When she came home the next night, she found the tree nailed, wildly askew, to the coffee table. Teenage accessories—earrings and keychains—dragged the drooping branches down further.
Amea Amaau is a new and gleaming city in a matrix of six hundred and forty-three thousand cities exactly like it, somewhere in the terribly exciting part of the world.
"I renew the pledge I made to you when I took office: you will be safe in your home, safe in your work, safe in your play from any who dare to oppose us. Wherever Americans walk, they'll walk in safety."
One by one the rest of the caravan joined us: sturdy eperu, neuters, the only sex of the Jokka that could withstand the grueling travel of a trade caravan. Last of all came little Thodi, our orphan found two circuits back.
She pulled an envelope from the stack. It was the letter she'd mailed to her mother the week before. A red stamp over the address read: "Return to Sender. Addressee Unknown."
I make Sarah lank and tall; I dress her neatly and without distinction—white blouse, dark knitted skirt, shoes dulled and scuffed at their toes. She looks ordinary—deliberately so. But with her eyes, I can gaze upon my audience; through her mouth I will speak.
"It's in the lease, sir; didn't you read it? Furniture, fittings, appurtenances, and one swan, care of aforesaid swan to be undertaken by the hereinaftermentioned Henry Wadsworth Oglethorpe."
Ponge, as its inhabitants will tell you, is a thoroughly unattractive city. "Well," they always say at the mention of any horrible news, "we do live in Ponge."
The first moon has passed its zenith. He-towers rise on all sides. Long slender Haes sail between them, skimming along the surface, their pods flared as sails. Shadows under the moon as shaes flit through the sky with pods spread to glassy thinness in crescent wings.
The first time she walked down our street, pots jumped off stoves, coal leapt from scuttles, wood went rat-a-tat-tatting down hallways. In our yard, a broom and spade got up and lurched around like drunks, trying to decide which way she'd gone.
She let the smile die on her lips and took a small drink from the bottle. "Actually, sweetheart, I already got a man. He's back in Angola doin' 9 to 12. Killed a man that was nasty to me."
Their purpose in making me was to have a scrying glass capable of seeing the future. In this sense I am a failure—I can see only what is, not what has been or will be.
Libby smiled. "It's okay to say ovarian cancer." Roger made a small sound and Libby looked up at him. "Not using the words gives them too much power," she added.
"Anyone other than an anthvoke would want something from me in return. Anthvokes aren't interested in flesh." She tugged at the front of her sweat-stained tank top, briefly revealing the butterfly tattoo over her petite breasts. "Do you really want to share me with someone else?"
"This whole neighborhood is built over magma. Volcanoes burned here once." Flecks of soot danced under streetlamps. "There's flaws in the rock here. Fissures. Could be a problem."
No matter how hard Aaron tried, he couldn't ignore the day he dreaded most: the day Darren's body would be auctioned off, piece by piece, to the highest bidder.
"As I said, we do believe you. But it is my duty to ensure that all blasphemy be scourged from the people, by any means necessary." His fingers touched my face, cold worms tracing my cheekbone, and I fought back a shiver.
These days magic is not something in which everyone can afford to believe. There is a suspicious absence of miracles. But sometimes impossible things happen when no one is looking.
We plunged into blackness. Icy wind whipped tears from my eyes and blurred my vision. The grumble of the generator faded above, letting other sounds intrude: the squealing whine of the rollers sliding down the guide rails, cables straining with an unnerving twang, the metal car rattling and shaking.
Only a witch would live in such a dark, smelly house with seven cats. Only a witch would keep four fat goldfish in a pond out back or keep a neat row of little handmade pin-stuck dolls in a drawer. And only a witch would offer visiting children glasses of muscadine wine and keep a dead woman in the closet.
"Accounts ambushed us downstairs. We could have used your help. But you were nowhere to be found." He drew himself up and glared at me, his face twisted. His hands were balled into fists. "Aren't you one of us?" he demanded.
"There isn't much time. The voices behind the Illuminati have fallen silent. The New World Order has ceased its relentless quest for world domination. I predicted this; they're puppets, after all."
Cyan's long sapphire hair ran down over her naked azure body. Her delicate blue hands moved gently between the branches of the low shrubs, as if she were searching for something.
It was hard to look away while Laura drew. She knew how to build light and depth, shadow and meaning, all from the crumbling powder of charcoal, the quivering, spreading streak of black India ink.
"You are so mean and stubborn and ugly that I will curse you for it. Each time you open your mouth, a horrible insect or an ugly swamp creature will drop from it."
It was the time of the Sun Dance and the Big Tractor Pull. Freddy-in-the-Hollow and I had traveled three days to be at the river. We were almost late, what with the sandstorm and the raid on the white settlement over to Old Dallas.
They step back to examine him. Most of them are already taller than me, almost as tall as Jaime. The adults, when they walk upright like humans, are nearly seven feet high.
"Your mother knew enough to paint the doors and windows to other worlds. Those are the most important doors there are; it's only through them that the terrible darkness of our time can escape, only through them that the fish can swim here. She painted maps for them. If those doors are shut forever, we're all lost."
