Nightpeople

by Anthony Eaton

  ‘Is that …’

  ‘Yeah.’ Dreamer Baanti didn’t even try to hide the smugness in his voice. ‘It’s her.’

  ‘Bloody hell! I thought she was stillborn.’

  ‘So did a lot of people.’

  ‘That mad old bastard Karri was right, then?’

  ‘Looks like it.’

  ‘Where’d you find her?’

  ‘Near dead out in the middle of the plains. She’d wandered off from her camp.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘So far as I can tell. Reckons she was on her way to Woormra.’

  The other man directed a sharp glance in Dreamer Baanti’s direction.

  ‘With Wanji?’

  ‘Nah. Dariand.’

  ‘Makes sense. He come after you?’

  ‘Not yet. We didn’t hang around.’

  ‘Good thinking. What are we gonna do with her?’

  ‘Got a few ideas.’

  ‘The rest of the town’ll be happy to meet her, I bet. Nice to get some good luck in Olympic for a change.’

  ‘If we tell ‘em.’

  ‘Course we’re gonna tell ‘em.’

  ‘I don’t reckon it’s a good idea. Not straightaway, in any case.’

  The two men squared up to one another.

  ‘Listen Baanti,’ the dark-haired man said, his voice even and reasonable. ‘You might be a Dreamer, but Olympic is my town, and this is my mob, and if I say we’ll tell them, then we will.’

  ‘That’s fair enough,’ Dreamer Baanti agreed easily. ‘But if you ask me, there’s more to gain by keeping her to ourselves for a bit longer.’

  ‘What?’ Slander’s brows creased with distrust.

  The conversation quickly shifted into a repeat of Dreamer Baanti’s lecture from that morning, and by the time he’d finished the result was the same. Slander, a thoughtful expression on his face, nodded in agreement.

  ‘I’ll say this for you, Baanti, you might be crap as a Dreamer but you think things through.’

  Dreamer Baanti’s fists clenched slightly. It was only a momentary movement before he got himself back under control. It happened so quickly Saria wasn’t even certain the other man noticed it.

  ‘Where’ll we put her in the mean time, then? Even if he doesn’t know we’ve got her, Dariand’s bound to come sniffing around here soon.’

  Dreamer Baanti shrugged. ‘I know one place in Olympic even Dariand won’t find. Not in a hurry, anyway.’

  ‘The bolt hut?’

  ‘Might as well. It’s not like anyone uses it for anythin’ else.’

  ‘Fair enough. We’ll move her after dark, eh?’

  ‘Sesta time’ll, do just as well. The sooner we get her tucked away, the better.’

  ‘Fine by me. I’ll come back then.’

  Slander started to turn towards the door, but stopped and walked back over to Saria. She dropped her eyes, refusing to meet his stare, but the man grabbed her chin and lifted her eyes to his.

  This close, the firelight flickering across his features revealed a face deeply creased, not with wrinkes of age, as Saria had assumed, but with scars, perhaps ten or fifteen of them, criss-crossing his cheeks and brow. His nose was bent and flattened, too, spreading much wider across his face than most people’s. His eyes were dark and cold. After a couple of seconds staring, he dropped her face again and crossed to the door.

  ‘Pity,’ he said to Dreamer Baanti as he left. ‘All these years waiting and she’s as ugly as her mother. Still, she’s better than nothing, eh?’

  Dreamer Baanti didn’t reply and Slander pulled the shutter aside just enough to slip out into the bright daylight, sliding it back into place behind him.

  From a box on the floor, Dreamer Baanti retrieved a water-skin and some dried meat.

  ‘Here. Eat and drink. Then get some sleep.’ He threw them on the dirt at her feet.

  The leather binding was so tight there was little feeling left in her fingers. When she bent and tried to pick up the water-skin, she fumbled and dropped it.

  ‘Can you untie me?’

  ‘Not yet.’ Dreamer Baanti shook his head. ‘Don’t trust you. As long as you’re in this hut, you stay tied.’

  ‘But I can’t eat.’

  ‘Tough.’ He picked a piece of meat out of the box for himself and settled on the floor across the doorway to chew it.

  Sighing, Saria struggled again with the water-skin, until she eventually managed to grasp it long enough to unstopper it with her teeth. With her hands bound, she ended up squirting as much water onto herself as she actually drank, but she’d managed at least a couple of mouthfuls.

  By the door, Dreamer Baanti watched her dispassionately.

  ‘Now sleep.’

  ‘What are you going to do with me?’

  ‘You’ll find out.’ Finishing his food, Dreamer Baanti reached across and slid the door shutter open, then whistled. As always, the sound brought back memories of the dog’s terror and Saria suppressed a shudder.

  ‘Bloody animal.’ Dreamer Baanti cursed when the dog didn’t immediately appear. He didn’t say anything more, just sat and stared at Saria with the door open beside him. Looking at the bright rectangle of sunlight that slanted into the room, Saria thought about making a run for it, or even just shouting for help. Surely if somebody outside heard her …

  ‘Don’t even think about it, girl,’ Dreamer Baanti warned. ‘You wouldn’t get halfway to the town fence, an’ even if you did, that’d stop you quick smart. And don’t think you’d find any friends out there, either. Dreamer Wanji and old religion aren’t too popular here in Olympic.’

  ‘What’s “religion”?’

  She was hoping to draw him into talking further, and perhaps revealing something that might help her, but Dreamer Baanti simply shook his head.

  ‘Nothin’ you need to concern yourself with. Trust me.’

  Trust me. Dariand’s favourite expression, but when the words came from Dreamer Baanti something about the way he said them and the quick snake-like grin which accompanied them made it sound completely different. Foreboding.

  At last the dog slinked in through the narrow slit of the doorway with its belly almost dragging through the dirt. Dreamer Baanti slid the shutter back into place, then, to Saria’s shock, he directed a savage kick at the animal. The dog, hunkered on the dirt at the old man’s feet, saw the blow coming but didn’t try to avoid it. It took the kick squarely on its skinny ribcage, a hollow ‘thud’ echoing off the tin walls.

  ‘Useless bastard.’ Dreamer Baanti squared up for another kick and Saria was horrified to see the animal roll submissively onto its back, its tail curled tightly between its hindlegs. Instinctively she pulled earthwarmth up into herself and reached for the animal, and as she touched its mind she was surprised to find no fear there, only a sort of resigned weariness.

  ‘Don’t!’ she shouted, withdrawing her mind from the dog’s. ‘Leave him alone!’

  She’d shouted without thinking, driven by the simple knowledge that the dog wasn’t about to protect itself and so she had to. Dreamer Baanti’s pale eyes narrowed as he turned his attention to her. In the dull light his pupils were so large that they seemed like holes in his face.

  ‘What?’ His voice went soft. ‘You don’t like that, eh?’ He stepped across and stood over her. The dog, forgotten for the moment, slinked immediately into the shadows. Slowly, Dreamer Baanti crouched beside her.

  ‘I’m a Dreamer, girl. What makes you think you’ve got the right to tell me how to deal with animals?’

  She didn’t answer.

  ‘’Cause you don’t. Animals are my business, that’s why I’m a Dreamer an’ you’re just a runt pup. I know animals. I know how to handle ‘em so they behave right. I know their secrets, and I know how to make them mine. Even clever animals like you.’

  His hands were reaching towards her, the fingers outstretched towards her neck. Saria tried to struggle away, but she was unable to get any distance from the old man.

  ’A
nd if you want to teach an animal to behave, sometimes you need to hurt it, right?’

  The old man’s fingertips burned like coals against the soft skin of her neck.

  ‘And it’s how you hurt it that’s important.’ Dreamer Baanti’s eyes engulfed her, pulling and sucking while his voice echoed all around. ’You have to hurt them properly, take away their spirit. That’s how you break an animal.’

  His mind was pushing into hers now. That cold, hard wedge of consciousness sloughed aside any resistance she tried to offer and forced its way into her, bringing with it wave after wave of crushing pain.

  ‘And once you break them, you own them.’ The words weren’t spoken but Saria heard them anyway, inside her head, in Dreamer Baanti’s soft voice. They mixed with the pain; they were the pain.

  Finally, while her body arched and spasmed, Saria sensed the black chasm of unconsciousness opening ahead of her.

  Thankfully and unhesitatingly, she plunged into it.

  Somewhere between awake and asleep, Saria felt the touch, stirring her. Slowly she opened her eyes.

  Her head ached, and not just her head but her whole body. The pounding throb pulsed behind her eyes and echoed along every nerve and fibre of every muscle of her arms and legs. Each breath she sucked in tore its way down the soft tissues of her throat and each exhalation burned its way out.

  The hut was dim. Dreamer Baanti lay slumped across the shuttered door, snoring. Beside her the fire pit had all but gone out, and somewhere outside she could hear the distant bustle of people going about their business.

  At her feet crouched the dog, its yellow eyes glittering in the sparse light. Guarding her. When it realised she was awake, its tail twitched just once, and for a second Saria thought she felt its mind reaching to hers. Then the sensation faded, and with it some of the aching pain, and exhaustion overtook her

  As she drifted back into sleep, the dog’s tail wagged again, and the list thing. Saria realised before she slipped under was that it wasn’t really guarding her – at least, not in the way Baanti intended.

  It was watching over her.

  ‘Wake up, girl.’

  A sharp toe nudged her side. Not a kick, but enough to jab her out of sleep.

  ‘Wh …’ Saria rolled groggily onto her back, her mouth dry.

  ‘Get up! Sit!’ Dreamer Baanti nudged her again, more insistently, and though her body screamed at her for it, Saria forced herself upright. She was still on the dirt where she’d fallen. The interior of the hut was nothing but shadows.

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘The same thing that’ll happen next time you talk outa turn.’

  ‘Here …’ Dreamer Baanti shoved something into her hands. ‘Eat.’

  Still dazed, thinking as though through sand, Saria took the bread end chewed it absently. It was hard, stale and filled with grit that crunched between her teeth, but it relieved some of the gnawing hunger in her belly, and swallowing it brought her back into herself.

  She was given water; not nearly enough to slake her thirst but sufficient to take the edge off it.

  ‘What did you do to me?’

  Dreimer Baanti smiled grimly.

  ‘Gave you your first lesson in what it means to be a Dreamer. You should be grateful, girl. Now, get up.’

  He picked up the leash, hauled her upright and moved across to the door.

  ‘You follow me out here, eh? And don’t try to run off or anythin’, ‘cause there’s no way you’re gonna get out of this place, and you know what I’ll do when I catch you again, right?’

  Saria nodded, and the old man slid the shutter aside.

  It was the middle of the day and the alleyways of Olympic were bathed in bright light. It was quiet, with nobody to be seen.

  ‘Sesta. Come.’

  Saria followed him out and had her first close-up look at a town. It wasn’t much. Dreamer Baanti led her through a maze of narrow alleyways, zigzagging left and right between one hut after another. The buildings were all much the same, tin and wood and cloth cobbled together with dried mud, everything coated in dust. At one point, through a gap, Saria glimpsed a wide, open area with a low, round structure in the middle and more huts on the other side. Dreamer Baanti led her away from this and into another narrow alley. With all the twisting and turning it was hard to be certain, but she had the impression he was skirting around the edge of the open area, rather than leading her across it.

  ‘Stop,’ he hissed, then shoved her roughly backwards into a narrow gap between two buildings. There was barely enough space for Saria to fit. ‘Stand dead still and don’t make a sound, or else.’ He blocked the opening with his own body and a second later voices approached from along the alley. Two men, deep in conversation.

  ‘Dreamer.’ One acknowledged Dreamer Baanti as they passed.

  ‘Fellas.’

  ‘What you up to, out here in the middle of the day?’

  ‘Got some business to attend to for Slander.’ The old man’s tone didn’t invite further questions and perhaps it was this, or the invocation of the town leader’s name, but the men quickly made their excuses and continued on their way.

  While Dreamer Baanti waited for them to round the next corner, Saria stared upwards.

  The narrow slit of dayvault which she could see between the roofs of the huts was deep blue, suggesting horizons somewhere far beyond the Olympic fenceline.

  ‘Right. Move.’ Dreamer Baanti used the leash to jerk her out of the hiding place and led her on through the maze. Meeting the men must have unsettled him, because now he set a furious pace and Saria had to run just to keep up. Finally he hustled her in through the doorway of a hut that looked the same as every other they had passed, except this one was unshuttered, light streaming through two open windows and a narrow smoke-hole in the roof Slander was waiting inside and as they entered he nodded at Dreamer Baanti.

  ‘No problems?’

  ‘Almost. Ran into Danti and Jander. Dunno what they were doin’ out at this time of day. Told ‘em I was on business for you.’

  ‘They see her?’

  ‘Nah. Got her hid real quick.’

  ‘She behave?’

  ‘Yeah. Pity. Woulda liked an excuse to give her a blast.’

  ‘Don’t be an idiot, Baanti. That’s playin’ with fire, ‘specially for a weak bastard like you, and you know it. We can’t afford to have our only Dreamer burnt out like …’

  A bloom of crimson flushed across Dreamer Baanti’s pale cheeks.

  ‘Psht!’ he hissed angrily, nodding at Saria. She didn’t know if he was angry at Slander for what he’d just said or for what he’d been about to say. But the town leader got the message.

  ‘Over here, then,’ he said abruptly, as he stalked across the room to the far corner, where an old wooden crate served as a kind of table.

  ‘Watch her,’ Dreamer Baanti muttered. The dog had somehow materialised by their side. It must have been following them the whole time. At Dreamer Baanti’s command it crouched in its usual position.

  The two men pulled the crate aside and Slander bent, scraping away dirt to expose a wooden panel set flush into the ground. With a grunt he lifted it to reveal a dark hole, its opening a little narrower than the crate itself.

  Then they turned to her. Silently, Dreamer Baanti fished a sharpened edge of stone from a pocket in his robe and used it to cut through her bindings. Days of chafing had left her wrists raw, and two angry red welts ran around them like bloody bracelets. Immediately she set to gently rubbing them, but Dreamer Baanti, after carefully returning the stone knife to his pocket, shoved her roughly towards the hole.

  ‘In.’ He pointed at the opening in the floor.

  ‘No.’ Saria backed towards the door, shaking her head, the pain in her wrists forgotten. The hole in the floor was a square of darkness. ‘No.’

  The old man hissed and grabbed for her, but Saria pulled away and turned to run, only to find her escape blocked by Slander.

  ‘Please, no.’ />
  But the two men closed on her and she was forced down through the dark maw into the space below.

  It was a tiny cell, roughly square. They dropped her in and her bare feet thumped into dirt as hard as rock. She tried to jump back up, but the hole was deep and she only managed to get one hand to the edge, which Dreamer Baanti promptly stepped on, crushing her fingers beneath his foot until she let go with a cry and fell back into the pit.

  ‘Here.’ A water-skin landed beside her. ‘Someone’ll bring you food later.’

  The dog whimpered as the wooden panel scraped back into place and the light vanished. The last thing Saria saw was Dreamer Baanti’s pale eyes staring down into her own.

  In the darkness, time stopped. Saria quickly lost track of how long it had been since she’d been thrown into the hole and had listened to the heavy crate being pulled back into place over her.

  The darkness was absolute. Not even the faintest hint of light seeped around the edges of the hatchway, and it made no difference whether Saria had her eyes closed or open. Trapped with nothing but the echo of her own breathing, at first Saria had screamed, leaping again and again at the roof, until eventually she fell, curled up and sobbing, on the tiny square of hard floor.

  A damp, pervasive cold came seeping out of the earth, chilling her bones and blood. It was a feeling she had known from reaching into the minds of coldbloods at day’s end, but now it was her own body cooling and she started to shiver.

  The water-skin was near her feet and in the darkness she managed to direct a brief squirt into her mouth. The water tasted gritty, but settled like something solid in her belly.

  She clawed at the walls, trying to scrape even the smallest lump of dirt out from them, to loosen them, but it was futile and warm trickles of blood oozed from her fingertips.

  She drifted in and out of consciousness so often that most of the time she was unaware which state she was in. Through it all, a black shadow of panic followed her, trying to find a chink, a small weakness in her mind into which it could worm itself