Venus of Dreams (32 page)

A formless doubt fluttered at the edges of Chen's thoughts. "But you don't know if he was really doing anything, do you?"

"Oh, Chen. Why else would he have left?"

"Because he lost his friends. Because you didn't trust him. It'd be hard to stay."

Her mouth twisted. "That wouldn't have stopped him if he were innocent. He could have complained, and brought things out into the open. He would have gone on if he'd really cared about the work. I went on with my lessons even when the rest of Lincoln thought I was a fool for doing them."

Her words were hard and merciless. Julia encouraged you, he thought. A Linker tried to help you, your friends still talked to you, and later, you had me. He felt a twinge of sympathy for the Linker's son he had never met. Whatever his transgression, Anthony's punishment seemed cruel, and the fact that Anthony had chosen to leave without a fight showed how effective the punishment had been. There had been nothing against which he could have filed a protest.

The window darkened as the train entered another tubeway. "We're almost there," Iris said.

A platform, protected on all sides by transparent shielding, carried them up past the lattices of the Institute's pyramid. Occasionally, Chen caught a glimpse of the green land below; Caracas gleamed in the valley, its towers pointed toward the cloudless blue sky.

Iris had greeted two of the other platform passengers. She stood with them now in one corner as they spoke in soft voices, then waved at another young woman as she boarded the platform. That young woman surveyed Chen; he was suddenly conscious of his gray worker's garb, and looked away.

He did not look up again until the platform stopped and the other passengers left. Iris had known them, yet she had not even introduced him, and he had not heard his name mentioned in her murmurings to the others. He was invisible; somehow, he had disappeared and his bondmate had forgotten him.

She touched his sleeve, startling him. "Just one more level." The platform stopped and they stepped out onto a surface lined with palm trees and hibiscus bushes. The level, protected by high railings, was open to the air; the trees fluttered in the wind.

"Sometimes, somebody tries to jump," Iris said. Chen stepped back from the railing. "But if you climb on the railing, the sensors signal and a servo's sent out to restrain you immediately."

"What happens then?"

"The person's taken to one of the physicians. If it's just a momentary depression, something's prescribed and a Counselor's called in. If it's more serious, the student gets a leave for treatment, unless his work's going really badly—if it is, then he's advised to leave. It happens once in a while—there's a lot of pressure. It's hard to think you might fail."

"You wouldn't do anything like that—jumping, I mean."

She shook her head. "Of course not. I wouldn't want that on my record. It'd be bound to hurt my chance to get to the Islands."

He followed her past a few shell-shaped dwellings of pink and white stone until she stopped in front of one. "This is mine. If you get lost, just remember that I'm on the eighth level and this is the eleventh one in from the platform on the north side. That way, someone can always direct you. Or you can just tell the servo my name." Her voice was impersonal, as if she were a tour guide.

She led him inside. A few students were sitting in the front room eating an early supper; the young men were shirtless while the young women wore sleeveless shirts and shorts. One woman looked up and nodded at Iris before turning back to her reading screen. One student was tall and blond, another looked African, a third had a flat, broad, copper-colored face, while a fourth looked like one of Chen's people, yet their similar clothes and slumped posture as they perused their reading screens made them seem alike. The Institute had already begun to mold them, smoothing away their differences.

They walked through the room toward a ramp; Chen thought he heard one of the women giggle. Iris stopped in front of the first door at the top of the ramp, took his hand, pressed it against a panel, then put her own palm next to it, "That's so you can get in when I'm not here," she murmured, though she hardly had to explain that; she was treating him like a stranger again. "And the front door will now open for you too"

The door slid open. The room was small and bare. Iris's clothes hung on a thin rod; her bed was a small platform.

"What's that?" He gestured at the room's only ornament, a blue crystal on a shelf above her screen.

"A mood stone. When I hold it, it soothes me."

"Where'd you get it?"

"It was a gift." She did not say who had given it to her. "I guess we should eat soon. You'd better use your own account, though—my allotment only covers what I eat, and I don't have much credit."

He dropped his duffel. "Iris." He reached for her. She drew back for a moment, then rested against him, her head on his shoulder. "It's been too long."

She stroked his hair, then freed herself. "Listen, I promised to meet someone about now, before I knew you were coming, but I won't be long. I'll just be outside. You can rest if you want, and then we'll have supper."

She had retreated from the room before he could ask her why she didn't want him to meet her friend. He sat down on the bed. Perhaps he was making it harder on her by reminding her of her home; maybe her teachers would regard him as a distraction, and disapprove of his visit. He should have thought of that before.

He waited, growing hungry. He thought of walking around the level, but the journey had tired him. At last he stood up and left the room; he strode down the ramp and passed another student on her way to her room.

The front room was now empty except for one young man slouched over his portable screen. He looked up at Chen and shook back his long blond hair. "Looking for Iris?"

Chen nodded.

"I thought I saw you come in with her. She's just out there. I'm Edwin Barris. Are you an old friend of Iris's?"

"Yes," he answered, unwilling to say more, not knowing what Iris might have told Edwin about him or what the young man might be to her. "I'm Liang Chen."

Edwin grinned. "You're her son's father, then. She's mentioned you." He stood up. "You actually worked on the Project. She told us that too."

"For a while."

"I wish I could talk to you about it, but I have to study. Too bad you didn't come here when we have more time off. Things get more interesting then. That's what it's like here—wild or dead. Not too wild, though. Wouldn't want anyone to think we couldn't be good, cooperative sorts on the Islands." Edwin grimaced, and Chen became aware of the strain and fatigue in the young man's face. "Staying for a while?"

"Maybe."

"Maybe we can talk, then. See you around." Edwin walked toward the ramp and hurried up to his own room.

The student's friendliness had eased him a little. Iris had spoken of him to others; maybe she still missed him after all. He went to the window and looked outside. Iris was sitting near a bush with a dark-haired young man. The man suddenly jumped to his feet and pulled Iris to hers. She stroked his bare arm; as he leaned forward, his dark beard brushed the top of her head. He was saying something to her; she shook her head. Chen backed away from the window and went to the dispenser, not noticing what he had selected until the panel slid open and offered him a plate of beans and rice and a small bottle of wine.

Iris came inside as he was seating himself; she was alone. She fetched her own meal and sat down across from him.

"Who was the man?"

Her eyes widened. She looked down quickly.

"The one you were talking to outside."

"Oh. That was Esteban."

"Were you afraid to have him meet me?"

She raised her head. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"I don't know."

"He had to go someplace."

He picked at the spicy, unfamiliar food; his appetite was gone. "Tell me about Benzi," she said.

"He's growing. Well, you know that—you've seen his image. He's stubborn. Give him a toy, and he's not about to let go of it until he's ready." Iris's face softened as he spoke of the boy; her eyes grew more gentle. Chen went on speaking, telling of how quickly Benzi seemed to grasp the meaning of a word and of how often he would take a small object apart, as if curious about how it worked, and how loudly he cried.

Iris stifled a yawn as he finished, then smiled apologetically. "I'm tired," she said. "I never seem to sleep enough now."

He cleared away their trays, then walked back to her room at her side. They undressed in silence. When they climbed into her bed, he drew her head toward his, missing the long hair he remembered as he stroked her neck. Her hands clutched at him nervously; her hip bone dug into his side. She was unfamiliar; the body he touched was thinner, her smell muskier.

He was too impatient to wait. He rocked against her, moaning as he entered, crying out as he sought release, and finished too soon. As he let go, she fell back on the bed. By the time his hands reached for her again, she was breathing deeply, her mouth open, her body slack, asleep.

Chen awoke once during the night. A dim light glowed near the screen; Iris was awake, a band around her head. Still wearing the band, she crept back to bed. Chen pretended he was still asleep, and soon drifted off once more.

When he woke up again, she was dressing. Her breasts glistened with droplets of water. She swatted at herself with a towel, then draped the towel over the clothes rod.

"Iris. You should have stayed awake longer. More than a year, and I didn't satisfy you."

"It's all right. It wasn't your fault." She smiled at him the way she once had. He got up and let himself into the cubicle next to the room. By the time he had finished showering in the small stall, Iris was dressed and in front of her screen, staring at lines of symbols.

"How long are you going to stay?" she asked as she looked up.

"I don't know. I don't want to be in the way. I can probably find my way around during the day."

"I'd show you around myself, but I wouldn't have time."

"I could come to your discussions with you."

'That wouldn't be wise. You'd probably distract everybody, and they'd want to ask you what it was like for you on the Project, and then we wouldn't get to what we're supposed to be doing."

"I wouldn't say anything."

"Oh, Chen. I don't have time for this."

He sat down on the bed, draping the sheet over his bare body, suddenly embarrassed at his nakedness. Her eyes had a distant look again, as if he were a stranger who had never shared her bed before. "Iris, do you want to end our bond?"

She gripped the back of her chair with her hands. "What made you say that?"

"I thought you might be thinking of it. You don't really need me now. You have what you wanted without me. We're growing apart. We'll change even more by the time you leave this place."

"Look, we've been separated. It's natural to feel that way. But I never thought of breaking our bond."

"Iris, you don't feel the same way. I can sense it. You didn't even introduce me to your friends. I shame you. You'll be someone with schooling, and I'll be a worker. You may want to be free from me then."

Her fingers curled around the chair's back. "You wanted me to come here. You told me it was the right thing to do. Maybe it's you who wants to end our bond."

He shook his head. "Never."

"Then why did you bring this up now?" Her voice was shrill. "I have work to do. I can't talk about this."

He had meant to say he loved her. His words had flowed from his lips almost against his will.

"Chen, I made a promise to you," she went on. "I'll do my best to keep it. We still share the same dream, don't we? Don't we? It may be harder for you to return to the Project without me. I'll be needed there when I'm trained. They don't have as many people in my field there as they'd like, because they need so many of them here for weather control. They'll be bound to keep you at my side. I can't break the pledge now."

Was this her way of saying that she still cared? He pressed his lips together, thinking that he had been a fool to speak.

"Anyway, be practical," Iris said in a lower voice. "If we break our bond, the time to do that is when we're on the Islands, not here. Once we're safely there, it won't matter."

"I see." Chen seemed to be outside of himself, unable to control his words. "You're just waiting to break it. At least be honest with me."

The muscles in her neck tightened as she leaned forward. "What do you want from me? I took you as a bondmate, against my mother's wishes, when she could have expelled me from her house. I gave you a son, I cared for you as much as I could. But it isn't enough for you. No matter what I give, you want more."

"You took me as a bondmate because you needed me then. Now, you don't. You can get to the Islands without me. You can have others, like that man Esteban."

"So that's what it is." She hissed the words. "How wrong you are. He shows me some attention, nothing more. He has to counsel many of us, so he has to treat us all the same way, and he can hardly sleep with all of us." Her eyes narrowed. "Not that I haven't tried. I've asked him to my bed, but he refuses. There. You wanted honesty from me."

"And there was no one else?"

"No one who mattered," she snapped. In spite of her words, she looked wounded. "You knew what my customs were before. I don't ask you what you do away from me. Our contract doesn't forbid other partners while we're separated."

She didn't understand. It wasn't jealousy he felt, but the fear that he was losing her. Why couldn't she see that?

"You shouldn't have come here," she went on. "What if you let it slip to someone else that we're bondmates, that you aren't just the father of my child? Esteban knows, and the Administrators must know, but they keep it in confidence. It wouldn't even matter if many of the students knew, because a lot of their people practice that custom, but there are students here from the Plains, and gossip spreads. I don't want to shame my commune."