03. Masters of Flux and Anchor (10 page)

"Where'll we go?" Suzl asked Cassie.

"I—I been thinking of going home just once. Just to see."

Suzl looked a little nervous at a journey, even a short one, but she finally decided. "Oh, why not. Nobody'd ever give me p'mission t'go so far alone, but nobody'll screw 'round with the Chief's wife."

"Adam knows. I been nagging him for weeks and he finally gave in."

They pedaled slowly, keeping close to the curb. Suzl was right—as they cleared the center of the city they began being challenged, but none of the authorities were willing to take the risk of running in the Chief Judge's wife on suspicion that she didn't have permission to go wherever she was going. The two were shy, humble, deferential and all the rest, but as soon as Cassie was recognized it was almost the other way around. It wasn't hard to verify who she was. Most girls only had their first names tattooed, but the nearly nude Cassie's I.D. clearly read "Tilghman."

They cleared the city and went out on the main road, now smoothly paved, and found little traffic. The wind on their bodies felt good, and they were giggling and laughing like children all the way. Suzl wore her hair short, but Cassie's did present something of a nuisance, one that she was happy to accept. It felt good to be out. like this, with Suzl once more. It had only been in the last few weeks that Cassie realized just how much she had missed Suzl. She had changed a lot, and not only physically, but deep down the old Suzl was still there and kept coming through.

The farm was not far from town, and the landscape approaching it hadn't changed much. The first entrance road had also been paved, and was now lined, as had been the main road, with poles and electrical wires, but it still looked like an old friend. It still ran through the pasture, and it was still, as always, littered with horse manure and the droppings of other animals.

Cassie had found herself depending more and more on Suzl's company to alleviate the loneliness. The two had much in common, and always had, even now to being equally pregnant, but Suzl had all those duties and a number of children still at home and had little time. Cassie had, however, found herself at times fantasizing about the "new" Suzl, and it bothered her a little. It didn't seem natural to get turned on by thoughts of those oversized breasts and that cute, shapely form.

The road curved as it came to a wooded area that had always been there, before going into the small mini-village on this side of the huge communal farm. They drifted to a stop at the curve. "Just beyond was my father's blacksmith shop. I found out he's now buried here, and I'd like to visit him, at least this once."

Suzl made no objection, and they pedaled on. Where the old blacksmith's shop had stood there was now only an overgrown clearing. The wooden building, it seemed, had burned down long ago. They found a farm supervisor, and when he learned who she was he took them to the grave¬yard that had been carved out of the pastureland. There were no stones, but small plates had been placed in the ground with the names. The man patiently checked until he found it, and Suzl took him off and flirted with him, allowing Cassie a little time alone.

Cassie had picked a few flowers growing wild by the side of the road, and now she placed them on the plate, then knelt on one knee and bowed her head. Tears welled up inside of her, and she started to sob. Finally, through it all. she whispered, "I'm so sorry, Daddy, In the end I just couldn't be the son you wanted. I tried so hard."

A tiny gust of wind came up, and seemed to whisper back to her, That's all right. At least you tried, and that's more than most can say.

But it was probably just imagination, or the wind.

She rejoined Suzl, and they managed to get rid of the man by thanking him profusely and apologizing that they had been allowed little time to come and go. Then both got back on their bikes and headed up the road, but Suzl again stopped near the clearing for the smithy, and Cassie looked at her, puzzled.

Suzl looked around, and saw no one nearby except a few cows. "Come on into the woods a little," she said. "It's time we talked."

Wondering what was going on, she followed, walking her bike into the woods and out of sight of anyone around. There was a small clearing in the middle, and there they stopped, resting their bikes against the trees, and spread a blanket from the basket on the ground.

Suzl reclined lazily on the blanket, and Cassie just stared at her. A very subtle change seemed to come over her old friend, something not physical but something sensed. Finally Suzl closed her eyes, then opened them again. "It's pretty hard to break out of it once you've done it for so long," Suzl said. She still had the lisp and the soft, sexy voice, but there was, somehow, a slightly harder edge to it. "Don't looked so shocked. They didn't destroy my mind, just kinda rearranged it a little. The 'portant parts took, but some of the old girl's still there. I just don't like to bring her out much is all. Went to a lotta trouble to keep her and then I find it's better not thinkin'. Saved it 'cause I figured I'd want out, but I never did and it ain't no good for girls t'think 'round here 'cause it's easier not to. Better and happier, too. I figure you got the same problem."

Cassie sighed, smiled, and sat down. "Yes, Suzl. you're right. You come in feeling you can leave when you want, and then you kind of fall into it. It's so seductive. No responsibilities, no cares, no worries. Like a little child again, only with all the sex. I'm also really in love. Suzl. but the difference between what Adam dreams of and what's really here just gets to me sometimes. But—you had Coydt's spell. How'd you manage to save anything of your old self?"

"I knew what Coydt had in mind, sort of. I couldn't change it, I had no choice in it. But I could add on to the spell, and I did. One of the things I added was, well, a power. Turns out it don't work with men—I'm jelly in the hands of a man—but it works on me. Suzl can't change the way she is, the way she'll be for the rest of her life. but she can bury the ghosts, bury the dreams. Wipe 'em out. It makes things so—easy. You don't think, you just experience, sort of. I left things that'd bring me out, but it takes a big shock and you were it, honey."

"I—I'm not sure I'd like that. Oh. Suzl. I'm not sure of anything anymore! All I ever wanted to do was be a vet, grow up here, and maybe get married and have kids. Daddy saw me as the son he never had, though, and I was a plain, flat-chested girl with a real deep voice and the looks of a boy anyway. So I sort of grew up a boy with a boy's work and not a boy's fun. I—I even ogled the girls. I—I loved to look at girls' bodies. They were pretty. Boys, well—they were like me."

Suzl nodded, but did not interrupt.

"So then came the Paring Rite," Cassie continued, "and there I was sold into slavery in Flux, just like you. And it all seemed to change, somehow. Matson had strength, the kind I'd never have. And I had the Flux power, 'though I didn't really know it, to make him make love to me. But he never loved me, Suzl. He liked me, that's all. I kidded myself that it was otherwise, but I really knew it wasn't, and when I thought he was dead it all just—left. I punished myself into bein' a saint for all those years, but I wasn't really the head of anything. The Nine ran the Empire, and they told me where to go and what to do, and I was happy with that, but everybody from Daddy to you seemed proud of me, and it seemed like I was doing the right thing. All I wound up doing was destroying every¬body close to me. Spirit, you, Anchor Logh itself, even my own Daddy, suffered or died because of me. And for nothing. The Empire was built on them buildin' up a saint who'd stay a saint, and suddenly I wasn't. Then I thought at least I could raise my grandson, but I really didn't know how. I was useless, worn out, tired, and I didn't have the guts to kill myself."

Suzl sighed. "And that's why you took the binding spell? To punish yourself? Get rid of the guilt?"

"I don't know. All I knew was that I didn't have to make any decisions, and for the first time in my entire life people were relating to me not as an 'it' or a 'he' but as a girl. I'd never really had that before in a way I couldn't fight it, and it felt, well, good. When I stood there in Flux and looked out at the void, that's all I could see—void.

There was nothing for me out there. Nothing. Something just sort of snapped. For the first time I had a big decision to make about myself, entirely by myself. I wanted to be somebody else, and there it was."

"Poor Cassie," Suzl sighed. "The first real 'portant d'cision she ever really had to make all on her own in her whole life, and it was to never hav'ta make another one 'cept what she'll wear today and what she'll cook for dinner. And it's forever, 'cause the spell they use is Coydt's old spell and he's long gone, gone, gone."

"I know, but this is where I belong, Suzl."

"Nope. Old Merv and his ghost buddies just got it wrong, is all. Old Suzl, now, she should'a been the boss, and you should'a married her when she was a he. Some folks, guys or girls, are cut out to run things, and most are not. It's no shame in that. Suzl unnerstands. She didn't wanna be you, but she got turned into what you always thought you wanted to be. So now you're it. and you're still not sure."

"Oh, Suzl—you're so wise and sweet! I've missed you so much!"

"You know you're stuck. Oh, I know you can shift into wife mode, but you can't stop thinkin' and wonderin'. Lemme tell ya what Suzl is, 'cause that's what Cassie is—for a long, long time. We're Fluxgirls, you'n me. We never get old and we never get sick. I once tried to work a slicer machine and cut my thumb almost off. It healed before I could 'member it was hurt. Couple days, tops. Look—all them kids and no stretch marks!"

It was true, Cassie realized. She just hadn't noticed it before.

"Now I'll tell you what Suzl is. She can't 'member, can't even 'magine, havin' a prick, or wantin' it anyplace except inside her as much and as long as possible. I'm just smart 'nuff now to know that I'm a lot dumber than I used to be. I can't keep two things in my head at the same time and I forget a lot. My 'motions are stronger than my head.

I'm so passive I get chills just looking at a butter knife. Once I saw two guys fightin' in the street and it made me sick. In a 'mergency, I panic, scream, and freeze. The idea we're out here alone kinda scares me silly. I can't do nothin' without beggin' p'mission. I can cook, sew some, and scrub and clean a place like crazy. They keep tryin' to show me how to change a light bulb and I can't do it. Animals bigger'n a pussycat scare me. I don't even unnerstand what readin' and writin's 'bout, and I don't really wanna. I like bein' pregnant and tendin' babies. I need men to have sex with me and tell me what to do, but I still think girls are the most perfect things nature ever invented. My body's all I got, and I love it; I want to feel good. I'm selfish. I got no interest in whatever men do when they're not home. It jus' goes in one ear and out the other and I smile and say, 'Yes, dear.' I'm more a pet than a person, but I can't handle it any other way. And I'm gonna be that way. prob'ly, long after the Brotherhood is gone. And you 'n me are two of a kind. What you see on the outside is just 'zackly what we are. Ain't nothin' more inside. You jus' ain't lived it long 'nuff yet to know. You're a perfect body and nothin' more, and you can't never be nothin' more."

Cassie sighed. "I guess you're right." She was seeing herself after twenty years of this, and it unnerved her a bit. "When you said you had ten kids I had to count on my fingers to see how many that was. And I had to take that guy's word for it that it was my Daddy's grave. I believed him, too, 'tho it don't make much difference, I guess."

"On the outside we're sweet sixteens, but on the inside we're five years old. It's hard for me to keep this talk goin' now. The longer you are this way the more you wanna be this way. This ain't no spell anymore, it's me—an' I like it."

"Suzl—why are you telling me this?"

" 'Cause Suzl's got the power, like I told you. Not just over herself. It's hard to 'member, but I think it was to give me some power over men. Didn't work. Don't work on men. Don't work good on nobody, less'n they want it. But you got hang-ups. All that guilt. Don't even know why you don't wear heels 'round Suzl."

She did know, but she couldn't act on it. "It's because I love you, Suzl. I always loved and depended on you. I missed you so much! Not the kind of love I have for Adam, more personal. Different—but real."

Suzl sat up and lifted up her huge breasts. "You want these? Take 'em. Want the longest, sexiest, strongest tongue ever inside you? I wanna do it, but I can't 'less you tell me. Take any or all of me. I can't resist and don't wanna."

Cassie didn't know how to respond.

"Look, Cassie, you got to accept what you are and be what you are. Maybe you ain't what y'thought y'were gonna be, but it's what y'are that matters. I'm slippin' back now; I really can't hold on no longer. So come to Suzl. Suzl's got the power to make it easy."

Cassie moved over next to Suzl, and Suzl moved around and started massaging her back. It felt wonderful.

"Let go, Cassie. Trust Suzl to make it all right," Suzl whispered in her ear.

And she was right, Cassie realized. There was no going back; there was only being the best at what she now was. "I trust you, Suzl," she responded sincerely.

Suzl's eyes closed, and she continued the massage, but now something, some energy, seemed to flow from her hands and into Cassie's body. It was electric; it aroused every area of her body. She lost herself in the glow of the feeling, and that feeling replaced all else. There was no thought, just sensuality, yet she was awake, and her de¬fenses did not activate.

"There's only now, there's no then," Suzl crooned as she rubbed. "Look at yourself. See yourself."

Suddenly she did see herself, in her mind's eye, or in Suzl's.

"See Cassie. That's Cassie, that's all Cassie is, or ever was, or ever will be. Outside is inside, inside is outside. Cassie was always this way, Cassie will always be this way, and Cassie likes it. Thinkin' is for others, not for Cassie. Cassie's built to please, to give pleasure, and for nothin' else. It's 'nuff, it's all she wants, all she ever was or ever will be. No holdin' back. Cassie's not brains, Cassie's feelin'. Feelin' good's the only thing in her life. That what makes her feel good is good, that which don't is bad. You was born the day you was claimed, there was nothin' before. Lookin' good is feelin' good. Nothin' on the inside that ain't on the outside. No worries, no problems, no past, only now. Dreams of pleasure, life of pleasure, no worries, no thinking, jus' let it flow and be what you feel."