The Just City Read Free Page B

ship a woman was sitting with her legs crossed, a book in her hand. One of the masters unbound the ropes from our hands and legs as we came aboard and we were led up to her in pairs. The woman seemed to be writing down the names of the children, after which they were led to a hatchway and disappeared. My own master, he of the red hat, led me up to her with my tormentor. “These two have saints’ names,” he said. “Will you name them, Sophia?”
    She looked up, and I saw that her eyes were grey. “Not I. You should know better than to ask, Marsilio. You name them.”
    â€œVery well, then. They were chained together. Write them down as Kebes, the boy, and Simmea, the girl.” He smiled at me again as he named us. “These are good names, names that will stand you well in the city. Forget your old names, as you should forget your childhoods and your time in misery. You are going to a good place. You are all brothers and sisters here, all reborn to new lives.”
    â€œAnd your name, master?” Kebes asked.
    â€œHe is Ficino, the Translator,” the woman answered for him. “He is one of the masters of the Just City.”
    Then one of the others shepherded us to the hatch, and we climbed down a ladder into a big open space. The hold was nothing like the hold of the slaver. It was surprisingly well lit by strange glowing beams that lay along the curving slope of the ship. By their light I could see that it was full of children, all strangers. I had never seen so many ten-year-olds in one place, and apart from the market, never so many people. There must have been more than a hundred. Some were sleeping, some were sitting in groups talking or playing games, others were standing alone. None of them took much notice of the new arrivals. There were so many strangers suddenly that those who had been chained by me seemed like friends by comparison. Kebes was the only one whose name I knew. I stayed beside him as we went in among the others. “Do you think the masters mean well by us?” I asked him.
    â€œI hate them,” he replied. “I hate all of them, all masters whoever they are, whatever they mean. I shall never forgive them, never submit to them. They think they bought me, think they changed my name, but nobody can buy me or change me against my will.”
    I looked at him, surprised. Like a dog who had been beaten, I had been ready to love and trust the first kind word I received. He was different. He looked fierce and proud, like a hunting hawk who cannot be tamed. “Why did you poke me?” I asked.
    â€œI will not submit.”
    â€œI wasn’t the one who bound you. I was bound beside you.”
    â€œI couldn’t get at the ones who bound me, and you were bound beside me where you were the only one I could reach.” He looked a little guilty. “It was a small rebellion, but the only one I could achieve at that moment. And besides, you got me back.” He pointed at the fading mark on his leg. “We’re equal. Tell me your name?”
    â€œSimmea, the master Ficino said.” I saw his lip curl as if he despised me. “Oh, all right. Lucia.”
    â€œWell Lucia, though I shall call you Simmea and you may call me Kebes where the masters can hear, my name is Matthias. And I will never forgive them. I may wait for my revenge, but I will get it when they do not expect it.”
    We had not even reached the city. The ship was barely out of the harbour of Smyrna. Already the seeds of rebellion were growing.

 
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    M AIA
    I was born in Knaresborough in Yorkshire in 1841, the third child and second daughter of the local rector. My parents christened me Ethel.
    My father, the Rev. John Beecham, M.A., was a scholar who had been at Oxford and cared as much or more for the classics than he did for God. My mother was a worldly woman, the daughter of a baron, and therefore entitled to call herself “the honourable,” which