Moon-Flash

by Patricia A. Mckillip

  “Why are they digging out there?”

  “They’re unburying a lost city,” Arin said; and when she looked blank, he explained slowly, “Many years ago, a city was built out of stone beside the river. The people who lived then are all dead, and the desert winds buried the city beneath the earth. The people digging find many things: cups, bowls, jewelry, weapons, statues, painted walls, even bones from burial sites. Most of the things are broken, but we piece them together, carefully, so we can see what the people made. Come, I’ll show you.”

  They followed him down one of the quiet, delicately painted hallways.

  “Why are there dust clouds on the hills with no wind?”

  The Hunter translated, and Arin laughed. “You don’t miss much, do you, Kyreol?” He paused, then reached to a shelf and took down a small vase. “Suppose this were covered with dust. What would you do?”

  Kyreol drew a breath and blew. The imaginary dust puffed into the air. She laughed, then looked surprised. “But I can’t blow a cloud that big.”

  “No. But we make—things that blow for us out there. Very gently, so small things aren’t disturbed. Wind covered them up, so we let the wind uncover them. It keeps the diggers from breaking things with their tools.” He put the vase back and led them into a huge, sunlit room. It was, Kyreol thought, as if all the pots and knives and beads and bone bracelets, all the hunting traps and spears and carpets and children’s toys in the Riverworld had all been gathered into one place, to be sorted out again. Long tables held piles of beads, bits of pottery, small broken statues, all waiting to be mended. A couple of people sat at the tables, piecing things together. They glanced up, smiling, then went back to their work.

  “This is what we gather out of the diggings.”

  “But why?”

  “To see how people before us lived. How they looked at this world. What they loved.”

  He took them through a doorway into another room. This one held things that at first glance meant very little; nothing about them said what they were for. There were sandstone pillars with odd signs on them, small painted stones, paintings on leather, shapeless carvings of wood and bone, masks without faces, fiery wheels of feathers. Kyreol, standing in the center of the room, felt as if she had suddenly gone deaf in a place full of chattering people. Arin watched her a moment, smiling. Then he took one of the stones off its shelf.

  “What does that say to you?”

  Kyreol held it in her hand. Nothing. The stone was as big as her palms, worn into a smooth oval, probably by the river. There was a black line down the center of it. “The story is in two parts,” she said tentatively. She heard the Hunter translate to Arin. She added, remembering her dream, “Maybe it’s a message to someone.” On one side of the stone is a man. “No.” She looked more closely. “It’s a woman. There are little trees all around her. Maybe that’s her sign. She lives among small trees. Then there is the black line. Then…” A blue line cut across the other side of the stone, with lean black smudges rising out of it and a tiny circle, like a black moon, rising over them. “I don’t…” The breath went out of her suddenly “Oh…the faces. Beside the river. That’s the message. Moon-Flash. This woman who lived among the little trees is dead. She’s buried inside the faces.”

  She looked up at Arin, who took the stone from her gently. He was silent for a moment, then he said something to Orcrow, who nodded. Arin set the stone down.

  “You have seen the faces.”

  “Yes.”

  “You touched them.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “Because—I wanted to know why people would make such huge stone faces. I just—I wanted to know.”

  Arin sighed audibly. She felt Terje’s hand touch her, lightly. The Hunter said to her, “Arin has never seen the faces. He’s seen pictures of them. For most people, the journey there is forbidden. He said that you have a great gift for understanding things people want to say without words. He thinks you should stay here. He can teach you many things.”

  “But—” Kyreol felt bewildered. Where was “here”? Here was only a pause in the river’s movement, a place with no true name, a house that held only things that would never be used again, forgotten by the people who made them. The Hunter took her hands. His dark eyes looked deeply into hers.

  “Kyreol. My world is very different. There, everything is spoken. Dreams mean nothing. If you see it, your eyes will change. You may never be able to look at the Riverworld again.”

  “You did,” she whispered. Her throat burned. “You lived in both worlds. Why?”

  9

  THAT NIGHT, asleep beside Terje in the room full of tapestries, Kyreol dreamed she was flying on the back of a butterfly. She had seen a few tiny butterflies in the Riverworld, colored pale pink and green like the leaves of the River-Tree. This one was huge, with wings silky black as night; lights glowed in them like stars. It lifted her into the air, swooped with her; she clung to its antennae, laughing, unafraid even of its great, golden eyes. Then a voice like the voice from the crystal said, “Cleared,” and, suddenly terrified, she groped behind her, saying, “Terje.” He was there, unexpectedly; she felt his hand in hers. She woke up then and saw the tapestries settling lightly as wings in the morning breeze.

  She lifted her head, saw Terje asleep. He was close to her, but she felt lonely, suddenly, as if the room were about to tear apart and float him away from her, still dreaming. Panicked, she said his name; he lifted his face out of the cushions, murmuring, blinking. He saw the fear in her face and reached for her hand. Then he shifted, pulling her against him, holding her closely, his arms around her, his cheek against her cheek. But it wasn’t enough. She still felt far from him, as though time and water and the earth itself were between them; she couldn’t get close enough to feel safe.

  “My bones are afraid,” she whispered.

  “Did you have a dream?”

  “I don’t know why.” Then she laughed a little at herself, because she couldn’t imagine where so much fear might come from. The laughter made her feel better. “Terje,” she said, thinking of what might lie ahead of them, “I was never afraid until now.”

  “Yes, you were.”

  “Not like this. Not of things I haven’t even seen.”

  “Your mother has seen them,” he said, and the thought comforted her a little.

  “Yes. I wonder… I wonder if she’ll like me.”

  Terje stared at her. The expression on his face was so comical she laughed again, and the fear finally dwindled away. Then there was a silence between them as they looked at one another. The breeze seemed to still; the sunlight seemed the world might never be the same. Their faces drifted toward each other, like small boats in slowly moving water. Before they touched, the silence broke. They heard footsteps, Arin Thrase singing.

  Terje’s breath drained softly out of him. His mouth crooked. He drew Kyreol against his chest; she listened to his heartbeat, felt him kiss her hair. She closed her eyes, feeling close to him at last, safe for a while.

  “Terje.”

  He made a noise.

  “When we see the Hunter’s world, then we’ll know what to do. When we come to the end of the river.”

  Arin opened their door then, bringing them breakfast.

  When they left his treasure house to go downriver, they saw that their boat was no longer moored among the waterlilies. Arin gestured toward a small dock bobbing along the river’s edge.

  “It will be safe there,” Orcrow said. “We’ll take a faster boat.” He was no longer the Hunter, Kyreol sensed. His face belonged to his own world; already his eyes were seeing it. Arin Thrase took her hand, put something into it.

  It was a tiny painted stone, shaped like a raindrop, a hole bored at one end so she could wear it around her neck. A yellow dot rising over a line of blue… It made her smile.

  “Good fortune,” Arin said, in the language of the Riverworld. He added something that Orcrow translated.

 
“If you want to come back here, you will always be welcome.” He dropped his arms around their shoulders. “Come. This is the shortest and the longest journey.”

  They stepped into a boat, which wasn’t made of wood. It was bright red, and like the crystal, it could talk. Kyreol sat down with a thump on one of the cushions in it. Orcrow offended the boat; it roared beneath them angrily and went backwards instead of forwards. Kyreol shrieked and tried to hide in the carpet on the floor of the boat. Terje slid down beside her, but Orcrow, implacable, eased the boat smoothly away from the dock. He turned a wheel in his hands, and the boat turned, picked up speed, and skimmed down the river, still thundering beneath them, tearing swatches of water into the air.

  After a while, Kyreol realized that Terje was no longer huddled beside her. She lifted her head unhappily, feeling surrounded by the giant heartbeat of the boat. Terje was standing up beside Orcrow, watching the water part before them. Kyreol stared at him, amazed and annoyed. He was grinning. He had completely forgotten her. She got to her feet slowly. The wind and water whipped at her, but she moved forward, under the canopy, clear as air, hard as wood, that shielded them from the wind.

  Orcrow moved a red stick, and the boat slowed, its voice softening. He glanced back, his face distant, almost hard. When he found Kyreol on her feet, he stopped the boat, let it drift in the water.

  They heard river noises again, birds, the rustle of trees. Orcrow went to Kyreol, took her shoulders.

  “Many things will frighten you now,” he said. “But this is what you wanted. I’m giving you what you asked for. Just remember: you are safer with me than you have ever been since you reached Fourteen Falls. And before I let anything harm you, I would die first.”

  Kyreol swallowed. Her chin lifted; she lied with dignity, though he could see her still shaking. “Nothing in your world can make me afraid, Orcrow.” Then, as he smiled, she asked perplexedly, “But how does it work?”

  He set the boat purring beneath them, moving sedately, and tried to explain. To explain, he had to teach them new words. Kyreol learned them patiently, though she could have thought up a far better story of how the boat with the bellowing voice moved so quickly through the water.

  Then Terje wanted to drive the boat. When Kyreol protested, he said, “It’s simple. When you turn the wheel, the boat turns. When you push the red stick up, it goes faster. When you push it down, it slows.”

  “Is that all?” She turned to Orcrow. “Why didn’t you just say that?”

  He sighed.

  They spent that night on the riverbank under the stars, as they had done so many nights before. They built a fire and heated food that Arin had given them. Kyreol found it hard to sleep. The boat had unlocked all the noise in the world. The river chattered in a strange language; night birds made harsh noises. Even the sky spoke occasionally, droning like a mosquito. She got up finally, restlessly, and walked away from the river, homesick for the first time for the small peaceful noises of the Riverworld, for trails she could walk at night with her eyes closed, that led from one safe spot to another. She went through a grove of trees, so quietly she didn’t wake the birds, and up a small hill until she could barely hear the noise of the river.

  She stood in the moonlight, searching the face of the moon, and it comforted her. It was tranquil and serene, the message-stone of the night, painted crystal-white, meaning peace. She wondered, for the first time, if it wouldn’t have been wiser not to ask so many questions if the answers were so confusing, so full of change and noise. Maybe she should go back… Her eyes strayed away from the moon, followed stars down to the edge of the horizon. But they didn’t stop there. Thousands upon thousands of stars glittered on the dark earth, in the distance, on both sides of the river.

  She sat down slowly on the cool, hard ground. Something enormous hovered above the lights. Big as a mountaintop, shaped like a half-moon tipped over…like a dome. Its underside was ringed with lights. It was dark, shadowy, smoldering from within with white fire, blue fire. Tiny burning insects winged in and out of it…

  She huddled against herself, hugged her knees tightly, pushed her face against them. There were no stories for such a thing. There was only truth. The Hunter had told her that. The Riverworld was so small it could have been lost among those stars and never found. Once it had been the entire world. Now it was no bigger compared to the world than her thumbnail was to her.

  “You wanted to know,” she whispered to herself. “You wanted to know.” She lifted her head again, crying helplessly, out of fear, for lost tales, until, in her blurring tears, the vast thing in the sky took on a fiery beauty such as she had never seen. She wiped her eyes, gazing at it, glimpsing the strangeness of the Hunter’s world. It meant nothing. It was itself. It held no messages, it had no need of stories. It was an answer.

  She stirred finally and found the Hunter, sitting quietly as a stone, not far from her. She blinked at him, wondering how—wondering why…

  “Why did you learn to move like that?” she whispered.

  “To become a hunter.”

  “In your world?”

  “In yours.”

  “Why?”

  He shifted to sit beside her, said softly, “Kyreol, the Riverworld is tiny, but its names and rituals are far older than that city. Many people know it exists. Very, very few are ever permitted to go there. I was one permitted. We go…because the Riverworld, its tales, its way of life, is something we value. Something precious. We go occasionally, secretly, disturbing no one, to make certain that nothing we do under that great dome disturbs the Riverworld. Not only the Riverworld, but all the small worlds within the world. We go even among the mask-people, among the river-tribe who built the faces. It’s a harsh, difficult thing to do. Sometimes it’s dangerous. But we go not to bring knowledge, not to bring change, but to observe. To watch over these little worlds. To guard their peace.” His face eased a little. “That’s why when you and Terje left the Riverworld because of me, the people in that dome were so angry with me. I should never have disturbed you, never caused you to question. But, having caused that, now I’m responsible for you.”

  “My mother—is she there?”

  “She came there, yes. Only…she came alone down that river. She never saw the stranger in the Riverworld. As you did. She simply asked, ‘Where does the river go?’ And she got into a boat and followed it.”

  Kyreol smiled a little, wiping at dried tears. “I’m more afraid than she was.”

  “Kyreol, you and Terje have so much courage you fill me with wonder.”

  “Terje…” She plucked a grass stem at her feet, tore it delicately along its seam. “He—we—”

  “I know. You love him. And you are betrothed.” He chuckled as she stared at him. “I’m trained to know about the Riverworld.”

  “He is to be betrothed, at the next Moon-Flash.”

  The Hunter was silent for a long time. “What does he want to do?”

  “I don’t know. He doesn’t know. He—” She frowned at the grass pieces, twisting them together. “He doesn’t want to trouble the Riverworld either. To disturb its rituals. Sometimes I think he never left it. All this is the dream. The betrothal at Moon-Flash—that’s the way things really are. Not this.” The immense floating dome drew her eyes again. Lights pulsated; it swallowed tiny flying things like a fish. “What is it for?”

  “It’s for—it’s like the dock where the boats were moored. Only—”

  She turned to him, her eyes big. “The things that fly like birds—they’re boats? Boats for the air?”

  “Ships.”

  “Ships.”

  “Yes. Some of them come from other worlds. Other earths.” He gestured across the endless span of stars. “From there. They make their journeys down the river of the stars to come to Domecity.”

  “It’s a story,” she breathed, entranced. “You’re telling me a story.”

  “Some of the animals you saw along the river were from other worlds. Worlds too crowde
d, too busy to take care of them. So they were sent here, to live freely in the wilderness.” He touched her hair lightly, smiling at the look on her face. “Do you like the story?”

  She nodded. “Oh, yes. What does my mother do here?”

  “She—” The Hunter’s voice stopped the story. “I think she should tell you. It’s not easy for me to explain.” He stood up, then; she watched him. He held out his hand, a dark, still figure in the night, as she had first seen him.

  “Hunter,” she whispered.

  “Yes.”

  She let him pull her to her feet, stood beside him, gazing down at the city of stars.

  The next day, they began to see people along the riverbanks. The river grew wide; houses of bewildering shape and size crusted its banks. There were no silent places anymore. The hot air seemed to throb with a dull, constant boom, like a heartbeat growing louder and louder. Boats crowded into the water, eluding each other in a graceful, unspoken ritual. Some were beautiful, catching the breeze with colored wings. Some sped and roared; others dropped out of the air like dragonflies, drew in their feet, unfurled their wings, and loosed fishing lines as they moved upriver. Terje, trying to drive and stare at the same time, almost hit one of them. A man on it yelled unknown words at him. Orcrow took the wheel, and Terje sank down beside Kyreol on the cushions. His body looked tense, defensive, as though all the sounds and colors were storming at him. Kyreol, watching him, wondered if his face would ever become quiet again. Then, slowly, he changed, something inside of him flowing outward, a current of peace, protecting him from the world.

  “How do you do that?” she asked. He looked at her out of calm eyes.

  “Do what?”

  “Whatever it is you’re doing.”

  “I’m not doing anything.”

  “Well, what were you thinking about?”

  He scratched his head. “I don’t know. All the different shapes the world makes.”

  They saw buildings steep and high as cliffs and others the same shape as the little turtle-shell houses of the Riverworld, only a hundred times bigger. Some buildings twisted themselves into peculiar shapes; their colors were smooth, bright, glistening like water. Factories, Orcrow called them. They made everything, he explained. Boats, the cloth they were wearing, airships. The air above them hummed busily, looking as crowded as the water. Finally, rounding a curl in the river, Kyreol saw the dome again.