Veracity

by Mark Lavorato

  I returned to the hut at nightfall, and brought the cage outside to feed the raven there. It complained as much as usual when I moved it, but, happily, if uncharacteristically, it didn't peck at my hands when I placed pieces of fruit between the bars. It was looking healthier by the day, and was certainly becoming more animated, more vocal, watching my every movement with more of an interest than with intimidation. I brainstormed aloud in the dark, leaning on an elbow, talking through different possibilities for the release mechanism of the boulders, the raven almost managing to sound interested with its well-timed gurgling noises.

  I didn't sleep well that night, waking to every movement the bird made in its cage, thinking that it was another warning, that it might be the signal to make a mad dash for the rope, which, I was at least comforted to know, was dangling in the gorge, bright yellow against the marbled green rock, ready to save me.

  * * *

  37

  I had imagined that I was going to clear a clean path that tunnelled through the limbs of the bushes, a tube of slashed branches that would allow me to run through the plateau and arrive on the other side of it within minutes. But if there was one thing that I learned on my first day of clearing, it was that this plan would need some serious rethinking. After tying my cutting tools to the end of the rope and climbing it, and then hoisting them up behind me, I began chopping and thrashing the bushes with the greatest of determination. But at the end of the day, I hadn't really made any progress - maybe five to ten metres - which only brought me to the conclusion that I wasn't going to be cutting a trail through the shrub plateau at all. Instead, it would have to be a kind of chaotic line that followed the path of least resistance, a meandering route that I would set out to weaken, define, and memorize.

  While I did this, every night after returning to the hut raw-skinned and exhausted, I would carry the raven's cage out into the grove of fruit trees and sit down to eat something. And as I put pieces of fruit in my mouth or tossed them in front of the bird, I couldn't stop myself from giving the land below slow, worried glances; my senses alert, waiting for signs of the Creatures.

  However, as stressed as I was about them, there was one thought that would sometimes calm me, which was that if they hadn't returned yet, it almost seemed likely that they never would. True, they might have been using the days to gather and organize as a single force, but they might also have simply chosen to run away and steer clear of me. Maybe I was safe. Maybe I was overreacting and didn't have anything to worry about except growing enough food for myself. I couldn't know. The only thing I knew for certain was that I had to continue working as hard and as fast as possible on the route through the bushes. Just in case.

  On the fifth day of weaving back and forth, chopping certain limbs, shaving off the spines of others so I could pass over them, or cutting away the vines and thorny underbrush so I could pass underneath, I made my way toward the river to check the depth of the gorge for the last time. As I'd hoped, the canyon walls had become low enough to jump inside, and the ravine of the rushing stream was wider. I was also happy to find that the vegetation right beside the water had been cleared away (as had been done further downstream) from the frequent flooding of the river. I imagined I would be able to continue into the plateau with relative ease from that point on, following the shore of the river. I now had a functional escape route.

  I devoted the next couple of days to weakening the rusted wires that held back the boulders, and building a release mechanism that I hoped would free the massive rocks when pulled. I had placed a thin log into a kind of makeshift bracket that I'd made, and then tied the meshing of wire to it. Once this was done, and I was sure that it would hold, I unfastened all the joints of the wire until the entire weight of the boulders was on the log, so that if I could bring it above the shallow brackets, everything inside would come toppling down the hill. (Though, I obviously couldn't test this. It would have to remain in the abstract world of theory, until the moment came that I would need that theory to be absolutely surefire.)

  Yet, despite all of these precautions, I still didn't really feel safe, and I managed to think of one last thing I could do to prepare for a potential ambush. It occurred to me that I knew nothing about the land beyond the plateau, the terrain I would actually be fleeing through - were it to come to that. So, in order to prevent getting cornered or lost while being chased, I decided to do some exploring. At first, I planned to venture further upstream for a few days, but this would mean leaving the raven behind to fend for itself; and as it had been spending so much time suspended in the hut, which it absolutely hated, I thought it would be best to spare the poor bird the added stress. Instead, I decided to explore as much as I could for only half a day. That way, I could be back by the evening, as usual.

  I travelled light, only bringing some fruit and a knife and set off at daybreak. I quickly threaded through the bushes and jumped into the far end of the canyon, where I began hiking along the wide riverbed, deeper into the plateau. After a few hours, the river began to wind and curve, snaking back and forth through the bushes. I followed the endless twists, moving fast, trying to cover as much ground as possible before midday, hoping to sight the end of the plateau or the beginning of a transitional zone that would lead into another ecological region. And after a few hours of hiking, that's exactly what I found.

  The shrubs were beginning to thin, the spaces between them spreading and making way for different flora, usually taller trees with waist high plants at their base, until eventually, just as it was nearing midday, the land started to open up. As I followed the river around a slow bend, I caught sight of some hills in the distance, their hunched backs speckled with thinly interspersed trees. I was ecstatic. Finally, I knew what came after the shrub plateau. It wasn't another barrier of dense vegetation that was barring my way, but something completely manageable. Without even touching it or walking through it, I could already see it was a landscape that would lend itself to easy travel, a place that I could traverse quickly through, yet remain relatively concealed.

  I was done; I had a trap that would buy me the needed minutes to get to the rope well in front of them, the rope itself, the route memorized through the bushes, and now the knowledge of what lay beyond the plateau. At last, after all of the work and preparation that had been carried out since the night the Creatures had come to the terrace, I was beginning to feel ready for them, to feel safe.

  I looked up at the sun and figured I might, at most, have an hour to spare; and, seeing as I'd been trudging the entire morning, I was more interested in resting for that hour than exploring, and I started looking for a place to sit or lie down. Around the next curve of the river, I found an enormous rock in the centre of the stream, which had been sculpted and smoothed by the high water until it almost managed to look soft. There was also a series of boulders that poked their heads above the surface, which I could hop across to get to this huge rock. In fact, it looked as if I could cross the entire channel using them, and had I not been so tired, it probably would have occurred to me that this was one of the few places along the river that an animal could safely access the other side, and that there was even a vague trail that led into the trees at both ends of the natural bridge that pointed that very fact out. But I didn't take any of this in. Instead, I just jumped across the boulders and ambled onto the giant stone, where I quickly found a spot to lie down. I curled up into one of the carved scoops, closed my eyes against the sun, and, lulled by the sound of rushing water, managed to drift off for a few minutes' sleep.

  When I opened my eyes, it was with the pressing thought that I should get moving in order to make it back to the hut before dark. I quickly yawned, stretched out in the little nook that I was lying in, and stood up, poking my head above a shoulder of rock that I'd been unwittingly hidden behind. And there he was.

  The Creature was squatted beside a small pool where the trail - which I was noticing for the first time - disappeared into the trees, scooping water into his mouth
with his fingers, drops streaming through the hair on the back of his hand. And though I'd studied their prints and the markings of their teeth, and had even seen one of their silhouettes, the first thing I realized - almost with a bit of disappointment - was that they didn't look anything close to what I'd imagined they would. His limbs were slender, and his entire body was covered in fairly long, dense fur that was light brown. He had a petite nose and dark-rimmed eyes that were wide open and framed with darker fur, which grew in a pattern that made a serious, if anxious expression. It was somehow important to me that it was a male; probably because I'd always imagined that, in a man-like species, it would have been this gender that advanced in droves over the hills, wielding spears and armour. However, as it turned out, he hardly looked threatening enough to flick a drop of water in my direction.

  Our frozen moment didn't last long. After a second or two, the Creature began to stand up, his motions incredibly slow and careful, his eyes fixated on mine, watching, waiting for the slightest hint of aggression, or maybe even of movement. And then, as soon as he'd postured enough to be able to use his legs, and without warning, he suddenly spun on his heals, planted his hands on the ground to shove off into a desperate run, and in one fluid leap, disappeared behind the leaves that overhung the trail, and was gone.

  I waited for a few minutes, trying to see into the shade of the undergrowth, looking for a sign of him, knowing perfectly well that I wasn't going to find one, that he was still sprinting away through the trees. Eventually, I hopped along the boulders and inspected his tracks, confirming that he was, in fact, a real Creature. And while I was kneeling down, running a finger along his imprint in the soil, I heard his sad, three-note call above the rumble of the water. I obviously couldn't hear any responses echoing it in the distance, but I know that if I had, I wouldn't have been afraid - or even, for that matter, mildly intimidated. Not anymore.

  I smiled; then I threw my head back and laughed, louder, hysterically, until I tipped over on the ground and had to lean on an arm. I felt like a complete idiot. And I felt like this because, well, I had been an idiot. I had just spent a full week of my life meticulously constructing an enemy out of thin air. And then, as if that weren't enough, I'd wasted my time and energy (even losing a little blood) building a series of cunning devices and escape routes that would combat this imaginary threat of mine.

  But now, finally, I had seen the Creatures for what they were. They didn't have clothes, sculpt gourds to drink from, organize armies, have a trading system, fashion weapons, and they certainly didn't carve out precise instruments to communicate with - they were just tooting to one another with their mouths in a whistling sound that I'd never heard before, which also happened to be somewhat flute-like. And the fact that they belted out a series of distress calls while running away from me wasn't really anything strange or surprising - almost every animal does it in some way - I had just chosen to see it as mysterious. No, the Creatures were nothing more than some kind of large monkey, and if I'd had research material with me, I could have simply flipped through the pages until I found them and read all about their habits and habitat, maybe even learning the name of the sugary melon they liked to feed on.

  And the more I thought about them without some degree of anxiety clouding the images, the more things seemed to fall into place, making sudden and perfect sense. I imagined that, being both primates and ground foragers, they were simply filling in a niche that had opened up when people disappeared. There were probably countless orchards and groves on the mainland that had gradually become abandoned, but, as they were fairly interspersed and wouldn't produce fruit all year round, the only kind of animal that could take full advantage of them would be one that had evolved to travel long distances, and climb trees. The Creatures (which could have been transported to or from any one of the continents by humans long ago) had merely slotted into an opportune role, in which they were happily flourishing.

  Yet I had chosen to see them as something else, something dangerous and menacing; and I had done this despite all my education, despite how 'conscious' and 'aware' I'd been trained to be. In exactly the same way that every culture had done before me, from primitive tribes to the most advanced civilizations, I had fabricated a myth that I could patiently feed the crumbs of my fear to. And, like them, I'd created something that could be touched, could be deterred by traps, could be tricked and lured into the wrong direction and washed away - something that could be controlled. For all my access to wisdom, I wasn't any better off. In fact, had the crew been with me, I'm sure we would have collectively convinced ourselves that we should set out to trap the Creatures, hunt them down, maybe even exterminate them completely, all while being thankful that the greatest peril in our world happened to be one that we could rid ourselves of. And we would do this, unknowingly, as the only way to appease the same phobia that exists in every human being: the fear that there might be something skulking in the shadows that has the potential to do to us, the things that we do to each other every single day.

  It's interesting that I wasn't really frustrated at myself for not becoming aware of this earlier, that I wasn't annoyed at having displayed such predictable, conventional stupidity. I think I felt buoyant more than anything else, as if a weight had been lifted from my shoulders. I stood up, light, contented, and hiked back along the streambed, arriving at the hut with the last bit of usable light. For some reason, I was compelled to take the raven out of its cage and sleep beside it on the ground outside. It absolutely relished in this little bit of freedom, hopping around and flapping to exercise its wings, making continual clicking and murmuring sounds, pecking at unseen things in the grass. It never really seemed to settle down that night, continuing to flit around for hours, a fidgety dark shape invisible in the dark beside me. But its restlessness didn't bother me; I was busy watching the pulsing sheet of stars until I could make out their insistent, sluggish rotation, the sky slowly pivoting on its axis. I felt completely free, in the way we do after stumbling upon a morsel of real truth.

  * * *

  38

  I had neglected my work on the terrace for almost a week, and it took me a while to catch up, watering the sorry-looking seedlings with buckets from the river, harvesting fruit that was overripe, and weeding around the vegetables.

  Once this was under control and I had a bit more time, I started experimenting with different methods of drying fruit in the sun, as it proved impossible to eat an entire tree's worth of produce that all became ripe at the same time. After quite a few trials, I did figure out a way to dry thin strips of certain fruits until they became rubbery slices that wouldn't spoil for about a month.

  All of these projects kept me busy for most of the day, and the days themselves began to pass by more easily, the raven and I settling into a kind of comfortable routine. We would wake up, eat some food, and go out to the terrace to begin working. Then, I would take a break at midday, eat something more and rest, usually sitting in the shade and talking things over with the bird - sometimes dithering my way through weighty deliberations, but most of the time just nattering on about trivial nonsense; the bird appearing to listen distractedly to it all. In the afternoon, I would work for a shorter period of time, and then go for a walk below the terrace, sometimes collecting other foods as I looked for beetles. When I returned, we would eat again, the bird gurgling enthusiastically at the sight of the plump insects in the jar before I spilled them out in front of it. We would relax after that, watching the slow day turn into night, and would retire into the hut after we'd seen the first few stars open their eyes.

  As the weeks melted away, the bird continued to improve and look healthier. It had grown back most of the feathers it had lost while bouncing between the walls of the buildings, and when it was outside of its cage and tied to the rock, I noticed that it was flapping its wings with more force, beating stronger surges of air down at the ground, the grass rippling out in waves that were deeper, more defined. And, to be honest with myself, I thi
nk I'd been pushing most of these facts away for quite some time, convinced that it needed only 'a few more days' before it could be considered fully recovered. However, it was becoming increasingly difficult to do so. It was ready. And we both knew it.

  It was during a midday rest when I finally ventured to say this aloud. "So..." I sighed.

  The raven cocked its head and looked at me for a moment, and then quickly darted its attention elsewhere. (This was completely normal for us. I spent most of my time talking to the back of its head.)

  "I've been thinking about letting you go."

  It looked in my direction for another second and then looked away, as if dismissing what I'd just said, as if sure that I didn't really have the backbone to follow through with such words. I craned my neck up at the sky, like I was trying to gauge whether or not the conditions were suitable for flying. "Okay. Yeah, I might have kept you a bit longer than I should have. But... you know, it's..."

  The raven crouched down, looking at me just long enough to blink its sharp eyes, and then cocked its head up at the trees exactly as I had done, only with a great deal more authenticity.

  I picked up the knife and leaned in toward it. The bird suddenly stiffened, posturing as if to make itself look taller, attentively watching me. And while I struggled to cut the mess of frayed rope around its foot (which I'd never felt the need to replace) I had to duck under the shade of its body to see what I was doing. It was amazing, this level of trust that I'd somehow gained, the bird standing rigid and patient as I ran a blade back and forth within a hair's-breadth of its leg. In fact, it didn't even take advantage of the tempting proximity of my head or hands to peck at them.