After
eating the animal I felt fuller than I had in many weeks and slept heavily. I
dreamed I was walking along the edge of a mountain peak with Perssu, Koyan,
Jacklyn, Aryamo, Rechk and Tephio. I felt weightless yet stable and I could see
us in traveling cloaks, leaning into the wind. I looked down and my sight flew
across a great expanse of swirling liquid like muddy water. It heaved and
swelled as far as the eye could see. The sky was grey-brown and cloudy and a
great wind whipped at our faces, threatening to strip the clothes from my back
and the hair from my head.
‘What
is that?’ an indistinct voice had yelled over the roar of the wind.
My
voice, unnaturally clear replied, ‘The Hundai.’
The
dream disturbed me, I took a while getting back to sleep after it and looked
forward to being in people’s company again though I had grown quite fond of the
families of birds, few snakes and mamalya in the area.
Upon
waking the next day I gathered as many vines as possible and began linking and
weaving and double knotting them together. I decided to add more knots to be
used as foot holds in case I wanted to climb back up the vine.
The
day thereafter I stood on the edge of a cliff, surveying the basin, it’s
mountainous boundary receding in the distance and a curious thin white-blue
line, barely discernable on the horizon that I thought may be another desert. I
wondered if it was a trick of light as I so often saw in the desert also.
As
I nursed a section of knotted vines I considered the white rocky landscape
behind me, sparsely littered with great old trees. I contemplated the villages
that may of existed somewhere in that direction and the devastated Amacite
village that had been my home. I had long ago let go of the idea of finding my
real parents in their nomad tribe and if Lenshu and Finlee had survived the
mudflow when they went to Kilmaro, I didn’t know which direction they would
take upon realising the village was no more. They were in an unknown direction,
innumerable days away from where I now stood. I half wished I’d stayed at the
site of the village for longer, or made more more effort to find my way back.
I
resolved to visit the sprawling stone village in sight, nourish myself properly
and consider returning to search for Lenshu and Finlee depending on what I
found there. After ensuring the security of a wrapped portion of food I had
tied to myself, I turned and began attaching the vine to trees and rocks on the
cliff face where I had chosen to descend. The loose vines I cast trailed out
into the empty space I hoped not to find myself falling into. It took all day
with a process of fastening a section and pushing the rest down to my next
footing, but I finally made it safely to the bottom; despite some anxious
instances where I was suspended free of any cliff face.
I
carefully laid out some stones in a line, pointing in the direction of the
mounds I had seen from above. Then I found a small cavernous hollow in the
cliff face to curl up in overnight. I looked forward to finding people again
and dreamed of meeting a family who might help me go back and find out what
happened to my own.
~
‘These
are the bonds for people born in the last year Murn Richard.’
‘What
am I to do with this pile of pulp? Why hasn’t it been sorted already? I want to
have the parents ratings combined to calculate the potential of each of these
children, and I want it done today. Geoldoff and Velda will be arriving
tomorrow morning to barter another exchange, they’re looking to increase their
economy and the profits of their own bon arminia but can’t get them breeding
fast enough it would seem. It’s their own fault, refining them you know… they
let them get too smart. Passing off our potential high fliers to their offices
will save us the cost of conditioning them later.’
‘I’ll
ready a list of names for you then.’
‘What’s
this I heard about a riot in the market?’
‘Some
urchins sparked a commotion and the tension that has been rising between
sellers came out.’
‘Tension?’
‘No
one will buy the cabbages from the desert anymore. Too many people have died.
It also means people are getting more choosy about other foods, they are
getting scared.’
‘Well,
redirect their fear. Poison the next lot of illegal gardens our Armin find and
make sure everyone believes that bad produce is coming from these unregistered,
unauthorized, home grown gardens.’
‘Neighbourhood
gardens?’
‘Yes,
make sure Murdacoc’s print place gets that story. Besides, they’ll soon forget
and hunger will drive them to try it again. In the meantime they can eat more
Prime.’
‘There’s
more to it than that, we can’t even keep on watering the produce in that
region. The water is getting more and more toxic because there’s less and less
of it.’
‘Elaborate.’
‘The
Aral sea is no more. And the underground river we started using is too
contaminated from the Prime Plant. The…urine and dung is concentrated because
of the numbers we have cramped into the lots and the runoff from the carcass
pits…’
Murn
Richard Rinehart held up a hand to say, ‘Why are there carcasses? Everything
can be used for something. Prime is a bottomless pit, why are we wasting such a
percentage.’
‘I’ll
look into it, but we still have to find another water source,’ explains the
informer.
Richard
sighs. ‘Send half the workers home, uproot the rest of the crop and send the
other workers to replant them in the Burdon Valley.’
‘But
the crop is …dirty.’
‘It’ll
be right after rain.’
‘And
we can’t grow in that soil remember.’
‘I
remember thank you. It should be okay by now.’
‘No,
the top dirt is unusable for at least another generation or two.’
‘Then
dig deeper, dig up the bottom soil.’
‘It’s
starved of nutrients from the last crops and still soaked in Monsanto.’
‘Then
burn down the forest in the foothills by the pass.’
‘But
burning damages the soil in the-’
‘Then
just hack it all down,’ growls Richard, getting to his feet, ‘gently, so as not
to damage the soil,’ says Richard sarcastically. ‘Now, is there anything
else!?’
‘No
Richard.’
‘Thank
you Mario, you can go to now. And get them to plant some crops as they’re
felling, anything sterile in the 468 or 979 range to get something going until
we can properly secure the area from thieving gebars.’
Richard
looks around the room, its walls filled with what they call bluestone. Blocks
of cast metals like iron, patterned with circular holes and other meticulously
arranged metallic shapes.
As
if in need of fresh air, Richard marches towards the doorway opening onto the
balcony. Richard’s informer Mario, a diminished figure wearing black, remains
seated on the polished silver guest seat in the chamber. He has tired eyes and
shoulder length hair.
A
haughty woman with her hair in a bun enters the chamber with a messenger boy.
Without acknowledging Mario, she approaches Richard where he stands on the
balcony looking down on the busy street below.
‘Camelia?’
says Richard without turning around.
A
slender hand passes him a few sheets of paper covered in technical drawings, he
inspects them briefly but doesn’t take them.
‘Murn
Richard, the designs confiscated from Vinci’s studio, sun machinery and
something that appears to lift with sound.’
‘I
thought he wasn’t willing to sell to us?’
‘He
wasn’t.’
‘Lock
them away with the others,’ said Richard lazily.
‘We’ve
received word from the Burden place near the cones,’ continued Camelia. ‘A
group of workers has been killed in a ground collapse.’
Richard
spins on his heel.
‘What
are they doing there?’
‘Trying
to put out the fire Murn Richard.’
Richard
screws up his face. ‘The fire isn’t spreading anywhere! It’s in the ground!’
‘But
the Amatie villages-’
‘They
can move!’
The
woman stops short of forming the word where?
‘Get
those workers to join the others in replanting. No, wait. We don’t need them
right.’ Richard crosses his arms.
‘Send
them to the southern arm of the Finlee mines. First thing tomorrow, all of
them.’ He turns to Mario. ‘The other half of the workers too. And put Finlee in
charge to see that they all get there.’
After
a moments silence Mario says. ‘We will need more workers to hack down the
forest or it will be too hard and take too long.’
‘No
they can manage.’
‘Really,
Murn they will take too long.’
‘I
don’t want to use the extra credit. According to this one,’ he said meaning
Camelia, ‘I’ve been paying people to put out a fire that’s not even moving.
It’ll burn itself out eventually. Now, enough, you can all leave now. It’s
eating time,’ he said looking up at the sun.
A
low wail issues from the doorway to the chamber and a young man runs into the
room.
Richard
spins around as Mario gets to his feet and as the woman and messenger boy step
aside. ‘What’s going on!’ demanded Richard.
‘It’s
Atalanta and Amon,’ explains the young man hurriedly.
Richard
strides across the room to an area of floor against a wall that is made of
steel mesh, he looks down at two enormous komodo dragons. The one with scarring
on its side is eating its kin.
‘Amon
has finally killed Atalanta!’ praised Richard. ‘They’ve not eaten in months you
see,’ explained Richard excitedly to the messenger boy cowering behind Camelia.
‘Actually,
Atalanta died of poisoning,’ corrected the young man.
Richard’s
smile fades.
‘I
must be going,’ said Mario as he waved at Camelia and the messenger boy to
follow him. Camelia cautiously began to walk towards Mario, followed by the
messenger boy.
‘We
shall return to our business,’ stated Mario with a bow and guiding Camelia away
with his hand on her back, together their steps quickened.
Richard
looked down at the dragons again, Amon tearing large chunks from Atalanta’s
body.
‘Why,’
began Richard as he stepped towards a plinth in the corner, ‘why have they not
been fed equally clean food?’
‘I
don’t know!’ blubbered the young man as Camelia and the young boy slipped
through the doorway after Mario.
Richard
picked up a hand-held ballista and turned around to face the young man who was
keeping his head down.
≈
A
foreign whistling sound like the tearing of air issued nearby followed by a
dull squelch. I lay low as I heard another person for the first time in a few
weeks. Anxiously, I waited until I was sure they had gone from the area before
rising. I found they had taken the teeth of an animal they had killed before
discarding the body, flesh fur and all. Rather than follow them directly I
picked my way through the bush that contained more sharp and spiky plants than
I was used to, until I reached the river as I had intended. From there I
followed it upstream towards what I had come to think of by now as a village of
stones.
Finally,
I came across a person and saw them. I didn’t approach them out of caution but
stalked them through the bush for a while. It was a young man that reminded me
vividly of a childhood friend Nile, whom I had not seen for many years. This
man appeared to be searching for something in the bush. After a tense hour or
so he appeared excited and called out. I lay low yet again as another man came
running over to join him. They celebrated and chattered in a language I didn’t
recognise, as he lifted a large pearlescent skyblue stone or egg. They held it
together and began to carry it away, taking turns. I followed.
It
wasn’t long before they stepped out onto an open area and I began to hear and
feel the hum of many voices. This village was larger even than I imagined.
Remaining in the bush I left them and headed towards a wall looming above the
treetops. Walking through the forest I realised there was an extraordinary
amount of mushrooms growing along the ground, crowding at the bases of trees
and hiding under grassy shrubs. In the evening twilight, while seated waiting
for dusk on the city edge, I dislodged a large golden specimen to expose a
thick rhizome of tubular cords branching out arbitrarily beneath the surface of
the ground; exploring the soil and exploiting it of food to deliver to the
hosts of mushrooms.
When
dusk fell I approached the wall that appeared to be made of pale round stones
of equal size, stacked evenly high up into the air. I could hear the noise of a
great crowd on the otherside. As night began to fall I started climbing,
finding many holes to use as finger and footholds. At several metres high I
heard a low growl below me and looked down to see a four-legged animal with
pointed ears and a long snout. Another one approached and they growled and
snarled at one another. I focused on climbing and soon reached the walls
zenith.
Slowly
lifting my head up into the wind, I peered down onto the scene below. Small
flaming lanterns had been lit around the walls and throughout the square below,
casting an orange glow over the scene under the clear night sky.
The
walls themselves seemed to be set with glowing rocks, a type I recognised from
having been underground in my childhood. The glowing rocks emmitted millions of
small different coloured specks of light.
A
hundred or more people I couldn’t count were gathered below at the steps of one
of the mounds. There were five more in the distance directly in front of me,
each surrounded by their own walls and the river flowed to the right of this
city from where I was perched.
It
was a temple of huge unnaturally square stone slabs. I gasped at their sheer
size, my mind trying to imagine however they might have made them and placed
them in such a fashion. The topmost part glinted silver and black with strange
cords and twisted shapes. What I would later realise were the hearts of
machines that drank the blood of the earth, used by an earlier civilization. As
I looked closer, I realised some of the stones were made of different silver
stones, metals, that had been compacted or stacked together and covered with
clay to form platforms and risen walkways that were being used.
The
crowd wore an array of woven fabrics, generally dull in colour, but a group of
people standing above the crowd wore more colourful attire and one tall pale
one brandished a large silverstone stick decorated with coloured stones.
At
his feet was a pile of five pearlescent white stones and another of perhaps
forty black ones. A dark pit sunken into the lowest steps was lit on fire as I
watched.
I
saw the man I had seen earlier in the forest approach the decorated one with
the stone he had found, the crowd cheered. As the man who brought the
pearlescent stone was sent away, the decorated one spoke loudly to the crowd
below and they quieted.
A
child came forward from the crowd carrying a basket. The one with the
silverstone stick took a dark stone from the pile as the child emptied leaves
from the basket and spread them across the stone ground beside the pit of fire.
The child lay down on the leaves. The one with the stick held up the black
stone and uttered more words. Then they brought the large stone down and rested
it on child’s chest, I imagined it must have been very heavy and made it
difficult for the child to breathe. The decorated one them motioned the act of
taking the child’s eyes and throwing them into the fire. Unnaturally dark smoke
began rising from the sparking flames, I guessed he must of had fire powder in
his hands.
Absorbed
by the spectacle, I didn’t notice my own arms tiring until they were burning.
Wearily, I cautiously pulled myself a little higher, stretched and rested my
head on the ledge. Now, still standing over the child, the pale decorated one
leant down, picked up another stone and placed it on top of the first. I
gasped, wondering how much weight the child could possibly take. As the
decorated one leaned down and lifted a third stone I began to feel ill.
Unexpectedly,
they suddenly dropped the stone they were holding and pointed up into the night
sky. I too turned to see what he was pointing at.
Suspended
beside the moon was the second star I had first seen from the roof of the Long
Hut. I had given it little thought since the ash fall and the flood. It had
been there the whole time since but I had given it little thought in the face
of losing everyone I had known.
My
hand slipped as my concentration lapsed. Remembering how high I was from the
ground I gripped the wall with a sudden fierceness. A rock cracked loose and I
quickly found another to grip. I could feel my raised heart beat slow as I held
my palm to the smooth round surface of the pale clay-like rock. I slid my hand
forward over the exposed edge and found a crevice to lock my fingers in while I
rested and stretched my other arm.
Suddenly
there was a tremor and the stone I was gripping came loose. I whipped my other
hand up and pulled myself tight against the wall. The tremor filled me with
fear, I wondered if the high wall would hold if there was another flood.
That
was when the shape of the stone I had broken free filled my field of vision. My
fingers had been planted in someone’s eye socket, that rock had been a skull. A
light in the sky broke my horrified gaze and set me trembling. The second moon
had begun to grow brighter as a smaller light exited, traveled across the sky
and faded like a slow moving shooting star. The crowd below entered a kind of
hysteria as I felt another tremor. I instinctively climbed back on top of the
wall as it dawned on me that the entire wall was constructed of human skulls.
As I looked around at the wall stretching into the distance connected to yet
more walls, my skin crawled with terror.
A
third greater tremor resounded and a section of the wall in the distance
collapsed. Some of the fourlegged pointy ears below me took flight,
disappearing into the forest. I hurriedly began to descend the wall, knocking
the loose skull free. It fell to the ground below, landing with a thud. I
prayed I wouldn’t follow. Sickness racked my body as I used the same sockets on
my descent. Half climbing, half sliding, I fell onto the forest floor below.
I
ran with the wolves along the outer wall of the city towards the river. I
passed a frightened couple as the sound of the panic stricken crowd inside the
city drifted overhead, traveling far in the cold night air.
I
plunged back into the forest, fighting my way through branches and fell onto a
pathway. Running past some concerned people that ignored me, I followed the
path that meandered along many torch lit terraces towards the riverbank. I
skipped the path and charged straight down the terraces, dropping down six or
eight feet at six intervals before I reached the river bank. There were people
scrambling up steps towards the city and some were jumping into boats as if to
get away from it. I sought out an unmanned boat and dashed along the waterfront
towards it. Grabbing an oar resting against an ornately carved pillar of a
centipede, I untied a fiber tether and leapt into the boat. I kicked myself
away from the bank with both legs.
The
river current was steady, I paddled out into the middle, desperate to get away.
I observed the city’s walls and the peaks of the temples above them as I
floated along. The sound of the crowd grew steadily quieter and I thought I
heard the sound of an instrument being played somewhere along the dark bank. I
discerned frightened faces under a few lights from people’s dwellings in small
caves plotted together.
~
Prahla
retrieved the short ornate metallic spear fallen on the ground and hid it in
the folds of her clothing as the gatherers dropped the pearlescent stones the
Hiidean’s had been asking people to collect.
Standing
up and looking around, she realised she could no longer see Jade.
‘Jade?’
she called through the din.
Tremors
underfoot grew increasingly aggressive as she began to fight her way through
the dispersing crowd. After being pushed sideways and to the ground she
continued heading towards the riverbank. Many people were standing around on
the bank of the river gazing up into the sky at the second moon that had grown
increasingly brighter. Stumbling down the terrace steps in haste, she glances a
figure leaping into her family’s boat.
‘Hey!
Stop!’
Tripping
over a fallen child in heavy robes she is momentarily stunned to realise it is
the same child she saw earlier that day. Have you been here all this time? she
wondered in horror. Placing her hand on their back, they looked up at her with
a blank, withdrawn expression.
The
shouts of other people fighting over boats by the bank broke her attention and
she looked back to see the figure floating out into the river in the boat.
‘I’m
sorry,’ she stammered before getting to her feet and leaving them behind to
charge down the steps.
Snatching
a spear gun from the hands of a gladiator standing gazing at the night sky
scene she sprinted along the bank, loading the ballista as she had watched
Armin do a thousand times before.
When
she felt she had gained enough distance in front of the boat gliding
downstream, she stopped, stood firm and aimed.
≈
The
air sang as an object approached, the thud of metal into wood resounded. I
looked over the edge of the boat to see a short spear had embedded itself in
the boats side. I gave one deep row with the oar and sank back into the hull
out of sight. Once it was quiet and I was away from the village of stones I
took out some meat I had dried and strapped to myself and had a few bites. As
the memory of the child by the fireside pierced my mind, I lost my appetite and
spat it out into the water.
I gazed up at the stars and cursed myself for not paying more attention
to Koyan’s lessons. I would have had a greater ability to navigate the land.
The gentle rocking motion of the boat lulled me to sleep while I wondered what
the star from the second moon was, and what the trailing flicker of light, like
a shooting star, was. The trees trembled on both banks of the river but I felt
safe on the flowing water.
