Storm

by Donna Jo Napoli

  When I wake, the boar is nowhere around. Scraps of hyena lie scattered at the base of the cedar, soaking up the rain. I’m hungry. “Hey, Screamer, are you starving?” The kit doesn’t move. I can’t remember the last time he moved. But I feel his weight. I stand and stretch and give myself a good shake. “Wake up.” The kit still doesn’t move. But he doesn’t fall off, either. If he were dead, he’d have fallen off. Right? I should pull him from my neck and find out. But I don’t. I need to have food to offer him before I do that. “Wait, Screamer. Please live. I’ll get you food. You’ll see.”

  My mantle is damp, more in the front, where I was curled over it, than the back, which was open to the air. Damp, not dripping. It’s odd to be so nearly dry. I lean over and finger my knee; a thick scab has formed. Good. I look around, giddy with hope.

  The only way down is to reverse how I got here. I scoot out the branch on my butt, then lie on my tummy and let my legs dangle until I’m hanging there. My toes don’t reach! I didn’t scoot out far enough. But it takes too much strength to go hand over hand. I don’t trust my strength. There’s no choice: I hold my breath and drop.

  And I’m teetering on the branch below. I skitter along it down to the first crook before I can lose my precarious balance. Success! It’s an easy jump from there to the ground. But where is that boar?

  The rain comes less here; the cedar needles screen it out. And my sense of smell has returned. The flesh of that hyena actually entices.

  I drop from the crook and pounce on a large clump of fur and gristle and bones. The boar bursts from nowhere. I bite down hard on the mess in my mouth and climb into the crook. It’s at the boar’s snout level. He grunts and jumps, rising onto his hind legs, but he can’t balance that way more than an instant. Ha! I’m safe, right there in the bottom crook.

  I squat and take the mess from my mouth and drop it into the hammock my mantle forms between my knees. “Meal time.” I squeeze my eyes shut a moment, then dare to pull on Screamer. The kit comes easily into my hand. Limp. Like the chukar chick back when I was on the rock shelf. But like the chick, his chest moves. “Good boy.” I rub his tummy with one finger and lick his face. He opens his eyes and mews. He mews! I let out a little whoop. Then I rearrange my legs so I’m sitting and the kit and hyena mess are cradled in my lap. “It’s yours.” Screamer eats.

  The boar watches. He stands on all fours, his nasty eyes fixed on us. All at once he opens his mouth wide. Teeth. So many teeth. He clamps his jaw shut again. Was that a yawn or a threat? He’s an idiot if he thinks I’ll be scared into doing something witless.

  Screamer devours every last bit of flesh and gristle.

  I’m hungry.

  The boar still stands.

  Slowly the little bit of light fades. The boar’s hulk remains unmoving.

  I imagine a blob of milky honey on top of my tongue, slowly melting. My friend Hurriya is a good cook. She makes better pudding than Mamma even. I miss her. I miss everyone.

  I sleep again.

  When I wake, the boar stands in the same spot. Surely he moved about during the night. But he’s back at his post. His eyes are closed. He must be sleeping, yet still he stands.

  As quiet as I can, I take the sleeping kit from my lap and tuck him behind my neck. I walk out the branch. I will not fall, I will not be scared. I will not give victory to a boar. I am too blasted hungry and a boar is too blasted idiotic. I walk to where I can easily reach the branch above. But I don’t stop. I walk farther, now hooking my arm over the higher branch. I walk out to where I can reach among the needles. I grab a cone and wrest it from its branch. I bite in hard and chew. The bitterness makes my nose wrinkle. But birds eat cedar cones, so they’re not poisonous. And I can’t be picky. I swallow. The rough clump catches in my throat. Coughing doubles me over. I hang on to the branch my arm is hooked over, hang on with all my strength.

  The boar grunts and walks to stand immediately below me.

  I throw the bitten cone as far as I can. It whizzes over the boar’s head and disappears into the rain beyond. The boar practically spins in the mud. He races off after the cone.

  I grab two, three, four more cones. I run down the branch to the trunk and wait for the boar to come trotting back toward me. Then I hurl a cone again. The boar is blessedly brainless; he turns and runs after that cone.

  I drop from the tree and snatch a handful of hyena mess. But, oh, there’s a sizable piece of flesh over there, just right there. I make a dash for it.

  Out of nowhere the boar rushes me. He’s between me and the tree—no! I run, but there’s nowhere to run to. The next tree is so far.

  Smash. Crack.

  I look behind. The boy bashes the boar with his club.

  The boy! How? Where did he come from? I go dizzy with the speed of it all, with my changing luck.

  When he finally stops, his face is splattered with blood. He looks at me. And grins.

  I stare back. “You smile? Have you gone entirely daft?”

  He turns his face upward into the rain, then wipes it down with his whole hand and shakes his head like some crazy dog. “Let’s go back to your crook in the tree.”

  “How do you know about my crook in the tree?”

  “I’ve been watching. What? Did you think I just happened upon you at the right moment?” He laughs.

  Anger rises through my chest, heats my cheeks. And it feels so good to be angry—so good to be anything but afraid. “Why? Why didn’t you kill the boar before?”

  “Are you grateful?”

  “Yes.”

  “Very grateful?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you should be. I saved you. If I had killed the boar while you were still in the tree, you wouldn’t have admitted I saved you. Now you can’t deny it.” He steps closer. “I protected you.” He steps closer still. “You’re mine.”

  He’s so close, I feel his body heat. And I am grateful to him. Not just because he saved me, but because I’m not alone anymore. That’s not enough, though. It can’t be enough. “Have you ever stolen beans?”

  He squares his shoulders and looks slightly alarmed. “I’m a fisher. I don’t steal. I earn my living.”

  I search his eyes. “Do I look like a bean to you?”

  His face twists in confusion. “A bean?”

  “A bean pod, I mean.”

  He shakes his head slowly. “You look like my wife. I protected you. And I’ll go on protecting you.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s what husbands do.”

  “How do you know about me?”

  “I’ve watched you with your mother. With your brothers. I’ve watched you all my life, Sebah.”

  “How could that be? I never saw you watching. Besides, I hardly ever come down to the water’s edge.”

  “I know. But you go other places. You went to the new moon festival after the equinox, just a couple of weeks ago. Your brothers held you by the hand, one on each side.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Aban.” He tips his head, questioningly. Then he grins again. “Do you think we know each other well enough now?”

  I swallow. “It’s raining.”

  “And I’m covered with boar blood. Not the most promising way to start a marriage. But it’s better than nothing. Lots better. Will you kiss me, Sebah? Will you be my wife?”

  “You need my father’s permission.” If my father’s still alive. If anyone’s still alive. I haven’t let myself think like this—it hurts so bad. My family! I pound my fists on Aban’s chest. “Ask him!”

  Aban catches my fists tight in his hands. He breathes heavy. His face is as sincere as any face I’ve ever seen. “I am asking him, Sebah. Inside my head. I am asking respectfully. And when I see him next . . .” He puts his own face in mine, as close as it can get without touching. “When I see him, I’ll ask outright.” His head stands just slightly above mine, so that now he’s blocking the rain from my face and I feel the air move on my lips from the movement of h
is lips. It is a small thing, but it feels good. It feels very good. This boy is alive and life feels rare now—rare and wonderful. “It’s the best I can do, Sebah. You know that. Do your best, in response. Answer for him. Please.”

  “I can’t.”

  He looks so sad.

  I put my hand on his cheek. “But I can answer for myself.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Days 16–18

  There must be a fire somewhere. The air tells me that.

  I crawl out the branch from the crook Aban and I share and unfold myself. My body is creaky, as though I’ve aged decades. But my footing is secure. We’ve been in this tree long enough now that every part of me has adjusted. My feet and hands seem to curl to the shape of each modulation of the bark.

  This is not the tree the boar trapped me in. The water from the never-ending rain reached the bottom of that tree within a day of Aban joining me there. So we abandoned it and walked uphill, stopping to dig our fingers into the mud and pull out drowned field mice. It was Aban who discovered them. I don’t know how and I didn’t ask. They were revolting. But Aban and Screamer ate them ravenously, while I satisfied myself with mushrooms and the filmy green slime that lies on the surface of the mud everywhere.

  The water followed us. We kept ahead of it, but only barely. And then we stopped. We could see that the trees were ending. We’d be at the top of the world soon, with nothing but rock under our feet. Nothing to eat. Taking our chances in the tallest cedar around made the most sense; trees are plants, and plants are edible. But the tallest cedar’s bottom crook was too high for me to reach. And this cedar had a nice low bottom crook—a point that both of us could easily jump down from to gather food. So this is our tree.

  “You’re a good tree,” I say as I pat the bark. “Old and good.” I’ve been studying the cedar trees. The bark on this one is deeply cracked, like those of the trees right around it. The younger tree downhill, the one that disappeared under the water only yesterday, had a cone-shaped crown. But the crown of Aban’s and my tree is broad and flat. I am convinced that, too, happened with age, like the fissuring of the bark.

  People boil cedar bark and make those afflicted with skin rot wash themselves in the potion that results. My skin has not rotted. Yet. The wool of my mantle seems to be a proper shield against the rain. I tell Aban we should take turns wearing it. But he won’t. He says, “That’s part of my job in protecting you.” He can be stubborn. So he’s bare, and his skin looks like withered fruit. When he presses against me in mating, I’m afraid to touch him too firmly. I’m afraid my fingers will break right through. Would a cedar bath help him? I laugh aloud at the very idea; the whole world has become a bath.

  I kiss the branch my hand rests on now. We are high in the tree, so the branches are close to one another. When I stand like this, I can rest my back against the next higher branch. I like the way the branches on a cedar spiral around the trunk. It feels balanced. Calm. Interesting. It’s important to have interesting things to think about as the rain falls and makes the waters splash up onto my toes. This tree is now halfway underwater. We’ll have to move to the next higher crook.

  Nonetheless, the tree stands straight; it will not succumb. Which brings to my mind the most interesting thing I have noticed about the trees so far. This other thing is also part of balance, just like the spiraling branches, I’m sure: The total thickness of the branches at any given height seems to be just about the same as the thickness of the trunk. I am proud of this discovery. This is what allows the cedar to grow so tall without falling over. Maybe all trees do this. There are no trees but cedars in sight, and I can’t remember them well enough to envision a tree and try to make the mental measurements. But I like the idea that it might be a trick unique to cedars. I like the idea that cedars are somehow special. That would be fitting, given that all other types of trees are completely underwater. The cedars will be the last to die.

  Because we are all going to die. Everyone and everything.

  I pluck off a cone—it comes easily now, no wresting needed—and take a bite. It goes down my throat without a hitch. My body always seems to rid itself of a cone at the other end in almost the same form it entered me. So maybe cones aren’t food at all. But chewing and swallowing helps ease the pain in my stomach. Usually. Right now, though, it doesn’t help at all. The sudden memory of boar meat makes my tongue fat. We gorged on it before it rotted. But it’s been days without proper food now. Days and days.

  I go back to the crook and brush my cheek against Aban’s ear. He wakes with that dazed look he’s had for a while, as though he’s constantly confused. Then he sees me and smiles. The idiot. I can’t help but smile back, though.

  “There’s a fire somewhere,” I say.

  Aban stares at me blank-faced. Well, of course. Who would believe it? I don’t believe it. My wishful mind has conjured up the smell of burning wood simply because heat would be such a delight. Oh, to be so hot we’re uncomfortable.

  Aban is still staring. Then his nose twitches. He blinks and his eyes change. They look sharp. I haven’t seen him look so sharp since the day he killed the boar. He gets to his feet quickly, but is careful to push me toward the trunk so he doesn’t knock me from the tree. It always surprises me how careful he is not to jostle me. I don’t know how to put this together with the boy who slapped me that first night. He’s changed. Well, of course. The rain has changed everything. Aban walks out to where I was standing just a moment before and points.

  I follow his finger. A cedar is on fire. It’s the only one uphill from us. The fire is real. I should have trusted my nose. And if I didn’t, I should have noticed it with my eyes. Maybe I’m as dazed as Aban is. Maybe more.

  Aban’s lips protrude in thought. “Sebah? Sebah, where did you put my club?”

  His question worries me. We are living in a tree, after all. Everything is within sight. He should know exactly where the club is. But maybe he just doesn’t want to climb. I climb higher and extend down to him the club, which was nestled in the topmost branches.

  He takes it and swings fast and hard, energy coming from some secret reserve. The club slams against the branch he’s holding on to right at the point where it meets the trunk. It splits away from the trunk just a little. Aban swings again. Slam!

  “What are you doing? Don’t hurt the tree! I love this tree.” I drop down onto the branch beside Aban, blocking his access to the injured branch above. “This tree saves us.”

  “Don’t you see? Look around. Look!” His neck is so thin, the ropes inside him stand out against his skin as he shouts.

  I look around. “What? What am I to see?”

  “Our tree is the highest point now. Lightning will take it next.”

  Of course he’s right. “So? We can swim to another tree when that happens.”

  “I can’t swim.”

  How could I forget? But swimming to another tree would only be a temporary solution anyway. This rain will not stop until it drowns everything.

  I put a finger into the thick sap. I can’t stanch the sap flow—I can’t heal this tree’s injury. But I won’t let this sap be lost. I hold my sap-sticky finger to Aban’s mouth. He licks. Now we are both eating the sap. I set Screamer on the sagging, half-broken branch, so the kit can eat the sap too. And he does. Sap is tree blood, after all. It’s bitter and slightly sweet and sticky and earthy. “Thank you,” I breathe onto the branch’s open wound. “Thank you, thank you.”

  “Move away.”

  I understand nothing but the need in Aban’s voice; still, that’s enough. What’s the point of arguing, after all? The branch is already severely damaged. Screamer and I move to a branch on the other side.

  Aban swings the club again; he bashes at the branch until it comes free. He jams the detached branch in among the branches above him and looks around. “The one you’re sitting on,” he announces. “That’s next.”

  Screamer and I move higher and watch Aban bash off that branch too. He’s still str
ong. I’m so grateful that he’s still strong. Then all three of us lick at the gash.

  “That one,” says Aban. He bashes a third branch off.

  “Now that one.”

  “Stop. Please stop. What will you do with all these broken branches anyway?”

  “Make a boat. Not a sturdy one—just a raft. But it’s better than nothing.”

  A raft on an empty sea.

  Except the sea isn’t empty. Every now and then a bloated carcass floats past our tree. A little white donkey once. A lion once.

  Fish and snakes swim by often. Aban even caught a fish. And he’s the one who said you can’t catch fish with your bare hands. But he did. Or almost with his bare hands. The stupid thing was nibbling at the tree bark, and Aban studied the slow flap, flap, flap of its gills. He quick jabbed a sharp twig between those flaps and we ate the most delicious carp ever. Tiny, but perfect.

  I would be dead if it weren’t for Aban.

  So I can’t tell him that a raft is a pointless idea. I nod. “All right, let’s make a raft. We can use as many branches as you want. But they better be the smaller ones, from the very top of the tree. We need the wider ones to sleep on.”

  Aban looks down at his feet. The water has risen up around his ankles. He puts his hand above his eyebrows to keep out the rain and looks up at the branches above. He’s already bashed off the next three widest ones. After that it isn’t clear that the branches are thick enough to hold both our weights. Please let Aban realize that. I feel the skin along my jaw twitch. I wait for him to speak. But he’s just standing there. He’s good-looking, in a strange sort of way. Oh, he was better-looking the first time we met; the rain is taking its toll. But he’s still oddly beautiful. Exotic. And I realize for the first time that his name is unique. His hair and eyes are black, like mine, his skin the color of ripe olives, like mine, but he must be of another origin. “What does ‘Aban’ mean?”