by S. Cushaway
Why is he playing some Shyiine mind game now? After everything that happened?
Leigh blinked away the tears and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I’m tired, and I don’t understand why you’re doing this. Kaitar, please. I need help getting back. I can’t drive in this storm.”
“Yes, you can. You walked all the way from Nal’ves and to the Harpers’ Trail before Gren found you. You can drive a few miles in a storm.” He reached for the handle and shouldered the door open. The wind roared into the front carriage, catching beneath the canvas tarp until Leigh thought it would rip right in two.
“Kaitar!” A torrent of sand swept over her as she reached for the flap, trying to hold it steady. The canvas tore from her grip.
“You were my last run, Leigh.” As he slid from the rover and closed the door, some of the tension pulling at her eased a little. Kaitar guarded his face with his forearm. “I’m done. I knew I was done before I took this job.”
Leigh pitched herself across the seat. “Get back in here before the storm suffocates you! Not even a Shyiine can be out in this without cover!”
He stood there, serene, his hair snapping around him like some grasping shadow. “Tell Mi’et to take care of Molly for me.”
“Where are you going? Why? Get back in here, Kaitar Besh! It’s an order, as an Enforcer of Dogton, I—”
His laugh cut her off as much as the howling wind did. Then he coughed, swore under his breath, and shielded his face with an arm until only his eyes showed, the pupils narrowed against the wind. “I’m an Enforcer scout, Leigh, and I’m resigning now. I told you I was going to quit after this one. Well, it’s done, and I’m quitting. You’ll have to tell Orin for me.”
“But, Dogton—”
“I can’t,” he replied, speaking around his forearm. A tear streaked down his cheek, but an instant later the wet spot was gone, dried in the unrelenting gale. “Over forty years a slave, twenty a scout . . . and I’ve seen all I want to see. I’m going. Remember, tell Mi’et to take good care of Molly, and tell him I said goodbye. Tell him I’m sorry for Mariyah.”
Leigh pulled the door open, ignoring the way it squealed against the sand packed in its hinges. “Where?” The wind sucked her breath away. “You can’t go anywhere in this storm! You’ll die!”
Kaitar thrust her back into the rover and pinned her against the seat. “Go home, Leigh. Dogton is your home. It’s not mine. Never was.” He slid away, slamming the rover’s door so hard the jolt rattled her teeth.
Leigh clung to the steering wheel and pulled herself upright. “Kaitar!”
Turning, he called over his shoulder, his sharp profile outlined in red haze. “I’m sorry I’m leaving you to tell Orin, but I can’t do it anymore. I can’t.” His voice dropped so low she almost didn’t hear his next words. “I should have died in that cage.”
She could not find the willpower to call for him again. Barking commands would do no good now; Kaitar was leaving her to drive alone in the storm, and she could do nothing about it. Her hand fell back to her lap, toying with the frayed edge of her dusty, travel-stained yalei.
“Keep in a straight line!” His voice sounded faint against the booming gale.
“Wait!” Leigh tugged the garment off her shoulders—just as she’d done for Romano nearly a week before —and thrust the yalei through the side window. The canvas tarp there flapped madly where it had come undone from the frame. It smacked her in the face, but she shoved it aside and—disregarding the sharp throb along her ribcage—pinned the tarp with an elbow. “Kaitar, wait!”
He’d already staggered several feet from the low wagon. For a heartbeat, Leigh didn’t think he’d heard anything through the gale. Then, he turned, his hair striking his back and shoulders like maddened serpents.
“Take it. You’ll need it out here,” she said, struggling to keep her grip on the yalei as the wind threatened to snatch it away. “To cover your face from the sand.”
Kaitar ducked his head low against the wind and retraced his steps. “Leigh, I don’t—”
“Take it. I won’t need it.” She shoved it against his shoulder, feeling so weary she didn’t know how much longer she could hold the yalei steady. “Do it. You know you’ll need it.”
He pulled the yalei from her and held it securely against his chest to keep it from blowing away. “Thank you.”
There was nothing more to say; Leigh jerked the canvas back over the window, not wanting to see him walking away. She didn’t want to wrestle the familiar, crushing sense of isolation welling up inside her bruised chest. Without thinking, she tied the flap into place, leaned back against the hide-covered seat, and closed her eyes.
She was alone.
For an instant, she could almost feel the weight of Siat-rahl’s body pinning her own to the ground, smell the blood, smell the fire and smoke as the Shyiine burned everything. She heard the screaming, too—panicked howls that rose higher than the wailing wind. Her father’s voice, calling for her, frantic, old, confused. Then, all the voices stopped. The only sound was the wind blowing, and the ghostly smells of ash and blood lingering in her memory.
I will not stay here and wait to die.
That thought—the same thought that had made her climb out from beneath the speared body of her brute husband—prodded her to reality. Leigh opened her eyes, grabbed the shifter, jammed the low wagon into gear, and listened to the engine growl to life. The heavy tires churned and the low wagon lurched forward.
Finally, she gave up trying to see through the tempest and felt her way through, every muscle tense, noting every small change in the engine hum. The rover crept along at a snail’s pace through the storm. Objects emerged in front of the vehicle like wayward ghosts; a withered acacia drifted by, its trunk bent against the storm, bone-white branches grasping like desperate fingers searching for a handhold. Boulders, too, loomed up now and then, sudden and huge. She eased the vehicle around them, waiting for one to crash up against the low wagon. The small, flashing point on the GPS screen seemed frozen in place. Every time she looked at it, her spirits sank and a cruel fear whispered in her mind.
“This is all just a trick, Leih’aja. You’re already dead. Back at Pirahj, perhaps. Maybe Lein Strauss killed you. Maybe you died last night in your sleep and didn’t know it. And now, you’re a Nah’gatt, damned to wander the desert, lost, hungry . . .”
“No,” she said aloud. “No. Dogton’s only a few miles north. I’m not dead. It’s just this storm. This Bloom—it has to be a real Bloom— playing tricks on my mind. I’m tired and I’m hungry and my rib hurts so badly I want to scream, but I’m not dead. I’m not.”
There was no one to answer her. Even the slithering, sly voice of her own fear fell silent.
Listening to the wind, Leigh drove on, her fingers gripping the steering wheel so hard they went numb. Every nerve hummed with adrenaline, and her eyes strained at the swath of red in front of her. Time crawled by. Minutes, hours, or days might have passed; Leigh did not know. It seemed a lifetime ago she’d set out from Dogton. Somewhere, in that endless eternity, she’d lost all hope of finding Gren Turren, had seen Romano Vargas gunned down mercilessly, had seen Kaitar Besh talk to threk before vanishing into the storm.
And she was alone. The last one. The only one crawling forth across the final stretch, toward home. Inch by inch, endless mile by mile. After a stretch of time she couldn’t measure, the green dot flashed again, followed by a little blip-blip.
Less than a mile to go. Almost there.
Leigh’s heart drummed, increasing tempo with every yard. She passed more acacia, and these trees she recognized as the ancient grove she’d seen countless times before on watchtower duty. For the first time in the weeks since Gren had gone missing, something like joy—raw and pure—lifted her spirits. In a few moments, she’d see the big gates punch up through the blowing sand. Vore would be there, standing guard, wearing goggles to protect his eyes, a big yalei over his Enforcer’s jacket. He’d smile, then cough b
ecause the sand got into his mouth, and his mellow voice would welcome her through the gates: “Leigh! I’m damned glad to see you. The captain’s been about sick with worry.”
She’d be home.
The undercarriage shrieked as something unyielding tore across the bottom of the low wagon, jolting her out of her fantasy. Leigh’s hands slipped from the steering wheel as the impact hurled her against the hard door. Pain seared up her battered ribcage. She screamed, doubling over even as the rover spun. The whole vehicle jerked, the right front tire lifting above the ground. The engine squealed as the vehicle pitched sideways, plowing into sand. A metallic roar filled the cabin, wound down to a sputtering whimper, and died away.
The low wagon thudded to the ground, motionless.
For a moment, she could not move and only huddled against the seat, dazed, pulling in short, painful stabs of air. Slowly, Leigh wrapped her hand around her throbbing left side and probed the cracked rib. Overhead, the canvas tarp flapped as the wind howled on.
“See?” The insidious voice laughed. It sounded so much like Lein Strauss, Leigh cringed, expecting to see his face hovering close. “See? You’ll never go back. You’re dead. You’re a Nah’gatt, and every time you think you’re home, you're gonna find yourself alone and lost. Forever.”
But he was not there. It was only her own fear speaking again.
Tears stung her eyes for the second time that day. They rolled down her cheeks as her shoulders shook in mute sobs. She was more tired than she could ever remember being in her life, and this time, there would be no Gren Turren to find her. He was gone. Dead. And even Kaitar Besh, the best scout in the Shy’war-Anquai, had turned his back.
She was alone.
Anger licked beneath the grief and weariness, hot enough to bolster one last wave of strength. Leigh cursed Kaitar under her breath, wishing he were there so she could spit in his face. She wondered why people set such a store of confidence in men. They buckled so easily, showing their soft underbellies whenever the world around them crumbled. Groaning against the cracked rib, she wiped away her tears with an angry, jerky motion.
I hit something. It tore off the axle, I think. It must have been a stump or a boulder, too low to the ground to see in this storm.
Leigh wished she hadn’t given her yalei to Kaitar and let him walk off with it. It would have been useful to keep the blowing sand from clogging her mouth and nose. A low, strange rumble echoed across the heavens, and her eyes fixed on the canvas tarp as if she could see right through it. A flash of light lit the canvas, outlining the dingy stains there—lightning. Another peal of thunder followed, and she realized she had not heard that sound since she’d been a little girl, before the Toros shard at Pirahj had been deactivated.
The grimy material strained, taut, half a foot above her head. The discolored blotches there reminded Leigh acutely of the stain above her own bunk in the barracks, and an aching desire to see Dogton filled her. But an idea—keener than her longing—struck her mind.
The canvas on the window . . . I can pull it off, use it as a bandanna to keep the sand out of my nose.
The canvas did not tear easily, old though it was. Leigh braced herself against the pain, gritted her teeth, and pulled at the material until it finally gave way. The wind immediately caught one tattered strip and sucked it through the window. It vanished in an instant. Leigh cursed, holding tightly to the ragged cloth. Carefully, she untied it from the eyehooks, tucked one end between her knees and made a knot in the other. The musty, fetid odor filled her nose as she yanked it across the lower half of her face. Ignoring the the stink, she pushed the rover door open and slid out.
The wind almost knocked her flat. Leigh leaned against the low wagon to catch her balance. Bracing herself, she lowered her head against the storm and walked. The gale shoved her, pushing against every step until her leg muscles quivered and her knees went rubbery. Grit filled her mouth and nose, gagging her despite the makeshift canvas bandanna. She focused on her boots—almost invisible. At times, it looked as though her legs had simply vanished from the knee down. Keeping the wind to her left, she staggered north. The low wagon vanished, left behind in a sea of scouring sand. Thunder roared far above, and between the rumbling intervals, lightning lit the rolling clouds until they flashed an eerie purple. After each flash, black spots danced before her eyes.
One step. Now another. And another.
It became a chant in her mind, droning on and on, monotonous.
One step. Now another. And another.
She stumbled on an unseen rock. The ground rose up suddenly and struck her so hard her head rang, and sand washed over her like a river, burning her skin wherever it showed. Leigh coughed, struggled to her knees, and fumbled with the rough bandanna. After pulling it back into place she stood, fighting the wind. Every movement was torment as she took up her march again.
One step. Now another.
It was the longest mile she’d ever had to go in her entire life. Every second she expected to look up and see the gates or hear Vore calling to her, and every time she lifted her eyes, and saw nothing.
I’m lost.
Plain, naked terror caught her by the throat; she stopped, panicked, unable to get her bearings. Thunder boomed.
“You see?” Her fear laughed. “Nah’gatt. Already dead. Lost. Soon your daddy's gonna come through this storm, and Siat-rahl and Romano and . . . yeah. Yeah, Gren too. And they’ll know you didn’t save them, but now you’ll be with them. Forever.”
Leigh ran. Somehow, against the storm, her legs moved faster and faster, burning with the effort, lungs hitching, pain searing her ribs.
One step. Now another!
Her knees started to buckle beneath the strain. She screamed inside her own mind to keep going, screamed that if she stopped, it would mean death. The sand would bury her, or lightning would come down in a blinding streak to burn her alive. Or, worse than either, the Nah’gatt—her father, Siat-rahl, Gren, and Romano—reallywould appear out of the red nightmare to drag her away to some final hell. She could see them now, forming a dark line somewhere ahead, too tall to be human, and still. Familiar.
Blinking to clear her eyes, Leigh peered intently at the spot, but the shape did not dissipate. It remained, unwavering. With startling clarity, she realized where she was—a few dozen yards outside Dogton’s big gates.
“Vore, Garv . . . are either of you—”
“Stop!” A voice—muffled by the strange, mechanical rasp of a sand mask—drifted out of the storm. “Identify yourself!”
“Vore!” she called, pleading, so breathless it took the last of her strength to raise her voice. “Open the terminal! Where’s Orin? Vore!”
“Identify yourself!”
Leigh went to her knees. “Leigh Enderi! Vore . . . I need—”
He appeared, a dark splotch against the dim outline of wire and sheet metal, moving toward her, rifle in hand. A sand mask she did not recognize covered his face, but something about his posture rang an alarm in her head, so loud that even the storm seemed insignificant against the fear.
That’s not Vore. It’s not Garv, it’s not Zres or Orin . . . not even Mi’et.
The man stopped in front of her, rifle barrel lowered toward her face, one hand pulling at the heavy mask. Murky, brown eyes squinted down at her, amused. “Well, hello, sweetheart. Guess you made it back from your walk after all.”
“J. T.” Leigh sank to the ground and closed her eyes, waiting to die. Wishing she’d walked off into the storm with Kaitar Besh.
Lost.
An Epiphany
“And in Her Light, Ornealius Zerestus Wallace will find eternal grace.” Just the right amount of solemnity tinged Moad’s voice, melodic even through the heavy sand mask. “And we here, left behind, will honor his memory with prayer and thanks every time we pass the place he fell.”
Bile burned hot at the back of Zres’s throat. He choked it down and stared at the pale, still body lying near a newly dug grave, already ha
lf-filled with blowing sand. They’d dressed Orin in the black jacket and fatigues of a Dogton Enforcer. So much red grit coated the brass captain’s pin no shine remained on the smooth surface. He seemed so small and shrunken. Old. Peaceful. There was no coffin; the only wood available had long since been used for building more important things. Orin’s body would be dumped into the earth and covered with stone and sand, a humble chunk of red granite marking the grave.
My Father. My old man. My fault.
“Orin was loved and respected by all of Dogton for his long years of brave service protecting the citizens of this humble town.” Moad swept his arm toward the group of Enforcers, Zres among them, standing huddled against the wind. The townsfolk brave enough to venture out in the storm stood behind them, heads bowed respectfully. Forming a silent, bristling ring around them all, armed Scrappers waited, their faces hidden behind sand masks.
“The Enforcers have suffered a great loss with his passing. But we should not mourn, for Orin is with Mary now, and looking down on us all.”
“He didn’t believe in that bullshit, and you know it!” The words cracked through the wind like a bullwhip.
“Zerestus, if you’d like to say a prayer, just wait and—”
“He didn’t believe in Mary-fucking-Soulmaker! All he believed in was doin’ his job!” Zres could not stop the words or the tears. The wetness on his cheeks dried instantly in the wind. “You’re feedin’ everyone here a pack of lies! He’s dead! And what happens when you’re dead is you get tossed into a hole, some dirt gets thrown over you, and you rot. There’s no Soulmaker, there’s no Light after death—there’s nothin’!”
“Zres,” Vore said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t.”
Zres shrugged the hand away and rounded on the tall Enforcer. Flashing a smile, he stared at the dusty faces of his comrades, regarding each and every one of them. Vore with his hawk-keen eyes filled with unshed tears. Garv, round-faced and squat, thick arms crossed over her chest as if she wanted to fold up on herself and hide. And behind her, Mi’et, impassive, staring off as if he hadn’t heard a single word being said—a living wall.