Channel's Destiny Part 2

"What for?" Owen asked dully. "Maybe I should just die."

Veritt said, "Zeth, you're tiring Owen. Find your father, and ask him to come up here."

"He's with Mama," said Zeth. "They're having transfer."

"By now he should bea"oh. Well, find Uel or lord, then."

"Yes, sir."

"Noa"don't, Zeth," said Owen. "I don't want to sleep."

"What do you want, son?" Veritt asked gently.

"I want to die."

"No," said the old man. "G.o.d made you Gen to preserve your life. Do not question His wisdom."

"I don't think G.o.d cares," Owen said flatly.

In the same reasonable tone he used to teach the older children, Veritt said, "You are not thinking, Owen. You have grown up in a community blessed with constant proof of G.o.d's caring. I, too, questioned His wisdom many times when I first became Sime. Yet I've lived to see His plan unfold. We are building a world where such brutality as you've suffered can never happen again."

The grim set of Owen's features relaxed under Veritt's care, and tears began to slide down the boy's cheeks. "That's right," Veritt said, pus.h.i.+ng Owen's bright blond hair back off his forehead. "Tears are good. Let them cleanse your grief away so you can find G.o.d's plan for you. Pray for guidance, son. There's a reason for what happened to you. I don't know what it is, but I have faith it is a part of G.o.d's plan."

Owen drifted to sleep under the spell of Mr. Veritt's words. Then the old Sime guided Zeth from the room. "How did you put him to sleep?" Zeth asked, "You're not a channel."

"Did you think I'd never noticed you boys nodding off during my sermons?"

Not believing he had heard right, Zeth looked up to find the old man's eyes twinkling. Abel Veritt joking with him? He felt suddenly grown up, admitted to the adult world . . . but he didn't deserve it.

"Zeth," Mr. Veritt said seriously, "Owen's injury is not your fault. You were hurt yourself, son."

The aching guilt exploded. "We shouldn't have been there! Mr. Whelan told us to go up to Mr. Brick's place, but I couldn't. I made Owen and Jana come with me."

"Let's talk about it," said Mr. Veritt, leading Zeth to the bench in the hall. "Tell me, how did you make them come with you?"

"I told them their pa would be there."

"But was your purpose wrong, Zeth? Did you intend to harm your friends, or profit at their expense?"

"... No. I was just scared to come alone," Zeth admitted.

"So," said Mr. Veritt, "you disobeyed Mr. Whelan, and you enticed your friends into disobedience."

As it was not disobedience that bothered Zeth's conscience, he brushed that aside with "Yeah, I guess so."

"However, Owen and Jana were under no constraint to follow your example. They also chose to disobey. Zeth, you are blaming yourself for the wrong thing."

"But I'm responsible!" Zeth insisted, looking up to find Mr. Veritt Half smiling at him.

"Yes, Zeth, you are responsible. Not guilty, but responsible. Like your father, you accept the consequences of your actions, whether you intended them or not. That's a very grown-up att.i.tude for such a young boy."

The words warmed Zeth, but they couldn't remove the hollow feeling when he thought of Owen. Mr. Veritt studied him. "I wish I could a.s.sign you a penance, Zeth, to atone for your disobedience. But your parents have never fully accepted my beliefs, and I will not impose them on their son."

"a.s.sign it, Abel."

Zeth looked up to see his father at the head of the stairs.

"Don't call it a penance," said Rimon Farris, "call it a punishment. I trust you to know what's right for Zeth."

"Don't you want to knowa"?" Veritt began.

"It wasn't me he confessed to. Wanttell me what you did, Zeth?" Farris was calm and relaxed now, glowing with repletion of selyn.

"I didn't go up to Mr. Brick's yesterday," said Zeth, "so neither did Owen and Jana. That's how they got hurt."

"I see," said Farris. "You feel responsible." He turned to Abel. "What would you have him do about it?"

Mr. Veritt said, "I think two problems can be solved at once. Owen will require a great deal of help in the next weeks and months. He'll be awkward, and others will feel embarra.s.sed around him. Some will avoid him, while others will find it easier to do for him than to teach him to do for himself. Zeth, I'm a.s.signing you the job of making Owen independent."

"... What?" Zeth asked in puzzlement.

"He doesn't have to be helpless. Take care of him until he can care for himself. Figure out how he can feed himself, dress himself, bathe himself. As soon as he's strong enough, get him on a horse. If you require apparatus, get Dan Whelan or Tom Carson to help you make it. Ask the women to design clothes Owen can get in and out of by himself. You see, Zetha"your penance is over when Owen can get along perfectly well without you."

Zeth was stunned. It was the worst punishment he could imagine. It was impossible. He won't even talk to me!

Rimon Farris smiled warmly. "Perfect!" he said. "Abel, I wish I'd thought of it."

Soon Zeth decided his punishment would destroy his friends.h.i.+p with Owen forever. The more he tried to be gentle, the more sullen and stubborn Owen became. The first day he wouldn't eat at all. The second, as his pain receded, his growing Gen appet.i.te caught up with him.

Owen's sister, her arm in a sling, was temporarily suffering the inconvenience Owen would face for the rest of his life, but she wasn't much help to her brother. When Zeth brought the lunch trays up, Jana told Owen, "Trina made us soup in mugs, see? That way we can drink it."

"I'm not hungry," said Owen.

"You didn't have any breakfast," Zeth said softly. "You've got to eat something." Owen had been defeated by the bowl of cereal that slid around on the tray when he tried to spoon it up. By the time Zeth thought to brace the bowl with a rolled napkin, Owen was too frustrated to eat.

Firmly now, Jana said, "To produce selyn, Gens have to eat even more than children."

"And what am I producing it for?" Owen flashed.

"To stay alive, dummy," said Jana. "I didn't know they cut off your brains with your arm!"

Owen was infuriated. "If you had the brains you were born with, you'd know I'd be better off dead!"

"n.o.body's better off dead!" Jana snapped. "You know how Pa feels whena"" She broke off with a glance at Zeth. "Only cowards give up. I never thought my brother was a coward!"

Owen leaned back against the pillows, fighting tears of frustration. Zeth said, "Jana, that's not fair. If you can't keep a civil tongue, you'd better leave."

"He's my brothera"and I'm not going to have a helpless coward in the family!"

"Owen's no coward! You're the one that can't take it, Jana! Get out and don't come back until you can be nice."

Zeth took a threatening step toward her, a little surprised at himself. All at once, Jana turned and stalked out of the room, pausing only to close the door with exaggerated care.

Zeth turned to Owen, who was staring at him wide-eyed, tears br.i.m.m.i.n.g his eyes, but awe in his expression. "Zeth, that was Jana you just threw out of here."

"Yea-ah," Zeth said slowly. It was the first time he'd ever faced her down. The two boys stared silently at one another until Owen said, "That soup does smell kinda good. Be a shame to let it get cold." Once started, Owen ate more than Zeth.

The next day, they moved Owen into Zeth's room. Still weak, leaning heavily on Zeth, he insisted on walking. "If I can't be useful, at least I won't be a burden."

But by the time they got him settled he was almost as pale as when they had brought him in unconscious. Rimon Farris said, "No harm done. You're still healing, Owen."

"But why does my arm hurt?" Owen asked. "I mean the whole arm, Mr. Farris. It hurts all the way down."

"The shock was to your nerves, as well as flesh and bone.

When they heal, the pain will stop. You're doing fine, Owen. Your field is climbing normally in spite of your injury."

Owen's soaring field soon proved the greatest nuisance on the New Homestead. When he met frustration, the emotional intensity of his nager irritated every Sime past turnovera"the point in the monthly cycle at which the Sime had used up half the selyn from his last transfer, and began to move toward need.

His clumsiness infuriated Owen. All Gens were clumsy compared to Simes, but Owen could not even walk right at first, the loss of his arm having changed his balance. He went at everything bullishly, forcing his way to victory over inanimate objects, careless of how often he fell, or cut or bruised himselfa"or the shock of each such event to nearby Simes. Zeth was reminded of the two dogs, Patches and Biggie, who had never quite grown up to the size of their feet.

Owen's normal sunny good nature had disappeared. Grim determination was now his most positive mood. After a while, only Zeth, Del Erick, and Jana spent much time with him; Zeth because he was determined not to fail, Erick because he wanted desperately to help his son, and Jana . . . Zeth decided she really loved her brother underneath the bickering. Things went better when Zeth finally gave up trying not to lose Owen's friends.h.i.+p. Owen was not able to be friends with anyone at the moment.

One day, after Owen had upset every Sime in the house, Zeth found him in the barn currying his horse, which was now stabled at the Farris Homestead because, as a Gen, Owen could not go back home to live.

Zeth started to call out, then paused. As he stroked the horse's flank one-handedly, Owen was crying. A shaft of sun caught his good right arm, and Zeth could see the bulge of Gen muscle that had developed over the last few weeks of savagely forced exercise. He backed up and called from outside the barn doors, "Owen?" "Go away!" Owen called back.

But Zeth went in. "Hey, that's a good idea. The horses could use a good grooming. I'll help you."

'No!"

'What's gotten into you?"

'I don't like being your punishment!"

'Who told you that!"

'Jana." He paused. "It's true, isn't it?"

Picking up a pair of brushes, Zeth went to work on the other side of the horse. "Owen, honest, it used to be I did it 'cause Mr. Veritt said I had to. But not anymore. You can be as nasty to me as you want because it's made you learn. When you can ride again, it will all be over."

"Ha! I'll never be able to ride again!"

Owen had attempted, prematurely, to mount his horse, fallen off, and reopened his wound. The pain disrupted a transfer that Zeth's father had been giving at the moment. Owen had been strictly forbidden to attempt it again until Rimon gave permission. The reopening of the wound had been followed by infection, the delay only worsening Owen's temper.

"Jana can already ride again," said Zeth.

"Jana still has her arm."

From the doorway, Del Erick called, "Oh! There you are, Owen!" As Zeth leaned out to say h.e.l.lo he couldn't help noticing that Erick was in need.

"h.e.l.lo there, Zeth. Dan Whelan sent these over for you." He held out a handful of buckles.

"Did he find a way to make them work?" asked Zeth, who had asked Whelan to design a one-handed buckle.

"I think so, with a little practice." He held them out to Owen, who glanced over his shoulder and then turned back to currying his horse. Zeth reached for the bundle of straps.

"I'll see if I can figure it out," he said.

"I don't know why you keep pretendinga"" Owen's voice cracked perversely at just the wrong moment.

Del stepped back, and Zeth could see him taking a deep breath, striving for control. Owen, wrapped up in his own miseries, hadn't noticed. But in a moment, Erick seemed calm again, as he said, "I figured out a way for you to mount that horse, Owen, but if you're not interesteda""

Owen turned, and Zeth could sense the hope that was more pain than anything else.

"Saddle up, then, and come outside. I'll show you."

Before Owen could turn sullen again, Zeth quickly helped him saddle Flash, letting Owen do most of the work.

Outside, Del took the reins in his right hand, tentacles retracted. "I've been working to get Flash to accept my weight from the right. It may take some practice, but watch. You take the saddle horn in your right hand, step with your right leg, anda""

In one leap he was mounted. "I didn't augment to do that. You're tall enough, there's no reason you can't learn it."

With a pained expression of defeat Owen turned away. Zeth picked up the reins he dropped, and said, "I wonder if I can do it."

But when Zeth tried the right-hand mount, the horse s.h.i.+ed. Desperate now, he said, "Well, it will take some practice."

That wakened Owen's spirit. "I've trained Flash since he was a colt. He'll let me do it."

"Well, let's start with a slower mount," said Del. "Come over here by the fence and go on from the railing."

Owen became wrapped up in the project, until he tried to scale the horse's side, right foot in the right stirrup. The horse sidestepped, and he went up one side and down the other to land with a thump.

Erick stiffened against the pain while Zeth rushed to his friend's side. But Owen was on his feet, his expression savage. He rammed his boot into the stirrup, and in a moment was seated atop his horse for the first time in weeks. A grin split his face and with a yell and a whoop he let out the reins. Before anyone could stop him, he was galloping down the road toward town.

Erick leaped for his own horse and raced after his son, gaining gradually. As he caught up, Owen pulled the horse into a sharp turn, seemed almost to lose his balance for a moment as Zeth held his breath, and then was racing back to the yard gate.

When the two horses pulled up, blowing hard, Erick said harshly, "What made you pull that fool stunt? Where did you think you were going?"

Owen slid to the ground and met his father's eyes on a level. "There's nothing for me to be afraid of in town. If I can't donate, I can't be killed!"

Erick was trembling, his tentacles restless with need. "But you can certainly make a Sime want to kill!"

Ready to snap back at his father, Owen stopped. It was as if he saw beyond his own anguish for the first time since the raid. "Oh, Pa, I'm sorry!" His arm went about his father's waist, and Zeth noticed that although they were the same height, Owen was already a larger man than Erick, who was thin even for a Sime. He seemed suddenly frail, leaning on his son, and Zeth, knowing that he was about the same age as his own parents, wanted to deny the sight, tie looks almost as. old as Mr. Veritt.

Erick's face smoothed, his tension relaxing under his son's touch. It took long months of Companion's training to learn that. Owen had no training.

Del Erick spoke slowly, carefully. "Owen, now don't be afraid, sona"but you've got to stop that."