Raging Star (23 page)

If I don’t win her over, I got no chance with them. An I need their insider knowledge of the Stewards. But right now it don’t look good. Not at all.

Cassie stares at me with naked despisal. Unlike the rest, she ain’t took her eyes offa me. Not fer a second. She fills the air with such black hatred that I feel it closin around me. As I speak, I can feel myself gittin redder an redder in the face. I start to think how stupid I sound. How stupid I must look. My lips dry an I git more an more unsettled till I’m fumblin an mixin my words. An it ain’t jest me. They’re all shiftin, uncomfortable. Vain Ed elbows open another window.

Jack warned she’d be rough on me. I espected it. Figgered I even deserve it. But still. I ain’t never bin flayed by ill will
before. An I’m shocked at the change in her. Grief’s clawed her soft round face. Gnawed the smile from her lips. Her pretty brown hair used to hang loose an wavy. Now it’s scraped back, knotted tight, like a punishment. The circle brand on her forehead stands out starkly.

You got the power, I says. He can only rule if you let him. If you do what he says. If you stay obedient. D’you see?

I stumble to a finish. To thick silence.

Cassie curls her mouth in scorn. Fault lines, she says. Mountains. The mountain crumbles, DeMalo falls, an we all join hands an dance in the sun. Who’d of thought it could be so easy?

All right, I says. Tell me this. What’s the one thing about this place that bothers the Stewards most? One of DeMalo’s rules that people don’t unnerstand or believe to be unjust. They might not say it, but they think it, feel it in their hearts to be unfair.

Silence. Mercy’s eyes go around the room. They stop on Bo, the plain-faced Steward girl. She’s lookin sidewise at her man. Manuel with the wispy beard. They bin huddled together, eyein me like I’m some creature they bin warned not to approach. I only jest now notice—Bo’s got the tiniest start of a baby belly. She looks at me.

They take away yer baby, she whispers.

The attachment of parents to their child is powerful, says Mercy.

So if you was to … take yer baby back from the Pathfinder, from the babyhouse, I says, that would be a powerful thing to do. That would start to shake the mountain. Any mother an father doin that is bein disobedient to the Pathfinder an New Eden. They’re takin a risk. A big one. Whoever does it is gonna have fear. But their desire fer their child will be greater than their fear. Once they have their child, an they’ve conquered their fear once, they’ll start to lose their fear. He controls by fear. If people don’t fear him no more, his power goes.

I wait fer a moment. To let all that sink in. To see if I can tell what they’re thinkin. Have I got to them? Moved them?

Mercy an me’s gonna go on a recce to the babyhouse tonight, I says. We’ll take a child if it looks possible. I’m askin fer yer help. You know the girls here. We need yer inside knowledge.

Cassie laughs. A dry huff of breath, nuthin more. Us? she says. Help you? Work with you? What, you mean like Bram did? Becuz that turned out so well, didn’t it?

I’m sorry, Cassie, I says. I am most truly sorry.

She says, Yer truly sorry an he’s truly dead an his body’s still unner the rock where you left it. An I’m paired with a new man, a stranger who sleeps in my bed an watches me with hawk eyes an that’s how it goes in New Eden.

Vain Ed says, A woman whose man disappears fer no reason is suspect.

Cassie speaks with tight care. To her skirt, to her sleeves, as she tidies what’s already perfectly tidy. You took everythin from me an now you want more, she says. You’ve had all yer gonna git from me. I let Bram go with you to rescue yer sister. He never came back. An you didn’t even have the decency to come an tell me he was dead. I had to hear it from a stranger. From Jack. At least he knows how to treat people right.

Cassie never liked me, never trusted me, an she never made no bones about it. Now she hates me. Bitterly. I’ve known the lash of her tongue before, but I’m feelin a bit sick from this onslaught. I glance to Jack. He gives me a what-can-I-do? look. Mercy clasps her hands knuckle-white on her lap. She cain’t speak up fer me, I gotta take this on the chin. But her eyes steady my spirit.

That was wrong of me, I says. I should of come. An I meant to, but—

But what? Cassie’s on her feet. She squares up to me. What? You had somethin better to do? she says.

No, I says, of course not. I’m sorry, Cassie, I should of come to you as soon as I could.

Well, you didn’t, she says. You can pack yer I’m sorrys an take ’em to hell with you.

If I was you, I’d probly hate me too, I says. But hangin on to blame won’t bring him back. It’s no way to honour his sacrifice.

Sacrifice! she hisses. You dare talk to me about sacrifice! She lunges an belts me. Slaps my face so hard that my head snaps back.

Jack takes a step. Mercy half-rises. I stop ’em with a hand. Cassie stares aghast, eyes wide. She didn’t plan to do that. Ed’s arm goes around her shoulders. His jaw dares me to touch her. My cheek flames an stings. I’m seein stars. But I welcome the hit an the pain. I’ll take them any day over the knife of her eyes.

I’m glad I didn’t hafta meet you in the Cage, I says. I deserved that. Please, can we try to work together? I hold out my hand. She looks at it. She looks at me. She’s set her face back to shun.

I am sorry, I says. I cain’t ever repay what I owe you. I cain’t ever make good yer loss, much as I want to. All I can do is try not to waste the chance that Bram gave us. I need yer help to do that. An, fer now, I believe you need mine. Please, Cassie. Let’s try this. If it works like I hope, you’ll all be able to carry it forwards on yer own. You won’t need me.

She goes back to the window to sit an stare out at nuthin. She’s finished with this. With me. That means the rest of them’s done with me as well. I read on Jack’s face what’s all too clear. My past mistakes damn me completely. What made me think I could win Cassie over? Comin here was a mistake. An maybe a dangerous one. If her hatred is hot enough to betray me.

I says, DeMalo is weak, but he believes he’s strong. Yer strong, but you believe yer weak. I nod a farewell. Let’s go, I says to Mercy.

As Jack lifts the hatch door, she gits up from her stool. She hesitates, then holds out her hand to Skeet. After a moment, he takes it. We never did git innerduced, she says. My name is Mercy. My home is Crosscreek. A sweet green valley that sleeps in the sun.

Her words shift his gaze into memory. He says, quietly—like he’s lyin in a bunk in a slave hut in the dark an he don’t want the guards to hear, like a chant he says inside hisself, over an over—he says, My name is Skeet. My home’s a cart. It’s got yellow wheels an a horse called Otis to pull it.

Shared trials forge instant bonds. Mercy lays her other hand atop their clasped ones. He does the same.

The girl ain’t perfect, my friend, she says. But she’s cut from rare cloth. I’ve pledged myself to her, come what may.

He says, JB here’s bin treedoggin fer a year or so. I bin with her a few months. We spoil a well, fire a hay barn, but they always come lookin fer us, beatin the woods with dogs. Sometimes they find one of our gaffs an fell the tree. We ain’t gonna git no faster, eh Junie B? Someday, maybe soon, our luck’ll run out. An they jest repair the damage an carry on an … funny, somehow I never stopped to ask myself if there might be another—maybe a better way.

When he’s done, there’s a awkward silence. That streamed outta him as if him an Mercy’s the oldest of comrades. Like they’d bin in the middle of a long conversation.

Maybe it’s time you did, says Mercy. Maybe it’s time we all did.

Their hands part. I move towards the ladder. I’ll go first an guide her down safely.

Hey Bo, ain’t there a girl went into the babyhouse a few days ago? Manuel speaks quickly, a bit too loudly. You know the one. I think she’s nearby the new turnpike.

I pause.

You mean that—oh, what is her name? Bo frowns an snaps her fingers. Dian, that’s it.

Vain Ed scratches his head. Naw, he says, that don’t sound right to me. Cherry?

Y’know, now I’m thinkin it could be Eula, says Manuel.

You three wouldn’t fool a child with that hopeless play actin. Cassie turns from the window. Her eyes meet mine in wary truce. Her name’s Rae, she says. She’s fifteen. She started havin pains a month before her time. I know her. I think she might go along with it. I’ll come with you.

Thanks, I says.

What about Hunter? says Bo. You won’t git out at night without him noticin.

Cassie’s lips tighten. He’s partial to a drink or five, she says. So long as I’m back by dawn.

My heart takes heart. The air starts to breathe. I don’t chance a handshake, but I give Cassie a small nod. She may never fergive me. We may never be friends. She may never entirely trust me. I don’t see all that as so bad. The only thing that matters is she’s willin to try an work together.

We’ll go as soon as it’s dark, I says. You an me an Mercy an Jack.

I
T
’
S ANOTHER NIGHT OF RUMPUS IN THE SKY
. T
HE STARS
chase about in fiery disorder. We came by the fieldways, around the edges, in the shadowland. But we probly could of took the roads, checkpoints an all. After dark in starfall season, most people bolt the door. They won’t answer a knock fer fear of the shades on the roam. Lurkin here behind the stables, with our pale faces an dark clothes, we might well be mistook fer haunts. Beheaded in life maybe, searchin fer our lost bodies. Essept ghosts don’t breathe fog on a chilly night.

On the left there, at the front, Jack whispers. That’s where the women stay. The birthin room’s on that side too. There’s a hallway divides the buildin in half. Runs straight from the front door to a door at the back.

Nursery’s on the right, says Mercy. Plus beds fer the midwife an wetnurses. To the rear’s Tonton quarters an a kitchen. Outside’s a well, a privy an a woodstore. They’ll git a food delivery every couple of days. That’s it.

How d’you know all that? I says. You didn’t midwife here.

They lay out all the babyhouses ezzackly the same, says Jack. An it’s always four men on duty. A commander an three grunts. Four horses in the stable here. That means they’re all inside.

We left our own horses in a scrubby hollow a half mile
north. I’d be happier with ’em nearby but we didn’t have the choice. There ain’t no cover hereabouts to be found.

The babyhouse stands by itself at a flat crossroads. It’s edged on three sides by little poplar whips. But it’ll be years before they’re high enough to make a windbreak, let alone one thick enough to hide in. This place is raw an new. Built only a few months ago, accordin to Jack. It’s a low one storey with a bark an sod roof. Walls of board, mud an strawbale sprawl low an long. There’s a sturdy barred door in the middle. Two windows eether side with narrow iron bars. They’ve closed the wood shutters inside, but light trickles out between the slats. I check ’em out through the looker, but cain’t make out a thing. Here behind the stables, we’re maybe fifty foot from the house.

Babyhouse, says Cassie. Baby prison, more like. D’you really think you can bluff us in there, Jack?

Oh, I can do that no problem, he says. It’s what comes after that I’m worried about. Seein how we got no idea what comes after. He smiles his lopsided smile at me.

He seems more like hisself tonight. I’m mightily relieved, if none the wiser. I don’t think I could of took no more of his cool distance. Tonight—unlike last night—he does have his Tonton gear on. An, fer the first time, I’m glad to see him in it. When I told him so, he jest raised one eyebrow. The fact is, he’s our only chance of gittin into this place.

Mercy’s padded Cassie with a pretty decent halfways
along baby belly. Our plan at the moment—an to say it’s rough is high praise—is fer Jack to pound on that barred door an say he’s got a pregnant woman who’s in a state. Mercy practised Cassie in signs of false labour an what to do when an it turns out she’s a champion at pretendin to be in hysterics. Once they’re inside, Mercy says the Tonton will leave the midwife to deal with her. An there’s a good chance she won’t blow the whistle when she sees Cassie’s a sham. Midwives hate their slavery, they hate what they’re doin, an they hate the Tonton above all. From there on, it’s down to Jack an Cassie what they do. So long as they don’t use no weapons an nobody gits hurt.

I trust you, I says.

I’m flattered by yer faith in me, Jack says. An, as you know, I’m a great believer in wingin it. But even by my standards this is a very loose plan. Yer sure you wanna do this?

Cassie’s got the final say, I says.

Let’s move in closer, she says. Take a look through them shutters. See what’s goin on.

Keepin low, we run across the yard. We flatten ourselfs aginst the house next to the window on the left-hand side. We edge in to peek through the shutter slats. It’s one long room lit by wall lanterns. Two neat rows of beds. Only two girls. One, a big ruddy gal, hugely pregnant, lays propped up in bed. The other’s a slim little thing with a sweet, exhausted, frightened face. She ain’t pregnant. She paces an turns. Starts
an stops. Wearin a path in the floor beside what must be her bed. There’s a small cloth-wrapped bundle set on it, like she’s ready to leave. Her hands clutch together at her waist. Tryin an failin to stop the agonized claw of her fingers. She stares at the door to the hallway.

That’s Rae, whispers Cassie. She must of had her baby.

A feeble wail trickles from the other side of the babyhouse. Emmi used to wail like that. Weak as a newborn mouse an no mother’s milk to feed her. It’s beyond a wonder that she lived.

Mercy shakes her head. Born before its time, poor thing, she says.

A collared slave, her face a careful blank, sits in a chair beside the door. She’s a great carthorse of a woman. That’s why they picked her. Why she’s here. To keep the girls on this side of the door. Rae goes to her, speaks to her, pleads with her. The woman shakes her head. No, Rae cain’t go to her baby.

Rae turns away. You can see her tryin to git hold of herself, but she’s crackin. The other girl holds out her hand, says her name. Rae runs to her an buries her head in her shoulder. She weeps as the girl holds her. As she strokes her back, talks to her quietly. She makes Rae sit up an dry her tears.