Jack Chalker - The Return of Nathan Brazil

“You mean—fly?” Yua was more than hesitant.

“Sure. Oh, it won’t quite be flying here. Just get an idea of the breeze, go with it, jump off like you were aiming at a nearby branch, spread out your arms, legs, and tail, and look straight at the cowbrey bush there. You’ll get there. You won’t fall. Trust me and don’t panic. When I jump off, you follow right away.” She poised for the leap.

“Wait!” Yua cried. “Let me get my courage up for this. Tell me—this land is called Awbri?”

“That’s right,” the other agreed. “Well, come on. It’s getting dark and I don’t like to be away from my tree at night.” With that she launched herself.

Steeling herself, Yua, too, jumped off and spread her tail and the folds of skin. She was amazed at how the air seemed to push against her, keeping her aloft as if in a long leap, although she was falling, very slowly, and the whole thing felt like descending in an elevator.

It was actually only thirty seconds or so until she reached the tree, but it seemed an eternity, and she feared she wasn’t going to make it. She didn’t dare look down, though; she kept her eyes on the tree and on the friendly woman nearby.

And now she was there, in the branches. She grabbed and hung on for all she was worth. That she had done it did nothing to calm her down, so she clung tightly to the limb until the shakes had subsided somewhat.

Her friend had already scampered off deep into the interior of the tree but Yua was in no condition to follow.

Several minutes later the woman was back, looking slightly amused at Yua’s still trembling perch. “Oh, come on! You did the worst of it! Follow me. I’ve told the Elder’s Secretary that you are an Entry and here and they want to see you immediately. Hurry along now! I have to be getting home. It’s almost too late.” And with that she was off.

Yua followed her with her eyes until the woman was out of sight. I never even knew her name, she thought. Taking a few deep breaths she relaxed and headed into the interior of the cowbrey bush.

The entrance was easy to spot as she approached the great trunk, for there was a large door in the tree, decorated with unfamiliar carved symbols. Yua opened the door hesitantly and entered.

Oil lanterns lit the interior; it was bright, cheery, and absolutely hollow. For a plant that appeared so healthy outside it was a nothing in its base.

A large male was seated behind a carved wooden desk writing with what appeared to be a quill pen. He looked something like a great duck-billed squirrel wearing large horn-rimmed bifocals.

He stopped writing and looked up at her. “You are the Entry?” he asked crisply.

She nodded. “I am Yua, formerly of Olympus,” she told him.

He sat back, relaxed. “We don’t get many Entries,” he told her. “You’re the first I’ve ever met. Had a devil of a time going through the manuals of procedure to see what is to be done with you.” He gestured at a large bookcase filled with impressive-looking red-bound volumes.

“However, the first thing I’m supposed to do is welcome you to Awbri. Welcome. The second is to give you this little speech.”

She sighed and relaxed. The Awbrians were a tough people to like.

“First of all, we don’t know who or what you were before you came here,” he continued, “nor do we care. That is irrelevant. You are on the Well World to stay and the sooner you forget your former life and adjust to your new one the better off you’ll be. You are now an Awbrian. This, too, will not change. You come to us from an alien form, but, more important, you come from an alien culture. Adjusting to your new physical form will be relatively easy; the cultural adjustment, however, is very difficult. You must accept the culture that has existed here for tens of thousands of years before you were born. You will probably not like it at first, will find it uncomfortable or hard to accept. The important thing to remember is that it is the culture here, it is the product of millennia of social evolution, and it works for us. We will do what we can to help you in that adjustment. Any questions?”

“Hundreds,” she replied. “But—tell me of this culture. I have seen some of it and guessed some, but I would like to know it all.”

“You’ll learn it in the days to come,” the secretary assured her. “However, some basics. We are divided into family groups, each group having a tree. It is their tree and no other’s. You can use another family’s tree to pass through, but for no other purpose. Almost all the trees are hollow, as is this one, and those are used for living quarters. If a tree is carefully managed it can support a reasonable population, since the rainforest climate here allows phenomenal growth. For every five thousand population there is a village Council on which the wisest men called Elders, sit. Age is revered here. There is also, off in Gaudoi, around the Well Gate, a Maintenance Administration that makes sure the paths and airways are kept clear, administers what little trade there is between the various villages, and settles intervillage disputes.”

“I notice you say wisest men, ” she said carefully. “Then it is the men who run things here?”

The secretary’s bill opened slightly in surprise. He was not ready for the question and thought a moment.

“There is a division of responsibility, culturally,” he replied. “Exterior maintenance of the tree, cultivation of leaves and fruits and the careful management of the harvest, are the responsibility of the males, who also assume the role of protector of the tree and family against anything. They also represent the family group to the outside. Females have the responsibility for internal maintenance, including cleaning, furnishing, and decorating, as well as food preparation and distribution and the bearing and rearing of the young.”

It didn’t sound like such a logical deal to Yua, but she let it go for now.

“What about professions?” she asked. “Surely not everyone is a tree farmer.”

“There are some,” the secretary told her. “I am of the professions. There are, after all, a large number of excess males for whom there is nothing in family life to offer support. Doctors, lawyers, traders, and maintenance personnel are needed. Those books had to be written by someone and printed and bound and distributed by others, for example.”

She frowned. “Excess males? No females?”

He cleared his throat lightly. “I know that there are some cultures where the females have a different role, but not here. I mean, after all, one male can, ah, service a number of females but not the other way around. It is only logical, you see.”

She didn’t see the logic of it at all. It was more than a slight shock to come from a culture where males were almost nonexistent and used for only one purpose, anyway, to such a culture as this.

“So what is my place in such a culture?” she asked warily.

“Tonight you’ll sleep here as the guest of the Elders,” he responded casually. “Tomorrow you’ll be interviewed by them, then placed with a family willing to accept you.”

She didn’t like that. “And suppose I don’t want to go with that family—or any other?”

He actually chuckled. “Oh, there is no choice. After all, what would you eat? And where? Where would you sleep at night? You see? Here you must have a family and a tree or you starve and die. Don’t worry, though. There are potions, things like that, to help you adjust, forget your former cultural patterns and fit in.”

The fact was that it did worry her. She didn’t want to be drugged and passed on to some oppressive, nasty male to whom she was only a bearer of babies. She couldn’t afford to be. She had been sent to the Well World not as a refugee but as a soldier. She had things to do, and this sort of life was not part of it, would never be a part of her existence.