Mirage (17 page)

“Why won’t Shining Moon compete in the tech parts of the Thunder Trials?” Hoku asked. “Seems a whole lot safer than competing in the fighting parts.”

Rollin chuckled. “How many four-feets have you seen in this tent since you’ve been coming? Go ahead, count.”

“Other than Tayan, I count zero.”

“Shining Moon is not the home of shining brains,” Rollin said.

“That’s not fair,” Calli said. “Dantai is very smart. I’m sure he could make something amazing if he wanted to.”

Rollin sent Hoku a look that plainly said, “I disagree. That boy is not very smart”— only a lot less polite. Hoku stifled a laugh, but Calli didn’t seem to notice.

“Many four-feets are good with tech in other herds. Very good with tech. But not here. Tactics smart isn’t the same,” Rollin said easily. “It’s good for me. If they could fix their own tech, I’d be hunting for another hideout.”

Hoku studied the mechanism in his shield.
Hideout?
Who, or what, was Rollin hiding from? Other Upgraders?

“If we make something, can Shining Moon use it as their entry in the tech competition?”

“Not unless we wear the herd colors,” Rollin said, “and I don’t see any blue and white in here.”

He looked around at the artifact-filled tent. “This place hasn’t seen the color white in years.”

Rollin chuckled.

“I keep suggesting ways we could help and competitions we might be good at,” Calli said. “They dismiss me every time. Even Dantai. According to herd law, anyone can join the herd with the khan’s consent. I just don’t see how we’re going to get it.”

Hoku pulled out a micro-adjustor and tried to steady his hand. “The Kampii Elders wouldn’t listen to us, either, if we were underwater instead of up here. And I bet we’d have to work really hard to convince your mother, too.”

“All the little spots of people, all you splinters, you grew up by yourselves,” Rollin said. “Hard to make friends when you’re used to being on your own. And when it was other people that drove you underwater or into the desert or into the skies in the first place.”

“The Upgraders didn’t do that, though,” Hoku said. “You didn’t flee the Human cities or live in big groups like colonies. Or did you?”

He pressed a button on his shield device, and a jolt of electricity speared his arm. The device tumbled from his hand. He rubbed his arm, then picked the artifact back up again. Carefully he undid the adjustment he’d just made. Trial and error was a lot less fun when the errors came with shocks.

“The Upgraders aren’t a people,” Rollin said, “although some would treat us as such.” She put down her tools, put her good hand at the base of her spine, and stretched. Hoku heard something pop. It was either the bones in her spine realigning or whatever she had in there instead of bones. “Don’t know about our ancestors,” Rollin said. “Maybe they were from the cities. Maybe they were from the hills or dark places. But somewhere they found tech makers and gizmos and mixers and medics. Somewhere, they decided that survival meant better parts.” She laughed and tapped her artifact eye. “Or maybe they just liked what they saw and wanted some for their own.”

“You wanted that eye?” Hoku said.

“Like you want food, you gobbly basic,” Rollin said. “This eye shows me heat and light and all manner of pretty things you aren’t ever going to see. It’s a whole new world I’ve got, an invisible world, a better world. Would have plucked out my own eye if the fixer had asked.”

An image filled Hoku’s head. An image involving Rollin and eyes and things he didn’t want to see.

“I’m going to fetch some food,” Rollin said happily. “Talking tech always makes me hungry. Too bad I’ll be munching grasses, if the four-feets have their way.” She grumbled to herself all the way out of the tent. Hoku could still hear her talking as she lazed down the path to the kitchens.

“I am never going to eat again,” Calli said, her face pale.

He grinned at her and put a hand on his own rebellious stomach. But seeing her sit there, hunched over a grimy table, her wings smudged with dirt and oil, made his smile fade.

“We can’t stay here,” he said. “We have to do something. I don’t know. Hire people to look. Go look for them ourselves. Maybe Electra and the other Aviars could come and sweep the desert.”

Calli left her seat, wound her way through the piles of junk, and took his hand.

“When an Aviar goes out to scout and gets wounded and can’t fly back, they’re trained to stay where they are. To make camp, eat what they can, make a signal if possible — but stay. We know their route, and it’s the best chance we have of finding them again.” She played with his fingertips. “Aluna and Dash know we’re here. We can’t go after them because we don’t know where they’re going. And if we leave, they won’t know where we are, either. Our chances of finding each other go from small to nothing.”

“The Thunder Trials,” he said weakly. “We all know where and when those are.”

“Yes,” she said. “We could easily waste our time looking for them and never find them. If we stay here, you can keep working on your project, I can monitor the commbox and try to get a message through to my people, and we can try to prove to the khan that we deserve to be made members of Shining Moon. I know everyone says that the warrior competitions at the Thunder Trials are the most important, but maybe that’s because they don’t expect to win the other battles. Not without their falconers.”

She talked so fast when she was passionate. Sometimes he almost started fights just to hear one of her speeches.

“You’re smart,” he said finally.

She smiled. “Tech smart or tactics smart?”

“Both.” He wanted to kiss her, but he couldn’t. Not without knowing what was really going on between them. Between her and Dantai. And he wasn’t brave enough to ask. He looked down at his hands. “If I’m going to win the tech competition, I’m going to have to survive making this shield.” He lifted up the device and held it out for her to see. “What do you know about force fields?”

Calli’s eyes grew round. “Nothing except the basics,” she said. “This is far beyond what I’ve done.”

For the first time ever, Hoku had surprised her with something he’d built. His chest swelled as if a puffer fish were trapped inside.

“Here, let me show you where I’m stuck,” he said. “And then maybe you can stop it from killing me.”

T
HE SUN REACHED
the middle of the sky before Aluna remembered to rip another notch in her sash. Six days. Six days of stumbling across the burning sand and scrub in the impossible heat.

Her throat ached for water, but they had only a liter left and it had to last the rest of the day. At night, Dash worked his desert magic and found them more. He dug holes, siphoned moisture from plants, and somehow extracted it from the small animals they killed. If he hadn’t been with them, they would have died days ago.

That Tayan still staggered beside them was a miracle. Of course, the wound had been near her Human heart, not her massive horse heart, which did most of the work. There were times when she seemed to fall into unconsciousness, yet still her horse legs continued to walk. Even so, they didn’t have long. Her fever had come and gone but now blazed hotter than ever before. Dash cleaned the wound each night — using whatever was left of their water — but it hadn’t started to heal. Too much walking, too much stress. If they didn’t find a settlement soon, she’d die.

Aluna tried not to talk, but there were days when she needed to. It was easy to get lost in her head out here, traveling for hours in miserable discomfort with nothing to think about except past decisions. Mistakes. Plans for the future that she’d never get a chance to realize.

Today she needed words. A connection. To think about something other than the sharks circling in her mind.

“So,” she rasped to Dash, “why does Weaver Sokhor want you dead?”

Despite days of marching, Dash seemed only slightly weary. Maybe he preferred marching to being locked up in a tent waiting for a death sentence.

He gave her a wry smile. “Weaver Sokhor did not appreciate his eldest daughter showing interest in an
aldagha
.”

“Interest?”

“He caught us kissing,” Dash said.

Aluna chuckled, her voice cracking.

“We had been lucky for weeks, but then one day it was all over.” Dash shrugged. “He could not punish me then, as there is no law against what we did. But he sent his daughter to foster with another herd, and I have not seen her since.”

“For kissing? That’s terrible!” She raised an eyebrow at him. “I’m sure the kissing wasn’t terrible, though.” For the first time since she’d met him, his sandy skin grew darker on his cheeks. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Weaver Sokhor had no right.”

“The thing is, I did not blame him,” Dash said. “What Equian would want his daughter involved with me? Our relationship was doomed before it began. I just wish we had not lost our friendship as well. We had always been close.”

“Friendship is everything,” Aluna said gravely. That’s why she was out here in the first place.

“I agree,” Dash said. “It is . . . difficult to know what will harm a friendship. I have learned to walk carefully.”

Suddenly she wondered if they were still talking about the Equian girl. Her heart, exhausted from the heat, found the energy to quicken its pace. Aluna found she had no coherent response to his last statement, only a jumble of thoughts and feelings swirling inside her like a whirlpool. Better to keep her mouth shut than say something stupid.

By evening, Tayan’s skin almost burned to the touch.

“She will not make it much longer,” Dash said.

Aluna nodded and pressed a damp cloth to the Equian’s face. Tayan groaned. She remained barely conscious, speaking only to spout nonsense or cry warnings about invisible foes.

“You need to go,” Aluna said. “Take Tal and find help. Any help. Lie if you have to. Tell them your name is Hoku.”

“Why me?” he said. “I am better at tending Tayan. You should go. Tal can carry you swiftly.”

Aluna shook her head. “Tayan is beyond our help now, and only you will be able to find your way back to us. You know this desert. You understand it in a way I’ll never be able to.”

“But Tal —”

“She knows you’re a better rider, too,” Aluna said. Tal snorted her agreement. “You’ll make it farther, and you won’t get lost. Take the compass.” She held out the battered artifact.

He plucked it gently from her hand, then stared at it in his palm.

“I’m not giving up,” Aluna said quietly. “I will never give up. This is my best chance for survival, and I know it. You know it, too.”

Dash stood up and started to take Tal’s packs off her back. “We will travel faster this way,” he said. “You keep the food and water.”

“No. If you don’t find someone, we’re all dead,” she said. “Tayan and I will sit here and conserve our energy. You need the supplies more than we do.” She didn’t mention that Tayan was barely eating or drinking anymore. They both knew the truth.

He gave Tal some of their remaining water, then stored the rest on his belt without argument.

“Go,” she said. “Good luck.”

He hopped onto Tal’s back, seemingly without effort. Like a leaf on the wind. Only then did he look back at her, his dark eyes filled with even darker shadows in the fading sun.

“You are the bravest person I know,” he said.

Before she could answer, he whispered something to Tal, and the two of them were off at a gallop, leaving only a trail of dust in their wake.

Aluna helped Tayan down to the ground and tried to make her comfortable. If Dash didn’t find help, Tayan would never get up again. Once she was settled and sleeping, Aluna worked on the fire. She didn’t need one for heat, but Tayan would.

The fireboxes the Equians normally used produced warmth and light, but they didn’t emit smoke. And Aluna wanted smoke — as much as possible. A nice big plume would help Dash find their camp again. She checked the ground around Tayan’s head for scorpions, spiders, and snakes, but didn’t find any.
Good
. She’d be safe while Aluna scoured their surroundings for burnable brush and plant life.

It felt good to use her muscles for something other than walking. She bent and tugged at shrubs, yanked them from the soil, and snapped their branches into smaller pieces. A few tasty rabbits scurried out of her way, but they were in luck. She was far too weak and tired to hunt.

By the time she returned to the fire, the shroud of night had fallen. Aluna set up all four of their fireboxes near Tayan and turned them on. There was no sense in rationing fuel if this was their last night.

She allowed herself two swallows of water and gnawed on a stick of cured cactus, the last of her food supplies. The salt burned her mouth and stung the cuts on her lips, but she sucked on it anyway, grateful that her mouth still produced saliva.

One by one, she tested her desert finds with the fireboxes. Branches from the scrubby trees and tumbleweeds burned fastest but produced the most smoke. She headed off into the darkness, armed with her Kampii vision, and collected as much as she could find. If she was lucky, enough for twelve or more hours. But she didn’t burn her stash that night. Dash couldn’t have made it very far yet, and no matter how big a pillar of smoke she made, he’d never see it in the dark with his Equian eyes.