The 97th Step Read Free Page A

your sins, boy!"
    Mwili prayed, but could his father hear his thoughts, he would have swung the strap harder. He prayed for a lightning bolt to strike his father. For the earth to open and swallow him, for—
    The second stroke landed, overlapping the first only slightly. His father was an expert with the strap, God knew he had enough practice! The burn spread.
    How can you allow this, God? How can the God of the Biblioscript, who is supposedly just and merciful, allow me to be whipped for something that wasn't my fault? Where is the Justice in that? The Mercy of Heavenly Love?
    The third lash smacked into him, farther down his back. That one hurt more, there was a bruise there from the flitter's rough landing. The whippings themselves left no permanent marks—his father had made the strap wide enough to spread the pain without cutting the skin—but they did hurt. Although lately, it was not so much the pain as the unfairness of it. He would have replaced the damned coil, had it been up to him! But no—!
    "Beg the Lord's forgiveness, son! Change your sinning ways!"
    Crouched under the flailing strap in the cold light of the exterior lamps, Mwili prayed. Take him now, God. Take him and take this whole fucking planet!
    His only answer was the whistling of the strap, and the dust it raised from his jacket when it landed.
    His mother sat on the worn form-chair, pretending to read from the Holy Script when Mwili walked past her toward his room. The worn and old electronic reader on her lap hummed constantly, and squeaked each time she pushed the cheap mechanical button to advance the text on the small screen. She spared him a quick glance when he passed, then stared back down at the dim and flickery gray screen of the reader, lest her husband see her offering any kind of sympathy to her son. As an adult, she was not subject to the strap, but an hour's lecture on one Rule or another was not uncommon. Himself, Mwili preferred the strap to the preaching.
    The boy did not speak. Later, when Mafuta was asleep, she might visit the fresher, and risk a side trip to his room, for a quick word or affectionate touch with her son. Only then.
    In his room, Mwili knew he was too tired to wait for his mother's possible visit. The trip to town, loading the supplies, then unloading and walking from Three Rocks had been enough to exhaust him. Fifteen from the strap had finished the job completely. He was bone-weary, and in his misery, could only think of one thing: he had to get out. Somehow, he had to get away from his father, from Cibule, from the Svare System altogether. There were twenty-two other explored star systems out there, somewhere, fifty-odd inhabited worlds, and scores of wheel worlds. The Confed took a heavy tax from every planet to push Bender ships out to explore yet more systems and worlds. Among all that, there had to be places better than here. There had to be.
    It had been on his mind for months now, hazy and ill-defined. His studies on the holoproj net had shown him that life was different elsewhere. He was a good student, he enjoyed the learning time, time he did not have to face his father and the ever-present farm work. There were other ways to live, and his resolve to find them crystalized as he lay on the narrow cot, face down to avoid pressure on his sore back.
    That it was impossible meant little to him. He was too young to ship with the Confed military yet, though they would draft him in a few years; nobody would hire a boy his age for any kind of legitimate work offworld; and he had all of nineteen stads to his name. That was less than half as much needed just to buy an application for a ticket to anywhere offplanet. Yet, there had to be a way. He had to find it.
    Otherwise, his future was grim. Another four years of beatings, then he would be a "man." Until then, he'd still be in thrall to his father, and he'd continue to work the dusty shamba fields, trying to keep the stubby wembe plants alive through the quakes,