Awakeners by Sheri S Tepper

“What is that music?” she asked at last.

“Just … just music. The music,” he said, flushing. He had done that more in recent days, the red moving in from the edges of his beak toward the center. The feathers on his chest were turning crimson as well, and the wide, plumy ones around his eyes. When he looked at her like that, she wanted to hold him, tell him everything was fine. It made her ache for him.

“Tell me of this man who hunts you!” he asked.

“How did you know about that?”

“I heard Mother talking. They think the Awakeners are very cruel to raise up the dead, who should lie asleep. Also our kin, the Servants. They think them stupid, vicious, and cruel, also.”

Not more cruel than they, she thought, stroking the line of his jaw, the feathers of his chest. She could tell he liked having her do that, liked having her near him.

“I suppose every group of people has its own cruelties,” she said, wondering if he would say anything about his own treatment at the hands of his people. Remembering her own rebellion as a child, she could not accept his passivity. Perhaps it lay in the fact that all males were treated much alike; perhaps that made it seem less cruel. “Don’t your friends miss you when you’re off here with me?”

“They are mostly alone. Besides”-he flushed-”I am a Talker. They aren’t Talkers. Males aren’t much. Only one in each thousand males is a Talker, they say.” “You mean other males don’t talk? Never did?” “They talk like everyone when they are children. When they grow up, though, talking goes. Except once in a while, one like me. It makes it harder.”

She could not bear the thought. The safest one to ask seemed to be old Stodder. “Is it true the male Treeci can’t talk?” “Oh, they can talk. They just don’t much.” “What do you mean, they don’t much?” “They just lose interest, that’s all. I suppose they figure why talk if you don’t have to?” This seemed to her to be Stodder’s own philosophy. She seldom heard him speak unless asked a direct question.

Upon examination, his comment made some sense. During visits to the Treeci village, Pamra noticed how cosseted the males really were. Why would they talk when every need was met before they had a chance to utter it? Each one had a circle of children seeing to his grooming, his food, his drink. Every male had a mother, sisters.

Though she went to the watching place each evening, there were still no signal fires. Stodder counted the days until Conjunction and remarked that the Gift of Potipur would likely not come until after the flood tides. “Thrasne’s a good boatman. He won’t risk the Gift.”

“Do you really think he won’t come until after the flood tides, Stodder?”

“Ah, girl, he could still get here. Don’t leave off looking for the fires. Just don’t be disappointed.”

Was she disappointed? Did she care if Thrasne came soon or late? What were they to one another, after all? She frowned at this new consideration. It was an uncomfortable thought because she should have been able to answer it and could not. She didn’t know. “Does he love me?” She whispered the question, looking for the answer in Lila’s eyes, which lightened almost imperceptibly into a smile. “Does Thrasne love me?” Suddenly she thought of things he had done, gifts he had given. Was that why?

What did the question mean? If he did or not, what difference did it make?

She wrapped herself warmly in a heavy shawl and went to the rocks with Bethne, seeing nothing on the Northshore, hearing nothing but the usual shush of wind and River sounds. They turned to walk back along the ridge in the dusk, the light of Potipur casting a ruddy glow along the slopes, making black pits of shadow. In a clearing at the foot of the hill, there were two Treeci dancing, male and female. “Beautiful,” whispered Pamra. “Look, Bethne. Look how beautiful.”

The male Treeci called plaintively into the dusk; the female responded, the two voices like a duet, sweeter than one could bear.