at him while she spoke. Winding his
towel about his waist once more, Herne walked across the room to
stand beside her.

“Long ago,” she began, “Oressia was a world
of profligate and violent passions. Wars were fought for foolish
reasons, or for no reason at all except the love of killing.
Rampant lust led to diseases and unhappiness. Oressian culture
seemed doomed because the people would not control or even postpone
their simplest desires. Every wish must be gratified immediately.
There are vast resources on Oressia, including metals needed for
the manufacture of space ships and their propulsion systems, but
the companies formed to mine and export those metals were ruined by
the greed of their owners and the indolence of the workers.

“Then arose our great leader, Olekan.” Merin
sounded as if she was declaiming the lines of some ancient epic
poem. “Many were the battles, terrible the bloodshed. Entire clans
were exterminated before Olekan brought peace to our world. Once he
had conquered all of Oressia, Olekan established stern laws and
named a Tribunal of Elders to enforce those laws. All forms of
violence were strictly forbidden, the slightest infringement
punishable by death. But that was not enough to prevent future
wars, or a return to our old decadent ways under a new leader after
Olekan had died. He understood this, so he made still more laws for
our protection.

“Oressia became a closed planet. No outsiders
were allowed to set foot on it, and any Oressian who left could
never return to contaminate our newly peaceful society with alien
ideas. Exportation of our products was from that time conducted by
mechanized ships and robots. The only importations allowed were
foodstuffs and the few raw materials we lacked, which came to us on
the returning unmanned ships.”

Here Merin paused, considering how to explain
the rest, how to make Herne understand without despising her.
Knowing her hope was a futile one, she drew a deep breath and
continued.

“Under Olekan’s laws, marriage was forbidden.
Families were forbidden because they generate ambition. Friendship,
greed, hatred, social status, all were forbidden, for these were
the temptations that had once led Oressians into near extinction.
The few children left alive after the wars ended were educated to
hate and fear those temptations.” Another pause. Merin swallowed
hard. “Lovemaking was forbidden. Even mention of it was against the
law. We are taught from our earliest days how dangerous it is to
feel any emotion. We are strictly trained from childhood to repress
all disruptive feelings.”

“What you are describing is totalitarianism
of a particularly insane kind,” Herne protested.

“For your people, perhaps,” Merin responded.
“But those Oressians who had survived the great wars understood
that for us there could be no other way. It was strict regulation
or certain extinction, and my ancestors made the only choice that
would allow our society to continue. For centuries, Olekan’s system
has worked well, proving the wisdom of this great leader. Oressia
is now a peaceful and prosperous world. Poverty no longer exists.
The metal mines are profitable once more, and those profits are
dispersed for the good of all our people. Where once we were
disreputable outlaws, now we have become valued members of the
Jurisdiction.”

“No families, no friends, no love, no
lovemaking. That’s a lonely price to pay for social stability,”
Herne said. Then, “Without lovemaking, how do Oressians reproduce?
And how are the children raised, if no families are allowed?”

“We do not reproduce,” she told him. “Not in
the way you mean. What you and I have done together is strictly
forbidden because it is the vilest of crimes, leading to terrible
social ills. Until your body entered mine, I did not even know
exactly how it was done. From early childhood each Oressian is
taught to avoid any activity or any situation that might give rise
to illicit desires. Disobedience of this law is punishable by
immediate extermination.”

“By Oressian law, you and I are criminals?”
Herne looked as if he could not believe what she was saying.

“From the first moment you touched me in the
grotto all those weeks ago, my life was forfeit,” Merin said, “and
rightfully so, for from that moment my discipline has been
dissolving until now it is completely gone and I am lost
forever.”

“Only on Oressia,” Herne said. “Not here, not
on Dulan’s Planet.”

“We carry our home-worlds with us wherever we
go.” Her voice was filled with sadness.

“You still haven’t explained how Oressians
reproduce,” Herne noted. “Obviously, you do reproduce, since the
system you describe has been in place for centuries. As a doctor,
and as a man, I find the question intriguing.”

“Olekan decreed that the population of
Oressia should remain stable, at the level best suited to our
resources,” Merin said, evading a direct answer. “And so it has
been done, since that time.”

“How?” Herne demanded. “I doubt that even
your Olekan could abolish all diseases, or accidental death, or the
ravages of old age. How, then, can a stable population be
maintained? Answer me, Merin, and tell me the truth, because I have
a terrible feeling that what we are discussing is against
Jurisdiction law.”

“Oressia became a member of the Jurisdiction
on condition that our planetary isolation and our ancient laws be
preserved,” she reminded him. “The Jurisdiction needs Oressian
metals. Our conditions were accepted.”

“And every Oressian who leaves the planet is
sworn never to reveal anything about Oressian culture, and never to
return there,” Herne prompted softly, trying to encourage what was
obviously going to be a difficult admission for her to make.

“It is a rule I never broke until I came to
Dulan’s Planet,” Merin said. “Great Olekan and the Elders were
right. It took only the sight of your naked body and one kiss to
lead me into moral degradation. I fell further from discipline and
honor each time you touched me. See me now, unclothed, hair
unbound, my body repeatedly opened to yours, unable to deny you
anything you want of me, even to speaking our deepest secrets. By
loving you, I have betrayed everything I was ever taught.” She
stopped on a sob.

“You are a perfectly normal human female,”
Herne said, “capable of great passion, able to conceive and bear a
child. I ask you again, Merin: would you bear my child? Would you
want to?” He saw in her face wonder, hope, joy – and horror. It was
that last emotion, unconcealed and painful, that decided his next
words. He had to know, so he made his voice hard. “No more
delaying, no more evasions. Tell me now how Oressians reproduce. Do
they use artificial insemination? Or have they discovered a means
to induce parthenogenesis, like the Riothans do? Is that it? Do
your women not need the male seed? Do they literally get themselves
pregnant?”

For a long time he thought she would not
answer him. He watched her struggle with this last, deepest
restriction, watched tears fill her eyes while she gathered her
courage to defy the final Oressian law. And he felt pride in her
and a love so wide and deep it was beyond measuring when she began
to speak again. But only until he understood what she was saying.
Then his heart went cold.

“We are grown from tissue stored in the
BabyCompLab,” she said. “By Great Olekan’s order, fifty males and
fifty females were chosen to be the progenitors of all future
Oressians. The choices were carefully made for diversity of
physical characteristics, for strength, endurance, lack of
inherited diseases, and for comeliness. Olekan saw no reason to
create an ugly race.”

“Create? BabyCompLab?” Herne was shaken to
his core. What Merin was explaining was absolutely forbidden by
Jurisdiction law. No wonder Oressians were so secretive. Though he
tried, he could not keep the distaste out of his voice. “When you
once told me you had no mother, you were speaking the truth. You
are a clone.”

She bowed her head under that condemnation
and Herne thought his own heart would break with the pain of it.
This woman he came near to adoring was the product of a practice so
abhorrent to all the Races of the Jurisdiction that he could not
yet comprehend the horror of her confession. But then she raised
her head and looked him straight in the eye.

“I am a member of the five hundred and
sixty-fifth generation of my original parents,” she said with an
almost defiant air that touched him through his revulsion and
disgust, and told him that whatever else Olekan’s laws had
achieved, they had not entirely eliminated familial pride.

“Tell me about your childhood,” he
commanded.

“We are raised under laboratory conditions,
in isolated cubicles, where the master computer teaches us what we
need to know at each stage of our development. At the age of ten,
we are given our first clothing, removed from First Cubicles, and
turned over to second Cubicles and advanced education. At the age
of twenty, those needed to replace dead Oressians are sent into
society.”

“What about the extra children?” Herne tried
to keep his voice calm, tried to hide the repugnance and anger he
felt at what Merin was telling him. “Olekan must have provided for
extras to be produced in case they were needed.” It made him sick
to talk about humans in that way, as if they were components in a
factory, waiting to be used on an assembly line to manufacture a
product.

“Those who are not needed as replacements on
Oressia, but who have displayed exceptional abilities, are
permitted to leave, to live on other worlds. I have an unusually
retentive mind for details. That is why I was sent to the Archives
at Capital.”