by Ely, Jo;
Now there is only the sound of Jengi’s breath, getting farther away. His feet in the bracken and the soft plant rot of the forest floor, crunch and squelch. Slow, regular steps, getting fainter.
The forest is still. Something makes her stand here, just a moment longer. Smell of waxen leaves and dark moss, something else. She can’t say what it is.
Zorry catches up. “So that creature? The sound? Will it come after us?”
“I don’t know. It never has so far, that’s all I can say for sure. But it has established a … pattern of behaviour, let’s say. It doesn’t get farther or nearer, just seems to want to stay close.”
“Great. So it’s stalking us.”
“I don’t … I don’t know.”
She feels the creature beside her, sound of low, deep breaths. Not coming any closer or getting father away. Zorry feels angry suddenly. Unreasonably angry about the gaps in Jengi’s understanding, why’d he bring me here? If he doesn’t know his own self what it all is?
“So, I’m behind. I’m watching your back, Jengi. Who’s watching mine?”
He sighs. “You’re never going to trust me are you?”
She eyes him. “I don’t remember you asking me to. Should I?”
“No. Absolutely not.” He says sincerely. Slow smile.
“Alright then.”
“So what was I saying … We figure it’s mostly been designed for general killing forest ambience.” He says lightly.
“What? Is that supposed to be a joke?”
Jengi turns back in time to catch Zorry’s scowl.
“I mean to say that it doesn’t do much. At least not yet, Zorry. Scares the holy baobab out of folks, that’s about it. Far as I can make out.” The heavy animal sounds stop, as if the creature were listening.
They go on trekking forwards, Zorry knowing to avoid the nipping saplings and leeches, learning from Mamma Zeina’s downfall not to ignore the deadly small things, or to let the nips cluster on her. From time to time she picks a leach off the back of Jengi’s neck, and he turns to her gratefully.
“The one eyed desert hyaena has apparently been modified again.” He says. “Come on, climb.”
“Where is it?” Zorry says, unalarmed, taking her cue from Jengi. And then she sees it.
“What the …?”
It waits by the roots of the tree. Curiously human expression, gazing upward. Zorry feels a scream coming up from the base of her stomach. Now her fingers freeze and her grip on the tree becomes slippy. Now she grapples and fights to hold on to her branch. When she’s found a secure hold, breathes out. Looks down, a little calmer.
The beast eyes her shrewdly. Gives a low, throaty, almost conversational snarl. There’s an up-lilt at the end of its bark, like it’s asking a question.
Jengi seems to Zorry to be unnaturally calm. Calmer than she’s ever seen him. She sees it for the first time then, “You live for this. Don’t you, Jengi? Danger, I mean.”
Jengi shrugs. “I’m a Digger.” He says. As if that were any kind of answer. And then, “Reminds me of Gaddys, that one,” he says. Throwing sticks down at the creature. The creature tries to catch the sticks in its mouth, one hits its ear, hard, and its snarling grows louder.
“Holy baobab, Jengi. What the hell are you doing?”
“Relax. They’re all noise.”
The creature’s pupils have narrowed into cat-like slits. A little drizzle is running down the black gums spilling out from its clumsily made jaw.
“Jengi.” Zorry says sharply. “I think it understands you. Jengi, stop.”
But Jengi shrugs again, doesn’t seem to notice or care. Breaking off branches and throwing them down. Once again the creature dips and swerves and snaps at the air around it, several sharp branches and twigs manage to hit the sides of its head. It does not leave, but goes on dodging and whimpering, and then, when the branches stop flying, seems to take a long shrewd look at Zorry. Turning in a loop, slopes away.
“Guess it wanted to get a good look at the newest mother cupboard.”
Zorry shivers.
“Anyway. It’s had enough for now,” Jengi says, sounding more serious suddenly. “But you showed it some fear, that’s of interest to it. It’ll double back with its friends. Now that will be something to worry about.” Jengi slides expertly down the side of the tree. “We need to get back now.” He says. A little more urgently than she’s heard him speak since they arrived in the killing forest. She’s noticed something else.
“What’s wrong with it?” Zorry watches as the creature’s vulpine nose reappears between the curling ferns to her right. Teeth and gums protrude from the hyaena’s mouth, it has an immensely heavy lower jaw, and a top jaw which ends in a long, hooked, blackened tooth. Now Zorry listens to the sound of its lolloping footfall, moving away to the left. “What was wrong with it?” She asks the question again, unable to frame exactly what she’s intuited. “Is it … Fearful? A fearful creature?”
“What?” Jengi shrugs. “That’s a Sinta question that I ain’t equipped for.” He laughs. “It’s mostly just blind, Sinta. Seeing is not necessary when its sense of smell is so good. That creature sensed us long before we even got here, Zorry. It smelled our intention to come.”
Zorry shivers.
“You cold?”
“No. Let’s get out of here.”
“The killing forest is evolving all the time Zorry. Or mutating at least.”
The creature circles back in silence, puts its head back through the ferns, sniffs the air. Watches their blurred shapes moving away. And now tilting its over-large head, as though it understands their conversation. Curiously intelligent eyes.
“Why didn’t it call for the others?”
“I don’t know.”
The creature seems to take a careful note of Zorry’s outline, smaller than the first one, it thinks. But not by much. Not as strong, but more skilful at moving quietly through the forest than him, the creature notes. A thing like the girl could creep up on the nest. She’s more dangerous than him. And then Predator. It says. Deciding. Soft, whooping, conversational-sounding calls to its mate. Danger. It says. And then Danger, danger.
There are several answers. Low, rasping, nuanced barks. And that soft up-lilt at the end again. Like a question.
“What does that barking mean?”
Jengi glances behind him. “We should get back. I’m … a little out of my depth.” Jengi says, manoeuvring himself around a rotting tree stump. Zorry looks up again, listens. Seems to tune into the barks and low rasps, which are coming from several different angles now, meaning that the two of them are almost surrounded already. “This way.” Zorry grabs his arm and then “Run!!”
Zorry’s vision blurs slightly, launching them both, heads first, through the bracken. Zorry is faster on her feet than Jengi, she quickly lets go of his arm, gets ahead. Reaching the suture in the fence before Jengi, tearing it apart with her hands.
“You first.”
Shoves Jengi through, Zorry climbs out after.
The creatures make no attempt to come through the hole in the fence and Zorry stitches the sides of the tear together slowly, carefully. Trembling tight hand. Muttering soft apologies to the fence as she goes. There is the sound of barking, snuffling as she stitches and pours the healing pizen. The fence re-grows until the stitched seam in it is hidden.
Jengi turns to Zorry, “How did you know what to do? Which way to run?”
“I don’t … I just knew.”
Jengi eyes her curiously. He leans against the rain barrel by the fence, he’s panting hard.
“What?”
He shrugs. “Starting to see why Zeina picked you.”
Zorry notices a small gap in her suture. She finishes suturing up the fence all the way to the edges, the fence quivering under her hands and she strokes it again. Soft, soothing words. She’s getting fairly expert at doing this already. The fence seems to trust her, Jengi notes. Seems to remember. It relaxes its fibres, making the stitching e
asier for them both.
“Good work. Now be quick,” he says. “Egg Men will be here in …” Jengi looks down. “In about six and a half minutes.” Jengi is telling the time by the shadow, spreading out underneath the street lamp.
The post-curfew street lamps are timed and their light goes out in increments. This makes it possible to tell the time by them if you happen to have an observant nature. Jengi mutters a soft count-down under his breath.
“Time.” Zorry thinks, watching him. “We have to keep time on our side, just like everything else.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Just one of Mamma Zeina’s sayings.” And then, “What was that rattling underneath us?”
“Rattling?”
“When we walked by the fence just now. Hissing sounds too. Seemed to come up from under our feet.”
Jengi looks down, notices Zorry’s bare feet, as though for the first time.
“Prod holes or vents under the leaves.” He sniffs. “It was your own Mamma Ezray who figured that for us, Zorry.”
Zorry looks surprised by this information.
“Small forest things fall into the vents, can’t get out again. It explains the strange noises underfoot in the playground underneath the Furdy.”
“You think the trapped creatures are burrowing under the village?”
“Yes, Zorry. I know they are. The forest is spreading out roots and critters in all directions. You can’t keep a living thing pinned. Only the fence knows how far it goes.”
“They’re burrowing under the OneFolks’ village?”
“Yes.”
“What the hell are they?”
“Dunno.” He looks up. “Ask your father. Don’t he work in the sewers? So maybe he saw something already.” And then, “You got bit.” Zorry looks at her hand.
“Yes.”
“You should have said, Zorry. You don’t want to show up at the general’s feast tomorrow with that’un, Zorry.” Jengi curses. “You should’ve been more careful.” He’s mostly angry with himself.
“I’m sorry. Must’a happened in the tree, when I was distracted.”
He wraps her hand. “Remember next time,” he says. “They’re in the tree moss. They were the real danger all the time we was both looking down at that clown of a hyaena.”
“I’ll remember.” And then, “You got bit yourself,” she says. He seems to see his small wound for the first time. The colour drains out of his face. “I must have took it sliding down the killing tree. I didn’t feel a thing.”
“Some of them plants contain anaesthetics, precisely so you’ll ignore them. Wait.” She blinks. “Thought you was s’posed to be training me?”
“The forest isn’t never the same way twice, Zorry. That’s all you can learn. Anyone can make a mistake, you can’t never really train for the killing forest on account the killing forest learns you too. Changes it up.” Jengi looks at her grimly, and then down at his hand. The pizen spreads so fast that he quickly finds it hard to move his fingers. Gently, “Help me.” He says.
Zorry examines his hand. The effect of this tree bite is a thing she’s not seen before. Black vine-like branches are spreading out under his skin. It looks different to Mamma Zeina’s plant bite, which was mostly inflamed. Green and red.
“These kind of nipping saplings, you can catch em iffen youz quick, and they deliver stings as you go,” Jengi explains to her now. “No one is dangerous on its own, but you gots to figure out a way of not collecting ‘em.” He glances down at his feet. His voice is weak now, drifting, “You need to tie it with something.”
She rips a strip out of the sleeve of her maid’s uniform. Makes a splint. Checks his pulse. “You’ll be alright. Just keep breathing.” And then looking down at her handiwork, is pleased with herself.
Zorry walks ahead along the fence now, back towards the lights of the village and her mother’s cottage. She’s been noticing a heavy, sliding sound for a while. It’s the other side of the fence. Zorry turns towards it. The light on the creature’s head blinks on and off. She thumbs left, points it out to Jengi.
“Is it a spy?”
“You asking me? Training day is over, Mother Cupboard. I already told you about everything I know.” Jengi is impressed, also sulking a little. He didn’t plan on being rescued twice today.
The fence seems to undulate towards Zorry, soft webbing breathes in and out.
It takes her a moment to realise that Jengi’s stopped walking altogether. She goes back for him. “Your hand?”
He bends his neck, looks down grimly.
There are small black veins still spreading out from Jengi’s plant bite, just above the bandage. Zorry binds it tighter, making Jengi wince. “They’ll turn into tree vines, if we don’t stop the blood to ‘em. Gotta cut off the flow for a bit, it’s what them sinews need to grow I reckon.” She explains. “You need to loosen it soon as you can, or you’ll lose that hand.”
“Thank you.”
She nods. “We’re even.” She says.
“There is one more thing I can tell you before you go back in alone, Zorry.”
“Aye. What’s that?”
“If you see the shape of a man, or a woman, then drop. Hide. Get out as fast as you can.”
“Who …?”
“I ain’t figured that yet. Runaway Sinta from the last era? The old forest workers, or stragglers from the old time? Egg Men sent in by the general in some new guise? One thing’s for sure, the killing forest has changed them. What I saw …” He shakes his head. He stops talking for a moment. Grimaces. “But I don’t care iffen you’s in a patch of evil stingers when you see that kind of a human, you just drop, Zorry. Understand me?” Eyes her. “And then you get out.”
“Alright but …”
Jengi rubs his head with his right hand. He’s thinking. “You may never see even one, iffen you never go into the dark mouth of the killing forest, Zorry. Most Mother Cupboards don’t go there. There was only Mamma Zeina. We won’t see her like again.” Jengi eyes Zorry curiously now, to see how she takes this challenge.
“You said that already. Holy baobab, Jengi. Do you ever stop trying to play folks? What has Bavarnica done to you, Digger? You might try being direct for a change.”
He eyes her gently swaying back as she walks away. “Play it straight eh? Maybe I will.” He says, low. Breathes out.
Zorry is looking toward the forest, looming up over the gently rippling fence. It’s like a dark mouth, she thinks. On a night like this. The whole thing, a snake’s body from tip to root. It seems to expand and contract at the edges. Zorry shudders. Looks away. Premonition washes over her. She can’t say what it means, only a bad feeling. She tries to put it away.
THE EGG MEN
FATHER IS ON A mercy mission to his sister’s house at the edge of the village. Her crop didn’t come up this year, some kind of blight. Food sharing is strictly banned and getting even vegetables to her is a dangerous mission. He’ll be gone all day. Zorry has gone to the allotment to see what Father has left them.
Mamma Ezray is alone in the house with Zettie when the Egg Men come. Watches their huge heads bobbing just above the hedgerow beyond the cottage. Mamma recognises the batch 47 Egg Boy, Antek. He stops to lace his boots on the path out front, forcing the two huge Egg Men to wait for him. This gives Mamma Ezray a precious moment to prepare.
“Run!” Ezray tells Zettie. “It’s now, Child.”
Zettie pops her thumb out of her mouth. “No.” She says, firmly. And then Zettie, in her infant stubbornness, wastes crucial moments resisting being pushed toward the back door by her mother.
“I’m staying with you.” Zettie starts to cry.
“Zettie.” Mamma Ezray says, “Zettie, you’ve been trained for this. Be a Big Girl. Right now. Go and wait by the fence. Nobody will look for a child there at this time, except those who know to. Don’t you want me to proud of you? Don’t you want Zorry to be?”
Zettie thinks about this. Sets her mouth in a line and ey
es her mother stubbornly. “I don’t rightly like to, there’s a man in that forest. He’s got slugs in his ears. I am going to stay here with you, Mamma.” She pops her thumb back into her mouth. Now her eyes are wide.
“Run.” Her mother hisses. Twists her hands. And then in her desperation, “I will be there. That’s where I’ll be. Zettie. By the fence. I’ll be coming right behind you. You just got to wait for me. Now go, go.”
Zettie examines her mother’s face. Then she heads for the kitchen and the back door beyond it. Closes the kitchen door behind her just in time.
Things unravel fast.
“It’s now.” Ezray thinks.
She hears the back door softly open and then close. She believes Zettie’s gone. Probably half way across the back yard by now, she calculates, counting down the steps. Or in the copse running around the back of the house, under the leaves. Zorry or Jengi will pick Zettie up by the fence when they hear, which will be soon, the Sinta grapevine being what it is. Mamma Ezray breathes out. She believes Zettie is safe.
Sound of boots in the gravel outside the front door now. Something comes to Ezray then, watching the door. Knowing that it will bust out of its hinges in just a moment. She has prepared for the possibility of this moment for so long that now it’s here it’s like a kind of dreaming feeling descends on her. She feels untuned and strange, standing here by her mother’s wooden table. The door seems to her to glow with a strange life. Cold unravelling feeling in the mother cupboard’s stomach. Now Ezray holds on to the wooden table with both hands.
The door bursts, just as though, she thinks, just as though it were made out of cardboard or paper.
“Witch.” The Egg Man says. And then his heavy boot, crunch, across the door jamb.
Ezray looks down at his boots on her newly mopped floor. For a long, unreal moment she can’t imagine what they could be doing there. On her floor tiles. She looks slowly up from the floor.