Jessa Ch. 14

"But strength is useless in the face of your anger. And I don't know how to be the kind of person that doesn't make you mad all the time. I... I don't want to be that kind of person."

"Then don't," he retorted so sharply, she suspected that his anger was rising to the surface again.

A faint tremor went through her and she sighed. "So it will always be like this? Me, in a cage, gilded or not. You, with your anger barely in check, or not."

He was so still, she was sure he was hiding his anger from her. But when he finally spoke, the ethereal calm seemed securely back in place. "We just need to find another way. Love..."

"Love?" she scoffed, then cringed when he turned sharply and she realized she'd interrupted him. "I don't love you, Torah," she said softly, with all the sincere regret she could muster. "I don't know if love even exists in this world we live in now. I know you once said you were falling in love with me." She took a deep, shaky breath. "I don't believe it." She looked at him boldly, but careful to keep any shadow of defiance from her features, even though he probably couldn't see her face that well in the darkened room.

Torah reached up to his neck and pulled a chain free from beneath his shirt, then over his head, tossing it onto the bed next to Jessa. She looked down and saw the pendant he had given her, after taking it back from Lania. Jessa shook herself so slightly, the motion was almost imperceptible. "I was wrong. You loved her," she stated simply.

"Yes."

"Are... Samu and Saula, are they..."

"My sons? No. I was in a training camp when Lania was sent to my father." Torah shrugged. "He did his duty. He impregnated her. But he truly loved my mother. He never treated Lania badly, he just wasn't interested in her beyond the children she carried. When my father began to ail, I came back from camp. I admit, I fell in love with Lania. I even made sure that she was allowed to stay after the twins were born. My father was too sick by then to insure they had the strongest start or that Lania was treated properly." He shrugged. "Maybe it wasn't necessary. They were early and small, but healthy and they thrived. Still, it gave me a few more months with Lania. I petitioned the Council to let me keep her. She was Elite, like you, but genetically sound and with a family history of multiple births. I thought for sure they would agree, as I had the ability to protect her on the family estate. She wouldn't face the normal dangers of being wed to a council agent. I couldn't believe when they turned me down. And then to give her to Renik of all people."

"I'm sorry," Jessa said. "And I'm sorry I'm not her."

Torah stood at the side of the window, looking out at the night for the longest time without saying a word. "You are her, in some ways," he finally said. "In enough ways, that I forget sometimes." He turned slightly to look at her. "You are beautiful. You are fiercely sexual. You are smart, smarter even than she was. You are stronger than she was." He shook his head. "But she was obedient. Whereas you defy everyone for the sheer joy of disobeying."

Jessa shook her head vehemently, but he held up a hand. "I thought I wanted, needed, obedience, but now I am not so sure. I thought the council's way was right, that women needed to be protected, impregnated, and focused on nothing but childrearing. When you killed Renik, easily escaped his men's dragnet, then fled across country, I was angry. Seething. Not because of what you accomplished to find temporary safety. I was angry because you had shaken my beliefs to the very core. I had failed to protect you and so you had protected yourself in spectacular fashion. I tried to let go, to treat you the way my father had treated Lania; better than he had treated her. Make you a Tenth Lady, see to your child-bearing in the least intrusive way possible, provide for your wants, your aspirations." He paused. "I even resigned myself to looking the other way if you should need to satisfy your sexual appetites.

"Then I found I couldn't let go. I thought that was what you wanted, yet you seemed to defy me again, showing me that wasn't what you wanted at all. I was floundering. I began to think that defiance was your only goal in life. To do the exact opposite of what I wanted or needed you to do. Then when I gave you that schedule, what should have been impossible for someone like you to adhere obediently to, you not only followed it, you essentially thanked me for giving it to you with lusty sex. What was I supposed to think then?"

"That I realized you were right," she stated softly, then shrugged. "About the computer use, anyway," she added with a rueful smile. "The more I explored the councilary web, the more puzzles I found. I thought I would get answers, but I only got vastly more questions. I became obsessed. I needed you to show me that."

"And now you have a new obsession," he concluded.

"I think it's one you wanted me to have," she challenged, her chin jutting out as she stared boldly at his shadowy figure.

He gave a rare, slight smile she could only just make out in the soft light. "Perhaps we both have ulterior motives we hide even from ourselves. But here is not the place for that discussion. Please. Rest so the doctor will release you. Then we can talk."

"Torah?"

He sighed heavily in exasperation. "Jessa, please, just once..."

"I just want to know what I did to my elbow," she protested.

He rubbed his face to hide his smile. "It was dislocated. Doctor wanted to keep it immobilized for a few days while the soft tissue heals."

"Torah?"

"I swear if you ask one more question, I will have the nurses gag you!" He exclaimed, but with that faint smile that he couldn't seem to shed.

****

Jessa was back in Jacq's conference room, pacing, eyeing the door. She was in no shape to make a run for it again, and she was certain, beyond any doubt, that she would never elude Torah; hadn't even been successful eluding Jacq, in the end. She was just slightly flattered that Torah seemed to think it took someone with the training of a Council Agent to contain her. That only served to guarantee he would be sure such containment was in place. Anyway, she was more than a little intrigued by the vague hints he had dropped and the ultra-secure conversation he was setting up; at least, that was why he had told her he was bringing her back to Jacq's office. So now, she was waiting impatiently for his return, craving whatever new information he could offer, like a drug she'd been too long without.

When he finally did enter, it was with Jacq and Erich in tow and her breath caught. She wasn't sure she was ready to trust them. Being bound to Torah, by so many tethers, forced her to trust him in ways she wouldn't have chosen had there been any other options. But the others, equally as terrifying, and to whom she was - obviously - more annoyance than any woman was worth; to be bound to them by commonly held secrets was almost more than she could bear. She watched as they settled at the conference table. Jacq had given up all pretense of friendliness, though at least he didn't seem angry. Erich struck her as restless and impatient, hauled here against his will by Torah, perhaps? Torah, at least, still had his current calm demeanor and led her to a seat at the table with an arm about her waist, then settled next to her.

Perhaps Torah noticed her eyes flitting nervously from face to face. He took her hand and tugged until he had her attention. "I've asked Jacq and Erich to help us with this... puzzle, because I trust them implicitly. And because this is too complex, too well hidden for us to solve alone. We need help and we need it fast." Her eyes widened. "You will ovulate soon," he explained. "As you've no doubt come to understand, it is more than just certain members of the Council that are interested in our progeny. Including, perhaps, whoever is trying to kill you."

She formed a silent 'Oh.'

"I will start, as my knowledge goes back further in time, if not in depth, than Jessa's." He leaned back in the chair, though he kept his grip on Jessa's hand. She wasn't sure if that was too keep her from fleeing, or to comfort and assure her. He took a deep breath and began, "I wasn't exactly secret about my disappointment concerning Lania being reassigned. Unfortunately, my Father's death gave certain other Council members more power, or at least more bravery to speak out against my family's interests. In the beginning, I thought that was what it consisted of, revenge against my family, or the power that my father had wielded."

He paused and glanced at Jessa. "My father was very skilled at collecting favors, and reminding others of debts yet to be paid off. Part of that was because he helped a great many people who were more than happy to return the favors paid. Part of that was that he had a very extensive intelligence network. He began his career as a Council Agent, and took information gathering to new heights. Even when he moved on to different pursuits, he nurtured that network, but by then, he was freer to focus it on enemies and others in high places. When he rose to a Council position, many felt powerless to defy his will, because of what they owed him or what he knew about them." He paused. "Drau was one of those.

"My father, and my mother saw to it that I inherited that network and banked those debts for the future. It took time to engender the trust of those who had fed him the information which he put to such valuable use; to convince them that not only their identities were safe with me, but that I would use the information they provided wisely. Lania was dead before someone came to me and revealed that the council denied her to me, not out of revenge, but because there was a greater plan afoot. I of course immediately set about to learn what that greater plan might be, with little success. When I was told about a year later that I was being sent to Summer's End to find an Elite for a wife, I figured that couldn't be the plan, because Lania would have fit that role easily. I fought the idea until I heard a whisper that it was part of the great plan." He shrugged. "Curiosity took over."

"So you didn't choose me?" Jessa asked softly, not sure how she felt about that.

Torah squeezed her hand. "I did. However, I failed to pick up on how pleased certain council members seemed with my choice, nor that they were prepared to argue me out of any other choice. I was more interested in getting the whole ordeal over with, or do away with it all together. I mean, why Summer's End? Why the pressure to 'seduce' the woman? Probably the one woman at the whole resort that had no interest in being seduced or seducing anyone else. How much easier it would have been just to drive up to her house, take her, willing or no, and bring her home.

"Then the whisper came again. It needed to be public. It needed to look like it was about the Circles absorbing the Elites. It needed to divert attention from the reality. Save no one seemed to know what the reality was. Thus the early exit, the helicopter, all of it. Grand theater to disguise the fact that it had to be me and it had to be Jessa. They would have preferred that she had come willingly, but that was a minor detail in the greater scheme of things. I didn't find out until later, but they also had me giving her hormones to encourage multiple eggs being released as well as to counteract the water at the resort. I questioned why they were so eager to get her pregnant as soon as possible, but they only insisted that when the maternal hormones kicked in, it would bond her to the idea of marriage and motherhood." Jessa snorted softly.

Torah nodded in agreement. "Once I got to know her, I knew they were wildly off base, but things were in motion. It was too late to take a step back. And I still didn't know what the reality was. It was becoming clear that most of the Council had bought into a story that seemed to parallel the hidden reality. They were told there was something special about pairing Jessa and me, but it wasn't the real something. They believed that we would be able to have many offspring and that the bloodlines of the Circles would be wondrously revitalized as our children came of age and bred. In the meantime, I'm trying to run my team, solve this mystery, convince the most obstinate woman in the world that her new reality - which was everything she had hoped to avoid for her future - was unavoidable, and that she was to have absolutely no choice in the matter, plus Renik has gone off the rails yet again when he heard I was granted a woman."

"So what was the reality?" Jacq asked.

"I still don't know. And I don't know who does know; who is orchestrating all this behind the scenes. I know someone, or ones, at the council level is very interested in the children that we can produce and the quantity, apparently. And that these children be produced as rapidly as possible. When the doctor declared that Jessa needed to heal for a month before trying to conceive again, the orders came down that her egg would be harvested and fertilized with my sperm." He curled his lip in distaste. "I have not been able to find out if an embryo resulted or if it has been implanted in a surrogate. That rush doesn't jive with looking forward to a child's contribution to the genetic pool. What is a month or two when you are looking at seventeen or eighteen years?"

Jacq looked at Jessa. "This is what you needed to go sneaking out at night for?"

Jessa ducked her head. She still wasn't ready to trust the others, but Torah interceded. "I didn't tell Jessa about any of this. I didn't have any solid information to go on. I needed to dig deeper and I didn't want to risk her if I got too close and made someone nervous. So I left her here, with the keys to the councilary web so that she could learn how to navigate, figuring when I returned with whatever information I could find, we could try to solve the mystery together. It never occurred to me that she would be halfway to solving the mystery herself. Nor did it occur to me that someone would be just as determined to prevent us from conceiving."

"Renik's people?" Erich asked.

Torah shook his head. "Renik could have killed her and didn't. This person or persons wants her dead, primarily because she's an easier target than I am, I suspect. Renik's sole aim was revenge, but I think someone might have been whispering in his ear about how to achieve it, perhaps believing that he would kill her; perhaps assuming that they could more easily accomplish it once she was in Renik's control." He shook his head in frustration. "There's too much I don't know."

The others looked at Jessa in expectation. Torah squeezed her hand, and again she didn't know if it was for reassurance or a warning to cooperate. She glanced at him and he merely nodded. "What did you find that started you down that road?" he asked.

She shrugged uncomfortably, her eyes laser-focused on her hands in front of her. "Everybody, including you," she added with a quick glance at Torah, "Was acting like I was the sole salvation for the genetic pool of the Circles. I may be naïve, but not that naïve. I mean, just look at Summer's End. The whole resort was full of healthy, virile elites. Other than being taller than most, I wasn't that special. My athletic abilities came through the hard training of my father as much as genetics. And I would even argue that I'm not any smarter than the average Elite, apart from a quirky memory and a thirst for knowledge. And while it's true that you can often tell a Circle from an Elite or a highborn from the telltale signs of genetic illnesses and weaknesses, it is becoming harder to tell the lowborn from the highborn as labor has become easier and food more plentiful, never mind their robust genetics that allowed many lowborn to survive the pandemic unscathed or even untouched. All of this information is available to us lower life forms and whispered about freely, whether the Circles acknowledge it or no. The more people kept acting like there was something 'special' about me, the more suspicious I became that it wasn't just about having good genes. Then there was the Tertiary Pandemic..."

"The what?" both Erich and Jacq said in unison.

Jessa looked at Torah. "Tell them," he said quietly.

She took a deep breath. "I heard there was a third major mutation that included an adaptation to new vectors."

"Heard from whom?" Jacq demanded, but Erich was looking at Torah with a raised eyebrow.

"From me," Torah acknowledged. "Go on," he told Jessa. "You know far more than I was ever able to find out."

"It didn't make sense to me, especially as time went by and I never heard more. I mean, by definition a pandemic is a disease that strikes and spreads faster than defenses can be put up to stop it. And yet, when I started researching on the Councilary web, the information was there; the mutation phases, the speculations as to how the mutated virus was introduced into other mosquito genera and fleas and mites, the vectors and vector hosts. Everything was there except how to prevent the spread to humans."

"Then why don't we know about this?" Jacq said with irritation.

"Nobody knows," Jessa said softly. "Almost nobody. I was asking the same question, essentially. How could such a virulent virus be out there, with no cure or prevention, and nobody knows?"

"And what did you answer yourself," Jacq asked, his skepticism etched deep in his face.

"There are two questions really," Jessa said, the tutor in her coming out despite her irritation with the cynical grilling. "The first question is easier. Why don't people know about this? The answer; because the Internet, where scientists interact nowadays, instead of side by side in a lab, holds the information very deeply hidden from prying. And that would be fine, if the scientists that need to be looking at the information are sharing it with each other, but hiding it from the public to avoid a panic. That is not the case. Virtually no one is looking at the information; in some cases, it hasn't been accessed for months and new information is virtually non-existent."

"And the other question?" Erich asked, toying with his cell phone.

Jessa spread her hands on the tabletop as best she could; Torah still had a firm grip on one of them. "Why aren't people dropping dead?"

"Maybe humans can't catch this virus. Maybe we're immune now," Erich suggested.

Jessa shook her head. "The research indicates that cellular penetration and destruction is nine times that of the original virus. None of the existing antibodies are effective against it and the development of new antibodies appears to be slower by a day than the onset of terminal cellular damage. Without intervention, either preventive or antiviral, this pandemic would reduce our already isolated human populations to numbers below the estimates for a viable genetic pool, much like the problem the current Circles have."

"So what's the answer," Jacq said, perhaps rhetorically.

Jessa made a fist and studied it intently, wondering if she wanted to put her vaguely formed theory on the table in front of these obviously skeptical, even hostile men. Torah squeezed her hand again. "I have a theory," she admitted, her voice barely audible. "But it's just a theory. Not even a theory, more like a vague guess."

"Tell us," Torah said impatiently.

Jessa lifted her shoulders slightly. "I don't doubt that the virus exists, is as virulent as the reports indicate. I mean, I saw no indication that the research was faked; there's often tell-tale signs. So if people aren't dropping dead, that would indicate that the virus is contained."

"Which means?" Jacq asked. "For those of us who aren't Einsteins."

Jessa glanced at his impatient face, then quickly away. "It's confined to a lab somewhere. It means that it was created and, perhaps, someone is just waiting for the right moment to release it."