Free Dragon Dance by John Christopher

perfectly formed.
    â€œYes,” Bei Pen said, “that was far speaking, B’lad. As all things are, it is governed by the law of suggestion, so impeded by adverse thoughts. Your mind was more open to Li Mei than Si Mun’s was to me.” Simon thought: I’ll bet it was! “All the laws are based on a simple truth: that there is mind in every living thing. Not just in men and women, horses, dogs, monkeys. . . . The tiniest insect has mind. Plants, too.”
    He touched the branch of willow which overhung the pool.
    Simon asked: “Are you saying you can do this far speaking with trees?”
    It came out more sceptically than he intended. Bei Pen said: “Is that so strange? Stranger than to speak with men thousands of miles away, or to seethings that are happening on the far side of the world?”
    There was a silence which lasted too long. Bei Pen broke it.
    â€œWe know of the place from which you come—not the land of the Lomani, but the land beyond the fireball. In his far speaking with Li Mei, B’lad revealed much.”
    â€œWe were asleep,” Simon said. “You can’t take account of what people dream.”
    Ignoring that, Bei Pen said: “It explained much that might have seemed strange. Two Lomani, coming not from the west but the east, two who would not enter the deep sleep, two from whose presence the spirits of wind and fire turned away . . .”
    â€œSo you’ve had reports on us?” Simon said. “Was it by your order we were brought here—not the Lady Lu T’Sa’s?”
    â€œShe wished your absence, we your presence: the two things went together.” His eyes were searching. “Is it not true that in your own world you are familiar with the wonders I have spoken of?”
    There was no point in going on denying it. Simon said, fumbling for words in Chinese toexplain the difference between science and whatever kind of mysticism they went in for here: “It’s different. Those wonders were—well, based on reason.”
    Bei Pen nodded. “And reason is a function of second mind. We talk now of first mind. Come, I will show you something.”
    They followed a winding path to one of the greenhouses. It was mostly stone, but the roof and south-facing wall were glazed. They went inside to warmth and a sweet pungent smell. Ripe peaches glowed against dark green leaves.
    â€œA good crop, would you not say?” Bei Pen asked.
    Simon said stubbornly: “And you say it’s good because of far speaking to the plants? We get good crops in greenhouses in our land without that.”
    But not, he privately admitted, at anything like this altitude. He tried to reason that it was possible to breed special strains which would tolerate adverse conditions, but knew he was not convincing himself.
    Without answering, Bei Pen led the way along a walk that ran through the greenhouse. As they followed him, Simon noticed something very strange: the fruits were getting less ripe and smaller. At theend there were no fruits, only trees in flower. It was impossible but also, like the elephant, undeniable.
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    In the middle of the day, on a terrace overlooking the fields and gardens, more than fifty men and women sat down to a simple meal of bread and crumbling white cheese and salads, washed down by a thin sharp ale. Some had come in from working in the fields. Simon realized he had been wrong in thinking the toiling figures he had seen were peasant servants. All worked for the community, and all were priests of Bei-Kun.
    A large man called Bei W’ih sat opposite them. His beard was unusually full for a Chinese, black but heavily flecked with white, and he had an open jovial manner. He questioned them on the customs of the Lomani: was it true they fattened mice in pots and ate them? He also referred to stories which had reached the Middle Kingdom of a rebellion against the