Fire Country

Lara sighs, looking like she got stung by something big and nasty. “You don’t know nothing. You just don’t know the details. You know it’s a way to avoid the Call. You know it’s about getting our lives back. You know I’m involved. I’m sorry, Sie, but if that’s not enough, I don’t know what else to tell you.”

“Thanks for stopping by Lara, really,” I say. “I’ll see you around the village.”

~~~

After my mind-numbing conversation with Lara, I’m exhausted, so I lie down in the durt, being careful not to disturb my notes. The hard-packed ground ain’t nearly as comfy as my tugskin rug, but my bones are so worn out that it don’t matter. I fall right asleep.

There are Killers in my dream. ’Cept not just twenty. Hundreds. Maybe thousands. They’ve overrun the camp, flattened our tents and huts into rubble. Everyone’s screaming. Everyone’s ru

I scan all around me, try to find someone else I know. There. Lara. She’s standing a little ways off, watching me. She extends a hand, beckons to me to follow her. Maybe if I go with her I’ll be safe. Maybe I’ll be happy. But somehow I know that following her means joining her and we and us. Only I don’t know who we and us are.

I keep searching until I find Circ. He’s on t’other side of me, standing atop one edge of the great fire pit in the center of the village. The pointers are flying so fast off the end of his bow that I can’t even see his fingers. Every shot is true. Killer after Killer falls, dead. But then one breaks through, the biggest beast of all, bigger’n two men. It dodges Circ’s every pointer, slips past them and almost through them as if it possesses magical powers. It’s right on top of him now, fangs bared, ready to snap, to maim, to kill, to satisfy its namesake. I have a choice to make. Go with Lara, save myself, find a better life. Or…run to certain death and Circ, my best friend. Maybe my only friend. I take a step toward Circ, fire in my veins.

I wake up.

The light hurts my eyes so I close them immediately. I don’t know what time it is, but it ain’t late, still too bright. Maybe still afternoon.

I realize what woke me up. Voices. Keeper’s growl and another voice, this one as melodious and familiar as any sound in the entire world, like the tinkle of Miss Merry’s glass chimes on a mildly breezy spring morning. My eyes snap open and I shield them from the light with a hand. Using my other hand I push to my feet, feeling every bone and muscle in my body protest, which is strange. It’s the ground that’s making them sore, and yet, they don’t want to leave it.

I gimp my way over to the bars, toward the voices. “This ain’t right,” Keep says. “Only one visitor ‘llowed a day.”

The other voice stays low and hard to hear, but I’d know it anywhere. “C’mon. Just…once…kicked by a tug…walked miles…see her?”

“Circ!” I shout.

My one shout is all it takes to win the argument. Whether Keep likes it or not, Circ turns and sees me, sprints over, all smiles and laughs and flashing mahogany eyes. Keep’s grumbling something behind him, but I don’t care and he goes back inside his hut, slamming the door behind him. I hug Circ through the bars. He’s sweaty and warm, but feels so good. Plus, I’m far durtier, covered in a light brown dust and grime, so I can’t really complain ’bout a little sweat on him considering he’s been walking for the last two thumbs of sun movement.

We pull back but he keeps holding my arms, which feel all tingly, maybe ’cause I been sleeping on them. “You look good,” he says, surprising me.

“I do?”

“Yeah, you look like you.”

I raise an eyebrow. “So me is all durty and groggy and boreder’n a Totter with no jinglejanglers?”

Circ laughs. “You is you,” he says. Now he’s talking like Lara too, in riddles.

“If my father knew you were here, he’d kill you and me both,” I say.

“But he doesn’t.” Good point. “How’s Confinement?”

“Well, the food ain’t bad. It ain’t good either. It’s neither, ’cause there ain’t any.”

Circ releases my arms, squeezing one of my hands on the way down. When he let’s go, I feel something in my palm. Tug jerky.

“Thanks,” I say, gri

He looks over his shoulder at Keep’s hut. The door’s still closed. No windows. “Here,” he says, handing me a skin. “I’ve got another one for my trek home.”

“Thanks.” Greedily and with shaking hands, I unknot the leather tie and push it to my dry lips. Warm, clear liquid runs down my tongue. I trap it in my mouth, swish it around a few times to let it moisten every nook and cra

“I can’t stay long,” Circ says. “Learning’s over, but Father doesn’t know I’m here and he’ll be expecting me home for di

Mouth full, I garble, “Hard to run with those ribs.” I motion to his bandaged torso.

“I’ll manage,” he says. And then: “I’ve got news.”

I stop chewing. “’Bout the Killer attack?”

He nods, eyes gleaming. “A group of Hunters is being sent out to investigate, day after next.”

I swallow the half-chewed jerky in a big gulp. “Whaddya think they’ll find?”

“Hopefully we’ll find out who’s been hunting on Killer land,” he says.

A lump forms in my throat, but not from the jerky. “Whaddya mean we’ll find?”

“I’m going with them,” he says.

~~~

“But why you? You’re only fifteen,” I say. We’ve been arguing for a while now, pretty much the longest argument we’ve ever had.

Circ shakes his head. “You know my age has never stopped me before,” he says.

“They didn’t let you fight against the Glassies,” I point out.

Circ sighs. “That was different. That was war. This is an investigation.”

“Will you be going on Killer land?”

“Yeah, but—”

“Then it’s a war,” I say.

“I’ll be fine.”

“You’ll be dead.”

“No—I won’t,” Circ says. He takes my hand through the bars, which I like. He’s taking my opinion seriously. “It’ll be a quick out and back,” he says. “I promise.”

I’m about to argue again but his sudden promise stops me. Circ don’t make many promises to me. I can probably count them all without even taking off my moccasins. And he’s kept every last one of them. Like the time I accidentally kicked the feetball and broke grumpy ol’ Greynote Fi

“Be safe. Please,” I say.

“I will.” His words are solider’n the stone blocking me from digging my way out. “What’s that,” he says, motioning past me, toward the durt in my cage.

“What’s what?”

“Those scribbles in the durt,” he says.

“Just scribbles,” I say. “I was trying to pass the time, do a little sleuthing of my own, try to figure out who’s behind the Killer attack.”

Circ looks impressed. “What’d you come up with?”

“It ain’t us,” I say. “The Heaters, I mean. No one ’ud be that stupid. Other’n that, I’d say the Glassies are a good bet. They don’t know the land as well as us. Mighta done it by accident, or on purpose, to get to us. I don’t know much about the Marked, but they coulda done it too, ’cause they were hungry, maybe even starving. I’m still not sure about the Wild Ones, but I hardly think a bunch of Bearers who don’t Bear could do much damage. That leaves the Icers, who don’t seem the type to come down into the heat of fire country.”