Walking the Tree Read Online Free Page B

and be too honest. She dreaded the question: "Why do you want this job?" She was supposed to say, everyone said, "For the joy of watching the children blossom with knowledge, and for a chance to understand the Orders of the Tree through the eyes of an adult". Her real answer, the honest one, was that all she thought about was sex; men; that she could not wait to lie with a man and feel him inside her.
      That was not what they wanted to hear.
      She picked up her bonsai and walked towards the beach. Only moments passed before word got out she was on the move.
      "Is she all right? Baby? Boy or girl? Has he fed? Birthman gone? Are they sleeping?" Nobody liked a sick person. The sickness called Spikes made the ghosts in the Tree hungry. Any sick person knew how much your bones ached, how much weaker you became. The ghosts ate the bones of the sick, kept eating until the body was all flesh. The Spikes epidemic was not something people were proud of. Although Spikes had occurred hundreds of years earlier, people still knew that it passed from person to person, transported by the sick. They knew they did not want the population halved again. They did not want people to die. So they took precautions.
      Lillah didn't know exactly what those precautions were; she only knew she did not want to sicken herself.
      Magnolia didn't believe in this but that didn't mean it wasn't true.
      Lillah stopped and spoke to every one who had a question for her. When she reached the beach, the circle of young women was gone. She peered to the end of the seawalk but in the dim light she couldn't tell if the fathers were there or not. There was a strange kind of light, evening with a storm coming. The heat had gone but the cold not yet risen. She felt as if she was caught between two worlds and that if she misstepped, she would stay in the wrong one.
      There was a crack of lightning and Lillah stood on the sand, undecided, lost. She felt she needed to do the exact right thing, impress people with her choices, but couldn't think what they wanted to see.
      "Lillah?" she heard. It was Melia. "Here you are at last. I got tired of waiting for Magnolia to give out that baby. The fathers are at the Tree Hall. They were wary of the storm."
      The girls walked together. "Is Magnolia okay? And you?" Melia asked as they walked.
      Lillah nodded. "I feel like I've been dreaming for days," she said. "You have to go see the baby. He's the most beautiful thing you've ever seen. Is the testing all over? Have I missed my chance?"
      Melia shook her head. "Come on."
      The smells of cooking as they walked made Lillah hungry. "My mother used to say we should cook food slowly and there's no rush if you start early enough. Her food always smelled so good."
      Her stomach rumbled and she wished she'd grabbed fruit or bread from Logan's kitchen. She could picture the food on the table; Magnolia always had food ready. She was a wonderful hostess.
      They reached the Tree Hall. The Tree Hall was low. The tallest in the Order had to stoop to enter, but could stand inside. There were doors at either end, but you entered through one, left by the other. Most of the Order could fit inside if they stood close together. Others would lean in through the windows. Lillah always tried to arrive late when the Order gathered here, to have a spot outside leaning in. It was so close inside, pressed together, thick, airless. The walls were curved, so all voices could be heard easily. It was very warm inside and people wore little clothing.
      The other girls huddled outside the Tree Hall, and greeted Lillah with squeals and questions. Erica nodded and squeezed her hand.
      Thea sat hunched over her bonsai, plucking at its leaves, grooming it until only bare twigs remained. She said in a low voice, "This is my last chance! I'll be twenty-five next birthday, and if I don't go now I'll never go."
      "So go! What's the problem?"
      "I just can't imagine how