by L. L. Crane
I shivered incessantly, and Troll would pull me closer to him. Somehow, he managed to sleep, little snorts spewing out occasionally. Once I thought another mutant had come, but it was something else. Lily growled and snarled, and I shook Troll awake, my hand on my knife belt.
“Hmmmm,” he said, opening an eye.
But it was nothing. Just a passing blur I couldn’t make out. Lily settled down and I pulled the jumpsuit blanket tighter to my chest, fear scraping inside of me like rough sandpaper. I sighed deeply, resting my hand on the body shield that protected the Peanut and tried to sleep, but I was too wound up to relax. Lily gently placed her head in my lap and I rubbed her ears repeatedly, taking my attention off of what was to come.
When morning finally arrived, Troll stood up and stretched nonchalantly. I guessed he had done this more than once. He ambled over to one of the boxes he told me about, and sure enough, there was food and water in it. Two bottles of water. Several strips of meat. And two apples.
“Do they always give you two of everything?” I asked him as I stood up, my muscles tense from exhaustion.
“Nope.” He handed me some jerky and an apple. “Eat up.” Then he tossed some jerky to Lily, who gobbled it up ravenously, wagging her tail the entire time. The night of rest must have helped her because she looked no worse for the wear other than some deep scratches on her fur. They were already scabbing over and looked as if they would heal in time.
I crunched into the apple, savoring the sweet and tart taste at once. “So they know there’s someone else here…they know about me?”
“Yep.” Troll was biting his jerky, his jaw working overtime. He was soaking wet, and the fingers hanging off his necklace had leaked purplish blood down onto his jumpsuit. I stared down at myself, almost gagging at the fingers, which seemed to have swollen up to twice their size since the day before.
“Just don’t think about them. They’ll dry up soon enough,” Troll told me, as if he had been reading my mind.
“Okay,” I answered speculatively, crunching into the apple again.
Troll wiped his arm across his forehead. “This is it. After we eat, we’re gonna run in that direction.” He pointed his finger out into the distance, into the orange light of the Asters.
“That’s where the blues are.” He let a few minutes of silence settle between us, and I listened carefully. “I’ve been thinking. The reds are too far away. And way too mean.”
“But we have red on our jumpsuits.”
“That’s a good thing, the way I figure.” He chewed thoughtfully. “They’ll think we might go all red on them.”
I couldn’t help but laugh at him, but then the reality of what we were about to do set in.
“What if they don’t…”
Troll didn’t let me finish. “They’ll take us in. We got the necklaces.” He fidgeted with the finger necklace laced around his neck as if it were a priceless gemstone.
I wasn’t sure if I believed him, but I finished eating in silence. I wasn’t very hungry after the apple so I tossed my jerky to Lily, who gobbled it up happily. Troll wiped his hands on his jumpsuit and downed the bottle of water. I took a giant swig of water from my bottle then placed the rest in the pack.
“Do you want me to carry the pack?” I asked him.
“As if.” He picked up the pack and settled it on his back.
Troll wasn’t in a talking mood, I could tell. His eyes were narrowed and he looked determined. “You ready?” he asked.
I nodded, not completely convinced that I was ready for what we were about to do. Troll reached for my hand then stared into my eyes. “If I don’t make it just keep running. Got it?”
“No…”
“Yes,” he ordered. Then he gently cupped my chin in his hand and kissed me lightly on the lips. I didn’t have time to think about it, to process it like I did when Orion kissed me because Troll took off running straight into the Asters.
I followed, my feet clipping against the subway floor and then the soft, muddy ground of the Asters, my eyes focused on the little bit of blue I could see in the distance, rain drizzling incessantly onto my already cold and wet body. I could tell Lily was by my side, her paws working to keep up with us.
Spectrum Blue, I thought. The mildest scale on the spectrum. I wondered if there was any significance to it. But the thought flew out of my head quickly, because Troll was a rocket, shooting forward with unbelievable speed.
I ran like I had never run before, even faster than when the renegades were shooting at me, because keeping up with Troll was proving to be more difficult than I thought. I gasped for breath as I chased after his lean body, not having any idea where I was going to end up.
Chapter 38
Blues
I tripped a couple of times, but Troll was there, pulling me up. He would roughly grab my hand and yank me along, my feet hammering the muddy earth like leaden sledge hammers. Scenery flashed before me, beside me…odd looking trees with orange cones hanging off of them, some blue bushes, green muddy earth. It felt like my lungs were on fire, and droplets of rain continued to trickle cruelly down on me. Lily somehow kept pace with us, her tongue lolling out of her mouth and an almost happy expression on her face.
Inverted hills that seemed to roll along forever were smashed out of the earth like upside down mountains. Explosions. I could tell, then, that Troll was right. The earth was blasted into deep ochre, red, and orange pits. We might as well have been running on Mars, flying over the small craters that were scooped out like chips and dip.
I didn’t know where we were going, but Troll did. The look of determination never left his face as we flew along. The mutant fingers I wore sprang up and hit me in the face over and over again, the bitter fur catching in my teeth. It was bad enough that I had smelled the filthy things, but now I was tasting them, a vulgar, metallic flavor pitting onto my lips, my tongue. I spit ferociously, glancing over at Troll. The same thing was happening to him, but he took it in stride, the back pack bouncing off of his thin shoulders.
At some point I heard footsteps behind me.
“Faster,” Troll called to me, his breath a turbulent cloud against my cheek. I didn’t think I could go any faster. My feet each had a mind of their own, though, spiking along ruthlessly, Lily never leaving my side. Troll yanked on my hand. He may have appeared to be smaller and weaker than me, but he could definitely run. I panted next to him, gasping for air. I may have been able to outrun him at a short distance, but this guy was certainly handing my plate to me on the long stretch.
“Don’t look back,” he yelled to me. “We’re almost there.” I pushed harder, the air thick in my lungs. The sound of footsteps, more than one set now, was bearing down on us, but I trusted Troll, focusing straight ahead, a huge pit in the earth the only thing in sight.
Troll took a flying leap, and I held onto his hand, jumping with him. We both caught air for an endless moment, Lily soaring beside us with her ears flapping in the wind. I knew then what it was like to be a bird, to fly freely through the clouds. The footsteps behind us stopped, and the air whistled in my ears, cruelly shrieking like a school yard bully. At last, we hit the earth, landing with a thud. I twisted my ankle as we rolled down a steep slope, end over end, landing finally in a heap, tangled up with each other and somehow on top of Lily.
It took a moment for me to catch my bearings. Troll was slipping his legs away from mine, attempting to stand. I was too shocked to move, holding my ankle as it throbbed, panting and wheezing for the sweet, wet air of the Asters. Lily was up in a minute, shaking her fur and growling protectively.
Troll was on his feet, holding the finger necklace out. Shaking my head, I looked up.
We were surrounded by people, mostly men. They appeared to be barbaric, but wore shiny blue clothing, each wearing a necklace of fingers, none with any flesh left on them.
Most of the men were huge, almost as big as Orion. One man was particularly large, a giant in comparison to Troll and me.
&nb
sp; My heart thundered in my chest as I stood up on shaky feet. Each of them was holding a spear.
Pointed directly at us.
Chapter 39
Acceptance
Troll’s chest was heaving, but he didn’t show fear. He moved his steely blue eyes purposely over each person, then he yelled something I had never heard before, words that were foreign to my ears. I shyly reached for his hand and tried to ignore the pain in my ankle. His words echoed through the huge crater.
“Zemper ni alphino,” he shouted. He finished simply with, “Blue!”
Immediately, the spears were dropped, hitting the ground in unison and stirring up orange dust. I wondered if these people spoke a different language. Surely Pan and Garment would have tried to at least teach me the basics of a new language if I was expected to speak it. I wondered how Troll knew what to say, but then again, I had spent most of my time with Troll wondering something about him.
Troll didn’t look at me but stared at the biggest man there, a muscular, beasty looking man with a flattened nose and broad face. His hair was long and black, tied back with a thick cord. He stepped toward us, and everything within me wanted to turn around and run.
When he reached us, he grabbed my left arm, quickly sliding my sleeve up. My heart thudded in my chest as the bloody tear drops sprung out and the puddle of blood where my tracker-timer had been was revealed. He ran his rough hands over it, turning my arm over and checking the underside. He repeated the process with my right arm.
“She’s mine,” Troll told him. It was a statement, void of any emotion, like saying your apartment or air glider belonged to you. The huge man nodded his head, his dark eyes surveying us. He moved over to Troll, yanking his sleeve up roughly. I hadn’t thought to ask Troll if he had a tracker-timer, assuming everyone had them. His arm was bare except for a few small tattoos of connecting bones. It was apparent he had never had a tracker-timer implanted. I made a mental note to ask him why if I ever got the chance.
The crowd was gathering closer, although they were still holding down their spears. “Accepted,” the big man roared, grabbing Troll’s hand and sticking it high up in the air. Fear gripped me. Obviously they had accepted Troll, but what about me? Would they cast me out?
The humongous man circled me, inspecting me, as if he might eat me alive. Lily followed him, snarling with bared fangs, but he seemingly ignored her. Gods, I hoped they wouldn’t hurt her. He sniffed all around me, his nostrils flaring. Oddly, he placed his hand gently on my stomach, covering it easily. I shifted uncomfortably underneath his touch, but he didn’t seem to notice. Then he cocked his head to the side, and a wide grin erupted on his face.
“The woman will present us with children!” He turned to the crowd. “Accepted.”
Cheering erupted from the crowd, hoots and hollers. Shouting like I had never heard before.
My ears were splitting into two, three, four, maybe a hundred different pieces. I let out a breath that I might have been holding since I first entered the subway door, because all I heard was the word “accepted”.
I didn’t know where it would lead, and a piece of me was nervous that they might want the baby for themselves, or even kill it, that they might hurt Troll and Lily, but I would have to worry about that later.
As Troll reached our hands into the dewy, starless sky, I smiled out to the people around me.
Whether I liked it or not, I had a new home.
Chapter 40
Home
The crowd dispersed slowly, talk among them trailing off into the slight wind. Fortunately, it wasn’t in the odd language that Troll had spoken, but in words I could easily understand. I was shivering, and Troll protectively wrapped his arm around my shoulder. I snuggled into him happily.
A slight woman with reddish brown hair and the fairest skin I had ever seen ambled shyly up to us. Her eyes were vivid green, and she had a spattering of freckles running across her nose, reminding me of Castle back home at the Clinic. She nodded her head at us, and her hair blew wildly in the breeze. I glanced at Troll, who nodded back to her. I did the same, hoping I wasn’t making some kind of mistake.
“I am Spice. I will show you to your home.”
“We thank you with our hearts full,” Troll rattled off to her. “I am Troll. This is Vanish.”
“So very nice to meet you,” she answered. Her voice was smooth, velvety. Something about her made me want to reach out and pet her, like a dog or a cat. She must have been a little older than me, her face smooth and void of any make-up. I glanced over at Troll, wondering how old he was. We had never even talked about that.
Spice turned around gracefully, her long blue skirt twirling with the quick motion. Troll clasped my hand tighter, and we both followed her. “The dog can stay. What is her name?”
“Lily,” Troll answered, proudly. I couldn’t help but smile. Lily had already become such a part of the us that Troll and I had become. I wondered how Spice knew she was a female.
She wound her way through the crowd, and the people parted as we trailed along behind her. There must have been about one or two hundred of them, all wearing blue of some kind or another. Each time we passed a man holding a spear, he would stamp it into the ground and make a huffing noise. I couldn’t tell if it was a welcoming noise or not.
There were mostly men, and they were all fairly large. I could see why Troll had such a difficult time being accepted all these past months. Still, he carried himself fearlessly, never letting go of my hand.
Eventually we reached a huge overhanging with small mud houses carved out of the sides of it. There were open windows and rounded wooden doors in each of the houses. In the center of all of them, a giant house was carved out. It was different than the others, constructed of wood and painted a light shade of blue. I had never seen anything quite like it before. There were decorations painted all over it, dark blue swirls. Compared to the other houses, it was a mansion.
Spice led the way up the immaculately groomed path that led to the doorway. She opened the door, which creaked on enormous hinges.
She stopped on the threshold, a beautiful arch, and spun her entire body toward me. “This will be your home. We have been waiting for our Lordess to arrive.”
My jaw dropped. Lordess? What was she talking about?
Troll beamed over at me, squeezing my hand at the same time that Spice reached out her hand and patted my stomach. “It’s been a long time since we’ve had bairns.”
“Wh…what’s a bairn?” I asked her, confused. She giggled, her voice rising childishly. “A baby. We haven’t had a baby in years.” Her voice had an accent I couldn’t place.
“Oh,” I replied, looking around the spacious room. “We get to stay here?” I asked her, dumbfounded.
“Aye,” she answered. “Aye, it’s your home now.”
I gulped, staring at the room before me. It was quaintly decorated with rough wooden furniture scattered about. A blue couch was situated in the front room and there were blue curtains on the windows. Several tables, elaborately carved out of wood, were displayed next to blue chairs.
“I’ll take you on a tour,” Spice told me, twirling again. “There’s a room for the bairn. For when he’s born.” She smiled at me, and her eyes sparkled like polished steel. “The boy, he’ll be our little lord, he will.”
“How…how do…”
“She started laughing, lyrical music that sounded like violins. “Shade said it was so. He has the gift.”
I wanted to ask her if the baby would be S.L.A.G., if he would be normal. Would Shade know that as well?
“Who is Shade?” Troll asked.
“He’s my man,” she told him, proudly. “He claimed me five suns ago, but we haven’t been blessed with bairns.” A sad expression cast over her pale face. “We’ve been living here, waiting for a bairn, but Shade says it won’t be. “The house is for you, for your bairn, Lordess.”
“Is Shade the man who touched my stomach?” I asked her.
�
��Aye,” she said. “He’s the prophet of Blue Spectrum.” She smiled sweetly at me. “He has the gift, I told you.”
“What about Troll?”
She examined Troll, looking up and down his scrawny body. “He’ll make a hunter and a fighter, he will. Once we fatten him up.”
Troll smiled at her, his crooked teeth poking out of his thin lips. I met his eyes, thinking that a few days ago I didn’t even know who Troll was, where the Asters were, or that I would somehow end up being a Lordess to the Exiles just because I happened to be pregnant.
I smiled back at Spice. She met me with a wide grin, her eyes sparkling merrily.
Spice led us into the first bedroom, which was quaint as well, but I was charmed by the decorations – blue clay pots with stars etched into them, a nice sized bed with carved chests next to it. More blue curtains hung from the windows, which were open, a wet breeze blowing through them. Lily plunked herself down on the stone floor as if telling us she liked the place.
Spice reached down and patted her head, still looking at me. “You and your man will sleep here, Lordess. Shade will have a crib made for the bairns.” Troll and I exchanged glances, both of us exhausted, filthy and unable to believe our good fortune.
Somehow, even though I had only been in Blue Spectrum for a short while, it seemed to be considerably more civilized than living in the Provinces.
I shivered against the damp breeze that blew through the window.
I had no idea what the next days would hold, but something in my gut didn’t feel right. I glanced over at Troll, who had the biggest smile on his face since I had met him, so I immediately tried to shake off the feeling. Lily appeared happy, too.
So, what could be bothering me, I wondered, my stomach twisting itself into a giant knot.