33. My Place

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"This is something no man can witness and live to tell the tale, so keep it a secret. For this is a Bene Gesserit meeting at the Black Rock—which actually means girls night at my place. Let me introduce you to the council. This is Lady Claudia, our manipulation expert."

"Hi, Jay! Nice to meet you!"

"This is Reverend Mother Karim with the procreation wing and my little sis Mika, I mean Acolyte Lolita, which is a pun in Spanish about her boobs."

"Hi!"

"Hey there!"

"And that's Paola, who we suspect to be a spy, trying to infiltrate our ranks in order to steal our secrets for the Honored Matres."

"Bet he didn't understand a word you said."

"Then he needs to read the Dune saga."

"You didn't say who you are!"

"Oh, well, I'm Superior Mother S, always fighting for the survival of the Sisterhood."

"And now we have to leave you, Jay."

"Yes, we have some vital issues to discuss."

"Yeah! Like comparing guys' performances, if you know what we mean."

"Yeah!"

"Bye!"

Jim chuckled under his breath, sprawled on his bed with his phone. The house looked tiny and cozy, with little to no decoration, save a few framed pictures on the bookshelf and some rustic things on the walls. The faces around the table went from twenty-five to forty years old, and they laughed together like old friends.

Next, the video showed a cloudy afternoon outside a small cottage, and he heard occasional exclamations and weird thuds. Silvia circled the cottage, heading to the backyard as she spoke.

"It's Sunday, and that means fencing practice for our Medieval Recreational Group."

She showed a circle of teen boys and grownup guys in the backyard. In the middle of it, two of them were fighting with swords that looked more real than props.

"This is Beltane, Claudia's house, a few streets away from the Black Rock, my place. Yeah, we name our houses and we like what you would call medieval shit. The downside of medieval geeks is that they're usually into heavy metal, but I love them all the same. Of all the people here, Claudia and I are the only ones who even know No Return."

The guys in the circle saw her and yelled their hellos. She greeted them from where she was and walked back to the front door.

"While our men enjoy their sports, we chicks gather here to read and cook. Really damned medieval, isn't it?"

One of the girls she'd introduced on the first part of the video opened the door and giggled when she saw Silvia filming.

Another cut and it was night again, in the middle of a narrow cobblestone street. The walls on both sides were covered in artistic graffiti and Silvia walked toward one of the bars on that street.

"This is the bar where we usually get together on weekends. We have a lot of bars here, even Irish. You should see this street on St. Patrick's night. Pipes and dancing on the street till dawn! Many of these bars brew their own beer, you know? But you would find it too strong and bitter. I'm explaining all this before going in because it's gonna be dark and noisy inside."

The place was crowded. It was a house turned into a bar, with lots of woods, little light, rock in Spanish playing loud. A dozen people waved Silvia over from a table. She panned the place and the faces and cut the video.

Next, Jim saw her little office, and then her house again, and an eighteen-year-old boy that hardly glanced up from his phone when Silvia introduced him as her little brother Tobias.

The video ended with an outstanding shot of a sunset over a huge lake surrounded by mountains, filmed from a moving vehicle.

"I'm on the bus now, on my way home from work" she said in whispers. "Not bad, going to and back from work with this view out the window, huh? Wait."

She didn't stop filming to get off the bus. She walked up to a low cliff over the lake, right by the road, and panned slowly the pebble beach below, the hills, the city lights a couple of miles away.

"Look at this beauty, Jay. This is my home, where I belong. This is me. See the mountains cut in black against the sunset, the woods, the water? How could anybody ever grow tired of this?" She switched the phone cameras to show her own face with the landscape, but she was still looking ahead, enjoying the view. "This is the place where I am free," she said, and sighed. A moment later, she smiled to the camera. "See you!"

Jim's lips curled up, mirroring her smile as he nodded to himself. Yeah, no doubt that was her place and her people. He recognized her. The woman dancing and singing at the inn, the one speaking about music and God at the bus station. Those five minutes only confirmed all she had showed him over their two days together.

He found Sean and Jo watching a movie downstairs. Most of their friends had already called it a day.

"Hey, wanna join us?" his brother said.

"No, thanks. Just pause it, I'll only take a minute." Jim sat down on the rug before the couch and accepted the beer Sean handed him. "Say, Jo, if I wanna shoot some kinda clip here with one of our songs, d'you think you can pull it off?"

"Sure, I always carry my camera with me, and I've got editing software on my laptop."

"Cool. Let me outline what I wanna do and we'll talk about it tomorrow."

"Anytime."

"What're you up to now?" asked Sean.

Jim stood up with a quick smile. "Nothing. Night, guys."

Sean and Jo watched him go back upstairs.

"He took my beer," Sean grunted.

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