Old Green World (18 page)

Albert kneaded the dough.

After hesitating, Clare finally let herself say, “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Albert’s—I—I’m still trying to figure it out,” he said. “It’s very big. It loves me, but it’s bigger than its love for me. I mean, it
is
me, and I’m Albert, too, and I . . . I’m not making sense.” His knuckles were white.

“Relax. You’ll toughen up the dough too much,” Clare said. She put her hand on his. “Put your arms to the side. Hold still for a moment. Breathe in and out. Your center, your breath: it’s still available to you, right? You can find some comfort there.”

Albert nodded, his eyes desperately closed. Clare guided him a little longer. She could see the boy he used to be and didn’t have to pretend any more.

+ + +

The world-mind used to be musical, but now it was chattering and noise. Esther was shouting at her.

Alice says that Niall is a traitor, that he deserves exile or perhaps even death. She says that you are a traitor as well, an accomplice. Why did you go there, to the Green Island, if not to aid in this?

I had no idea that this was going to happen
, Clare said.
I came back here because it’s my home. I came here because I had participated in an atrocity, and I’d earned the right to step back.

See? It’s exactly this
, Esther said.
You and Niall have been two of the biggest malcontents since Baixa. And you just happen to be right by the shore to harvest Niall’s little insurrection. It’s awfully convenient.

Clare started to respond—
Coincidence is not causation, Esther, what an obvious
—but then stopped.
Actually, fuck you, Esther
, Clare said.
If you or anyone else has a problem, you come here and work it out with me. I’ve noticed no one has managed to do that, to come up here and confront me, or Albert. Because you’re all afraid, right?

She could feel Esther’s shock and anger, but Esther said nothing.

Come here to the shore, if you have such a care
, Clare said.
Come here and we’ll settle it, in body or blood.

Her ears rung and her face flushed. She filtered Esther out. More and more, she found it easier to filter out the world-mind. Many Adepts had started to filter it, or to become quiet. Niall spoke to only her at this point.

She took her sketchbook outside and went to the edge of the cliffs. She sketched the sea and the cliffs for a while. Art had always been part of her practice. Albert sat not far from her, a few hundred yards, in contemplation. She started working him into her sketch. The grasses around him were longer than anywhere else on shore. They seemed to be growing taller by the moment. She drew for a while longer, then approached him. She sat beside him for a while until he roused himself.

“Are the visualizations working?” she said. Training a young Adept was usually seamless: everyone just shared a mind. This work had been awkward, but Clare liked the challenge.

“I’ve had to change them a little, but yes. Thank you.”

“I should be thanking you,” Clare said. “Maybe this is for the best, for all of us. The forest can be a nurturer, a mother. We thought of it as an enemy in Baixa because we were doing it violence, and it just responded.”

“Maybe. I don’t know. I’m still figuring it out.” Albert said. “I’m not—
it
.
It’s
not cruel, but it can do terrible things. It loves you, but it’s not your friend.”

“I don’t understand, what do you—”

“I really need to sit quietly now,” Albert said, squinting, as if fighting off a headache. He closed his eyes again, sat up straight, and relaxed his face.

She wanted to touch him. It wasn’t an erotic feeling. She told herself it came from a desire to comfort him, but it wasn’t. He was strange to her, something unknown, and she just wanted to know what he felt like to the touch. But she left him alone. She walked down the cliff trail to stare at the sea.

+ + +

Niall finally arrived, sailing a small dinghy from downcoast. They saw Niall from the shore, and they watched him climb the cliff. They were standing on the mossy, breezy top of the cliff, but the way up was made of dark, irregular wet rock. By the time he reached the top, Niall was huffing a little.

Albert ran toward Niall and embraced him, nestling his head in Niall’s shoulder. Niall reciprocated, stiffly. They leaned back and looked at each other for a moment, then Niall dropped his gaze and walked toward Clare.

“I hear you’ve been fighting with Esther,” he said.

She ignored him. “Albert, are you all right?”

Niall made a thin smile. “Even the most normal initiation leaves some unresolved feelings, Clare, and what we’ve been through was far from normal. We’ll work it out. Won’t we, Albert?”
 

“Right, sure, work it out. Tame it. Organize it into a system,” Albert said, and walked away, descending the cliff that Niall had just climbed.

Niall stared blankly at Clare.

“What are you doing?” Clare said. “Go after him. He’s your acolyte.”

“It’s complicated,” Niall said. “It was a very different initiation. One of the ego loss phases manifested as . . . intimacy.”

“Oh,” Clare said.

“In retrospect, I should have managed it better. There’s a lot to work out now.”

“But that wasn’t a surprise, was it? He’s eighteen years old, a young man. He’s almost entirely lust and rage and fear right now, and you took him into an initiation ritual.”

Niall didn’t say anything.

“Unbelievable,” Clare said. She kicked dirt on his foot.

“Have you ever tried to initiate an adult, Clare? Have you?” Niall said. “Do you have any grounds whatsoever on which to judge me?”

“I haven’t initiated an adult, and I wouldn’t,” Clare said. “But, if I had to, I would have had a fucking plan for what to do when sexual cathexis happens, as it inevitably would between two adults in an initiation.”

“When did you become so crude?” Niall said.

“I get it from my grandmother. I think my language is the least of our fucking concerns right now.”

She let Albert sit quietly on the beach for a half hour, and then took some tea down to him.

“Niall’s very good at ideas and systems. He’s not very good at people,” she said.

“He forgets that God is in the details,” Albert said.

Clare furrowed her brow and looked at him. “That’s a way to put it, I guess.”

They sat in silence for a little while.

“Everyone falls in love with their mentor, Albert. It always happens. I fell in love with mine. Usually we’re children when it happens, and it’s not as painful or complicated.”

“Thank you for the tea,” Albert said, and managed a small smile. “I’m just going to sit a little longer.”

She left him and went back to the house. She had prepared a chicken, and she got it to roasting. Niall had brought some gin and had a drink. He started to pour another when Clare told him to prepare some vegetables.

Albert came in after the sun had set. “I’m sorry, I didn’t help with supper,” he said.

“It’s fine,” Clare said. “Niall helped. We’re all ready.”

“I know it’s hard, Albert,” Niall said. “But we’re going to get through this. This is an exciting opportunity. I’ve been thinking a lot about how you’re now connected to the primordial chaos, and I’ve thought of some exercises—”

“Shut up, Niall,” Clare said. “Just shut up and pour Albert a drink. We’re having supper. The primordial chaos can wait.”

+ + +

“Albert, I think you’ve had enough to drink.
Niall
,” she said, as Niall poured Albert another glass. They both ignored her. Niall had a plan, and he was electric with its potential. Albert had had too much gin. He nodded with his eyes hooded.

Niall wanted to go back to Baixa. He wanted to return to the woods beyond the Baixan Old City and start a new civilization. They would take the dinghy downcoast, travel east by land, and take a larger boat back to the continent.

“When you feel ready, Albert,” Niall said. “Not until you feel up to it.” Albert nodded. Niall felt like they could start over. He believed that the Baixans would easily follow “what Albert has become,” as Niall put it.

“Just Albert,” Albert slurred, stopping his rhythmic nodding.

“Beg pardon, Albert?” Niall asked. “What’s that?”

“My name is Albert. It’s not ‘What Albert Has Become.’ I’m just Albert.”

“Of course you are, Albert. I just meant that—”

“No, I get it. Albert’s not really that interesting, is he? Certainly not as good as What Albert Has Become.” He gave Clare a miserable stare, then looked back into his glass. Then he put his hand on Niall’s thigh and leaned in to caress Niall’s back. “I could be What Albert Has Become if you would kiss me. How about that? Would you, Niall? Would you sleep with What Albert Has Become?” He slurred the last words into Niall’s ear.

Niall held himself still for a moment. He took Albert’s hand away from his thigh and held it in both his hands. “We’re going to work this out, all right?” Niall said. “I’ve thought of some exercises.”

Albert pulled away and curled into himself. “I wish I’d never done any of this. I wish I’d never met you,” he murmured, eyes welling. “I love you. It hurts.”

“You’ve had too much to drink, Albert,” Clare said, rising up from the table to go to him. “Here, let’s put you to bed. We’ll go ahead and clean up—”

“Clare, would you give us a moment?” Niall interrupted.

Clare stared at him and then sat down again. “You get a moment,” she said. “One.”

Niall took Albert outside for a walk. Clare connected to Niall and followed them. She felt the intensity of Albert’s emotions and Niall’s attempts to control the situation. At some point, Niall’s control eroded, and they moved into a relationship of energy that was best kept private.

Clare disconnected. She stood from her stool and kicked it across the room. She poured herself a glass of gin, then another.

When Niall came back in his robe hung off the edges of his shoulders. His legs were spattered with mud.

She walked up to him and hit him, a left hook across the jaw. She had never hit anybody before. Her fist glanced awkwardly off his chin.

She grabbed her hand. “That hurts!” Her voice was plaintive. “That really hurts.”

Niall clutched his chin.
“Why?
Why would you do that?” he cried through his hands.

“You fucking know why,” she said. “Why would
you
do that? What are you doing to him?”

Niall connected with her.
He’s an adult
,
Clare,
he said.
He’s also an unprecedented being. He and I talked about it. We came to an understanding that it would be better to work with the feelings than repress them. It isn’t a mentor-acolyte relationship. It’s something more complex, not least because of what Albert has become.

Stop it. Stop calling him that. He hates it. And I hate it, too.

I’m just describing phenomena. I’m just saying what we all know, whether we want to acknowledge it or not.

You keep acting like you have a plan
, Clare said.
Like you know. You have no fucking plan. You came up with all that Baixan civilization bullshit spontaneously. I could see it in your face. Sister Alice talks about your plots like you’re some sort of revolutionary mastermind. They have no idea. The world’s at stake and you’re experimenting.

What else can we do?
Niall asked.
It’s over, Clare. Everything relied on a narrative the Old People produced. We’re pretending like there’s still a narrative, that we know what’s next. We don’t. It’s gone. Maybe that’s for the best.

Just then, Clare noticed something different in Niall: a change in texture.
You’re different.
She focused on it for a moment, then looked at him in the physical world and said, “You aren’t controlling your body any more. You aren’t controlling how it expresses.”

“I’m experimenting, Clare,” Niall said. “I’m tired of the narrative. I’m experimenting with not knowing what’s next.”

She looked at him for a long time.

“We’re not going to Baixa,” Clare said. “There’s no way you’re taking him back there.”

“Fine,” Niall said. “We’ll stay here for a while. We’ll settle in and try to let Albert grow into what he has—”

“Don’t. Don’t say it.”

Niall sighed. “We’ll help Albert adjust.”

“We don’t have time for that. You hear the others as well as I do. They won’t stay afraid of us for long. They’ll get a gang together and come for us.”

Niall groaned, placed a glass loudly in front of him and poured a finger of gin. “What would you suggest we do then, Clare?”

“We’re going to the Old People. We’re going to talk to them.”

“There are no more Old People.”

“There are. You know there are,” Clare said. “They’re as traumatized as we are, and they need a reason to engage again. This is the reason.”

“Why would we even want to do that? They’ll attack him, try to imprison or brainwash him.”

“That’s a terrible lie. She would study Albert and work with him. She would come up with a plan and communicate with us about it. Stop pretending you don’t know who Susan is. Stop pretending you don’t remember what she means to us.”

“Maybe we’re both deceiving ourselves,” Niall said. “I thought you were taking after your grandmother now, anyway. The old wild woman—”

“My grandmother hit me whenever her capacity for language was inadequate for conversation,” Clare said. “My grandmother died because she decided to paint herself with sigils and fight the cat demons in her body instead of accepting medicine. I loved my grandmother, but we have very different opinions of the value of civilization. I knew what I was doing when I became an Adept. I believed in civilization. I still believe in it.”

Albert had come in a few moments earlier. He sat on a stool.

“Clare wants us to go talk to the Old People,” Niall said.

“Yes. That’s what’s we do,” Albert said.

“It’s up to you, Albert,” Niall said. “No one’s forcing you.”

Albert shook his head. “It doesn’t matter what I want to do. That’s what is going to happen. We’re going to visit the Old People. We leave in three days.”