The Boys of Fire and Ash (2 page)

“Relax,” said Av. “He wants this, Urgs. Come on, it's getting late.”

“It won't take me long,” I said through gritted teeth. In fact, I was ready to let Av talk me out of it; Fiver was easily
a foot taller than me, weighed about as much as two of me, was stronger and faster. I didn't stand a chance.

I felt a tugging at my arm—Cubby. “Did you hear that?” he whispered, his wide eyes staring up at the tree line of Nikpartok Forest, the dense wood that surrounded the Ikkuma Pit.

“What?” asked Av.

“I heard something.”

Everyone's eyes followed Cub's, up the steep black walls of the Pit to where the withered trees peeked out. I listened. Nothing but thunder and the quiet bubbling of the Hotpots.

“It's a forest, Cub,” I told him. “It's filled with creatures.”

“Like you would know,” giggled Wasted.

My cheeks burned for the second time. I'd never been into the forest, never hunted anything but Slag Cavies, and everyone knew it.

“All right, all right,” said Av. “Let's just get to the Landfill. Give me your pack.” He snatched it up from the ground by my feet and fastened it securely onto his own pack. “You take the kid.”

“What? I specifically remember you saying
you'd
help him across the Hotpots.”

Av ignored me. He faced the first row of smoldering Hotpots, took a few big steps back. Then, with that speed no Brother could match, Av ran full tilt, hands open, always open, slicing through the air, and leaped, landing with a thud on the other side.

“Come on, Cub.” I crouched so he could get up onto my back.

“No way!” he shouted.

“I don't blame you, kid!” laughed Fiver, sitting back down beside Wasted.

“You can't make that jump,” I told him.

“Can so.”

“You can't!” I snapped.

“I can!”

I turned away from him.
What an idiot
. The Hotpots were no joke. Brothers died in them all the time and he knew that.

“Cub!” called Av. “Listen to Urgle.”

“Fine,” he groaned. Fiver and Wasted sniggered some more. I was humiliated.

Cubby shimmied onto my back, his sweaty arms wrapping around my neck. I was suddenly nervous; I'd never made the jump with this much weight. Didn't help that I had an audience in Fiver and Wasted.

“You're holding on tight, right?” I said. “I mean like really tight.”

“Yes!” he snapped. “Let's go.”

I backed up farther than usual. I charged ahead, leaving my hands open like Av. It had worked for him. I came to the edge of the first pot and jumped.

“Scroungee!”
yelled Fiver, but he was too late, I was airborne. I came down with a thud, Cubby's chin slamming into my shoulder, and my left foot slid back, nearly dipping into the boiling lava.

Fiver. He'd wanted me to fall. Wanted me to burn. If he'd yelled a second sooner…I would have.

When we reached the Landfill, the three of us stood and scanned the giant trash mounds, our eyes peeled for movement. Rusted metal branched from the mounds, reaching out, refusing to stay buried—smooth, rough, twisty, flat—all of it busy and messy, a lot of noise for my eyes. Not a Slag Cavy in sight. No problem, though; there'd probably be
hundreds beneath the trash, scavenging for food. I didn't really care. I was still seething about Fiver.

I viciously unhooked my pack from Av's back and began fishing out my spear and thrower.

“Just forget him, Urgs,” said Av.

Easy for him to say
.

Cubby was chewing on his dirt-crusted fingers, no scowl anymore, just wide, wet eyes.

“I'm—I'm no scroungee,” he murmured.

“That's right, Cub,” said Av. “You're not.”

My blood was boiling. “It wasn't about you, Cubby. It was about me.”

“But he said it to
me
!”

“You don't even know what it means.”

“I know it's really bad!”

I ground my teeth and clenched my fists to keep from slugging the kid. It wasn't him I was mad at, it was Fiver, but Cubby had a way of annoying me like no one else. I turned my back on him to stop the argument and hunkered down on the rusty shards to fish out my hunting gear.

“There it is again,” Cubby whispered. “Can you hear it?”

“It's nothing. Stop scaring yourself!” He had been a paranoid mess about Nikpartok Forest creatures all his life. The kid had nightmares every time the Hunting Party brought back a big animal he didn't recognize.

Cubby came over to me and sat down cross-legged with his head in his hands, watching eagerly.

“I think the Cavies are gone. I haven't even seen one,” he said.

Showed what the kid knew. He didn't take in anything I told him.

“Slag Cavies live under the trash, Cub,” Av explained as
he inspected his sling. “Dens and tunnels all through the mounds.”

“Why?”

“Jeez, Urgs, don't you teach the kid anything?” laughed Av, smacking the back of my head. Great. First Fiver, now Av.

“I teach him plenty!” I snapped. “He just forgets!”

“You're right, I'm sorry.”

I shot Cubby an angry look for making me look like a bad Big Brother. He didn't notice. He was staring at my daggers.

“Don't even think about it,” I warned.

“This one's new.” His grimy little finger grazed the handle of my newest piece and I slapped it away.

“It's not finished.”

“I like it.” He grinned, his fingers fidgeting in his lap. I tried not to smile. I liked it too. It was one of the best daggers I'd made in a while. The blade was a polished black fire glass; all my blades were made of fire glass. It was all over our mountains—smooth, shiny black rock that flaked into the sharpest edge, if you worked it right. When this one caught the light, it showed a red stripe pattern that I'd seen only a few times in fire glass. Sort of a shame I'd have to give it up.

“Don't get too attached,” I said, “because it's leaving with Digger.” Digger was the oldest out of all of us, sixteen, and considered himself some kind of leader. Which was stupid. In the Ikkuma Pit there are no leaders. Big Brothers take care of their Little Brothers, hunters hunt, healers heal, fixers fix. No one needs to tell you to do your part, you just do it. I hated when the tall, gangly jerk gave me orders. Good thing his Leaving Day wasn't far off.

Av bent down to take a look, rubbing his thumb over the
end of the handle. The handle was made of bully wood; Av had brought it back for me after a day in Nikpartok with the Hunting Party. The wood was dark, nearly black, and very hard. It had taken me a long time to get used to the way it ground under my tools when I tried to carve it. It took a long time, but I got the hang of it eventually.

“I get it,” he laughed, tracing the image creeping up its side, five perfect notches splayed out from the butt to the blade. “They're fingers! That's great!”

I nodded. Digger's Little Brother, Fingers, came to me after Digger made his Leaving Day announcement. When a Big Brother decides his Little Brother is ready to handle life on his own, he makes an announcement. Always the same announcement:
“When the next baby is dropped, I will leave to make room for him. He will take my place.”
It's a big deal. The boy who leaves and his Little Brother usually exchange gifts. Fingers wanted to give Digger a dagger and asked me to make it. I'm not a big fan of Digger, but I usually get asked to make a dagger for Leaving Days, so I told Fingers I'd do it. The Brothers seem to like the ones I make best. It's the one thing I do really well. This one I was particularly proud of. I had Fingers grip the handle and I traced his fingers with a bit of charcoal and carved away.

“What's this for?” asked Cubby, pointing to a circle impression where the blade met the handle.

“A-Frame,” I said. That's the one thing I put on all my daggers—a small piece of wood from the A-Frame. A little piece of home.

“When you make mine,” he said, sitting on his hands, “can you make it with
your
fingers?”

I shook my head. “You said you wanted a curl, like the one I made for Asher.” The list of demands for Cubby's
dagger was endless. I'd promised I'd make him one on my Leaving Day, and every time I made a new dagger he liked, he asked for his to be the same.

“Yeah, but I like this better.”

I chewed the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. He'd like the next one more, and the one after that even more.

He pointed to the glinting red stripes in the glass. “And that too. Make mine with that.”

I wouldn't. What Cubby didn't know was I'd started his the day he became my Little Brother. So far, I had the blade complete. It was made of fire glass, like the rest, but this was special. I'd found the stone years ago, back when I was a Little Brother. There was a thick line of blue at its center. I'd never seen that color in fire glass. Reds, purples, oranges, maybe some yellow from time to time, but never blue. When I finished working on it, Cubby's blade had this long, thick blue swoosh flowing at its center. I'd been so busy getting the blade just the way I wanted, I hadn't had time to think about the rest of it.

“Cubby,” said Av, “you know making it look good doesn't make it work good. It's how you use it that matters.”

Cubby shrugged. Something in the mound must have caught his eye, because he got up and left us to rummage through the junk. He loved collecting worthless trash from the Landfill, stashing it away in his little hiding place he liked to pretend I didn't know about.

“Don't do any of that fancy stuff for me when I go, Urgs,” Av went on. “I just want three real good blades. Light and easy to throw.”

I looked up at him. “What? What do you mean?” Av and I were the same age; everything we did, we did together.
He was dropped at the wall only a few days after me, and he got Goobs not long after I'd got Cubby. We'd never discussed leaving before.

Av didn't say anything, just focused on picking out his wooden darts.

“Av, are you thinking of leaving?”

He shrugged. “Digger's going. He's only two years older than me.”

“Two years is a lot, Av.” It was. Digger's voice had already bubbled—it had turned deep and scratchy, and his neck had that bubble that only the oldest boys get. He had hair too, right on his chin. Av's voice was still the same, his skin still smooth and bare. He was too young. We were too young.

“Maybe, but Goobs is already the same age I was when I got him.”

I wiped the sweat off my forehead. The thought of Av's Little Brother, Goobs, all alone and with a baby made me uneasy. Goobs was the same age as Cubby. What would he do without Av? What would
I
do without Av?

“But you bring down the most game,” I said. “The Hunting Party needs you.”

“Fiver'll be with them.”

I frowned.

“I know Fiver's not your favorite person, Urgs. But he's an amazing tracker, really. I may bring 'em down, but I wouldn't find them if Fiver weren't out there with us.”

I didn't say anything. I hated when Av said anything good about that Cavy fart.

“He's still your Brother, Urgs,” said Av. “He's one of us.”

Maybe. But I didn't have to like him.

We sat in silence for a minute, both of us watching Cubby tugging on some shiny stick he couldn't budge.

Without Av, Cub would be all that was left for me. And he wasn't ready for me to go, wasn't ready to take care of himself, let alone a new Little Brother. I hadn't taught him enough yet. Maybe Fiver was right. Maybe I was turning Cubby into a scroungee.

Av squinted as he watched my Little Brother, and for a second I worried he was thinking it too. “I had it again last night.”

No, his mind was on something else. “The dream?”

He nodded.

Av had always had vivid dreams, ever since we were small. But they never bothered him before, not like this. Lately he'd been having the same one, over and over, and it was one that would upset any Brother.

“About your Mother?” I asked.

He kicked me on instinct, to shut me up. He didn't want anyone to know, and I didn't blame him. It was a secret between us. But there was no one around to hear besides Cubby, and he wasn't paying any attention.

“Sorry,” said Av.

I nodded, rubbing my thigh where his foot had slammed into it. “So it was the same one?”

He jabbed lightly at the ground with his spear, staring at his feet. “When they get out there—the Brothers, I mean—outside the Pit. Think it's true about some of them?”

I waited, not sure what he was getting at.

“You know, going to find her?”

No. Without question, no. Not the good ones, anyway. No self-respecting Brother who left the Pit went to find those monsters. No self-respecting Brother would ever go looking for his Mother.

Av was one of the good ones.

When I didn't say anything he hurried by me with his spear thrower. “Anyway, I was just talking. We better get going, here. Don't want to waste the day.”

He was just talking. I knew that. Av hated the Mothers just as much as any of us; he'd said it plenty of times. But if anyone heard him talking like that…

“I still hear it!” Cubby had freed his shiny stick and was pointing back at the tree line with it. “There's something out there, I swear.” One thing was for sure. If Av was thinking of leaving, I was going to have to get better at hunting real fast. If I didn't, I'd let Cubby down.

I sat on a big scrap of metal, inspecting the black, furry rodents I'd brought down. I'd only managed to catch three Slag Cavies over the course of the afternoon, which was in itself embarrassing. But on top of it, they were awfully skinny for Cavies, probably why I'd managed to hit them—they were slow and unhealthy.