"I've heard all this second- or third-hand from at least half a dozen people. I don't know how much of it is true. I don't know where Larkin is, and don't have any idea how to find out. I'm sorry about that, sorry about Bankole, sorry about everything.
"You probably won't like this, Lauren, but I think that if you really want to find your daughter, you should join us— join Christian America. Your cult has failed. Your god of change couldn't save you. Why not come back to where you belong? If Mom and Dad were alive, they would join. They would want you to be part of a good Christian organization that's trying to put the country back together again. I know you're smart and strong and too stubborn for your own good. If you can also be patient and join us in our work, you'll have the only chance possible of getting information about your daughter.
"I have to warn you, though, the movement won't let you preach. They agree with Saint Paul in that: 'Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach nor to usurp authority over the man but to be in silence.' But don't worry. There's plenty of other more suitable work for women to do to serve the movement
"Some of our people have relatives or friends who are Crusaders. Join us, work hard, keep your eyes and ears open, and maybe you'll learn things that will help you find your daughter—and help you into a good, decent life as a Christian American woman.
"I don't know what else to tell you. I'm enclosing a few hundred in hard currency. I wish I could give you more. I wish I could help you more. I do wish you well, whatever you decide to do, and again, I'm sorry. Marc."
And that was that. There wasn't a word about his going to Portland—no explanation, no good-bye. No address. Had he, in fact, gone to Portland? I thought about that and decided he had—or at least the server who told me he had believed what she was saying.
But why did my brother not mention where he was going—or even that he was going—in his letter? Did he think I wouldn't find out? Or was he just signaling me in a cold, deliberate way that he wanted no further contact with me. Was he saying, in effect, "You're my sister and I have a duty to help you. So here's some advice and some money. Too bad about your troubles, but I can't do any more. I've got to get on with my life."
Well, the money I could use. As far as the advice was concerned, my first impulse was to curse it, and to curse my brother for giving it. Then, for a moment, I wondered whether I could join the enemy and find my child. Perhaps I could.
Then I remembered the man I had seen at the Center—the one whom I had last seen acting as one of our "teachers" at Acorn, and raping Adela Ortiz. Perhaps he was the father of the child she would soon be having. Marc might be able to convince himself that the Crusaders are outcast extremists, but I know better. Whether CA chooses to admit it or not, they and the Crusaders have members in common. How many? What are the real connections? What does Jarret really think about the Crusaders? Does he control them? If he doesn't like what they're doing, he should make some effort to stop them. He shouldn't want them to make their insanity part of his political image.
On the other hand, one way to make people afraid of you is to have a crazy side—a side of yourself or your organization that's dangerous and unpredictable—willing to do any damned thing.
Is that what's going on? I don't know and my brother doesn't want to know.
Chapter 19
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From EARTHSEED: THE BOOKS OF THE LIVING
All religions are ultimately cargo cults.
Adherents perform required rituals, follow specific rules, and expect to be supernaturally gifted with desired rewards—long life, honor, wisdom, children, good health, wealth, victory over opponents, immortality after death, any desired rewards.
Earthseed offers its own rewards—room for small groups of people to begin new lives and new ways of life with new opportunities, new wealth, new concepts of wealth, new challenges to grow and to learn and to decide what to become.
Earthseed is the dawning adulthood of the human species. It offers the only true immortality. It enables the seeds of the Earth to become the seeds of new life, new communities on new earths. The Destiny of Earthseed is to take root among the stars, and there, again, to grow, to learn, and to fly.
I BEGAN CREATING secret Dreamask scenarios when I was 12. By then, I was very much the timid, careful daughter of Kayce and Madison Alexander. I knew that even though I was allowed to use Dreamasks with strict Christian American scenarios—like the old "Asha Vere" stories—no one would be likely to approve my creating new, uncensored scenarios. I knew this because back when I was nine, I began making up plain, linear installment stories to amuse myself and my few friends at Christian America School. It was fun. My friends liked it until we all got into trouble. Then some teacher eavesdropped, realized what I was doing, and punished me for lying. My friends were punished for not reporting my lies. We had to memorize whole chapters of Exodus, Psalms, Proverbs, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. Until we had memorized and been tested on every single assigned chapter, we were allowed no free time—no recess or lunch breaks. We were kept an hour late every day. We were monitored even in the bathroom to make sure we weren't indulging in more wickedness—like stealing a minute or two "from God."
It didn't matter that I had said from the beginning that my stories were only made up. I never tried to convince anyone that they were true. And it didn't matter that the Dreamask scenarios we were all allowed to experience were equally imaginary. It was as though my teachers believed that all the possible stories had already been created, and it was a sin to make more—or at least it was a sin for me to make more.
But by the time I reached puberty, except for the pornography I managed to find, most of the scenarios I was permitted were tired, dull, boring things. Characters were always being shown the error of their ways, suffering for their sins, and then returning to God. Boys fought for Christian America. They went to war against heathens, or went out as missionaries in dangerous, wicked, foreign jungles and deserts. Girls, on the other hand, were always cooking, cleaning, sewing, crying, praying, taking care of babies or old people, and going to church. Asha Vere was unusual because she did interesting things. She saved people. She made them return to God. She was one of the few. In fact as a Black and a woman, she was the only one.
A very old woman—she was in her nineties and lived in one of the nursing homes that Christian America had set up for elderly members—once told me that Asha Vere was my generation's Nancy Drew. It was years before I found out who Nancy Drew was.
Anyway, I wrote scenarios—had to write them down with a stylus in my notebook since even outside of Christian America, no one was going to trust a kid to work with a scenario recorder. At least our notebooks had a lot of memory and I could code them to erase the scenarios if someone else tried to get into them. Or I thought I could.
I wrote about having different parents—parents who cared about me and didn't wish always that I were another person, the sainted Kamaria. I didn't know at this time that I was adopted. All I had was the usual child's suspicion that I might be, and that somewhere, somehow, I might have beautiful, powerful "real" parents who would come for me someday.
I wrote about having four brothers and three sisters. The idea of eight children appealed to me. I didn't think you could be lonely in such a big family. My brothers and sisters and I had huge parties on holidays and birthdays and we were always having adventures, and I had a handsome boyfriend who was crazy about me, and the girls at school were all jealous.