I wanted to get moving again and shake off these poisonous thoughts with a good stride. I sensed Harry’s impatience with Candace and her sulky show of defiance, as he looked at her pacing back and forth, and then at me.
“It serves no purpose to be standing around like this,” he said. I got his drift. Her rudeness had gone on long enough.
“Candace?” I called out. “Are you coming?”
I heard her make one of her harrumphing noises, as she shrugged her shoulders. I had actually decided to go on without her, when she approached us, frowning. She said nothing, only glared at each of us in turn, but longest at Harry. Then she officiously took the lead, and we set off in a queue, with me at the rear, watching and listening, and with my right hand always close to the handle of my knife. I wondered again if my decision to leave my machete behind in the City had been the right one.
We walked that day until just after sunset; then settled for the night in a small clearing about ten paces from the main path. I made sure I positioned the campfire so that whoever was on night watch could see in every direction, with no trees blocking their line of vision. Candace took the first watch and Harry and Chandelier together did the second. When I assumed my turn at midnight, the forest was absolutely still. All I could hear was someone discreetly breaking wind (Candace, I thought), the occasional sharp crack of a joint as Harry flexed his elbow or his knee and sometimes — so soft it might be mistaken for the hum of insects busy underground — the sound of the boy moaning in his sleep. I wished with all my heart that I could dispel the dream-images that drew this pitiful sound from him. Yet I was relieved as well to hear he had a voice.
These were the sounds my human companions made in the darkness that enclosed us and I found a strength and contentment in the fact we were together (yes, even Candace), travelling in the same direction. Four of us. Four square. I wondered if we might meet others who would want to join us, not imagining then just how soon that would come to pass.
Two days later, when I was out on a morning foraging expedition, I saw a flash and blur of colour ahead of me through the trees. It was as if the arc of a rainbow was spinning on its axis. I was mesmerized, and a little frightened, as one always is at the apparition of some strange new form of beauty. I held my breath and approached as silently as I could, walking on the balls of my feet. Then I spied a young woman whirling with her arms out-flung in the centre of a ring of fleshy, brown-flanged mushrooms. The rainbow effect was produced by the dazzling hues she wore: translucent tangerine leggings, purple slip-on shoes, a tiny frilled skirt in an abstract pattern of cornflower blue and primrose yellow barely long enough to cover her bottom, and a leotard top of the brightest emerald green I have ever seen. Her hair was fair and fine and the morning light caught in her silken curls as she twirled and hummed to herself. “E-pon-a” is what she seemed to sing. “E-pon-a.” The same word, or perhaps just nonsense syllables, over and over.
It was that repetition, and the whirling round and round, that made me fear at first she might be mad. I was concerned too for her safety if she was travelling alone. She had the prettiness and slender grace that make one think automatically of fairy lands, and there are many men, and some women, who cannot see such delicacy without the urge to trample it.
“Hello,” I called out.
She froze on the spot as if she was playing the old childhood game of statues. She stood balanced on her left foot, with her right just off the ground. She kept her outstretched arms absolutely still, right down to her fingertips. Then she turned her small head to look at me and in an instant was at my side with her hand extended in greeting.
“Hello,” she said. “My name is Bird Girl.” I barely had time to tell her mine when she asked abruptly: “Have you ever read a poem called ‘A Rabbit as King of the Ghosts’?”
She did not wait for my reply but rattled on. “Part of it goes: ‘And to feel the light is a rabbit-light / In which everything is meant for you / And nothing need be explained.’
“Do you think,” she went on, speaking extremely rapidly, “that this is rabbit-light?” And she thrust her hand into the gold-white shaft that fell aslant through the treetops. I smiled at her. From the look she sent me in return, I saw that she was not only quite sane, but also astute.
“I get carried away sometimes,” she said, “with thinking about the things I love best.”
I told her this also happened to me, especially when I was working with my clay.
“I thought you looked like an artist,” she said, which made me warm to her all the more.
She told me then she was travelling alone, searching for her mother who had disappeared from the warehouse in the City where she had lived.
“Have you heard of a women’s vigilante group called The New Amazons?” she asked. “They ride motorcycles and do raids on pimps and pornographers. My mother is The New Amazons’ leader,” she said proudly. “Her name is Epona.”
So I understood then it was her mother’s name she was humming when I first saw her twirling about.
“And do you believe your mother is headed north?” I asked.
“I think it’s likely,” she replied. “My mother and her gang have made some very powerful enemies — people who are close to the EYE. She had found out some secrets about links between the innovative industries and the brothels and human trafficking.
“And then too . . . ” she hesitated. “She maybe felt she was getting too old to go on waging war against evil, ugly men.
“They say,” and her face was ecstatic as she spoke, “that one is free in the North. I mean, freer to be the person we really are. We won’t always have to be fighting thought-control because there won’t be any EYE. And the air won’t be poisoned.
“They’d started to put chemicals in the air that made you feel stupid and confused, don’t you think? And all those corpses everywhere, just left . . . Ugh!”
She made a little leap on the spot and shook herself.
‘I think that in the North,” she announced solemnly, “there will be no end to the rabbit-light.”
I realized then she was one of those people of such abundant quick energy it must always be spilling over, in dart-like action or glittering chatter. Yet unlike Candace, Bird Girl also knew how to be silent. On instinct I liked her immensely.
Her mood seemed to switch abruptly and she looked troubled. “You haven’t seen a man with one real eye and one made of marble, have you? I mean here, in the forest? Or a man with a misshapen nose? You can see it’s been slit right down the middle and then healed badly. Have you seen either of them? You would tell me, wouldn’t you?”
She had become most agitated and was hopping from foot to foot, while wringing her hands.
“No,” I told her. “I’ve seen no one like that. No one at all. Are they your enemies?” I did not know how else to put it.
“The man with the marble eye is my enemy. The man with the nose is my mother’s. But I suppose you could say he is also mine, since I am my mother’s daughter and he would consider me a quite suitable object of vengeance, I think.
“Let’s talk about something else altogether,” she urged me.
“I cannot stand the shadows those two throw upon my mind if I think of them too long.
She twirled round then, and fluttered her arms. “Have you ever held a real book, one kept safe from the burnings?” she asked when she came to a stop again.
“Yes.” But before I could say anything more, she grasped my hand and said rapturously “Isn’t it wonderful? I mean, there’s nothing better on earth than to hold and read a real paper book. Don’t you think?”
She jumped backward again and whirled about, then asked: “Have you heard about the Cyberspace Library?”
I nodded, although I have always thought this legend of a vast invisible net holding all knowledge was likely mere fantasy — something people dreamed up after the book burnings.
“They say it contained much untruth, as well as wisdom,” she said. “
And that you needed a good internal map to negotiate its windings or you might find yourself unawares in a horrid trap and never get free again. But the most wonderful thing about the vast net was that it contained whole books. You could sit and read every word upon a little screen.”
Her round blue eyes widened even more. “What do you think happened to all those cyber-books after the viruses destroyed the net? Do you think they’re still out there somewhere?” She gestured vaguely at the sky. “Out there as spectral books or ghost-books?
“But I’d rather hold a real, three-dimensional book, wouldn’t you, and know the joy of touching and turning the pages and looking off into the middle distance as you picture what you just read? Real books are all so amazingly idiosyncratic. They even have their own smells.”
Here she stopped, as if another kind of thought had struck her dumb. She took three quick steps to stand close by me and clasped my right hand tightly between her palms. How cold her hands were.
“You would tell me if you’d seen either of those men, wouldn’t you? I mean, you wouldn’t hold back information because you didn’t want to frighten me?”
“I would always tell you the truth,” I declared. “I’ve seen no one like the two you describe.”
“Would you like to travel with us?” I asked her. I very much wanted her to have whatever protection we could offer.
“We are four so far.” And I told her briefly about Candace, Chandelier, and Harry.
She frowned at my description of Candace even though I tried hard to keep any hint of distaste out of my voice.
“She sounds like a know-it-all,” she remarked.
I laughed.
In fact, Candace began clucking and fussing over Bird Girl as soon as she saw her. Chandelier watched her warily, as he did everyone with the exception of Harry. But Bird Girl and Harry hit it off immediately and were soon making silly faces at each other behind Candace’s back as she went on at length about why her great gifts as a social facilitator made her eminently suited for founding a community where fellowship would flow naturally . . . I had heard it all many times before.
Bird Girl’s arrival meant that each of our turns at the night watch was considerably shorter, but I still took the last because I was accustomed to being wide awake in those last few hours before dawn.
“Five,” I thought to myself that night and the wonder of it for me was how vastly different we were one from another. We had come across each other by chance and the simple crossing of paths. And chance would likewise rule how our journey went and what other human kind, well-intentioned or not, we met on our way north.
He did not appear that night, or the next — the one who was to become our sixth member, and the most mysterious of us all. It was on the third night after Bird Girl’s arrival, deep into my watch, that I heard something approach behind me. I could hear no claws; nor could I pick up any scent of animal fur or flesh. I assumed that whatever approached was human and I prayed that he or she came alone. One of my worst fears was that we would one day or night be swarmed by many more assailants than three women, an old man, and an adolescent boy could fight off.
I already had my knife drawn when he knelt beside me. I could smell burlap, rubber, and a touch of fever. I felt the heat of his breath in my ear as he said: “I wish to serve you and your friends.”
Of course the question why immediately sprang to my mind, and almost to my lips. He answered my unspoken query by walking around to the other side of the fire so that he was opposite me and illuminated by the flames. I knew a monk’s garb when I saw it and I guessed as well, that his gown with its capacious hood, which he wore up obscuring his face, was likely purchased from a costume shop.
“I am doing penance,” he said. The gravity of his tone conveyed this was no jest.
“I have shadowed your group for two days. You will benefit from having a strong man to watch out for you.”
“Do we have a choice?” I asked him, and immediately regretted it lest he think me ungrateful. I could certainly appreciate the advantages of having such a man accompany us. He was exceptionally tall and from the sinews in his naked feet and hands (the only parts of him that were visible) I could see he was probably as strong as he claimed.
“Should you all accept my offer of service,” he said most courteously, “there is only one proviso. And that is that I will keep my face hidden from you. To be faceless,” he added, “is a part of my penance.”
This struck me as somewhat odd, but who among us is not at least a little odd these days? In a time so fractured and blighted, it would be strange indeed to be normal.
I thanked him and told him I would introduce him to the others in the morning so that we could make our decision together.
“Prepare them well,” he whispered. “I do not want to frighten the young ones.” I gathered he meant Chandelier and Bird Girl but my chief concern was — as ever — Candace.
“Are you insane?” she exploded at me when I described my night-time visitor and his offer. “Don’t you know how dangerous these people are who dress up? There’s usually some severe mental slippage. They just flip and start swinging their axes, chopping off heads . . . ”
“He doesn’t have an axe,” I said.
“You don’t know that,” she countered in her most patronizing tone. “He might have a whole box full of weapons you didn’t see.”
I didn’t say anything, but I had to admit she had a point. Other than my intuitive trust of his voice and his intentions I was largely ignorant of both the man and his weaponry. As a result I was probably more anxious than any of the others as we waited for him. Candace, who sat cross-legged on the ground, had set her long serrated kitchen knife in full view in front of her. I had not even tried to dissuade her from this. Bird Girl paced and did a series of high kicks. Chandelier kept looking anxiously at Harry who would smile and nod reassuringly at him. In fact Harry was the only one of us who appeared totally at ease. I kept asking myself if I was deluded in putting my trust in a man without a face.
Despite my best efforts to prepare her, Candace screamed when he did appear. I suppose I readily associated the monk’s garment with images I had seen of Saint Francis cradling a dove in his hands. What Candace saw, I presume, was something loathsome and unholy.
He made his case to the others in almost exactly the same words he had put it to me.
“What is your name?” asked Harry.
“You can call me the Outpacer,” he said, “for I would always be a few steps behind you or ahead of you, or to your right or left. I will maintain a kind of invisible cordon around you.”
Candace gave him one of her frostiest glares. “Speaking personally,” she said, “I find your disguise really suspicious. What exactly are you hiding?”
“The hood is part of my penance.”
“So you say. But how do we know we can trust you?” she challenged him. “What guarantee can you give us that your intentions are honourable?”
“None,” he answered her. “I can only give you my word.”
Candace heaved one of her overly dramatic sighs. “I’ll be frank. I decline your offer. I can’t accept the word of someone whose face I cannot see.”
I looked at the others. Chandelier was staring up at Harry as if seeking to read his thoughts on his face.
“I think we each need to mull your offer over,” Harry said. “And then discuss it as a group.”
“I agree,” said Bird Girl. “We’ll have a parley. Isn’t that a nice word?”
“Harrumph,” said Candace.
“Can we speak with you again tomorrow?” I asked him.
The hooded man bowed his head. “I will be nearby,” he said, “should you have need of me.” He left us as silently as he had entered our midst, and we all began to make ready for the day’s trek.
“I liked the sound of his voice,” Bird Girl announced. “I really think he means what he says. He wants to help us.”
Candace simply shook her head in disbeli
ef. But as I was stamping out the last of the embers of our fire, she came close and whispered harshly in my ear. “You have some wonderful qualities, Lucia. But you are being dangerously naïve about this madman in his ridiculous costume. Naïve.” She repeated the word with an emphasis that made her exasperation with me abundantly clear.
“Can we not just consider his offer as we walk, and then discuss it this evening?” It took me all my effort to put this question to her civilly.
“There’s nothing to discuss,” she snapped at me. “Accepting his offer would be madness. He’ll murder us, one by one. And heaven knows what else.”
We all set off, and Candace aggressively took the lead. She assumed an uncharacteristic quick-march step, with her shoulders thrown well back. Every so often she would glance behind as if we were a row of ducklings in her charge. How tedious I found her domineering ways. I decided to fall in behind Chandelier and Harry and be the last in the line so as to avoid as much of Candace’s posturing as I could.
It was shortly after I moved to the end of the line that I caught a scent of rancid meat. At first, I thought it must be the carcass of an animal rotting on the forest floor. Then I saw a flash of sliver and black bearing down on Candace from the left out of the trees. She screamed as a dog with ragged fur and yellow eyes, sent her sprawling. I drew my knife out so quickly I nicked my palm, and pushing past Harry and Chandelier, ran to her aid. My intention was to plunge my blade into the dog before it could harm her badly.
At that moment, a man’s voice roared and there was a flash of fire. I looked on, the blood thundering in my ears, as the Outpacer thrust a blazing brand into the dog’s jaw. The animal howled in such pain I could not help but pity it, especially when I saw the mange that had stripped the fur from its flanks and left exposed its sore, pink, swollen skin. The dog slumped on its side, stunned and whimpering. I foolishly yearned for it to run off, but understood why the Outpacer felt he had to come up behind the animal and slit its throat. I turned my face away from the wound and the gushing blood, but not before I saw that the dog’s eyes were not in fact yellow, but ringed with a purulent matter.
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