This Time, This Place (Part 4) - 50th Anniversary fiction

For 'this is not an adventure' disclaimer and notes on the Sororiate, see Part 1

Part 3 here



From the private journal of Quinquaginta-Soror-Hortus, Year of Grace 1337:

I had become used to retreating to the garden, to visit her flower, in order to feel less alone—but also to keep far from the presence of all others. So I was unprepared for the appearance of a visitor this morning.

He stood on the last of the Memoriam Steps, a tall man in a long dark brown coat, with the ends of what I eventually realised was a scarf reaching almost to his feet. His head was covered by a dark wide-brimmed hat, from which I could see brown curls escaping.

He was throwing stones, trying to make them skip along the surface. He obviously had several in his hand, but he soon exhausted his supply. After a few more moments spent contemplating the lake, he turned, perhaps to get more stones, and saw me.

I was next to the Aeturnum bed, so there were two hundred metres between us. The man stood, and looked at me, making no attempt to come back to the shore, so eventually I began to move closer to him. I had no desire to talk to anyone, I had no desire to see anyone—but if he would not come to me, I could not ask him to leave.

Even when I reached the first of the Steps he remained still, watching me. I hesitated, suddenly wondering if he was dangerous. How had he found the place? There had not been anyone here, other than new initiates, since…since the Doctor and Charley, fifteen years before.

He did not appear to be armed, however, and although I could clearly see a formidable intelligence in his eyes there was also a kindly gleam. But his expression was sombre.

‘Hello,’ he said, in deep voice. Even the simple word, a genuine greeting, seemed invested with irony. He went on: ‘You look like you’ve lost your best friend. How odd.’

I was so surprised at his perceptiveness that all I could do was echo. ‘Odd?’

‘I mean, it’s an odd coincidence. Because so have I.’ He came closer. Then he turned to survey the lake. ‘That’s why I came here. To think. Quite lucky to have made it, really, the way—’ He broke off and turned back to me. ‘I’m sorry, perhaps you’d prefer to be alone?’

‘No,’ I said, without thinking. ‘I—’ I cut off the self-contradiction that followed immediately. ‘It is…all right.’

He was looking out over the lake again. ‘Her name was Sarah. Is Sarah.’ He paused. ‘Was Sarah.’ He took off his hat and ruffled his wildly curling hair before turning a rueful half-smile on me. ‘I left her at home, about five hundred thousand years ago and fifty thousand light years from here. I couldn’t take her where I was going.’ He looked down at his hat. ‘But all that time and space is just a short hop for me—I could go back and get her, now I’ve sorted out their mess for them. But should I? Perhaps she deserves a chance to live an ordinary sort of life. What do you think?’ He replaced his hat and lifted his head, looking at me down his strong nose. ‘Do you mind me talking to you like this? I’ve got rather used to having someone to overhear my musings.’

I had no idea what to say; I spread my hands. Then a question came to me. ‘You are The Doctor?’

I had caught him off guard, but his widened eyes and opened mouth were quickly replaced by a brilliant smile. ‘And you’re…Dam, no—Soror Hortus! Looking at you, it must be…twenty years? I was here with—well, you would have known him as Magister. I’m so sorry about that, it wasn’t—’

‘That was another Doctor, and not the last time…’ I stopped speaking, and half-turned back toward the Aeturnums. Then I looked at him again.

He was watching me expectantly, his eyes bright.

I hesitated to voice my thought. It had come to me with increasing insistence over the years, but it still seemed incredible. ‘Y-you are some kind of metamorph?’

‘Well…in an occasional, needs-must, from-the-inside-out sort of way, I suppose I am. But we’ve been through all this—well, we will have.’ Then he looked as if struck by a sudden thought, and his hands reached out to my shoulders, not quite making contact before they drew back. ‘Ohh. Hortus? Quinquaginta Hortus?’

I nodded faintly.

He thrust his hands into his coat pockets and stepped closer to me. It was a moment before he said anything, and then his voice came out as a croak. ‘I’m so sorry. Soror Coquus. I remember.’

His words chilled me with the memory of my loss, but part of me was struck with wonder and disbelief. How could he know? How could he ‘remember’?

His eyes were the colour of the lake, and they looked into me with infinite sorrow. ‘You have just lost your best friend.’

I fought to keep the feelings from overwhelming me. I failed, and felt myself swaying. He caught my flailing arm and steadied me, supporting me as I sank down on the seventh stone.

And I had never held her. A year of simmering ill-will, followed by the realisation that she resented me only because of the feelings she could not control – that she did not understand – and then two decades of friendship that could never become anything more…and then to miss her final moments because of some wretched Novina who needed to bond with a bloom…

But no. It was not that girl’s fault. There was nowhere to lay blame, except at the feet of duty, and tradition. And my own fearfulness.

Veritae – and I would always now think of her by her real name – would never have dared transgress. She believed in the rules of the order. I was always the malcontent, the dissident. She had always left it up to me. And I was too afraid. Too afraid, and now it was too late.

I do not know how long I sat huddled, weeping. My tears subsided at length, leaving me only exhaustion.

All this time he had stood on the seventeenth stone, his back turned, honouring my grief without intruding upon it. Now he turned to me and approached. He reached down a hand. ‘Come with me. I want to show you something.’

I allowed him to grasp me by my wrist and pull me to my feet. I expected him to take me out, to the farthest stone, but he led me back to shore and along the waterline to the Aeturnum bed.

We stood for a few moments contemplating the flowers. I sought out my former favourite, in latter years merely my second favourite bloom, and was not surprised to see it reflecting something very like the colour of the lake.

I avoided looking at the flower that had been Veritae’s, but the Doctor now knelt before it. ‘This was Coquus’ bloom?’

I nodded without turning my eyes. I wondered how he knew.

‘Come and look at it.’

I looked at him.

He moved aside, stretching out a hand in invitation. ‘Come and look. Look closely. It won’t hurt.’ He looked thoughtful for a moment. ‘Well, only a bit…’ Then he grinned, his mouth seeming huge and his eyes alight. ‘Come on.’

I lowered myself next to him, and forced my gaze onto the Aeturnum. The petals were slightly wilted, as I had expected, but the flower looked as though it would survive.

‘Look closer,’ he insisted. ‘Bend down to it.’

I did not want to, but there was such gentle command in his tone that I obeyed. I brought my face close to the flower.

It responded, lifting slightly. I gasped, drew back—and it drooped. I looked at the Doctor. He nodded slightly, his eyes wide and shining. I looked at the Aeturnum and leaned closer.

It lifted its head again until it was directly facing me. And it began to shift hue; Veritae’s hazel colour withdrew slowly as grey began to spread from the outer edges of the petals. I leaned still closer, hardly aware I was doing so, my breath held.

The colour stopped its slow advance, leaving the inner petals hazel, but with a grey fringing, and tiny streaks of the grey reaching down into the heart of the flower. I exhaled. I looked wonderingly at the Doctor.

‘Now it holds both of you,’ he said. ‘It will do that, if there’s sufficient affinity between the one left behind and the one departed.’

I had to blink now, to clear my vision. It was not enough, and I wiped at my eyes with my sleeve. ‘H-how did you know…?’

He made an expansive gesture. ‘Ah. Well, when you’ve been where I’ve been, seen what I’ve seen…’

‘Thank you.’

His expression became sober again. ‘You can’t change what’s been. You can’t go back. But this is a way to go forward.’

I looked at the Aeturnum. It looked back at me. My vision swam again, and I bowed my head.

I heard the Doctor stand. I blinked hard once again and looked up at him. ‘Will you…go back? To find…Sarah?’

‘I don’t know if I can. I don’t know if I’m meant to. I don’t know if I believe in things being meant, or not meant, to be.’ He grinned, but with a trace of rue again. ‘There’s a great comfort in ignorance—it keeps you moving forward, questing, looking.’ He put his hands in his pockets. ‘Goodbye, Quinquaginta-Soror-Hortus. Till we meet again. And we will.’

I came to my feet, aware that there were many questions I had left unasked. He was already walking away. I went to speak but was interrupted by a loud gurgle from my stomach. I realised I had not eaten for almost a day, such had been my distress.

He paused and looked back at me. His hand was delving in his pocket. ‘I don’t like the sound of that. Before I go…’ There was rustling, and he produced a wrinkled paper bag and held it out towards me.

‘…Would you like a jelly baby?’



From the private journal of Quinquaginta-Soror-Hortus, Year of Grace 1338:

Septendecim-Novina-Hortus came scuttling up from the garden today to tell me there was a man down there. Foolish hopes rose in me – another visit, so soon after the last? – but even as I approached the lake I knew something was amiss.

He stood looking out over the water in a dark brown, high-collared coat. He did not move. I watched, hardly daring to move or even to blink. At length he seemed to become aware of me and turned, his gaze focusing directly on my face. There was a kind of emptiness in those brown eyes, like the final surrender to some horror. His face was lined and haggard, his hair brown with streaks of grey, turning to white in the straggling beard and moustache.

He gazed at me, without speaking or showing any expression on those haunted features. Then without warning he turned and strode away, climbing one of the slopes and disappearing. There was that sound again, echoing over the low hills and across the water, then silence.

For a long time I did not move. When I felt sufficiently strong I made my way down to the garden. I did not want to look, but I had to see.

My second favourite flower stood drooping, its petals almost touching the earth. I cried out when I saw it, and fell to my knees. It was not dead, but it would need all my care to live. I sat with it for the remainder of the day. Whenever I thought of the man I had seen, I could not suppress a shudder.



Interlude (Year of Grace 1368):

He stands on the seventeenth stone and looks down at the eighteenth. She stands a few stones behind him, her arms loosely folded, her head cocked to one side. There is no sound except for the gentle lapping of the lake.

He kneels, slowly, and traces the letters chiselled into the final stone. ‘Even we don’t know,’ he says. ‘Where life comes from, where it goes to, what might be on either side…there are some mysteries hidden even from the Time Lords.’ He pauses, fingers resting lightly on the stone. Then he pulls his hand away and looks at it as if it was speaking to him. ‘With all of time and all of space to choose from, it always comes down to one moment, one location. Time is another mystery. There are rules, and lines that can’t be crossed…but no one knows exactly what they all are. Personal time and universal time are two distinct streams. Except when they’re not.’

Clara lifts an eyebrow.

‘Don’t you see?’ He stands up and faces her. ‘If there are further regenerations of me out there, are they out there “now”, for me? How can they be? I haven’t become those Doctors yet. And yet, here we are at the far end of human history, so somewhere in the past there must be, or must be going to be, other, future regenerations…so, personal time and universal time are different things.’

‘Except when they’re not.’

‘Exactly.’ Then his brows draw down. ‘Are you making fun of me?’

‘Would I? I’m just mocking the entire structure of space and time.’

‘Oh. Well. That’s all right.’ He turns back to the stone, pauses, and looks back at her with a frown. Then he crouches again. ‘I ran away from this kind of existence. She ran towards it. I don’t think she felt she was very important, and I’ve…well, I’ve saved a planet or two in my time. But maybe that’s less of a difference than it seems. Maybe what’s important is not always what happens to you and around you, but…’ He falls silent and lays his hand on the stone again.

‘Are you all right?’ asks Clara.

‘I can go back.’ He says. ‘I can always go back. Just like I can go back to the underground, or Global Chemicals or Forgill Castle. But once you see this, once it becomes real…becomes a moment in time that has been lived through... Personal time has its own rules.’ He sighs, and sits back, looking at the name carved there, and the date.

‘Year of Grace,’ she reads. ‘I thought you said we’re far in the future.’

‘The date is from the founding of this Cenobate,’ he says. He sighs again. ‘We should have come earlier.’



Part 5 here

Thoughts on the 50th Anniversary Episode

People wanted classic Doctors. People wanted Captain Jack. People wanted River. People wanted the Master. People didn’t want just Tennant and Piper.

I really don’t envy Steven Moffat. Well, actually, I do in many ways…but not in this case. He knows full well that whatever he does, however hard he's worked, whatever appears on November 23rd, a lot of people will complain. But, to those who are unhappy with the anniversary show in prospect, let me pose a couple of questions.

Does anyone seriously think Steven Moffat has not been trying his absolute hardest to make this the best anniversary story he possibly, possibly can?

Does anyone seriously think Steven Moffat is not a huge, huge fan of classic Doctor Who?

Possibly many of the classic Who fans would be happier if Robert Holmes was still alive and writing the anniversary story, and perhaps they would be ecstatic if every surviving classic Doctor was in it. But let’s remind ourselves that it was Robert Holmes who couldn’t find a way to make an anniversary story with only four and quarter Doctors work satisfactorily. And neither could Terrance Dicks, it turned out – The Five Doctors was a pleasant romp, but, as my mother observed at the time, ‘it didn’t seem to be about anything’.

Which is exactly the trap that Mr Moffat will have tried to avoid. I’m quite certain he wanted to do his best for all the fans, old and new, but his first duty when he sat down to write was to drama and narrative, and to the people who pay his wages – i.e., the entire potential audience for the night of Saturday 23rd November. Not just the fans. I don’t doubt for a moment he would love to celebrate the entire history of DW, and there will be, I am sure, many in-jokes and references, perhaps some surprise cameos/clips, etc. But putting the pre-TV Movie Doctors in will only emphasise that they are not the men they once were, and would almost certainly detract from the drama, as well as making the story hopelessly unwieldy. And if Eccleston has declined to take part, it would be a little odd to use McGann, welcome though he would be.

It seems to me that bringing back David Tennant and Billie Piper is the obvious choice to celebrate the programme’s past and yet still keep the drama manageable; they are still the faces of the current programme for a great many people, and they fit easily into the style of the show in a way that the older actors would not. And having only two Doctors (plus the estimable Mr Hurt, of course) will enable the story to breathe. It’s significant that none of the multi-Doctor stories ever turn up in top tens of the programme, and very rarely even in top twenties. The best chance of changing that with The Day of the Doctor comes with the comparatively limited star cast. And who doesn’t want the 50th to be an absolute classic?

It’s possible, of course, that there has been massive misdirection on the part of the BBC publicity machine, and that all the old guys will be popping up unexpectedly during the story. I won’t be sorry to see that, but I won’t be sorry if it doesn’t happen. The history of the programme will be nodded to in many ways, I’m sure, but the fact of the programme, the length of the programme, the presence of Tennant, Piper and the Daleks and the Zygons are all in celebration of the legacy.

But the greatest legacy of Doctor Who is the its power to transport and delight. And the very best result for the 50th anniversary story will be if the entire audience is thrilled, entertained and moved for an hour and quarter and get up to make a cup of tea thinking ‘well, that was bloody good!’ It would be the best result for the BBC. It would be the best thing for the future of the show. It would be the best thing for the fans. Because, after all, we don’t want something that will just top The Three, Five or Two Doctors – we want a new Androzani, Daemons, Fenric, Girl in the Fireplace, City of Death…not a mere celebration, but a new classic. A damn good story.

Does anyone seriously doubt that’s exactly what Steven Moffat sweated blood to try to deliver?

(And if you still want those wonderful old guys, there’s Big Finish’s The Light at the End.)

This Time, This Place (Part 1) - 50th Anniversary Fiction

Disclaimer: This is not an adventure as such, more a character study and a commemoration, though there is a story of sorts. I would like to have included everyone, but it wasn’t practical, so I should warn those entering here – there’s no Rose, but her influence is felt, and there’s no Sarah Jane, but her absence is definitely felt. (As is Elisabeth Sladen’s, surely a shoo-in for the 50th programme if she’d still been with us.) So, please just consider this a brief visit with each of those splendid fellows, and a few of their assistants. (...Companions. Fellow travellers. Whatever...)

The story will be posted in seven parts, ending 16th November 2013.



Prologue: (Year of Grace 1368)

Crouching, he passes his hand in front of the heads of the flowers at the end. The stems give out tiny creaks as the Aeturnums lean, their pale red petals spreading and shifting in hue. He smiles as the colours follow one another; green, grey, brown, blue. He opens his eyes wider and leans in, as if to offer the flowers a better view. ‘Can’t quite get this set, can you?’ He addresses himself primarily to a flower that is already dark brown, but is fluctuating slightly as he stares at it. The red-petalled flowers subside into stillness.

He looks across to where the young woman is gazing out across the water. ‘Clara...’ He straightens up and lifts his head, tilting his prominent chin slightly towards his companion. ‘What colour are my eyes?’

She flicks aside her black hair as she glances round. ‘I don’t know. Depends on the light.’ She immediately returns her attention to the lake. ‘Time Lord colour?’

He looks at her for a moment, then skips down the slope to join her at the water’s edge. He waits without speaking.

She does not look at him. ‘I don’t know. They’re odd—-multi-coloured. Multi-dimensional, almost. Like...well...you know...bigger on the inside.’

‘Now she says it,’ he mutters, following her gaze out across the placid water to the solitary, white-capped mountain beyond the low brown hills. ‘Well...everyone’s eyes are bigger on the inside, anyway.’

‘Windows to the soul...?’

‘If you like. Every person’s bigger on the inside.’ He pauses. ‘“Soul”?’ He looks at her. ‘You know, speaking existentially—-’

‘Why?’

He frowns. ‘Why what? Why are we here? Speaking existen—’

‘No, I like it here. Don’t need a reason for the stop off. Why are you asking about your eyes.’

‘Nothing, it’s just – I noticed, this time the Aeturnums can’t match the— what d’you mean, ‘Time Lord colour’? How many Time Lords do you know?’

She looks at him pointedly. ‘Just the one. So far. But they change every regeneration. Your eyes, I mean. I thought...possibly sometimes you get a sort of mixture.’ Clara looks closely at the Doctor’s face. ‘I liked four’s very much. And that grin…’

His wispy brows lower. His head shifts uneasily between his shoulders. He looks at her, then at the water. His mouth makes shapes but he says nothing. He plucks at his bow tie, straightens his back and firms his thin lips into a line. His gaze is now fixed on the distant snow-covered peak.

Clara turns her eyes surreptitiously in his direction and controls her smile. ‘And six. Such...intelligence.’

‘Well, I don’t know.’ He folds his arms. ‘IQ points are all very well, anyone can stack up IQ points. But what about emotional intelligence?’

‘Listen to the geek-boy pot talking about the kettle...’

‘And sartorial intelligence?’

Clara opens her mouth, then closes it again after a moment. ‘Mmm. Okay.’

‘And, while we’re on the subject of clothes, the number of times he – I – we – nearly tripped over that scarf...’

Clara lets out a small, quickly suppressed snort and turns to him. But her eyes are caught by something else. He turns to follow her gaze. The sight of the line of rough, flat rocks stretching out from the shore into the water brings a sad smile to his lips. ‘Ah. The seventeen stones.’

‘Eighteen,’ she says, after a few moments.

‘No, it—’ He looks at her, then back at the stones. She lifts her eyebrows at the back of his head. He counts.

He sets off along the shore. ‘Come on.’



From the Day Book of Deci-Novina-Hortus, Year of Grace 1292:

When I went down to the garden today at sun-view there were people there. I watched them for a while, then went and told Nono-Dam. She didn’t believe me. None of them believed me at first; they said I must have fallen asleep and been dreaming. The Sisters sit all day talking to a spirit that no one can see or touch or hear, but they wouldn’t believe in people, real people, just standing and talking by the water—talking to each other, not to the air. But they had to believe me when they took me down to the water and everyone could see the footprints. The lady took off her shoes and let the water wash over her feet. They could see the shape of the lady’s beautiful feet in the ground, and a few marks of the man’s shoes farther away from the water.

I had watched them from the Ventus bushes by the path. I was just close enough to hear them; although they were strangers, I understood every word they spoke. Well, not every word—but it was our tongue. None of the Sororiate believed that, either.

His coat was so bright in the sunlight it almost hurt my eyes – garish lapels of red and yellow, and on the body of it, thin black lines crossing each other on a red background. He looked a bit like the party-droll I saw on the Morestran transit ship, with his golden curling hair and yellow striped breeches. His eyes didn’t make me laugh, though, even from so far away. After I’d been watching a minute he took his coat off and laid it next to him where he sat. He turned his face up to the sun.

The lady’s clothes made me wish for my old things—not so bright as his, but a soft white shirt and pale blue breeches that left her legs open to the air. I might have shown myself, I might have spoken to them, but I couldn’t stand beside her in my brown smock. And with my hair shorn! I can’t wait for the day when I’ll be able to wear the Cappa. Her hair was so smooth and black, just long enough to rest on her shoulders. It was beautiful.

She seemed unhappy, holding herself with her arms and moving her feet through the water, looking down as she went, as if she was searching for something.

‘Where would you go back to?’ said the man. ‘Not to your step-father.’

The lady pulled her mouth to one side, and shook her head.

‘I know, I know, Necros wasn’t,’ he hesitated, ‘the most pleasant of experiences, but-—’

‘It’s not that.’ She turned and faced him, still standing in the water, spreading her arms slightly. ‘I was thinking…what we’ve seen is just the tip of a…galactic iceberg, I guess. So much suffering; what can we…’ She stopped herself. ‘I mean, how do you decide…?’

‘Not always knowing where the TARDIS will land next has its advantages. No one can make those kinds of choices, Peri.’

‘So you trust to blind luck?’

‘I’m not so sure luck, if it exists, is so blind. I think you have to trust that wherever you are is the place you’re meant to be.’

I thought then that I couldn’t see how they’d got here. I looked around for a vehicle, but the only thing I could see was a tall dark blue cabinet, like a small hut, standing near the shore a little way beyond the Memoriam Steps.

She was saying: ‘You’re not saying you think there’s some intelligence guiding the universe? Wow. That’s pretty close to relig—’

‘I’d be very careful of thinking that intelligence, as you or I understand it, is the only kind. Remember James Jeans: “the universe looks not so much like a great machine—-more like a great thought”. Of course, I had to prompt him a bit…’

‘“Remember”? Do I know this man?’

‘Oh…no, that was Polly…and Ben. Well, I can always take you to meet him…’

‘That’s okay. Another time.’

‘There’s always another time.’ He wagged a finger in the air. ‘But it’s never as important as this one.’ He stood up abruptly, brushing at his breeches and putting his coat over his arm. ‘Now, come along – let me show you why I brought you here.’ He walked quickly up the slope, not waiting for her. She stood watching him for a moment then followed, picking up her shoes before she hurried to catch him up.

He squatted by the Aeturnum bed. The flowers began to lift their heads. ‘As an alleged botanist, Perpugilliam, this should interest you.’

‘“Alleged”? Show me your medical degree, “Doctor”—-and then be prepared to take notes…’

‘You have heard of Joseph Lister, I take it…?’

‘What..?’ She got down beside him. The Aeturnums wavered slightly, not sure where to focus their attention. I saw her mouth fall open. ‘They’re moving…’

He sighed. ‘Nothing escapes the eagle eye of Professor Brown…’

‘Watch it.’ But her voice lost the sharp edge at once. ‘What are they…?’

‘Aeturnums. Another kind of intelligence. They bond – telepathically and otherwise – with higher life forms. Well—sentient life forms, which is not necessarily the same thing…’

‘Why are they changing colour…? They’re changing all the time…and this…this one’s brown…?’

‘They match eye colour. No one knows why. That one has latched on to you, it seems.’ The man leaned closer to a flower that now had bright blue petals. ‘And this one likes me.’

‘No accounting for taste.’

‘Mmm.’ The man sat back. ‘They bond for life. Those two flowers will always be that colour now. Well, if I don’t come again…’ He waved a hand over the rest of the bed. One or two of the flowers twitched, but none changed colour this time. ‘Normally they’re that sort of pale red.’ He reached out a hand quickly. ‘No, no, don’t pick it. If it’s left alone it could live for a hundred years.’

The lady was obviously puzzled. ‘But…but if it’s bonded…shouldn’t I…aren’t we going to take them with us?’

‘They won’t survive in the TARDIS environment.’

‘Are you sure? I thought the TARDIS was about the most—’

‘I’m sure.’ He stood slowly, looking down at the Aeturnums. ‘But think of this; wherever you go, whatever happens to you, there’ll be a memory, and impression of you – of both of us – in this time, and this place.’ He gestured at the dark brown flower. ‘That’s part of you now. And you’re part of it.’

She got to her feet beside him, and they looked together at the rows of blooms. Then she looked at him. ‘What is this time? When…are we?’

‘Approximately half a million years after your time. But even here, even now, there are human descendants on Caela.’

‘People?’

He waved a hand at the Aeturnums again. ‘This garden is still tended.’

‘But only one kind of flower…’

‘Yes, well…’ he looked around, and I hid a little further behind the bushes. ‘It’s a religious order. See the odd-coloured ones? The members of the Cenobate come down here when they first arrive, find one of Aeturnums, and bond.’

‘What for?’

‘I expect they find it grounds them in some way. Simplicity was what Thomas More thought plants were created for. Do you feel grounded, Peri?’

She spoke slowly, after a few seconds. ‘I feel…I don’t know. Not stressed.’

‘Well, there you are. Do you feel ready to face what the universe has to throw at us?’

She took a deep breath, and smiled. ‘I guess.’

As he lifted his arm and she took it, I stepped forward without meaning to, half out of the cover of the bushes. But their backs were turned and they did not see me. As they walked along the shore in the direction of the Memoriam Steps, I felt I wanted to run after them. The Sororiate had been as kind as they knew how, but I did not want to stay on Caela for the rest of my life. At that moment I was so frightened by the future I saw that I was ready to run after the strangers and beg them to take me away with them, for all their talk of suffering wherever they went.

But I was too afraid, and I watched them as they walked a little way out on the Steps, stood there for a time looking at the lake, then walked back and into the hut thing. There was a noise which seemed to me like the cry of some beast or monster, and I hid. When I looked the hut was gone.

Of course I said nothing to the Nono-Dam or any of the others about the disappearing hut. Or about my feelings.

Part 2 here



Notes on The Sororiate Pantheia

The Sororiate are a multi-denominational order in the cenobitic tradition – that is, the sisterhood welcomes adherents of many spiritual paths, and stress community life. The Sororiate was founded in the late period of the Seventh Morestran Empire, on the planet Caela, and eventually spread to several hundred worlds as far apart as Draconia and New Refusis.

Nomenclature: the sisters usually abandon their given names when they take their vows (a practice discontinued by the Marian sect, but reinstated later by some others), and are thenceforth known by their appointed task, the stage of their progress in the life of the spirit and of the community, and the decade of life they are living through. Younger aspirants are graded for every year up to the age of twenty.

Thus: Deci-Novina-Hortus denotes a ten-year-old novice gardener. An older novice (eleven and beyond) is Novus. Each section of the community (gardening, cookery, laundry, etc.) will have members at different stages, but no more than one novice, one disciple, one sister, and sometimes an Honorarius, a senior sister who is semi-retired from her official duties but may in time become a Dam, of which there is only one at any time, designated by age and title.