Wanderers

by Susan Kim

  “Pilot,” the person murmured from the front row. “That’s enough. Shut up now.”

  The dog obeyed, quieting down instantly. Then the figure rose from its seat and turned to face Esther.

  “Here,” he said. Something flew through the dark air, and somehow Esther managed to catch it. It was a firestarter. She clicked it, and by the light of its small flame, she could finally see.

  A boy had risen from his seat to face her, using one hand to hold on to the edge of the stage. In the flickering light, Esther saw that he was bone thin, not much taller than she was, with brown skin and matted dark hair that fell past his shoulders in thick locks. Even though he had been sitting in close to pitch-blackness, his small oval glasses were dark.

  With a stick used as a cane, he made his way with difficulty into the aisle. Smoke wafted from a small paper cylinder, which he held in his teeth.

  “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m looking for Aras, the guide,” Esther replied. Her heart was still pounding from her close encounter with the dog, which now lay in the aisle, panting, its dark eyes fixed on her.

  “You are?” he said, sounding perplexed. “What for?”

  “I need to ask him something.”

  As the boy came closer, Esther noticed that he used the backs of seats, leaning on them. When he reached the dog, he bent down and undid its chain. Then he held the animal’s collar and allowed it to lead him the rest of the way.

  With a start, Esther realized that the boy was blind.

  When he reached her, the smoke smell was overwhelming. “Well,” he said. “You found him.”

  Esther was stunned. “Oh!” was all she could manage to say.

  “What you want?” he asked, ignoring the obvious shock in her voice. He seemed to be sixteen or so. “Need help getting someplace?”

  She decided to be blunt. “Mundreel. You ever been?”

  He didn’t say anything for a moment. Then, “I been there,” he said, as if remembering something long ago. “Well, right outside, anyway. I left some people there, I think. Of course, it was a while ago, but . . . I don’t think it’s moved, or anything.” He chuckled.

  Aras had a vague way about him that Esther found both confusing and annoying. Furthermore, she was nearly choking from the smell of the thing he was smoking, which he never removed from his mouth.

  “Hey,” she blurted out. “Could you get rid of that?”

  “What?” Aras asked, dumbly. “This?”

  “Yeah. I can’t breathe.”

  The boy shrugged. Then he dropped and rubbed it out with a foot in a dusty boot. “It’s just natural,” he muttered. “From the earth itself.”

  “Look,” said Esther. By now, her voice was grating with irritation. “I got to go. Thanks anyway.” She turned to leave.

  “So what are you gonna give me?”

  Esther stopped halfway up the aisle. “What?”

  “To get you there. I’ll take food and water. But I’m willing to take whatever you got, if I like it enough.” He laughed again.

  “I’m not asking you,” Esther said, almost laughing, too, at his presumption.

  “You ain’t gonna get there yourself. I mean, you might get there. But dead.” His brow furrowed, as he considered if what he’d said made sense. He seemed to decide that it did. “You already way off the main road. There’ll be plenty more detours and the roads are shot.” Still, Esther said nothing, and the boy seemed to lose patience. “Look, I don’t got to do it. I don’t got to make trouble for myself. I got a good life here.” And with that, Aras started back down the aisle.

  Then he stopped and turned.

  “Hey.” He gestured, snapping his fingers, and Esther realized he was talking about his firestarter. She almost tossed it at him when she remembered he couldn’t see. After she retraced her steps and handed it over, however, Esther hesitated.

  Although she hated to admit it, everything he said was true. It was clear they could not make it to Mundreel without a guide.

  Aras was the only hope she had.

  “Look,” she said. “I can’t give you anything.”

  Aras nodded. He already seemed distracted as he reached down for his dog and patted its muzzle.

  “But if you get us there,” Esther continued, “you can share whatever we find. That’s the best I can do.”

  Aras brushed his long hair back, one side and then the other, appearing to think. Then he lifted his face and in the dark, she could have sworn that he saw her, in one way or another.

  “Maybe,” he said, as if doing her a favor. “Maybe I just will.”

  Esther realized that Aras had no bicycle of his own and so when the two emerged on the sidewalk, she had an idea.

  “You can go in the wagon,” she said. “Or if you want, I can bike standing up and you can sit behind me and hold on.” It was the way she and Skar often gave each other rides when there was only one vehicle between them. But the moment she said it, she realized her mistake.

  Aras bridled. “I ain’t helpless,” he snapped.

  Esther grew flustered. “I didn’t say that. But it’s a long way back, and I thought maybe—”

  “Forget it,” he said. “I’d rather walk.”

  With that, Aras slung his battered nylon backpack over his shoulder and pulled a length of chain from his pocket. “Hey Pilot,” he called, and the wolflike animal nuzzled his hands and allowed the makeshift leash to be attached to his collar. Then Aras straightened up.

  “You just go on ahead,” he said to Esther. His tone was patronizing. “Pilot can pick up your trail.”

  Esther bicycled at a fraction of her usual speed, weaving back and forth across the highway and glancing over her shoulder to see how the boy and his dog were doing. It wasn’t encouraging. The two ambled along the road and into the woods that surrounded them, and even backtracked once or twice. Since Aras said nothing, it took Esther a while to realize he was actually communicating to his animal through a complex series of soft tongue clicks and whistles.

  Throughout, the boy continued to smoke his bad-smelling papers. When he finished one, he would signal Pilot to halt, fumble in his pack for a small tin box, and roll up some more dried plants into a fresh package before lighting it. Each time, this operation seemed to take forever.

  Esther and Aras didn’t exchange a single word. When he finally spoke, what he said surprised her.

  “We almost there.”

  In fact, they were. Esther was so focused on Aras’s progress, she hadn’t noticed that the gas station was visible in the distance, on the side of the highway near the exit. A skilled tracker like Skar relied on her eyes above all. Aras was blind: Did he have some special ability? As if he had heard her thoughts, the boy bristled.

  “It ain’t magic,” he snapped. “It’s called listening.” And a minute later, Esther, too, could hear the faraway thread of voices.

  It had taken her perhaps five times as long to return, and by now the sun was low in the afternoon sky. The others flocked around her, so frantic for whatever she had brought that at first they paid no attention to the boy and animal who stood at a distance. Esther could not give out the bottles and packages fast enough; people seized them from her hands, ripped them open, and began eating and drinking on the spot. Only Joseph, who took a sip for himself, made sure to give a long drink to Kai.

  Aras crouched by his dog and rubbed its ears. “They better slow down,” he remarked to no one in particular. “They gonna get sick.”

  Again, Esther was unnerved by how much the boy seemed to know without seeing. Then she realized that anyone could hear the ravenous noises that filled the air.

  “Tell them,” Aras insisted.

  Esther hesitated, then spoke up. “Hey,” she said. “Slow down.” But no one paid attention.

  “I bet half that stuff ain’t even cooked,” Aras said. He had straightened up and now his voice rang out, arrogant and overbearing. “You eat too much, you gonna kill yourself. Or end up wishing y
ou was dead, anyhow.”

  In the silence that followed, the others turned to gaze at Esther’s companion. They took in Aras’s bony, disheveled appearance, his long hair, the reeking smoking paper still dangling from his mouth, and the wolflike animal that crouched by his feet with yellow fangs bared, panting. Then one by one, they turned to Esther.

  “Who’s this?” Silas asked.

  “We can’t take anyone else,” Eli said at the same time. “We don’t got enough as it is.”

  With everyone staring at her, Esther took a long swallow down a dry throat. She avoided eye contact, choosing instead to look at the ground. She especially dreaded Eli’s reaction.

  “This,” she said, “is our new guide.” She paused, then cleared her throat. “Aras here is going to help get us to Mundreel.”

  Esther winced, bracing for the uproar that she knew would follow. Instead, there was a silence that was even more damning.

  She looked up and saw the others studying Aras with open disbelief, distaste, and hostility. First Michal and then Joseph flinched; they had just picked up the terrible smell coming from not only Aras’s smoking paper, but his hair and clothes. And Silas and Rhea were smiling at each other, giggling and whispering.

  Esther had no choice but to take full responsibility for her decision. Instinctively, she turned to the one she could always count on for support: Skar.

  Yet her friend was gazing at her with a mixture of concern and compassion that rattled Esther far more than the other reactions. When Skar spoke, it was as if she were talking to Asha or someone else not quite right in the head.

  “Esther,” she whispered, “I know you’ve been upset since . . . what happened. Are you sure this was the best idea to—”

  Since she wasn’t sure at all, Esther responded with decisiveness. “Yes, I’m sure,” she said. “I wouldn’t have asked Aras if I—”

  Eli cut her off. “You should have asked me.”

  Esther sighed. She knew that she had insulted Eli by going behind his back and usurping his new authority. With difficulty, she began, “As I said, he’s just here to help, Eli, he’s not—” but she never finished her thought.

  “Your guide can’t even see!” Eli shouted.

  At this, Rhea and Silas burst into laughter.

  Throughout, Aras had said nothing. But as if sensing the group’s hostility, the dog growled and then exploded into loud barking as he strained against his chain.

  Everyone jumped, none more so than Joseph. Stumpy bushed up her fur and seemed to grow three times her usual size, hissing and spitting. Joseph scooped her up and together they fled to the safety of their wagon, where he pulled the tarp shut behind them.

  Unless she was able to think of something, Esther realized with a sinking heart, her plan would be over before it began.

  “Listen,” she said, addressing the group. “Aras has been to Mundreel. He can get us there. He—”

  But she was interrupted by the sound of more barking. Goaded by Rhea, Silas was taunting the dog, poking a branch at its snapping mouth and slapping the leaves across its muzzle. As he and the girl laughed, the animal’s yelps grew to a deafening frenzy of screams and growls.

  “Stop it, Silas,” Esther said, annoyed, over the noise.

  “Let him have his fun.” Even though Aras understood what was happening, he seemed unperturbed.

  Silas, emboldened by Rhea’s shrill laughter, stepped even closer. Wielding his branch like a sword, he whipped the animal across the eyes; and when it recoiled with a yip, he hit the dog, hard, across the ribs.

  Esther could hear the crack from where she stood, and she moved to yank the boy away. But before she could, she saw Aras drop his end of the leash. The animal coiled down like a spring and, with a roar, lunged forward. He flew at the boy and, ignoring the stick, sank his teeth deep into Silas’s thin arm.

  It all happened so quickly, Esther couldn’t even react. Above the sound of growling, there was a shrill, high-pitched whistle which took her a moment to realize was coming from Silas’s open mouth as he tried to wrestle free. But the dog refused to let go and began to worry the limb, shaking its head from side to side and dragging the small boy to his knees.

  “Pilot,” Aras’s calm voice pierced the commotion.

  The dog seemed to hesitate. Then, with a final toss of its massive head, it let go and returned to its master’s side, panting, its tongue lolling out. Aras once more picked up the chain and wrapped it around his wrist. Silas was left crumpled on the ground, sobbing, bright red staining the dingy white of his robes. Rhea ran to his side, shooting Aras a terrified look.

  “Don’t hurt animals,” Aras said, his voice even. “They our kin, you know.”

  Silas deserved to be punished for his cruelty, Esther thought; still, he had nearly had his arm torn off. Glaring at Aras, she pushed past him, about to rip a strip of fabric from her sweatshirt.

  “Wait up,” said Aras.

  “What?” Esther was in no mood to talk. “He’s bleeding. I got to tie up his arm.”

  “You gotta clean it first. Don’t you know anything?”

  Esther bridled, but managed to keep her temper. “We don’t got any clean water.”

  “You don’t need clean,” he replied. “Dirty is good, too.”

  Baffled, Esther and the others could only stare at him. But Asha was already speaking up, her face flushed with eagerness at being the one with the answer.

  “Over there,” she said, pointing. “There’s some water!”

  She was indicating a small, abandoned truck parked to one side. It had been destroyed long ago: its windows were smashed to spiderwebs of broken glass, its fittings had been mostly torn off and tossed aside, and one of its doors gaped open.

  The hood was badly dented and held a rusty pool of water, left over from the recent rain.

  Even looking at it caused a murmur of apprehension to ripple through the crowd.

  “Good,” said Aras. “Somebody fetch a bowl. A firebowl. And some kind of cup or bottle, too.”

  There was again a silence, during which the only sound was Silas snuffling. Aras cocked his head and then shrugged.

  “It’s up to you,” he said. “Don’t matter to me if your friend dies.”

  Esther saw Eli’s face darken and his fists clench. But just as she was about to hold him back, Joseph poked his head from his wagon. He held out a dented firebowl that had seen better days, as well as a chipped mug that had the words FIRST NATIONAL BANK on it.

  “Here,” Joseph said. He handed them to Esther and ducked back inside.

  “And a piece of clothing,” Aras said. “A shirt or something would be good.”

  Esther was as confused as everyone else. Nevertheless, she went into the other wagon and rummaged in it until she found a T-shirt. It was still clean and in good condition, with months of use left. Still, if she was to convince the others to trust Aras, she had to commit to his plan, whether she understood it or not.

  She only hoped Aras knew what he was doing.

  “Okay,” he said. “Now we need a fire.”

  “You better hurry up,” Esther said to him, under her breath, as she bent to gather kindling. “That boy’s bleeding bad.”

  Aras grunted. “Here,” he said. He dug his firestarter out of his pocket. “Use this. Only don’t waste any. I need it.”

  Skar alone volunteered to help. She looked dubious, too. Together, they built a good-size pile from twigs and trash they found littering the small woods that surrounded the garage. Then Esther used the firestarter to get it blazing.

  Throughout, Aras crouched to one side. His dog lay in the dust on its back; its owner tickled its spotted stomach, and the animal, which moments ago had almost killed a boy, now writhed with a kind of innocent pleasure.

  “You done yet?” Aras called.

  “Just about,” replied Esther.

  The boy got to his feet and Esther handed the firebowl and mug to him. He checked them by touch before giving them back.

>   “Okay,” he said. “Take this and scoop as much water as you can into the bowl.”

  Everyone murmured and Eli glanced up sharply.

  “Don’t do it.” His voice was harsh. “He’s crazy.”

  But Esther shook her head. Then she approached the destroyed truck, its hood brimming over with the deadly liquid.

  Holding the cup by its handle and using the utmost care, Esther lowered it into the pool. It grated across the corroded hood as she scooped up a small amount of water. It was mostly clear, although there were orange flakes of rust in it, a few dead insects, and a dried leaf. Forcing herself to move slowly, she poured it into the firebowl on the ground next to her, taking care not to spill any. She did this again and again until there was no water left in the hood.

  “Okay,” she said. “Done.”

  Behind her, she could sense the others give a collective breath of relief. But it wasn’t over.

  “Now bring it to the fire,” said Aras. “Take your time.” Again, the warning was snide.

  Carrying the water was even more of a challenge. When Esther picked it up, the firebowl, nearly full, sloshed its contents and some of it splashed onto the ground at her feet. She froze; and in the silence, she could hear Rhea exclaim. Only after she made certain that none of it had touched her did she dare to continue. She finally settled the metal container on some stacked bricks that held it over the leaping flames.

  “Now what?” she asked.

  “We wait,” replied Aras.

  Boiling water was nothing new; it was how Esther and her friends prepared much of their food. But they used only the safe kind of water that either came from the spring or in sealed bottles from the Source.

  It was terrifying to think what would happen if you heated the other sort of water, the sort that could kill you. As steam began to rise from the firebowl, everyone shrank back, and more than one of them covered their mouths and noses.

  But eventually, curiosity won out. Within minutes, everyone had edged forward and now peered over Aras’s and Esther’s shoulders to watch the water churn and bubble. Even Joseph could be seen observing from his wagon. No one paid any attention to Silas, who sat alone, nursing his injured arm and whimpering in pain.