The Country of Ice Cream Star (44 page)

Then my spirit catch in teeth. I hold in perilous thought.

El Mayor been obvious choices for the Massa search. I send him, I be sending my best eyes. Child smart as books.

But sure, if Anselm want to rid him, El Mayor be rid entire. He go to Massa, far from tattling eyes, and shot like meat. Could ask him neverless, with proper warning of his risk – but when I think of doing this, my heart go false. Cannot. Nor I be brave to tell him on
the enfant, how it murdern. Gone vally to my death, but I be weak to say no hurt.

I step back superstitious from this door. Go on, with sad excuses in my mind.

I come next to the sofa room, without no clear intention. Room empty of no people, but its doors be open to the outside porch. A knifen breeze come in. Yo, through the glassen doors, can see a child outside, is bigly made.

He show in profile, and the glitter sun confuse his face. But his hair be croppen like a Sengle’s, rough correct. I step to the doorway gratty, drawing breath for Driver’s name.

Then he startle to me, and is Crow.

He wearing Mariano clothes – a churching suit of perfect black – but all his skin look tired from weather. Eyes be red like hurt. Yo, he wear the marks of godscars in his cheeks, still purplish raw. And I recall Karim. How his hands guard to his face, want desperate to save himself. I see Crow’s godscars like an injury left by this bad killing.

Almost, I turn away. But Crow’s hurt eyes catch to my guilt. And I step out to the fearing cold. Watch Crow’s deep-known face, the unchin jaw and lashy eyes. And Crow be watching with no comfort, stare like I be no one.

I say soft, ‘Salue, my Crow.’

‘Salue.’ He duck his head in nerves.

‘Be sorry for your feathers. How … they shot.’

He shrug like this be stupid mentions. ‘You save me, I guess.’

‘Ya, and I be gratty for that leaf you sent. Your warning.’

He grit closer now. His face look mostly like denials, like he going to say it been no leaf. But he say, ‘Ain’t guess you want no warning.’

‘How I ain’t?’

‘Thought you come to Mamadou yourself.’

Go guilty in my heart, but I say quick, ‘Nay, why I go to him?’

Crow laugh undervoice. ‘You be his queen. Ain’t remember to you?’

‘He keeping that?’

‘Yo sho, he keep it.’ Crow laugh pitchy, rub his mouth. ‘Got some resentment, I ain’t know.’

‘Ain’t chase us all that way for this, I hope.’

Crow’s laughter pass like it ain’t been. He look back to the raily edge. ‘Nay. Ain’t for this.’

I follow his eyes out to the tower buildings, a jaggen crowd of gray. By sunlight, can see they ill bekept. Windows mostly gone, is moss along their stain concree.

At last I say unhappy, ‘Mamadou told they others, how I be his queen? Told Driver?’

To this, Crow’s eyes disgust. ‘Nay, he ain’t talking much, himself. Can keep your prettieuse lies.’

‘Lies? Nay, what this going to mean?’

‘Be all you caring for, that Ice Cream keep in admiration.’

I startle ugly. ‘What this be? Nay, how you always be so vicious?’

‘Only be saying how you do. Is how you be, but you ain’t never seeing, Ice Cream God.’

‘God? You lost your final brains?’

‘You god here, what I heard. Heard all this story. How you save the roo.’

‘Truth, ain’t kill him. And I save yourself. And so?’

Crow turn outrage eyes to me. ‘How he precieuse? He killing us. He kill us glad.’

I take a ragged breath. ‘Karim, you meaning?’

‘Yo sho.’ His face go twisten. ‘I kill your roo. Want only chances.’

‘Roo come to save my life at Army camp. Ain’t been–’

‘And what you come there for? Shee, save your life! No person murder you!’

‘I been there for the Christings, damn! And Deema trying – nay, you wrong. You wrong.’

‘But why Karim must die for this?’ Crow raise a sudden fist. ‘Roo kilt him why?’

‘Ain’t Pasha–’ Then I catch my voice. Brace in the freezing wind,
and Crow’s eyes fix on me, is agonies. And it realize, he ain’t know I ask for Karim his death. Know nothing.

I say, with falseness burning in my chest, ‘Pasha, he had no time to think. Was seconds.’

‘But why the roo be living still?’ Crow’s voice break high. ‘Why he ain’t dead?’

‘Damn, he ain’t known! He seen me hurt, and shoot. Ain’t be his blame!’

Crow stare through a breath of rage. Then he say rough, ‘Ain’t going to kill your roo, ain’t fear. Keep all your filthen males, you safe.’

‘My males? Goddamn–’

‘I wish I never send that leaf! Shee for yourself! You poison!’

‘And what that leaf been even for? If they ain’t come to steal me?’

‘Mamadou going to steal you! Shee!’

‘You said, the Armies ain’t been there for me. You only said!’

Crow open his mouth, but bite down on his words. He look back to the city. ‘We coming … ain’t for that. But Mamadou thinking, if he get you, you will speak for him.’

‘Speak for him?’

‘Ya. Be yourself, he thought they others heed.’

‘What I will speak?’

Crow frown, his eyes gone blank. Raise one hand toward his face, like seeking to take some troubling thought away from there. Say with scarcely breath, ‘Ask them to war.’

‘War?’

Crow start to speak, but then his face go wrong. He breathe out hard.

A coldness inkle in my heart. ‘To roos? He warring to the roos?’

Crow nod and gesture with one hand, like waving at some knowledge. Eyes spark in sudden tears.

‘Crow, what been? Why – what the roos done?’

‘We the only people left,’ Crow say in strangle voice. ‘What they done. Roos kill them all.’

Then he begin his story, on this lofty edge of nothing, where dead towers watch their broken eyes. Wind suffer in my flesh and beat my braids against my naked shoulders, while Crow tell the final memories from our Massa woods.

45

THE ROOS IN MASSA WOODS

‘That Deema told what going to be.’ So Crow begin his tale. ‘Always been telling, if we hurt him, roos kill us with every torture. He
love
to tell us stories, what they do. So, how he dead … ain’t nothing change to eyes. But every person known.

‘What Mamadou want, we hide. Ain’t wait in camp like easy bait. But half they feathers never heed. OldKing Hak, ya any person close to him, ain’t heed. How they saying, Mamadou turn coward since he shot. They choose a different NewKing, call him digger, worm, all that.

‘Can know, they people dead. They all be dead.’

Been seven feathers, ya and Crow, who leave with Mamadou. Go with vindictions from their people, go with only carrying goods, and stash themself into an evac in the wrecks of Lowell City. Building be six floors of decay walls and unglass windows. Been left by even mice and birds, its only life be rot. In this unlucky home, they make a camp with sheepskin rugs. Set their carven gods around, and blacken the mouldy ceilings with the fire of sacrifice.

Then all they do, they scout for roos. Go seek the woods, the broken city; haunt the ash of Tophet gone. Creep superstitious by Lowell mill, that lost its noisy hundreds. Lectricity dark, its turbines hush – but on the walls be always dozen children waring out with
guns. Worst strangeness, these be often Christwives. Yo, how the feathers learn, these wives will shoot at any moving life.

Crow tell me: ‘We been in this evac, I ain’t know. Two weeks. Nay, I ain’t knowing days. Time it finish, all they feathers do, they booze and fight. Beat myself, you know that. And Mamadou healing, but he changen. Ain’t want no one talking to him. Always staring like he hate. But how it been, you only seen him, and you known he going to live. Who stay by him, can live.

‘Yo, all that hunting that we do, we never seen the roos. Seen nothing till the plane.’

Time the plane appear, been middy meal. The NewKing’s feathers sitting to a corny stew. They telling dreams, like Armies do, and gray Yusuf make joking prophecies from these stories. Day risen clean, the buildings all be fuzzy bright with sun.

First knowledge been a deafen scouring. It grow impossible, be loud like nothing that belong in life. Noise tremble in the walls, ring in their skulls, buzz wrong in flesh. Feathers go sprinting to the windows, screaming fear unheard. Expect to see the sky torn end to end, a hell of lightnings. But all been blue and simple, while the noise grow past no bearing. Be like some invisible monster crush the world entire.

When they spy the rooish plane, it seem a petty detail. Ain’t even move its wings. Is still. Fly like an object thrown, and cannot feel how all the noise come from its posing tininess.

It go as quick as bats, and score the blue with whitish smoke. And it come around, bring its goliath noise again. When it fly toward the Armies, they all duck, go flailing down. But when the sound retreat, they rise. Lean out again with showing courage. Musa fire his pistol at it, but be stupid helplessness, like shooting at a cloud.

Then in the farther city, rise a trembling light against the day. A deeper thunder follow, shuddering in the planken floor. Yo, when the plane pass round again, can notice petty sheddings falling underneath its body, like it drop its shee below. Brightness waken from
this shee, that thunder loosen out. And they understand, is bombs. Stuff from fable histories, is happening now in sight.

Ya, as they comprehend, the plane turn off, like losing interest. Some time its noise go weaker, before the hush close sudden in.

On the bland horizon, is left a leaning trunk of smoke. Keep sturdy white, and spread its haze into the morning clear. Ain’t no sound from this. Can only hear the normal flies that bother their forgotten meal.

‘So all they fools talk big, you know how. Want to join the roos again, like they each getting planes from this. Sure, no one going to say they frighten. Bombs been
wolfen. Cool
. The other feathers left in camp,
they
frighten. Shee they going to talk.

‘Then Mamadou tell them to go scout. Wish you seen, how they change. They pissing terrify. Run off, but I ain’t guess they scouting much. Hiding, be more like.

‘Yo, Mamadou send me separate with Malik to find the bombing place. Ain’t lying – if Malik ain’t been, I gone to hide myself. Keep thinking, bomb been poison. Ain’t want to breathe.

‘So anyone known, this been the mill. There in the city, ain’t be nothing else. So we gone there.’

Been twenty minutes walking, and they pass this in a boding silence. Both be walking jittery, checking to the sky for planes. Yo, as they come, the air go thick. Be stinging dust that blow about, must squint to almost blindness. It got a teasing warm, that fickle and vanish in the wind. A weirdo pue begin, is teary sharp like onion smell, as they come to the mill canal.

The mill be gone. Where it risen tall and large, is smoke and empty sky.

This goneness take them both in spooking. Be a moment, Crow decide this ain’t the place, they stray somewhere. But the water recognize, glut with dust and rubble as it be. Ya, in changes of the breeze, Crow see a piece of house wall left, a set of broken windows. In one, is curtains moving, dabble across the jaggen shapes of glass.
Fire freak bright among. In the water, be mounds of brick, with splinter wood stuck out in points. By one of these, a yellow shirten shape float in the cloudy water. Crow cannot tell if this be someone drown or only empty clothes.

Beyond this, cannot see no people. Be no crying voice. Can only hear the trampling noise of fire, its crackle. Their own short breath.

Without no word, they start to skirt the mill upwind. Come past a city building that been hit, its upper part collapse. Here the air be dull with smoke, must pull shirts over mouths. Then, along the mill side, can see the wreck of easter gate. Its bridge be broken off halfway, precarious in air.

On this bridgen edge stand small First Runner. Her face be sparkling blood.

Malik see his sister, and he yell. Go sprinting, leaping wreckage. Come to the gate and scramble up its ruin. Some bricks kick out from underfoot, and he slip clumsy as First Runner turn and run to him. He catch her in his arms, and as he lift her, she begin to wail. Crow stop below and stare up with no notion what he do. Is only scary from this wail. He want to run away and never learn no farther knowledge.

Then Malik turn back, skid down an avalanche of brick. As he release First Runner down, Crow see the scarlet glittering spread across her cheek. Is blood and glass. All her clothes be wet and various red with blood and brick dust.

Then she start telling, loud and strange, be people in this ruin. They all was screaming. She try to swim across, but it be burning still. Been too hot. Water itself been hot. She talk on, garbling, how it been some roos, she watch these from a window by. Been fifty roos, ain’t guess how many. Lowell guards fire shots at them, been shooting backen forth. But these roos run off, is gone. Then come the plane, the bombs, she been thrown down.

And she begin again to say, how people be in there. Must help them, but it still be burning. She say these contradictions, until Crow shout at her in nerves. Then First Runner hush, touch to her bloody
face in puzzle. Ain’t seem to even notice when Malik grip to her hand.

Malik say soft, ‘They kilt, my sister.’

‘I know,’ First Runner say with fixen stare. ‘We got to help them.’

But when they turn away, First Runner come without no cavil. Start to pick glass from her face as they pass to the normal day, where all the buildings whole and stupid-looking with their blank unhurt.

When they come back to their evac, it be no one there. Malik clean down First Runner’s cuts, using his knife to pick some deeper splinters from her skin. She hold careful without tears. Only shut her eyes sometimes, take breath. Ya, Crow gone standing to the window, watch the smoke from Lowell mill, when steps sound on the stairs.

Mamadou come in alone. Is wrapping his arm back to himself, been washing it below. His face be tired from pain, and he look to First Runner cold with no surprise.

Malik explain, this be his sister. Say how the mill be gone, and he repeat First Runner’s sayings, how she seen the roos, been shooting. How they all was screaming. Crow add nervy in, ‘It been no voices when we come.’