by K. A. Holt
And what of Aunt Billie? Can I just leave her, never to return? She could teach me so many things, and I think now, I could teach her things as well. Is her heart broken, having lost both Temple and me on top of the old wounds of having lost Benny and Mama? Would her heart heal to see us again? Or break anew to see the Cheese that we are becoming? Or was it never broken by us in the first place, only relieved to have fewer mouths to feed?
The questions are too many. Ebibi has not shown me a path. I continue to wander in the darkness until I hear a Kwihuutsuu scream. I light a flameless flare and hold it over my head.
“You must come now, Tootie.” It is Jo, her shouts carrying around the corner that hides the cave entrance. “There is trouble in the village.” As I run to her I see her shoulder is bandaged, tinged red with blood and dirt.
Kwihuu is behind her, just outside the cave. She flaps her wings and lowers onto the soft, cool ground next to me. I climb into the saddle and grab the reins. “What trouble?” I ask.
“A’alanatka” is the only word I hear before Jo’s Kwihuutsuu screams and flies up into the stars, Kwihuu right on her tail, the cool air of these lands of Ebibi blowing over us in whistling whispers.
23
FIST LIES SWEATING ON WANTOSAKAAL’S table. The gash on his hip is angry and seeping. He is muttering with fever. Klara kneels next to him, chanting, her head low, her ear membranes throbbing in and out slowly.
Wantosakaal spreads a poultice over the wound and Fist grimaces, his eyes opening and then rolling back in his head. She binds the wound and puts a hand on Klara’s shoulder. Klara stands and they go off in a corner. Wantosakaal’s voice is quiet but still grating. I try to understand the snippets I hear, but nothing makes sense.
Jo pulls me to the side. “She say a’akow naa sonako.”
“Fire won’t stop,” I say. “You mean the fever?”
“Ja.”
I look at Fist, so big his feet hang off the edge of the huge table. How could a strong Cheese like this be felled by a fever? It seems impossible.
“Is there anything that can help?” I ask, my brain buzzing. At Origin Township, fever is one of the most insidious killers. Aunt Billie creates tinctures and exhausts her limited supplies of medicines from the Origin, but more often than not there is no medicine that can overpower infection. Before I . . . left . . . I was learning some of the tinctures, but I don’t remember the recipes. Maybe the Kihuut have a special herb, something.
“There is nothing,” Jo says, her face lined, dark. “Only the mercy of Ebibi.” She touches her chest and closes her eyes, then gives me a half smile. She traces the space on my right hand where my finger used to be. “We cannot cut off Fist’s hip, Tootie.”
“I know that,” I say. “But there has to be some kind of . . .”
Klara walks to us. She nods slightly and Jo takes a protesting Wantosakaal outside of the cave, leaving me and Klara alone with Fist.
I walk to the table and put a hand on Fist’s sweating arm, then look to Klara.
“Owa’a,” she whispers. “A’akow.”
“Yes,” I say. “He’s hurt. More badly than we thought. And feverish.”
“Mayrikafsa,” she chokes out, emotion strangling her words. She takes my hand. “Help.”
“Tell me,” I say, squeezing her hand. “I will do anything.”
Klara looks to the ceiling and then back at me, her eyes glistening. She puts her other hand on Fist’s arm.
“Whatever it is, Klarakova, please tell me. We must have time on our side. Maa bali.” “More time” is the best I can do in my translation.
She nods and swallows. “Medicine,” she says. “Medicine in Origin. Medicine a’akar hyoo-mans long ago.”
“There was medicine that helped the humans long ago? Well, the ship was stocked when it took its journey, but I don’t think there’s any left. And if there is . . . it might not be the right kind. It might not even help the Kihuut. The anatomies are so different.” I can’t tell if she understands me or not. Her eyes are black as the caves of Ebibi, and they are wild.
Klara tilts her head, putting her hand on my face, looking at me so lovingly that I feel my face flush. I think of the early days of my time with the Kihuut, the days when this same hand struck me many times, not out of malice, but instructing me in ways only the Kihuut could. It seems so long ago.
“Find medicine, Mayrikafsa. A’akar hyoo-mans. I saw it work. Go to Origin. Find flotaka.”
“But, Klara. I don’t know where to—wait. You’ve seen medicine help humans?”
“Famalilta.” It comes out as a whisper.
“Tragedy?” I whisper back. Klara puts her other hand on my face and stares into my eyes. It’s as if she’s trying to send her words into me through her palms.
“Famalilta to Kihuut. Famalilta to Hosani pea-pulls. Ebiloti. Maa maa maa ebiloti.”
“Many, many sickness?” I say, not fully understanding where this is going.
“Ke’ekutaat bring illness. Ebiliki in mara.” Her tears are flowing again.
“Death in the wind?” It makes me think of months ago when Ben-ton spoke of a plague brought by humans. I thought he was just being dramatic.
“Much death, Mayrikafsa.” Klara blinks slowly. I wonder what she’s seeing behind those closed eyes. “Hyoo-mans have medicine. Hyoo-mans not die. Hosani die. Kihuut owa’a. Ebiliki in mara.”
“The death in the wind killed people from Hosani, but only hurt the Kihuut? And the humans had their own medicine so they were okay? What does this mean, Klara?”
“Go, Mayrikafsa. Go!” Klara swallows hard, and lightly clacks her upper lip against her teeth. She not so gently pushes me. “Go. Origin! Go!”
I stand and stumble back a little. “Okay,” I say. “I will try. But, Klara, I don’t know where any medicine is. The Origin is as much a mystery to me as it is to you. It’s huge. I wouldn’t know where to look.”
“Act like warrior, Mayrikafsa,” Klara says, her voice sharp. “Gather supplies. Take Natka. Find medicine. Bring home.” Her eyes narrow and I am afraid she might take her grief out on me physically.
“I would do this alone,” I say, taking a short step back from her. I have never seen her this undone. “It will be easier by myself.” A plan is forming in my mind. A ro-ri-ta rockhead plan.
“We cannot trust her,” Natka says, bursting into the cave with an armload of fragrant scrub. Jo follows after him, gesturing her apology at the interruption. Wantosakaal reenters the cave and motions for Natka to put his armload of scrub into a pot hanging over the fire. As he’s cracking the branches and pushing the wad into the pot, his eyes narrow and he looks up at me.
“You feel too much still for the hyoo-mans. If you leave, you not come back.” He smashes the lid onto the pot and Klara hisses at him. Fist moves his head back and forth on the table, moaning.
Wantosakaal takes the lid off the pot. She chatters at Natka in Cheese until he backs away from her, handing over the spoon he used to stir the scrub.
“I’m not going to run away,” I say. “I would not leave Fist to die. And I would never leave Temple. You know that.”
Jo looks from me to Natka and back again.
“You wish to leave?” she asks, her face creasing with hurt.
“If I am to try to save Fist, then yes. I wish to leave right now.”
“Naa.” Jo waves her clawed hand through the air. “You wish to leave the Kihuut?” Her face is stricken and then she puffs out her cheeks, her eyes flaring.
“No.” I say. “I mean, I don’t know.” I put my head in my hands and then look to her, trying to ignore Natka’s angered breathing and fighting stance. “I don’t know what to do. But I’m not going to think about that right now. You have to trust me, Jo. I want to save Fist.”
“We cannot save him,” Natka says simply, and Klara cries out angrily. “It
is only the truth,” he says. “We must prepare.”
“Klara and I were talking, Natka. She thinks there might be something we can try.”
Klara regards us both, her mouth tightening. I cannot read her expression. “Go now,” she says. She points at me, then Natka. “Both. Go. Return safe. Mara watch over you.”
I do not like this. Natka could ruin everything. I am about to protest when Fist cries out and Wantosakaal puts a rag over his face, trying to cool the fever.
Klara hugs us both tightly. “Go.”
“Come,” I say, grinding my teeth, grabbing both Natka and Jo and pulling them outside. My brain whirls with all of the new information and with the plan that is forming.
Outside, Natka runs to the Kwihuutsuu nests, but I stay for a moment.
“Tell me about this illness, Jo. This medicine.” I tell her what Klara told me.
“It was a hunting germ, Mayrikafsa,” Jo says. Her voice is a low hum. “An illness brought to A’akowitoa to hurt anyone not ke’ekutaat. To kill.”
“But Klara said the humans grew ill, too. And why in the name of the gods would the humans kill the Hosani people if they held the only escape from the moon?” None of this makes sense.
Jo shrugs. “Ebiliki in mara is difficult to control. Humans survived with medicine. Medicine did not work for Hosani peoples on A’akowitoa. Kihuut survive, but . . .” She pats low on her belly. “No more kakoni.”
“The illness brought by humans is why the Kihuut have no female children?” I don’t know what to think. Could humans truly be so cunning and cruel? Suddenly, cutting off ears and stealing babies seems less brutal by comparison.
I mean, it should not surprise me, the brutality of humans. It also should not surprise me that they could be so dumb. Accidentally killing off their only salvation from the moon? Origin Township truly is a punishment from the gods.
“It is how they gave us the name they call us, you know,” she says.
“The name?” I say, not understanding.
“Because we do not go to Ebibi from this germ, because we cheat death for so long. This is why the hyoo-mans call us the Cheats.”
“The Cheats?” I say. Then my hands go to my hair. “The Cheats?” I start laughing uncontrolled hiccups. “All this time we have been saying it wrong?”
Jo nods. “They call us the Cheats. Because we cheat death. We do not go away. We do not play by rules.” She smiles, showing off those teeth of hers. “You have this in common with us.”
Yes, indeed. I am about to break nearly every rule there is.
“Jo, stay with Klara. Keep Fist alive. Natka and I will be back.” I grab her in a tight hug and it’s so nice to feel the strength and warmth of her body up against mine.
It doesn’t take me long to gather what we will need. I am not sure how many days we’ll be gone, but I plan for the fewest possible. I have one last thing to find and I will be ready to go.
The cave is dark when I walk inside. The Cheese woman is standing over a fire, Old Man Dan’s baby sitting at her feet, playing with some rocks. I come up behind the woman so she can’t see me and put my hand over both her mouth and her nose. She struggles with great force, scratching my arms as she reaches back to fight me off. But my warrior training has paid off and I am stronger than she is. Soon she is limp and I lay her carefully on the ground.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “When you wake, please know that I am terribly sorry.”
I pick up the baby, offer her a fingertip of sleeping root, and when she is asleep, I put her in the sack on my back.
I leave the cave, walking with purpose.
“Tootie!”
I whirl around, my heart banging in my chest. It is Temple.
“Kehka ke ton?” she asks.
What am I doing? I lick my lips, having not prepared a lie. “Uh . . . I’m just gathering some things for Wantosakaal.”
“Fist ebilot? ” she asks.
I nod. “Ja. He is ill. I am trying to help, but there is not much to do.”
Temple’s face is grave.
“Ben-ton says you hate us. That you plan to abandon the Kihuut, run back to Origin Township. Is this true?” She runs her tongue across her sharpened teeth and looks up at me with her huge blue eyes. Her face has grown narrower, her waist slimmer. She is growing taller and more like a woman.
I splutter, raising my upper lip. “You should not speak with Ben-ton. He is a troublemaker.”
“But is he correct?”
“I have no time for this, Temple. We will talk soon, okay?” I put my hand on her arm and lean down to kiss her cheek, but she backs away.
“You would turn your back on the Kihuut? After everything they’ve done for us?” Her hand hovers over the knife at her waist.
“Temple, please,” I say, backing up a step. “I am—right this moment—working to save Fist’s life. How is that turning my back on the Kihuut? Please. Let’s have this talk another day. I will be back as soon as I can.”
“Where are you going?” she shouts after me as I begin walking quickly away.
“I will be back soon,” I answer. I hear her huff, then run away in the opposite direction.
Good gods. This Ben-ton and his gum mouth.
I walk quickly away from the village and out to the Kwihuutsuu nests, feeling shame and guilt, but also knowing that this is our only chance.
“Too slow,” Natka says when he sees me. He is already in his saddle, ready to go. He points to the suns. “We lose time.”
I don’t answer. I tie the meager supplies to Kwihuu’s saddle, keeping the baby hidden on my back. I jump into the saddle and pray to any and all gods that the baby will be quiet on the journey.
Natka will not like my plan, and so I will not tell him of it.
24
WE AGREE THAT WE CANNOT afford to camp. We will push the Kwihuutsuu to ride as far and as fast as they can, carrying us even as we sleep. I lead the way, refusing to tell Natka what my plan is.
The nose of the broken Origin is splayed out under us as we fly over Maasakota.
Natka is confused when we don’t stop, but he follows. It should be less than half a day now. Kwihuu is lathered, I can tell, and will need to stop soon. I wish we could land at the homestead, but at this time of day, Aunt Billie will not be there. We are going to have to make a spectacle, I’m afraid.
It is with relief that I see the Origin Township market area coming into focus below us. That relief is immediately replaced with trepidation, because I know this is a risky plan, and I also know that having Natka along makes it even riskier.
I hold up my hand and Natka slows. Our Kwihuutsuu hover over the outskirts of the market. We have come in slowly and quietly and no one has seen us yet.
“Cheese!” a woman yells, dropping her basket of cooling crystals. Homesteaders run to help her refill her basket as others run for weapons.
“Naa sita,” I tell Natka as we lower the beasts to the ground. Do not speak.
He snaps his bony upper lip at me, but says nothing. Without his silver paint and warrior clothes, he looks young sitting astride the dactyl. I know this is deceiving, though, and if the homesteaders recognize him as the Cheese who took Virginia’s baby and her ear, they will know this, too. I am hoping they will be frightened enough to listen to me before attacking, but this is probably foolish.
We land Kwihuu and Suu at the edge of the market, leaving them to rest and chew scrub. They will come to us if we need them. The whistle hangs low on my neck, just under the bibiloka. I pull the bag tightly against my back, feeling the baby squirm. At times during the journey, I would fall back behind Natka, claiming to need to relieve myself, but instead would give the baby water and crushed hashava fruit mixed with sleeping root. She is waking now, just in time. She will be angry, soiled, and hungry. Perhaps not in that order.
Na
tka walks briskly to my side, his good hand hovering over the knife holstered on his thigh. I stop walking. He goes a couple of steps ahead of me and then turns.
“Kehka? ” he asks, looking irritated. What?
I walk quickly to him, and without stopping again, reach down, remove the knife from his holster, and throw it as hard as I can back behind us, toward the Kwihuutsuu.
Natka makes no sound for a moment, then runs to me. I am walking quickly. He is blinking rapidly and spluttering. Finally he manages to bark out my name and I put my finger to my lips to tell him to be quiet.
“We cannot go into the camp weaponless, Tootie,” he seethes.
“Yes we can, and yes we will,” I say. I keep walking but turn to look him in the eyes. “You will not be taking any ears or babies or starting any fights today, Natka. We aren’t even supposed to be here! You will be silent, contrite. If you are lucky, they won’t kill or imprison you. I told you it was a gum rockhead decision to come.”
We are approaching the first booths of the market. All of the people have run elsewhere. It is empty now, and the wind is hot and brisk, blowing my long black horsetail over my shoulder.
Something crunches underfoot and I look down. A piece of cooling crystal that spilled from the woman’s basket. I put my hand to my neck, feeling my necklace, happy that it’s helping me breathe so clearly this hot, dusty day.
“Your bag,” Natka says, pointing. His head tilts to the side. “It moves.”
I nod. “Stay one step behind me. Do not speak.” I pull the bag around to my front and wrestle the squirming baby from it. Natka gasps. He says nothing but his eyes flash and his fists clench.
“I have returned the Livingstons’ daughter!” I shout into the wind. My human language sounds tinged with Cheese now, but I am not ashamed. “I have returned her as a trade.”
A head appears from behind a metal counter in one of the open-air booths. Shortly thereafter the muzzle of a light rifle also appears.