Lilith's Brood: Dawn, Adulthood Rites, and Imago (Xenogenesis Trilogy) by Octavia E. Butler Read Free Book Online Page B

beings.”
    “We are committed to the trade,” he said, softly implacable.
    “No! You’ll finish what the war began. In a few generations—”
    “One generation.”
    “No!”
    He wrapped the many fingers of one hand around her arm. “Can you hold your breath, Lilith? Can you hold it by an act of will until you die?”
    “Hold my—?”
    “We are as committed to the trade as your body is to breathing. We were overdue for it when we found you. Now it will be done—to the rebirth of your people and mine.”
    “No!” she shouted. “A rebirth for us can only happen if you let us alone! Let us begin again on our own.”
    Silence.
    She pulled at her arm, and after a moment he let her go. She got the impression he was watching her very closely.
    “I think I wish your people had left me on Earth,” she whispered. “If this is what they found me for, I wish they’d left me.” Medusa children. Snakes for hair. Nests of night crawlers for eyes and ears.
    He sat down on the bare ground, and after a minute of surprise, she sat opposite him, not knowing why, simply following his movement.
    “I can’t un find you,” he said. “You’re here. But there is … a thing I can do. It is … deeply wrong of me to offer it. I will never offer it again.”
    “What?” she asked barely caring. She was tired from the walk, overwhelmed by what he had told her. It made no sense. Good god, no wonder he couldn’t go home—even if his home still existed. Whatever his people had been like when they left it, they must be very different by now—as the children of the last surviving human beings would be different.
    “Lilith?” he said.
    She raised her head, stared at him.
    “Touch me here now,” he said, gesturing toward his head tentacles, “and I’ll sting you. You’ll die—very quickly and without pain.”
    She swallowed.
    “If you want it,” he said.
    It was a gift he was offering. Not a threat.
    “Why?” she whispered.
    He would not answer.
    She stared at his head tentacles. She raised her hand, let it reach toward him almost as though it had its own will, its own intent. No more Awakenings. No more questions. No more impossible answers. Nothing.
    Nothing.
    He never moved. Even his tentacles were utterly still. Her hand hovered, wanting to fall amid the tough, flexible, lethal organs. It hovered, almost brushing one by accident.
    She jerked her hand away, clutched it to her. “Oh god,” she whispered. “Why didn’t I do it? Why can’t I do it?”
    He stood up and waited uncomplaining for several minutes until she dragged herself to her feet.
    “You’ll meet my mates and one of my children now,” he said. “Then rest and food, Lilith.”
    She looked at him, longing for a human expression. “Would you have done it?” she asked.
    “Yes,” he said.
    “Why?”
    “For you.”

II
FAMILY

1
    S LEEP .
    She barely remembered being presented to three of Jdahya’s relatives, then guided off and given a bed. Sleep. Then a small, confused awakening.
    Now food and forgetting.
    Food and pleasure so sharp and sweet it cleared everything else from her mind. There were whole bananas, dishes of sliced pineapple, whole figs, shelled nuts of several kinds, bread and honey, a vegetable stew filled with corn, peppers, tomatoes, potatoes, onions, mushrooms, herbs, and spices.
    Where had all this been, Lilith wondered. Surely they could have given her a little of this instead of keeping her for so long on a diet that made eating a chore. Could it all have been for her health? Or had there been some other purpose—something to do with their damned gene trade?
    When she had eaten some of everything, savored each new taste lovingly, she began to pay attention to the four Oankali who were with her in the small, bare room. They were Jdahya and his wife Tediin—Kaaljdahyatediin lel Kahguyaht aj Dinso. And there was Jdahya’s ooloi mate Kahguyaht—Ahtrekahguyahtkaal lel Jdayhatediin aj Dinso. Finally there was the family’s