I stood up and walked away to think for a moment.
“Are you okay?” asked Jane. “Don’t go all funny on me. I’m out on a limb for you here.”
I swallowed my anger and revulsion, and took a deep breath. “Okay,” I said, turning to face her, “we can go.”
“Not yet, we can’t.”
She took Courtland’s arms and instructed me to take his legs, and we carried him into the forest until we reached a grove of yateveos. She told me to haul him to his feet at the edge of the spread, and we then just let him fall backward. There was a flash of movement, and the tree had him deposited in its trunk within a couple of seconds while Courtland’s spoons spilled from his satchel and cascaded to earth with a musical ring.
“I always act out my cover stories for real where possible,” said Jane as we walked away. “I’m not going to be caught out by shoddily prepared homework. Come on, it’s getting late.”
We headed off among the grove of yateveos and followed the narrow strips of safe ground that lay between the highly territorial trees.
“You said the Herald was a lost page from a missing book. What did you mean by that?”
“I was being dramatic. The truth isn’t lost or missing—it’s right here, in our heads.” She tapped her forehead. “We’re more complex than you think. Perhaps more complex than you can think. There’s stuff locked up in our heads—we just can’t access it without the correct combination of hues. Pookas, memory sweeps, cross fires, the Mildew, Lincoln, lime and Gordini are only the smallest part of it.
There’s more. Much more. We’ve only dipped a toe in the lake.”
“How does it work?”
She shook her head. “I have no idea, but I don’t think we’re the first society to embrace the visible Spectrum as the focal point of our lives. There was another before us. A better one. One that went wrong or was displaced. They left stuff behind. Not just Chromaticology and the Mildew, but complete histories, accessed by nothing more complex than a subtle combination of color.”
“The painted ceiling,” I said, “Rusty Hill.”
“You saw a partial Herald while you were looking at the violets. But not enough of the ceiling is finished to hear her speak. When it is, then we might know more about the Something That Happened. We may even discover the nature of Munsell’s Epiphany.”
I thought about this for a moment.
“Zane was buying paint that day in Vermillion, wasn’t he?”
She nodded. “We need to complete the mural. To even have a hope of defeating Head Office and Chromocentric Hierarchilism, we have to know how it all came about. Ochre stole the swatches to exchange for paint. Zane wrongspotted himself so no questions would or could be asked. I wrangled the Perpetulite to get him around—we even went into neighboring sectors to avoid suspicion.”
“Is that why everyone was Mildewed in Rusty Hill?”
“Yes,” she said in a quiet voice. “They started to complete the roof, and the workers started to see confused snippets of Heralds. They were reported as Pookas, and the system swung into action to protect itself.”
There was a pause.
“So that’s what enlightenment feels like,” I said in a quiet voice. “You said cozy ignorance was a better place for people like me.”
“It still might be. And listen, I want you to know I’m sorry.”
I stopped. We were standing on the narrow area of safety between the spreads of two medium-sized yateveos. I had been in this situation before with her, and my heart fell. I thought we’d been getting along.
I turned to face her, and she looked at me apologetically.
“Do you have to?” I asked.
“I do. And I’m really, really sorry.”
She hooked a leg in mine and expertly heaved me off balance. I landed with a thump, and there was a sound like a whipcrack. I cried out in pain as one vine wrapped around my leg and another took hold of my arm. I felt the sensation of being lifted, and the ground and Jane moved rapidly away from me. I think she waved.
The Way Home
2.6.23.02.935: Residents may not keep pets in their room.
And this is where you find me now. Head down in a yateveo, musing on the events of the past four days and how I could have been so stupid as to deny myself the endless opportunities to avoid this particular destiny. Like most people, I’m not much scared by death, but swans, Reboot, creepy crawlies, my twice-widowed aunt Beryl, social embarrassment and loss most certainly did frighten me. Loss of my father, loss of Jane, but most of all, loss of my potential obligation. Not my Chromatic obligation, you understand, but the loss of my obligation to real truth and justice, deeper and more powerful than I would find in a thousand Rulebooks. I’d found enlightenment and a sense of purpose, and lost it again. But it had been mine, if only for a short while.
It began to darken. Not the darkness that was already within the yateveo, but an enveloping darkness, even blacker than the night but without depth or time. This was it. And as far as reporting what death was like, I can use only one word: colorless. But oddly, that wasn’t quite it. After what could have been anything between a couple of seconds and a century, I saw a dim sliver of light open up in front of me, and I believed, for a moment, that I was about to be reborn. Perhaps to another couple somewhere in another sector, and a long time after a forgotten Edward Russett was lost on a toshing expedition to the middle of nowhere.
But I wasn’t being reborn. It was the same old me, and I was flowing out of a split in the tree’s digesting bulb, coughing and spluttering. I felt someone place her mouth over my nose and suck out the liquid in a sort of power-assisted nose blow, and after retching up a stomachful of gloop that burned my throat, I managed to open my eyes. The first thing I saw was Jane’s face, staring at me with a concerned expression. We were sitting at the base of the trunk, with Jane holding the sharpened potato peeler she had used to slit the bulb. The yateveo was making halfhearted snatches in our direction but doing no damage.
“Phew!” she said, sticking a finger in my ear to clean it out. “You stink.”
I retched again and she handed me her water bottle. “Rinse.”
I took a swig and spat the foul-tasting liquid from my mouth.
“Were you almost gone in there?” she asked. “It took a while to get into the bulb.”
I nodded. “My whole life flashed in front of me. The last four days, anyway—which probably amounts to the same thing.”
She gave me a hug. “Oh, I’m so sorry—I should have explained. This is part of our cover story. But, hey, I’ve come to a big decision: That’s the last time I try to kill you.”
“Promise?”
“Absolutely. In fact, I may actually try to save your life if the opportunity presents itself. And if I ever threaten you again, you have my permission to give me a good telling-off.”
She smiled again. “You can call me by my name, too—and I promise not to thump you. Will you kiss me?”
So we did, there in the dappled shade of the yateveo, covered in digestive gloop and not an hour from the darkest secret of the Collective. It was, as I recall, every bit as good as I thought it might be.
“I may have trouble getting used to the new Jane,” I said. “I’m not sure perkiness really suits you.”
“It’s only when we’re together. Broken anything?”
“I think I landed on something. Something the yateveo couldn’t digest. Have a look would you?”
Jane had a look and laughed.
“What?”
“You have a spoon or a fork or something embedded in your left buttock.”
“Hilarious. Pull it . . . OW!”
“Sorry, what were you saying?”
And we giggled, then guffawed, then burst out laughing. Inappropriate, given the circumstances, but something of a relief.