Crewel

enough to prompt a former Eligible to reveal her rejection. It’s one thing to be catty about others’ misfortunes but harder to admit your own.
    ‘Your duties will be assigned based on skill level. There are always opportunities for advancement for loyal Spinsters of the Guild,’ the holographic woman continues. Behind her an enormous machine flickers into view on the screen. It’s a loom, like the one they presented me with in testing, only bigger. Gears and wheels grind together silently, connected to a series of intricate silver tubes. As she speaks, sparkling strands weave across it in a mixture of gold and other colours. I know from experience that the gold is time, and when I focus hard enough to see the weave around me, these strands flow across, forming bands. The other strands weave through the bands, forming a tight, colourful tapestry.
    Before this moment, I’ve only seen looms during testing, and then I spent so much time ignoring my compulsion to touch the weave that its subtlety was lost on me. Now it shimmers with life. But as I watch, the image on the screen changes. The gears of the loom adjust, zooming in on a portion of the weave on the loom. First, the fibres suggest an aerial view of a neighbourhood. Then the weave is focused more closely until it reveals the image of a street. And finally, the weave reveals a family sitting inside their home. The vlip then winds the image back to the complex weave it first showed us.
    ‘Spinsters work hand in hand with the men who oversee the Guild of Twelve. In the Western Coventry compound, your work will be focused on basic weaving, maintenance, and Crewel work. Our compound is responsible for food and weather, and our most advanced Spinsters handle special issues specific to our sector. You were each transported to this facility based on your aptitude tests. Should you develop skills in other areas, the Guild may issue a transfer of assignment at any time. All four coventries work together to maintain the physical integrity of Arras’s weave and to ensure our world is bound together in safety and prosperity. Each coventry is carefully located to provide optimum control over the weave, and while each has specific tasks assigned to the women working its looms, all are of equal importance. Advanced Spinsters may perform Crewel work, a form of manipulation that adds to Arras and controls elements crucial to our survival.
    ‘The peace and prosperity of Arras are enabled through your work on the looms. Following patterns strictly to ensure the metros function smoothly, and monitoring the weave for evidence of deterioration, allow us to catch dangerous behaviour and conditions before they can affect the safety of our citizens. Special techniques have been designed to clean and renew threads damaged by aberrant tendencies. We work closely with academies across the world to catch deviants at a young age. This ensures a crime- and accident-free population. We rely on you to report any irregularities found in the weave in a timely manner.’
    So that’s what Cormac meant when he laughed at me in the café. Arras isn’t as peaceful as the Stream and officials would have us believe, at least not naturally. Whatever this procedure is that cleans strands, I’m sure it’s what they used in Romen after my disastrous retrieval. Would citizens feel as safe knowing deviant behaviour exists but is merely wiped away from recollection? Or that their children’s threads can be cleaned at any time if a teacher expresses concern? For the first time, I’m glad I’m not a teacher put in that impossible situation. And I understand the gilded cage of false windows and concrete they keep us in. We can never go home with this knowledge.
    The vlip fades from the holographic message to a slideshow of images from across Arras, drawing my attention away from this revelation. I’m glued to the images now, but to my disappointment, the metros on the vlip look the same as Romen – concrete, sky towers with thousands of windows spiking up from the metro centre, and small houses and stores dotting the perimeter in perfect spirals. The plants are the only parts of the landscapes that seem to vary. In Romen, we had grass and looming elm trees, bushes, and carefully preened flowers in yellow and white. But these metros have palm trees, pines, ferns, and tall yellow grass; these are plants I’ve only seen on screens during academy lessons. The differences are minute, but seeing all