Dark Paradise

by Cassidy Hunter

  Or maybe it was cold in paradise. Maybe snow blanketed the ground and clung to the naked limbs of skinny trees, and they had feasts and music and snuggled together under piles of blankets.

  In paradise there were no zippers or dry bones. Maybe paradise was like her world, except there were no governments who sold their people to aliens.

  She was alone. Funny how she hadn’t known how bad it was to be alone before. She’d preferred it. But now she knew what she’d been missing.

  It took her twelve days to reach the mountains. With her injuries, she had to rest often, and because of the fresh horror of the dry bones, creatures she still didn’t understand, during the first couple of days she was only willing to walk at night. When the moon lit the sky, she walked. Those early days were spent high in a tree with Saint and Satan and her bag, sleeping as best she could.

  She didn’t think the dry bones could climb.

  Shell had told her the dry bones were only rarely seen. A person might never see one, or have the misfortune to cross their paths just once in his or her time on Ripindal. Ripindal was huge, and the dry bones were wanderers. Still, that fact didn’t reassure her. Not then. It was too soon.

  Some days she found a cabin in which to sleep, and those were the days she thought she understood the one-legged man and the blind woman. They’d found places they felt reasonably safe and didn’t want to leave. She had to force herself from the huts on those days.

  She wanted to lie down and give up. She wanted to lie down and nurse her wounds and cry, but she didn’t. There was only one way to be with her men again, and that was by gathering the fucking shrube. And that’s what she’d do. That was her purpose.

  On the twelfth day, she stood at the base of the mountains, wondering if she had the strength to climb them. They rose before her like a vast mirage, blue and smoky and sharp, filled with mysteries and treasure and life.

  She took a deep breath, sick of her sadness. It wasn’t going to bring them back. Walking around all morose and gloomy wasn’t going to get her to them any quicker.

  “Get a grip, crazy lady. The shrube await.” She forced herself to laugh. Not because she found anything amusing, but because laughing just made a girl feel better. And she’d be damned if she was going to waste any more time feeling sorry for herself.

  She stood there holding her stomach and laughing, and eventually the laughter became real. And when she finally wiped her tears and started up the mountain, she did feel better.

  As soon as she stepped on mountain soil, the search began. Treasures were everywhere, one just had to look. But the main thing she wanted was the shrube, and she set about looking for them with a grim determination.

  She would share her bag space with only extra edibles like certain greens and mushrooms and a few of the potatoes she found when she dug into the dirt.

  Some kind soul had stuck crude signs into the hill at various intervals, guiding miners toward water. It wasn’t often a person found such signs of kindness on Ripindal, and she paused to run her fingers gently over the face of the weathered sign. She knelt down before it and carved Thank you then Cin was here into the old wood.

  Images of the dry bones still intruded, but she shrugged them away, unwilling to be prisoner to some fucking skeletons she’d only seen once in all her time on Ripindal.

  Fuck ’em.

  “Hey.”

  Startled, she jumped to her feet, knife held before her.

  Elif sat on the low limb of a nearby tree, swinging her legs, munching an apple.

  “You scared the piss out of me,” Cin told her and thrust the knife back into her belt.

  Elif nodded. “I saw that. You’re too jumpy.”

  “I have reason to be. Are you following me?”

  “Maybe you’re following me.”

  Disgusted, Cin tightened the straps on her bag. “I have to work.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Cin stopped walking, and sighing, turned back to the urchin in the tree. “I’m sorry. Thank you for…” She gestured.

  “Saving your life?”

  “For helping save my life. Yes. Thank you. Please thank your people for me.”

  “I will.”

  Cin tilted her head, curiosity getting the better of her. “What are you, exactly?”

  Elif picked the seeds from her apple core, pocketed them, then jumped to the ground. “I’m a Weechin. Otherwise known as a tourbillion, a vortex, a whirlwind…”

  She showed some of her eerie speed as one moment she stood at the base of the tree and the next she stood in front of Cin, holding her palm out. In it sat another apple.

  “Show off,” Cin said and took the proffered apple.

  “Your people are gone. You should have listened to me.”

  Cin felt a quick spurt of anger. “You should have been clearer.”

  Elif shrugged. “I gave you the warning. You didn’t listen. Not my fault.”

  “So why did you help us? And why are you here now?”

  “Searching. As always.”

  “Oh. For shrube.”

  Elif cocked an eyebrow. “No. Shrube are for the humans. We have no wish to leave here. The Gamlogi wouldn’t take us even if we did.”

  “What are you searching for?”

  “Reefer.”

  Cin paused with the apple halfway to her mouth. “Pardon?”

  Elif giggled. “Humans call it reefer, weed, pot… We like reefer.”

  “Why?” Cin began walking again. The girl could follow if she liked. There was no time to stand around talking about getting high. She needed to find shrube and get the hell away from Ripindal.

  “We trade it to the Z’s. They treasure it above all else.”

  “What? Why did I not know this?”

  Again, Elif cocked an eyebrow. “There are many things you don’t know.”

  “Well, if you’re going to hang around, perhaps you could—”

  But before she could blink, the girl was gone.

  “Dammit. I wish she’d stop doing that.” It occurred to her that if Elif hadn’t wanted to be caught back in the reach, Cin wouldn’t have caught her. The kid really had been trying, for some reason, to help.

  Feeling less alone and chuckling occasionally at the thought of a stoned gargoyle, she went to work with a vengeance. Few treasures went into her bag, but armed with new knowledge, she did cram in some marijuana when she came across it.

  Elif was like her own personal guardian angel. Kinda sorta.

  Mach and Elder never left her thoughts. Their absence left a hole inside her, one she couldn’t fill with work or food or exhaustion. But at least mining gave her a purpose, a light at the end of the tunnel. At the end of that tunnel, Mach and Elder would be waiting.

  They had to be.

  It was at that exact moment that she saw her first shrube, and as she fell to her knees and began digging the small red chunk from where it had wedged into the dirt, she took it as a good sign.

  When she had freed the shrube and wiped it clean, she sat back and ran her fingers over its smooth surface, smiling. Inside the shrube was a light so bright it could have lit a dark area a half a mile wide, but if a miner cracked the shrube and let the light out, the Gamlogi would not take it.

  Eventually the light would burn away, and all that would be left was a blackened rock, of no use to anyone.

  Carefully, she wrapped the shrube in a bit of cloth and placed it into her bag. One down, nine to go.

  It was unbelievable that she’d already found a shrube, and that gave her hope. With more of the same kind of luck, she’d be out of Ripindal and back with the men before long. A couple of years, maybe.

  If she was very lucky. And thinking of the shrube she’d already found, she had to believe she was indeed very lucky.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The rest of the day was uneventful. She found no more shrube, no more pot, and finally called it quits before the sun began fading and the moon awakened to guard Ripindal.


  She decided on a place to camp for the night, right at the base of a tree she could shimmy up should trouble come calling. She could only hope trouble couldn’t climb.

  Elif made no more of her sudden appearances. Cin wished she would and had to laugh at herself for her new needs. Before Mach and Elder, she would have shooed the girl away.

  Funny how quickly a person’s views could change.

  She sat beneath her tree, keeping a small fire, drinking her water and eating supper. Ripindal seemed peaceful right then, with a calm, sweet breeze blowing in scents of summer perfume and nearby water.

  Night insects serenaded her, and the moon steadily rose to provide enough light to chase the shadows back.

  She dozed, her fingers close to Saint and Satan, part of her conditioned to be aware of the slightest noise.

  When it came, she was tired enough to be tempted to ignore it and sink back into her dreams and hope she was still alive come morning.

  But she couldn’t. She slid her fingers to the straps holding her knives and popped them loose. Carefully, quietly, she slipped the knives from their beds. They vibrated against her skin, perhaps as pissed as she was at being awakened.

  Most of the night had passed; the fire was a pile of dying embers, and she was thankful. She didn’t want whatever now stalked her to be able to hide behind the blinding blaze of her campfire.

  Her stomach tightened. The sharp metallic taste of fear lay heavy upon her tongue, and dread lit her mind. She was so tired of this shit. So fucking tired.

  Tired of the constant struggle to survive, of the ever-present danger, of stress, and of having fighting knives as her only companions.

  Her enemy was Ripindal, and she wasn’t sure it wouldn’t eventually take her down. She was a puny human.

  Stop it, Cin! Fuck! This was not a good time to lose her spirit.

  Now the noise, furtive and quick, was coming from behind her. With the tree at her back, she slid to her feet, Saint and Satan in her grip.

  Her heartbeat was weak and thready and way too fast. It was too soon after the attack of the dry bones. She wasn’t ready.

  Laughter bubbled from her. Sudden, hysterical, uncontrollable laughter. She couldn’t stop it. The more she tried, the harder she laughed.

  She could feel the surprise of her stalker, and even the crickets seemed to pause to listen. Finally, her laughter died down, and between chuckles she spread her arms, still clutching her knives, and screamed, “Fuck you, motherfuckers! You want me? Bring it!”

  Pretty sure she was nuts, she just didn’t care. She leaped from the shelter of the tree and waited. Let them kill her and get it over with. She’d make them work for the privilege.

  “Come on,” she screamed, and her fear left her. Rage took its place, and she welcomed it, embraced it, held it to her with a ferocious glee.

  “We’re not looking to hurt you, missy. We’re a small group hunting shrube. Didn’t mean to disturb you.”

  Her breathing calmed a little. “How many are you?” She tried to get a glimpse into the shadows but saw nothing, no movement, no shapes, nothing.

  “Seven,” the voice said, a man, and an older one by the sound of him. “One of us is not well. You wouldn’t be a doctor or a nurse, would you?”

  “Right now we’d settle for a vet,” someone else said, garnering a few chuckles from his friends.

  “I’m not. What’s wrong with your friend?”

  “Don’t know,” he replied, and at last stepped from the shadows. “She’s pretty sick.”

  She swallowed hard. “Like how?”

  She saw his shrug. He was a tall, thin man. He wore a baseball cap. She could see little else. “She’s throwing up, weak, fever, cold one minute, hot the next…and she…” He hesitated, glanced over his shoulder, then continued. “She smells pretty bad. Sorry, Luce.”

  She took a deep breath and holstered Saint and Satan. Carefully she knelt, felt for her bag and her blanket, and stood again. “Does she have…marks on her body? Like black moles?”

  Again he hesitated. “Yeah. They came on her before she got sick.” Then his voice sharpened. “What do you know?”

  She sighed. “There’s a virus. It’s contagious. You probably all have it.” She draped her bag over her shoulder and began backing away.

  “Wait a minute! What kind of virus? What do we do for it?”

  She clenched her hands at the desperation in his voice. “The kind that has housekeeping interested, mister. I’m sorry.”

  “Housekeeping,” someone shrieked. “Oh God, no!”

  “Let’s kill Lucy,” another person said. “We can bury her and move on; housekeeping will never know.”

  They will. They will because you all have it. She began backing away once again. She needed to put as much distance as possible between herself and the sick band of miners.

  They began arguing over what to do with the sick woman, some of them saying to just leave her and move on, others yelling that killing her was the better option.

  Cin had almost believed they’d forget about her when one of them shouted, “She’s getting away! She’ll lead housekeeping right to us!”

  She dropped her blanket, slipped her arms through the straps of her bag and ran. If it wasn’t one fucking thing, it was another.

  There was no one place better than another to run to. She didn’t run down the mountain, which might have been easier for her. It would also have been easier for them. Besides, she’d spent hours climbing and wasn’t about to undo all that work now.

  She went up. With any luck, the group would already be feeling some of the effects of the virus and would be weakened, whether they realized it or not.

  Any guilt she might have felt, she shoved away. After all, there was nothing she could do for them. Bastards should have the decency to leave her alone.

  She heard them behind her, tearing through brush and scrambling over ancient stumps and dislodging rocks in their eagerness to catch her. She didn’t know how many were behind her but was pretty sure most of them had joined in the chase.

  High above, the sky began to lighten.

  She wouldn’t have minded Elif’s help at the moment, but Elif wasn’t coming to help this time. No matter. She could surely outrun a bunch of sick human miners.

  But no sooner had she thought it than her boot caught on a root and she went down. Cursing, she got to her feet and couldn’t resist looking for her pursuers.

  They came, four of them that she could see, and were close enough to catch her if she didn’t haul ass.

  Catch her and…cough on her, the diseased fucks.

  That was enough to get her moving again. If she could get enough of a lead, she’d climb to the top of a tree and watch them run all over looking for her. The problem was getting far enough ahead of them.

  For sick people, those dudes could run.

  She ran on, stumbling over roots and stones, briars catching at her hair and clothes, low branches slapping her face.

  Morning came.

  And at the exact moment it made its appearance, or so it seemed to her, she looked up and there stood housekeeping, right in her path. Smiling, silent, waiting.

  She fell to her knees, icy terror clutching at her heart, black spots swimming in her vision.

  From behind her came shouts of victory, but those who chased her had not yet gotten a look at what waited ahead. She almost felt sorry for them. Would have, even, had it not been for the fact that she was now in for as bad a time as they were.

  Mach and Elder weren’t here to save her now, and Danix wanted her. She’d be better off with the virus.

  She got to her feet, not going for her knives. She knew better. No sooner had she stood than the sick miners hit her from behind, one of them shoving her, another grabbing a thick handful of her hair.

  “Got you!” one of them said.

  She grabbed her hair, trying not to breathe lest she inhale the virus. One of the men hit her on the side of her face, and the blow sent her to
her knees once more.

  “Look ahead,” she cried. “Look!”

  But they paid her words no mind. A kick to her ribs sent her flat on the ground, writhing in pain, and she decided she didn’t care if housekeeping got them or not. Assholes, the lot of them.

  A loud, long growl floated to them, and she knew without looking that it came from Danix.

  Her attackers froze, one with his foot in the air as he got ready to kick her again. She rolled away, wondering if she might be able to roll right on down the mountain and get away from the whole hellish bunch of them.

  But Danix had other ideas. “Get her.” He said something else, something she couldn’t understand, and one of his men marched to her, knelt down, and with surprising gentleness, lifted her against his chest.

  He walked back to Danix and stood by his side, holding her like a baby. Danix glanced at her, his eyes as cold and inhuman as always. He looked back at the miners.

  “Why do you chase this woman?”

  None of the humans spoke. She couldn’t blame them. What, after all, could they say? Danix grunted and one of his men loped toward the small group. He grabbed the first one he came to and without warning, broke his neck.

  Just like that.

  The men came alive then, moaning and begging, but not one of them attempting to flee.

  “Now,” Danix said. “Talk.”

  One of the men stumbled forward, fell to his knees and held up his palms beseechingly. “She’s sick,” he blubbered. “She has the spots! You must kill her, quickly!”

  Before he’d finished speaking, the housekeeper holding her dropped her with an exclamation of disgust that transcended all languages. She bit her tongue and felt sure her tailbone had cracked on the long way down. Housekeepers were tall.

  Danix frowned. “You are ill?”

  She sneered at the miners, her temper surfacing. “They’re the ones who’re sick. There are more of them a half mile or so back. They were chasing me because they thought I would share their little secret.”

  Danix bent, grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet. He peered down into her face, his eyes as black as death. “You’re not sick.”

  “No. I’m not.”