by Boyett, J.
There had been a skittering sound before. She was waiting for it to recur. It would be easy to hear. The People were hardly talking.
Though they needed her for now, she didn’t trust them. She had been tempted to sneak away from them, to just go sit in the darkness alone and die, but she worried what would become of Quarry. So she stayed, biding her time, maintaining enough control over them with her made-up visions to keep herself alive and Quarry safe, hoping she would figure out a next step eventually. Although the longer they stayed in this cursed cave, with its darkness and its heavy black stone sky, the more she had trouble remembering there was a world outside at all, the more it seemed they would all just rot here.
Other than Quarry, Hoof was the only one whom she might have put faith in. But he was gone. There had been some commotion—Hoof had said something, Gash-Eye didn’t know what, and Spear had shrieked that he was a coward and chased him from the fire. Whatever he’d said, Gash-Eye was sure it hadn’t been cowardly, just sensible. Everyone had expected Hoof to wait till Spear calmed down and then head back again, without so much as holding a grudge. But he hadn’t come back. The chances of him willingly remaining absent for so long, far from any fire, were low. Probably something had gotten him.
The noise came again. A shadow scurried past against a background of paler shadow. Gash-Eye grabbed the thing by the back half and whipped it against the stone. It twitched. Gash-Eye picked up the rock she had ready and brought it smashing down on the thing’s head, which she could only just make out. She wanted to be sure it was dead before she picked it up. It was small, but not too small, and apart from that and the fact that it had hair, Gash-Eye had no idea what sort of animal it was.
Except that it also had a long, hairless tail, as she discovered from feeling around. It was some kind of big rodent. She picked it up by the tail and brought it back to the fire. The People had heard the noise and were looking back in her direction, glum and expectant. The small sounds of blood and brain dripping on stone could be heard as she drew near.
All eyes were on the beast as soon as it came into view, but no one molested her as she carried it to Stick. She held the meager, mangy creature a bit higher as she presented it to him, and said, “Accept this meat, Stick, on behalf of the People.”
Stick looked at the dirty hairy rodent without enthusiasm. But he said, “Thank you, Petal-Drift. The People live by your service, while we remain trapped in this darkness.” He accepted the animal from her, set it on the ground between himself and the fire and simply stared at it, as if wondering how he would ever be able to divide the raggedy thing among all these people, few though they were.
In reply to his unvoiced worry, Gash-Eye said, “I know this will not serve the needs of the People. I will continue to gather what creatures I can find, till there is enough for all. Meanwhile, divide this among whoever you find fit to be the first to eat.”
Stick nodded, without looking up at her. “This I shall do, Petal-Drift,” he said.
Each time he called her “Petal-Drift,” his voice stuck a bit. This was in part because of his long habit of calling her the traditional name, “Gash-Eye.” Also, she was sure, it was because the name “Petal-Drift” suggested something beautiful, and to Stick and the rest of his kind a full-blooded Big-Brow could never be anything but ugly.
Not even Gash-Eye could think of herself by that name, Petal-Drift. She tried, but she had been Gash-Eye for too long. But she was glad she could make the proud People call her by the name she’d had before ever meeting them.
Letting her eye rove over the People first, taking in how they cowered closer to that small center of illumination, helpless against the dark, she turned and started back to the darkness at the edge of the chamber.
Behind her she heard movement, footsteps advancing on her swiftly. She turned to face whoever it was, and saw Spear there; he tossed the rodent into her face and slapped her across the cheek, hard as he could.
“Take back your trash! Rat might be suitable food for Big-Brows. But we humans eat game! We’re hunters, not jackals!”
He paused, glaring into her face, breathing hard in his fury, waiting to see what she would do.
She regarded him with almost a stupid expression. Finally she said, “Very well, Spear.” She crouched down, picked up the rodent, stood again. Spear watched her closely, hatefully. She pitched her voice over Spear’s shoulder and said, “Stick. Stick, and all you People. Spear says the food I bring is fit only for Big-Brows and not the likes of you. Very well, I will catch and eat my Big-Brow food alone. I meant no offense.”
“There was no offense, Petal-Drift,” said Stick. Gash-Eye relished the anxiety in his voice. “Spear does not speak for the People.”
“Then the People should not let Spear speak for them.”
“I speak as I wish,” said Spear.
“Very well. Hunt game where you wish, as well.”
Gash-Eye turned and began to walk away from him. Spear growled, grabbed her shoulder, and spun her around. Gash-Eye didn’t resist; she waited to see if someone from the People would intervene.
Someone did. “Leave her alone, Spear!” screamed Horn, one of the hunters.
His scream echoed and roiled through the cave, its volume eerily amplified. The People clenched in on themselves more tightly, as if they were afraid the scream would cause the ceiling to vibrate and fall in on them.
But Gash-Eye knew that what they were really waiting for was to see if she would refuse to catch any more food. The hunters could take dim, smoldering brands far enough to find water by themselves—there were pools here and there, and a scout had already brought back word of a huge subterranean lake not far away. But the fire would frighten away whatever food there was, before the People could get close enough to see it.
The scream had startled Spear. Once he recovered, it disgusted him. He sneered at Gash-Eye, and said, “Fine. Go back to your rat-catching, Big-Brow.” He turned and sauntered back to the fire.
Gash-Eye watched him go, then kept watching even after he’d sat back down. One of the hunters scampered out, grabbed the rodent, and returned to the fire without looking at her. The People were conversing among themselves in murmurs now. Already they’d forgotten the confrontation—they were content to let her go back to her rat-catching, and they’d be happy to eat the results when she was done.
She walked back to the circle around the fire. Some looked up with trepidation, afraid she was still angry—some looked up hungrily, and were disappointed to see she brought no more food.
The conversations ceased. She stood looking down at Stick, who looked up to meet her gaze. He waited with resignation for her to speak.
“Am I to be beaten for bringing meat to the People?” she said.
“No, Petal-Drift. I am sorry Spear hit you.” He turned to Spear. “Spear, I say you shall not hit her again.”
Unbelievably, Spear didn’t protest, though he looked like he was having to chew off his own tongue to avoid doing so.
But Gash-Eye said, “I honor you, Stick. But what you say isn’t good enough. Spear wanted to kill me before the unkillables attacked. Spear beat me right after we took shelter in this cave. And now Spear beats me when I bring meat to the People. Each time, Stick has said words to restrain him, but always Spear beats me again.”
“I’ll show you a beating, you Big-Brow animal,” said Spear, no longer able to hold his peace. “Are we truly going to sit and let this Gash-Eye talk to us this way? Talk to Stick this way—Stick, whom till now we always held to be the strongest and the wisest? Are we going to let this Gash-Eye talk to us at all?! By the bone, I’d rather starve to death! Or, better, die fighting those unkillables! If they even are still out there!”
Some of the People were hissing at him to be silent. Keeping her eyes on Stick, Gash-Eye said, “They are indeed still out there. I will tell you when they’re not. You know I can see the truth of it, for you captured me and have held me all these years thanks to my Sight.” She tu
rned to the rest of the band. “If the People’s pride tells them they must not take aid from a Big-Brow, I will no longer give offense by offering it.”
Desperate assurances came from around the circle that she gave no offense. Stick’s eyes seemed no longer to see as he held his face in her direction. “Tell us what it is you wish, Petal-Drift.”
“Spear’s life.”
Stick showed not the slightest quiver of surprise. But the rest of the circle burst into an uproar, and Spear and his good friends leaped to their feet, some with spears or knives in hand. “Never!” shouted one of the hunters—it was small, wiry young Tooth. “Never could the People surrender one of their hunters because this Gash-Eye slave requested it! Never! Such a thing is unimaginable!”
“I don’t expect you to do it,” she said. “I only said that was the only condition upon which I’d feed you.”
Tooth sneered. “And what if your scavenging food for us is the only condition upon which I won’t gut you now, Big-Brow?”
Moving faster than she had done in years, Gash-Eye grabbed Tooth by the throat and the skins he wore, hoisted him all the way up over her head, and almost before anyone realized what she was doing, she slammed him down hard onto his back, right into the middle of the fire.
The burns weren’t bad enough to kill him, but he flailed and made noises that would have been shrieks if he hadn’t had the air knocked from his lungs. Others screamed for him. They dragged him out of the flames, which his body had not extinguished but had much diminished. Everything was illuminated now only by a dim unstable red light.
The People were all on their feet. They made as if they would rush her, but an invisible barrier held them back. There was lots of contradictory shouting, and it was almost impossible to make out individual words.
Stick stood in the inner ring of the furious circle that had formed around Gash-Eye. He faced her and said, “What do you wish?” She could hear how it galled him to have to ask her anything.
“Kill her!” screamed Spear, hidden behind the crowd gathered around her. Gash-Eye wondered why he wasn’t rushing her himself, then realized someone must be holding him back. It was hard to tell through the commotion, but she thought she heard sounds of struggle, and she wondered if not only Spear but also his friends were trying to attack her, while the more level-headed among the People stopped them. “Ask her for nothing, kill her!”
“What do you want?” repeated Stick.
“The life of the man who returned my gift of food with blows.”
“She is our slave!” cried Spear. “A slave cannot give gifts!”
Now the sounds of a fight were unmistakable. Some of the People were trying to beat Spear and his friends into silence.
Stick looked at her with something almost like despair. “Thank you for the meat, Petal-Drift,” he said, and the words sounded like they were being spoken to a conqueror whose foot was on his neck. “But if our only hope is to remain in this dark cave till our last days, perhaps it would be better to die soon.”
“No one said you need stay down here forever. Only till the unkillables leave the hill outside.”
“How long will that be?”
“Many, many nights,” she bluffed. “But when it happens, I shall see it.”
“Don’t make her angry!” shouted someone. There were screams of outrage at this cravenness, then shouts of support for its good common sense.
“Spear’s always been a bastard anyway!” shouted someone else.
“Quiet!” shouted Stick. “I say, quiet!” Some obeyed, but it was only a mild lessening of the hubbub. Stick glared at Gash-Eye—in the red light, it almost looked like his eyes were wet. He said, “I don’t know whether it is right or wrong to kill Spear for your pleasure. I do not wish for the People to all die out, forever. But I feel it would be wrong, and that the shame of it would follow us always.”
He paused and watched Gash-Eye, as if hoping his words might provoke some mercy. She met his gaze steadily. The idea of the People living under the cloud of an eternal shame provoked in her nothing but a satisfaction as dark, red, and smoldering as the fire she’d thrown Tooth into.
Stick dropped his eyes. His body seemed to shrink. He said, “It cannot be my voice that says these words. If it must be, it must be the whole People.”
Someone rushed from the circle at Gash-Eye. At first she tensed, readying herself to fight. Then she saw how small the on-comer was; it was Quarry. The child took her hand. Tears in her voice, she said, “Don’t make us do that, Gash-Eye.”
Gash-Eye stared down at Quarry, her face frozen and unreadable. She didn’t even notice that Quarry called her, not the name she’d insisted on, but the one by which she’d always been known among them.
“I know he deserves it,” said Quarry. “But please don’t make us do it. Please.”
Gash-Eye kept looking at the girl. For some reason she thought of the Jaw. She imagined that he had survived. She thought of how, if he had been trapped in here with them, she could have used the opportunity presented by her bluff to try to create a web of obligations that might keep him safe forever. Maybe she could have made the People grateful to her, maybe she could have used her new power to transform herself from a tool into a different sort of asset, a person of value. Then she would have been able to interact with her son, without either of them worrying that such interaction would contaminate him, would alienate him from the rest of the People even more violently than the mere fact of their kinship already did.
For some reason she had the urge to touch Quarry’s face. She didn’t do it, of course.
“Let Spear live,” she said. “Let him live, I don’t care what happens to him.” She turned and shouldered her way through the crowd. They hesitated to let her by, as if uncertain what they ought to do with her—thank her, punish her, supplicate her—but finally they made room. She left them behind and trudged back to the dark reaches of the chamber, among the rats and moles and insects, where there wasn’t any light for them to see her.
Behind her there was only a little noise for a while. Most of it came from the People trying to help the injured Tooth as best they could, without any herbs or potions. There was some hushed arguing over how much of their small store of wood should be used in rebuilding the fire—in the end they settled for a smaller blaze. Gash-Eye had talked like they would be down here a long time, so they would need to conserve their supplies. But she had also been careful to convey an impression that they would eventually be able to leave. If the People became hopeless, they might decide to go out and die fighting those unkillable things, or commit suicide, or some other desperate act. In any case, Gash-Eye would no longer be able to control them.
She huddled in the shadows by the wall. Blind animals scurried and crept over her and she ignored them. The People had split into clumps, she saw. Spear and his faction sat together, talking quietly and intently. Even if it turned out they were working out a plot to kill her, she didn’t give a damn.
Quarry wandered the chamber floor. The dark scared her, but she went as far as she could without passing completely out of the light visible to her. “Gash-Eye?” she would whisper, her small sibilant voice carrying far into the echoey chamber. “Petal-Drift?” she would whisper then, remembering the strange new name.
Gash-Eye never responded or let the child know where she hid. But she never took her eyes off her, either.
***
She awoke to a flaming stick being shoved near her face. Though she’d thought she’d reached a state where living or dying were matters of indifference to her, her body tried to recoil in panic from the flames. But she couldn’t recoil—there were four strong hunters holding her tight, one for each limb.
The flame was drawn back somewhat, but stayed blindingly close to her face. She heard Spear’s voice: “Now what say I burn out this Big-Brow slave’s rebellious eyes?”
Cries of protest. “We need her!” pleaded someone. “We need her to find food. We need her to look into the h
idden places, so we can know when it’s safe to leave....”
“Shut up!” said Spear. “I’m sick of hearing you gullible fools prattle about the hidden places! Can’t you see that’s a game she’s playing to humiliate you?”
“But we know she sees the hidden things!” That was Tooth! “That’s why we keep the Gash-Eye in the first place!”
“Shut up! And stay back, all you cowards, or I’ll stick your Big-Brow master right here.”
Gash-Eye felt a cold stone blade at her throat. She stopped struggling. Now that someone was actively planning to kill her, she found her will to live returning. But the only way to escape was to wait and see if an opportunity would present itself. Where was Quarry?
There were more cries and pleas from the People.
“If you cowards don’t be quiet I’m not going to kill the Big-Brow, I’m going to start killing you!” That quieted some of them.
“What is your plan, Spear?” That was Stick.
“My plan? It’s a simple one. I’m going to lead us all out of these caves.” Moans of protest, rallying shouts of encouragement. “Those of my faction are going to stamp out the fire as we go, so if any of you cowards choose to stay and snivel here, you can do it in the dark. Meanwhile, we’re going to go outside. I tell you, those unkillables will have moved on. Even if they haven’t, we’ll be ready for them this time. They move slow, before they’ve started eating anyway, we’ll see them and slip back into the cave again.” Gash-Eye was blinded as the brand was again shoved close to her face. “What do you think of that, Big-Brow? Still promising the unkillables won’t have passed back into the forest from whence they came?”
Gash-Eye could think of nothing better than to stick with her original gambit. “Death awaits outside.”
“Bah! The dark is the natural place for you. Rats and bugs are your rightful diet. But we are men, and women!... What say you, Stick?”
Stick’s voice was hard and merciless: “If, once outside, we find that Gash-Eye has deceived us, in that case I say she dies.”