Saviours of Oestend Oestend 2 (17 page)

* * * *

The wind was unbelievable, like nothing Simon had ever seen. It roared around the ranch with a wild destruction that seemed too brutal to be natural. When Frances finally unlocked the barracks door and opened it, the wind blasted into the small building. It ripped the door from Frances’ hand, banging it loudly against the outside wall. The door tore free from its hinges with a deafening shriek. Simon and the other men stood and stared in wonder as it tumbled across the prairie, looking as insubstantial as a leaf.

“Holy Saints,” Frances said. “Gonna have to fix that by nightfall.”

They had to duck their heads and lean into the wind just to get to the main house for breakfast. The door to the kitchen opened the opposite way from the one on the barracks, so it couldn’t be torn from its hinges, but they had to fight to open it, and when they let it go, the wind banged it shut behind them.

As they ate, the wind grew worse. The kitchen was silent except for its roar and Cami’s quiet humming. In his years in Oestend, Simon had seen hellacious wind, but this was surreal.

The ranch hands fought to do their chores that day. There was no point in taking feed out to the fields. The wind would blow it off the wagon before they made it to where the cows huddled in the sheltering trees on the far side of the pasture. They went around the ranch, securing doors and gates. Three of the men tried to fix the door to the barracks, only to have it ripped off the hinges a second time.

By the time they were eating supper, the storm had reached an all-new level of fury. It was deafening. Dante came downstairs, concern obvious on his face. He went to Cami, who stood at the counter. He put his hand on the small of her back and leant down to say something in her ear. She smiled up at him.

Simon felt himself blush. He looked down at his supper. He wasn’t sure when they’d become lovers, but it was obvious now that they were. No wonder they’d both seemed happy despite the fact that Brighton was coming down around their ears.

Crack!

The noise was so loud, Simon jumped. The other men looked up from their plates, faces pale and eyes wide with fear.
Crrrrrack!
The second one was loud as the first. And then a series of them, like gun shots, one right after the other. Simon felt the sounds in his bones, each one harsher than the last. The reverberations seemed to echo in his mind, tingling along his thinly-stretched nerves.
The men jumped up from the table and ran—some to the door, some to the living room to gather around the one window. Simon followed Dante out the door just in time to see the last fence post of the wooden corral snap at its base. The wind lifted the entire fence, yanking it free from the side of the barn, and it flew high into the air like one of the kites Simon had owned as a boy back in Lanstead.
“Mother fuck,” Dante swore as it disappeared across the prairie. “It’s like a twister, except there’s no clouds.”
A twister. Simon had seen a couple of them over the years, but only from a distance. Still, the description seemed apt. As they watched, the weather vane tore from the roof of the barn.
The wind gusted stronger. Two more noises boomed from the direction of the barn, similar to the sound of the snapping fence posts, but twice as loud. It was the logs that supported the giant sign over the gate to Brighton. Simon watched in awe as the wood plank fell to the ground and the wind dragged it like a sled across the ground.
Frances came out the front door, and the three men huddled together against the side of the house. “Never going to get that door fixed tonight,” Frances yelled above the racket of the wind.
Dante nodded. “Tell the men—”
Whatever he was going to say was lost in a shriek of metal and wood. The ground quaked. Simon knew they should get inside, but he wasn’t sure they time. He grabbed Frances and pulled him close, thinking to protect him, although he didn’t yet know what the threat was.
Another loud groan that Simon felt in his gut more than heard.
“Holy shit!” Dante yelled. He pointed.
Simon and Frances both followed his gesture, and Simon’s jaw dropped open.
Dante was pointing to the giant windmill, situated between the house and the barracks. One blade was gone, and it spun erratically, in bursts and stops, but that wasn’t what made Simon’s heart begin to pound with fear.
The entire windmill was leaning.
Another gust hit it, and it shook. The ground bucked under Simon’s feet.
“We should get inside!” Simon yelled.
He wasn’t sure if the other men heard him or not. Neither moved. One more gust. One more screech of metal and wood. With a slowness that seemed unreal, the windmill toppled.
A blade hit the ground first. It snapped in half and was whipped away by the wind. Then the body of the beast slammed to the ground. Simon instinctively turned his back, huddling around Frances to protect them both from flying wood. Debris pelted his back. The crash was deafening. The ground shook, and for one second, Simon was sure the house would come down too.
And then…
Utter silence.
In the blink of an eye, the wind was gone.
Simon took a breath, then another.
“I can’t breathe,” Frances said, and Simon realised he was still holding the boy tucked against his body, squeezing him as if the tightness of his grip would somehow keep him safe.
He laughed nervously and let Frances go. Next to him, Dante began to curse.
Simon finally turned to survey the damage.
The windmill was no longer recognisable as such. It was nothing but a rat’s nest of metal and wood, stretching from the wrecked base across the compound to the barracks.
Or rather, to where the barracks had been.
The building was demolished. Only the back wall, near the privies, still stood.
“Well,” Frances said quietly, “at least we don’t have to fix the door.”

Chapter Seventeen

There was no way Dante could justify staying at Brighton another day. The rest of the evening was spent in preparation—salvaging what they could from the barracks, loading the wagon, rounding up some of the cattle, opening the gates between the pastures so the ones being left behind had room to roam. After that, the only thing they could do was wait for morning.

The windmill had fallen, but the generator was still intact. Dante didn’t even consider relying on reserves for the night. He filled it with coal and prayed to both the Saints and Olsa’s ancestors that they’d last until morning.

The tension in the house was horrible. With Dante and Cami both now using her room each night, there were enough beds in the house for the men to each have one, as long as they didn’t mind doubling up, and yet none of them seemed inclined to leave the warmth of the living room. Dante wondered if any of them would sleep.

“Tell us a story,” he said to Cami.

She blushed, looking at the men, who were all suddenly attentive. “They’re children’s stories.”
Dante looked at his ranch hands. Some of them weren’t much more than boys. Most of them hadn’t led his life, hidden away in the barren reaches of the prairie. They’d probably grown up hearing the stories. He began to feel foolish for having brought them up, but then one of the hands said, “How about Rider and the giant?”
“I haven’t heard that since I was a boy,” Simon said.
Frances smiled over at him. “Then it’s time you heard it again.”
So Cami told the story, and the men sat enraptured, as if they really were all boys again. As if magic really existed and giants could be slain by men.
“The way my mom told it, the giant fell to earth and became the mountains,” Frances said when it was over. “And the people of Rider’s village made a fortress in his bones.”
“No,” another said. “He turned to smoke and became the clouds, and the rain made the forests grow. They used the trees to make the fortress.”
It irked Dante that they’d argue with Cami’s story. He wanted to tell them they could go to the wraiths if they were going to be ungrateful like that, but then he caught Cami smiling over at him. She seemed to know what he was thinking, too. “It’s like I told you,” she said. “The stories were always there, but sometimes they change.”

* * * *

Dante and his men rolled into the BarChi two days later, the dogs and the hands driving a herd of cattle in front of them. Tama and his father came out immediately, and Dante began trying to explain what had happened, telling himself the entire time it didn’t make him a failure. He was glad Deacon was out in the field. It made it easier.

Alissa and Aren were the next to greet them, although they both ignored Dante and went straight to Cami. It annoyed him. Both of them were smiling at her, touching her, flirting with her. He thought he was over his jealousy of Aren, but watching him with Cami brought it all back in a hurry.

Tama helped him carry his things to his old room. “I’ll get the boys’ room ready for Cami.”
“Don’t bother.”
She turned to look at him with obvious confusion. “What do you mean?”
“Well…” Dante felt himself blushing under her sudden scrutiny. “I mean, she won’t be in the boys’ room. She’ll be in here with me.”
“Sharing a bed with you?”
“Yes.”
“But, she’s a woman.”
Seeing her bewilderment, Dante found himself at a loss for words. He hadn’t thought ahead to this moment. Of course Tama was confused. She knew he’d never been attracted to women, and yet here he was, taking one into his bed. Of course, Cami wasn’t like other women, but Dante couldn’t tell Tama that. It wasn’t his secret to share. He’d have to lie to Tama, except he knew once Tama found out, she’d feel betrayed. They were friends, after all.
“Dante?” she prodded.
“Uh…” He stumbled for something to say. “It just happened.”
“
What
just happened? Sex? Or are you telling me you’re in love with her?” “Both, I guess.”
She was torn, he could tell, part of her wanting to be happy for him, but the other part of her fearing he was lying to himself, and lying to Cami.
“Does she know?” she asked.
He wasn’t sure exactly what she meant, but it didn’t matter. “I don’t have any secrets from her.”
Tama sighed as she turned to leave. “It’s going to break Alissa’s heart.”
Tama wasn’t wrong. It did indeed seem to break Alissa’s heart. The next day, the girl’s eyes were red and swollen. She did her best to avoid both Dante and Cami. Dante felt bad about it, and yet, what could he do? Cami didn’t want Alissa, even if Dante hadn’t been in the picture.
There was one person who took the news of Dante’s new relationship well—Dante’s father Jeremiah. “I’m glad to finally see you happy,” Jeremiah said, patting Dante on the back. After that, he didn’t say another word about it, but he seemed to immediately take Cami in as part of the family, joking with her and treating her with the same easy affection he showed all of his daughters-in-law. Dante loved him for his ready acceptance of her.
The next morning, after the hands had eaten and left to do their chores, Dante found Cami alone in the kitchen. She was wearing a pair of wide-legged women’s trousers. To the others, it probably meant nothing, but to him, it accentuated the fact that she was male and female both. The narrow angle of her hips and the soft curve of her backside fascinated him. He wrapped his arms around her waist from behind and buried his face in her thick black hair. “We should go upstairs,” he whispered.
She shook her head. “I have work to do.”
“This isn’t your kitchen. Let the others do it.”
“I want to help. I don’t want to be a burden.”
He kissed her neck and as he did, he slid his hand down her stomach. He caressed her groin, letting his fingers play over what was hidden there. She wore a wrap under her clothes to minimise the bulge, and Dante found it unbelievably enticing. “Please?” he whispered.
Cami laughed, although he could tell by the breathless sound that his touch was getting to her. He didn’t hear Olsa enter. It wasn’t until Cami went stiff in his arms that he noticed the old lady shuffling in.
“Don’t be afraid of me, Scia’loh. I’m not your enemy.”
Cami’s cheeks turned red, but she didn’t answer.
“Don’t you feel silly for having worried so much about him knowing? It was all for nothing. He knows your secret now, and he loves you for it.”
Cami blushed more. She glanced down at where her hands rested on the counter. Dante noticed how they shook. “How did you know?”
“Because I’m Ainuai. My people knew many things. They were smarter than those pale fools from the continent. We made them feel stupid. That’s why they wiped us out. But that’s not the history you learned in your schools back east, is it, Scia’loh?”
Cami ignored her question and asked one of her own. “What is that word you call me?”
“Scia’loh? It’s hard to explain. Your language uses its words on all the wrong things. In my language, there’s
leh
for ‘he’. And there’s
lah
, that means ‘she’. And there’s
loh
, for the others. The ones like you.” She waved her hand in Cami’s direction. “For the scia’loh.”
Cami’s eyes went wide. She took a step towards Olsa, watching her with a rapt expression that might have been horror or might have been love. “What does it mean?”
“You don’t have a word. It means man-girl. Or she-he. It means one who’s neither. Or it can be one who’s both. Or one who’s in between. It is one who’s other than leh or lah.”
Cami turned to Dante, looking for an explanation, but he had none to give. All he could do was shrug. “Olsa?” she said, turning back to the old woman. Her voice shook. “There’s truly a word for what I am?”
“Of course there is!”
“But…” Cami’s voice caught, and she stopped, covering her mouth with one hand. “I don’t understand,” she whispered.
Olsa made a vague gesture with her gnarled hands, as if the answer were clear. “Continent people want to make everything sets of two—black and white, man and woman, earth and sky, right and wrong. They’re blind to the world in between. But not the Ainuai. We know all things are connected, blending one into the other, all part of a whole. Between black and white are all the shades of the rainbow. Between earth and sky there’s wind and rain and clouds and wraiths. Between right and wrong there are a hundred in betweens.” She reached out and took Cami’s hand. She stared at her with her strange, sightless eyes. “Between man and woman is you, Scia’loh. You are what you were meant to be.”
Cami’s breath hitched. She looked over at Dante, her eyes brimming with tears. There seemed to be a hundred emotions in her eyes—fear, and relief, and hope. ‘
Is it true?’
she seemed to be asking. ‘
Could it really be?’
He brushed her hair from her eyes. “Makes perfect sense to me.”
She covered her face with her hands, and Dante pulled her into his arms. She was quiet, but her shoulders shook from the force of her tears. He rocked her and stroked her hair as she cried. It wasn’t grief behind her tears. It was relief, and a lifetime of doubt and shame. It was knowing she’d found a home. Dante wasn’t sure he’d ever appreciated Olsa the way he did at that moment. She’d given Cami the one thing nobody else in the world had been able to give her. He glanced at the old woman over Cami’s head.
“Thank you,” he said.
She waved her hand at him in dismissal. “Bah! Don’t thank me. I still think you’re a horse’s ass.”