"Careful," Gavi warned. "A couple are okay, but you don't want to drink too much."
The second leaf was warming, and Ben felt the soreness leaving his muscles.
Isika bounded over to them. "Okay!" she said. "Why don't we run the next few miles, get closer to Kital?"
Jabari and Gavi burst out laughing. "Can you imagine what one more would do to her?" Gavi asked Ben, and Ben widened his eyes and shook his head.
"Don't drink any more, Isika," he said, though he looked longingly back at the nectar leaves as they left them behind and traipsed back to the road.
They swam the first river, stripping to their underclothes in the sunshine of the morning. It wasn't swimming, exactly, more wading through water up to their armpits. The water was cool but not frigid. Ben's mind settled into a low hum, with no imminent threats nearby. He was at peace with his mind and body, and the water was gentle on him. As they crossed, they carried their packs on their heads. Jabari gave his pack to Gavi so that Gavi carried two, and Jabari carried Ibba on his shoulders, leading the way across the wide river.
Ben walked with Gavi, since the older boy was a bit slower, encumbered by two packs. He was also breathing heavily and Ben shot a glance at him when he heard Gavi's breath hitch in his throat. The water was up to his collarbone.
"Are you all right?" he asked, reaching a hand out to steady Gavi.
Gavi nodded, one stiff nod, and frowned in concentration as he regained his balance. In a few minutes, they reached the shore and joined the others, who were lying on the bank, drying in the sun.
"I'm afraid of water," Gavi said to Ben, finally, his breath slowly going back to normal. Ben raised his eyebrows.
"You?" he said, reaching under himself to retrieve a rock that was digging into his back. "I wouldn't imagine anything could make you afraid." He looked at the tall, broad-shouldered, near-man beside him, with hair like a wheat field that had been bleached in the sun. Gavi shrugged.
"Nothing does," he said, then glanced at Ben. "Except water."
Ben waited for an explanation, enjoying the feeling of the sun on him. In a moment, Gavi offered a slight one. "My father thinks it comes from being outcast. Many of us are afraid of water." Ben looked at him sharply. It made sense, he guessed, if they remembered being adrift in boats, even asleep. Or maybe they remembered being told they would be sacrificed in a boat. Maybe that was enough.
Jabari called that they needed to keep moving. Ben stood and pulled his pack on without dressing again. They walked in their underclothes, ready for the next river.
Ben worried that Kital would be afraid of water. He had a question for Gavi.
"Your father?" he asked.
Gavi nodded. "My adopted father. We all get new parents, you know. All the outcast."
CHAPTER 17
"Just over the next hill," Jabari called.
As Isika arrived at the summit of the hill, the view stretched out around her, so she could see squares of yellow grain stitched together, tall forests in the distance. Off to their left was a village of small homes with no walls separating them. Just before them, a wide swathe of water ran westward, crossing their path. Isika strained her eyes, but she couldn't see the expanse of the sea. They had walked far inland.
She had dreamed about Kital the night before, and she found herself thinking about him all day as they walked, remembered his tiny body next to hers at night. Sleepily feeding him out of a glass jar with a rubber nipple tied to the top, she had poured all her love into the little baby as she grieved for her mother. She remembered bathing him, how at first she had been terrified that she would drown him, how, as he grew older, he smiled and played in the water, how he had always loved the water and begged to spend time near the sea. Once, when Kital was about three years old, and they were visiting Jerutha's mother, he had asked Isika if they could swim in the sea beyond her door.
"No, of course not!" she had said, shivering at the sight of the black, choppy waters. Now, as they approached the green river, she wished she could introduce him to the warm, pleasant water of Maween, to show him new fruit or how to open his mouth and let nectar fall in. She pulled her shoulders in. Nothing was whole without him. She felt like she was missing a part of herself.
Isika walked faster. He was only four years old. She hoped they were being kind to him. But of course the rescuers would be used to two-year-olds… they would know how to care for young ones. Suddenly she thought of eight-year-old Aria, sent out in the tiny boat, nearly too small to hold her. She shoved the thought back. Hope too painful for words tried to spring into her mind, but she pushed and pushed, until she had stopped herself from thinking about her lost sister.
As they drew near to the river, she saw that it was much broader than it had appeared in the distance, with small islands in the center. She turned to Jabari, her eyes wide. "We have to swim this?"
She had loved swimming the last river; beautiful, full of warmth and the flowing strength of a hundred little forest springs. She still felt invigorated from the swim. This river was three times as wide though.
He shook his head, smiling. "This one we cross in a boat," he said. "It's the largest of the delta rivers." He went on when she didn't understand. "The mother river is called the Erial, the great river of Maween. Erial fans into many rivers as she makes her way to the sea at the deltas. Our city is built far upstream, on the feet of the Sister mountains, where Erial begins her journey."
Isika frowned. "So why don't we walk beside the river and cross where it is smaller?" she asked. The river's swift current looked dangerous.
Jabari shook his head. "Too slow," he said. "The road we follow leads straight to the city. Following the river would be a rough trail and eventually we would reach canyons that are difficult to travel. That way would take many more days than the road we are now on."
Isika nodded and took a deep breath. She would go the way that brought her to Kital the fastest.
They climbed down the hill to a dock that had several small round boats tied to it. Gavi reached down to untie one while Jabari pulled an oar out of a nearby tree. The boat had bright paintings of water animals looped around its sides, with a sort of oily sealant over them. Isika leaned closer to look at the paintings. It was not a long boat like the ones the rescuers had used to take Kital. This boat was completely round, like a deep bowl that sat in the water.
"Whose boat is it?" she asked, curious.
Jabari glanced at her from where he was inspecting the oar, running his hand along it. "It's mine," he said. Isika supposed that made sense. It would always be tied to the dock on the side of the river where he needed it. "It's a coracle," he added. "The people of this village are craftsmen of this type of boat."
"Jabari has a thing for collecting boats," Gavi said, his voice dry. "He likes to gather a variety, so he can endanger his life in many different ways."
He held the boat close to the dock while they clambered inside, rocking back and forth as they tried to settle in without tipping. They sat on blocks set into the bottom of the boat. Gavi was deathly white and his jaw was clenched. Jabari had a wild, happy look on his face. His eyes flashed.
"Hold on!" he called out. He leaned his head back and laughed an exhilarated laugh, then plunged his oar in the water. Isika widened her eyes at Ben, and he smiled and shook his head.
"Enough with the theatrics," Gavi said. "Let's get through the river and onto the sweet, sturdy land."
The boat spun wildly as it set out, sitting very low in the water. "How many people can this boat carry?" Isika asked, her stomach plunging.
"Shhhh," Jabari said. "I'm concentrating."
Gavi shut his eyes. He was gray, now, and his lips moved silently. Ibba slipped her small hand into his, and he immediately looked a little better, his eyes flying open.
"Wow, Ibba. That's quite a gift." He shook his head, smiling slightly. "The three of you are the strangest poison-landers I've ever met. Thanks, little one, that feels better."
Isika was b
arely listening. She concentrated on the water that surrounded them, cool, smooth, and full of life. Its energy reached her as the swift waters curved around their little bowl, and as she closed her eyes she could see the river as a young stream, making its way down the mountains, gathering speed near villages. She saw cows bathing in its shallows as it passed lazily through the fields, gathering speed until it roared to meet the ocean.
She opened her eyes. A group of the large, fish-like sea animals encircled the boat, gliding through the water with ease. One leapt out of the air and flipped, splashing Isika, then several more followed his example. Isika caught her breath. Beside her, Ibba stared at the water animals with round eyes. They swam and jumped, curving in the air like the wind itself, their shapes mimicking the rounded currents of the river. Jabari laughed again, the sound of it long and loud and clear in the air. He shifted from laughter to a wild song Isika had never heard before, paddling all the while. The sky was very blue, the animals pink against it.
Jabari stopped singing. "My father told me that the naia are the most joyful of creatures because they have the clearest memory of the Shaper. They spend their days dancing their memories," he said.
Isika's heart ached at the sight of them. "Naia," she breathed, and the word clicked into place as though she had always known it. She felt that she wanted something, badly, something she could barely remember. "We have stories of something like this called the dolfina, but I thought it was just a fairy tale," she said.
Jabari nodded. "Some people call them by that name. We call them naia, the friends of the sea."
Isika held her hand out to one of the naia, and he swam over to her and nudged her hand with his rubbery nose.
Welcome, she heard him say clearly in her mind, and she gasped. The naia left his nose in her hand until, as one, they turned and swam downstream, jumping one after the other, their bodies rising and disappearing in waves. Isika watched until they were too far to see, and still she could feel their peaceful spirits.
Jabari guided the coracle to the shore and held it fast while the others cautiously climbed out of the boat. Isika's knees wobbled. Jabari carefully tied the boat to the dock there and after a moment of stretching and some strengthening tea from Gavi's flask, they continued on their way, Isika giving the wide river one last longing glance before she followed the others.
They swam the next river when the sun was beginning to slant toward the western sky. The water was warm and clear, and when they reached the other bank they lay in the afternoon sun for a while, but then Isika sat up and said, "Let's keep going. We can dry as we walk." Jabari nodded, and they walked in their underclothes. Isika marveled at herself, walking with two boys she knew only slightly, legs and arms and face warm in the sun. Isika, who a few days ago had been averting her eyes because eye contact was impolite.
She walked with Gavi as Jabari, Ben, and Ibba walked on ahead, Ibba's head swiveling from one tall boy to the other as she chatted away. She looked like a small sparrow, hopping every few steps.
"Do you remember life in the Worker village?" Isika asked Gavi.
He glanced at her. He was very tall, at least a head and a half taller than her, and she was not short. "Also," she couldn't help adding. "You're very tall for a Worker." He smiled at that.
"It's remarkable what good food will do," he said. Then his face grew serious. "No," he said. "I don't remember. They cast me out when I was two years old. Sometimes I think I can remember shapes, or smells, or sounds, but I don't remember my parents. I don't remember their faces or the sounds of their voices. I wish I could, sometimes. But other times, I'm glad that I can't. Some of the other Rescued remember well, and it's hard for them; remembering people they loved who cast them away."
Isika felt a flash of alarm. Until they found Kital, he would be like that, remembering his brother and sisters but knowing they had allowed him to be cast away. They needed to get to him, and soon. Isika couldn't bear the thought of her little brother believing that they hadn't wanted him. And, as always, as it had in every moment of the last four years, the memory of Aria threatened to overtake her, but Isika pushed it away, again, again, again. She was so used to pushing away grief that she didn't know how to allow hope to come in. She looked at Gavi for a moment, wondering if she should ask him about her sister, but although she opened her mouth to speak, she couldn't get the words out. Her heart was hot with pain. She focused on the trees they were walking under, the way the branches met overhead and the blue, blue sky beyond.
Jabari, Ibba, and Benayeem were just out of sight around a curve in the road, heading toward the fourth river. After this there would be two more, but Jabari had told them they were small and not anything to worry about. Isika wasn't worried anyway, so far she had loved the rivers, even the biggest.
Jabari's shout rang out in the stillness of the afternoon. "Gavi!" They could hear the alarm in his voice clearly, sharp as a knife. "Come quick!"
Gavi broke into a run, and Isika started after, struggling to keep up with the tall boy's long legs. They ran around the bend in the road, straight to the bank of the next river, where Jabari and the others stood gazing into the water.
As soon as Isika saw the river, she knew something was very wrong. The river didn't feel alive at all. It was dark gray and the waters flowed slowly and painfully, as though they were prisoner to something horrible. In some places the water was completely still. Pools grew a thick white scum on their surface. The whole place reeked of rot. Isika felt compelled to go toward the water to touch it, but as she moved, Jabari cried out, "Stop!"
He looked relieved when she stopped.
"If I get you to the city alive, Isika, it will be a miracle. This water has been poisoned. Its touch is fatal."
They stood and stared at the river. It was painful to look at, as though there was no life in it at all.
"What can we do?" Isika asked. "We have to cross it."
"Gavi, we need to try a healing," Jabari said. Gavi drew in a breath.
"What?" Isika asked, looking up at Jabari. "What's the problem?" She looked at Gavi and saw that once again, his face was white.
"We can do it," Jabari said, his face set and determined. And after a moment, Gavi nodded, but still he looked afraid. "You three need to back up, come on, we're not joking about this."
Then, like a nightmare, it happened. Jabari reached for a long staff from his pack. Ibba came closer to see it, ignoring Jabari's instructions. Ben started forward quickly to pull her back, but his right foot slipped on the wet grass at the bank, or perhaps the river itself pulled him in. He reached out for something to catch hold of, but his hands flailed in empty air and he fell, slipping over the bank and into the poisoned water.
CHAPTER 18
Jabari and Gavi shouted and Ibba screamed as they saw Ben go over the edge. Isika threw herself on the bank and clutched at her brother's reaching hand, so she saw the moment the water touched him. His eyes went wide with horror and then they stared blankly, as though the water had killed him instantly. She held onto his hand with all her strength.
"Pull me back," she called to the others, and she felt strong hands on her legs, hauling her away from the river's edge. She and Ben inched up the bank until they were both on the dry ground, she still holding onto Ben's one dry hand. He was frozen, stuck in the same crumpled pose. She stood, horrified at the brown sludge that covered him.
"What do we do?" she cried, looking at Jabari and Gavi. Tears were flowing unchecked out of Gavi's eyes, and Jabari's face crumpled.
"There's…" he was silent for a moment, then went on. "There's nothing, Isika. We can't heal that. Only one of the strongest elders could do it, and by the time we reach them, it will be too late."
But Isika wasn't paying attention anymore, because the tugging inside had become very strong, and her anguish at what they were saying was overcome by a strong desire to touch him.
She moved quickly and right before she grabbed him, she heard Jabari shout, "Isika! No!" But he was
far too late, because her brother was in her arms. Her heart was full of every single thing they had been through together, from walking in the desert hand in hand, back when they were small, to imagining things beside the wall in the garden at their house, to sending their mother out in the funeral boat, to staring dead-eyed at the walls when they were so overcome by grief they couldn't do anything else. She thought of the way their eyes would meet when Ibba or Kital said something ridiculous, the way his bowed head looked from behind when he trudged out to the temple in the early mornings. Now she knew his whole being had cried out against being in the temple. A sudden rage filled her as she held him. This was his time. He couldn't die now, just as he was breaking into a better life.
She leaned over and laid her forehead on his. The poison, murky with despair, drained out of him and filled her, but instead of killing her, it met the fire in her heart and fizzled out. The poison met the strength of the trees moving through her and vanished like steam. She knew he would be fine.
She dropped him and stood as an even stronger pull tugged at her. Ben's eyes opened and he sat up, but she saw it as though from a great distance, occupied with the need that screamed at her from the river. She turned her back on the others, who were bending over Ben, and dove into the river in one straight, clean dive, like a water bird.
The poison of the river was much stronger than what she had felt in Ben's body. It pressed against her, urgent in its despair, and she felt it clouding her mind. It was malevolent, desiring to suck the ability to think or move right out of her, but she forced her hands in front of her face, with the strength of a tree that withstands the rain, and pushed them back through the water to her sides. She swam like a fish or a strong water bird. The water glowed where she touched it, and she felt the poison loosen its grip. Just before her lungs gave out, she broke through the surface, inhaled sharply, and dove back below.
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