Whisperworld
Chapter 11
The Whitefingers fed us. Literally, since our hands remained tied awkwardly behind us. The roasted fence lizards were familiar, but their soup was strange — salty and tangy and full of green strips of a plant I didn’t recognize. It left an odd taste in my mouth long after I had swallowed.
“What is it?” Zach asked skeptically.
“Fish broth and seaweed,” said the Whitefinger crouched in front of us.
“What and what?” I asked.
The man just shook his head and offered me another spoonful of soup. I glanced over at Kiyu. She was next to the fire again, talking to Jacks. Probably getting filled in on the discussion she had missed. I got the feeling that Jacks and his group were a bit like Zach and me right now, operating alone for the moment and making their own decisions. They would eventually report back to someone important, though. That was always how it worked… The important people didn’t do field work. They stayed safe in their offices and sent other people to die.
I considered asking our Whitefinger server to switch out for Kiyu. Being spoon-fed by a beautiful girl sounded like a lot more fun, but even I knew how stupid an idea that was. The soup wasn’t so bad that I wanted to eat someone’s boot instead. I try to save my stupid remarks for the really important stuff, thanks.
The Whitefingers arranged their mats near us and the smaller fire pit, but far enough away to remain outside our striking range. They lit the second fire and then smothered it down to coals to keep the basement warm without choking us all with smoke. Zach eyed the wastelanders cautiously, but Jacks ordered a rotation of watches and even with his eyes closed, Diesel kept one ear cocked toward us throughout the night.
Having already been unconscious for several hours — to say nothing of being bound in the semi-darkness and surrounded by people that my mother repeatedly warned me ate children — I didn’t exactly fall right asleep. I lay uncomfortably on my side, listening to the hiss of breath all around me. Zach was still awake too, I was certain.
I tried not to wonder if Kiyu was asleep yet or when it would be her turn at watch. The short, dark-eyed wastelander girl was beautiful. I could admit that. But she did kill three people, even if it was an accident. And she was a thief. She stole Gardener Byron’s key and tried to break into a place that even eternally questioning and back-talking Julia Reed felt was sacrosanct. And Kiyu had stolen all those baubles in her little pouch, too. I wondered why she kept them. Because they were pretty? It was stupid, childish.
Kiyu really had an amazing smile… But she also hit me on the head. No pretty smile or lovely eyes could make up for the huge welt on my temple, right?
Right.
Best to start thinking about what the hell we were going to tell Gregory. He wouldn’t believe any of this. At least Zach would back me up. He would never lie and was too smart to totally ignore what Jacks had told us. Zach might not like it — and I doubted that he had noticed how beautiful Kiyu was — but the Whitefingers’ story lined up with the one Liam told and everything Gardener Matthew said about Bridge City.
I tried to imagine a way to recount this story without sounding crazy, but by the time I fell asleep, it still sounded like a dream.
I was woken by a warm, wet tongue stroking my ear. I groaned and reached out, but my hand lurched to a sudden and painful stop behind me, finally jerking me fully awake. Diesel looked down at me, then gave my ear a sniff and another quick lick. My face burned and it wasn’t because of the mutant dog’s drool.
“Diesel, stop that,” Jacks said. The dog barked once and then did his strange five-legged scamper back to his master.
The Whitefingers were all awake and getting ready to leave. The fire pits were extinguished, their mats rolled up and laid against the wall. Our captors wound their faces in long cloths and cinched cloaks around their shoulders. One of them gave his metal spear a sharp twist and it came apart in the middle. Carefully, he blew sand out of the threads and then screwed the pieces back together. So that was how Kiyu had concealed her spear in Angel City.
The tall Whitefinger who had tended our injuries yesterday walked over to me and Zach. “Time to go. Get up.”
He had to help me stand. Being upright sent the blood draining suddenly from my head and I grew dizzy. When it came surging back to my brain, the knot on my temple throbbed. I took a few deep breaths until I felt slightly steadier on my feet.
Zach was doing better and showed no sign of my wobbliness. He tensed, shifting his feet a little wider. I knew he was contemplating jumping the Whitefinger. Even with his hands tied, Zach was a good fighter and I had no doubts that he could kill a man with his feet alone. But there were five of them and a dog. They were armed and one of them was still a dreameater. A yang, which Kiyu said meant she could scoop up the rubble and stone us to death without getting her nice nails dirty.
I widened my stance, too, just in case Zach went for it. I thought it was a bad idea, but he was my partner and you always back your partner’s play. Thankfully, Zach seemed to decide that since they were returning us to the Whisperward anyway, escape wasn’t necessary. Instead, he only cleared his throat and coughed. The Whitefinger gave us some water from our own canteens and then circled around behind us.
“We can’t let you know where our hiding holes are,” he said almost apologetically.
With that, he pulled a bag over my head and I heard Zach grunt as the same happened to him. A hand took my arm in a firm grasp. It felt small enough to belong to Kiyu… or was that just wishful thinking? Whoever it was, I let them lead me out of the buried building.
The Whitefingers didn’t remove the bags from our heads after climbing up the sloping tunnel of their basement outpost. Zach and I stumbled over invisible stones and our feet dragged through the sand. I felt hot sunlight against the back of my neck, but could see nothing. We had to trust that the Whitefingers knew what they were doing and wouldn’t accidentally drop us down any holes not of their own making. Someone always held on to us, but we made slow, painstaking progress.
There wasn’t much conversation. I didn’t know if the Whitefingers were usually silent when they roamed the Pacific Desert or if it was just because of us. The only time anyone spoke was a few hours out, when Diesel barked out a harsh warning. It was followed by a noise like pebbles skittering down a hole, the unmistakable rattle of a snake. It sounded big.
“Quiet,” Jacks ordered. Diesel stopped barking, but I could still hear the mutant dog growling deep in his throat.
“Don’t run,” whispered someone in front of me.
“Slowly,” Jacks said.
Kiyu tugged my arm, moving me backward. I took cautious steps in the direction she pulled, but with the sack over my head, I was blind. My heel hit a rock and I stumbled. The snake hissed and rattled again, sounding more like tumbling stones than pebbles this time. Yeah, that was definitely a big one.
“Kiyu?” Jacks asked.
“I’ve got it,” she said. “Back me up.”
She released my arm and another hand quickly replaced hers. My new escort held me tightly, but I didn’t complain. They would be my only defense if the snake struck.
I strained to listen, trying to see with my ears, and heard Kiyu’s light footsteps move forward, closer to the snake. Sand ground beneath its scales as the huge beast shifted. Then there was a loud, heavy-sounding thump that I could make little sense of. I heard running feet and the snake hissed savagely, then its tail rattled as it thrashed.
The air tasted of dust and my own sweat. I heard grunting and heavy breathing, and then the unmistakable sound of sharp things piercing softer ones.
“Hold it,” someone grunted, the only words spoken during the entire battle.
My captor’s hand tensed on my arm, but didn’t jerk me away or release his grip, so I guessed that Kiyu and the others had killed the snake.
“Peter, Ahmet,” Jacks said. “Once that beast finishes squirming, check it over. If it’s tainted, catch up with us. If there’s anything good, take it back down the hole.”
“Come on,” Kiyu told me.
Her small hand replaced the larger one on my arm once more. I wanted to ask her what had happened, but then we were moving again and I was too busy concentrating on my footing to talk.
“This is close enough,” Jacks said.
As best I could guess, about five hours had passed since we set out. Someone yanked the bag off my head and I had to blink a lot to adjust to the sudden light. Where the hell were my goggles?
Kiyu picked at the knotted rope around my wrists for a moment and then my hands were free. I gasped as my arms finally came under my own power once more and rolled my aching shoulders in slow circles. The joints burned. Zach rubbed his wrists and glared at the Whitefingers. The one who untied his bonds was backing swiftly toward Jacks with one hand on the spear jutting from under his cloak.
The burn-scarred Whitefinger leader held a tangle of straps and gear in each hand. He threw it all toward us and our belts, canteens, goggles and bandanas thumped into the sand at our feet, but Jacks had gotten the two jumbles of equipment mixed up. I handed Zach’s stuff over to him and took mine. But our knives and crossbows were gone.
“What about our weapons?” Zach asked.
“Sorry,” Jacks answered curtly. “We can’t trust you. You’re still dangerous.”
But the Whitefinger did toss back Zach’s hat. My partner caught it out of the air and frowned suspiciously before brushing the dust off the wide black brim and settling it down over his head again.
“There’s your Whisperward,” Jacks said. “And take a look at the storm line.”
He pointed over our shoulders and I turned to find myself at the edge of the ancient city. I squinted. Was Jacks right? The border between the ruins and the Whisperward’s protection looked blurred, like the storm damage was closer to the walls than before. Beyond them were the tall, lumpy city walls and then the more orderly buildings of my home.
The Stormsphere rose up over it all, still utterly smooth and polished black. It was hard to believe that anything could harm that obsidian immensity, but…
When I turned back, the Whitefingers were already fading away into the dusty haze once more. One of them — the smallest one, if my imagination wasn’t just trying to give me fodder for fantasy — stopped and looked back over her shoulder at us for a moment. But then they were gone. Within hours, even their tracks would be only memories.
“I don’t trust them, Julia,” Zach said.
We watched the ruins where the Whitefingers had disappeared and then turned toward Angel City. I took a long drink from my canteen. My mouth still tasted like dust.
“Specifically or on general principle?” I asked.
“Both,” Zach said. “Specifically, why not talk to the Gardeners themselves?”
“Zee, our job is to kill them. On sight. We don’t exactly give Whitefingers the chance to talk.”
I didn’t really want to think about that too much. It made even the heroic parts of being a Blackthumb feel like birth control duty.
“I suppose not,” Zach admitted. “But there’s something else going on here.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. But what I didn’t say was that I was starting to think it was happening on our side of the wall. “That storm last night looks like it came closer to the city than before.”
“Let’s get moving,” Zach said.
We did, breaking into a trot as we neared the city gates. I waved up to the Blackthumbs on the wall with actual enthusiasm. After a day away from the Whisperward, I would even have hugged Woods if he would open the gates for us.
“Who’s there?” someone shouted from on top of the wall.
“It’s us, damn it!” I shouted back.
“Zachary Dias and Julia Reed,” Zach supplied more helpfully.
“We thought you were dead!” called out the man on the wall. “There was a storm.”
“Then let us in and plant us in the orchard already,” I shouted. “I’m about ready to start pissing sand out here!”
The city gates ground slowly open. I didn’t recognize the Blackthumb who greeted us, but as I may have mentioned, I wasn’t very popular among the Greenguard. I didn’t have a lot of friends, but I was about ready to kiss the ground when we hurried through into the city.
“It’s the middle of the day,” Zach said as the gates began to swing closed behind us. “Why were the gates closed?”
“No new refugees today,” answered a tall woman in olive drab.
The urge to make out with Angel City passed. We had chased Kiyu through dozens of refugees coming in the day before. Zach and I traded an unhappy look. There should have been more of them today. But the storm…
There would be other refugees, I reminded myself. Yesterday’s storm couldn’t have killed them all. Before long, even more new people would be piling into the Whisperward.
The other Greenguard didn’t linger to talk to us. There may not have been any refugees outside the gate that morning, but there were still plenty inside, piling up in the streets of Angel City. I saw one Blackthumb with his hand on someone’s head, the Halo image turning green as the scan came up clear. The woman who had let us in grabbed a young man and inspected his hands closely for salt.
Zach and I made directly for the base, still wearing our blood- and sand-stained fatigues. There were stares and questions and regulation concerns, but we waved them off and headed straight for Gregory’s office.
“Dias! Reed! I can’t believe you’re back,” Gregory said when we came through his door. He came around his desk and actually shook our hands. “When you went after that dreameater, I figured the heat had driven you both mad!”
Zach shot me a look with a lot of raised eyebrow in it, but didn’t actually agree with Gregory.
“No, sir,” he said.
I stood at a tired mutant version of attention and let Zach lay out the details of our chase, tracking Kiyu and then our strange captivity. Gregory asked some questions, but surprisingly few. Mostly, he just listened and drummed his fingers against the wood of his desk.
“That’s… quite a story,” he said in an even voice when Zach finished. Without Thorn here to give his strings a tug, I suspected that the Greenguard chief had no idea what to make of our tale. “You’ve both been through a lot.”
“You’ll tell Thorn, though?” I asked. Maybe a touch more intensely than was strictly necessary, but it was important. “He needs to know about what the Whitefingers said.”
“Yes.” Gregory nodded his answer just as emphatically as I had asked the question. “I will tell the High Gardener. I’ll go see him at once.”
“Thank you, sir,” Zach said.
“You two go get some rest. Tomorrow, we’ll issue both of you new weapons. And try not to lose them this time.” Gregory flashed us the ghost of a real smile. “Dismissed.”
Zach bade me a weary farewell in the hallway of our building, but I didn’t let him leave until he promised to get that slice under his arm looked at. Zach assured me that he was fine, of course, but agreed to have it checked out.
“Just to shut you up, Julia,” he told me firmly. “Not because I’m worried.”
“Get your ass moving. I’m too tired to stand here arguing with you, Zee.”
Zach smiled and nodded, then turned away down his hallway. I practically crawled past Silva leaning out her door to ask me what had happened, grunted wordlessly at her and went into my apartment. I was hungry, but before I could even think about digging up something to eat, I had to get clean. Dry cactus pulp was clumped in my hair and my clothes were saturated with dust and sweat.
I checked the water in my bath jug. It was about half full. Good enough to get the job done. I stripped out of my boots and crumpled fatigues, throwing my sweat-soaked underwear on top of the pile and promising myself that I would take care of the laundry later. I untied my tangled auburn braid and stepped into the washtub, then poured cool water over my head. I worked my fingers through the knots of my hair and pried loose bits of dried salve the Whitefingers had applied. My scalp stung around the bump, but it felt good to wash the grit out of it. I poured another stream of water over myself and watched it turn brown as it ran down my legs, but leaving my skin cleaner beneath.
I finished off the jug and then dripped my way across the apartment to my water barrel and refilled it. I was going to spend most of my barter this month — vegetables and fruit from the Houses that were the Greenguard’s pay — to get more water, but I’d grown up on cheap crickmeal and saguaro. I would manage.
I returned to the washtub and inspected my nails. They were filthy, with what seemed like an entire storm’s worth of dust crusted beneath them. I scrubbed my nails and then the rest of my body until I glowed pink all over. The brush stung my storm-abraded skin and the rope burns around my wrists, but it felt good. Purifying, somehow.
But thinking of the Whitefinger’s ropes reminded me of Kiyu, too. The slender girl was certainly not what I had expected from a Whitefinger or a dreameater. She was young, for one thing. I had always imagined Whitefingers as storm-weathered old men with skins burnt snakeskin-rough by a lifetime in the desert. It made sense that there were women among the Whitefingers, too, and that they would have children, or else the wastelanders would have disappeared generations ago.
Kiyu was a far cry from my craggy and dangerous image of a Whitefinger. If my mother ever said that a dreameater like her might eat me, I wouldn’t have been nearly so frightened. I couldn’t help laughing a little at myself, but I felt my nipples stiffen, too. I looked down and found my hand cupping my right breast. I didn’t remember telling it to do that. But as the water beaded on my skin and thoughts of Kiyu refused to leave me alone, I let the scrub brush fall into the muddy bottom of the washtub and pressed both hands to my chest. I let my hands trace the curves of my chest and linger on the hardened peaks.
Kiyu’s sleek hair and dark, angled eyes were as clear in my thoughts as if she had been standing right there in front of me. I remembered her throwing herself on top of me when the storm hit, tackling me away from her spear-turned-lightning rod. Kiyu was small, but I had felt her muscular and lithe body against me as we fought for my knife. She was determined and energetic, beautiful and deadly, all crammed into one tight, tiny body.
I picked up the jug and poured the last of the water over my body. My hand followed the flow down the slopes of my breasts, over my stomach, and to the soft, heated juncture of my legs. My cunny was slick, the lips parted like those of a blooming orchid.
Kiyu was beautiful, so much like the baubles she collected. Why did she do that? I truly wanted to believe that it was some childish habit or, even better, a thieving compulsion that proved true everything that the Gardeners told us about the Whitefingers.
But no, the horror stories I had always heard didn’t seem to fit Kiyu. Not many people bothered to look for beauty in this dusty, sand-blasted world. They went about life with their heads down, just praying to get through the next day, the next storm. The Gardeners had their bright, beautiful flowers… But they kept all those blossoms locked away, drinking up half the city’s water for our great leaders’ mysterious rituals.
My hand didn’t care about my self-righteous rambling or confused thoughts, though. It knew exactly what it wanted and traced the petals of my sex without indecision. My finger slipped inside and my brain just gave up trying to talk sense. Helplessly, I let the moment take me, let myself picture Kiyu’s heart-shaped face. I moved to the small bud at the apex of my cunny and caressed it in swift strokes, biting my lip against moans that threatened to become cries. My other hand squeezed my breast and pinched at my nipple, reaching for the peak.
And found it. My climax seared through me and hot, tight shudders shot through my body. I cried out once, hard and loud.
I came down slowly, panting and feeling even more confused than before. I distracted myself by scraping the last of the water from my skin, trying to avoid lingering on my breasts or between my legs, lest I go back for seconds. When I was done I dressed quickly and went in search of food. Yes, that was what I needed. Dinner.
