The Boys of Fire and Ash (34 page)

I heard Cubby's screams in my head, begging me to come back as I ran to find Lussit.

“What happened?” said Av as he and Lussit caught up to us.

My whole body was trembling and my turning stomach was sneaking its way up my throat. I looked at Lussit, her big dark eyes, her perfect lips. She was filthy and tired, but she still looked so beautiful. Her hair was still firmly tied back, her silver band sitting atop her head. I'd left Cubby alone…for a girl.

“A ball,” said Fiver. “I saw a ball of fire. It flew over our heads and—and when it landed, there was so much smoke, I couldn't see.”

“Cubby!” I yelled at him. “Where is Cubby?”

“I fell,” he said, his voice wavering as tears overtook him. “I fell so far, the entire roof just collapsed, the whole south side of the building.”

I thought of the pile of rubble we'd crossed over at the south side.

“When I landed, it hurt so bad, but I tried to ignore it. I could hear Cubby screaming, he was screaming and coughing and when I could see through the smoke I could see him. He was in the water—”

Not Cubby
.

“And he was screaming, trying to fight the river but he couldn't. He's just so small.”

“Where is he?” demanded Av, his hands gripping at the roots of his hair.

I thought I might fall down and I crouched to the ground, closing my eyes to keep the world from spinning.

“I tried to get to him,” said Fiver, trying to gain his composure. “I moved as fast as I could but…I was too late. The water was just too strong for him.”

I threw up.

“What…what do you mean?” said Av, but we all knew what Fiver meant.

“He's gone,” said Fiver. “The falls swallowed him up…. I lost him.”

Everything inside me radiated with grief and I screamed on my hands and knees in the mud. Every silly grin, every angry scowl face flooded my memory, and all I could see was him. I'd had him, I'd had my Cubby back, and I let him go.

I felt Lussit's hand on my back and I wrenched myself away.

“Don't touch me!” I screamed at her. How could I have done it? How could I have abandoned him for her? This girl, this Mother in the making. Cubby was my family. And now he was gone. After everything, I'd failed.

None of us had spoken since Fiver finished his story. I led the way, walking ahead of all of them, running from their concerned faces.

My eyes were swollen and even after I'd finished sobbing for Cubby they still flowed with tears while the rest of me went numb to the pain. I felt dead, empty.

We reached Abish Village by sunset. It was the same way we'd left it, you'd never know the world had changed forever from the looks of the place. It was still as busy as ever, a hodgepodge of stands and strange people, a bustling marketplace that buzzed with life. It was the last place I wanted to be.

Serin and Farka were there, waiting for us, for Lussit.

“Well done, little Urgle,” laughed Serin when she saw us. I ignored her, not wanting her praise, dropping back while Av, Lussit, and Fiver approached the women.

“I don't think any man has been able to strike that kind of fear into Krepin. I guess he underestimated the Ikkuma boys, huh?”

“I wish you'd come back with us, Brother,” Lussit said to Av. “There are so many talents inside you that I can help you master.”

“I can't,” he told her. “My Little Brother is back at the Pit.”

Happy and safe.

For now.

“He needs me,” said Av.

Lussit gave a sad nod of understanding and kissed Av on the cheek. She gripped Fiver's hand and he nodded, still too traumatized to say anything. Then her eyes fell on me.

I looked away. Lussit's very existence was the reason Cubby was gone. I could never look at her again.

She kept her distance, sensing I had nothing more to say, and joined Farka and Serin as they prepared to leave.

“The Beginners are preparing to move out,” Farka told us.

“Yes,” laughed Serin. “You've scared Krepin so thoroughly, you've got him on the run!”

“The Pit,” Av said suddenly. “He's not running. He's planning to go to the Pit.”

Fiver's head snapped in my direction. He didn't know. I turned away, unable to look at him.

“How?” said Serin, eyeing him skeptically.

“Krepin's Abish shroud.” My voice was hoarse, they could barely hear me.

Farka moved closer to me. “What Abish shroud?”

The sun was a blazing orange and it burned my eyes as I stared. “It hides proof. About Ardigund.”

“The Secret of the Ajus,” Farka breathed.

“Impossible,” said Serin.

“Blaze told Krepin,” said Av, “how he hid it in the Pit. Krepin tortured him. He told Krepin everything.”

“Blaze had the Secret of the Ajus?” she hissed incredulously.

Serin regarded Av a moment and looked to Farka. Something passed between the two women, and Serin held her face in her hands as though she had a headache.

“Someone must retrieve it,” said Farka.

My voice was lodged in my throat; it was dry and hoarse but I felt like a flood of tears was ready to flow out of me. Cubby's green eyes, his little fingers carefully holding the stone treasure—Cubby's treasure.

“I will,” I croaked.

Serin ignored me, nodding to Farka.

“Farka, you will go with the boys to the Ikkuma Pit. Urgle, you will give the Abish shroud to Farka and Farka will run it north to the mountains for safekeeping.”

“Serin,” Farka said, shaking her head vigorously, “I am a warrior, you will need my blade.”

“I will do it,” I said, raising my voice.

Serin put up her hand to stop me. “No, child, this is not a game.”

“A game?” My cheeks flushed with anger.

“You will give it to Farka.”

“I can't do that,” I said. Cubby's green eyes hungering for the dagger I'd never give him were all I could see. “It's hidden, and you don't know where.”

“Who does?” demanded Serin.

Cubby
.

Av tried hard not to look at me as he bit his bottom lip and his eyes began to water.

“I do,” I barely managed to say. I was the one now. I was the only person who knew where Cubby would have hidden it.

“Then, Farka, the boy will show you where to find it.”

“Serin, this is not a task for me!” Farka stomped.

“It's a task for me,” I insisted.

Serin held up her hand to me. “Quiet, boy, this is too important.”

“No!” I shouted. “One of us ‘boys' is the only reason that thing is safe right now!”

I thought of Tanuk's story about Blaze. He'd done so much and he was just a boy like me not that long ago. He'd been a part of something bigger than any Ikkuma could imagine. Cubby had been a part of something big.

“He beat him!” My voice was trembling, breaking, but I didn't care. “One of those little boys. My Brother beat him by keeping it safe.”

I felt a heat creeping down my face, the salty taste of tears on my tongue as I tried to talk instead of cry. I wiped my nose with the back of my wrist and took a deep breath.

“I'll keep it safe for Cubby.”

The two Belphebans stood in stunned silence, looking down at me, but I glowered at them defiantly. Krepin didn't know what Cubby knew, that the Abish shroud was not where Blaze had said it was. This was Cubby's secret treasure. And there was no way I was going to let Krepin have it.

Av was wiping his chin on his shoulder, getting rid of the tears he was pretending not to have. He cleared his throat and stepped in beside me to face the two women.

“Yes,” he said, “we'll go to keep it safe.”

Fiver didn't make a sound. He didn't even look at me. And he wouldn't, not after what had happened. Fiver would never forgive himself, I knew that. But it wasn't Fiver's fault. It was mine. With his head down, he pushed past Serin and Farka, and joined me and Av.

I thought of the ember glow of the Hotpots, the soothing rumble of the Fire Mountains, the warmth of the air. It was my home, my home with Cubby. I thought of all the Brothers who would be there to greet us, all the Brothers I'd have to tell that Cubby was gone, that the Beginning was coming. They'd never understand that their world was about to rip open. That nothing would ever be the same.

They wouldn't be ready, not for this. This was too big. And the three of us, we would die for our Brothers, I knew. But we were still only three.

Serin smiled, all of her protests dissolving when she saw the looks on our faces. “Very well. Look to the east in three days' time. We will come.”

Farka grabbed me by the back of the neck, forcing me to look at her. “We will not forget you.”

I said nothing and she tousled my hair before joining Serin and Lussit. We watched as the three women ventured into the village and Lussit turned to look at me one last time. I looked away, my stomach still stinging where Cubby had shoved me.

“What will we tell the Brothers?” Av sighed.

“Their Mothers are coming,” I told him.

I turned and began the journey towards the Pit, Av following on my left, Fiver on my right. The sun hung high in the sky and I couldn't help but notice there was no ache in my head anymore. As Abish Village teemed with life around me, I was barely aware of the smells, the sounds. I'd grown so used to this world outside my childhood home, and with every step, I was bringing that world closer to my Brothers.

It all starts to look the same, the fire glass, when you've worked with it forever. Even your reflection looks the same, the way each piece catches you inside its shiny black surface.

Except this piece.

I caught my image in the blade, half my face obscured by the bright swish of blue running up the center. I looked different, thinner maybe, but not just that. My eyes looked smaller, probably because they were still swollen. And my jaw looked different too.

Well, it was all different now, wasn't it?

I put the blade aside. I didn't want to look at it anymore. I rested it beside a careful assortment of stones and bones—all of them interesting shapes and colors. All of them secret treasures, all of them special as far as one boy could've told you.

I could feel the heat from the tiny fire crackling at my back, the strain in my neck from ducking my head low below the tiny cave's ceiling. I was cramped in this little space, tucked away in the side of the tallest of the Fire
Mountains. But that was how it should be. This cave wasn't meant for me.

I flipped open my pack. My tools tumbled out, and I picked up the Cavy skin that kept my newest piece safe. I unwrapped it carefully and stared at the wood nestled safely inside. My nose began to burn and a lump formed in my throat.

Two rough faces had been carved into it. The top one grinning. A gap where his tooth was missing. The one on the bottom, tight-lipped, empty-looking. On both their foreheads were two curling lines, one big, one small, wrapped around each other.

Brothers.

Born of fire.

Tears stained my vision and I bit my lip, looking out the mouth of my tiny little cave. If I looked straight ahead, I could see the tree line of Nikpartok, below me the black ashen floor of the Ikkuma Pit. It was quiet, save for the deep rumbling of the Fire Mountains. Nothing moved outside the brown A-Frame, somehow smaller than it used to be.

My Brothers were all inside.

Waiting for what would come.

Carefully, I fitted the fire-glass blade to the handle and secured them together. It wasn't the longest I'd spent carving a handle for a dagger. It wasn't the most detailed I'd made either. But never had I tried so hard to make it perfect, tried so hard to make it my best. And now, I couldn't even be sure it was.

He was always here to tell me.

But there was still one thing it needed.

I felt around inside the Cavy skin for the piece I had been saving, the piece I put on all my daggers—a little piece
of the A-Frame. I'd taken it from our nook. My fingers felt the little wooden circle and I fitted it to the empty space where the handle met the blade.

I held the dagger to my heart and tried my best to turn around, my knees cramping and my head scraping along the cave ceiling, so that I faced the tiny burning flames. Blaze's green flint box and the Abish shroud sat just in front of it, its shiny surface reflecting the glow.

I picked up the flint box and in its place, I laid the dagger.

So it would be there for him when Rawley came.

So Rawley would know, the fire burned for Cubby.