Kingdom of Cages

by Sarah Zettel

  When she was finally empty, Chena lifted her head. Someone was still screaming. Who could be screaming? She had killed everybody, hadn’t she?

  No. Eden, the hothouser’s thing, the thing that had killed Mom, was still alive. She would not believe he was her brother. She would not, would not, would not! The words screamed themselves inside her head. Not my brother, never my brother!

  He had curled himself into a ball in the corner, his arms over his head, barely muffling his screams. The sound filled her mind, along with the hideous smell, until she couldn’t think.

  “Stop it,” she said hoarsely, taking a step toward him. “Stop it. I need to think.” Think about how to get out of here. Think about how to get away from the blood and the smell. Think about how to get away from the world before it ate her alive.

  Eden uncurled just enough to look at her with one eye. The eye widened and a fresh scream burst from him. He scuttled backward, trying to get away from her.

  “Stop it!” Chena saw her hand go up, and she saw it come down. Eden fell sideways. She heard the crack as his skull hit the rock. Then Eden lay still.

  Chena crouched next to him. She realized she still held the scalpel. She could kill the thing that had killed Mom. She could end it all right here. She looked down at the still boy.

  “Why did you have to look so much like Teal?” she murmured, and reached out to touch his hair. The blood coating her hands was already beginning to darken from scarlet to rust. The death smell clung to every inch of her. I need a bath, she thought dizzily. But really, she would have to drown herself in a world of water before she would ever be clean.

  That was it. Chena felt quite still. Eden had been taking her out toward the water. Water was a friend. It hid you from the cameras. It washed the insects from you. It would take her away from the world. It would save what was left of her family from the hothousers, and give her all the revenge she needed. They wouldn’t catch her in the water, ever. It would all end in the water. Finally.

  Chena scooped Eden up carefully and, cradling him against her chest, walked through the environment lock and up the tunnel.

  Dawn had turned the horizon pink and white by the time Teal emerged from Farin’s tiny house with Tam and Nan Elle beside her. Elle had insisted they try to get at least a couple of hours’ sleep. It hadn’t worked. How could Teal sleep after hearing Tam’s description of the Eden Project and Mom’s part in it? How could she sleep after realizing that those eggs she sold to the tailors were probably going straight to the hothouse so they could make more of the things? The idea dragged down her whole body, leaving her feeling leaden and hot-wired at the same time.

  As bad as she felt, Administrator Tam looked worse. His cheeks and eyes had sunken in until all the bones of his face were clearly visible. His mouth moved constantly, and he seemed frightened to put one foot in front of the other. What was that voice in his ear saying to him? Teal shuddered and decided she did not want to know.

  The first fingers of sunlight reached across the quay, turning the waters blue and touching the dunes with their warmth. Teal wiped the tears from her eyes and looked inland. The cliffs stood in the distance, rust red under their green crown of trees. Chena was in there somewhere. Teal let herself smile. This was going to be one time Chena could not argue about who was saving whom, which was a petty thought, but she held it close just the same.

  Nan Elle took the lead. The plan was to head for the fence duty house, find out who was on duty, and put them out of commission by the least aggressive means possible. Then they’d duck the fences and she and Farin would head for the caves, using the map tucked into Teal’s pocket. The three of them were already smeared with a layer of Chena’s goop to fool the mote cameras. Nan Elle and Tam would suss out the situation with the dirigibles and boats on the jetty to see who would carry them all away.

  That was if Tam could still talk by then. Teal decided she’d better not think about that too much. The only reason any of this was going to work was that they had a hothouser with them. If he gave in to whatever was whispering in his head, they were screwed and blasted, and this time it would be for good.

  “Do you hear something?” asked Farin suddenly.

  Teal listened. She did hear something, a low droning, too deep to be a dirigible. She scanned the morning sky in front of her and saw nothing but a few streaks of cloud.

  “Garden of God.” Nan Elle pointed her stick to the sky.

  Teal swung around. A great black cloud hung over the tops of the dunes, humming with a sound Teal was sure should be familiar.

  “Get inside!” shouted Farin, shoving Teal toward the dune.

  Unnerved, Teal turned to run. In the next second, a locust dropped onto the tip of her shoe, and another onto her tunic sleeve.

  “Get in—” Farin’s shout was cut short, and the world went dark.

  Teal heard herself screaming as the locusts swirled around her, clinging to her clothing, tangling in her hair. She swatted at them, but they were everywhere, their tiny claws digging into her skin. Blind, she ran forward until she thudded into the side of the dune house, but the locusts were already there, and they crunched and chirruped and clung to her hands. Somehow, somehow, she found the door and darted inside.

  “Hold still! Hold still!” Hands brushed against her, knocking the insects away. Teal forced herself to open her eyes.

  Farin stood in front of her, clearing the locusts off her and crushing them underfoot. Nan Elle darted around the room with a broom to destroy the creatures that had poured through the door when they had retreated inside.

  “Get the fire going, or they’ll come down the chimney,” she ordered, sweeping the insects from the walls and crushing them underfoot.

  Teal knocked Farin’s hands away and dropped to her knees in front of the brick stove, tossing in handfuls of kindling and fuel until the flames roared and their heat felt harsh against her face. She was vaguely aware that Farin had snatched the cloth off the table and stuffed it into the crack under the door, and that Tam had collapsed in the middle of the room and cradled his head in his hands.

  “Dionte,” he murmured. “She knows, she knows. She’s told the family. I should be back there. I should—”

  “Shut up!” shouted Teal. “Just… shut up!” She ran both hands through her hair, half afraid she’d find another locust clinging there. “What in all the hells is going on?” she demanded.

  “The hothousers.” Nan Elle stood, panting. A single locust clung to her apron. She snatched it off and tossed it into the fire.

  “They found us out.” Farin peered out the window at the whirring darkness.

  Teal forced herself to walk across the room to stand beside Farin and look out. The sunny dawn had turned black and gray with the swarms of tiny bodies. They crowded the boardwalk, the windowsill. They slammed against the window, and she knew by the shivering of her skin that they crawled all over the roof.

  “Dionte found out,” said Tam. “This is a quarantine. We’ll stay here until the family comes for us.” The utter relief in his voice raised clusters of goose bumps across Teal’s arms. “It is right. I was wrong to stand against them. They are my family. They know what’s best. Pandora must be protected.”

  Oh, no. Teal pressed her knuckles against her mouth. They’re getting to him. She stared out at the dark, whirling storm, trying to think of some way to get out, someplace they could run to. But no thoughts came to her. There was just the drone of the swarm and the terrifying calm in Tam’s face.

  Nan Elle knelt carefully in front of the hothouser. “Tam, you can call the Alpha Complex. You can stop this.”

  “No,” he said, his face and voice serene. “This is right. Pandora must be protected.”

  “They can’t,” blurted out Teal. “We can’t!” She faced the strip of window, black with insects somehow finding purchase even on the slick glass. “We can’t let them win like this,” she whispered. “They’ll take Chena. They’ll take the Eden Project. We can’t let t
hem.”

  “We may have to,” said Farin quietly. “For now. Teal, I’ve heard of these things. We don’t know how big the swarm is. People can go crazy trying to walk through them without protective clothing.”

  Fear and rage surged through Teal. She wanted to shout, to hit something, to strangle the peaceful hothouser sitting in the middle of the floor, but all she could do was stand there with her hands dangling uselessly at her sides. “It can’t be this easy for them.”

  Farin shook his head. “They’ve had a long time to get ready for this.”

  “Now what?” demanded Nan Elle, lifting her chin.

  A new note sounded over the droning and thudding of the locust swarm—a harsh metallic shriek, and another, and another after that.

  “Gulls?” said Farin.

  Surprise wiped the expression from Nan Elle’s face for a moment. Then, slowly, a smile full of mischief and wonder spread across her face. Using her stick to push herself to her feet, she shouldered between Farin and Teal to peer intently out the window.

  “There! There!” She stabbed her finger against the glass. “Do you see?”

  Teal stared over Nan Elle’s head. For a moment all she saw was the endless cloud of insects. Then she saw a flash of white. A black-backed gull settled onto the boardwalk, snapping up locusts as fast as it could crane its neck and swallowing them down. Another gull landed beside the first, bending and stabbing at the insects. A third joined them, and a fourth. A brown and white kestrel landed on Farin’s windowsill and began pecking insects off the glass, swallowing them greedily.

  “Ha!” Nan Elle barked out a laugh and thumped her stick against the floor. “I told you! I told you it would happen!”

  “Told what to who?” said Teal, unable to take her eyes from the birds. More landed every second. Gulls, kestrels, fishers, grouse, fat brown turkeys, strutting guinea hens, and prairie chickens, all come to the feast. Soon it seemed there were as many birds as there were insects.

  Elle swung around to face Tam. “Come and look, Tam. Pandora has decided to protect herself.”

  Tam lifted his head and stared at her, wide-eyed, like he didn’t understand.

  “Look!” She thumped her stick one more time.

  Slowly, shaking from the effort, Tam stood and teetered over to the window. He pressed both palms against the glass and stared at the spectacle outside, the triumphant birds and swirling insects.

  “Pandora herself has said she doesn’t want the family to catch us,” said Elle, watching Tam as intensely as Tam watched the birds. “Call the duty house, tell them to shut down the fences.”

  “No,” breathed Tam. “I cannot. My family—”

  “How can your family be right when Pandora says they’re wrong?” demanded Elle. “This is Pandora telling you what to do! Call the duty house, shut them down. You can do this, Tam.”

  Tam’s jaw worked back and forth, alternating between whispering to himself and chewing his own lip.

  “Come on, Tam,” breathed Elle. “I know you’re still in there somewhere. Pandora’s giving you a chance.”

  “I must go back to my family.”

  Elle gripped his arm. “You can do this. I know you can.”

  Tam squeezed his eyes shut. “I must go back to my family.”

  “Yes,” said Elle fiercely. “When it is over, you will go back. You will tell them everything. I know that’s what you have to do. But first you must help Pandora.”

  Tam raised one trembling fist. Farin sucked in his breath, and moved to step between Tam and Elle, but Elle waved him back. Tam, his face white with concentration, uncurled one finger at a time and touched the tips to the data display on the back of his right hand. Teal swallowed hard, fear and hope both clogging her throat.

  Tam traced a series of commands on the display. No one breathed. There was only the screech of birds and the crackle of the fire.

  “Done,” said Tam. “Done.”

  “Go!” shouted Elle.

  Teal took a deep breath. Then, so fast she had no time to think, she opened the door and ran out into the maelstrom with Farin right behind her. Her last sight of Elle was her laying a hand on Tam’s shoulder.

  The world outside was a frenzy of singing insects and shrieking birds. Teal ran, keeping her head ducked, so all she could see was the boardwalk in front of her. Birds screamed and fluttered out of the way. Insects scrunched under her shoes. Something dark slithered across her path and Teal realized the snakes had come to join in the feed. A kind of wild delight filled her. Nan Elle was right. Pandora itself was fighting back.

  The idea gave her the strength to look up. They had almost reached the northern edge of the village. Ahead of her, she could see the board-walk’s edge with its neat row of fence posts. If Tam had lied, or his orders had been countermanded and they’d turned the fence posts off only for a moment, it ended here. They were dead, or as good as.

  Screaming at the top of her lungs, Teal leapt.

  She hit the ground with a thump that knocked all the air out of her lungs and sent an outraged flock of birds winging skyward. A second later, Farin measured his length in the sand beside her. They both lay there panting for a moment.

  Alive. Awake.

  We did it. Teal lifted her head. The clouds of insects were thinner out here, and the clusters of birds were thicker. They warbled and chortled triumphantly to each other as they strolled casually after their prey.

  Scrambling to her feet, Teal knew exactly how they felt.

  “We still have to find your sister.” Farin climbed to his own feet, scanning the boardwalk for witnesses. “Before the hothousers show up to find out what’s gone wrong.”

  “Not going to be a problem,” said Teal, taking in a deep, free breath of morning air. “The whole world’s on our side.”

  Farin laughed, and headed off into the brush. Teal ran to catch up, and as she did, she snuck a look at him, watching the way his long legs swung so easily, even over the shifting sand, and how his auburn hair caught the sunlight. For just a minute, she could see how he had looked so good to Chena.

  The memory of old fights and old insults came back hard.

  “Farin…” She licked her lips. “Are you really a… a… prostitute?”

  “I’ve been paid for sex,” he said. Then he broke stride for just a moment to look at her. “And no, I never made love to your sister.”

  “Oh,” said Teal, pointing her eyes straight ahead. “Okay.”

  Farin laughed a little at that, but it was a kind sound, as if he understood. Teal had to admit to herself the question was pretty stupid and probably none of her business, but she still felt as if a weight had left her. When they found Chena, she’d tell her she’d been stupid, or maybe she wouldn’t, because Chena would never let her hear the end of it if she did.

  The new lightness only lasted for a short time, however. Farin set a pace up the dune that left Teal with no breath for anything but walking. The sand shifted under her boots, giving way slowly to firm earth, which made walking somewhat easier, but the new soil grew short, crabbed bushes loaded with burrs and thorns. A few scattered prairie chickens hunted stray locusts under the bracken, but that was all.

  Get to the cliffs. Teal wiped her forehead. Get Chena out. That’s all that’s left to do. Then we go back to the station.

  “Teal?”

  Farin had stopped and was pointing up the slope in front of them. Teal followed the line of his arm and saw a human figure crest the ridge from the other side.

  “Chena!” she shouted.

  But Chena did not hear. She just turned toward the lake, trudging toward the edge of the cliff. She cradled something heavy in her arms.

  Teal felt the blood drain from her face. Chena carried a small boy.

  “I think that’s the Eden Project she’s…” began Farin, then he saw Teal’s face.

  “God’s own,” Teal breathed. Chena had paused at the edge of the cliff, hugging the boy close to her chest and peering down at the water.
“What’s she doing?”

  “Teal…”

  But Teal was already running. “Chena! Stop!”

  “Chena!”

  Chena jerked her head up. A woman ran toward her. She tightened her grip on Eden’s still form and turned to look down into the water where it swirled against the base of the rust-red cliff.

  “Stop! Don’t! It’s Teal!”

  Chena turned again; she couldn’t help it. “Teal?” she heard herself breathe.

  The woman had stopped running. She stood in a clump of antelope’s tail brush about ten yards away, panting hard. She was tall and round in the hips, with skin the exact color Mom’s had been.

  “It’s me, I’m Teal,” she gasped. “I had a tailor age me up. The one who got hold of you, I think.”

  “Teal’s gone,” murmured Chena. It was a good thing the woman wore sturdy trousers, she thought idly. Antelope’s tail had thorns. “She left.”

  “I’m back,” said the woman. “God’s own, Nan Elle recognized me.” Chena felt her eyes strain as they stared. “And you used to call me vapor-brain,” snorted the woman.

  Chena’s mouth had to shape the word several times before any sound come out. “Teal?”

  “So, what do you think you’re doing this time?” The woman— Teal? really? Teal come back?—folded her arms, standing with one hip thrust a little forward and her face twisted up, scornful, superior. Just like Teal in the hothouse when she was telling Chena how things really were. Just like Teal a hundred times when they were staying with Nan Elle and she didn’t want to go to class, didn’t want to go on shift, didn’t want to do anything Chena told her she had to.

  “Teal.” She took a step forward, and then Eden shifted in her arms. Was it waking up?

  “Hello.” Teal waved a careless salute. “I asked what do you think you’re doing.”

  Chena looked down at the water. From here, it looked deep blue. Spurts of foam leapt up from where the waves splashed the rocks. Remember what you’re doing. This is important. You have to do it now.