Raging Star (13 page)

It don’t take long. After more’n a month of this, day after day, we got the fast come an go down pat. Slim’s carthorse, Duff, stands patient, hitched to the Cosmic. Molly an Tommo load Bean the mule with the ammo an other bits of fightin gear while the rest of us ready our horses. There ain’t much talk. We’re all shook by what’s happened.

We can hear wolfdog howls as Tracker circles Painted Rock with Tommo an Creed in search of Nero. Though I know it ain’t likely they’ll find him, still I’m tense until they come back.

Tommo’s face says all. Sorry, he says. No sign of him.

Mercy’s jest about to mount Tam, her stolen pony. I hurry to give her a boost. She don’t really need my help, but it’s my first chance to speak to her since I seen Jack. The moon shades dark the tired hollows of her face. The scratches from Nero’s attack. I could count every line, every wrinkle. But she sits tall, straight-backed, a queen in her slave collar.

I fiddle with the bridle. Keep my voice low as I says, I gotta talk to you. Alone. Soon as we git to Starlight Lanes.

Her eyes speak assent.

You comfortable there, Mercy? says Lugh. His voice makes me jump. I didn’t realize he was so close.

Yer sister’s had a shock, she says. Look to her, won’t you?

He hugs his arm around my shoulders. You don’t hafta tell me, he says. He’ll find us, Saba, he always does. He’s probly jest off on some crow business.

As I sling my pack onto Hermes, I catch Tommo starin at me. He’s kneelin, fmessin with his bootlace. The second our eyes meet, he ducks down his head. A flush floods his cheeks. My conscience gives me a guilty start. I’d put from my head he tried to talk to me earlier. Lugh’s right. I shouldn’t of took his hand at the bridge.

Now, you know where yer goin, says Slim. Starlight Lanes, Sector Five. He takes a deep breath. His arm goes up to point the way. You head southwest from here—

Got it, says Ash. You told us twice already.

Well, he says, the sign’s likely to be overgrown is the thing. There’s snakecreeper grows fast as wildfire all over the—

We’ll be on the lookout, I says. You better git rollin.

I told Peg the Flight all about you numberous times, he says, but, still, don’t especk no warm welcome. Peg’s a genius with the junk, but a notorious cranky old fish. Ergo, there ain’t many drop-ins at the Lanes. Ideal fer a hidey-hole. Oh, an I meant to say. There’s a Steward fella by Willowbrook’s got a bad tooth I promised to pull. I’ll swing by there an yank it out. Maybe stop a couple other places along the way. Gotta keep myself lookin bona fide. A wolf in sheep’s clothin, that’s me. A sheep’s dress, I should say. Ha ha! Wouldn’t that be a sight? A sheep in a frock.

Slim, I says. Go.

Walk on, Duff. He clicks at his carthorse an, with a cry of, See you anon! they’re off. Inside the Cosmic his potion bottles clank in their cupboards as they bump through the gap an outta sight.

Eccentric he is, no question. But he’s a medicine man among few such. So Slim’s got value, he’s official in New Eden. The five circle tattoo on his right arm says so. Still, it’s curfew till sun-up fer everybody but the Tonton. An dawn’s a
while off yet. He’ll hafta travel by one of the old ways till daylight. The slow, rough ones that wind an wander, that nobody much uses these days. DeMalo’s new roads is the thing. The rest of us, we’ll strike out wild. We’ll probly reach Starlight Lanes well before he does.

I take a last glance around. The site’s clear. I won’t think about Nero. I won’t I won’t. We’re all here, we’re all ready to mount up. Apart from one. Where’s Emmi? I says.

Nobody remembers seein her once we started breakin camp.

Molly says, That one’s had her head in the clouds all day.

Dammit, I says. Why cain’t she never do what she’s s’posed to?

Lugh sighs. I’ll go, he says.

Look who I found! It’s a shout. Emmi’s voice. We whirl around as she comes runnin through the gap. She holds Nero in her arms.

My heart bounds. Leaps. Nero! I cry.

Tracker makes a beeline, barkin like crazy. In the clamour of excitement that breaks out, I rush to her an take him. He greets me with caws of relief. Tellin me what happened, if only I could unnerstand. I elbow off Tracker, set to drown him with slobbery licks of joy.

Where’d you find him? says Creed. We looked, Saba, I swear we did.

As I check Nero to make sure he’s okay, Emmi’s breathless with the thrill of it.

I found him in a rabbit burrow tethered to a peg, she says. His beak was tied, so’s he couldn’t call fer help. He’d nearly got it off—he’s so smart, he was rubbin aginst this sharp stone—but oh, poor Nero, it must of bin awful. He must of bin so afeared. He was sure glad to see me, I can tell you.

Where was this? I says.

Oh, over there a ways. She flaps a vague hand in no particular direction.

Unnerground, says Creed. Guess that’s why Tracker didn’t sniff him out. He ain’t no burrow hound.

How did you know where to look? I says.

Em’s a hopeless dissembler. She tries to meet my eyes, but cain’t. Like a guilty dog that’s stole the supper.

I dunno, she says. I jest kinda … felt where he was.

Felt, says Lugh. Airy fairy. Come on, Em, none of yer mystical baloney.

It ain’t baloney! I swear, she says.

Lugh gives me a frownin look. Jest then, there’s a vexed squawk from my arms. Nero’s head feathers stick up in mad spikes all over. Tracker’s soaked him with swipes of his tongue. We laugh. I ain’t laughed fer so long, I almost fergot how it feels. I pull Emmi in fer a one-armed hug an kiss the top of her head.

Thanks, Em, I says.

I’m really really sorry I didn’t watch, she says. I feel jest
awful, truly I do. But look, I brought you the tether cord. Here.

She hands me a short length of two-ply hemp twine. Plain, workaday cord that’s seen plenty of use. The kind anybody pretty much anywhere might be likely to have on ’em. I shove it in my pocket. Where’s yer boots? I says. Go put ’em on, yer as bad as Creed. Okay, we’re on our way. Next stop, Starlight Lanes.

Nero would have managed to free himself before long. He’d tied his beak loose enough to make sure of it. Still, he’d hated doing it. Hated himself for doing it. Taking him, frightening him
.

He’d rattled her. She thought a Tonton had followed them. That the dead crow and Nero proved they could get at her—at all of them—at any time, at any place. So what? She wasn’t going to give up. Run away in fear. Had he really thought, even for a moment, that she’d do such a thing?

No. He’d stopped thinking. He’d lost his head. It was a shaming, stupid trick. Born of panic in the night-time woods
.

He had to stay cool. Forget about DeMalo and just stick with his plan. It was simple and it would work. He’d follow her as she went to meet Jack. He’d look for his chance. He’d take it
.

And his deal for their past and future would be done
.

Our way to Sector Five takes us through the fells, with their acid springs an unsettled tors. It’s a place of sudden echoes. Of long ago bloodshed, cold on our skins. The wind whines its claws over rock. There’s bin a fresh landslip, a big one. We hafta dismount an help the horses pick their way through the shattered slabs.

I planted myself at the rear from the off, wantin to be alone with my thoughts. Not that I’ve had much chance. I carry Nero snug to my chest. He’s buttoned inside my coat with his head poked out to see where we’re goin. Tracker sticks like a burr, shovin his nose in, anxious to keep check on his friend.

Ash hangs back to wait fer us. How is he? she says. Hey, Nero. How ya doin, buddy? She reaches out slowly. He chitters nervily, beaks at her. It’s okay, okay, I won’t hurt you, she says. But he won’t let her near enough to stroke him. Helluva thing, she says to me.

You said it, I says. I go to walk Hermes on, but her hand on my arm stops me. The hostile wind circles, snatchin at her forest of plaits. Whippin the manes of the horses. She stands foursquare aginst it, tall, shadow-eyed an sharply white faced. Like a shade of some old war, rumbled from the stones by our passage. Her fingers chill through my sleeve.

I bin thinkin, she says. An I don’t like where it’s took me.

The liar inside me takes a cagey step back. What’re you talkin about? I says.

Come on, she says, you must be thinkin it too. It was one of us did that to Nero. Took him an tethered him.

I stare at her. It never crossed my mind, I says.

I don’t wanna think that one of our own did it, she says. But I cain’t figger how else to explain it.

DeMalo is how. But I cain’t say. I couldn’t ever say. None of us would dream of hurtin Nero, I says.

If somebody wanted to git at you, shake you, what better way than Nero? she says. An, I mean, we ain’t ezzackly bin holdin hands an dancin in a circle. Yer in a spiky time, my friend.

Are you talkin about Creed? I says. You an him’s best friends.

I ain’t namin nobody, she says. I hate that I’m even sayin this. Maybe I’m wrong. But. You need to look into it. If it is one of us, we gotta know who. An why.

You ain’t mentioned this to nobody else, I says.

No, she says. An listen, you make sure you suspect me too, okay? It could be I’m tryin to throw you off my trail here. Mind you, if I was, it’s such a sorry attempt I’d hafta cut off my own head in shame.

No need fer that, I says. Okay, Ash. This stays between you an me.

She nods as she turns up her collar aginst the wind. We pick our way on through the rockfall. After a bit, Ash says, You know me, right? I ain’t crazy or nuthin an … gawd knows I ain’t got no imagination, but … I feel like she’s still here. With us.

She don’t hafta say who she means. I know. It’s Maev.

An I see her, Ash says. Sometimes, I’ll turn an I swear I see her. Jest fer a moment I catch a glimpse of her. An it’s so real. It’s like she’s … caught in the light. In the moonlight. The sunlight.

Maybe she is, I says.

She’s bin so tangled with my life, says Ash. With who I am, fer so long. It don’t seem possible she’s gone. An her an me, we had some … times together. Y’know what I’m sayin? Not heavy or nuthin—neether of us was like that—but …

Oh, I says. I guess I thought becuz her an Lugh—

Ash slants a smile at me. He, she … whoever, right? she says.

I’m sorry, I says. I know we don’t talk about her enough. I jest feel too guilty.

Don’t, she’d hate that, says Ash. She believed in you, Saba. She believed in this fight. Remember who she was, how she was, an take strength from her.

This time, when she puts out her hand, Nero lets her stroke his head. If only crows could talk, she says.

If only.