The Inferior (13 page)

A trap! Wallbreaker’s speciality. Perhaps it was just a leftover from the battle; many houses had been protected in this way, although it was surely strange that something so dangerous should still be here when the threat had passed.

Stopmouth climbed carefully into the room without disturbing the spear-shaft. He saw nothing more suspicious amongst the shadows than racks of smoked flesh and a few tree branches ready for cutting into tools.

In the next room at the back of the house, Mossheart slept, breathing noisily. A few flames danced in a fire pit, throwing light onto the delicate curve of one cheek. She looked as beautiful as on her wedding night. An arm stretched out from under the hides, resting on what might, in her dreams, have been a shoulder. His heart melted and for a moment he was once more the boy who had loved her in desperation. He shook his head, ready to move on. But then he saw the first signs of Indrani’s presence. In the corner, something black and shiny rested against the wall. He stepped over to it carefully and picked it up. A smile came to his face. It was part of the strange costume Indrani had arrived in. It must be. A bent container, just the right size for one of her feet. He had just turned it over to examine the sole when he heard a movement and froze. Mossheart had stirred in her sleep. His mouth turned dry and his heart thudded
bang, bang, bang
in his chest. But she seemed to settle again at once. He put down the foot-covering and moved on.

The next door brought him to what had been the meeting room before Wallbreaker had stopped inviting guests into his home. No fire here, no sounds of breathing. Nothing.

One last place to check, he thought. It lay in front of him, hidden by a hide drape across the entrance. He steeled himself for what he might find now: his brother and his love entwined on the floor. He’d leave as soon as he saw it, but he didn’t want to add to his humiliation in Indrani’s eyes by being caught. No matter what was in that room, he vowed, he’d keep silent. He could cry all he wanted when he got home.

Careful, he thought. Careful…

Remembering the spear-shaft on the windowsill, Stopmouth checked for traps again, and amazingly found a piece of ligament twine tied at ankle height across the doorway. Nothing fatal. But in your own house! Another piece of ligament stretched across at neck height and Stopmouth had to duck between the two as he pushed the curtain aside.

He heard more breathing in here, one person only. It was a hoarse rattle, a constant struggle. With no fire to guide him and the window blocked up, he had to get down on his knees and crawl towards the sound. His hand found the damp palm of another person in the dark. The fingers didn’t move under his.

‘Indrani?’ he whispered. ‘Indrani?’ The person didn’t wake up when he shook her by the shoulders. Her skin burned under his touch and every few seconds a twitch passed from her body into his hand. It reminded him of something. But what? Then it came to him. In his mind’s eye he saw the rooftop where he and Rockface had recovered the Talker. He saw the dying Flyers with their staring eyes and trembling wings.

This then was how Wallbreaker kept her at home. Stopmouth wanted to cry out, to scrape at the walls until his palms ran bloody. It’s a mistake, he thought. Wallbreaker didn’t do this. Nobody could do this. Indrani was always so ignorant of even the most basic things, like a child. And like a child she might have forgotten to brush mossbeasts off her food if any had crawled onto it.

And yet a person would need to eat whole handfuls of them for this to happen.

He lifted the woman onto his shoulders with far too much ease. Perhaps this wasn’t Indrani after all. Indrani had muscle on her frame. He moved to the doorway and tore the curtain out of his way. He nearly dropped his burden right there. Mossheart stood in the hallway looking straight at him. Shadows covered most of her face, giving her the look of a skull.

‘Good, Stopmouth,’ she said. ‘I thought you’d never come! And on a night when Wallbreaker is off working on plans for an alliance with the Clawfolk. Good!’

She pointed a shaking hand at the body on Stopmouth’s shoulders. ‘She is destroying my husband.’ Her voice was almost a screech; tears tracked down her face. ‘He was never so frightened before
she
came to this house.’ Stopmouth didn’t try to correct her. He edged past her towards the main entrance.

Mossheart’s skull turned to follow him. ‘I almost don’t recognize you any more, Stopmouth. You’re filling out, more of a man than a boy.’ She shrugged, as if to say,
The past is no more
. ‘Once Wallbreaker finds out she’s bewitched you, he’ll have to volunteer you both.’ Was she smiling? ‘I think after that…he’ll be able to sleep again.’

Stopmouth left through the main entrance, not caring if anybody were awake to see him. He was sure Indrani was dying, so it seemed less important to him in that moment that he too was as good as dead; little more than walking meat to be traded to the Clawfolk.

11.

THE LONGTONGUE

I
n Centre Square the smoke fires had burned down to the embers. He removed Indrani from his back to get a good look at her. She blinked slowly through drooping lids and didn’t respond to her name when he softly called her. White flecks of foam speckled her chin and glittered in the low light of the ancestral fires in the Roof.

He didn’t know what to do. He’d only gone to Wallbreaker’s house to see her, to talk to her and suffer her scorn. Looking at her now, he realized that if she wasn’t already dying, his stupid rescue had surely condemned her. And himself too.

Unless…He couldn’t believe the idea that settled in his mind just then. As if the ancestor of an enemy had wormed its way into his head and whispered:
Sneak back into the house. Murder Mossheart. Murder Wallbreaker on his return
. He shook off the alien thought, knowing no human was capable of such a thing. No, he’d find another way. He wasn’t as clever as Wallbreaker, but he’d think of something.

He took Indrani into his house and built a fire. He found a cloth to wipe her face, then ruined his good work spooning broth into her mouth. For a while he just watched over her, expecting Wallbreaker at any minute. But her rasping breath drew first his pity and then his eyes. He found he couldn’t look away. Sometimes when she spoke, full of excitement, she clenched her teeth behind open lips, fiercely, but fierce in the way a child is fierce; all innocence and enthusiasm. That look never failed to make him smile. She wore it now in her illness and he imagined her standing proud before the enemy ancestors that assailed her, wishing he could be with her.

He touched a hand to her damp forehead. Without meaning to, his palm slipped down to cup her face and passed from there to play idly with her perfectly black hair.

‘Indrani. P-poor Indrani…’

He wondered again how long it would take for Wallbreaker to come back. The first place he was likely to search would be here.

When the broth was gone, Stopmouth packed up his weapons and two empty water skins. He wouldn’t be able to carry much more if he had to take Indrani as well. He hefted her onto his shoulders and went out into the night-time streets. His shuffling steps echoed off the walls as he stumbled towards an empty building near the new perimeter. The windows here had been blocked, of course, but one particular barrier had been made weaker than the others so that it could be easily removed from the inside.

He heaved Indrani up onto the windowsill, climbed past her and pulled her down after him. He made no effort to close off the barrier again: he doubted whether it was even possible. Besides, he wanted any pursuers to think he’d gone towards the now empty streets of the Hairbeasts.

Half the night had passed and Indrani got heavier with every step he took. Her breathing rasped in his ear and her drool soaked into his shoulder. He still had a long way to go before he could rest. He circled the old perimeter until he came to a house that had been prepared for himself and Rockface on the Flim side. If the Armourbacks and their allies had chosen to attack from newly conquered Flim-Ways instead of Hairbeast-Ways, the two men would have hidden here rather than the place they’d used for stealing the Talker.

He stepped round the traps on the stairs, which hadn’t been disturbed, and found with relief that no one had touched the food caches either. There was so much flesh from the great battle that nobody had yet needed to come for it.

He laid Indrani down on the old skins that had been left here. Then he curled up in a corner and was asleep in an instant.

Stopmouth woke with a knife against his throat. The glare from the Roof was so strong that for a moment he couldn’t see who held it.

‘He promises he’ll give an extra wife to whoever brings Indrani back,’ said Rockface. ‘What do you think of that? And me a widower, hey?’

Rockface gave off a foul odour–his teeth were going bad, and for the first time Stopmouth realized that the bigger man might soon lose his great strength. Nor did he look like a person used to a good night’s sleep: his eyes were bloodshot and baggy. Soup caked the sides of his mouth.

‘I was s-s-sorry about W-W-Watersip and Q-Quicksmile,’ said Stopmouth. ‘They s-still had a th-thousand days left in them.’

‘Yes,’ said Rockface sadly. ‘Yes, they had.’ He put away the knife. ‘The men are already checking in our old hide, the one we used for stealing the Talker. It was sneaky of you to leave by the Hairbeast route, but they’ll come here next. This is not a good place for you.’ He studied Indrani, his bloodshot eyes blinking slowly. ‘You should move to another building, hey? I’ll help you carry her, although she looks ready to volunteer no matter what you do for her now.’

They took Indrani and the blankets to another house nearby. Then they carried over the food and Stopmouth’s few weapons. As they left, Stopmouth triggered a trap on the stairs by lobbing a rock onto the appropriate step. Half the roof collapsed. He didn’t want any of his old friends setting it off by mistake. Besides, they’d use up more time wriggling through the rubble to get to the rooftop.

‘Stopmouth?’ said Rockface. The younger man nodded and waited. Rockface was always so easy to read. Right now his face had screwed up as if he’d found a particularly tough knot of gristle in his broth. ‘Wallbreaker thinks you and I are in league. He tried to have me followed this morning. And…and there’s something else…Wallbreaker said…Well, it’s a message, I suppose. He said that if you come back to the Ways without her…If it’s just you by yourself, he’ll forgive you. He’ll deny the rumours that you took her and say she ran off alone. He even told the others they were only looking for her. He’s letting on she’s feverish and doesn’t want to volunteer.’

The two men turned to look at Indrani. She’d gone way beyond feverish. She burned under the attack of an army of enemy ancestors. And yet Stopmouth remembered how well she’d taken care of him when people had wanted him volunteered. He could do no less in return.

For some reason this thought cheered Rockface. Maybe he needed the distraction. ‘Oh, you’re always getting me in trouble, Stopmouth! But it’s the type of trouble that’s good for a man, hey?’

Rockface didn’t leave immediately. ‘I almost forgot! They found Crunchfist.’

‘The b-b-body?’

‘No! That’s the amazing thing. He’s alive. All his pack were killed by Armourbacks in Flim-Ways and they damaged his leg so he couldn’t run. But he managed to hole up there, and even with all his wounds, he caught a few to keep him company while he healed.’

‘W-W-Wallbreaker?’

‘Oh, he locked him up in the old wedding tower. He’s within his rights, hey? Crunchfist is a failed candidate. But people aren’t happy about it and Wallbreaker won’t be able to trade him until food gets really short.’

Or maybe, thought Stopmouth, Crunchfist would eat a few mossbeasts. The unloved chief couldn’t afford to keep a living hero around for long. Especially one as dangerous as Crunchfist.

Rockface clapped the younger hunter on the back and left the way he’d come.

Afterwards, loneliness swept over Stopmouth. He grew angry at his brother and then cried because he’d lost him.

He spent the rest of the day building a shelter on the roof. Sometimes he saw hunters pass by, human or Clawfolk. Once he even saw a pack of Bloodskins. He wanted to shout the alarm, but couldn’t. Nor did he dare light a fire to warm Indrani when they ran out of soup.

He looked up to where a pair of Globes floated almost directly above him. It was strange how there always seemed to be at least one of them near Indrani. The Roof darkened, its panels turning from searing blue to grey and then black, the grid of tracklights slowly brightening. The Globes never moved the whole time. Finally he turned away to examine the supplies.

They had eight strips of dried flesh between them. Each strip could sustain a hunter for a day. He tore off a chunk of it and chewed and chewed until his aching jaws had turned it to pulp. He mixed this with water in the base of a Flyer skull and poured it into Indrani’s mouth.

‘We’re done for,’ he said as he massaged her throat. ‘We can’t go back, and yet where else can we go?’

Then again, if Wallbreaker were to die somehow…

That horrific thought again. How could a human kill another when everyone needed everybody else? When the Tribe had been so far reduced as to hang on the verge of extinction? Humans didn’t kill their own kind unless to put them out of their misery. From time to time the chief could simply order a hunter to volunteer for the good of the Tribe. In this way even adulterers and other criminals contributed to everyone’s survival.

Stopmouth knew he couldn’t murder Wallbreaker, not even this new Wallbreaker who could look at a brother and not see him. Nobody else was sharp enough to save the Tribe; nobody else could come close.

A terrible smell distracted Stopmouth from his musings. Indrani had soiled herself. He cursed and realized he should have thought of that earlier. At least it was a sign of life.

Over the next few days his meat supply dwindled. Hunting parties still passed in the streets below, but they were looking for flesh and not criminals. By now Indrani had ceased foaming at the mouth and her body rarely spasmed as it had at first. They both needed flesh. Stopmouth could think of little else, even though he knew he had no right to live.

When night fell, he took his spear and sling, a supply of stones and a water skin. He spent a few minutes studying the streets from roof level before setting out. He’d never hunted alone before. In the Tribe, only Crunchfist had survived such stupidity more than once.

He headed for the Wetlane, always keeping to shadows, ducking into doorways if he thought he heard any movements. Then he did hear something: human voices. He stayed stock-still and waited, hoping a gurgle from his stomach wouldn’t give him away. A trading party was coming back from Claw-Ways. Three of the creatures accompanied the humans, but the beasts couldn’t have been volunteers for they weren’t bound and they even carried weapons embedded in their hook claws. So Wallbreaker had used the Talker to make an alliance! Stopmouth changed direction to avoid getting too close to the group.

He decided to head for Flim in the hope that a few Armourbacks or Hoppers might be left there. If nothing caught him, he could at least scout out the area and return the following day.

He reached the Wetlane at the Clawfolk end of the old perimeter, but stayed on the human side until he came to a place in the forest where an old tree had fallen over it. Both humans and Flims had used the trunk in the past as a route into each other’s territory. Now Stopmouth crossed it and sneaked through the woods until Flim stretched before him like a curtain of black moss. No fires brightened the night and the towers appeared unguarded. Nevertheless, because both his life and Indrani’s depended on it, he ran hunched over towards the first buildings, as if thousands of eyes were searching the night just for him.

He’d covered no more than fifty strides when a light brighter than the Roof exploded into the air around him with almost physical force.

He dropped his weapons and fell to his knees, pawing at his eyes. ‘I’m blind!’ he screeched, heedless of who or what might find him. He lay down and wept for hundreds of heartbeats, palms pressed against his face. When finally he pulled them away, garish spots danced in front of his eyes. But at the edges of the spots his vision was clearing. A short time later he could see well enough to run over to the first wall, panting with terror. Only then did he begin to question what had happened.

The old people had spoken of something like this. What was it? What? Then he grinned. He couldn’t believe his luck.

‘Of course!’ he whispered.

In the past, whenever a species had been hunted to extinction, new victims appeared to replace the old. Enough new creatures would arrive to fill every room of every building in the area. Those numbers would decrease very quickly until the new arrivals learned to defend themselves. But as long as their ignorance lasted, every nearby species would be sending hunters to profit from the bonanza.

Stopmouth decided not to bother sneaking in through a window, and ran instead for the main gate. He wouldn’t have to fear other hunters with so much easy flesh to be had.

The streets of Flim-Ways lay silent and empty before him. Good, he thought. Good! New beasts were always said to arrive in their sleep.

He entered a street containing only ruins. But near an intersection, three houses stood together wholly intact.

‘Mustn’t get greedy,’ he told himself. Depending on their size, the weight of an adult might prove too much for him and he didn’t want to risk hanging around to butcher a corpse. No, what he needed to find was a family. He could spear the young and bring back enough flesh to keep himself and Indrani alive for weeks.

The first house of the group of three had no hide curtain across the door. Stopmouth approached cautiously and peered into the hallway. He couldn’t see a thing. He poked the spear inside.

‘Stop wasting time!’ he scolded himself. Just this once he was on a hunt with nothing to be afraid of. His mouth was watering at the thought of new flavours. It was almost too much to bear. He stepped into the darkness of the hall. Away from the tracklights he could see very little apart from two shadowy openings. He was about to enter the first of these when his spear-tip encountered something soft and yielding that seemed to be stretched across it.