Raging Star
Page 13
They all know I git regular intel about DeMalo an the Tonton an what’s goin on in New Eden. They know I cain’t say who or where they are. They think I meet with Bram’s old network. The little gang of contacts, informants an insiders that he managed to set up before he died that day on the road to Resurrection. Jack runs them now. He’s information. I’m action. Together we plan. I don’t ever meet nobody but him.
Creed’s bin mendin this little hand squeezebox that Slim got from Bobby French, a trader pal of his. Now, he tries it out fer the first time. Sweet melancholy wheezes from its cracked leather lungs.
Good gawd, it works, says Ash. Where’d you learn to play?
Travellin show, he says. Squeezebox, tightrope, fire jugglin … y’know, the usual.
Ash looks at him askance. Tall tale or truth, with Creed it’s sometimes hard to know. You was never a showman, she says.
You think I tell you everythin? he says.
Huh. Well, she says, it would explain a lot.
He noodles quietly on the squeezebox while a skin of Molly’s latest brew gits passed around. Stink currant rum this time, but it’s always the same. Brain-killer hooch with a kick like white pain. I give it a miss. I need a clear head.
Emmi comes to sprawl across our laps. She buries her nose in Lugh’s shirt. I know jest how he smells to her. Safe. Home.
An it strikes me. We ain’t ever bin like we are at this moment. Never. I mean, the three of us takin comfert from each other’s nearness an company. It was always me an Lugh, with Em on the outside. Fer the very first time, this feels like brother an sisters together. Lugh smiles at me over Em’s head. I smile back. Tonight he seems lighter somehow. He seems … lifted.
I cain’t bear to think of sendin Emmi to Auriel. Of bein without her. But I must. It’s the only way to keep her safe. I’ll speak to Lugh in the mornin.
As the stars shoot the sky, Creed idles their way on the squeezebox. Its ancient sighs fade the echo of harsh words. Smooth balm over anger. Drift our troubled day to the night.
I ain’t ever known a star season like this one. Molly watches ’em, shakin her head in amazement. So many shooters, she says. If they keep on at this rate, there won’t be none left.
Mercy’s bin lookin at Lugh. Really starin, like she cain’t help herself. It’s makin him flushed an shifty. At last she says, It’s uncanny how like her you are. Your eyes, they’re just the same. The face, the smile, even how you turn your head.
She’s right. Lugh’s the spit of Ma. He shrugs, but you can tell he’s pleased. Time creeps. My stummick’s in knots. Hurry on, hurry on, I need to see Jack.
Ash stands an stretches mightily. My watch, she says. Better go relieve Tommo. None too gently, she nudges Slim with her boot. Hey, sleepin beauty, don’t you be late fer me.
He cracks open his good eye. Fret ye not, he says.
On silent feet, bow in hand, Ash heads into the shadows.
Emmi says, What’s that tune, Creed?
No idea, he says. Probly the last song this old thing played. It’s like it’s bin waitin. It ain’t quite ready to come, but it will. In its own time, it’ll come. He keeps playin softly an, sure enough, before long, the song shows itself. It’s slow. Spare. Worn an warm from its passage down the ages. Ah, says Creed.
My throat thickens as I reckanize it. As it sounds in my heart. The tune settles. It waits. Fer the right voice to claim it. It waits. Fer Molly. An she sings.
Dreams to sell, fine dreams to sell
Angus is here with dreams to sell.
Memory slashes me. Ma, singin me an Lugh to sleep. The sun scent of her skin. Her fingers smoothin my hair. It’s bin ten year. But this music cuts deep. To the place where the wounds never heal. Lugh’s arm circles my shoulders. He hugs me close.
Hush now, my baby, an sleep without fear
Dream Angus will bring you a dream, my dear.
The song halts from Molly, raggedly tender. An I know, without knowin it, that she sang this to Gracie. Her child with Jack, fever-dead after five months of life. Em leaves us, goes around the fire an lays down with her head in Molly’s lap. Music at Silverlake died with Ma. Not once was there a lullaby fer Emmi.
Molly sings while Creed plays. There’s a truce, even a smile in their eyes fer each other.
One more note, I’ll be undone. An at last it’s time fer me to go. I give Lugh’s hand a squeeze. Then I slip away, Nero still huddled inside my coat. Tracker rises from his spot at Mercy’s feet. Slim raises his pipe to my goin. Creed nods. Molly smiles. They’re all used to my night-time junkets by now.
I scoop up my quiver an bow. I leave the warm an the light an my folk an Ma’s song. With Tracker at my side, I head fer the night-deep woods.
I set Nero to fly an we head north. Irontree, where Jack changed our meet to, is a good two leagues from here.
I pause, jest a moment. I give our night-time signal. A two-note widowbird shiver. So our lookout knows who’s on the move in the woods below. Answer floats down from the top of Painted Rock. It’s Ash. She’s took over the watch from Tommo. He’ll be on his way down to the comferts of camp.
Saba, wait up! It’s Lugh, hurryin after me, dodgin a path through the trees.
With a snap of impatience, I stop. What? I says.
I jest wanted to—that song, he says. I couldn’t stay. It’s too much.
I know, I says. I bin dreamin about her lately. About Ma.
It’s strange, he says, we bin without her fer so long an you think yer okay an you are, but then Molly starts singin an—all these feelins an memories came rushin outta nowhere an I was right back there. That last time she sang to us. Lugh lets out a shaky breath. It hurts, he says, but … I felt like she was with us fer a moment.
She was, I says. Listen … Lugh, I gotta go, I—
I know, but I thought maybe I could … walk with you a ways? He looks at me, uncertain. Like I might not welcome the offer.
Oh, my poor heart. Like Molly’s song warn’t enough fer one night. Here’s Lugh takin a step towards me. I bin waitin fer this since the day the Tonton took him from me. Long months ago.
I’d like that, I says. More than anythin I would love that, but … Lugh, I got some hard thinkin to do. I really appreciate you speakin fer me like you did, but you an me both know I done bad work today at the bridge. They’re right. It ain’t good enough. I gotta do better, a lot better, startin right now. I got some … concerns that I—
We could talk, he says. Maybe I could help. You an me, we always bin able to figger things out together.
I could walk with you a ways. We could talk.
That he should even hafta say it. My very blood quickens to Lugh. To tell him everythin, anythin … or not hafta tell him becuz he’d already know.
I wish we could, I says. But this is somethin I gotta work out on my own. I do wanna go fer that walk though. Soon.
You bet, he says. I’m here any time. Always here.
I turn to go, then remember. I gotta talk to you about Em, I says. I wanna send her back to Auriel at the Snake. It’s wrong to have her here. A fight like this ain’t no place fer a kid. If somethin was to happen to her, I—I cain’t even think of it. Or if somethin was to happen to us. We’d wanna know she’d be okay.
I won’t have it, he says. Even if I would, I sure as hell wouldn’t send her to Auriel Tai. We’re family, Saba. We’ve fought hard to stay together an we will, no matter what. She does need to step up, though. One minute she’s smart an tough an you think you can rely on her an the next, she’s actin like some dizzy little kid. I’ll speak to her.
Creed’s bin mendin this little hand squeezebox that Slim got from Bobby French, a trader pal of his. Now, he tries it out fer the first time. Sweet melancholy wheezes from its cracked leather lungs.
Good gawd, it works, says Ash. Where’d you learn to play?
Travellin show, he says. Squeezebox, tightrope, fire jugglin … y’know, the usual.
Ash looks at him askance. Tall tale or truth, with Creed it’s sometimes hard to know. You was never a showman, she says.
You think I tell you everythin? he says.
Huh. Well, she says, it would explain a lot.
He noodles quietly on the squeezebox while a skin of Molly’s latest brew gits passed around. Stink currant rum this time, but it’s always the same. Brain-killer hooch with a kick like white pain. I give it a miss. I need a clear head.
Emmi comes to sprawl across our laps. She buries her nose in Lugh’s shirt. I know jest how he smells to her. Safe. Home.
An it strikes me. We ain’t ever bin like we are at this moment. Never. I mean, the three of us takin comfert from each other’s nearness an company. It was always me an Lugh, with Em on the outside. Fer the very first time, this feels like brother an sisters together. Lugh smiles at me over Em’s head. I smile back. Tonight he seems lighter somehow. He seems … lifted.
I cain’t bear to think of sendin Emmi to Auriel. Of bein without her. But I must. It’s the only way to keep her safe. I’ll speak to Lugh in the mornin.
As the stars shoot the sky, Creed idles their way on the squeezebox. Its ancient sighs fade the echo of harsh words. Smooth balm over anger. Drift our troubled day to the night.
I ain’t ever known a star season like this one. Molly watches ’em, shakin her head in amazement. So many shooters, she says. If they keep on at this rate, there won’t be none left.
Mercy’s bin lookin at Lugh. Really starin, like she cain’t help herself. It’s makin him flushed an shifty. At last she says, It’s uncanny how like her you are. Your eyes, they’re just the same. The face, the smile, even how you turn your head.
She’s right. Lugh’s the spit of Ma. He shrugs, but you can tell he’s pleased. Time creeps. My stummick’s in knots. Hurry on, hurry on, I need to see Jack.
Ash stands an stretches mightily. My watch, she says. Better go relieve Tommo. None too gently, she nudges Slim with her boot. Hey, sleepin beauty, don’t you be late fer me.
He cracks open his good eye. Fret ye not, he says.
On silent feet, bow in hand, Ash heads into the shadows.
Emmi says, What’s that tune, Creed?
No idea, he says. Probly the last song this old thing played. It’s like it’s bin waitin. It ain’t quite ready to come, but it will. In its own time, it’ll come. He keeps playin softly an, sure enough, before long, the song shows itself. It’s slow. Spare. Worn an warm from its passage down the ages. Ah, says Creed.
My throat thickens as I reckanize it. As it sounds in my heart. The tune settles. It waits. Fer the right voice to claim it. It waits. Fer Molly. An she sings.
Dreams to sell, fine dreams to sell
Angus is here with dreams to sell.
Memory slashes me. Ma, singin me an Lugh to sleep. The sun scent of her skin. Her fingers smoothin my hair. It’s bin ten year. But this music cuts deep. To the place where the wounds never heal. Lugh’s arm circles my shoulders. He hugs me close.
Hush now, my baby, an sleep without fear
Dream Angus will bring you a dream, my dear.
The song halts from Molly, raggedly tender. An I know, without knowin it, that she sang this to Gracie. Her child with Jack, fever-dead after five months of life. Em leaves us, goes around the fire an lays down with her head in Molly’s lap. Music at Silverlake died with Ma. Not once was there a lullaby fer Emmi.
Molly sings while Creed plays. There’s a truce, even a smile in their eyes fer each other.
One more note, I’ll be undone. An at last it’s time fer me to go. I give Lugh’s hand a squeeze. Then I slip away, Nero still huddled inside my coat. Tracker rises from his spot at Mercy’s feet. Slim raises his pipe to my goin. Creed nods. Molly smiles. They’re all used to my night-time junkets by now.
I scoop up my quiver an bow. I leave the warm an the light an my folk an Ma’s song. With Tracker at my side, I head fer the night-deep woods.
I set Nero to fly an we head north. Irontree, where Jack changed our meet to, is a good two leagues from here.
I pause, jest a moment. I give our night-time signal. A two-note widowbird shiver. So our lookout knows who’s on the move in the woods below. Answer floats down from the top of Painted Rock. It’s Ash. She’s took over the watch from Tommo. He’ll be on his way down to the comferts of camp.
Saba, wait up! It’s Lugh, hurryin after me, dodgin a path through the trees.
With a snap of impatience, I stop. What? I says.
I jest wanted to—that song, he says. I couldn’t stay. It’s too much.
I know, I says. I bin dreamin about her lately. About Ma.
It’s strange, he says, we bin without her fer so long an you think yer okay an you are, but then Molly starts singin an—all these feelins an memories came rushin outta nowhere an I was right back there. That last time she sang to us. Lugh lets out a shaky breath. It hurts, he says, but … I felt like she was with us fer a moment.
She was, I says. Listen … Lugh, I gotta go, I—
I know, but I thought maybe I could … walk with you a ways? He looks at me, uncertain. Like I might not welcome the offer.
Oh, my poor heart. Like Molly’s song warn’t enough fer one night. Here’s Lugh takin a step towards me. I bin waitin fer this since the day the Tonton took him from me. Long months ago.
I’d like that, I says. More than anythin I would love that, but … Lugh, I got some hard thinkin to do. I really appreciate you speakin fer me like you did, but you an me both know I done bad work today at the bridge. They’re right. It ain’t good enough. I gotta do better, a lot better, startin right now. I got some … concerns that I—
We could talk, he says. Maybe I could help. You an me, we always bin able to figger things out together.
I could walk with you a ways. We could talk.
That he should even hafta say it. My very blood quickens to Lugh. To tell him everythin, anythin … or not hafta tell him becuz he’d already know.
I wish we could, I says. But this is somethin I gotta work out on my own. I do wanna go fer that walk though. Soon.
You bet, he says. I’m here any time. Always here.
I turn to go, then remember. I gotta talk to you about Em, I says. I wanna send her back to Auriel at the Snake. It’s wrong to have her here. A fight like this ain’t no place fer a kid. If somethin was to happen to her, I—I cain’t even think of it. Or if somethin was to happen to us. We’d wanna know she’d be okay.
I won’t have it, he says. Even if I would, I sure as hell wouldn’t send her to Auriel Tai. We’re family, Saba. We’ve fought hard to stay together an we will, no matter what. She does need to step up, though. One minute she’s smart an tough an you think you can rely on her an the next, she’s actin like some dizzy little kid. I’ll speak to her.
