Authors: Anne McCaffrey
“But you know where she’s going. Why can’t you just send her there? Is she too big for you?”
Amariyah was as aware as everyone at the Center that Peter Reidinger had the most astounding telekinetic ability.
“I’ve got to know where to stand first,” Peter said, his eyes focusing on a distant goal.
She waited in case he had more to say. The shine in his eyes warned her that his thinking had turned very private. He’d said all he intended to right now. She slipped away, leaving him to thoughts that made his face both sad and glad. She was pleased that this admiral person had kept his promise to Peter. It was good that important people kept promises. She
was pleased, too, that Peter had confided in her as much as he did. She loved Peter.
She left his room, tiptoed to the door, which she closed quietly so as not to interrupt all his happy-sad thinking. She really did have to check on the seedlings. Ted was very pleased with the way hers came on. He said she had magic fingers, not just green ones, because her garden produced the most beautiful flowers and the tastiest vegetables. He had stopped trying to persuade her to concentrate on flowers; even stopped complaining that she bordered her garden with marigolds. She liked Ted: he was always smiling and cheerful. Just seeing his thin, weathered face made the day better. Dorotea liked him, too.
“Never a harsh word for anyone, bar insects and those dratted moles,” Dorotea said. “A good man, our Ted. Knows his flora, too.”
“He mispronounces the Latin names.”
“But,” and Dorotea held up one hand in mild rebuke, “he knows them.”
Amariyah was suitably chastened.
“Now, now, child. Remember, too, that he understands gardening in this climate. Which is quite different from Bangladesh.”
A
s Amariyah walked over to her garden, the other children in the Center were also released from their Teaching sessions. There were fifteen, six boys and nine girls, ranging from four to twelve. The Center also had daycare and early training for infants, but she didn’t see much of them. Dorotea liked her to play with the older ones, and Amariyah endured activities like hide and seek—as long as no one tried to injure the bushes they hid behind or stepped on
her
garden—and jumping rope. She had quick, clever feet and knew about rope dancing from the orphanage. She learned the songs in English and added a few in Bangla. She did not, however, see any point in the endless tossing of the big ball up into the net circle. The ball was too heavy for her and the iron rim too high. Mostly the older boys and girls monopolized that outdoor activity. None of them was at all interested in gardening but she was as glad of that. They had no delicacy of touch and might damage young plants. She never forgot the death of her garden in the orphanage, nor Lila. It was therefore odd that she had felt from the very moment of their meeting that Tirla was different, safe, and
trustworthy, even if Tirla did, somewhat, resemble Lila in physical type. Tirla was as special to Amariyah as Peter was. Tirla was sister to her, though sometimes the girl could be more motherly and demanding than Dorotea. Tirla considered Amariyah ineluctably
hers
. Tirla was also very smart about things in Jerhattan and the Linears. When Tirla took her out and about, Dorotea always reminded Amariyah to listen to Tirla and do exactly as she said.
Amariyah reached her garden and stood where she could survey the bed. It had started out as a small rectangle, almost begrudged by Ted as a special concession to Dorotea. He had now enlarged it three times; one end had partial shade during the hottest part of the day, so she could grow those special flowers that did not do well with full sun. She was, as Dorotea called it, counting heads when the ball bounced once, slamming into the display of narcissus, breaking heads off; bounced a second time and broke branches off the orange-colored
Azalea indica
.
Amariyah let out a shriek that was heard throughout the grounds, both orally and telepathically. The ball rolled from the
Azalea indica
down the slight slope and mashed down her marigold seedlings. Amariyah was not a violent child but she kicked that ball so hard that she sent it high into one of the trees, where it stuck in a bole.
Peter got to her first because he could ’port himself. Dorotea was not far behind him, Ted as well as two other groundsmen, Sascha and Sirikit from the control room, and Rhyssa from her office, while apartment windows were flung open as people reacted to the loud scream.
Amariyah was on the ground in front of her flattened marigolds, keening and rocking back and forth, tears streaming down her cheeks. She ignored Peter, though he tried to put a consoling arm around her shoulders. She ignored Dorotea, and Sascha and Rhyssa and even Sirikit whom she usually liked. Ted reached out to assess the damage and an invisible barrier blocked his hand. Startled, he looked to Dorotea who shook her head and he drew back, clucking his tongue at the damage.
“It isn’t that much,” he muttered to Dorotea.
“Any damage is too much,” Dorotea said. “Find out who was shooting baskets and shoot them.”
“They wouldn’t have done it on purpose,” Ted said. “Whyn’t we just leave the ball up there?”
Dorotea followed the direction he pointed and gave a sour grin.
“I could put anchor fencing around the court, help keep the ball inside,” he suggested. “Like I have around the tennis courts.”
“Do so, Ted,” Rhyssa said, having heard their discussion. “And no more basketball shooting until the fence is up.”
Did you get the same blast of fury and vengeance as I did?
she asked.
Is there anyone on the estate who didn’t hear it?
Dorotea countered wryly.
It’s gone now
, Sascha said, making eye contact with Rhyssa from the other end of Amariyah’s garden bed.
Not a trace of telepathy from her now
. He ran a frustrated hand through his thick hair.
Did you have a chance to assess it, Dorotea?
Rhyssa asked.
Dorotea shook her head.
Might only occur for protection
.
Peter said,
She sure tore hair out of a bigger and older girl’s scalp at the orphanage. The nuns were amazed at her reaction. Is there anything we can do about the bush and the bulbs?
He reached out to pick up a narcissus bud and couldn’t. He shoved his fingertips against the barrier and it dissolved.
She’s got a barrier around it. So protective yes, but I don’t feel any ’pathing. And the barrier just went away
.
She trusts you, Peter
, Dorotea said.
And I get no hint of Talent right now. She is a bit young
. She started to get down on her knees by the child.
“Don’t,” Amariyah said sharply, but her voice was low and dispirited. “I’ll fix it.”
“Can you?” Peter asked, putting a world of sympathy and encouragement in his voice.
“I can, you can’t. Go away!” Then Amariyah seemed to realize that she was speaking to the most important adults of the Center. “Please!”
“If you need any help, Maree,” Ted said, “lemme know. I’ll go put up a fence so it can’t happen again.”
“We’ll find out who was playing,” Rhyssa began.
“No!” There was no “please” to that sharp reply. “Go away while there is still time.”
Time for what?
Sascha asked.
Go away, she said
, Peter added and, with an apology, ’ported everyone out of the immediate area, including himself.
Peter!
Rhyssa, Dorotea, and Sascha said in surprise, finding themselves back where they had been only a few minutes before.
He’s right
, Dorotea said to forestall rebuke. As well she was back in her
kitchen. She rescued the cookies she’d been baking before they were crisped.
W
hen Amariyah came in for her supper, she was unusually silent. To be expected under the circumstances, Dorotea thought, and didn’t remark on it. Peter kept watching the child across the kitchen table. Her eyes were swollen from crying despite the fact that she had washed her face. She hadn’t quite got all the dirt from under her nails.
She’s not unhappy
, Peter remarked,
but she sure is tired
.
Amariyah finished her dinner, thanked Dorotea, rinsed her plate and utensils and put them in the dishwasher. Then she went to her room. She was in bed, fast asleep, ten minutes later when Dorotea surreptitiously checked.
I
t was Ted who came knocking on Dorotea’s door early the next morning, before anyone else was awake.
“You better see this, Miz Horvath,” he said, his eyes wide in their sockets and his whole body tense.
Dorotea flung a jacket over her dressing gown and followed him across the lawn and to Amariyah’s garden.
“What?” Dorotea stared, as amazed as Ted. The marigold seedlings that she had seen smashed were upright and whole. The
Azalea indica
had not a trace of broken boughs. The narcissus sported intact buds.
“She could have replaced the marigolds,” Dorotea told herself and Ted. “She might have also changed bushes, though I can’t imagine where she got another orange azalea on short notice.”
“It’s the same one, missus. She didn’t change it,” Ted said, slowly shaking his head from side to side. “And bulbs don’t transplant well when they’re ready to bloom. They’d wilt.”
“You’re right about that.”
Without a thought for grass or dirt stains on her elegant burgundy velvet housecoat, Dorotea knelt down and peered at the resurrected plants.
“And I sensed nothing at all. But then,” she murmured, fingers on her lips, “I was busy with the cookies and then supper.”
Peter? Wake up. Do you remember the state of Amariyah’s garden in the orphanage when you saw it?
HUH? What?
Dorotea repeated her question.
I didn’t see it. Or rather, I saw where it had been; all neatly raked as if nothing had ever grown there
.
Oh. That’s a pity
.
Why?
Well
, and Dorotea accepted Ted’s hand to help her to her feet,
I’ll see if I can winkle it out of Amariyah
.
Why?
Peter’s tone was stronger, wider awake.
I think she resurrected her garden
.
So that’s why she wanted everyone to go away. Before it was too late. But I didn’t feel anything. Did you?
No. Did you
know
that’s what she was going to do?
No, but it’s what she did, isn’t it? Plants would wilt real fast in Bangla weather. Here there’d be more of a lag. Wouldn’t there?
Did you help her?
Dorotea asked, trying to solve the puzzling resuscitation logically.
Me? No. I’m no help in a garden. Except for ’porting things
. There was amusement in his voice.
Did she fix everything?
As near as makes no never mind
. “Thank you, Ted,” she said out loud, patting the bemused man’s arm placatingly. “Just one more psychic mystery. Let’s make no more of it, shall we?” She smiled brightly at the head gardener. “And do put up that fence.”
Or maybe
, she added to herself in her innermost mind, almost ashamed of such a thought,
that’s what we shouldn’t do so we’ll find out what Amariyah does when her precious garden is threatened. Strange, I didn’t ‘feel’ any output. I must be getting old or something
.
D
orotea told Rhyssa as soon as she sensed that her chief was in the office.
Well, I had one ear open for her, so to speak
, Rhyssa said.
I perceived nothing. Though, come to think of it, later she was very tired but not at all as miserable as she had been when she gave that shriek. And that was very definitely telepathed. In extremis!
Then there’s my mother
, Dorotea said, her eyes thoughtful.
Your mother?
Yes, Ruth Horvath was a micro-Talent, you know, and never did know what she was doing because she did it on a subconscious level. When she
tried
to manipulate on the microcellular level, she couldn’t. It was spontaneous or it wasn’t
.
What could Amariyah have done? To restore
plants
to life?
Probably just as elemental. Ah, well, I don’t think we should interfere
.
I agree completely
, Rhyssa said firmly.
Ted’s putting up the fencing today
, Dorotea said.
Under the circumstances, is that right?
Morally right
, Dorotea replied irritably.
I’m not sure I could live through another such incident. That’d be carrying research a shade too far
.
Right. How are we going to explain it, though?
You mean the garden? I’m not going to try
, Dorotea said.
Good idea! Especially since we can’t. Have a good day!
Rhyssa advised in a bright, overly cheerful mental tone.
W
hen the boys came to apologize, and they were sincere to their toenails, Amariyah was just finishing her breakfast. Dorotea “heard” the boys approaching: two were promising empaths and Scott a possible kinetic since he always made many more baskets than his peers. They had reached their decision to come independently. Drew Norton was the spokesperson, his eyes anguished as he led the trio into Dorotea’s kitchen when she opened the door for them.
“Amariyah,” Drew began, swallowing hard and gulping, “we’re the ones you should beat up for smashing your garden.”
“Oh?” Her reply was noncommittal as she turned in her chair to face them. Scott Gates and Moddy Hemphill shot quick glances at her and then ducked their heads.
“We were messing with the basketball,” Drew went on in a rush.
“And I kicked it, hard. I didn’t
aim
at your garden, Amariyah. I really didn’t,” Scott said.
She gave Scott a long look. “I know you didn’t. But my garden got messed up anyhow.”
“Can you
ever
forgive us?” Drew asked, his face contorted.
“
You
didn’t mean it,” Amariyah said, accepting the apology and dismissing them with a nod of her head before she turned back to her hot toast.