The Earth Dwellers (6 page)

Siena

I
’ve never seen the Glass City ’fore, but now that I have, I wish I hadn’t. ’Cause what chance do we got against people who could build such a thing? Their city next to our measly huts and tents is like comparing a Killer to a burrow mouse. There ain’t no comparison.

A sudden burst of anger rises to my head and I feel even hotter’n I did ’fore the sun went down. “Why won’t you people just leave us alone?” I say. I meant to aim the question at the fathomless glass dome, but for some reason I’m looking right at Adele.

She stares right back at me, her eyebrows heavy in the middle. For the first time I notice how dark her hair is. If her skin weren’t so pale, she might fit right in amongst my people. Strange how something as basic as the color of one’s skin can make two people seem like they’re from different planets. Does it have to be that way? Everywhere I turn it seems like the world is separated by color. Us, the brown Heaters. To the north, the white Icers. To the east, the white, freckled Soakers and the dark-as-night Stormers. No mixing allowed. Maybe that’s why Skye won’t admit to her feelings for Dazz. Seems kinda silly if you ask me.

And yet…yet I feel my cheeks heating as I glare at Adele. White Adele. Pale Adele. Does the way she looks make her the enemy? Her eyes are wide with wonder as she gazes at the dome. Is she faking her amazement at the size and beauty of the city?

“They’re not my people,” Adele says. Sun goddess, how I wanna believe her, but I can’t. Not yet. Not when I could pluck her ’tween my fingers and stick her inside the glass dome and she’d fit right in. She’d look like she’d been there her whole life. And then she’d come out holding a fire stick and riding a fire chariot, killing my people, killing everyone who’s not a Glassy.

I sigh, don’t respond. I’ve got nothing in me but anger.

“My father was a terrible man,” Tristan says, gazing out over the Glass City. “The man inside that dome, the one controlling everything, he might be even worse. President Lecter is the one man who managed to control my father.”

“You want to prove to us that you’re not with them—that you are who you say you are?” Wilde asks.

Adele nods; Tristan says, “Yes.”

“Then tell us how to beat them.”

Chapter Nine

Dazz

“A
be?” I say, because it’s the only question hammering through my mind.
Abe? Abe? Abe?

“Sometimes wealth is power, son,” Abe says, smiling that crooked-toothed smile of his. “Especially if you use a little of it to help rebuild the lowliest District in ice country.”

“Get that monstrosity out of here,” a plump woman from the White District says, looking Hightower up and down. Hightower grunts, but I can’t tell if it’s a burp or if he tried to say something.

“He’s with me,” Abe says.

“Consortium members only,” a man with a curly mustache from the Blue District agrees.

“You’ll have to make him leave, I’m afraid,” Abe says. “And I wouldn’t advise that at all.”

Hightower grunts in agreement.

“He’ll sit in the back and won’t cause any problems,” I find myself saying, as if I’m the one calling the shots.

All heads turn to look at me, which allows Hightower the chance to duck his head slightly and enter, filling a whole corner of the room as he slumps down.

Yo stands as Abe sits with the other reps from the Black District, who go right on slapping their cards down, as if there’s not a crucial meeting happening right in front of them. They deal Abe in as he lights a cigarette, drawing glares from the plump woman and the curly-mustache man. The other six White and Blue District members simply ignore the less wealthy side of the room, as if they’re not even worthy of complaint.

I clear my throat, trying to open a path so my voice will come out sharp and strong. Yo begins. “Fellow consortium members, we’ve taken major steps to rebuild ice country and our way of life since the unexpected yet necessary fall of King Goff. However, it has come to my attention that a greater enemy stands at the foothills of our great country, one we cannot ignore. Thus, I have called you here today to listen to the testimony of the witnesses.” I realize my jaw has fallen, leaving my mouth gaping open. I’ve never heard Yo talk like that. It’s like outside of his pub, he’s a different person.

“What enemy?” a heavyset White District man shouts. I recognize him as the owner of the largest timber yard in the village. He grew up in the Brown District, but found a way out when he founded his business. Of all the White District members, he’s the one who’s most likely to be sympathetic to our message.

“That’s what these boys are here to tell you about,” Yo says, waving a hand at us to begin. He sits.

I stand, very aware that Buff remains seated. “The Glassies,” I say, but before I can continue, a dozen voices start shouting at once:

“
The Glassies are our friends!”

“
We trade with the Glassies!”

“
I never liked the Glassies, kill them!”

“
Who are the Glassies?”

Yo stands again, waving his hands and shouting, trying to quiet the members, while Abe blows a puff of smoke out, half-laughing, half-coughing, as if I’ve just made the funniest joke in the world.

And I just stand there stupidly, wondering where I went wrong. Perhaps I should’ve started at the beginning of the story, instead of the end. Leave it to me to mess up in the opening seconds of one of the biggest moments of my life.

Finally, after much arm-waving and a whole lot of red-faced shouting, Yo, with the help of Hightower and his clenched fists, manages to regain order. I take a deep breath, start again.

This time, I start from the beginning. I tell them about my role in taking down King Goff, about how he kidnapped Jolie, how his men killed Wes, about Skye and Siena and the others from fire country. How we went to water and storm country, what happened there. About the information Wilde brought us. “Now that King Goff has fallen,” I say, “the Glassies are no longer our friends, if they ever were. A friend to a mad king is no friend to us. Simply put, they want to wipe us off the face of the earth.”

When I finish this time, there’s silence. I think it’s partly due to the heaviness of my words and partly because Hightower has inched his way up the side wall, silently daring anyone to speak over me again.

“Uh, any questions?” I say.

Curly Mustache Man raises a tentative hand, glancing nervously at Hightower. “Yes,” I say.

“What do you expect us to do with this information, exactly?”

I raise my eyebrows. Have I been talking to a wall? Did I not make it obvious? We’re under attack, for Heart’s sake! Or maybe he wants specifics, like what is my recommendation to the consortium. “An alliance,” I say. But before I can add “
With the Tri-Tribes
,” the man’s curly mustache twitches as he speaks:

“I couldn’t agree more. An alliance with the Glassies is just the thing we need.”

Chapter Ten

Adele

W
ilde didn’t mean for us to literally tell them how to defeat the earth dwellers, at least not right away. Which is good, because Tristan and I need to talk about it, think about it—talk and think about A LOT of things.

“Follow me,” Wilde says, and we all do, partly because none of us want to look at the beautiful monstrosity that is the Glass City, and mostly because we’re all too tired to argue.

She leads us down the slope and to the right, where a rock formation juts out from the sand. It’s large, roundish on one side with sharp protrusions of rock on the other. We head straight for one of the sheer sides of rock, facing away from the city.

As we approach, Wilde whistles, high and clear, and suddenly the rock ripples, folds, opens up to reveal a dark cave. Not rock, an animal-skin cover, stained to look like rock, almost perfect. A secret cave…but why so close to the enemy? There’s only one answer: spies.

A young head pokes from the opening, brown skinned, dark eyed. A guy. Shirtless, skin pulled tight across his pectorals and biceps. Basically the male version of Skye. Ripped.

“Hawk, you baggard,” Siena says, punching him on the arm.

“How ya doin, Skinny?” the guy answers with a smirk. He straightens up when he sees Wilde. “Uh, Wilde, uh, good to see you.”

“We need food and bedding,” Wilde says, waving us inside.

“Yeah, sure, right away,” Hawk says. He’s about to turn, but then notices Tristan and me. “What the—”

“Hawk—meet the pale-faces,” Skye says, pushing me past him and inside.

~~~

“Hawk’s a durt bag,” Siena says with a smile. Her arm’s around a bald girl who has tattoos winding around her bare arms, legs, and neck. She was introduced as Lara, an old friend of Siena’s. Apparently now a spy.

“A reformed durt bag,” Hawk clarifies. “I was sort of a bully growing up. Until I realized I was an idiot—that I was on the wrong side.”

We’re sitting inside the secret cave, which is quite a bit larger than I expected from the small opening on the outside. Eerie light glows from above us, entering through a largish hole in the roof, which I fully expect is covered with a rock-colored cloth during the day.

My mouth is full of the sort of crunchy, sort of chewy vegetable that Siena called prickler. It’s not half bad, although I’m so hungry I could probably eat raw meat from the Killer carcasses right now. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Tristan chews happily beside me, his knee touching mine. Evidently, the food’s woken
both
of us up a little.

“So yer Glassies?” Hawk asks, handing a plate of prickler salad to Siena.

“Reformed Glassies,” I say around my food. When Skye’s chin lifts and her eyes narrow, I hold up a hand. “I’m kidding. We’re not Glassies.” Skye’s lips part, so I say more forcefully, “We’re not. For the hundredth time, I swear it. On the sun goddess, moon goddess, rock goddess and every other goddess out there.”

“There’s no rock goddess,” Siena whispers.

“Look, let me explain things once and for all…” So I do. I tell them all about the Tri-Realms. The history. How they were dug out and formed before, during, and after Year Zero. The class system. The rebellion. What we learned about the Glass City and the earth dwellers before we came up. Everything leading up to our arrival except for the fact that Tristan has actually been inside the Glass City once before. Somehow I know that won’t help them to trust us.

When I finish, everyone’s plate is clean, and Hawk is dishing out bowlfuls of some kind of soup. Tristan takes the first one, raising an eyebrow in question. “’Zard soup,” Siena says, which means about as much to me as Cotee steaks would’ve before I came face to face with a pack of Cotees. “It’s better warmed up, but it’s too dangerous to light a fire this close to the Glassies.”

I nod and take a sip, feeling something slimy roll over my tongue. When I bite down on it, I find it’s somewhat chewy. I swallow twice, trying to keep it down. It might not be that tasty, but I need the energy.

While everyone’s busily slurp-chewing their soup, Skye looks at me, steel in her eyes. “Why would you help us against the Glassies, if they’re the same kind of people as you?”

Her question takes me by surprise. One, because I’ve never thought of myself as a “kind of people,” and if I did, I would most associate myself with moon dwellers, rather than
all
dwellers; and two, because I’ve been fighting against “my own people,” for so long, I’ve never really had to think about it.

Tristan nods at me. It’s a look he’s given me many times, that says, “I trust you, I believe in you, I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth.” If nothing else, it reassures me.

“I fight on the side of life,” I say. “For those who are being treated unfairly, against those who would seek to oppress others just because they can. We didn’t come to the earth’s surface to fight the Glassies. No, we came because we were curious, and because we wanted to give our people the same chance to live above as anyone else. Living in the dark, under mountains of rock, choked by dust, always hungry—that’s no kind of life. Not for anyone. We might’ve won the battle against Tristan’s father, but a war still rages below us, and our people are fighting for their lives just like yours. And at the center of it all is President Lecter and the Glassies. So maybe we’re not so different. Maybe we’re on the same side, after all. Does that make any sense?”

Although I’m looking from face to face as I speak, out of the corner of my eye I can tell Skye’s eyes never leave mine, never blink. When I finish, she says, “I understand what you mean more’n you could possibly know.”

Then she stands and pushes through the fake-rock flap and into the night.