27. Burda
BURDA
The okra was indifferent to what the humans did on the island.
It wasn't bothered by the Sacred Mothers or the crazy rumors surrounding the disappearance of ten women and two children from the enclosure.
All it cared about was getting water at dawn and shade at midday, and Burda gave it both, no matter what else was going on around her.
Vegetables kept their own rhythm, regardless of rebellions, explosions, blackouts, and every other crisis the males on the other side of the wall manufactured.
"They doubled the circles." Mahra handed her the next seedling. "Morning and evening now. Mother Dassah pulled me aside in the laundry yesterday. She said a woman my age shouldn't carry water alone from the well when she could carry it with sisters."
"What did you say?" Burda asked.
"I didn't know what she was talking about. What well? Was it supposed to be some allegory?" Mahra's eyes darted to the pathway and back. "I just smiled and nodded like a fool. What else was I supposed to do?"
Burda pressed the soil down around the seedling. "When she spouts something like that again, ask her to explain. It was probably what she expected you to do. It would have given her an opening for a recruitment sermon."
Mahra froze with the seedling still clasped in her hand. "So, I failed. I should have asked. I'm so dumb."
The girl wasn't the brightest, but she wasn't stupid either. She was just afraid of her own shadow, and that fearfulness often rendered her mute, but not deaf. She was very good at collecting gossip because no one paid her any attention and people talked next to her as if she wasn't there.
That was why she was perfect for infiltrating the Sacred Mothers.
"You didn't fail." Burda gave her a reassuring smile.
"You got nervous, and that was perfect for your cover.
Let them believe that you're timid and afraid to ask questions.
That way no one will expect much of you when you sit in their circles, hum their hymns, and report to me everything you hear.
" Burda reached for the watering can. "You can hum, right? "
"Of course. Not well, though. I'll probably mess up the tunes."
"So, you mess them up. You think anyone will care? As long as you fit the profile of their recruits, you'll do fine."
Mahra let out a breath. "There is a big assembly today after dinner. I was invited."
"Where are they meeting?" Burda asked.
"The dining hall. That's the only place big enough for them. You can come, you know. You don't need to be a Sacred Mother to attend the sermons. They welcome anyone who wants to listen."
"Of course they do. The more the merrier."
By midmorning, the little ones came, and Sensa peeled off from the group that was headed toward the play equipment and planted herself at the edge of the row with her little fists on her hips.
"You're not doing it right," she announced. "Saphira said slow water goes deep and fast water runs away."
"Did she now?"
"She did." Sensa pouted. "I miss Saphira. She was nice."
"She is nice."
Sensa shook her head. "Mama says that she's dead, so she can't be nice to nobody no more."
"That might be true." Burda kept patting the soil next to the new seedlings. "Some say that the dead are here with us, so we need to talk about them with respect, or they will do mischief to us."
Frowning, the girl lifted her face to the sky. "Where are they?"
"We can't see them."
Mahra shook her head. "You shouldn't fill the child's head with nonsense."
"It's not nonsense. I sometimes hear my mother talking to me, and she's been dead for over twenty years."
"Is it true that Tomek was given to Mortdh?" Sensa asked.
Mahra gasped, and the bag of seedlings fell from her hands.
The shock reverberated through Burda's body, freezing the blood in her veins, but she kept working as if nothing had exploded in her face just now.
"Where did you hear that?" she asked in the most level tone she could muster.
"I heard Mother Vinnah tell the big girls.
She said Mortdh took the children as payment for the sins of their mothers.
They're with him now. I asked Telasah what it meant, and she said it meant Tomek and Bianca are dead, and that Mother Vinnah says that being with the god is better than being alive.
" Sensa's fists came off her hips. "Is it? "
"I don't know, child. I will know soon enough, though. At my age, it won't be long before I join the god."
If she dared, she would have told the girl that Tomek was with his mother and they were perfectly fine, but then Sensa would tell her mother, who would tell others, and Burda would be hauled in for an investigation. It was better to keep her mouth shut and stay out of trouble.
Sensa considered this with a serious expression. "Will you come back and tell me if it's better in heaven than here?"
"If I can, I will. Now, off you go. Go play with your friends."
"Bye." Sensa waved once and took off running.
Burda had let the apostasy story spread because it was a convenient explanation for the women's disappearance. It had seemed like a clever solution at the time, but it had gone too far, talking about sacrificing children to Mortdh.
After dinner, Burda stayed in the dining area and waited for the Sacred Mothers to arrive. She didn't sit with Mahra.
There were nearly four hundred of them now, whereas before the escape, there had been about two hundred and fifty.
Fear was a powerful recruiter, and rumors about the fate of the ten missing women were fueling it.
Humming was the only way they knew to protect themselves from the fate that had befallen those ten women.
The First Mother stood on the kitchen steps, where the light from the doorway made a frame around her.
She was not a large woman, but she had the aura of a leader, the type of charisma that drew people to her.
When Burda was younger, she might have fallen for the benevolent smile and the kind eyes, but she'd seen those types before, and she wasn't easy to fool.
Vinnah stood at her right hand, holding a book.
Burda remembered a different Vinnah. A young mother in the nursery rows, humming to her son when she thought no one was listening, embarrassed when caught, as if tenderness were contraband. Now, the humming meant something very different and had an audience.
Vinnah lifted her hand, and as four hundred women joined in the hymn, her joyful expression made Burda's stomach turn.
When it was done, the First Mother raised her arms.
"Lord Shavek, the keeper of the breeders' enclosure, has heard our petition. The god Mortdh took the faithless and claimed their children as payment for their sins. What is owed must be paid, or more will be taken."
Cold sweat slithered down Burda's back. This was not going anywhere good.
"What were their sins, you ask?" The First Mother didn't wait for an answer. "It is the same sin we are all guilty of. Our devotion has waned. Who among you has gone to her knees and offered daily devotions to Lord Navuh before joining the Sacred Mothers order?"
This time she waited as the women hung their heads in shame.
"We are all guilty, sisters, and we have to repent, but the God Mortdh is not merciful. He will not accept our prayers as payment. We need to make a sacrifice grand enough to appease him."
Every woman and child in the dining area fell silent.
"We sought Lord Shavek's blessing to consecrate an offering to Mortdh to invoke the god's favor back upon us. When the moon is full, we will present the god with what is his by right."
She didn't specify what the offering would be. She left the word alone in the darkness to grow, and then Vinnah began the closing hymn, with four hundred voices echoing it.
Burda pretended to hum with the others as her mind churned.
What did the Sacred Mothers believe was Mortdh's by right?
The only thing that came to Burda's mind was too terrible to coalesce into a complete thought.
They wouldn't sacrifice their own, but not every child in the enclosure had a mother. Some had been orphaned, and even though they had been placed in the care of other mothers, they weren't as dear to them as their own children. They were the most vulnerable.
Burda knew every one of those children by name.
That night, she lay in the dark of the dormitory building, and thought of her options.
She'd been told to call in two weeks, but she couldn't wait that long. She'd been told to use the device sparingly because using it too often might expose her. If she was caught with it, she would be the next apostate, and there would be no one to stand between the Order and the motherless.
But the moon was filling, and the children were running out of time. She had to get help.
It was still dark when she got up and went to the garden.
No one would wonder why she was there so early, because everyone knew Burda liked to water her vegetables before the heat came. No one would pay any attention to an old woman doing routine work in the garden.
She knelt by the east wall, where the mango leaves provided shade and partially obscured her from sight, and pulled the device out of her brassiere.
A distant humming made her stop and put her hands in the soil. She pulled weeds until the humming faded. Then she wiped her fingers on her work pants, held the device as she had been shown, and brought the speaking piece close to her lips.
Her call was answered by the same voice as before.
"Forgive me for calling early," she whispered. "It could not wait."