by Chloe Garner
Taims were long-haired, woolly animals that didn’t seem to respect fences any more than they did anything else. The only thing that appeared to keep them in was the fact that the food was only on one side, and that they’d already proven often enough that the fence was a pointless addition to their living space.
Palk liked the taims. Even when one that had gotten loose, a big, heavy-set male with curling horns and a temper, tried to take him out at the waist. Taims head-butted each other as a matter of social greeting.
Bobnot were big, dumb, and meaty, the stupid version of kalt. They wandered where they wanted to, seemingly keeping to a herd structure more by coincidence than by any active force of will. They rubbed on fences and each other, destroying most everything around them by degrees. Palk imagined that the fences that kept them confined in close spaces had to be repaired weekly, if not more often. The biggest ones, the breeding males, had to be kept individually with metal-bar fences rather than wire ones, and even those had bulging bars and joints that only just looked like they were holding on.
There was a herd of kalt, blue and green and purple and gray, grazing and picking reasonably good-natured fights with each other. Palk spent a while watching them, too. Someone had let Biscuit out with the rest of the kalt, and he was definitely a defining personality in the herd.
Eventually, he went back to the bunk house and lay down on the bed, just appreciating having something soft to lay on again. His body ached everywhere, more in some places than in others, and he realized that he might have a hard time getting back up, now that he was down.
The sound of men talking outside woke him from a drowse, and he got up to find the sun going down. He forced himself not to crash back into the bed, instead walking across to the main house, where the central room was crowded with animal handlers and the smell of animals. Starn was sitting on a chair, coolly ignoring everyone. She saw him and smiled.
“You passed out, didn’t you?” she asked.
“Just a little bit,” he answered. “I’m starving, though.”
“They all are, all the time,” she said. “This way.”
He followed her through the door that Rosie always came and went through, into a long room with long, simple tables set up in it.
“Food’s down there,” Starn said, pointing. “Line starts here.”
He went to stand with her, watching as the crowd of men slowly filed past the huge cooking dishes full of meat, stew, vegetables, breads. Rosie was around, but busy. She didn’t notice them.
Everything smelled mouthwatering, but Palk suspected he could have boiled his own shoes and eaten them quite happily at that moment. He took his heaping plate back to one of the benches and sat down next to Starn, who had a much more modest portion.
“You’re the wanderers,” someone said.
“That’s right, man, but he doesn’t want to talk to you about it,” Tannish said, throwing himself onto the bench next to Palk.
Palk grinned.
“Hey.”
“Heard you were out riding fences the last few days,” Tannish said. “Told you Galp would put you on night duty, didn’t I?”
“Five nights,” Palk said agreeably. “That’s how far off you were.”
“I’ve rode fences a few times,” Tannish said. “Bored out of my mind, man, the whole time.”
“It’s not exciting work,” Palk said. “Learned a lot, though.”
“Yeah, yeah. Dirt. More dirt. Some grass. A tree. More dirt.”
Palk heard Starn laugh.
“Saw a few bodies out there.”
“Really? Men?”
“No,” Palk said. “Two stilth, a taim, and a bobnot.”
Tannish sat back again.
“Not funny, man. I thought you’d got to see some real action.”
“Not this trip,” Palk said. “Maybe next time.”
“But your girl, man. She got a job.”
“What else was she going to do?” Palk asked. “Quilt?”
Tannish looked confused, then shook his head.
“But she’s working, man.”
“She’s smart,” Palk said. “Elli’s lucky to have her.”
“I don’t need you to stand up for me,” Starn said quietly enough that only Palk could hear her.
He glanced at her, not sure what he’d done wrong. She didn’t give him any more signal than that. He returned his attention to Tannish.
“What have you been doing?” he asked.
“Oh, you know, you know, this and that,” he said. “Running errands for Gamm, counting things, doing math. I hate math.”
“I think I’m not bad at math,” Palk said.
“Should have my job,” Tannish said. “I much prefer being out pushing around the stilth.”
“What is it you do, exactly?” Palk asked.
“I’m Gamm’s assistant,” Tannish said, ducking his head a bit. “I do whatever the man tells me to do.”
“That’s not a bad job,” Palk said.
“Pays good,” Tannish said. “And all of my brothers get jobs here, no problem, man, but…”
“What would you be doing, if you could do anything?” Starn asked.
Tannish looked up and down the table, drawing more attention than he had had to begin with. He glared at the couple of men who looked over at him, and they went back to what they’d been doing.
“I was good at tarnall as a kid, you know?” he asked. Palk shook his head. “Course not, man,” Tannish said. “Wanderers. I forgot. It’s a sport. All the kids play it. I thought I could play in a league. Maybe get big, you know? But my uncle was here, and this is how you get a job, when you’re a Drint from nowhere, so I came. Haven’t played since I left home.”
“Do many people… make it, playing…?”
“Tarnall,” Tannish said. “No. It’s a kid dream, man. Just wish, you know.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” Starn said.
“You got no clue what your dreams are, do you?” Tannish asked. Palk shook his head.
“Makes it hard to be disappointed.”
Tannish grinned and clapped him on the back.
“Just right, man. Just right.”
Palk grinned at him and returned to his meal. Starn was watching the men around them, making many of them uncomfortable.
“She’s supposed to be with the women, man,” Tannish muttered to him a few minutes later. “They all sit over there.”
It only took Palk a moment to find them, dressed differently and speaking faster, over at a table against the wall.
“I’m not going to tell her that,” Palk answered Tannish, “and I recommend you don’t either.”
“Smart man,” Starn said very quietly into her meal. He tried not to smile.
*********
The days were hot and dry, but the nights got cold. Under the bright white of the first moon, Palk and Starn made their way back toward the bunk, he walking with his arm across her shoulders comfortably.
“This is going to work,” he said.
“Of course it is,” she answered. “Didn’t I tell you that?”
“Yeah, but I only just now believe you,” he said. “How much are they paying you?”
“A whole lot more than they are you,” she answered.
“I bet.”
“I had negotiating leverage, in all fairness,” she said. “We already have room and board because of you, and I could walk away from the job if I wanted to.”
He appreciated her saying it.
“They run this place pretty tight,” Palk said, “but I think there are things they could be doing better.”
“We know a lot, Palk,” she said, leaning her head against his shoulder.
“What do you mean?” he asked. She shrugged.
“I mean, we may not be able to remember it, but we’ve seen and done things that no one here has even thought about. It’s a big advantage, and I suspect it’s why Gamm hired you. He knows it. He knows a lot of wanderers never use it, but you sh
owed up and acted like the person you are, even without the memories, and he could tell.”
“I don’t think I’m following you.”
“I think there’s a trick to it,” she said. “Knowing things you can’t remember. I’m getting better at it, and I’ve only been trying for a couple of weeks, now. At some point, I’m going to get really good at it, and they’re going to want me here, when I do, because everything’s going to change.”
“Like guns,” Palk said. “The one that he showed me was huge and…” He struggled. Struggled hard.
“You’re doing it wrong,” she said. “Just speak. Say what you know. Don’t try to remember.”
“It’s outdated,” he said. It was the word he’d wanted to use, but it didn’t make sense. She nodded.
“It is. It’s a relic.”
“It should be smaller, made of other things and work differently,” Palk said. “I just don’t know what any of those things are.”
“That’s what I’m getting better at,” Starn said. “Knowing the positives, not just the negatives. It’s easy to see the negatives, but to see what should be there instead, when you can’t remember it… It’s hard. It’s like a puzzle in my head, and I’m winning.”
“You’re scary,” Palk said. “They just hired me to ride around and be menacing.”
“No, they just pay you to ride around and be menacing. You get good at it, and anything else, you can ask for more money. Because if you get special at anything, the other ranchers will hire you away. It’s the secret they don’t talk about. There’s this big deal that the ranches make about who they fire. Some of them fire a lot of people, some not so many, but everyone talks about it. All the time. Everyone knows what it takes to not get fired. If they could see what the really talented boys are making, and how many times they’ve hopped from ranch to ranch to get those promotions… That’s all anyone would talk about, and wages would explode, except at the very bottom end.”
“You’ve seen what everyone gets paid?” Palk asked. She looked up at him with disdain.
“Well, Elli doesn’t know I’ve seen it,” she said, “but there’s an awful lot Elli doesn’t know that I do, so it’s hardly that novel.”
He shook his head, not sure what to say to that.
She laughed.
“I don’t always follow the rules, when I think they’re dumb. Does that bother you?”
“Those are private information,” he said. “I wouldn’t want Tannish’s wife to know what I made.”
“Tannish knows what you make, and he’s never going to get married,” she said.
“Neither of those is the point,” Palk said. She laughed.
“Sorry. It wasn’t on purpose. He had it out on his desk and I saw it. I have a hard time not reading things I see.”
“Speaking of,” he said. “I need you to teach me to read.”
She nodded.
“Won’t do for my husband to be illiterate,” she said. Again, the prickle on the back of his neck when she said husband. She pointed at the marking on the side of the bunk they were passing.
“Three,” she said. “There’s nothing about it but to memorize it. No tricks, no counting. But that’s three.”
He looked at it, and felt nothing imprint itself on his brain. It was just a shape, and one he would forget as soon as he looked away. He shrugged.
“Maybe you can write them down, so I can stare at them for a while.”
She sighed.
“Yeah. It’s going to be a long curve, if you can’t just look at that and identify it.”
“You can?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
He pulled her in a little closer.
“I don’t understand you at all.”
“That makes me happy,” she answered. He grinned.
They got back to their bunk and he sat down on the bed to take off his shoes while she turned up the lamp.
“Have you thought about those?” she asked.
“What?” he asked. She pushed his shoe with her toe.
“Those. They aren’t from around here. I haven’t seen anyone wearing anything like them.”
He looked at the shoes, and saw them for the first time.
“My clothes, too,” he said, pulling his shirt off over his head. She nodded.
“There’s a tag in it. One that says a lot of things about how to take care of it. I don’t remember any of those things, but I don’t see any of them being particularly relevant, here.”
“We must have come from a long way away,” he said, looking at the tag and finding, with massive relief, that he could read it. Every word on it.
“Do you know what polyester is?” he asked.
“It’s a chemical,” she answered. “But I don’t know what that is, either.”
“A chemical is the stuff stuff is made off,” Palk said, shaking his head. “But that’s useless.”
“That’s the positive knowledge rather than the negative,” she said. “We’ll get there. But look at the shoes. Here.”
She took her own shoe off and put it in his hand, sitting down on the bed next to him and picking up one of his shoes.
“Look at how they’re made,” she said. “The boys around here are all in leather of varying degrees of hardness. In King’s Port, we saw people wearing cloth shoes, but nothing like this.”
“What’s the sole made out of?” he asked, turning his shoe over. It was hard, with slick spots on the bottom where he’d worn off the original finish. She shook her head.
“Don’t know. Mine is weirder.”
Her shoe had a soft layer between a malleable sole and a not-quite-fabric piece under her foot. He didn’t know what any of them were.
“Where are we from?” he asked. She shook her head.
“I’m trying to get a picture of what the land around here looks like, the really big picture of it, but no one seems to care very much, outside of their immediate piece of it.”
“Galp has a map of the district on the wall in his office.”
“So does Elli,” she said. “Not anywhere near big enough.”
He shook his head.
“Somewhere, a long way away, our people are making things they’ve never even heard of, here.”
She nodded.
“It would help us figure out where we came from, if we could get a map.”
“I’ll keep my eyes open,” he said. She nodded.
“I think that the train station may be the best place to check next. We need to get you better clothing for being out on a kalt all day.”
He agreed to that.
“Boots, for one,” he said.
“And a hat that doesn’t stink like a dead man,” she agreed. “Clothes for both of us. Some basic care stuff, like a brush for me.”
“Do we have the money?” he asked.
“Time is going to be harder to find than money,” she said. “But we’ll make it work. I’m going to ask Elli for a raise in a few weeks, once I’ve done a few things he’s pretty sure he couldn’t manage, and you need to impress Galp enough to get a really big raise from him. They’re basically paying you in food, right now.”
“I do eat a lot,” he said.
“Exactly,” she said. She leaned against him, looking out through the slit of the window that wasn’t covered. “We can stay here as long as we want to. If we’re happy and we’re doing what we want to do, there’s nothing wrong with it. But the day we decide we want to leave, I want to be ready.”
“I like that,” he said. She nodded, the skin of her cheek warm against his shoulder.
“I missed you,” she said. “I find plenty to do to keep myself occupied, but there’s a difference between occupied and lonely.”
“I missed you, too,” he said. “I think Grindoth is worse than alone.”
He felt her smile.
“There are a lot of men here who aren’t worth the air they breathe, but they do the job. Tiedmont is loyal to anyone who is loyal to him.”
“You met him?” Palk asked.
“Once, after you left,” she said. “He still rubs me the wrong way, but it’s not on purpose.”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t want to stay here forever,” she said. “Not if you have to keep going out for days and weeks at a time.”
“Yeah. I don’t think I do, either.”
She nodded, and he kissed her forehead.
“It’s just for a while.”
She kissed his chin, her hand coming up to find the place where his throat met his jaw. His pulse spiked at the touch and he swallowed. She laughed, kissing the underside of his jaw.
“Do I make you nervous?” she asked.
“All the time,” he said. Her hand drifted down, skimming the cool skin of his chest, down his stomach, and finally wrapping her fingers around his side. He pushed her down onto the bed, finding her mouth with his, her hair tangling in his fingers.
It was like drowning.
*********
Days went.
Starn frightened more than just Palk with her astonishing wit and ability to see though the things that were going on, enough that Tannish let slip on more than on occasion that some of the professional ranch staff were intimidated by her.
For his part, Palk learned to ride, learned to handle animals, and started practicing with a gun. Galp sent him to the Dandys to negotiate a livestock return and active watching on the front fenceline, and that went well. The Dandys were in fact good folk who listened to him and were willing to see the reason to what Galp was suggesting. It didn’t get set up in a single conversation, but there was progress.
There would be a hunt for plinth, because the bobnot corpse that Palk and Grindoth had found was not the only one to turn up in that area of the ranch, and Galp started leaning on Palk to organize it, not only because the burly men who worked with Galp were about as adverse to direct leadership as Palk could imagine. Galp was chasing down more missing livestock on the Plangow side of the range, and the rumors said that he suspected the Plangows themselves.
“They haven’t been doing so good,” Galp said one day, in surprisingly good spirits. “You never know what people are going to do when they see it coming.”