Sky Child (2 page)

2

I
hand the glowing stick to Jet, and tell him and Flot that I'll bring breakfast back to our room. Jet heads down the tunnel, with Flot close behind. I turn and brave the rain, leaving the Crag behind me.

The meat we get from hunting isn't our only source of food. Some of us tend fields of wheat, barley and vegetables, and others take care of chickens, goats and sheep. There is some danger to it, but not like the hunt. Most predators stay away from our fields. We've built walls of stone to protect our animals. During the hunt, we have no walls to protect us. We only have our weapons, and our armor.

It takes me a while to reach the chickens, because I try not to slip on wet rocks. I let myself in through a wooden door, making sure to tie it up behind me so that wolves can't get in and the chickens can't get out. I pick many eggs off the ground, check for cracks, and then place them in different pockets that I've sewn into my clothing.

When I was young, I stitched secret pockets into my clothes. That way, when someone bigger tried to take something, it kept the things I really needed hidden. Food, tools, weapons; the things I needed to survive. When I was a new one, I had no parents or older brothers or sisters to protect me, which is why I protect Flot and Jet now. Soon they will be able to look out for themselves, but for now they still need my protection. I have a feeling that if it weren't for me watching over him, things would be much worse for Flot.

I check that the wooden door is tied up good and tight so that the chickens will stay safe. As I leave, I see a flash of light, and with it the familiar boom of sky fire. This time is different. This time, the flash and the boom happen at the same time. I'm surrounded by bright white light. The force of the strike knocks me back, and I can hear the chickens scream out in panic. As I stand back up, I check my pockets, and I'm glad to find that the eggs aren't broken.

I run as fast as I can back to the Crag. Looking over my shoulder, I make sure that I'm not being followed by wolves or other predators. When I get to the mouth of the cave, I jump over a puddle and nearly slip on the wet, moss-covered stone. Knowing that I've reached safety, I turn back to look out at the sky, defying it to try and hurt me while I'm inside the cave.

A streak of sky fire booms right in front of the Crag, charring a large patch of clover. I leap back in surprise then make my way deeper into the cave.

I decide to burn a tribute in case I have somehow angered the Sky Gods. Standing by the Great Fire, I take some small twigs from a pile then twist them into what looks like a person. I go back to the entrance of the cave and collect some moss to add as hair. Even though it is hard to tell at first, it is supposed to be me.

Once I am certain that the Sky Gods will know that it's me by looking at it, I walk back to the Great Fire. I close my eyes, raise up the tribute to the sky then drop it in the fire. It burns quickly, until all of the wrong things I have done are burnt up with my stick person.

Hopefully the Sky Gods will forgive me for whatever wrongs I have done. I can't think of anyone or anything that I have harmed, but there must be a reason why they brought sky fire down at me.

It takes me a moment to remove the eggs from my pockets, and set them down on the cold stone ground. I grab a pan from a stack next to the Great Fire.

When I was still a new one, I asked Charm how pans were made. She told me never to ask where things came from. Questions like that are forbidden. Charm told me that the pans were gifts from the Sky Gods, like the Great Fire. But I think she just didn't know.

I remember looking up the word 'pan' in our Book of Knowledge. Our Book of Knowledge is good if you want to look up what a word means, but it doesn't tell you how to do things. Some of it I think is pretend. Things like aardvarks, and automobiles, and avocados don't make any sense, and I doubt they really exist.

We have a few other books. You may learn what the books teach you, but you must never question them. You must never disagree with them, for they are sacred.

I crack the eggs I have laid out against the side of the pan, and with each egg I crack, I throw its shell into the Great Fire. I dig into one of my many pockets and pull out a metal scoop. I use it to break up the eggs, and mix them in the pan until they are all the same color. Once they are mixed together, I hold the pan in the flames of the fire. The heat makes my hand and arm warm, but I stay far enough away so that I don't get burned.

After a long while, the eggs are firm. I take the pan back to the mouth of the Crag and carefully place the bottom of the pan in the large puddle. It hisses and makes water-smoke float into the air. Once I think the pan has cooled enough, I find my way back to our room.

I notice that Flot had already visited the Great Fire, heating some water in a pot while I was out gathering eggs. He pours some into cups for each of us, and carefully sets them on the ground in the middle of the room. As we sit down in a circle around our feast, we close our eyes and raise our hands up to the Sky Gods as a sign of thanks for our meal. We eat, and we drink, and we talk about the hunt.

"Sam, what are we hunting today?" asks Jet.

"Probably the same things that we always hunt."

"Flot says that you might try to hunt a dragon," says Jet.

"No, dragons are too dangerous to hunt. You know that we try to stay away from them," I reply.

"But there has to be some way to kill a dragon. What about attacking their eyes?"

"Almost everyone that has ever tried to fight a dragon has died. I only survived because I found a safe place to hide."

"Maybe if the entire Crag went out to fight one, maybe then we could kill it," says Jet.

"I don't think so," I say.

"Are you saying that because you're afraid?"

He's challenging me, waiting to see if I am as tough as I act.

"Yes, I am afraid. You should be too. You can't kill a dragon."

Jet looks at me and realizes that what I'm saying must be true. I never lie to them, and I never admit to being afraid of anything. He knows that I don't let much scare me. I can't be scared, because no one will ever save me. I've always had to save myself.

"Sam?" says Flot.

"Yes?"

"Can we play jump stones today?"

"Sure, we can play jump stones."

"Will you go easy on me?"

"Never!" I say.

The twins giggle. I just smile at them.

We finish our meal, and I send Jet off to wash the pan that we used.

"Remember to scrub it, and dry it off really well after you wash it," I say.

"I know, I know. This isn't my first time washing pans," says Jet.

"Yes, but for some reason, when I don't remind you, people complain to me about there being dirty pans. Why is that?" I ask.

"Ungh," grunts Jet as he leaves.

I look over at Flot.

"Jump stones?" asks Flot.

Sigh.

"Sure, we can play jump stones now."

Flot pulls out the piece of wood we play jump stones on, with its many squares, and sets up the stones. He keeps the lighter stones, and I play the dark. Flot, for the small number of snows he's seen, is very good at jump stones. He can beat almost everyone in the Crag, except for me. Because of that, and because people that are too smart end up dead, I make sure that Flot only plays with people who aren't a danger to him.

My thoughts drift away from the game to Sickle and Scythe. I need to come up with a plan to protect Flot, and keep him safe. The hard part is being smart about it, so that they won't come after me. I don't want to kill them, even though that would fix the problem. I don't want to kill anybody. I just need them to stop hurting Flot.

"Rock!" says Flot.

I look down and realize I haven't been paying attention to the game at all. I watch as Flot replaces his stone with a much larger rock. Now he can move it forward or backward. He's also captured a few more pieces than me. Flot has never beaten me, and I won't let him beat me now.

I stare at the board for a moment, thinking about what it will take to win. I make my move. He moves his rock. I keep my stones in a tight group, making sure there is no way he can jump them with his rock. I keep moving, and he keeps following. Eventually I'm able to move a stone into his back row, turning it into a rock, but I lose a pair of pieces in the process. I use my rock to jump his. Although I'm down a hands worth of pieces, he only has stones, and I have a rock.

I use my rock to protect another stone, and as he finally turns one of his stones into a rock, I gain another rock. I use my pair of rocks to take apart his army of stones, and finally corner his rock. He moves his last piece out, and I jump over it to win the game. Flot looks unhappy.

"So what did we learn?" I ask.

"Don't play jump stones with you," says Flot.

"No. What you learned is that you should protect what is important to you. I protected my pieces with my rock, to make sure that later in the game I could turn them into rocks and win."

"But you lost a pair of stones to get your first rock," says Flot.

"That is true, but sometimes you have to make your enemy think they are winning to beat them. You thought it was smart to lose your rock just so you could take out a pair of my stones. But then you didn't realize that all I needed to beat you was a rock. That was what you should have stopped. Do whatever you can to keep me from getting rocks. Don't worry so much about losing pieces. You're going to lose pieces. Just make sure that when you do lose pieces, it matters. That they aren't mistakes. That they make you stronger, and closer to winning by losing them."

Flot stares at me for a while, thinking about what I've just told him.

"Okay," says Flot.

I can tell that he gets it. Hopefully, some of what I am teaching him with jump stones will make him better at the hunt, and keep him safe.

"We should get ready for training," I say.

3

E
ach day we train before the hunt. Both hunters, and those that want to become hunters, learn how to use weapons. We are also trained how to be quiet, and stay hidden from our prey. We are taught how to think, how to see, and hear, and smell. That way, when the time comes, we might take our prey by surprise.

The hunt is important, not only because it brings food to the Crag for everyone to share, but it also scares away predators. Spreading our scent wherever we go warns the wolves that they are in our territory.

Jet, Flot and I stand outside the mouth of the Crag. The air is crisp, and clean smelling. The rain has died down, and it has been a while since anyone has heard sky fire booming across the land. Others start to show up, ready to learn how to be better at the hunt. Eventually Lagan appears. His short, graying beard stands out against his tanned, weather-damaged skin. I notice that he is holding a spear that is thinner and shorter than our normal spears.

Lagan is the Leader of the Hunt and also our trainer. He earned that right the day we lost our old leader, Hammer, when a dragon attacked. It was Lagan's quick thinking that spared the rest of us.

Lagan is not the best hunter in our group. He is not the strongest, or bravest, but he is the most fair. He is also the person that people come to when there is a problem in the Crag. He acts as a judge, and does his best to hear both sides of every argument. That is why his decisions are respected, and why he has survived for so long.

Lagan is not the only leader in the Crag. There is also Chaff, the leader of the harvest, Crook, the keeper of animals, and Vault, the protector of the Crag. Vault is a good man, and Crook is a very strong and courageous woman. Chaff though is a monster.

Chaff, in many ways, is worse than his sons. He keeps the secret of growing food to himself, so that he can't be removed as leader of the harvest. He has help from many others with preparing the fields, and with picking what comes from the ground. But no one is sure what he does to make the plants start growing.

Chaff is hungry for power, and if you get on his bad side, he will starve you. He'll do the same to anyone trying to help those on his bad side.

Chaff's fields give us more food than we could ever gather from hunting or taking care of animals. When we hunt, we are lucky to bring back enough meat to share with the others. Everyone gets a taste, but it is not enough to feed everyone. Raising animals requires food to feed them. Grains and vegetables, and things that must be grown and harvested. Without the harvest, the people of the Crag would quickly die. That is why people do not challenge Chaff.

A few people have tried to steal food to survive, but when they are caught, they are killed. You are allowed eggs in the morning, before the animal keepers arrive, but they are not enough to survive on alone. Some people have been so desperate to get food that they leave the safety of the Crag on their own. Sometimes they go and never come back. I pray to the Sky Gods for them, hoping that they find a better place to live.

Chaff is the reason why Flot and Jet came to be my brothers. Flot and Jet's father was part of the harvest, their mother was a hunter. Barrow, their father, never got along with Chaff. I remember hearing he'd tried to find the secret of the harvest, so that Chaff would no longer have control over people. But Chaff caught Barrow sneaking into his room. Chaff told the other harvesters that Barrow had been stealing from the garden, the one law that could not be broken. Barrow was buried up to his neck in soil, then the harvesters took turns throwing rocks at his head until he died.

Barrow would have put up a fight, would have tried to kill Chaff, but Chaff vowed that if he did, he would have Flot and Jet killed. A day after Barrow's death, his wife, Shoal, died while eating dinner. The whispers said it was poison, but no one knows for sure. That's how Chaff kept control of people; making them fear being poisoned. Being stoned to death.

It is that constant fear that makes me want to leave this place. I hope that somewhere outside of the Crag there are more people. Honest, and hard-working, and good. I also hope that Flot, Jet and I can live there. Maybe another cave where the people aren't as dangerous. Where everyone gets along, and shares, and protects each other. Where Flot won't be bullied anymore. But I don't know if there's a place like that. We've never met people from outside the Crag. For all I know, we could be the only people left in the world. We could be the only survivors of the End War.

We don't know much about the End War, other than it happened a very long time ago. Some of the gray ones tell stories that they remember hearing when they were just new ones. Stories of brave heroes fighting, bright lights of destruction, and the death of almost everything. Animals, people; all gone and burned up. But I think those are just stories told to warn us about fighting with each other. They teach us that if you try to become too powerful, someone else will want to take that power, and war will happen. I just wish people like Chaff would learn from the stories, so that they wouldn't be so evil.

I am lost in my thoughts, and I finally realize that Lagan is showing us how to use the new spear that he has created. It looks like he's taken a thin piece of wood and made points on both ends. It is different from our regular spears, which are thicker, heavier, longer, and only have a point at one end.

Lagan grips the spear one-handed, gets a running start then throws it as far as he can. It doesn't go as far as I can throw a rock with my sling, but it goes far enough that it could take an animal by surprise. It lands in the soft grass, and sticks straight out of the ground.

I am impressed. Our spears do not go very far, and they are not meant to be thrown. They are made to stab, and to keep predators at bay. This new spear could probably kill a deer that was so far away it couldn't smell you.

I want to learn how to use this new weapon very badly, so I walk over to Lagan as soon as he is done talking.

"Lagan, what do you call it?" I ask.

"A sky spear, because it falls from the sky like sky fire," says Lagan in his deep voice.

"Can I try?"

"Yes. I've made a few of them. Try to stand away from the others when you do, because we don't want anyone hurt," says Lagan.

I pick up one of the sky spears from the pile and walk far away from everyone. Resting one end on the ground, the other end comes to the middle of my chest. I hold onto the front end of the stick, trying to keep it off the ground. I get low, and start running as fast as I can. I throw the spear with all of my strength, but it lands on the ground right in front of me. I realize that there must be a trick to throwing them.

I look over at Lagan, who is holding the sky spear loosely, and near the middle. I watch as he gets a running start then doesn't really throw it like I had. Instead, he sort of spins his arm in a circle, keeping his arm almost straight. He also lets go of the spear earlier in his throw than I did. It's amazing how far this new spear can go.

I pick my spear up. I hold it in the same place that Lagan did, get my running start then throw it. This time it goes almost as far as Lagan's throw. It ends up right next to his spear. Lagan looks over at me and nods. I see a few other hunters have realized that I picked this up more quickly than them. Most of them are people that I know and trust. A few of them are people that I know and do not trust.

I walk over and pick up my sky spear. This time when I throw it, I make sure that everyone sees that my other throw was just luck. It lands right in front of me. I look around, and the few people I was worried about look away.

I hate having to hide my abilities just to stay alive. I could really help out the Crag if the others would listen to my advice. But if I seem too smart, someone will kill me in my sleep.

Frustration builds inside me as I think about how much I hate hiding my abilities from the others. I throw the sky spear with all of my strength. It flies farther than anyone else has thrown it, including Lagan. Everyone turns to look at me, and I can tell that I won't be able to sleep safely tonight. Stupid! Maybe I really am as dumb as I pretend to be.

My next few throws don't go very far, but it's too late. I can tell a few of them are still watching me. Now I can only hope and pray, and ask the Sky Gods to protect me from the other hunters. Maybe the hunt will distract them and make them forget. Maybe I am worrying about it too much, but I know that I'm not, because I've seen people murdered for less. There is no rule against murder in the Crag, because they kill anyone that tries to stop it.

Still angry with myself for the mistake, I look over at Flot and Jet. Both seem to be having a hard time throwing their sky spears. Flot holds the spear right, but his arms aren't very strong yet, so it doesn't fly very far. Jet is much stronger, but he hasn't figured out the right way to hold it. I see Flot look over at Jet then walk over to him. He says something I can't hear, but I watch as Jet changes where he holds onto the sky spear.

Jet takes a few steps then throws the spear with all of his strength. It flies as far as Lagan's throw. I smile, because I have hope that if something were to happen to me, Flot and Jet would be able to work together to survive. Maybe I've been wrong about them. Maybe they can survive without someone watching over them.

Lagan blows a horn to let us know that our training is over. We all slowly walk back to the Crag to prepare for the hunt.