Initiation by Marian Hughes

Author:Marian Hughes [Hughes, Marian]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, General, Life on Other Planets, Fiction
ISBN: 9780671876401
Publisher: Baen

Chapter Twelve

30:1 GM S: 452M.A.L

Day 30: First Gifter Moon of Spring:

452 Migrations After Landing

"This is your first day of Initiation." Nystra, Mother General to the Women of The Home, smiled down at the girls sitting in two disciplined rows in front of her. Her blue, smooth-weave gown shimmered from the early morning light that slanted down from the Assembly Hall windows. "From now until your Thirteenth Sort Ceremony in two tendays you will be free from school and from your household chores." She smiled and fingered her gift necklace: three red stones for living sons, two blue ones for living daughters. "Until you make your life choice, you are free to go where you like in The Home: to the Guildhalls, to any quarters on the Promenade Deck and even to steerage. And you may talk to anyone you like: anyone who might help you decide whether you wish to live your life as a quarters-wife, a guildwife, or a steerage field hand." A couple of the girls gave muffled snickers. The Mother General paused; the girls quietened immediately. "Your initiation has another purpose, too." She smiled warmly at them. "This is also your Barricade Walk time."

Sanda sat tiredly on her mat. She'd been so afraid of her reactions to today that she had climbed up and down the cliffs all night. Now she could hardly stay awake. Goddess Within, she prayed silently, let it work, let me not lose control until I am safe in steerage. Let the other girls go to their Barricade Walk. Let them talk and giggle with the warriors. And let Haddim wait for me in vain.

She looked around the Assembly Hall, waiting for the farce to end. She was in the second row of sixteen girls who sat facing the dais. Around them and behind them was a wide expanse of worn stone where more than five hundred adults and a thousand children crowded in for Assembly Day ceremonies. On either side, the walls rose ten meters to an arched roof blackened by centuries of torches used to light the hall on gloomy winter days. The voice of the Mother General echoed thinly in the emptiness of the hall as she described the life choices open to the girls.

Beside her Ullan shifted to a more comfortable position. She was sullen, weighed down with bandages and heavy wooden bone-splints. Was she mourning the end of her dreams, too? She'd wanted to be a potter as intensely as Sanda had wanted to be a scholar. And now both their dreams were impossible: guilds did not allow zerkers.

On Sanda's other side, Gena, the dusky steerage girl, sat twisting her sash. Sanda wished she could trust Gena enough to ask the questions that raced around and around in her head. But she couldn't. Not until she'd made her choice. Not until she was safe from Haddim. When she thought about him she could feel an increasing unease. Having Ava in front of her didn't help either.

She glared at her stepsister, wanting to reach out and break her neck.

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