"THEY'LL CANE US IN PUBLIC if we get caught," Miranda whispered.
"So stay home," Chloe told her friend. "I'm only going to turn seventeen once. I won't let the threat of the rod spoil this day."
Although birthday celebrations had been outlawed, the Commission considered them a minor transgression, so participants were generally spared the harsher punishments such as permanent mutilation. All the same, a caning was nothing to scoff at since the Officer of Public Corrections tended to dispense justice with such a firm hand that offenders weren't able to sit on their backsides for weeks.
"Don't pretend they went to all the effort of putting on this party just for you," Miranda said. "Besides, the real reason you want to go is to make sure that Lillian doesn't get her hands on Wayne."
"If Wayne is stupid enough to fall for Lillian, then she can have him," Chloe countered, annoyed that her friend would hit her with the stinging truth. Miranda was right. The party had been planned to honor Lillian. The fact that she was the mayor's daughter while Wayne was the sheriff's son had given the town's teenagers enough courage to stage the secret event. Because of their parents' influence, everyone assumed that if caught, the authorities would go lightly on all the participants. It was dumb luck that Chloe happened to share a birthday with Lillian. But she wasn't about to let that unfortunate detail interfere with such a rare occasion for amusement, nor with her ability to celebrate tonight's party as though it had been thrown for her own benefit.
"Listen if you're afraid to take the risk, I understand," Chloe said, "But it's chilly out here, and we can't stand on your back porch arguing all night."
Conflicted, Miranda looked up at the full moon, then guiltily down at her slippers. She hadn't even bothered to get fully dressed—proof she'd known all along that she wouldn't have the courage to sneak out. As she twirled one of her brown locks, she said, "Maybe I'll catch up with you later."
Chloe rolled her big, green eyes and groaned. "Alright, but if you do, remember to travel by an uninhabited route."
Slipping into the dark shadows cast by the trees in Miranda's backyard, Chloe was determined to follow her own advice. Her route took her along the streets with the greatest number of derelict buildings. For convenience, the townspeople of Dragon's Faith had taken up residence in close proximity to one another, leaving the remainder of the former city's houses and buildings to languish in decay. Almost anything of utility had already been stripped from these gutted out homes. Chloe always got goosebumps when she trekked down these lonely streets. Under the full moon, the dark, empty windows of the houses seemed like watchful eyes. The only real danger was the feral dogs skulking along the ruins, which occasionally banded together into packs. They had been known to attack children and elderly people walking alone in the evening. But fortunately, over the winter, the sheriff had been given the task of culling stray animals that had lost their fear of humans.
Although Chloe treaded down the center of the street in order to avoid stray dogs, she listened carefully for sounds of a patrol. At any moment, she was ready to dive into the thick bushes of the overgrown yards. She couldn't keep her mind from drifting and thinking about how this city had been fully populated only seventeen years ago. Last year, she and Miranda had ridden their bikes to the outskirts of town where they found a shattered wooden sign, face down in a ditch. When they turned it over, they determined that an artillery shell of some sort had completely demolished the upper half of the sign. Although the town's original name had been obliterated, they could still make out the inscription: 'California'.
"Such information from the past is useless to us now," her father had said when asked for more information about 'California'. "And don't go spreading that name about. You'll get us chastised for nostalgic yearnings.
When pressed again later, her father still refused to tell her the original name of her home town, even though she knew it hadn't always been called 'Dragon's Faith' as he insisted. Although adults were forbidden from recounting such information by strict 'nostalgia laws', her generation had an insatiable curiosity to know more. Whenever one of her classmates learned something about the lost era, it was passed by word of mouth to all the other teenagers. They had compiled a very weak understanding of the lost era as well as the events leading up to the downfall of the preceding civilization. Among friends, Chloe had been proud to reveal that the territory surrounding her town had once been known as California before being renamed as 'The Pacific Governorship'.
A sudden dry rattle from above startled Chloe, and she let out a shriek of surprise. She glanced overhead and found a coatl sitting on its perch. The creature resembled an enormous rattlesnake with wings of iridescent rainbow colored plumage. Chloe had been so lost in her thoughts, she hadn't even noticed that she was walking past the Cloud Temple. She and her friends had concluded that the building had once served as a church for the old religion. It was a large brick building with a steeple out front. Above the entrance doors, a large metal pole had been affixed to act as a perch for the coatls—messengers of the Cloud Lords. With another shake of its rattle, the angry serpent stretched its wings, bared its fangs and coiled its body, signaling that it could strike at any moment.
A chill ran through Chloe's veins. Normally the coatl ignored passers-by, but she must've startled the serpent from sleep. She'd never heard of a Coatl biting a resident of Dragon's Faith, but there was no reason to become its first victim. The eight foot serpent could deliver enough venom to provide certain death. As she slowly backed away from the winged serpent's watchful gaze, she put a hand on her chest to feel the necklace bearing a pendant and a crucifix under her shirt—a token that had once belonged to the mother she'd never known. For Chloe, the necklace acted as a good luck charm. She'd discovered it hidden in a cranny of the brick wall behind the old boiler down in the basement. Whether her mother, her father, or someone else had hidden it there, she could never determine. But since the necklace bore a symbol of the old religion, she'd been wise enough not to ask questions, and thus risk having it confiscated. She knew the necklace had belonged to her mother because the pendant bore her initials. Chloe prized this only remaining connection to the woman who had died while giving her life.
Once Chloe had retreated to a safe distance, the coatl folded its wings and curled up into a ball upon its perch. However, it kept its unblinking eyes trained upon her. After she breathed a sigh of relief, she noticed a hound barking nearby. Some people still kept guard dogs chained up in their yards, and it must have heard her shriek when the coatl frightened her. A wooden sign above the Cloud Temple's door was inscribed with the words: 'Only those on high can rule'. It was the credo of the New Religion, and from what she and her friends had gathered, it had been a condition of surrender when the Rift War ended. Even though her town was not the capital of the Pacific Governorship, it remained an important launching point for offerings to the Cloud Lords above. And the arrival of the coatl signaled that their rulers now demanded another ritual supplication.
The sound of horse hooves trotting across asphalt brought Chloe back to the moment—the Night Patrol. Clearly, a deputy had heard the dog barking, and he was coming round to investigate whether or not someone had broken curfew. Chloe rushed to the overgrown bushes on the other side of the old road and hunkered down as low as possible. Typically, the Night Patrol's job was to issue citations to citizens that hadn't observed the blackout by forgetting to cover their windows when an oil lamp or candle was burning. One of the many conditions of the truce was the adherence to a set of rules known as the Dictates. The earth dwellers were to abandon their technology, and as proof of their subordination, light was forbidden after certain hours. The Cloud Lords could track even the smallest light on the earth below. In the past, dragon fire had been the punishment for even the smallest transgression. But ever since the New Religion had been organized, a certain amount of autonomy and freedom had been permitted. Chloe was certain that the New Religion had gained its first converts due to self-preservation, and then later, everyone joined because of social pressure.
As the deputy's horse trotted up the street, Chloe finally caught a glimpse of the rider in the moonlight. It was Jarod, the only deputy among the sheriff's Regulators that she despised. His cheeks had been scarred by acne, but his appearance bothered her less than his creepy demeanor. More than once, she'd seen him in the crowd at public events, staring as though undressing her with his eyes. But thankfully, he was too much of a coward with women to come up and say anything to her. Nonetheless, his pale eyes scanning the length of the street unsettled her. He stopped his horse below the coatl's perch in order to stuff a wad of chewing tobacco into his already full cheek. Unnerved by the horseman, the coatl reared up into a position to strike, bared its fangs, and shook its ominous rattle. Jarod spun his horse to face the creature and spat a huge, gooey mess of tobacco straight into the coatl's gaping maw. The serpent was as surprised as Chloe by this unwarranted attack. It choked on the tobacco and nearly slid from the perch. Jarod sidled his horse away from the creature and wiped a trail of tobacco from his chin.
"Ha! I showed you... foul beast," he boasted. "Some want to call your masters 'angels'... and even the new gods'. But I say you're demons! Demons who need to be sent back to whatever hell dimension you came from!"
The coatl flapped its wings as if preparing to take off from its roost. Jarod pulled his pistol and aimed it at the winged serpent.
"Just try it! I'm an even better shot with this pistol!"
The coatl hissed in anger, but the fact that it hovered above its roost without flying down to strike showed it understood Jarod's threat. It glared at the pistol with unblinking frustration and rage. Jarod laughed as he backed his horse away from the steeple. Finally, when he was a safe distance away, he sunk his spurs into his horse's sides, setting it into a gallop.
Chloe was flabbergasted. Jarod had just committed outright blasphemy, a crime punishable by three days of torture and then death. He had demonstrated a rebelliousness that Chloe was sure many of the townsfolk secretly harbored within themselves, but were too cowardly to reveal. And strangely, it almost made her respect him. Almost. But, he was still Jarod, and she would never be able to shake the creepy feeling he gave her. After all, she'd seen him haul transgressors out of jail for public punishment. He lacked all compunction when carrying out his ghastly duties. Yet, it was a surprise to learn that one of the town's deputies harbored such a deep resentment against the New Faith.
She'd never spoken about the New Faith with Wayne. She always knew that his being an assistant deputy had required swearing an oath to defend their way of life. Moreover, a critique of the political order wasn't the sort of topic you brought up around someone who sent butterflies swirling in your stomach. Besides, when she was with Wayne, she felt an unbridled optimism for the future. And that was precisely why she wanted to spend the rest of her life with him.
The thought of Wayne prompted her out of the bushes and steeled her resolve not to head back home to her safe, warm bed. As she approached the abandoned old center of the city, there were significantly more destroyed and derelict buildings. Most of this destruction had been the result of the fighting which had taken place during the Reorganization—the name the victors had given to the civil war that immediately followed the swift and decisive Rift War with the Cloud Lords above.
If her townsfolk were so severe with transgressions of the New Faith, it was due to the days of the Reorganization when brother had been turned against brother. Not everyone had been willing to accept defeat by the Cloud Lords, and that was what had sparked even greater chaos. Chloe retained only passing memories of this troubled period since it had ended when she turned five. Since the end of the civil war, peace had reigned, albeit with a rod and an iron fist.
Up ahead, she sighted the old municipal library. It was one of the few public buildings that remained standing in the old center and had probably only resisted due to its thick stone walls. Well over a century old, it still appeared stately with its greek columns and cornices. The structure's windows and entrances had been boarded shut. Chloe had been told that the entrance to the party was supposed to be through one of the basement windows. As she approached, she had to wade through thigh-high grass and brambles. While skirting around the building, she heard a voice call out in a hushed tone.
"Hey Chloe, it's over here..."
She doubled back and found her friend Sandra's face peeking out of a propped open window. Sandra helped Chloe in through the window which required some dexterity since it was necessary to slide in backwards and then descend upon a rickety ladder. Once inside, she found the basement lit with a few candles. It was damp, musty and depressing, but Sandra could barely contain her enthusiasm and her curly red locks jiggled as she spoke.
"Come on," Sandra said, "You're the last one here and we're missing all the fun! I've been waiting here for over an hour.
"Sorry, I almost got caught by the Night Patrol," Chloe said.
As Chloe followed her toward a flight of stone stairs, Sandra spun around and headed toward a pile of debris from which she extracted a bundled up object.
"Oh, I almost forgot. I have something for you." Sandra giggled. "After all, it's your birthday too."
Astonished, Chloe carefully unwrapped the yellowed gift paper from around the object. The paper had creases and had obviously been used for previous gifts, but it was too precious not to try to spare for yet another usage. As she slowly pulled back the paper, it became clear that a hardbound book lay beneath. And once all of the wrapping paper had been pulled away, Chloe could guess that the book would clearly be among those that could be deemed forbidden. The name 'Michelangelo' was embossed with gold letters into the cover.
"What do you think?" Sandra asked. "I found it when we were cleaning up the library for the party. Of course, the whole place had been emptied of books, but this one had slipped under a shelf. I think he was a famous artist. Wait, let me show you my favorite one..."
Sandra reached over Chloe's shoulder and flipped the pages until she came to an image showing a sculpture of a man in agony stretched across the lap of a beautiful young woman who appeared to be supplicating him. What struck Chloe the most was the mix of agony and ecstasy within the photo. The woman's beatific expression radiated love and hope. At the same time, the man's body clearly had been pushed to the limit by some form of torture, and yet he remained a most sublime specimen of male beauty, graceful and perfect in every way. The caption under the image read: 'Pietà'. It was the most beautiful thing Chloe had ever seen.
Chloe gave Sandra a peck on the cheek. "Thank you. This is the best gift I've ever received."
And yet, it was also the most dangerous. This was the type of book that could land her in enormous trouble. The New Faith preached against any form of nudity and there were plenty of images in this book that were overtly celebrating the human body. It was the sort of document that had been systematically destroyed during the Reorganization. Of course, not all books had been forbidden. A library had been established in the new town center. Every book within had been carefully vetted to make sure that it complied with the morals expected of citizens of the Pacific Governorship. All texts of intrinsic technical knowledge had been spared.
Sandra had offered this forbidden book as a present because she was the only person aware of Chloe's secret stash. Unlike Miranda, Sandra wasn't a coward. When younger, she and Chloe had spent many of their afternoons crawling through the basements and attics of ruined houses in order to find 'treasures' from the past. Occasionally, they had uncovered a book or a magazine that would clearly be forbidden. They knew that if they left these texts behind, someone else would come upon them and most likely use them for kindling. Chloe loved to read and was thirsty for knowledge. Thus she carried home every volume of interest that they'd discovered. She kept these books beneath the disused boiler in her basement. And on rare occasions, she and Sandra would pull out one of these forbidden texts and read it together in her room.
Chloe returned Sandra's gift to the pile of debris where it had been hidden. There was no way she could bring it to the party. She would recover it on her way home later that evening. Once the book had been stashed away, she and Sandra climbed the stone stairs. There was a heavy wood door at the top of the stairs, and when Chloe pushed it aside, she was astonished by the sight beyond.
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