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I lost my seven-league boots. But the germ plasm is still mine! We can make good kids...
All right. There was something wrong here. But if she had the time and the patience, she could reconstruct the thought processes that once came to her so easily. And it was important for her to reconstruct these. Very important.
With the basket in hand, she traveled back down the hill.
Mary A
In three weeks, using a constant, unvarying work schedule, Cadma
The roof girders and additional support beams were finally in place. Cadma
Their stove warmed the makeshift dwelling beautifully, and there was plenty of headroom and walking space, more than in some of the 1800s pioneer cabins she had visited in Kentucky museums.
They sat cross-legged in the shelter. The stove and the body heat of the two dogs were quite enough to keep her warm as she wrote. Two sheets of paper were spread out, and on one she was listing every plant Missy had accepted as food. So far, there were six varieties.
The other sheet was blank. I ought to be recording something, but I don't know what it is. Damn. But—I am useful. Cadma
The earth that surrounded them on three sides was terrific insulation, and there was something womb-like about it. So I'm missing some brain cells. I had billions to spare.
She heard Missy's angry chattering in the distance. Four of the youngsters had survived with her and were old enough to run around the cage. If they could be bred...
"A garden there," Cadma
"It would be nice to have a little more natural light." Mary A
He sipped at his coffee, then put an arm around her. It still sent a shiver of pleasure through her to feel it.
They hadn't slept together for the first week, and when he had finally taken her into his bedroll and made love to her it had been an angry, demanding, selfish kind of love—and she had not demanded in return. She was happy to be able to give. But now, as his house was taking form, as the Joes and turkeys filled their cages and makeshift pens, as the plot of worked land doubled and trebled, and the mesa became Cadma
He was softer with her at the end of the day, and spoke of "us" and "we." And she was happy, despite her frequently aching muscles.
In the weeks since the attack on the camp, Cadma
"I'll dig the cha
"For what? Oh, the Amazon," she remembered. He wanted to divert water for the vegetable garden. Something ticked at her memory...
"F-F-Falling Water."
"What?"
"I remembered! Falling Water, a house by F-F-Frank Lloyd Wright, and the water ran right through the living room!"
"That's what I was trying to remember. You're amazing!"
I've never felt like this, she thought to herself. And I've been married, and in love before, and have had... enough lovers to know the difference.
There was something about the darkness and the warmth. About being next to a man who had built his dwelling by the strength of his back and his wits. Something about watching Cadma
Protected... A competent, civilized human being didn't need a protector. Mary A
And yet there was no cruelty in this man, no demand for her subservience or helplessness: she was sure that he had accepted her because she could do certain things, she could take care of herself. She could go when she wished, and he made that clear. Yet he had accepted with pleasure her suggestions about breeding the Joes. She wanted to do anything for him, be everything to him—but if he ever abused her, that urge would vanish.
How strange, and how wonderful. How natural to be here, in the earth, huddled with the man she loved, who she hoped would one day love her in return.
So there, Sylvia. She gri
He pulled her to him, and there, in their home, made love to her on the packed earth of the floor. And they rejoiced together until both were exhausted, until sleep stole the thoughts from her mind as she curled against his side. The two of them, surrounded by their home, their dogs, the whispering wind and the small night sounds. Together.
Cadma
Their home! to make it safe, and warm, and ideal for her. For them.
Their home was roofed now, and planted with grass seed. Rows of strawberries and lettuce and carrots and corn stretched across the mesa wherever there was enough soil to give anything a chance. Much of it would be lost. She expected the strawberries and the hybrid melon-cactus to do the best. Two pens of captured turkeys and their cage of Joes were thriving, and as she fed the Joes their morning leaves, they were actually happy to see her. The kittens had sprouted into twelve-inch furred lovelies, only slightly less beautiful, and better tempered, than young foxes. The furs would be useful, and the flesh...
A sudden cramping wave of nausea fa
Morning... ?
She gri
Mary A
"Well, Missy, I think that I have some news for Madman Weyland." The Joe looked up at Mary A
Call her Mama.
The taste of the river changed with the seasons. For a time the water would run sluggish and cold. Then the taste of life was scarce; the flying things were scarce; the swimming things were dead.
Later the water would race, carrying the taste of past times. Mama had seen scores of cycles of seasons. She was wise enough to ignore the ancient tastes: bodies or blood or feces of life her kind had long since exterminated, long buried in mountain ice, released as the ice melted.