Sky Raiders (13 page)

A
falling star blazed diagonally across the sky, a searing ember of white-gold brilliance with a long tail. After flaring bright enough to cast shadows and make Cole squint, the meteor shrank to a spark, vanishing before it reached the horizon.

Cole’s eyes needed a moment to adjust so he could get back to enjoying the sky. Several of the stars were brighter than any he had seen in Arizona. There was more variety in color as well, particularly in shades of red and blue. He could make out the little spiral smudges of distant galaxies, and cloudy patches of light that were either nebulae or dense clusters of faraway stars.

Stranger than anything was the rising moon. It wasn’t like the moon back home. It was smaller, dimmer, bluer, and more translucent, almost like a glowing ball of ice. He wondered why he hadn’t noticed the difference before.

“You shouldn’t be out after dark without a good reason,” a voice said from behind.

Cole glanced back to find Mira coming toward him across the back porch. “I’m not far from the door. There’s a wall around the whole area.”

“Even the yard can be dangerous once the sun goes down.”

“I needed some time alone.”

“There are places in the caves,” she said.

“Not with stars,” he replied.

Mira stood next to where he sat on the porch steps. “True.” She stared out at the dark salvage yard.

Cole had wanted some alone time, but he found himself glad for the company. He hadn’t spoken to Mira since she’d equipped him the night before. “I just saw a shooting star,” Cole said. “A bright one.”

“We have a beautiful sky,” Mira said wistfully.

“It’s different from the one on Earth.”

“People from outside always comment on it. At least the observant ones do.”

“The moon is really different.”

She gave a faint smile. “That isn’t our most common moon. It’s Naori, the Shiver Moon. We only see it now and then.”

“That makes sense,” Cole said. “I think one of your more regular moons is more like ours.”

“Light can partially pass through Naori, so it’s always full,” she said. “They make a big deal about it in Necronum.”

“How many different moons do you have here?”

“At least twenty,” Mira said.

“Are they ever all up at once?”

“I’ve never seen more than five at the same time. Sometimes there are none.”

Cole reconsidered the glittering sky. “You guys must have complicated calendars.”

“There are no really reliable calendars,” she said. “There isn’t much of a pattern to the moons or the stars. You can never be sure what sky you’ll get. The years tend to be around three hundred and fifty days, but the seasons are haphazard. It can be summer for a hundred days, autumn for twelve, winter for forty, spring for two hundred, then summer for twenty, and on and on without any kind of pattern. The days aren’t trustworthy either. We measure hours, but only to track how many have passed since sunrise. First hour, second hour, and so on. Then we start counting again from sunset. Most days are around twelve hours, followed by twelve hours of night. Without warning, they can be as short as four, or as long as thirty, though the extremes aren’t common.”

“Wow,” Cole said. “Do you have more than one sun?”

“Almost always just one. It usually rises in the east and sets in the west. Sometimes we have duskdays, when the sun seems to be rising in all directions but never does.”

“I saw one of those.”

“That’s right. We had one not too long ago.”

Cole scanned the salvage yard, cluttered with bizarre, shadowy shapes, great and small. Among the discernible objects were statues, potted trees, cages, wicker baskets, outdoor furniture, coiled chains, a huge barbershop pole, a battered jukebox, a canoe, an old-fashioned bicycle with a huge front wheel, and a shantytown of sheds, large and small, that probably housed more fragile treasures. The yard was still, the night cool. The door into Skyport was only a
few steps away. It was hard to believe he was in any danger.

“You shouldn’t lurk out here,” Mira said. “They’re still talking about your escape from the centipede. You ought to soak it up.”

“Scorpipede,” Cole corrected. “At least, that was how I thought of it. Part scorpion. It had claws.”

“Whatever,” Mira said. “You should come enjoy the attention. These men have seen it all. They’re not easy to impress, especially on a first outing.”

“I should be dead,” Cole said, suddenly fighting a hard lump in his throat. “This lady . . . she protected me. The scorpipede . . .” He couldn’t continue speaking and keep it together, so he stopped.

“One of the semblances?” Mira asked.

Cole nodded, not trusting his voice.

Mira crouched beside him and put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re sweet, but you can’t let that get to you. She wasn’t real. None of them were. They’re just puppets. Dangerous, lifelike, but puppets.”

“She gave me her shawl to help hide me. She seemed so real, Mira. Perfectly real.”

“Some do. It’s an illusion. They’re just temporary. If you had brought her back here, she would have dissolved into dust. Only some of the simplest ones have any chance of surviving outside the castles. That lady didn’t die. She wasn’t alive. She was heading for nothingness in a day or two, when the castle vanishes into the cloudwall.”

Cole stared down at his hands. The guilt had gnawed at him all day, but Mira’s explanation helped. “One mission down.”

“At least the other one was more fruitful.”

Cole smiled at her wordplay. One of his bunkmates, a boy called Twitch, had scouted today for another Sky Raider ship, the
Borrower
. They had found what looked like a village of big, fancy gazebos. The woodwork was all fragile and ornate, but the raiders were most interested in the extensive gardens, especially the fruit trees. At a signal from the
Borrower
, the
Domingo
had joined in reaping the harvest.

The only obstacles had been a few giant carnivorous weeds. Since the weeds were stationary, they were easily avoided once you knew to watch for them. Both ships had spent the day off-loading fruit of all description. Some were familiar, including oranges, lemons, bananas, plums, apricots, apples, pears, and kiwis. Other varieties had looked foreign—fruit protected by stinging tendrils, fruit that grew in clusters like grapes but had thick rinds, fruit they had to chisel out of the trunks like tumors.

“We brought a lot of food,” Cole said.

“We never go hungry here. Some food comes from the castles. Plus, traders go out of their way to bring us goods. They know we can pay or barter.”

Cole looked around. “It doesn’t seem dangerous out here.”

Mira shrugged. “It’s safer inside the walls of the salvage yard than out in the open. But just because you don’t get killed tonight doesn’t mean you won’t get ambushed tomorrow. Bad things come up from lower down the cliffs at night. We seal the caves carefully. We have some tricks that help keep the night stalkers away from Skyport. But it can get plenty dangerous. A lot of people have disappeared
because they braved the Brink at night.”

Her words made Cole less comfortable. Certain pockets of shadow suddenly seemed more suspicious. Had one of the sculptures shifted position a little?

“Maybe we should go in,” Cole suggested, standing.

“You go ahead,” Mira said, stepping out into the yard, head craned back to take in the sky. “I just need a minute to unwind after—”

She froze and said nothing more.

“After what? Mira?”

She looked at him, and for an instant he saw unbridled panic in her eyes.

“Are you all right?” Cole asked, looking up for signs of danger. All he saw were stars. What was he missing?

“I’m fine,” Mira insisted with an uncomfortable smile. “I just . . . I remembered something I forgot to do. Something important. I’ll come in with you.”

“Are you sure?” Cole asked. “For a second there, you looked like you’d seen a ghost.”

She gave a feeble smile. “Life of a slave. I forgot to do a chore that could get me in trouble.”

“Need help?”

He followed her through a doorway into a hall. She closed the sturdy door and locked it in three places. “I should do it on my own. Thanks, though. You’ve had a busy day. Go get some rest.”

Cole watched her walk away. He had a strong suspicion that she wasn’t being completely honest with him. While looking up, she had seen something that scared her, and
then tried to mask her reaction. Could it have been a winged creature? Did the night stalkers fly? Maybe she’d glimpsed a threat lurking on the roof?

He looked back at the door. He could peek out to see if something had entered the yard. No, if some monster had scared her that badly, he didn’t want to take the risk.

But why would she try to cover up something like that? If she had seen a monster coming for them, why not grab him and race indoors? Why be secretive? Why make up an excuse?

Maybe her excuse was real. He supposed an important task left undone could explain her reaction. Looking at the sky might have reminded her. Or it might have been a coincidence.

Avoiding the boisterous commotion of the common area, Cole made his way to his room. He had already eaten, and decided he would take Mira’s advice and get some rest.

The narrow bunk room had a high ceiling and a pair of stacked bunks on either side. Cole found Twitch seated on a bottom bunk. His head jerked up, as if Cole had startled him, blue eyes wide and round. The short, skinny boy had a young face. He couldn’t be older than ten.

“I didn’t know you were in here,” Cole said. He hadn’t spoken much with him besides a quick introduction the night before.

Twitch licked his lips. “All the people can be . . . a little much. Do you need the room?”

“Not for anything special. I was just getting tired.” Cole had been assigned the bunk above Twitch, across from Slider.

“Don’t let me stop you. I can dim the lamp.” Twitch hopped out of bed and crossed to the oil lantern.

“Nice job finding all that fruit.”

Twitch gave a weak chuckle. “Don’t thank me for the fruit. Spotters handled that. Thank me for almost getting eaten by a plant. I barely got out of the way in time.” The lantern dimmed.

“Those things were scary.”

“They weren’t too bad once you knew what they looked like and could keep out of range.”

“But you had to find out the hard way.” Cole opened the trunk he had inherited and started changing into his sleeping clothes.

Twitch went back to sit on his bed. “A crazy part of me almost wishes the weeds got me.”

“What?”

“Just to end the suspense. It’s too much. If something is going to get me sooner or later, sooner might be a mercy.”

“Don’t think like that,” Cole said. “You have to aim for fifty.”

“I’ve done sixteen missions. I don’t want to even think about fifty. That isn’t the end, you know. After fifty, the danger isn’t gone. The scouts aren’t the only raiders who have accidents. The other jobs are only a little safer.”

“Well, you’ve done fifteen more than me.” Cole stashed his clothes into his trunk. “Is Twitch your real name?”

“Ruben.”

“Why do they call you Twitch?”

“Very funny.”

“No, I’m serious.”

He studied Cole as if measuring his sincerity. “I’m kind of jumpy. I guess I flinch a lot. That kind of thing. Some of
them think I scout too slowly. If they don’t like it, they’re welcome to take my place.”

“Nothing wrong with being careful.”

“That’s what I say! It’s
my
neck I’m risking. I do it how I do it. Helped save me from those killer plants.”

“What item do you use? Jumping Sword?”

Twitch gave him a suspicious look. “Drop the act. Who put you up to this? Slider?”

“What do you mean?”

Twitch considered him. “Nobody knows what item I picked. I’ve never used it. Some of the other scouts are always trying to find out.”

“Why the mystery?”

“It’s not their business. I have little enough privacy. They know my birthmarks and the color of my underwear. My item is mine.” He shared a sneaky smile. “Not knowing drives Slider nuts.”

The door opened and Jace peeked in. “There you are! Man of the hour.” He came inside. “Already going to bed?”

“Long day,” Cole said.

“Busy night, too,” Jace replied.

“What do you mean?”

He wore a teasing grin. “I noticed you hanging out with Mira in the yard. Starry night, Shiver Moon . . . pretty romantic.”

“Stop it,” Cole said. “I just wanted some fresh air. She came out to warn me it could be dangerous.”

“She came back in a hurry,” Jace said. “Seemed kind of flustered. Maybe somebody was putting on the moves?”

“What? No way! She just forgot something she had to do.”

Jace nodded knowingly. “Right. You’re good.”

It frustrated Cole that Jace kept after him. Why did he care so much? “Wait a minute,” Cole said. “How do you know everything she was up to? Were you following her?”

“I just pay attention,” he said, sounding a little defensive.

“We weren’t by the common room.” Understanding dawned. “Oh, I get it,
you
like her.”

Twitch looked intently at Cole and gave a little shake of his head.

Jace exhaled sharply. “Whatever. In her dreams.”

He was trying to act tough, but he couldn’t hide that Cole had gotten to him. Twitch’s anxiousness confirmed it. “How else could you know we were out there together?” Cole pressed. “You really were following her! Were you up on the roof?”

The guilt was written all over his face. “Shut up, Cole.”

Cole made his voice dreamy. “I bet you wish
you
were with her under the stars. Sailing in a lifeboat, putting flowers in her hair.”

“Keep your messed-up daydreams to yourself,” Jace almost shouted, his eyes darting to Twitch.

“I wasn’t the one tailing her,” Cole pointed out.

Jace’s face went rigid. It took him a moment to speak. When he did, his voice was barely under control. “She’s one of the few people in this place who is actually nice. Actually a
good
person. I watch out for her a little. Don’t try to make it sound like I . . . You don’t want me to hate you, Cole. You really don’t. Watch it.”