Doomseeds Page 20

  The baby’s flailing arms vibrated with his cries. Lusty cries. Sefe looked at her with dead eyes, his hand still clutching the baby’s ankles. “Boys never live.”

  Eily thrust her free hand beneath the baby as if to catch it in case Sefe released his grip. “The Flame Runnas can save them.”

  Sefe’s eyes narrowed and his mouth curled into a snarl.

  “Let me try to save them,” Eily said. She’d seen grief in his eyes when he’d looked at Ana. There had to be a spark of humanity in his feral soul. “These are your sons.”

  Staring at the bloody child hanging from his fist, Sefe’s chest heaved. His arm trembled as if the child weighed too much. A heartbeat later, he thrust the baby toward Eily and addressed the waiting gunman. “Take this Flame Runna outside. Maybe the flying machines will avoid the women if one of their own is among them. Arm the men and get them to the top of the basin.”

  Eily settled the second child awkwardly into the crook of her right arm as the gunman prodded her with the tip of his rifle. She kept her eyes on Sefe, hoping what she was about to say was true. “The Flame Runnas know I’m here. They won’t attack if you don’t.”

  Sefe pushed up to his feet on his spear. “Flame Runnas killed my parents. My brother. Broke my back so I could barely walk.”

  “At least call everyone into the cave.” She struggled to her feet, fettered by the infants. “We’ll be safe here until the fight is over.”

  “I’ve seen them fill caves with fire, leaving nothing but blackened holes. If you hide in here, no one will survive this fight.”

  Her blood chilled at the thought of being trapped inside while Burn Operatives blasted the cavern. But the Protectorate knew she was here. They wouldn’t burn without checking first. She raised her chin, looking him square in the eye. “If we surrender, no one will get hurt.”

  “Flame Runnas have no honor.” Sefe spat and stalked away.

  The chill in her blood crystallized into daggers. Sefe could be right. Behind her, the gunman grabbed her shoulder.

  Jubal scanned the eastern path. The sky glowed a hazy gold but the earth was still in shadow. How far had Rann gone, trailing wagon and goats? The Flame Runnas might arrive before he tracked his brother and the white cloth down.

  A newborn wailed near the cave mouth, followed by Eily’s voice. Like a ripple on water, the crowd grew silent and turned toward her. Jubal gripped his staff and raised himself onto his toes to see.

  Eily stood at the threshold, her white bonnet glowing like a beacon in the early light. His heart swelled with relief. She was alive, and there was no sign of Sefe. Where was the cannibal king? Surely he wouldn’t let her go, not easily, at least. There was no time for answers. Her bonnet could signal the Flame Runnas. He would have to use every trader skill he had to convince the people to stand firm in the face of what would look like certain death.

  He pushed forward through the crowd. Eily was arguing with a man holding a gun, her back to the crowd.

  “Let me through.” He elbowed past a warrior, ducked around a woman clutching the hands of two children, and rose on his toes again. The warrior shoved Eily, sending her stumbling down the rock toward the crowd.

  As she regained her balance, she turned to face the people. Her dress was smudged dark with blood, and in each arm she held a baby. She shouted, “The Flame Runnas will kill you all if you don’t surrender!”

  The crowd burst into an unintelligible roar. Jubal was borne sideways on a wave of moving bodies. His flimsy staff folded in half under his weight. Someone bumped him from behind and he went down. His necklaces of trade beads broke free while his right arm bent painfully underneath him.

  “Flame Runna lies!... Kill her!... Sefe will win!...”

  A heel connected with his temple, and stars shot across his vision. He rolled right. Someone stepped on his groin, turning the stars into a white-hot burst of agony. He rolled to his side and retched.

  Rodi’s voice roared over the clamor. “Jubal carries the trader’s staff. Don’t harm him!”

  The scuffle continued, but a small space cleared around him.

  “Can you stand?” Rodi spoke next to him. Her hands gently but firmly urged him upright.

  Jubal swayed to his feet, panting through the pain. His palm was sticky, and he realized his arm was bleeding from an abrasion on his elbow. The crowd spread over the stone lip of the Taguan, easily two hundred faces, all of them speaking at once. Eily huddled on the stone, head bowed over the infants in her arms as three cannibals jabbed and slapped her.

  His pulse roared through his ears. “Do not hurt her! We need her to communicate with the Flame Runnas. She can call Peace.”

  “We don’t want Peace!” shouted a man with a gun.

  “Sefe will defend us,” a woman added.

  “Do you really think Sefe can protect you?” Jubal bellowed. “The hunters will scatter when the Flame Runnas kill enough of them, and leave the rest of you to face the fires. Our only hope is to stop Sefe and declare a Peace with the Flame Runnas.”

  The people surrounding Eily ceased their attacks, but remained close to her. She hunched on the ground, not looking up.

  Jubal strode through the crowd to her side. “Give me your bonnet.”

  Eily twisted her head to look up at him, her face contorted. “What are you talking about?”

  He squatted beside her. “A white flag. Gid always waved a white flag. We can use your bonnet.”

  She sat up. One newborn squalled, and she jiggled it slightly to calm it. “One tiny flag won’t protect all these people.”

  He reached over and yanked the bonnet from her hair. “The only way we’re going to survive this is to prove to them we’re more than cannibals.”

  “But Sefe’s readying his men to fight.”

  Jubal rose to his feet. He had to find a way to stop Sefe—to overcome him if need be. Raising his voice, he addressed the crowd. “How many died in the last fight with the Flame Runnas?”

  The crowd muttered and shifted. A nearby woman stepped up, her dark hair streaked with silver at the temples. “Too many. My boy was one of them.”

  “Will all of your sons take up guns and die for Sefe?” Jubal made eye contact with everyone close enough to see him. “For what? To own a handful of Flame Runna slaves?”

  “Flame Runnas kill our families!”

  “So do hunters, but Sefe welcomes them here—he calls them to join.” Jubal pointed at the gunman standing in the entrance. “Is the One Tree a tribe of hunters? A tribe that breaks the laws the Mothers set down for us? Sefe stole my woman. A trader’s woman. Soon no traders will visit the Taguan.”

  A man with a short beard and a bone spike through his nose hawked a wad of spit toward Eily. “Flame Runnas aren’t goods. They’re the enemy.”

  Several hunters wielding guns stepped forward to join him. People quieted and cleared a space around them.

  Jubal drew himself taller. “Sefe treats his Flame Runnas as goods. He trades their magic for your allegiance. He trades them to the Blood-Eye for guns.”

  Rodi’s shoulder brushed his arm as she called out, “And Sefe calls Ana his woman. Yet her skin is green. He makes or breaks laws at his whim.”

  People surrounding the warriors bristled. The space around the gunmen narrowed. Eily rocked back on her heels and clumsily got to her feet.

  The bearded man widened his stance, shooting wary glances to either side. “Your brother traded them for his life. The Flame Runnas belong to Sefe now.”

  “My woman was not Rann’s to trade.” The only way to convince people to overthrow Sefe was to make this personal. He pointed to the young couple who’d joined him at the fire. “How long until Sefe takes your woman? Or your child? When I was a member of the Red Hand, our Big Man wisely sought the council of his tribe. When did my people decide to let one person rule without question?”

  “Sefe makes the One Tree strong,” said a voice from the crowd.

  “He’s turned the Taguan into a sla
ve den. And now the Flame Runnas want revenge. Sefe can try to fight, but he’ll only force them to kill us all.”

  “We have to run!” a woman screeched.

  “Jubal,” Eily leaned close to him. “This isn’t going to work.”

  Jubal clamped a hand on her shoulder. “Eily, this is our best chance.” He raised her bonnet high overhead and shouted to the crowd. “The Flame Runnas spare the people behind the lightning wall when they hold a white flag in the air. This is how they call a Peace.”

  Behind him, a man spoke, “That will be very useful in the upcoming fight.”

  Jubal spun, stepping around Eily to shield her.

  Just inside the cave’s mouth, Sefe pointed the long nose of a gun at Jubal’s chest.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Eily peeked around Jubal’s shoulder. Sefe stepped out of the shadow of the cave onto the stained rock, his hands around a long rifle. The crowd seemed to be holding its breath.

  “Sefe, your people don’t want to fight,” Jubal said.

  “I disagree.”

  In the crowd behind her, a few men jeered in agreement.

  Eily spun to face them, her back to Jubal’s. A handful of gunmen pumped their weapons in the air as they voiced support for Sefe. Men and women eased away from each warrior, pulling children close. Several children cried and mothers shushed them without success.

  Sefe was going to end them all.

  But what could she do? No one would listen to the words of a Flame Runna. She looked at the puckered faces of the babies in her arms. One of them rooted against her chest, mouth open wide in a useless attempt to nurse. Her eyes stung. She met the gaze of a young woman with an infant bundled against her breast. A young boy clutched the woman’s leg. The mother looked so pitiful. Barely more than a child herself. Eily’s heart ached.

  Doubting anyone would actually hear her, she said, “We have to save the children.”

  The woman’s gaze slid to the men behind Eily. A very short woman holding a little boy whispered something. Both women nodded. The short woman pivoted to face the crowd. “Sefe doesn’t speak for me!”

  The young mother joined her. “Or me.”

  One after another, mothers spoke out, then sons and brothers, the outcry gathering strength and momentum. A gunman in the crowd backhanded a thin woman next to him. The man behind her shouted in protest. Further back, another scuffle erupted between two men. People continued to speak out against Sefe, forming into solid groups.

  An earsplitting crack echoed off the face of the Taguan behind her. Jubal’s back slammed into hers. Both babies nearly toppled from her arms. She clutched them against her chest and braced herself.

  Jubal collapsed against her legs.

  “The trader! Sefe shot the trader!” A woman screamed.

  Eily spun, half tripping over Jubal’s out-flung arm. Blood welled from his left shoulder. Before she could see more, the crowd surged forward, driving her out of the way.

  “Mambabarang!” a woman shouted beside her.

  “Stop him!”

  “He killed the trader!”

  With both arms encumbered by newborns, Eily fought to remain upright in the rush. “Jubal!” she screamed, unable to keep him in sight. “Jubal!”

  More shots reverberated against the rocks. People screamed in either rage or fear. To her left, a gunman yelped and fell to his knees as three women bore him to the ground. One woman wrenched the weapon from him and smacked it like a club against his face. Another of Sefe’s men jammed the tip of his rifle into a graying man’s gut just before being tackled from behind.

  The short woman who’d first spoken against Sefe grabbed Eily’s sleeve. “Come with me.”

  Eily peered through the crowd as the woman guided her. “Where’s Jubal?”

  “We got him out of the way.”

  People seemed to make room for the woman, unconcerned about the Flame Runna following her. Together they reached the Taguan’s face and followed it to the edge of the dry stone wall. Next to a pile of rubble, two women, one with wildly curly hair, the other with tight, beaded braids, knelt next to Jubal. He lay flat on the ground while the braided woman pressed a blood-soaked cloth against his wound.

  Eily cried out and sprinted forward. “Is he dead?”

  The woman with curly hair turned and narrowed her eyes. “You brought the Flame Runna?”

  The short woman said, “She’s his woman. He wants her here.”

  “Rodi, did you find her?” Jubal struggled to sit up, and Eily exhaled in relief. The women pushed him flat before he could rise. His eyes were bright, feverish looking. He held out one hand. Bunched within his grasp he held her bonnet, stained crimson. “We can use a flag.”

  The short woman—Rodi—took the scrap of fabric between two fingers. “What do we do with it, Jubal?”

  Jubal’s brow furrowed as he stared at the bloody cloth. “I ruined it.”

  The top edge of the sun cleared the amarantox, sending blinding rays into Eily’s eyes. She flinched, and both infants began to wail like sirens. “Can we move him into the cave?”

  Jubal flailed and caught hold of Rodi’s wrist, but his eyes were on Eily. “Not the cave. We have to prove we mean no violence. Like your Holdout.”

  She wanted to touch him, to comfort him, but her hands were full. “Sefe means to fight.”

  He lifted his head from the ground but the effort proved too much and he collapsed to the stone again, lips pale. His words were like breath. “The Flame Runnas won’t stop with Sefe. We’re all the same to them. All dead.”

  A chill shivered up Eily’s spine. Jubal had a point. The Protectorate wanted to stop the Fosselites, or, at the very least, the cannibals with guns. And the Protectorate always got what it wanted. She and the reversions were collateral damage. The dusters knew they were approaching armed men. They’d attack first. Unless something stopped them.

  She focused on the stained bonnet in Rodi’s hand. During cannibal raids, the Order used their white hankies to signal the dusters so they weren’t mistaken for attackers. Would Burn Operatives in the Reaches pay attention to a symbol from the Holdout? The tiny scrap of her bonnet would barely be visible from the air, even if it hadn’t been darkened with blood. It wasn’t enough. Not by itself.

  She glanced down at her stained dress, then raised her eyes to scan the women. All browns and grays and muted natural colors. White was rare on the Tox, except for the yuvee trees during a sunstorm. Too much to hope for. But she looked to the sky, anyway.

  The sun had fully cleared the horizon. Dusters would be in the air by now, Burn Operatives at the ready behind long-nozzled flame guns. Flashes of her childhood clouded her thoughts. Green faces and roaring flames and the horrific screams of her tribe. Ana clutching her tight, their small naked bodies cringing from the heat. Prickles of sweat broke out all over Eily’s body, and the bodice of her dress felt too tight. Clothing always caught fire first and made it hard to escape.

  Wait. Her undergarments were white. A seed of hope sprouted in her breast. Did she have enough fabric to signal the duster?

  “Please, hold my babies.” She lowered the infant from her right arm into the lap of the curly-haired woman. The woman instinctively put her hands out to cradle the newborn. Then Eily turned to Rodi and handed her the second.

  Grasping the front of her bodice, Eily yanked at the closures, ignoring the pop as threads broke. She dropped the dress around her ankles. The morning air raised goosebumps on her arms and legs. She stripped out of the chemise and undershorts, leaving her in only dark stockings and shoes.

  The women gaped at her. Eily ignored them. The underclothes were old and sweat-stained, but still white enough. Gripping one hem of the shorts, she jerked, straining to tear the seams in two. She repeated it with the chemise. If the flags were any smaller, they wouldn’t be visible. But four flags were much better than a single small, stained bonnet. She held the rags out to the women. “Take these to the people. Make sure to spread them out and
hold them high.”

  The braided woman rose and wiped her bloody hands against her thighs, then accepted the flags. “You must stand with us.”

  Eily’s attention dropped to Jubal. Drying blood caked his chest. The wound glistened with a scarlet ooze. She fell to her knees beside him, finding it hard to breathe. Cupping his cheeks with both hands, she brushed her lips against his. His breath tickled her skin. She choked in relief. He still lived. But not for long if the dusters burned them out. “Hang on, Jubal,” she whispered. “The Protectorate is coming. They have medicine to save you.”

  She rose and faced the women. Her bare skin tingled in the rays of the sun, usually hidden chloroplasts springing to life. She could shimmy back into her dress, but her green skin might stand out enough to make the dusters pause their fire, and she needed every advantage, no matter how exposed she felt at the moment. Raising her chin, she said, “All together.”

  Rodi handed Ana’s baby back and swapped her own, heavier child to her other hip. She took a flag and left to join the mass behind them.

  The curly-haired woman rose, Ana’s second baby still in her arms, and took a flag. Her eyes locked with Eily’s. “I’ll hold this child.”

  Eily bit her lip. If these people were to trust her, she had to return their trust. She nodded. The woman strode away into the crowd. Eily was about to follow when the braided woman said, “You come with me.”

  The woman held onto both the remaining scraps until they reached the crowd, then she handed one off to another woman, giving instructions. The throng had already begun forming around the flags. Eily scanned the other groups, keeping her eye on the curly-haired woman carrying her nephew.

  “What if they shoot first? We can’t outrun fire,” a gruff voice said.

  Eily responded with more confidence than she felt. “They’ll hold their fire.”