Fire Country

“I’m going back to Confinement,” I say.

“What? Why would you do that?” Circ turns to face me.

“I gotta know what’s going on,” I say.

“If you sneak up there and try to follow the prisoners to wherever they’re working every night, your father will notice you’re gone. There’s no way you’ll get away with it.” Circ’s right. I can sneak away for one thumb of sun movement, maybe two, but to carry out a plan like this it’ll take more’n five. The snapper’ll be waiting when I come back. If I’m lucky that’s all that’ll be waiting.

“I’m not sneaking there,” I say, a plan coming together in my mind. “I’m going back in my cage.”

~~~

Circ tries to talk me outta it, but I can be as stubborn as a Totter who won’t eat his evening stew. For some reason I get my head set on doing this thing, and I can’t think about anything else until I do it.

Before we part ways, he tells me not to do anything stupid until we talk again. I tell him I’ll think about it.

When I burst through the door I know I’m in for it. I ain’t late for di

My Call-Mother and Call-Siblings turn away from me, huddle together and take turns tying knots in a ball of string.

Father glares. “Where’ve you been?” he demands, ’fore I have a chance to gather my thoughts or figure out what’s going on.

“Out,” I say. It’s not a lie, but it’s not what he’s looking for either.

“Don’t toy with me, Youngling!” he snarls. “I saw you go off with that boy.”

“His name’s Circ,” I say. “You’ve known him since we was kids.” I’m being bolder and feeling bolder’n ever before. Between me and my mother, we’re probably really getting on his nerves.

“I know who he is. Playing with him as a Totter and Midder was fine,” he says. What’s he playing at?

“But now?” I say.

He strides forward, breathing so heavy I can feel it waft off my face. His breath smells like spicy tug jerky. My stomach rumbles. Shut up! I tell it. This is not the time.

“Listen to me carefully because I’ll only say this once more. I will not have my Pre-Bearer daughter ru

My blood’s boiling, all bubbly and hot, not too different’n my mother’s stew. I’m sweating all over and I know my face is glistening with moisture and heat. No hiding my anger this time. “It’s not like that!” I scream, turning to run back outside, away from this place, from this man, from the creature who refuses to call me by the name he gave me when I was born.

He grabs my arm, hard enough to bruise, whips me ’round. My eyes are glued to his white-knuckled grip, seeing as much as feeling the strength in him. He might be older’n durt, but he ain’t caught the Fire yet, ain’t weak in the least. I can’t fight him with my runty body.

My only chance is to use my mind.

Chapter Sixteen

My father’s message was as dark and mottled as the purple-black-blue five-fingered bruise he left in the flesh of my arm: I see Circ again and it’s another trip to Confinement for me.

My plan is on track.

I lie in bed thinking. If I can get back to Confinement I’ll be able to find out what the scorch is going on. Then maybe me and Circ can come up with a way to stop it. Whatever it is, my father’s got his fist clamped on things tighter’n a butcher about to castrate a dead tug. Circ may not approve of my plan, but he’ll have no choice but to go along with it once it’s in motion.

When my father’s breathing from behind his curtain grows heavy and deep, I throw back my tugskin covering and tiptoe for the door, sparing only a second or two to slip on my moccasins. I ease the door open a crack, praying for silence, and then slide through. Escape! I think. There’s something satisfying and exciting about sneaking out at night. Maybe it’s ’cause no one’s telling me what to do, or where to go, or what my duty is. Or maybe it’s just ’cause I like being a bit rebellious every now and again.

Everything’s blacker’n the inside of a tug’s stomach, ’cept for the sky, which is aglow with hovering fireflies—the stars. To scare me when I was a Totter, Skye used to tell me that night came when a gigantic monster stood in front of the sun, blocking its light and casting a mammoth shadow over everything. She made me scared of the dark for years, until I was a Midder. Now I’m glad for the big ol’ monster’s shadow. It hides my movements.

I sneak my way through the Greynote huts, peeking ’round corners and stopping to listen for footsteps or voices every coupla steps. The village is silent. A ghost town. Everyone sleeping, or at least pretending to. When I get to the last row of huts I cut to the right, purposefully avoiding the village center and the fire pit. There’re almost always insomniacs there, drinking the night away, stirring the fire up and telling war stories. Hunts gone bad, Hunts gone good, and everything in between.

I’m nearly out of the Greynote block when the last hut’s door swings open right in front of my face. I’m behind it, hidden, but whoever opened it is go

The door shuts and whoever’s there makes a sorta groaning noise, but not like he’s in pain. Come to think of it, it’s more like a sigh, like of relief. I risk a breath and a peek up. Too dark to see anything ’cept the outline of a man, which means he probably won’t see me either, unless he happens to look directly down, or trips on me.

There’s the scrape of a flint and then a flash of red as he lights a pipe. For that moment I’m completely illuminated, can see my own hands, feet, and everything else, even the tip of my nose. And I can see him too. My breath catches when I recognize the Greynote:

Luger.

But then the light goes out, replaced by just a finger’s tip of light at the end of his pipe. A bitter, somewhat fruity aroma settles on the tip of my tongue. It leaves a sour taste in my mouth, like I been drinking stale prickler juice. Luger’s not just smoking the pipeweed that so many men around the village like to puff on. It’s fireweed. Like I smelled out behind the Learning hut when Youngling Granger got his hands on a whole pouch of it. Half the Younglings were giggling all through class that afternoon. Luger’s guilty pleasure, so guilty he can only smoke it in the dead of night.

Luger sighs again and then walks on down the row, skirting behind his own hut.

I move on, first back the way I came to get as far away from Luger as possible, and then up a row of huts to further my distance from him. If he catches me now it might work out okay for my plan, but there’re no guarantees. I need to get further.

I edge my way down the row, and once I’m out of the cover of the Greynote huts, I run like I’m being chased by a bloodthirsty pack of Cotees. Tents fly by on both sides, most of them quiet and closed off, but a few of them with late sleepers sitting around cook fires, tent openings wide and flapping lazily in the night breeze. A few of them cry out, but I keep ru

I get to Circ’s neighborhood and slow down, quickly locating his tent, which is half falling over from the recent spat of windstorms we’ve had. It doesn’t look ready to survive the first sandstorm of the season. I’ll hafta mention that to him.