by Annie Bellet
He crept forward and Sofia sat back on her heels, two sets of dark brown eyes staring solemnly at her, waiting for her to begin. They were so little, so fragile, so full of life.
“Maa? Why have all the lights gone out?”
Roshni shivered and pushed away the memory, wishing suddenly she hadn’t made the offer. The story was too close to the past, to the last time she’d heard the story. She leaned into Sham’s warmth, letting the smell of cooking food, oiled leather, and horse wash her mind clean. Then, with a deep breath, she told the story quickly, trying not to hear her mother’s voice in the words.
“After Allah had created the world, he wanted to make one perfect thing to put in it. So he made the first horse. He carved it out of stone and set it upon the earth. But the stone was hard, inflexible, and the horse stood fast to the land until the rain wore it down and it faded away. So Allah tried again, this time making it out of clay. The clay was delicate and very beautiful, but it broke easily and crumbled to dust. So Allah thought on his mistakes and then took a part of the West Wind and infused its power into a thing of blood and flesh and bone. Thus we have the Arabian horse, God’s most perfect creation.”
“But what about Sham?” The little girl asked.
“He’s the son of the Wind. Descended from the fastest horses in Africa. The original Sham was sent to France and eventually England, fathering the great racers.” The names of the countries felt strange on her tongue and Roshni saw wistful looks on the other adults’ faces. Countries that didn’t matter anymore, places none of them would ever see. She supposed someone could build a boat, but what would be the point?
“That’s a stupid story,” Sofia said, pursing her cracked lips.
“Enough, Sofia. Dinner is ready.”
Roshni stroked Sham’s soft coat and sighed. Her heart hurt for Alma. Raising children in this world with the Dark only a thin veil of light away, waiting to turn them into shadows on the ground. There were different kinds of brave. She’d stick with staying on the move and carrying a sword.
It felt strange to sleep with the sound of so many bodies breathing. The family crowded together inside the light on blankets in a comfortable pile that only emphasized her own loneliness. She had Sham.
Sunlight glinting off his golden body. Vision blurred from tears. Their shadows lifting away with the dawn sunlight as she screamed and screamed, horrible sounds from a raw throat, trying to catch the last pieces of her mother as they drifted upward and dissolved.
The stale, processed taste of the cheese puffs mingled with the broth as Roshni gagged. She forced her dinner to stay down, wrapping her arms around herself. It was more difficult at night to keep away from that memory. The Dark was out there, pressing against her wards, wanting to consume these children, to take the world away from her again. But it would never take her. No peace in shadow for a lightbringer.
“I won’t leave you,” she whispered to her horse. His sides rose and fell like waves against her back as he breathed deep in his slumber. Holding herself as she curled tight into Sham’s side, Roshni stared at the wall of light for a long time, trying to remember a sky full of stars.
* * *
“You should come with us. Hope Tree has crops, irrigation from the river. It’s a real community, not like those closed in enclaves that will only take a few. There’s always room for a lightbringer.” Angelo lifted the last bundle of blankets up into their makeshift wagon as he spoke.
Roshni wanted to be away, had meant to leave at dawn’s light, but the little family had awakened with the sun. It’d been over a year since she’d last interacted with other humans and she found herself double-checking tack and telling Sofia the names of all the pieces she could remember. They even offered her some of their water, but Roshni had swum a river two days ago and carried enough still.
“I don’t really stay in one place,” she said. “Me and Sham like to move around.” People crowded together attracted the Dark and were easier targets for other humans. She hoped this Hope Tree place wasn’t a lure. “How’d you hear about this place?”
“Another family, going to join relatives there. Said they needed more families, they’ve got work.” Angelo’s face creased as he looked up at her. “They are not,” he paused, searching for the word, “bad. Closed off, like some places.” He waved his hand, trying to convey more.
“And they’ve got other children, even a school starting up perhaps.” Alma helped Miguel up into the wagon and then combed her fingers through her long hair, yanking it into a braid as she talked. Watching her made Roshni’s scalp itch. “I was a teacher. Before.”
“I’ll ride with you,” Roshni said, giving in to them and her own curiosity. “But I don’t think I’ll stay long.” The people she’d encountered usually lived in small groups that were hostile to outsiders or traveled in small bands, scavenging what they could from civilizations remnants. Too many people in one place were hard to protect. Crowds seemed to attract the Dark, wearing out wards more quickly.
The morning passed easily enough. Angelo and Alma traded off on the bike pulling the cart, Alma tying her skirts up around her knees with bits of twine. Sofia begged to ride Sham, but Alma told her if she kept asking she’d end up walking. Roshni smiled at the empty threat, ducking her head to hide her amusement from the little girl.
The sound on an engine brought them all up short. The sun had hit zenith and Angelo assured Roshni that they were nearly to the settlement, though she’d seen nothing but heat waves glimmering on the horizon and no signs of anything but open land and road. Even the tiger seemed to have abandoned his pursuit now that there were more humans present.
Simple combustion engines still ran during the daylight hours as long as no electrical parts were used. People had gotten pretty ingenious about it, but as the years passed and the roads grew worse and worse, Roshni hadn’t seen many. The group approaching them on the dusty, cracked road had three vehicles like overgrown motor bikes cobbled together from spare parts. She wondered where they even found fuel anymore.
“Scavengers? Or a welcoming party?” she asked Angelo. Her hand was already on her sword, the blade drawn and laying against her leg, hidden in Sham’s shadow.
“I do not know. No! Stay in the wagon, Sofia.” He moved up beside Roshni but gave the stallion room. Alma quickly untied her skirts and stood in front of her children, unarmed but with a fierce expression carved into her features.
The motor bikes pulled up to a stop about ten yards down the road and Roshni shivered as she noticed that of six of the men were armed with guns. Her instincts told her to turn Sham and run. A moving target was hard to hit and the vehicles couldn’t follow her off road. She glanced to the side and saw the frightened but determined faces of the little family. No running for them. Roshni bit her lip and adjusted her hold on the katana, indecision digging into her heart.
“Hola! Hello.” Angelo held out his hands, showing he was unarmed.
“Hi.” A tall man with a thick beard dropped down to the ground and walked forward a pace. “Where are you all headed?” He had a smile pasted to his face.
Roshni scanned the men again and saw that two of them, a very old man and a redheaded youth, were gagged with dirty cloths and seemed to be bound where they sat in the crude side-cars. She wished she could nudge Angelo. His eyes were fixed on the leader and she didn’t know if he’d seen that these men had captives. Sham responded to her tension by prancing in place and shaking his head, tugging on the reins.
“Hope Tree,” Angelo said. “We’re joining my brother’s family. They’re expecting us.” Roshni choked back a snort. The implied threat of familial retribution, that someone would come looking for them, was empty in this world.
“One of you a lightbringer then?” The man said. His dark eyes swept over them and his hand twitched toward the gun stuck in his belt.
So that’s it, Roshni thought. The two bound men might be lightbringers. She’d been warned that some took lightbringers for their groups
by force but it had always sounded stupid to her. All the lightbringer would have to do is refuse to ward and wait for the Dark to claim the kidnappers. She wasn’t sure she could be that hard. The Darkest night had taught her that people felt it, felt the Dark burning them away until only a shadow was left. She remembered the screams. She tensed, ready to give Sham the cue to bolt.
“No,” Alma said from behind her. “We just have ward stones.”
Roshni glanced back. Alma stood by the cart, Sofia and Miguel huddled just behind her. Miguel had started to cry, his thin sobs puncturing the tension around the little group. Roshni saw the determination on Alma’s face, the slight nod as she acknowledged Rosni’s glance. So she’d seen the bound men and put it together. Why didn’t she give me up? Roshni reined Sham in. If a woman who had no reason to protect her had lied for her, she wouldn’t be a coward and run. Damnit.
“Okay then,” the man said with another disingenuous smile. “We’ll just be taking that horse and let you go on your way.”
“Like hell you will,” Roshni said without thinking. Angelo cried out a warning and movement from one of the men behind the leader drew her attention to the raised gun.
She threw herself to the side. Stinging heat blazed along her scalp above her ear and she heard the crack of the rifle as her back hit the dry earth. The air flew from her lungs and for a long moment all she could do was try to breathe as buzzing pain took over her brain. She heard Angelo screaming something like “tomalo” and Sham’s nervous whinney. Laughter. Engines starting. Wet heat flowed into her left ear and when she swallowed all she tasted was the metallic bite of blood.
Roshni lay very still until the sound of the engines faded and a cool, damp cloth touched her head. Miguel was still crying and his parents talked above her in hushed tones.
“I’m not dead,” she said, getting the gist of the conversation. But they are, she thought. They’d taken Sham. She sat up and blinked hard to clear her swimming vision.
“You must lay down. You are bleeding a lot.” Alma pressed the wet, now red, rag to her head again.
“Head wounds do that,” Roshni said. She pulled off her blood-soaked bandana and felt along the side of her head. It was a nasty gash, but she’d been lucky. “Could have been worse.” She wrung out the bandana, then rolled it up and retied it despite Alma’s objections, pulling it tight to cover the wound.
Her katana was on the ground near where she’d fallen. Roshni got to her knees and picked it up, guessing that men with guns would see no use in a sword. Idiots. She took a deep breath and stood up.
“Thank you,” she said. “For lying about me. I think they would have taken me, too. Good luck in Hope Tree. I pray those prisoners weren’t the lightbringers from there.”
“You are going after them?” Alma’s tone matched her incredulous expression. “What will you do?”
“They took Sham,” Roshni said with a shrug. “I’m going to kill them.”
“They have guns!” Alma stepped forward, hands out in supplication.
“Have you even killed anyone before?” Angelo asked.
Roshni glanced at the children, now watching her with big golden-brown eyes. There was no point in answering that question here and now.
“Allah protect you,” she muttered as she turned away. The first few running strides hurt, but she found her pace. She did not look back.
* * *
The sun had sunk low in the sky when Roshni finally caught up to the group of men. They’d been pathetically easy to track, sticking to the biggest road heading north. Her lungs burned and dust caked her nose as she bellied along the ground near where the men had set up camp inside a natural canyon. Roshni wished for even a sip of water but shoved the desire away. She had more important things to worry about.
She felt like the tiger must have, though her dirty green shirt and plain leather chaps were more suited to the coloring of the landscape than the tiger’s bold stripes.
The first man was easy to pick off. He practically walked on top of her as he went to take a leak behind the scrub brush she hid in. Roshni came up to her knees quickly. The blade went into his throat and he fell down, bleeding out in warm pulses.
After a moment, when no shouts of alarm went up, Roshni crawled closer to the camp. There were more men now. The group of two prisoners and six bandits had been joined by two other bandits. One down, seven left.
The second man went out to look for the first, calling a name into the growing shadows. Roshni rose like a shadow herself from behind him and took him down. Six left.
The remaining men milled around, talking in voices too low for her to make out. They kept casting worried glances at the two prisoners and were arguing about something judging from the sharp gestures and occasional raised voice. Sham was tied by his reins to one of the motor bikes. His golden head lifted and he scented the air, ears flicking around nervously. Roshni wondered if he could smell the blood on her.
She slipped along the edge of the canyon and crouched low behind the motor bikes, hiding herself in the shadow. The sun dropped lower, the sky turning orange and pink. The Dark was coming. She could wait, bide her time until they slept. But they’d find the bodies soon; get nervous, aware someone was hunting them.
With a deep breath and a whispered prayer for Allah to guide her blade, Roshni darted out of hiding. She took the first man high in the chest, turning and cutting into the next one lower, across his belly. Shouts and screams greeted her. A man with a red beard took a wild swing at her with a rifle. She ducked it and stepped in close, stomping his knee. Her blade cut into the back of his neck as he went down.
A younger man, his eyes wild with fear, came at her with a tire iron. She slashed across his arms, then moved in, jamming the blade up into the soft flesh under his chin. The second to last man grabbed her from behind in a bear hug, yelling at the last one to grab a gun. Roshni slammed her head back into his face and twisted as his arms loosened. She kicked him away from her and thrust her sword down into his chest with both hands.
The leader, the man who’d taken Sham away, was the last one standing. Roshni dragged her blade out of the corpse and spun but he had a gun up and leveled at her chest.
“Fucking bitch.”
She lunged, full out, but knew even as she did that it was too far to reach. I tried, Sham.
A black and orange wave slammed into the man from the side. Roshni watched, frozen in her lunge, as the tiger lifted a huge paw and batted the man’s head into the rock with a sharp, wet smack. The tiger then sat on the body, watching her with orange eyes, offering no further aggression.
Roshni backed away, lowering her bloody sword.
“Thank you,” said a tentative voice behind her. During the fight, which had only lasted a minute, the lightbringers had been working to free themselves. The younger one was already half out of his ropes and had pulled the gag off the older man.
“I didn’t do it for you,” she said, her eyes still on the tiger as she bent and used her blade to cut the old man free.
The tiger stepped off the dead man and walked toward Roshni.
“Um,” the young redhead started to get up. But she waved him back.
She extended her hand to the tiger and he butted her with his head, his fur thick and surprisingly coarse for how soft it looked. She felt the light within him, a smoldering coal, not the usual fluttering presence she found in human lightbringers. It confirmed her theory and she smiled, wanting to laugh but knowing it would probably sound like hysteria at this point.
“It’s okay. He’s a lightbringer, too. I think he understands.”
“How can you tell?” the old man asked, leaning heavily on the redhead as he stood.
“By touching him. Can’t you feel other lightbringers when you touch them?”
They both shook their heads, looking at her like she was some kind of angel, or maybe an alien. Roshni shrugged. “Must just be me then” she muttered.
The old man shook himself and looked at th
e setting sun. “We have to make one of these bikes work. There’s still time to get back if you hurry, Jamie.”
“I can’t leave you here,” the one she assumed was Jamie said with a nervous glance at Roshni and the tiger.
“They’ll die without one of us,” the old man said.
“They fired into the crowd, papa. For all we know, everyone is dying already.”
Hope Tree. Roshni wondered if Alma and her family had arrived there yet. “Is it far?” she asked.
“I don’t think so, not too far. Not with a vehicle. South of here, down that big road.” The old man gripped Jamie’s arm and shoved him toward the motor bikes.
“How many people?” she asked.
“Two hundred, maybe less after today.” Sorrow cracked the old man’s voice and bowed his head.
Two hundred. No one gathered in such numbers. Two hundred people about to go screaming into the Dark. The tiger seemed to sense her thoughts and turned, bounding away into the growing shadows.
Roshni wiped her sword on her leg and strode to Sham, shoving the still dirty blade into its sheath. She untied his reins and jumped up onto his back. Alma had lied to protect her, a stranger. Lied to protect the light.
“Come, help him up,” she motioned to the old man. “Take a bike,” she told Jamie as he hesitated and then helped the man mount up behind her. “It’ll die after Dark, but get as far as you can and come the rest on foot. You’ll be safe enough.”
The old man’s arms were thin as sticks and wrapped like iron bands around her waist. She urged Sham forward, out of the canyon and set him in a gallop, heading south. The light within her passenger was dim, faded, fluttering around like lightning bug caught in a jar. She felt the tiger nearby, a hot coal out beyond the road.
“And so Agba, Sham, and Grimalkin the cat were exiled in shame to live in the Fen.”
Roshni’s mother’s voice echoed in her mind, telling her favorite story. I guess that makes you Grimalkin she thought to the tiger, smiling even as she bent lower over Sham’s neck, urging him to go faster. His stride flattened out and the broken ground streamed by beneath them, gold and green and black.