by L. S. O'Dea
She sat back down. She’d always considered herself less than a Producer.
He didn’t bother to look at her. “The only things standing between you and death are all those traits that you hide.” He stared at her, his black eyes glowing red from the fire. “Funny how the Great Mother works.”
“You don’t worship Araldo?” She’d read about creatures of old who worshipped the earth and sun, but she’d never met one.
“Araldo is an Almighty’s god, not mine.”
“He’s not just an Almighty’s god. He’s our god too.” Her response was immediate.
“Really? Who taught you about Araldo? Your parents, right? But who taught them? The Almightys have been forcing their god on all the other classes for as long as I can remember, and I can remember a long way back.”
Suddenly, his face looked haggard. How old was he? How long had it been just him and Mirra in these woods.
“What is your god like?”
He snorted. “Curiosity. That’s your weakness.” He stood and stretched. Then he bent, gathering dirt and putting out the fire. “You wouldn’t like the Great Mother. She is a harsh god. She gives us everything that we need but there is a price.”
“What is it?” She wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
“The one that all pay. Death.”
She inhaled sharply. Araldo protected them. He did not make them pay with their lives.
“Everything dies and goes back to the Great Mother.” He gathered his pack and quiver. “Now, up the tree.”
She stood and groaned. Her whole body ached.
“Move it.”
“I don’t think I can.” She really didn’t. She couldn’t jump to the first branch, she’d have to climb and her arms felt like jelly.
“Is that what you’re going to do when death comes for you? Sit there and whine.” In a falsetto voice he continued, “I can’t. Please, don’t make me.”
Her eyes narrowed. He wasn’t a jerk; he was a...a Grunt’s ass. She turned and stomped several feet away and then raced straight at the tree. She leapt, exposing her claws, but her timing was off and she hit the trunk, tumbling to the ground. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t.
He squatted next to her. She waited for the berating, but he remained silent.
She sat up, pushing her hair away from her face. “Just leave me here. I told you I couldn’t do it.” She cringed at the whininess in her tone but she couldn’t seem to stop it.
“Try again.” He stood. “This time, extend your claws a second before you think you should.”
Unbelievable. How did he expect her to do something before she thought about it?
“You can do this. You’ve learned a lot today. More than I thought possible.”
She grunted. Great, now she even sounded like him. She wouldn’t admit it, but his words made her feel better, like she actually could do it. She stood and stretched. Then she walked several paces away and ran toward the tree. She was preparing to extend her claws in another step when she pushed them out and leapt. She hit the tree and her claws slipped a bit but held. It was working. She pulled first one hand and then the other free. She climbed up to the first branch. She’d done it. She turned and looked down, unable to stop smiling.
He stared up at her, his face blank. “Go to the third branch.”
The second branch was close so she jumped. Once she was situated, she climbed to the third one. When she looked, Gaar was already halfway up, his gear and her backpack on his large shoulders. She cringed. She’d forgotten her stuff.
He squatted on the limb and pulled out a rope from his pack. He tied it around her chest and waist so she was secured to the trunk of the tree. Then he moved to a branch next to hers and leaned against the trunk. He didn’t tie himself in place.
“Now, you need to practice listening,” he said.
She groaned. Not more lessons.
“Be still, quieter than quiet and pay attention to the forest,” he whispered.
He steadied his breathing until there was barely a sound. She mimicked him and focused on the surrounding area. She should do well at this. She had great hearing.
After a long moment, he said quietly, “Describe what you hear.”
She spoke in a hushed tone, like his. “An owl hooting.”
“Where?”
“Didn’t you hear it?” She turned toward him, surprised.
“Of course, I heard it. I want you to tell me exactly where it is.”
He had to be kidding. “It’s pretty far away. How am I supposed to know—”
“It is a quarter of a mile away to our right and above us by ten feet.”
Her mouth dropped open. He was right about the direction. She wasn’t positive about the distance but she’d take his word for it.
“Now, concentrate. It is not enough to hear. You must listen.”
She focused once again, trying to pay attention to all the different sounds and determine their location. “There is something below us in the bushes.”
“Describe it,” he said.
“It’s small. It seems to be searching for something.”
“Where exactly below us?”
She listened closer. “Straight down and about eight inches to the left.”
He turned toward her, his teeth shining in the darkness. “It’s ten inches to the left, but very good.”
She smiled back. Finally, she’d done something right.
“Not surprising. Your kind are good at pinpointing sounds at close distances, but you also need to identify locations of creatures at far distances. It could save your life.”
Her spirits sank a little. Out here, it always seemed to come down to life and death. She missed being safe. She missed home.
They practiced for another hour or so as night fully descended around them. Finally, Gaar called it quits. She was exhausted and her head pounded, but she was too excited to sleep. She’d done well in this lesson. He was proud of her. He didn’t say it, but she could tell. A cold breezed picked up and she shivered. He grunted and handed her the blanket out of her pack.
“Thanks.” She covered herself. It was big enough to share. “Do you want some?” She held up a corner of the blanket.
“I’m fine.”
“Okay.” She stared into the darkness, making out the shapes of leaves and a few small creatures that were huddled down for the night like them. “Gaar?”
He grunted in response.
“If the Great Mother supplies everything, why do you need to go into town?” It had been eating at her ever since he mentioned getting supplies. The forest was teeming with food.
After a long moment, his voice almost a whisper, he said, “Did you ever wonder how creatures such as Mirra and I came to be extinct, or almost extinct?”
She’d heard the stories about their annihilation by the Almightys but she wanted to hear his side. “I heard the Almighty’s version of the story, but I’m sure it’s not true.”
“It’s mostly true.” He sighed. “A long time ago there were quite a few of us. Then one day everyone was gone; everyone but Mirra and me.” His voice was clipped, the words sharp.
“You don’t have to tell me. I know that the Almightys killed your kind.”
He smiled grimly. “You heard part of the story. The rumor is that the Almighty eradicated us and that is true, but not the complete tale. Something went wrong. Something inside of us. We became violent.” He smiled. “More violent than usual. The Almightys had no choice. They came into the forest with Guards and weapons and killed everyone. I saw it. It was chaos. Handlers were fighting Handlers and Trackers were fighting Trackers. This sometimes happened, but”—he shook his head—“pairs, bonded pairs of Handlers and Trackers like Mirra and I were fighting each other. That never happened before. They wouldn’t stop even as the Almightys killed a few. The others just kept attacking.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I saw many die that day.”
She squeezed his hand, his skin rough and warm in her gra
sp. The Almightys had slaughtered everyone he knew, but he didn’t blame them. She wouldn’t be that fair minded.
“I was not affected, not at first, but then I found Mirra and she was...different. Edgy. Angry. I feared that she was becoming violent and that they’d kill her. I coaxed her deeper into the forest but she was starting to ignore me. That’s when I came across Bradley, an Almighty, and one of his Guards. They tranquilized Mirra and we carried her to Bradley’s lab. He invented a serum for us that we take monthly. It makes Mirra easier to handle, gentler.”
Had she seen this side of the Tracker? If this was the gentle easy to handle Mirra, she wasn’t sure that she wanted to be around the other one. “Has she had her serum lately?”
He shook his head. “We’re due, but I have to wait. It makes her ill and I can’t have her sick when we free the Trackers and Handlers. It may not go well.”
“Do you think the captive Trackers take the serum?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Did they fight amongst themselves or only with the Handler?”
“They didn’t fight each other, but I don’t think their chains allowed them get that close to one another.”
“Hmm. We’ll have to wait and see then.”
They fell silent but she couldn’t let it go. If they had a sickness inside them, what caused it? Maybe, she could help.
“Did you ever get angry, violent?”
He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “I felt agitated and upset...”
“That could be because of what you saw and worrying about Mirra.”
He patted her hand. “Possibly, but possibly not and I can’t take that chance. If I get violent no one will be there to give Mirra her shot and then she’ll die. The Almightys will kill her.”
“This serum. What’s in it?” If this illness were natural then there would be a cure in nature.
He shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Perhaps, she could duplicate it. She was good with plants and herbs. “Do you have some that I can taste?”
“No. It might hurt you,” he said.
“I won’t drink it all. I’ll only taste it to try and figure out the ingredients. I may be able to find a natural alternative for you. Then we wouldn’t have to go into town. We could go directly to the Tracker camp.”
He remained silent for so long that she thought he’d gone to sleep. She shifted to get more comfortable. They could finish the conversation tomorrow.
“Nothing is free, Little One.”
She turned toward him. What did he mean by that?
He stared into the forest. “When we kill the Guards at the Tracker and Handler camps, we are going to be hunted. We will have to travel high into the mountains and stay there for a long time. I have some extra serum but not much. Some months I can hold off for a couple of extra weeks. With what I’ll pick up from town, I’ll have enough to last about six months, after that it might become dangerous. I want you to know in case you decide to go with us.”
He was giving her a choice. She could go home and she would, but did she want to stay? She liked the freedom out here. At home, she’d miss Gaar and Mirra, but they’d have others of their kind. She should stay with her kind, but who was that? “Let me sample some of the serum before I go home and I’ll try and identify some herbs for you.”
He stared at her for a long moment. “Mirra was right about you.”
She wasn’t positive that it was a complement, but she was going to take it that way. “Thank you.”
He closed his eyes. “Go to sleep. Tomorrow you visit the Lake of Sins.”
CHAPTER 7
TROY STARED OUT THE WINDOW of the guard shack, waiting for the automated light to pass. Jackson’s visit that afternoon had convinced him that he couldn’t delay any longer. He had to fix the fence before anyone discovered that Trinity had escaped from his section.
He grabbed a sack filled with tools and a large gray blanket and slipped out the door. The light was almost halfway into the next section. No one would be looking his way. Of course, Titus, the Lead Producer to his left, probably wasn’t watching anyway. Titus had a tendency to have a little nip from the bottle on occasion and every day was an occasion for Titus. Drinking was frowned upon except for special events, but no one ever questioned who supplied the alcohol. He had. Titus operated a still in the brush near his fields. That itself wasn’t a huge issue. The problem was that Titus had a tendency to skim a little off the top of his crop yield to fill his moonshine orders. That was strictly prohibited. He snorted. For every rule that was strictly prohibited, he could name at least two Producers who were breaking it. The Almightys really should pay more attention or change their policy from strictly-prohibited to please-don’t.
He ducked behind the bush and dropped his bag and the blanket. He knelt by the fence, pulling out a trowel from the sack, and began to dig. When the hole was large enough, he set the trowel aside and took out a plank of wood. He slid it into the hole. He turned to grab the small hooks that he would use to fasten the chain link to the lumber when he caught a glimpse of the automated light coming from the right. He grabbed the blanket, covering himself and his tools and waited. Hopefully, if Hector, the Lead Producer working the section to his right, was following the light, he wouldn’t notice anything.
Hector was a good guy. One of the few kids who had accepted Troy before he’d filled out and learned to hide his more flamboyant tendencies. Unfortunately, Hector was a stickler for the rules and he doubted that the other Producer would keep quiet about this.
After several moments, he peeked out from under the blanket. The light was moving into Titus’s section. He shrugged the blanket off his shoulders and proceeded to affix the fence to the wood. When he finished, he began shoveling the dirt back into the hole. The entire process took a few trips under the blanket, but when he was done he stuffed everything back into his pack and headed toward the guard shack.
He was ready to sit back and relax. He might even take a small sip of the moonshine that Titus had given to him. He deserved it. He stepped through the door and stopped. Remy was not supposed to be here and yet, here he was sitting in the chair by the window.
“How could you?” Remy’s face was drawn and haggard.
His best bet was to pretend innocence until he knew exactly what Remy had witnessed. “How could I what?” He let the bag slip out of his hand and kicked it to the side as he shut the door. Now, he’d try and change the topic. “What are you doing here? I told you what happened with Bell. It’s not safe for us to be together right now.” It wasn’t a lie. Bell might be keeping an eye on him. Of course, if he were really worried about that he wouldn’t be creeping around in the dark filling in holes.
“How is Trinity going to get back inside?”
Gruntshit. “It isn’t what it looks like.” It was exactly what it looked like but he stalled for time, his mind spinning and coming up empty. He walked over to Remy.
“Are you telling me you didn’t fill in the hole that Trinity needs to get back inside the camp?” Remy crossed his arms over his large chest. “Millie was right. I should have never told you about Trinity leaving.”
He tipped his head, cracking his neck. So, it was going to be like that. “I had to, but don’t worry. If she comes back...”
“When she comes back.”
He gritted his teeth. Remy was a big oaf of a Producer, over nine feet tall with huge shoulders, but he had the heart and soul of a child. “When she comes back, I’ll get her inside. I promise.” He reached for Remy’s hand, but the other Producer snatched it away.
“How are you going to do that? What if you’re not on duty?”
He’d had it with Remy blaming him. “For once in your life, think!” He dropped on a nearby chair and leaned toward Remy, resting his hands on the other male’s legs. “She took advantage of us, of our friendship.”
“She wouldn’t do that,” said Remy.
“Then explain why she snuck out from my section while I was on duty
.” He stood and began to pace. He had to calm down or Remy would side with her. “She was upset about Randy and wanted to get away. I understand that.” He stared at Remy. “But she put us in danger.”
“She didn’t do it to hurt us. She didn’t think. She’s just a kid.”
“She may not have meant to harm us, but she should have thought it through more carefully. She is not a child. She is of age to have children.” He wasn’t positive that the selfish brat cared about anyone but herself, but he wasn’t going to say that.
“Okay. She made a mistake, but you have to unfix the fence.” Remy’s eyes filled with tears. “She’s my little girl.”
“No, she’s Tim’s daughter. It’s a shame she isn’t your offspring. She’d be better off.” If Remy were her sire she wouldn’t be so different. He suppressed a shiver. House Servants gave him the creeps with the way they stared, unblinking and the way they moved. Even when Tim wasn’t sneaking into the encampment, he still almost slithered. It was like he couldn’t walk normally; he had to glide. Trinity moved like that when she wasn’t careful.
“But, I love her,” said Remy.
He crouched in front of Remy. “I have to protect us. You come first to me. Always.” He leaned forward to kiss him. He hadn’t wanted Remy to come by, but now that he was here, there was no sense in wasting the rest of the evening. That was another side effect of Trinity’s actions. She’d ruined his and Remy’s evenings together for an entire month. He was going to kill her if she ever came back.
“She has to be able to come home.” Remy turned his head away from the kiss.
“She will. I’ll know when she returns.” Remy was being stubborn, but he knew the other Producer well enough. They would go no further until he reassured him.
“How?” Remy relaxed, kissing Troy’s neck.
That felt so good. He tipped his head back, giving Remy better access. “Jackson will find her and...”
Remy stood, breaking their contact. “You sent a Guard after her? That was your brilliant plan.”
He gritted his teeth. He knew better than to mention Jackson. It was going to be another long night. “Jackson owes me. He won’t go to Benedictine.”
