Epilogue

“Mikel, there’s no tap for water. The faucet is just a tube with nothing in it and there are no pipes,” Remy said. “What are we going to do for water?”

All three of them looked at each other with consternation. “Water? Electricity? Transportation? Cooking? What the hell?” Nicola said, holding up four fingers as she counted off the issues.

“Mikel, step out the back door into the yard.”

“Forte is asking us to go out into the backyard,” Mikel said, ushering both women with an arm.

“What a weird sensation,” Remy said. “I feel like the entire yard is alive beneath my bare feet. I walked this yard yesterday and it felt like I was walking on dirt and grass. This is strange.” She kept walking in a straight line until she came to a slight depression. She stood in the middle of the dip with an odd look on her face. “I think there is water under me.”

“Let me try it out,” Nicola said. “Move your butt out of the way.” She dropped to her knees, placing her hands in the dirt. “Yeah, there is a bunch of dirt and rocks in the way, but I can sense a flow. I don’t think the water is that deep though. What can we try?”

“Take their hands and circle the spot, Mikel.”

“After me, folks,” Mikel announced. He arranged them in a circle and tried to feel the ground beneath. He did not sense the water or the rocks, but he sensed power, a pulsing force that felt connected to the earth below and to the living things at the surface. “I feel power down there.”

“Yes, maybe,” Remy said. “Can you bring the power to me?”

“Umm, how?”

“Mikel, try grabbing the power and use it to push the water upwards,” Remy said. “I can sense it, but I can’t do it.”

“Feel the mana with your senses, Mikel. Caress it and nudge it together until it feels solid. These are your new senses. Yes, touch it like that. No, no, don’t push it or it disperses like steam above a boiling pot.”

Mikel felt the sweat pooling in his armpits. “Try. It now, Remy.”

“I don’t,” she began when Nicola chimed in, “I can sense it, guys. I can spin it if Mikel keeps pushing it together. Keep pushing.

“Oo, the water is rising with whatever you’re doing Nicola,” Remy said. “Slowly, slowly. Breathe, Mikel. Jeez, you act like you’re giving birth. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out.”

“I’m spinning faster,” Nicola said. “Can you pull at the water, Remy?”

“Gently, yes,” she said. “We’re close; we’re closer. Ahgg!”

They were immediately drenched in a spray of dirty water that shot up over their heads and dosed them from above. The water was spurting straight up, a good foot above their heads. Mikel felt immediate relief both from his focused exertion and the cooling wet.

“Someone, get a bucket,” he gasped.

“No, no: someone get a pipe to keep this sucker going,” Remy said. “There were all sorts of tubing and pipe in the basement on the table by the casks, Nicola. Go see if any of it transitioned with us and get it.”

Nicola ran. Mikel felt like he was squeezing and squeezing forever when he finally heard Nicola returning. She was holding thick sticks and a wooden mallet used for inserting corks.

“Bamboo,” Nicola said. “Stronger per inch than most woods and hollow. She rammed the stick into the ground where the water burbled and then pounded the stick two feet down before she stopped. “That is as far as it will go.”

Water continued to rise and babbled out of the top like a water fountain. Mikel took a long draught and Remy followed his lead. Nicola pulled back her hair and opened her mouth before sucking down the liquid.

“It’s sweet,” Remy said.

Mikel took another taste, “It’s fresh water from the aquifer, not the recycled and treated stuff we’re used to drinking. This water tastes good, it tastes wholesome.”

“It tastes like a new world,” Nicola said. “Do either of you feel you are breathing deeper, and your muscles sit ... fuller, more substantial? I started the day with bloating and cramps, but I feel great now.”