Heroes Adrift (17 page)

“They could have figured it out themselves, Lee,” he snickered. “I know we're brilliant, but we're not necessarily the only ones who can discover things.”

I supposed that was a possibility. “I hope they don't miscalculate their abilities and cause a catastrophe.”

“Catastrophes, I can handle.”

And then we had to get moving, packing up and soaking everything in the process because we didn't know what we were doing. Wet leather straps chafed against wet skin. I couldn't tie my hair tightly enough to keep it from whipping into my eyes and my mouth. Karish was threatening to have his head shaved. The mud sucked our feet deep into the earth, and I almost wished I were wearing the same scanty clothes as the others. Drenched and stuck to the skin, they truly left nothing to the imagination, but they allowed greater freedom of movement and they were, I guessed, less clutching and heavy then the trousers and shirt I was wearing.

It was the nightmare we had anticipated, and worse. Dark, the rain almost horizontal in the wind, stinging every inch of exposed skin—there were advantages to my clothing after all—and painfully blinding. All hands were needed to push the wagon through the mud, mind the animals, and make sure none of the children got themselves lost. Karish pulled wagon duty while I held the small hands of Ashti and Glynis. Not that it did either of them any good. I lost my footing more often than they did, a few times falling completely in the mud and coating myself with it. Which was a nice shot at my bench-dancing self-esteem.

I didn't know how far they felt they had to go to defeat the alleged effects of that ludicrous curse. Not terribly far, for surely we weren't able to cover much ground in those horrible conditions. As far as I could bear, though, because I was sure I was going to drop long before everyone was allowed to stop moving.

And then we had to set up again, which was even harder than pulling everything apart had been. Trying to erect a tent in the driving rain had to be an exercise in futility, and what was the point? Every single thing we owned was soaked through. And even once we had the tent set up, we couldn't dry anything. We couldn't light a fire or even a lantern. All we could do was strip naked and lie on the wet mat, not bothering with blankets as they were equally drenched. Finally we weren't hot. We were freezing, right to the bone, and we curled together in the pathetic hope of producing some body heat.

Karish was shivering so hard I could hear his teeth chattering. “If you get sick because of this, I'm going to kill Atara.” This was ridiculous.

“Man, I hate this place,” Karish stammered out through his teeth.

I crushed a handful of his hair in my fist, trying to wring out some of the water. “Aye.” I sighed. “So do I.”

Another village, another performance. I was starting to get used to it all. Walk, set up camp, put on paint, dance, go to sleep. My mind seemed to lose track of what I was doing. Which, I knew, wasn't a good thing. I wasn't on Flatwell just to dance and earn money. I had a more important task to perform. But sometimes, in the drudgery of the constant walking and dancing and walking and dancing, I kind of forgot.

We had walked, stopped, and set up camp. We were in our third evening in a little town that smelled overwhelmingly of mint. I had put on my ridiculous costume and all the paint. Taro had escorted me to the dance site.

And someone in the audience caught my eye. A young girl, too skinny, barely clothed. It took me a moment to place her. The little thief, the one I had caught in the act of trying to take my purse. And there she was, one of the spectators, in the front, not a jot of shame to be perceived anywhere about her.

Kahlia had already announced me with her usual flair. The spectators were waiting for me to step onto the bench. It would look other than elegant—an essential element for a creature with the ludicrous title of Flame Dancer—to face off against the little street urchin right then. But she had better not try to take any of our coins, because elegant or not, I'd grab her.

Piece one. The light piece that demonstrated yes, I was an actual bench dancer who could participate in the sport, while at the same time looking elegant and easy. Some mild polite applause, as usual, and a few coins. Piece two, the more technical piece, designed to show off the more difficult moves, at least those that were possible with only one bench and one pair of bars. Piece three, the “comedic” piece. Piece four, which showed off nothing that was from the original sport and was comprised entirely of “artistic” moves Kahlia had made up. That, of the four, garnered the most interest and the most coins.

Then, the grand finale, what Kahlia had taken to calling the snake dance. Because she thought snakes were sexy, which still took my brain to places I really didn't want it to go. It was still the most humiliating piece in the repertoire. Though I never felt that way at the time of performing it. Oh no. There was something about the sand singer that just eliminated every inhibition I had, and shortly after hearing its first raspy notes I threw myself into the curving arms and arched back with abandon.

Until I felt the piercing pain along the bottom of my left foot, stumbled over a bar with my right, and landed flat on my back, the air knocked completely out of me.

I can't breathe, I can't breathe, my foot is screaming, I can't breathe, don't panic.

Then I was being pushed upright. Someone was rubbing my back. Kahlia was murmuring soothing nonsense into my ear that accomplished nothing.

Where was Karish?

All right. Calm down. Breathe. Not too deep. Shallow. Shallow. Don't panic when it doesn't come. It will come. Shallow. Breathe. Careful. Good girl. Well done.

What was all the shouting about?

I couldn't believe it. I'd let my foot get caught in the middle of an artificial bench dance performance. Obviously my skills were going to hell. I'd be completely useless by the time I got off this Zaire-neglected island. If in fact I ever did.

All right. I was breathing. Nice and slow and smooth.

I wondered if the people who'd already thrown coins would be taking them back after that spectacular finish.

“I can't say I think much of your man,” Kahlia said. “Here you are, in the dirt with pain, and he's fussing over Panol.”

“What's wrong with Panol?” Now that I could breathe, I could see. Panol was stretched out on the ground, clutching at his knee and holding his ankle off the ground. Leverett was at his head, holding him down by the shoulders, and Karish was lightly touching his upheld ankle.

“He was bitten by a vashi. A snake. That's why he fumbled the bars.”

Oh. Snake. I shot a few glances about and could see nothing under the dense foliage.

“Don't worry. Sacey clubbed it. It's dead.”

“Poisonous?”

“Very. Setter's gone to get the ahkar. It's medicine for such things. But it's already too late. The poison will have gone too far by the time Setter gets back.”

Why had no one warned us of such snakes? There we were, wandering around in sandals, and there were lethal ankle biters slithering about. And why wasn't everyone carrying around their own supply of this ahkar for the purposes of instant application?

These people were making me crazy.

Karish was watching me, waiting for me to notice and return his gaze. Once I did, he raised his eyebrows.

I lowered my head slightly, a subtle half nod.

Karish's internal shields lowered. Mine rose. I waited as Karish sifted through the pulses and ebbs working through Panol, the pain in my own foot becoming forgotten. The tension in Panol's muscles eased.

Leverett noticed immediately. “No, Panol!” he cried, misunderstanding. “Not yet! Setter's coming! Panol!”

“Quiet, fool!” Taro snapped. I wasn't sure why.

“He's dying!”

“He's just relaxing.”

Oy. Karish. You can do better than that.

Leverett shot Karish a withering glance, which he, in my opinion, fully deserved. “What would you know of such things, offlander?” he sneered.

The insult, if such it could be called, was a new one on me.

“We've got snakes up north.”

We did, and from what I heard, it took hours for a person to die from a snake bite, if they ever did. How could these people feel Panol was in immediate danger?

Well, Southern snakes. What did I know?

Kahlia chose that moment to start prodding at my foot. But by that time, much of the pain had faded, so the touch tickled more than it hurt. It was a distraction, though, so I hissed at her and yanked my foot free and strove to keep my attention on Karish.

Was he accomplishing anything? I knew he was easing Panol's pain, but did that do anything in the long term, or was it merely making Panol feel better as he died?

See, this was why Karish's ability needed to be studied and quantified. But did he ever listen to me?

Setter, breathless and sweating in a way I hadn't witnessed on any of the islanders before, broke back through the crowd carrying a small green bag. He was opening it as he knelt beside Panol, swiftly unstopping a small vial and tipping its contents into Panol's mouth. Panol swallowed without prompting. Ripping open another bundle, Setter squeezed a small amount of gel onto Panol's ankle. “Rub that into the bite,” he ordered tersely.

“It's too late,” Kahlia murmured in a broken voice.

“Go to him,” I ordered. “I'm fine.”

She didn't move. She seemed frozen.

Karish rubbed the gel as instructed, continuing his unseen manipulations as he worked.

We waited.

I became aware that none of the spectators had left since my fall. They stood in a small cluster around us, silent, watchful.

“When will we know whether it's working?” I asked.

“It's too late to work,” Kahlia said.

“If it weren't too late,” I said sharply, “how would we know?”

She didn't answer, tears welling up in her eyes.

That was her brother. Why wasn't she hovering over him instead of me?

Karish dipped his fingers into the bundle Setter still held and rubbed the additional gel into the bite.

“Ah!” Leverett said with satisfaction. “His color is coming back!”

Everyone seemed to find that a particularly optimistic sign. Kahlia gave a pleased little gasp. I heard some soft applause.

Still, we waited.

Then Panol pulled in a deep breath. Leverett grinned.

Could endangerment and cure really work that quickly?

Everyone else seemed to think it could.

To me, Panol didn't look all that much better, but everyone around him appeared relieved. Taro carefully lowered Panol's foot to the ground. That meant to me that he thought either Panol was fine, or there was nothing more he could do. He shifted over to me, and glared at Kahlia.

Who glared right back. “What were you doing, meddling with him when she's hurt?”

“I could ask the same of you,” he retorted. “He's your brother.”

“I'm fine, Kahlia,” I said, before the argument could take off. “Really. By far the lesser of the two injuries. Go check on him.”

Another few moments of glowering, and she left. Karish knelt beside me. He didn't insult me by apologizing for going to Panol first. Without a word, he picked up my right foot, and the last lingering sting faded away. “No damage here,” he said.

“No.” I looked at Panol. Setter was wrapping a strip of cloth, dampened with something, around Panol's ankle. “Is he all right?”

Taro shrugged. “The yellow's gone.”

I guessed that was a good sign.

I was fine. Embarrassed but fine. I leapt to my feet before Karish could offer to assist me.

The audience was still there. I hoped they didn't expect any more to the performance, because it was definitely over. I could go on, but Panol was done, and I didn't want anyone replacing him at such short notice. Instead of a pinched sole, I'd end up with a crushed ankle.

Leverett and Sol arrived back to the dancing ground with a stretcher—it kind of disturbed me that they had something like that on hand—and shifted Panol onto it. He looked awfully pale and still to me.

To my very great surprise, members of the audience threw coins as Panol was lifted and carried away. Not as much as we got for a full performance, but a generous amount, I thought, for an incomplete one. Sacey, Karish and I collected the coins, putting aside a larger portion than usual for Panol. I wondered when he'd be able to participate again. Perhaps we had to look into training a new stalker for the bars.

And when I was finally ready to go back to the tent, I found myself face-to-face with the thief, standing there looking at me, as bold as brass.

“What are you?” the thief demanded bluntly.

I had no idea what she meant by that question.

“Northerners,” Karish said.

She looked at him with an expression that declared she thought him highly stupid. “Not all Northerners are like you.” She was studying us, looking from him to me and back again. “What are you?”

“I don't understand the question,” I said. And I wasn't in the mood to be talking to her. Little thief.

“You're not like everyone else,” she said with blatant frustration, her black eyes glinting. “What are you?”

I was a Shield, but that wasn't what she meant. Her people didn't really know about Shields and Sources, and it wasn't as though it were something a regular could sense. That was why we had to wear the braids on our shoulders.

I touched my left shoulder. I missed my braid. It had solved so many problems.

“Aryne!” a loud, powerful voice shouted.

The slight figure before us jerked in surprise.

Looking up from her, I saw the figure of the fake medicine seller bearing down on us, red faced and furious.

The thief—Aryne—dashed away, darting through the remainder of the spectators and disappearing into the dense brush.

And suddenly, for some reason, I felt a great deal more sympathy for her.

“Get back here, before I—” I supposed he remembered he was in front of an audience, then, for he cut himself off. Then, scowling, he shouted, “You'd better be back before I am!” He turned and stomped away.

So that was the girl's father. No wonder she was a thief, with that as an example.

“We should head back to our tent,” Karish said. “We've no doubt got an early start tomorrow.”

Ah yes. The curse. Pushing us forever onward. Ours was not to reason why.