Fire Country Read online

  “I don’t mean me me. I mean hypothetically speaking. If the Wilds were to try to kidnap me”—I look at Circ, trying not to laugh at the sight of his squashed nose—“or any other Youngling girl, why wouldn’t they just grab her from behind, put a hand over her mouth, and carry her away in a tugskin sack?”

  “Maybe they’re all out of tugskin?” Circ says, cracking up and losing the grip on his nose. He sticks out his tongue as the foul odor sneaks up his nostrils. The tips of his moccasin-covered feet are touching mine as we sit cross-legged across from each other. We’ve sat this way since we were Totters.

  “C’mon,” I say, clutching my stomach, “I’m being serious.” The only problem: it’s hard to be serious when I can’t stop laughing.

  “I don’t know, Sie, maybe it’s easier if they can convince you to come with them, rather than having to haul your tiny butt away with you kicking and screaming.”

  It’s a good point, but still…

  “Something just doesn’t smell right,” I say, and we both crack up, but then just as quickly fall over gagging from the thick, putrid latrine air.

  “Let’s get this over with, then we can talk,” Circ says, covering his mouth and nose with a hand.

  I smile behind my own hand. “Thanks for helping me with Blaze Craze,” I say.

  “Just promise me you’ll stop daydreaming in class. I don’t ever want to have to do this again.” He plucks his moccasins off with his spare hand, one at a time, and then pulls his thin white shirt over his head. I’ve seen him shirtless a thousand times, from Totter to Midder to Youngling, but this time I force myself to look closer, ’cause of what all t’other Youngling girls are saying about him. Circ is so smoky. What I wouldn’t give for five seconds with Circ behind the border tents. You’re close with Circ, aren’t you, Siena? Could you give him a message for me? Of course I say I will, but I never do. If they don’t have the guts to say whatever they want to right to his face, then they’re not good enough for him. Plus, the thought of Circ behind the border tents with some shilty Youngling makes me a bit queasy.

  Anyway, I try to see Circ from their perspective, just this once. To call his skin sun-kissed would be the understatement of the year, like calling a tug “Sorta big,” or a Killer “Kinda dangerous.” It’s like the sun is infused in the very pigment of his skin, leaving him golden brown and radiant. He’s strong, too. Almost as strong as iron, his stomach flat and hard, his chest and arms cut like stone. But he’s always been this way, hasn’t he? Still staring at his torso, present-day Circ fades from my vision and is replaced with images of him growing up. Circ as a Totter, five-years-old, small and a bit pudgy in his stomach, arms and face; Circ turning eight and becoming a Midder, less chubby but still awkward-looking, with too-long arms and legs; Circ at twelve, a full-fledged Youngling, much taller and skinnier’n a tent pole, not a bulge of muscle anywhere on him.

  The images fade and Circ stares at me. “What?” he says.

  “Uh, nothing,” I say, shaking my head and wondering when Circ became so smoky. It’s weird how when you’re around somebody so much you don’t seem to notice the changes in them. It’s like with every passing year he’s become more’n more capable, while I stay just as useless as ever. He’s good at everything, from hunting to feetball to Learning. And all I’m good at is daydreaming and getting in trouble. He’s smoky, and as my nickname suggests, I’m Scrawny.

  “You were daydreaming again, weren’t you?” His words are accusing but his tone and expression are as light as the brambleweeds that tumble and bounce across the desert.

  “You caught me,” I mumble through my hand.

  I see his grin creep around the edges of his fingers. He stands up and offers a hand. “Care to shovel some blaze with me, my lady?”

  Despite my self-pitying thoughts, he manages to cheer me up, and I take his hand, laughing. He pulls me up, hands me a shovel. While I carry my shovel, Circ wheels a pushbarrow, and we follow our noses toward the stench, which becomes more’n more unbearable with each step. You’ve done this ’fore, I remind myself. You just hafta get used to the smell again.

  If the smell is bad, the heat is unbearable. Although the heart of the summer is four full moons distant, you couldn’t tell it by the weather. The air is as thick as ’zard soup, full of so much moisture that your skin bleeds sweat the moment you step from the shade, as if you’ve just taken a dip in the watering hole. All around us is flat, sandy desert, which radiates the heat like the embers of a dying cook fire. With summer nipping at our heels and winter approaching, almost everything is dead, the long strands of desert wildgrass having been burned away many full moons earlier. A few lonely pricklers continue to thwart death, the usually green, spiky plants turned brown by the sun, but rising stalwart from the desert; we call them the plants of the gods for a reason, bearing milk even in the harshest conditions. Without them, my people might not survive the winter.

  We reach the edge of the blaze pit and look down. It’s a real mess, as if no one’s been here to shovel it for many quarter full moons, maybe even a few full moons. It’s gonna be a long afternoon.

  “Maybe we can just cover it with durt,” I say hopefully.

  Circ gives me a look. “Don’t be such a shanker—you know it’s not full yet.”

  “I’m not a shanker!” I protest.

  “Well, you sure sound like one,” Circ says, grinning. Now I know he’s trying to get me all riled up.

  Determined to prove him wrong, I roll up my dress and tie it off at the side, and then clamber down the side of the pit, feeling the blaze squish under the tread of my bare feet. Gross. Some even slips between my toes. Cockroaches scuttle out of my path. The smell is all around me now, a brownish haze rising up as the collective crap of our entire village cooks under the watchful eye of the hot afternoon sun. Not a pleasant sight.

  Gritting my teeth, I start shoveling. The goal is to even it out, move the blaze that’s around the edges to the center. You see, people come and dump their family’s blaze into this pit, but they’re sure as scorch not gonna wade down into the muck and unload it in a good spot; no, they’re gonna just run up to the pit as fast as they can, dump their dung around the edges and then take off lickety-split. That causes a problem: the blaze keeps on piling up around the edge, usually the edge of the pit closest to the border tents, until the pit is overflowing despite not being even close to full. Then a lucky shanker like me—not that I’m the least bit shanky—gets punished, and hasta use a shovel and old-fashioned sweat and grit to move the blaze around. Or if the pit is full, you get to cover it with durt so people can start using the next one. That’s what I was hoping for earlier.

  Anyway, I get right into it, heaping the scoop of my shovel full of stinky muck and tossing it as far toward the center as I can get it. Some of it splatters my clothes, but that’s inevitable, so I don’t give it another thought. Clothes can be cleaned, but the job’s not gonna get done without us doing it.

  A moment later Circ’s beside me, and within two scoops, his bare chest is glistening with a thin sheen of sweat that reflects the light into my eyes like thousands of sparkling diamonds. Every once in a while, one of us gags, our throats instinctively closing up to prevent any more of the blaze haze from penetrating our lungs. Can a person die of excessive blaze fume inhalation? With three more Shovel Duty afternoons to come, I’m certainly gonna put that question to the test.

  Scoop, shovel, gag, repeat.

  It goes on like that for a while, neither of us talking, not ’cause we don’t want to, but ’cause we can’t without choking. At some point I become immune to the smell, but I know it’s still there, like an invisible force lying in wait for its next victim. My s’posedly nonexistent muscles are all twisted up, as if a hand is inside my skin, grabbing and squeezing and pounding away. Each shovelful gets smaller and smaller, until there’s almost no point in scooping so I stop, try to jab the shovel in the blaze so it stands upright, but I don’t do it hard enough and it just falls
over.

  Circ stops, too, and looks at me, a smile playing on his lips. “You look like blaze,” he says, full on laughing now. I feel like blaze, too, but I won’t say that.

  Instead, I get ready to tell him the same thing, but then I notice: although his legs are spattered and dotted with brown gunk, from the knees up he’s spotless; he’s dripping beads of sweat like the spring rains have come early, but he doesn’t look tired; his tanned arms and chest are machine-like in their perfection. He doesn’t look like blaze at all, so I can’t say it, not without lying, and I won’t lie to Circ.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean—I was just joking around,” Circ says.

  My eyes flick to his. How does he know what I’m feeling? Does he know what I see as I look at him, that I see him as perfect? I realize I’m frowning.

  “No biggie,” I say, my lips fighting their way against gravity and exhaustion into a pathetic smile. “I was joking, too.”

  Circ studies my face for a moment, as if not convinced, but I look away, scan the pit, try to determine our progress. “Ain’t much in it,” I say.

  I feel Circ’s stare leave me, like it’s a physical thing touching my cheeks. “We did more than you think. Another thumb of sun movement and we should be nearly there,” Circ says.

  Another thumb of sun movement? Ugh. Maybe I’m a shanker—but that long might kill me. I think I make a face ’cause Circ says, “Don’t worry, we’ll do it together. Let’s rest for a while and then we’ll start again.”

  Rest: I like the sound of that. There’s nowhere to sit in the pit, unless you want to sit in a big ol’ pile of blaze, so we climb back out, slipping and sliding on the slope. Once I almost fall, but Circ grabs me by the arm and keeps me upright. My head’s down when we near the top and I hear a voice say, “Having fun yet, Scrawny?”

  I look up to see three Younglings staring down at me. Hawk’s in the middle.

  Stopping, I let Circ pull up alongside me. Caught by surprise, I’m tongue-tied, unable to find the right words to send these blaze-eaters packin’. Circ, on the other hand, always seems ready for anything. “Get the scorch out of here, Hawk. We’re working.”

  “Mmm, shovelin’ blaze. And from the looks of it doin’ a pretty grizz-poor job of it.” One of his mates, a guy they call Drag, coughs out a laugh.

  “Like you’d know anything about it,” Circ says, taking a step forward.

  “You’re right. I dunno a searin’ thing about blaze, other than it comes out from between my cheeks about a day after I eat a load of tug meat. And then you get to shovel it.” He laughs. “But the only thing I don’t understand, is why you’re here, Circ. Wasn’t the punishment for Scrawny?” There’s a gleam in Hawk’s eyes that makes me shiver, despite the oppressive midafternoon heat.

  “I don’t abandon my friends,” Circ says calmly, although I see his fingers curl into fists. “And don’t call her that.” Another step forward, just one away from the lip. Hawk’s friends take a step back, but Hawk doesn’t move.

  “But that’s what she is, right? I mean, look at her. She’s skinny, not an ounce of muscle on her—”

  “Watch it.” Circ’s voice is a growl.

  “—she’s got legs that are wobblier than a newborn tug’s—”

  “Shut it!”

  “—and her chest is flatter than the Cotee Plains.”

  Circ moves so fast I almost slip again just watching him. I don’t even see the step or two he takes before he’s on top of Hawk, pounding away with both fists. Hawk’s doing his best to block the blows, but he’s making a strange high-pitched noise that tells me plenty of Circ’s punches are getting through. Drag and the other guy, Looper, seem so stunned at first that they just stand there, but then they finally get their act together and jump on top of Circ, each grabbing one of his arms from behind, pulling him away from Hawk.

  Circ struggles, but they’ve got him so tight he can’t get his arms free. I’m frozen, as if the coldness of ice country has suddenly descended from the mountains, gluing my feet to the sludge beneath me.

  Hawk stands up.

  They’re going to hurt him—

  Hawk steps forward, wipes a string of blood from his nose, his mouth all screwed up.

  —all ’cause of me—

  The first punch is below the belt and Circ groans, doubles over, unable to protect himself.

  —I hafta do something.

  My feet finally move, come unstuck, as if someone else is controlling them. I’m not Scrawny anymore, not a Runt, not Weak, not any of t’other names I been called my entire life. I’m Siena the Brave, and Circ is my friend, and he needs me.

  Hawk sees me coming and moves to cut me off, but he’s too slow. My muscles ache from the shoveling, but I block it out, block everything out, ’cept for getting to the guys holding Circ’s arms; if I can just unloose one of them…

  I trip. Maybe on the lip of the blaze pit, maybe on a random rock I don’t notice, maybe on my own feet for all I know—it certainly wouldn’t be the first time—but regardless, I start tumbling headfirst, out of control, my arms and legs flailing and flopping like an injured bird as I try to regain my balance.

  I don’t.

  I crash into the back of Looper, who feels more like a boulder’n a Youngling boy, my nose crunching off his iron-like elbow, which fires backwards, knocking me off my feet. I’m in a pile in the dust, covered in blaze and durt and a bit of warm blood that trickles from my nose and onto my lips and from the scrape that I feel on my knee.

  “Stupid, Runt,” Hawk says, looming over me, his shadow providing a much needed reprieve from the relentless sun. “You two ain’t even worth the blaze you’ve been shoveling.” He kicks me once in the stomach and I groan, clutching my ribs, which feel like they’ve cracked in half.

  With my cheek against the dust, I see Circ struggling against the boys, bucking and twisting, but they’re strong, too, and they have the advantage in numbers and energy. Hawk laughs and saunters back over to Circ. “Don’t worry, I won’t hurt your girlfriend anymore. She practically knocked herself out anyway.” Violence spreads across his face and he slams his fist into Circ’s stomach twice, and then, winding up, whips a wild haymaker that glances off Circ’s jaw with a vicious thud. Drag and Looper throw him to the ground, where he slumps, unmoving.

  All I can think is:

  My fault.

  Chapter Three

  Winter is approaching, and with it, the dust storms. Already I can feel a change in the wind, as if it’s grown arms and legs and a face with a mouth that howls and cries as it approaches. Every few seconds it reaches its boiling point and sweeps a cloud of dust into the air and into my face. I close my eyes, cover my face with my hands, wait for the tiny pricks of sand to cease. Then I soldier on toward the village watering hole.

  It’s getting late, the sun having sunk deep on the horizon, where the thickest yellow clouds swirl like a toxic soup, turning the sky darker’n darker brown with each passing moment. Soon the sun goddess’s eye’ll wink shut completely as she passes into sleep.

  I’m glad it’s getting late for two reasons: if I run into anyone, it’ll be harder for them to see my blaze-, durt-, and blood-covered skin; and it’s less likely anyone’ll still be at the watering hole. Circ went to his family tent to get cleaned up, but I’m too scared to face my father looking like this. I didn’t tell Circ I wasn’t going home right away, and he didn’t ask, which I’m glad about, ’cause he probably woulda wanted to come with me, which I really can’t handle right now.

  I’m still muddling through everything that happened. Circ apologized about a thousand times on the way back toward the village, until I finally told him to “Shut it!” He has nothing to apologize about—it’s me who messed everything up.

  When I reach the watering hole, no one’s there.

  I sit on the edge and look at the murky brown face in the water. I’m just plain ol’ Scrawny again. I been called it a thousand times, probably more times’n Siena, so why shouldn’t it
be my name? Add it to the number of times I been called Runt, Stickgirl, and Skeleton, and you’ll have a number greater’n the total people in the entire village.

  Rippling Scrawny looks back at me, Real Scrawny. Her long, black hair is stringy with sweat and durt. Her thin face is dark brown from the sun but featureless, muddled, with chestnut eyes that almost disappear beside her skin. The dress she wears is frayed and torn, soiled from a day spent shoveling crap and scrabbling in the dust. Her bone-thin arms are like the weakest, topmost branches of the trees she’s seen sketched by village artists, good for nothing but swaying in the wind. And…

  —she’s got legs that are wobblier than a newborn tug’s—

  —and her chest is flatter than the Cotee Plains.

  I close my eyes, hating Hawk’s words ’cause they’re true.

  When my bleeding time first arrived I was scared, but also excited. Bleeding meant becoming a woman, finally finding my place in the world. But it never really materialized. I didn’t become a woman, just stayed a scrawny girl, the bumps on my chest no more’n mosquito bites, my hips remaining as flat and straight as a pointer shot from a Hunter’s bow. The only thing that identifies me as a girl is my long hair. My reflection shatters when the tears drip off my chin.

  “It doesn’t have to be like this,” a voice says from behind, startling me. I go to turn but then remember my tear-streaked face. Cupping a hand in the water, I splash a bit onto my cheeks and then turn around, rivulets of tear-hiding water streaming down my cheeks, neck, and beneath my dress.

  Lara. With her scalp-short haircut, she looks more like a boy’n ever under the darkening evening sky. Even more like a boy’n me—but at least she looks like a strong boy, her arms tanned and toned, her jaw sticking out a little. Solid—that’s the word for her.