"Just from the wood hunters. I don't know anything about–"
"We do. We know about the wood hunters. The scavengers from the country. We know about them. And you?"
"Yes."
"They deal in all things that grow in the ground. They mine the brown fields. They scour the planet. Anything that survives the drought is a target."
"Yes..."
"Wood is not their only product. Fibers for textiles. Food. And precious compounds – fertilizers used for... farming, among other things."
"Yes, but–"
"They are vagabonds, not in the city or village records. Oh yes, carpenter. We know about them. But we do not know them."
"No... n-no." The chair maker shook his head. "No."
"You do."
"N-no..."
"You have met them. Who are they, carpenter?"
"I-I don't know..."
"These are your business associates."
""N-no... no..."
"What can you tell us about them?"
"Nothing... nothing at all. They hunt for pieces of wood, roots, the beams in old ruins... I buy these things. I know nothing else."
"Perhaps some of these people were your friends?
"No!"
The bearded man waited a moment, blinking serenely. The corners of his mouth may have lifted minutely. "Of course not." His voice was soft. "You're a peaceful man. Just a simple tradesman. You wouldn't be friends with criminals."
The chair maker nodded mutely.
"You aren't friends with killers."
"No..."
"So tell us about them."
"W-wait. Killers?"
"The explosions. On the ship. We know this was caused by the, ah, enhanced soils the farmers use. And we know that if the scavengers know nothing else, they know soil and they know what sells."
The chair maker sat up, staring wide-eyed at the bearded man. But I didn't... "I know nothing about that!"
"But you know about them. Tell us. Tell us about the scavengers who sell you your materials. They are killers. You are not. So help us."
"No. No, I only buy wood from them. For my job. I live in the city. I am from the city. I have no idea what goes on in the country. They are not my friends or anything. I–I don't know anything."
"But you have a... relationship with them." His voice was still soft, almost a coo in the quiet room. "Maybe you sympathize with them–"
"No, I–"
"We would understand. Your business and your security depend on them. But they are killers. You are not," he repeated. "And now your business and your security depend on what you can tell us of them."
"My business is burned to the ground! And my wife–my wife..." He choked, but this time not on the frigid air. "I do not care about these people!"
"Then you will help us."
"I can't." He hunched back, hugging his arms over his chest again, shivering.
"You do not care about these people. You are not protecting them." The voice was even softer under the serene eyes, the unmoving face. Almost whispering, the bearded man continued, "You are protecting yourself."
"Protecting my–" The chair maker couldn't even get the words out. He stared at the man across the table who looked back, still with the same calm eyes that had looked at him over the word Death. "You can't... can't think I had some... something to do with... My wife is dead! Why would I kill–" The chair maker choked. He squeezed his eyes shut. Then he opened them and looked the bearded man straight in the eye. "How can you think I did this?"
The man sniffed, wiped one finger under his nose. Then he was still another moment before his lips moved again.
"We do not," he said. "Whoever did this did not survive. But you know the people who had a part in it."
"No, but I don't–I don't know them. I don't–"
"Mr. Carpenter, have you ever been to Union Proper?"
"No."
"Blue, Mr. Carpenter."
"What?"
"You're jacket. It's blue."
"It was a c-celebration. For the ships."
"Many in Proper think those who wear blue walk around with their heads tilted upward and have no respect for life below the clouds. Poor Skyland has nothing to live for except the Sky. And the poorest take extreme steps–."
"That's not true."
"It is. There is a chain – the scavengers, the farmers, the Sky Reverends, the desperate to the pious who will go to any length–"
"No, I mean, we have respect–"
"So you say."
"It's true!" He sat up again, his hands fell to his sides and he shivered harder. H stared, shaking his head. "It's true."
For the first time, the bearded man moved more than his lips.
His eyes softened. They flicked down to the table then back up to the chair maker with – what? Compassion?
"I know," he said. His head tilted to one side and he blinked silently at the chair maker for a moment. His chest rose minutely and fell. A sigh? He shook his head, a tiny movement. "I know."
"It is true," the chair maker repeated.
"But many don't believe it. Help me prove them wrong. Show them you are not a killer. You care."
"I... I–"
"Where are the scavengers?"
"They are out in the country with the farmers–"
"Where?"
"I don't know."
"But you can find out."
"No, I–"
"You buy from them."
The chair maker's head was still shaking absently. He looked at the once again statue-still face across the table. "No–"
"You do."
"Yes. I mean yes, but I can't help you. "
"You can."
"I can't."
"You can."
"No... But, b-but what do you mean? I don't know any–any–"
"You can find out." The man sighed, openly this time. He stood up. The movement was smooth, almost graceful. He waited for a minute, standing as still as he had been sitting. Take some time."
"What do you w–"
"You can decide tomorrow."
"But I don't–I don't..."
"We have a day until reinforcements arrive," he said, looking calmly at the chair maker. "And that is about how much time you have, too."
He turned away. He walked to one side of the room. The chair maker watched, head bent, hands cupping one side of his face, eyes barely open. The beaded man pushed a panel – a piece of the black wall so well blended as to be nearly invisible – and with a gentle buzzing a part of the wall opened, swung downward, then stopped, resting two feet over the floor like another table held up at one end by the wall.
"Sleep well," said the man. Then he walked to another wall, pushed on another almost-invisible panel and a door opened.
A second later he was gone. The door shut behind him.
The chair maker shivered.
He rubbed his ear and it hurt. The pain woke him up a tiny bit more. He pushed himself off the chair and over to the newest piece of furniture in the room – the only thing in the room that was not an obsidian mirror. It was a white box, dull and roughly man-sized, set on a horizontal frame. The chair maker pushed against the white part with his fingers. It gave, just a little.
It was a bed.
At least, bed was the closest description. There was no pillow and no sheet. But it was too low for a table and the wrong shape for a chair.
The chair maker bowed his head and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. His fingernails dug into scalp at the hairline. In the darkness he swayed on his feet. He put one hand out to steady himself, leaning on the bed, but he did not lay down. He couldn't bring himself to lay down. Not on that plastic thing. Not in this cold Skyless place. He was tired. But not that tired. Not yet. He straightened, opened his eyes, looked around the room.
There wasn't much to see.
There were no windows. No furniture besides the bed and the table in the center of the room and the two chairs on either side of it.
No food. No toilet. He could see the vague outline of the door now. It was so faint it could have been one solid wall in an unopenable cube.
The chair maker turned back to the wall closest to him that the bed had folded out of. He walked along the wall, face close to the surface, eyes squinting at it, hands brushing across it's smooth surface, looking for any other panels he may have missed, anything else to break up its solidness.
There was nothing.
He turned the corner after only a few steps. He walked along that wall, inspecting it.
Nothing.
The wall with the door had nothing else. He pressed against the door the way the bearded man had done, but it did not give or open or do anything at all except remain like a solid part of the wall. No light came from the cracks around it. He turned to the fourth wall.
Nothing.
The grumbling in the chair maker's stomach made him notice, again, that there was no food. The tea he had drunk that morning made him notice, again, that there was no toilet.
He stepped around the bed and began to walk again around the room. His head nodded as he walked, his eyes blinked heavily, his shoulders bent. But he rubbed his ear and the bruise on his nose to stay awake.
He shivered.
And he walked. Around and around and around the room. One side, then another, then another. Walking reminded him that he was alive. For now. Perhaps for not much longer, but at least for now.
There were tears on his face.
Hot first, steaming against his shivering cheeks, they fell, then chilled in the air of the room. They ran over his nose, salted his lips, dropped from his chin.
Belle...
And he walked.
Again.
Again and again. Around the room, and around again, and again.
One knee gave out and he tumbled to the floor.
He pushed himself up, braced his hands against the black wall, took another step.
Belle...
His knees wobbled.
Nothing you can do... There is nothing you can do. Nothing you can do... A sob broke through the silent tears at the thought. Nothing you can do...
He leaned against the bed.
Then he sat. Then, finally, he lay down. The mattress, squeaked under him. He curled up. His arthritic knees creaked, but he pulled them up tight under his chin. The tears ran sideways over his temple, onto the mattress.
He couldn't sleep. The shivering and the squeaking and the thinking kept him awake.
He thought of Belle. He thought of the professor and the woman who'd poured the tea, and wondered where they were now. He thought of the tea, the tea that had reminded him that there was no toilet, and he thought of the flying bullet ships whizzing in its reflection, and he wondered what was happening in the Sky outside the obsidian room.
The chair maker shivered.
He knew why the bearded man had been so calm. He did not need to threaten the chair maker, the cold would do that for him.
Belle...
Chapter Sixteen
in which there is... an informant?
The hanging contraption of plastic links wasn't much more a bed than it was a chair. Harper curled uncomfortably in it. The guard had showed him how to expand the chair-bag so that it hung like a hammock and he could sleep in it. He'd showed Harper to a storage unit in one corner where there were pillows and blankets and then told him to sleep well.
He didn't.
The pillow didn't make the chain-link chair-bed any softer, and the blanket... the blanket didn't do anything whatsoever. Here, as on the Skyland ship – chilly after the scorching heat of Skyland, then oven-like after the cold of the obsidian room – the air, after a few hours, just felt... neutral. Harper felt neither heat nor cold on his skin. The chains of the chair-bed were no less uncomfortable and the seat no warmer with the flimsy bedclothes. Harper wondered why, in the perfectly temperature-controlled rooms of the ship, they even had blankets. He suspected both pillows and blankets were symbolic. Cheap reminders of home for the Union soldiers. Comforts, if not physical, at least psychological.
Harper was not comforted.
A few hours after the angry man left, most of the civilians had made their seats into hammocks and laid down. Some snored softly. Harper lay awake. The door opened and closed a few times. People come in and out quietly. Harper did not look over. He lay awake watching the automatically-dimming room. He curled up one way, then the other, tossing and turning trying to find some sleepable position. Eventually, he lay still, eyes open, arms crossed over his chest feeling the rubber links of the chair bite into his back through the blanket, wondering–
"It's not so bad, you know."
The voice came from the darkness on his right. Harper turned his head. Ben the Transport-worker-turned-soldier was back. He sat in the hanging seat he had vacated earlier.
He had taken off his red Transport Union uniform and put on the dirt colored one of the Union soldiers. Harper looked at the tag on the chest. In the low light he could just see the G of "Gather." The new soldier looked down, not meeting Harper's eyes. He played with the cuffs of his new uniform. It looked slightly too long in the sleeves.
"What are you doing here?" Harper kept his voice low. None of the snorers around him broke their rhythm.
Ben didn't look up. "I'm allowed to walk around."
"So?"
"I just thought... Look, I feel bad about... about this afternoon. I'm sorry."
"About?"
"Look, I know it's your planet. I just wanted to apologize for..."
"Going to war with my home?"
"No, just.... I don't know. Being angry. Before. I know not all of Skyland is the same. Like you. You're different. You left." Finally, he looked at Harper. One side of his mouth crooked up into a half-smile. "And we're on the same side."
"I am not on a side."
"You're helping the Union."
"I know." He didn't know what to say to the rambling, trying-to-be-friendly soldier. He wasn't in the mood to say anything at all. He turned his head back to the black ceiling, wondering why the guy was even making an effort to talk to him at all. Then, "What do you mean?"
"What?"
"You said 'It's not so bad,'" Harper clarified. "What did you mean? What's not so bad?"
"This..." Ben gestured vaguely. "Everything. This whole... situation. Us being here."
"Five thousand people are dead and we're going to war."
"I know, I know. I just mean... Look, in the Transport Union, I was a steward. A steward. I brought people crackers and asked if they wanted magazines. I've been going all over the galaxy for years but not actually going anywhere." He looked at Harper, eyes wide, almost pleading.
Harper didn't reply.
"Now I can do something," he went on Something significant. Something–"
"Wrong."
The soldier was silent for a moment. "You know it's not."
Harper rolled his head back over to the right for a second to stare at the man next to him. He looked at Ben's face. He could barely see his eyes, glinting in the low glow of the lights on the floor. Ben turned away.
Harper looked back at the ceiling. "I don't know." Is it wrong? "I really don't."
"But I don't just mean it's not so bad for me. I know, that's selfish. But think of yourself. Think of your planet. Maybe this is your chance to help your people."
"So it's all good, then? People are dying, people will die–"
"No. I'm not saying that. I'm saying maybe it's meant to happen. And we can make the best of it, we can make something better out of something terrible."
Maybe.
Harper sighed. He didn't know what was better anymore. He'd thought going on the Skyland ship was better than following his father's hateful plans. Now he just seemed to be following somebody else's hateful plans.
Maybe...
Ben was still talking. "...Maybe this is your chance to help your people in your way."
Harper snorted. "I'm not even he
re by choice. I'm not doing anything my way."
"You are returning with the power and protection of the Union. You can do anything."
I don't know... "But I think... I think..." Harper squinted at the ceiling. "I think – even if I wanted to help – I think what I can do it limited. The Union doesn't trust me. They just want me to point out the weapons stores, which I could do with a map, but they're worried I'll double cross them, so they're dragging me back there..."
Ben didn't say anything.
Harper shook his head at the dark, trying to sort his scattered thoughts. "Even when I offer to help, they're suspicious." Why does that hurt?
It did hurt. After everything – after everything – the mistrust hurt.
They don't even know. They don't know...
But he didn't want the other ships to be destroyed. He didn't want any other Skyland farmboys to face the choice he had. He wanted to help. Not with a war, but somehow...
I am mistrusted everywhere.
"They should trust me." Harper heard the disappointment in his own voice. "But they don't." If only they knew what I didn't do!
Something creaked. He looked over at the chair-bag beside him. Ben was leaning forward – as far forward as the hanging contraption would allow. He looked around, then turned his head back and looked directly at Harper.
"Yes, they do."
It was a low whisper, almost impossible to catch, but Harper did catch it. He stared at Ben.
"What?"
"They do trust you."
"I don't think–"
"They know you're not one of the bombers, or not, like, working with them or something. You'd be locked up right now if they did."
Oh. Of course. Really not a secret. "I know that. But they still don't trust me."
"I don't know... I really don't know..." Ben shook his head, looked around again. His shoulder twitched in what might have been a shrug. He sat back for a moment, then jerked forward again. "But I do," he said. "I don't think you're dangerous. If... if that means anything."
His voice was back up to a polite whisper.
"I know." Harper turned away again. He rolled onto his left side, away from Ben. "Thank you." The words were awkward in his mouth. Thank you for what?
He didn't know.
For not assuming he was a criminal? For telling him it was all going to be ok even though it wasn't? But he did not know what else to say, so he just lay in silence.
Skyland Page 10
