Seeking Eden Read online

  “The batteries that gave the power to the cars and the lights and the telephones killed the babies. Made barren the mudders and the vatters. Stole avay the future. But for the Plain Folk, not. We the batteries did not use. And born our babies were, and lived they did. And around us, no more moving on the world. No Rapture there was. No end of days. Chust a slowing down.”

  “What?” Tobin cried, sitting straight up like he’d been stabbed. “What did you say?”

  But Samuel had no time to answer him, because the floor came up to smack Tobin in the face.

  −

  34-

  “You’re awake.”

  Was he awake? Tobin squinted one eye open.

  “How do you feel?” Elanna’s weight sank the bed next to him.

  “I’ve never spent more time in bed, feeling like crap, than I have the past two months,” Tobin said sourly.

  The room was plainly furnished, but the bed was comfortable. Sunshine streamed through lace curtains. Elanna brushed the hair away from his forehead, and he reached up to grab her hand. He kissed it, then held it to his cheek for a long moment.

  Then he noticed her clothes. “Don’t tell me they’re turning you into one of them.”

  She looked down and laughed self-consciously. “My others were dirty. This was all they had. Don’t laugh. You’re wearing a nightgown.”

  Tobin felt the thick material with his fingers, and peeked under the covers. He was, indeed. His legs looked spindly and weak sticking out from the bottom of the hem, and he quickly dropped the blanket.

  The look didn’t exactly suit her, either. The severe cut of the dress and the white apron overtop hid the feminine attributes he’d grown used to noticing. And yet, with her auburn curls pinned up in a tidy bun, her face had a shining luminosity he’d never seen before.

  She touched her hair, as though noticing that he noticed. “I didn’t put on the head covering. At home, only married women cover their heads, and then only when they pray. They seemed to find that strange.”

  He thought covering your head at all for any reason other than to keep the sun or rain off seemed strange. He didn’t say that, though. He’d learned not to laugh at faith.

  He sat up, expecting his head to roar with pain. It didn’t. “I feel better.”

  “I should hope so,” Elanna said. “You’ve slept a day away.”

  “Not much of an superhero, am I?”

  She frowned at him. “What?”

  “Never mind.” He had to remember that she’d probably never read a comic book. “I’m starving.”

  “I can bring you something to eat. Rachel is a wonderful cook. And they have such great food, here, Tobin, you won’t believe it! And it’s all new, and fresh! If they don’t grow it, raise it, or trade for it, they don’t have it.”

  “Something to eat would be great, but in a minute.” He knew all about the food. He curled his fingers around hers. “We need to think about getting out of here.”

  Her expression closed against him. “We can talk about it later.”

  “No,” he said stubbornly. “Not later, now. We don’t want to be here when the Gappers come. Whoever they are. Whatever they are. They sound like bad news, them and their thundermakers.”

  “Tobin, we can’t just run away,” Elanna protested. She cast a quick glance toward the closed door. “These people have helped us.”

  “And you heard Samuel! He wants us gone!” he said harshly, not caring who heard him.

  She pressed a finger against his lips. “Nobody’s going to chase us out until we’re both well enough to travel. Enoch told me that, no matter what Rachel’s father said. It should only be a few days. And…Tobin…” she sighed. “I like it here.”

  That answer didn’t satisfy him. If anything, it frightened him a little. “This isn’t where we’re supposed to end up, anyway. As soon as we can get someone to drive us back to the car --”

  All at once he remembered what Samuel had told them. “No,” he said with a mouth gone suddenly dry. “Not the car. We can’t use the car!”

  Now she looked puzzled again, and tried to soothe him by rubbing his head. He pushed her hand away, gripping her fingers hard enough to make her wince. He released the pressure, sorry to have caused her pain but too excited to stop now.

  “He said it was the batteries that made people stop being able to have children,” Tobin said.

  A look of understanding rose in her eyes. She pressed her hands to her stomach, tears welling in her eyes. “That’s why we...that’s why the Tribe survived. The Reb and the one before him, probably the one before him too, they said the same thing. That we survived, had children when the others didn’t, because we kept the sabbath and they didn’t. It was when we didn’t use batteries, didn’t use power. That’s why we lasted when they didn’t, and still...all this time,” she whispered. “We could have just stopped using them completely. We could have stopped killing the babies?”

  “You didn’t know,” he said, and could see that his words didn’t soothe her.

  “These are good people, Toby. Please don’t judge them so harshly.”

  He thought of the roar of thunder, and the men who weren’t men spilling over the barrier. He thought about the guns. “Samuel was right. I want to get out of here before those Gappers, whatever they are, get back. It can’t be good.”

  “We have no car. And neither one of us is in the best condition to start walking across the country again, Toby. I haven’t forgotten those damned weeks after we left the city. I don’t think I can face something like that again.” She paused, seeming almost embarrassed. “Not until I’ve stopped bleeding, anyway. A few more days. That’s all.”

  “You heard what Samuel said,” he told her as calmly as he could. “And I know you remember those girls, those Gappers, looking for us. They wanted to kill us, Elanna. Whatever arrangement they have with these people won’t help us. They have guns!”

  A discreet knock on the door interrupted them. He couldn’t pretend he wasn’t grateful for the disruption. “Come in!”

  A white-capped and dark-skirted figure entered the room under the burden of a heavily laden tray. The girl was followed by another carrying a pile of folded clothes. Yet a third girl entered, carrying a basin and pitcher. A fourth, giggling, came behind the others carrying a small square of something white and a towel.

  The small room was suddenly filled with overpowering femininity. Tobin didn’t know where to look or how to act. The girls, all except Elanna, were busy putting down their burdens. And giggling.

  Elanna looked annoyed. “Thanks, but I can take care of him.”

  “Mudder Stolzfus these things sent,” said a pretty dark-haired girl. She stole a look at Tobin, and her cheeks colored. She giggled again.

  “You can leave them here,” Elanna said coldly. “And you can leave us alone, too.”

  “We came to help redd up the room,” another girl said. She giggled too.

  “If you want, we can spread the bed across,” the first and seemingly boldest said, which set the others girls into peals of squealing laughter. “Make the sheets smooth for you.”

  “Thank you, but I think we’ll be fine!” Elanna repeated, twisting on the bed to glare at all of them in turn.

  They caught the hint. Still giggling, stumbling over each other, the girls left. The room seemed a lot larger after they’d gone.

  Elanna got up and pulled the tray, and the small table on which it rested, over next to the bed. Delicious smells made his stomach growl. Tobin’s mouth watered.

  “Soup,” she said. “Bread. Some milk. Something they call butter. You spread it on the bread. And these red things are called red-beet eggs.”

  Tobin tore into the food with relish, slurping up the hot, salty soup and dunking the thick chunks of bread into it. The butter melted into the broth, yellow globs of sweetness floating on the top. He ate those, too.

  As he ate, Elanna fidgeted around the room. She lifted things up and put them down. She arr