Bannerless (The Bannerless Saga 1)

Studying what had happened, learning a history that didn’t much help grow food or build roads, Enid wasn’t really sure what she was looking for. It was another way of getting out, maybe. If she couldn’t travel from place to place, she would travel through time. If Auntie Kath wasn’t around to remember anymore, someone else would have to do it for her, at least a little. No matter how much she traveled, how much she read, or how many places she saw, it would never be enough to satisfy her, none of it.

Two months after Enid got her implant, Auntie Kath died. She’d been sitting on the porch at the clinic all afternoon. People walked to and fro like they always did, raised their hands, and called hello like they always did, and if Auntie Kath didn’t wave back, well, she must have been napping.

Only at twilight did Peri come out on the porch to check on her. She touched the old woman’s neck and cried. They all did.

There at her pyre, when it was so clear that the body that had held Auntie Kath simply wasn’t her anymore, people spoke of a great woman earning her rest. As if death were a resource that had to be earned, that could ever be used up or wasted.

CHAPTER NINE • PASADAN

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Interrogations

Enid’s first case as lead had been relatively simple. A household had been discovered hoarding wheat—two extra fields sown in secret, over their quota, when they should have lain fallow. The two heads of the house declared that they were right to work the land and risk leaching it of its future ability to grow food; they were right to keep it secret, to lie to their committee. Even as they listed off every exact infraction they had committed, they insisted that they were right. To Enid, that had seemed the worst violation of all. You had a problem with quotas, field rotation, any of it—you petitioned your committee. You worked with the committee; you didn’t go haring off on your own. Not when a whole community depended on you for food. Enid had seen what real hunger looked like.

Everyone thinking they knew best and going off with their own plans with no mind to anyone else was what had gotten the world to the Fall. What had kept people from doing anything about it until it was too late.

“Did you think of anyone else?” Enid had asked the folk of this household. “Did you think of the next generation that’ll have to work this land and wonder why they’re getting half the yield they should? Or the ones who’ll starve when the land gives up because you”—she had pointed at them, with two stiff fingers—“couldn’t be bothered to take care of it?”

They hadn’t answered. She hadn’t expected them to. She’d just been angry. That had been her mentor Nan’s major criticism of her work. Not just her, but Tomas, too—in fact, everyone—said the same thing: You’re too angry, Enid. You take it personally, and you can’t do that. Be an arbiter. Be stone. Your anger won’t touch them, so be stone.

When that case concluded, the investigators had the regional committee move new folk in to run the household, and the two culprits were banned from having a vote in local committee matters and from being eligible for a banner for a decade. This effectively meant they’d never earn a banner at all. If they thought the extra grain they harvested by breaking quota would get them a banner, they were wrong. Instead, they were shamed and shunned.

Enid hadn’t gotten much better at reining in her anger in the few years since. She always seemed to approach her investigations with a sense of . . . disbelief.

“It’s no good to ask what they thought they were doing,” Nan told her. “They still think they have the right. The consequences are too far ahead for them to think about. They’re sure the future will take care of itself.”

“If it could, we wouldn’t need any of this,” she’d muttered, tugging at the hem of her brown tunic and scowling up the road as they walked away from the case.

“Enid. You’re trying to save a world that went away a long time ago.”

No, she wasn’t. That old world, everything from before the Fall, might as well be a made-up place in a story. Long ago and far away. She was trying to save this world. She was trying to save everything. “Enid. It’s not your job to save everything. Just do this one little thing, yes? Then do the next little thing. It’s all right.” Funny, how she could still hear Nan’s voice chiding her.

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Needing to find Ariana, Enid tried to guess the committeewoman’s schedule, where she might likely be this time of day. Probably at her household, Newhome. Enid could go over there and maybe interrupt her and Dak gossiping about the investigation. Enid wasn’t above listening at doorways herself.

Then she got lucky, and the woman herself brought a crock of stew and cornbread to the meeting room for lunch, while they were still going over Pasadan’s records.

“Hello!” she announced after knocking, bustling with what seemed an excessive amount of energy. “I saw you were here and thought you might be hungry, and we had plenty to spare if you’d like some.”

Tomas welcomed her in. “Thanks. I can smell it from here.” They set out bowls and spoons, and yes, the stew smelled wonderful. Full of herbs, onions, vegetables, it had probably been simmering all morning.

“Would you like to join us?” Enid asked, casually enough. “I have a few more questions for you, if you don’t mind. It should only take a minute or so.” Her politeness felt downright aggressive—to match Ariana’s own. The woman didn’t even flinch; she smiled and settled into the chair like she’d been waiting for the invitation.

“Of course, I’ll help however I can.”

She’s the one who wants us here, Enid remembered. She poured them all cups of lemonade, smiling all the while.

“What do you need to know?” she asked.

“I’m just curious, mostly,” Enid said, pleasantly enough. This was just a conversation. “We come into a place like this as strangers—it’s hard sometimes to get the feel of a town right off. Every place has its own quirks. I suppose I’m just looking for a little insight.”

“Pasadan’s

not really any different from any other place, I suppose.” Ariana shrugged. “We’re proud of our households; we take care of our families. There’s not much more to be said than that.”

“How long have you been on the committee?”