It was ten days before I saw Elián again.
It’s not unusual for a Child newly come to the Precepture to spend some time being tutored privately before joining his cohort, but Elián stayed away longer than any I could remember. And then, one day . . .
We were harvesting new potatoes. Han and I were forking over the rows, and the others of our cohort were gathering the tubers and laying them out on the wickerwork riddles. I looked up to blink the sweat out of my eyes and saw Elián coming down the slope toward us.
I felt a gasp catch in my throat. Elián had a proctor with him.
It was unusual to see a proctor outside at all, and this one was eye-catching. The proctors that swarm the school have a variety of adaptations, but mostly look like overgrown daddy longlegs—knee-high, spindly, and quick. Elián’s proctor was as heavily built as a scorpion, high as my waist, its jointed legs easily clearing the churned places and raised beds.
At the edge of the potato trench, and with this thing beside him, Elián stopped.
He shot a round-eyed glance at the proctor, favored our group with a rictus of a smile, and said, “Hi. I’m Spartacus, and I’m here to lead you in a slave revolt against an unjust syst—”
The proctor touched his belly, and he went down screaming.
Or, to be fair, it was just one scream. But it was so loud, and so— I can hardly describe it. It was a sound a human might make if turned into an animal. There was nothing of dignity or tradition in it. It was not the kind of sound we Children heard often, and all up and down the garden terraces, white figures fluttered up like a startled flock.
Unprecedented, that’s what the sound was. Unprecedented. We don’t scream here.
Not out loud, anyway.
Elián had folded up with his head on one of the heaps of dirty potatoes. The scorpion proctor took two mincing steps toward him. He flinched, pushed up onto one hand. But his elbow gave way and he went sprawling.
I knelt to help him, my heart twisting—but as I moved the proctor straightened with the barest ticking of joints. I froze. Its iris clicked in and out. What did it expect? Was I meant to leave him? Or to help him? I held rabbit-still with one hand on Elián’s shuddering shoulder. The proctor’s head swiveled like a turret, taking in everyone.
Thandi and Grego were closest to Elián and me, but they were paralyzed. Thandi looked as if she’d been turned to wood. Grego’s false eyes were completely black. The proctor’s optical beam swept over them, and still they didn’t move.
The proctor locked on to Da-Xia. And she, bless her, pressed her palms together and bowed to it. Then she came forward. She crouched on the other side of Elián. We took a shoulder each, and helped him sit, and then stand. They had indeed cut his hair, shaved it back nearly to the scalp. This close, I could see it prickle, see the convulsive tick in his throat as he swallowed, swallowed.
Elián hung between Da-Xia and me, wobbling. It was unsettling to be so close to a stranger. I could smell him, feel the heat off him. I could see all the secret nicks and scars of his scalp.
Across the top of Elián’s bent head, my gaze met Xie’s. What if he couldn’t work? Couldn’t stand? What should we do?
But even as I wondered, I felt him find his feet. “Hello, Greta,” he rasped, still sagging. “I’m still having some . . .” His voice gave way, came back, and he twitched a smile. “Some trouble with what’s appropriate.”
“I can see that.” I put every ounce of Precepture dignity into my voice. A smile? Did he not understand what he had done? His behavior would cost us all. “What’s appropriate now is for you to introduce yourself. Properly.”
He lifted his head and looked at me, big-eyed. He was still clinging to me, and his look made me feel as though I’d hit a puppy. I suppose from his point of view I’d changed sides. He would not understand why. I knew all the complications, knew I was doing right. And yet his bewildered, betrayed expression still made me look away, which gave me a close-up view of his forearm. His muscles twitched. His skin was goose-bumped and shivery.
And he still hadn’t answered. Xie tried to prompt him. “I’m Li Da-Xia. From Yunnan, the Mountain Glacials.”
“Da-Xia,” he echoed.
“You may call me Xie,” she said, which was generous of her.
“Z? Like the letter?”
“It’s zed in this kingdom,” said Grego, looking sideways at me. “They are touchy about it.” He told the joke carefully, as if he were defusing a bomb.
And Elián missed it. He looked blankly from Grego to Xie, as if the proctor had shocked thirty IQ points off him. Maybe he was just a bit slow. “Xie is Z; got it. Xie and Atta and Gregori and Thandi and Greta and Han.” He recited it as a list, by rote. He turned to the proctor, and added, “Is that right?” As if he expected the thing to answer him.