The Robert Stanek Short Story & Novella Collection Page 10

  Morning tidings were a mixture of offerings and collections, though she ate, as always, frugally. Afterward, she returned to the short, stout trees and eternally thanked them for their offering.

  She admired their steadfastness, knowing they nurtured all they needed to sustain themselves from the very air about her. Still, her father had taught her and proven to her that to produce meat they needed what she provided, and so she was tied into their cycle of growth as much as they were tied into her own.

  The tender meat of the fruit was a main staple for her and most of her people, and it was this that she traded in Adalayia, though it was dried and preserved for the journey by endearing hands.

  The trees yielded variety, changing with the seasons, though she never felt poorly for exchanging their winter offerings for the things she needed from the city, primary amongst this being the white, powdery grit she knew to add sparingly to her gatherings to preserve and store them.

  As she wandered from tree to tree greeting them, her stare ambled out into the hard that surrounded her hovel. Momentary reflections went out to the stone crossing, the vast, steep bridge that separated the Adalayian proper and lead to the capital city of Adalayia.

  Thinking of the city made her think of Stirling, sad thoughts for a heavy day. Heavy because the sense of loneliness had returned once more. She broke the silence with a piercing whistle, a high-pitched whine formed from a spout of air into properly cupped hands.

  Kerry thumped the top of her father’s crossed rod, waiting impatiently now, tossing another ensuing toot into the air, turning away disappointed at long last. She returned to her chores—self-implemented labor that perhaps didn’t need to be done at all—throwing surreptitious glances upward.

  “Off again,” she whispered to herself, angrily.

  She swept out her house, cleansing it of dust and soot, chasing away lines from the windowsills and billowy plumes from the rafters. She made up the bed—a bed she had not slept in for some years now. Gathered chairs, three, around the small, cylindrical table tucked into one end of the small structure.

  A line of sweat broke her brow and this pleased her. She aimed the rocker towards the window at such an angle that she could watch the sun wander through the sky throughout the day and then easily turn to watch the sunset. Afterward, she moved back outside, beneath a benevolent sky.

  She greeted the trees again, reassuring them, tidying away their woes, waiting until precisely midday to touch a bit of life fluid to their limbs. She whispered words as she poured, words her mother had passed down to her through the years and words that had been passed down to her mother and her mother’s mother and so on through the ages back to the dawn of Adalayia. Three times a day, she spoke thus, granting only as much as she needed to receive in return what she wanted.

  Upon finishing, she emitted a shrill summons to the heavens again, and again the call went unanswered. Her thoughts were troubled now, where had the other gone?

  She called out again, anticipating an answering return that did not come. She did not fear the other’s passing though. A gift had been placed before her stoop that morn and she had properly dressed it out, relinquishing a full half, part of the bargain, cleaned and waiting. A shiver passed along her spine and she returned indoors.

  Deep thought carried her back to the top of the stone bridge, staring down as she had that very first crossing into the endless falling off. She recollected now that only the sight of Adalayia had coaxed the fears from her heart. She would have moved to Adalayia then without ever returning home had her father not pleaded with her to change her mind to the contrary. Her promise could not keep away her yearnings though, and thus the heavy thoughts that she began the day with remained with her throughout the day.

  Shifting in endless strides back and forth, she waited, adhering to the settling of the sauntering sun. She dispersed the last of the life liquid and then began the long trek to the water’s edge.

  The long walk didn’t bother Kerry; this was a time for easing the tensions of the day. She meandered around each falling off, making her way gradually downward. She had taken this stroll a thousand times with Stirling, and many thousands more as three, but each time, she spied something new that she had not seen before and this made the journey worthwhile and in a way, magical.

  New erosions of the land spoke to her. She understood the gentle outcroppings sprawled across the face of the earth, the way a sheer precipice reached up to lofty heights and the way the gently oscillating wind meandered between ridges and falling offs.

  When Kerry reached the water’s edge, she took only the meager supply that she needed, more come winter season, returning the excess, before she began the hike home. Returning home was more difficult than going as the trek was uphill and not down. She walked awkwardly then, levying the weight of the buckets, trudging uphill with strategically placed footing.

  A fresh breeze rolled in just as she attained the summit and she paused to enjoy it, staring off into the sparse land. Her eyes followed a line that meandered to the edge of the horizon and she envisioned the nestled paths that lay secluded from sight, knowing most of them though she had never walked them.

  Upon her return, she fancied a tremor of delight floating from tree to tree and for this she scolded them. “Not yet,” she whispered.

  The allure of the stone bridge was clambering upon her thoughts again. She passed through the doorway into her house, sealing the door, shifting to the window and settling into the rocking chair beside it. Weary of heart, she closed her eyes for a time, waiting for the arrival of the slumping sun. “Tomorrow,” she whispered to herself for hopefully by then, she would have forgotten the things that brought her pain.

  A lofty screech caught her attention and she shot from the chair, her eyes probing the empty crossed stave planted outside the door. The screech repeated and she sprang out the door, scouring the skies with hope-filled eyes. Into cupped hands, she replied, the whistle reaching far. The scream returned, but this time it was farther off as the other was going away and not toward.

  She blew into her hands again, forming a perfectly shrill shriek. Again, the answering call grew more distant.

  “Wicked, wicked, Waring!” she shouted. Stirling had bidden her to keep the beast sharp set, but she preferred to give it equally proportioned repayments.

  She sounded off again, stouter and longer, louder than she should have. No call broke the air. She was frightened now, something drove the other off. She scrambled into the house in search of the lure. Sure it would bring the other home. She began slowly rotating the line of the lure, allowing it to slip outward a hand’s length with each turning just as she had been shown and sure to allow it to flash against the sky.

  She howled out with poised lips, not as fervid as her other call, but still purposeful. “Come back,” she said in a half-spoken voice, “come back, I promise I will not go away again…”

  The line was at full span now. Its thin, arcing shadow raced along the ground beside her. She offered whistle after whistle, turning the lure until her arm stung with pain.

  Glumly, she returned to the vigil at the window, finding no pleasure in the spectacle before her. Dusk passed, night came. She still stared with fixed eyes, lost either in thought, remorse or remembrance. Tomorrow would be bright and beautiful, she promised herself.

  Chapter Nine:

  Strange Meeting

  The smoot’s visit had an impact on Ray though he was not entirely aware of the depth until he awoke the next morning and found a sense of peace and premonition. He ate breakfast while delving through another’s eyes. True was off, finding his own meal near the brink of the wet, and amongst the scrub.

  Admittedly persistent in his watch, he kept a close eye on the Out and while seemingly calm and collected by outward appearances, inside, his thoughts were turbulent.

  He searched for hidden meaning he would not find so readily, and beyond this, in the far reaches of his minds lurked shadowy remembrances. Temporari
ly his concerns went out to someone else, triggered by these far thoughts. Tall should have already arrived at the deep if he was as fortunate as Ray had been. Ray pondered what Tall’s choice would be, wondering if it would be the same as his own choice.

  A nearby rustling in the thick brought him back from reverie and his keen sight zeroed in on the small slither mixing through the bramble, coming to rest before him. He coaxed True back into the security of the cage, noticing the larger than normal bulge in the slither’s belly. True was growing and so was the size of the captured prey. He smiled at the other’s sluggish movement, knowing True would soon rest soundly until the hot passed.

  Precious few seconds had passed, but by the time he looked back one of the Out had arrived, the girl with the laughing countenance, the one the smoot had said would come early this day. She had, and now he wondered what the choice he would have to make would be. True settled in, though Ray was now oblivious to this. He attended to the Out with earnest eyes, watching as the other filled the canisters resting on the ground before her.

  He would not have seen the knobbed head if he had not been paying particular attention. The approaching bull was young and guileful, hardly stirring the surroundings as it lumbered towards its target. Ray watched with speculative interest, wondering which would be quicker this day. The other had already gathered her wares and would momentarily be safely on her way. He silently urged the bull to hasten, offering a sense of play to his thoughts.

  He watched as the outsider girl surveyed her prize, preparing to depart. The agile bull slipped up to the very edge of the wet. “Beware lashing tail and gnashing teeth,” Ray softly stated, his voice scarcely cutting the still air. He spied the eminent frown, as the other raised a canister to check its contents, ambling towards the wet to spill a portion back.

  A breath seized in his throat, he almost cried out, “No, you’re not supposed to do that!” The perception of play was gone in an instant. The girl was in real danger. Her sense of fair play in taking only what she needed was going to get her killed.

  He watched the bull’s tail sink; his heart skipped. The bull was about to make its attack. He watched as the jaws snapped upward, not even realizing that his feet were in motion until he was halfway between In and Out, and by then there was no stopping. The bull was a heartbeat away from the outsider girl, but which Ray had in his heart to deny it of a meal.

  He slapped his arbor staff stiffly to the bull’s snout and quickly wheeled around, half flying through the air, half flailing with his arms in a struggle to remain stable throughout his vaulting leap.

  A trace of a smile crossed his lips as he landed squarely and cocked the bull on the head again. The bull was not as versed as Ray was, its instinctive tactic was to retreat, and though Ray knew the bull would at some later point have learned not to do this, the ploy worked for now. The young bull was not as skillful in the hunt as Ray was nimble.

  Ray spun around catching a glimpse of the laughing face only for a fading instant. He followed the retreat of the bull, running wildly for cover and the sanctuary of his precious In.

  He slipped his pack around his shoulders, rudely awaking True, preparing to slip away into the shadows when a soft, searching voice reached him. The words were not harsh or unruly as he had heard they would be, and the revelation of it all was that he understood them.

  Ray pushed his eyes from behind his cover, taking a clear view of the other. Her face flushed with fright yet a genuine sense of gratitude fixed in her grimace.

  “Thank you,” intoned the soft voice again.

  Ray poked his head out from the undergrowth, his eyes filled with intent. The face that greeted him was warm and inviting, not hostile like the others. He saw no ill will in the eyes, no hidden intent, only sincerity.

  “Who are you?” the voice asked, apparently unafraid.

  Ray shrank back down, yelling in a half-hearted tone, “Go away! Take your wet and go away!”

  “Go away? That’s rather an odd thing for someone who just saved my life to say. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  Ray listened to the voice, adhering to the words, still shocked he could understand them with little difficulty. She spoke with an odd twang to her words, but the voice was soft. He didn’t move or offer anything further. In his mind’s eye, he saw the others he had seen before. He saw them stalk to the edge of his home and tear it up. “Go away!” he threw out again.

  He heard a low rattle and a grumble as the other did precisely what he had asked.

  He shot a hesitant glance towards the retreating form. “Wait!” he commanded. The girl stopped, turning back expectantly. Ray stood, immediately shrank back down. “What is your name?” he asked, not knowing what else to say.

  ***

  “My name? What is your name?”

  “Why would you want to know my name?”

  Kerry shot back, “For the same reason you want to know mine.”

  Ray said nothing.

  “You saved my life. I owe you a debt.”

  “You owe me nothing.”

  “Untrue, and if you’re not going to say anything else, good-bye…” Kerry was playing with him now, trying to coax him from hiding. She knew how to play this game well; this was how she had earned Waring’s affections.

  As she hurried away, playing with him, she was also curious. She had glimpsed the other for only a moment, but what she had saw in that moment stunned and attracted her as the lure attracted her Waring.

  “Nothing out there. It is all waste,” Stirling had told her of the place where they gathered the life liquid. “Its only purpose is for us to apply to the trees so that they may bear meat and to drink when we thirst. You stay away unless you have needs. Strange beasts lie there. Men have ventured out never to return, swallowed whole by the beasts of the wild.”

  She knew the faces of those beasts very well from her earliest childhood recollection to her most recent nightmare. The great crockin abounded in the lore and in life. She had seen their strange heads adorning testaments to the wild beyond preserved in the special houses. It was said the wizard got power from them.

  She felt a chill in the air as the wind stirred, blowing hollowly down the face of the slant. Her pace quickened, though she only took a few more steps before she turned to stare back. “Where are you, Waring?” she asked of the wind, stopping just short of casting a shrill whistle after the gale that was gradually wafting along the hill.

  She wouldn’t be so afraid if she knew the other was near. She replayed the face she had seen in her mind. The dark, fierce countenance, the short thin body, barely clothed. She saw him lunge at her and grab her, and she started to run away, suddenly realizing what she saw was an image in her mind.

  “Are you still there?” she called out, not understanding the curiosity attached to her attraction.

  ***

  Ray stepped out from behind the camouflage, shouldering his pack, raising his arm in a sign of hailing. “I am,” he called back, not knowing the pull of the lure was equally set into him.

  He saw the full, round face tucked into a partial smile, accentuated by thick lines—the laughing lines. The eyes beckoned him to come closer, and he did, again not knowing why. He shifted the weight of the pack until it was comfortably settled and then slowly crossed the length that separated them.

  In his mind, he saw pale, white faces surrounding him and staring down at him, imagining himself slumped to the ground under their gawking gaze, a relentless circle of ominous gloom. He stopped, as he was about to touch the dry and the Out. He glanced up at her, down, looking back up with intrigue at the dangling gnarl of long, flowing hair, hair so light that it seemed to match the hue of the sun itself.

  Scratching at his head, Ray pulled out a tangled, stubby, dark curl, catching sight of his hands as he did this, suddenly comparing his hands to hers. In the back of his mind he saw the other outsiders again, the men dressed in thick clothes with angry faces, crashing headlong into his world. He pulled back, turned away. T
he smoot had said Ray would make a choice this day and while Ray considered it yet ahead, he did not know that it had already passed the instant he had taken his first step in the other’s defense.

  “What is your name?” Kerry asked, moving back down the hill. “You haven’t told me though I have already given you mine.”

  She regarded him from head to toe, wondering about the long, slender stick in his hand, the store on the back, and all sorts of other things. Where had he come from? She wondered. And why was he here? And why wasn’t she afraid?

  As the distance between them diminished, so did her apprehension and her first impression of him changed as well. Up close, he didn’t look so scant and thin. Well, thin to be sure, though he was, perhaps, her equal in height. She couldn’t be sure because the slant of the hill obscured the proportions somewhat.

  Ray responded after long duress, “Ray, my name is Ray.” He moved closer feeling the tough, gritty touch of the stone land upon his feet. He was unafraid now, his determination was wrought. “Why do you theft that which is not your own?” he asked.

  “Theft?”

  Ray coldly intoned, “Steal.”

  “Steal? I do not take anything that is not freely granted,” Kerry hesitated, pointing a long finger, “If this is what you are implying that I steal.”

  “I am,” said Ray, unaware that he stood firmly upon the dead land and the feeling of it wasn’t as foreign as he had once thought.

  Kerry puffed up her cheeks, walking away without saying anything further.

  Ray followed her up to the flat of the hill, struggling to catch up to her fleeted, long legs. He went no further, however, his heart stopping as he glanced over his shoulder, down, down to the wet.

  Kerry maneuvered around a falling off, coming to a rest on the far side of it opposite Ray, a seemingly safe distance. She could stop now and regard him with full intent.