They made one further overnight stop in a travellers lodge, as Rhia called them; apparently this was a joke. As before, there was a sheltered clearing surrounded by bushes climbing into trees with an open aspect to the south. Toby busied himself browsing the perimeter while Rhia took dry wood from one of the encircling dens and lit a fire.
Trueman watched her casual grace as she bent over the iron cooking pot, not unlike the one at the Little Big Farm from which he had accidentally consumed the enormous dose of psilocybin mushroom, inducing a psychotic episode, much to the annoyance of Spicer who had been intending to scoff the lot for himself.
This pot, on the other hand, contained a stew which, together with fresh, raw salads, largely gathered from the woodland edge or hedgerows while on the way, appeared to be her staple diet. Having said that, Trueman had to admit that no two meals had been the same. There was occasional game too, rabbit tonight, though where this had come from he was not sure.
He sniffed and watched Rhia as she bent forwards to stir the stew. The flicker of flames sent shadows dancing across her face, the lowering sun striking a rim of light across her head and shoulders. She looked very comely in the twilight, he thought, the scars upon her face concealed. As she leaned forward he could see where her breasts pressed gently against the front of her smock. Looking quickly away, he could not understand why this embarrassed him. I am a man, he thought, she is a woman. What is the problem?
Eating together reduced his tension and he enjoyed the variety of tastes and textures and even managed to express some appreciation.
“Anise hyssop in the salad,” Rhia explained, “Gives it that aromatic edge.”
He agreed and relaxed further.
“Have we much further to go, to this... gathering, the preparation for the... Intervention?” he inquired, somewhat tentatively when they had eaten the lot and he had wiped out the pot with a crust of rye bread from a loaf they’d been given on the way.
Rhia seemed reluctant to answer at first, then finally sighed and started to cry quietly, making no attempt to hide the tears running freely down her cheeks. Trueman was stunned at the ease and fluidity of her emotional responses. She reminded him of Dawn in that sense, yet she was very different also; now he had become more used to her manner, he realised that she never lost control, as he saw it, of her emotions, only expressed them, openly and honestly. It disturbed him considerably, as though the potential for similar or related emotional upheavals boiled within himself also. It made him tremble and he only controlled himself with some difficulty; the effort hurt, a band of muscle around his abdomen clenching.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” he managed, trying to make the voice sound gentle but as usual the tongue contrived to stumble and distort the pronunciation, producing a guttural accent.
Rhia laughed, continuing to look into his face.
“Please,” she said, “it’s just old stuff, my stuff. There’s no blame attached to you. Its because there isn’t much further to go and then you’ll be leaving and I’ve been left before. It just reminds me.”
She began to cry again and Trueman, feeling incredibly awkward, leaned over towards her and placed the new body’s hand upon her arm. Rhia looked straight into his eyes, smiled and cried even harder and louder. This startled Trueman so much that he snatched the hand away and she burst out laughing leaving him totally confused.
“It’s OK,” she gasped between laughs. “You’re doing really well.”
After a few moments she settled and began talking quite rapidly to him, as though there was little time.
“It’s because you’re so hurt, or I saw you as so hurt,” she rattled, “and thought that I could help you. I wanted to help you, so much.” She laughed again then went on more carefully, as though searching for increasing precision in her language. “No, I expected to be able to help you. I think I felt I needed to help you, as though this would make everything all right.
“Its an ego thing, isn’t it,” she quietened, making a statement. “And because I allowed myself to build up expectations, now I feel like a failure, even though it wasn’t my task to help you.”
“But you have helped me!” Trueman broke in at last, unable to remain silent. “You have helped me. You’ve brought me, why, a considerable distance, using quite, um, a primitive form of transport. Very helpful. Indeed.“ He was insistent, if only because he couldn’t bear the sight of her crying again.
Rhia was initially surprised by his interruption then laughed and patted his arm.
“I know you only mean well,” she said, “but that is why you are so dangerous.”
Trueman was taken aback.
“What do you mean?” he stammered.
“I’m aware of your status,” she replied. “I’ve observed your misinterpretations throughout our journeying and the effect they cause on my own experience of Konsk. In that, I’ve followed my instructions and reported back accordingly. I’ll admit that I chose to go beyond my directions and gave you at least one opportunity to put down some of your burden and also that I was saddened when you didn’t take up my offer but that’s not the point.”
She waved the flat of her hand at him dismissively.
“That’s my stuff. I’d suggest that you recognise that your emotional rigidity has seriously reduced your capacity to reason. This has been evident in your inability to ask questions of me during our travels, even though there was much that you desired to know. I would further suggest that you transform this mistake into a lesson for the next stage of your journey. For all our sakes.”
She grasped his hand in both of hers and pressed it. Trueman was thoroughly shaken. During the course of her speech she had taken on a completely different attitude or character. Rather than his general feeling of superiority over this young woman, he now felt like an adolescent in the presence of an adult, even a parent. A lump pushed up in his throat and for a horrified moment he thought that the body was going to start crying. He made it shake its head.
“I,” he began, “I really don’t understand what you are saying. Who instructed you? How do you report back?”
Thus he distracted himself with trivial detail. After a pause, Rhia pointed her left index finger at the palm of her other hand. Then she curled up the first two joints of the finger. Trueman jumped as her ring emitted a bright light and a faint, moving image appeared on her open hand.
“Its a projector,” she explained, “A toy really. Any reasonably flat surface will do.”
She demonstrated by moving her hand, waving the ring; the image swirled across the ground, quickly losing its intensity as it enlarged, rising up to dimly fill the side of the caravan. It was a kaleidoscopic pattern, ever changing, reminding Trueman of a fractal screen saver he had once coded. The image was remarkably stable for a hand held, as though motion compensation was built in, thought Trueman numbly.
“Support, please,” Rhia requested.
The fractal pattern coalesced into the heavily lined face of an old woman. Her lips moved silently. Rhia watched Trueman.
““I’m afraid you won’t be able to hear her,” she explained. “I'm listening through my earring. She’s an elder of the First Of Many cantref, part of the posse who are designing your realignment.”
Trueman’s mouth hung open. Inside his head, questions arose so fast that he could not cling onto them, could not construct a meaningful argument or explanation before another question surfaced. Had this all been planned, from the very beginning? Was his manifestation in the wilderness part of some elaborate programme? And if so, what of his time at the Little Big Farm, was he a mere pawn then? And for what purpose? Was he to be punished? Had he done something wrong, perhaps in his old life, even as a child?
The image of the ancient woman projected on the canvas topped cart moved as she continued to speak, a gentle smile on her face when she paused. For some reason this disturbed Trueman even further. He began to shake uncontrollably and with a mental start, realised that for the first time, the new body felt like it belonged to him. He could feel the ache in his thigh from the embedded thorns, a pain in his temples as if a migraine was coming on. His forehead was hot yet the palms of his hands were cold and clammy. Abruptly he clenched his mind.
No, he thought sternly, this is not my body. He pushed down the pain from the leg. I am not at fault here, he recited internally, they are at fault. They don’t realise who I am and have just assumed that I’m the person who went with this body, presumably a madman or a murderer or something. But I am not, I’m a rational being, a great scientist, a towering intellect and I will not be treated as anything less.
When he turned his attention back outward, the projected image had gone and Rhia was holding her hands to the sides of her bowed head. Trueman made the body rise and it stumbled to one of the dens, curling itself immediately upon a couch with the face towards the earth wall.
Thus he remained throughout the night, dozing fitfully, awakening at times to find the new body bathed in sweat. He was troubled by fleeting dream images which he could not recall, though they made the new heart pound loudly. At one point he thought he roused to find a figure bending over him, Rhia possibly, though whether out of concern or malevolent intent he could not be sure. Morning was a long time coming.
When the first hint of colour tinted the lightening sky he got up and made his way to the compost toilet to urinate and defecate. He considered abandoning Rhia and the caravan and just going on into the depths of the forest. The option was attractive; apart from having done with her game playing, there was the possibility that he would meet someone else who was more suitable to his needs, someone who could provide him with the information he required. He thought for a moment, then remembered something, something that the Saxon lad had said.
Suddenly excited, he ducked into the storage shelter. Along with the various jars and other containers, the bundles of dried herbs, there was another blank picture, like the one Saxon had called a face. Interface, he thought, almost triumphantly, of course!
He tapped it experimentally and the surface lit up. Now we're getting somewhere!
“Facial recognition in operation,” a soft voice intoned. “Location tracking. Please wait.”
He did so as a series of bright dots performed a little circular dance. Then he jumped as a man's head and shoulders suddenly appeared. Another head, a woman's this time, thrust into view, pushing the first to one side. They were wearing some sort of stylish uniform and both began talking at once.
“We've found him! Location identified.”
“Welcome back sir, we're arranging immediate transport.”
So startled and somehow disturbed by this was Trueman that he slapped the interface, rather hard and the screen went dark again.
He backed away numbly. Perhaps this hadn't been a good idea after all. Who on earth were these people? They certainly knew him. He wondered how immediate the transport might be. A helicopter? He hurried back to the clearing.
He found Rhia with porridge waiting. They ate in silence. Trueman found himself growing frightened by the thought that some form of transport might arrive at any moment, possibly with uniformed men, even with guns. What would they do with Rhia? What did they want with him?
The morning once more was bright with a cloudless sky, as before, the air remarkably moist, the breezes cool and pleasant coming as they did from beneath the trees. Yet he felt no joy and little interest. A dark, crushing weight seemed to engulf him. He had not felt so alone since times long past, before the Little Big Farm. Even in this place, lost in the wilderness, he had not felt so alone.
He was unable to bring himself to speak to Rhia, despite her obvious desire to communicate with him, to help him. A feeling of deep shame, even disgrace, washed like a black tide at the periphery of his mind, discolouring any positive thoughts that strove to arise. He couldn't bring himself to tell her about the communication and he was now appalled at the body's barely controllable sexual desire for her. That and the revelations he had received the night before combined in a bleak sabotage of what might be his last moments with her. Thus he began to blame Rhia for his own state of mind and escaped into a cold anger at his plight.
Nothing occurred as she packed up and gradually, as they travelled onwards, he came out of himself somewhat and detected a change in the surroundings that stirred some feeling of hope within him. The forest became more fragmented with a greater proportion of clearings that now looked like the fields he had known, filled with various crops, although there were often rows of trees as well.
Towards midday, with both of them walking up a steeper incline, unusual in itself, Rhia brought Toby to a sudden halt.
“Oh no,” she said, staring ahead.
Trueman looked up and also stopped. A rare smile appeared on his face.
“Well,” he said, “This looks more like it!”
His transport had arrived.
Thanks for reading. As always, suggestions welcome. More pictures? Pictures not necessary? Just to remind you, Substack is automatically inserting a “pledge your support” button into my posts- this is not me and is not currently necessary so have no fear!
Konsk will continue but various other pieces are in the pipeline including more on Artificial Stupids (re AIs) and crap software projects (this next piece spurred on by the Post Office’s Horizon IT scandal finally breaking into the mass media, though Radio 4 listeners like ourselves will have been following Nick Wallis’ excellent series since 2011). Plus more on fire, as I got a fair bit of interest after the last bit, so I’ll be looking at designing with fire in mind, fire resistant species and David Holmgren’s Flywire House.
Till then, take care and hwyl! Chris.
What a cliff hanger!