The Lord of the Plains (9 page)

Then there was another painful conversation,
this time with the landlord. At least he saw how tired they were
and quickly let them go. He asked if he needed directions to a
clinic. Aerlid responded, ‘No’.

The apartment was sparsely furnished. He
barely noticed. He found a small room with a bed in it and
carefully laid Riley down. There was a chair in the next room which
he brought in and put next to the bed. Sitting in it, he laid his
hands over her shoulder and closed his eyes.

He stayed that way all night.

The next day when Aerlid awoke it was past
dawn. The sun shone brightly through the open shutter doors to the
balcony. The living room was bright, the bedroom somewhat darker.
It was the first time in he didn’t know how long that he hadn’t
sung because he’d fallen
asleep
. Hardly a fitting way to
treat the Lady, but if the Lady had something to be upset about,
this was the least of it. He looked down at Riley. His hands were
still on her shoulder. Dangerous. He carefully removed them. The
hole was gone, her shoulder unmarked. He felt a weight lift from
his shoulders. He’d have to wait til she woke to see how her
mobility was. Aerlid tried to stand. Dizziness hit him so hard he
stumbled, caught himself on the wall.

Riley still slept. She would likely sleep
the rest of the day and then some.

Carefully, he stumbled out of the room and
shut the bedroom door softly. He slid down the door and hit the
floor with a soft thump. He cradled his head in his hands. Healing
Riley and fooling the testers had taken a lot out of him. His head
was thick and foggy, the sunlight felt like spikes thrust into his
skull. His stomach didn’t seem like it wanted to behave. He sighed
and stretched out his legs, lifting his head up. Slowly he opened
his eyes and waited for them to adjust. The spikes of sunlight
faded. He needed to eat. And wash. There must be somewhere to wash
but at the moment he couldn’t remember where. Slowly, with a groan
he stood, shaking.

He took some food from their packs and had a
little nibble, just enough to settle his stomach. Gathering his
courage, he left the apartment, taking the key with him.

Their apartment was on the second floor. The
bathrooms, he found, were on the ground floor. Despite his
discomfort he still managed to be pleasantly surprised to see the
humans here had proper plumbing. He took great pleasure in his
shower. It wasn’t warm, but that was ok. It wasn’t as if he’d had
hot showers out in the wild. It woke him up and stilled the
pounding in his head.

He needed to find somewhere he could wash
his clothes. He had one pair of what he thought of as ‘real’
clothes (this set included his white coat), the rest were animal
skins. His real clothes needed a wash- he had worn them coming into
Astar, and he doubted the clinic staff would be too impressed if he
turned up in animal skins. Right now though, he wasn’t up to
finding the landlord and asking.

He returned to the apartment and sat down in
the chair gratefully. He ate some more food, slowly. As he ate he
looked over their new home.

There was a small kitchen opening off the
living room he was sitting in and one bedroom. The living room wall
opposite the entrance consisted of wooden shutters. Outside was a
small balcony that overlooked the entrance to the apartment block.
The shutters were open at the moment and through them he could see
grey stone and… more grey stone. The apartment floor was tiled, the
walls bare stone. There was a table and one chair in the living
room and a single bed, and the other chair, in the bedroom. There
was no bathroom in their apartment; it was communal. Why was there
only one bed? he wondered vaguely. They had slept on the ground out
in the wild, so it wouldn’t matter if they did that here. Could you
buy beds from somewhere?

His thoughts drifted on and he went back to
surveying the apartment. It was small, and sparse, but at least it
was clean. The kitchen consisted of a sink, a counter and some
cupboards. It wasn’t much of a kitchen. Still, it was luxury
compared to what he had become used to. He vaguely remembered
something about a communal stove and icebox.

After his survey of his new domain he had a
flip through the leaflets the hellishly slow lady at the testing
centre had given him. The first thing he looked at was a map of
Astar. Well, part of Astar. Mainly the poor parts. The clinic he
was to report to was marked. So was the office he was to go to if
he didn’t meet the standards of the clinic staff. He felt it was
more likely that they wouldn’t meet
his
standards. Shops
were also marked, as was Riley’s school. He studied it curiously.
It didn’t look too far. He fully intended to walk her to school and
pick her up. She didn’t have the sense of time city folk did and he
thought it was more likely she’d wander off and try and climb a few
buildings and probably arrive at school just as everyone was
leaving.

There was also a set of instructions. It had
details on his payment plan- useful since he barely remembered any
of that- and rules and customs of Astar. It was like a traveller’s
guide in that respect. Then again, he didn’t think there were many
travellers these days, at least, not the type who travelled for
pleasure. There was also information on the education system. This
he read more closely. From a quick perusal it seemed education was
very important to the Astarians. Education was free. All of it.
After five years of schooling children were expected to choose a
general area of work- military, research, medicine, resources,
farming, administration or civilian. Research, medicine, farming
and resource followed the same path for two more years- two more
years where children could choose which path they wished to follow.
Afterwards they split, farming and resource students having one
more year of education together before learning the rest of their
trade on site. Administration and civilian also followed the same
path for three years. Military was entirely different. A year was
spent learning basic things, then they split off into four parts.
His eyes widened- space? Space followed military for a year,
seeming to weave in and out of research and the air force.

‘They are ambitious…’ he thought. But why?
Perhaps even more surprising than that was that education was free
even after the primary level. Getting in was solely determined by
ability. He had a closer read. Where did people go who couldn’t get
in anywhere else? It took some close reading that set his head
pounding again, but it sounded like military or civilian- whatever
that was-was the place for those people.

As he looked over the pamphlets he wondered
how long they would stay here and whether Riley would have to make
a choice. He had a pretty good idea what she would choose. He was
supposed to return these pamphlets after a week. They were paper-
and paper, he was getting the feeling, was very valuable here. As
were stoves and iceboxes and bathrooms apparently.

He spent the rest of the day in the
apartment. He left once around dinner time to talk to the landlord
on the first floor. The landlord was willing to show him around and
explain how everything worked. He showed him the ice box- it was
quite large and had a number of compartments in it. He handed him a
key and told him he was only to store food and told him how long
everything would last in there. Aerlid wondered what else he would
store in there but didn’t ask… He also found out where the laundry
facilities were.

He checked on Riley, found her still
sleeping. He closed the door gently behind him. That night he slept
on the floor.

The next day Aerlid awoke at dawn. He was
tired and gritty but he needed to get ready for his first day of
work. He stumbled around the apartment for about half an hour,
checking on Riley, nibbling on some food, checking on Riley
again.

He was concerned about leaving her alone the
entire day. Would she wake, alone in an unfamiliar place and panic?
Aerlid ate as much as he could stomach then settled back into the
chair by Riley’s bed. Closing his eyes he placed his hands lightly
on her shoulder.

By the time he was done his stomach was
growling again, but Riley wouldn’t wake til he returned, and she
wasn’t going to starve while she slept.

That done he showered and prepared what he’d
bring to work. He pawed through the chips of delicate veined marble
that passed for money here. His cleanest clothes were animal skins,
so he was hoping he’d be able to buy some new clothes on the way to
the clinic. However he wasn’t sure how many of these chips he
should bring. With a grumble he gathered some of each size into a
bag, along with some food. Then he left, locking the door behind
him.

Once outside he glanced up at the sky.
Without a timepiece he could only make an approximate guess as to
the time so he hoped he wouldn’t turn up late. Walking at a pace
that, when healthy, he could keep up all day, he followed the route
he had chosen from the map. It would take him past some shops
without too much of a detour.

The first clothing store he found wasn’t
open. In fact, looking around the street, nothing was open. He
sighed and glanced at the sky again. The streets here were wide and
straight and made of hard packed dirt with stone gutters. Between
the gutters and the buildings was a strip of dirt wide enough for
two people to walk abreast. This was where he walked. The buildings
in this part of the city were low, one story affairs. Most of the
buildings had large windows with sturdy, tightly shut wooden
shutters in place. Signs were painted upon the bare stone above the
windows. He saw further into the city the unremarkable grey
buildings rose in an orderly fashion. Astar was not a beautiful
city by any stretch of the imagination. Despite this, everything
looked solidly made and well maintained.

Aerlid waited on the sidewalk, carefully
watching the sun all the while. It was perhaps an hour before he
spotted a human walking towards him.

The human eyed him without fear.

‘Do you work here, fa?’ Aerlid asked, as the
man came closer. This time he used the polite term for someone who
did not warrant a ‘faya’.

He shook his head and Aerlid’s heart fell.
‘I work next one over.’ he said.

At that Aerlid beamed. ‘Do you sell clothes,
fa?’

The man nodded and smiled slightly. ‘I
suppose you’ll be wanting some?’

‘Yes, please.’ he tried and failed to keep
relief from his voice.

Aerlid waited for the man to unlock and open
the door. The store was dark inside. Aerlid tried to wait out of
the way while the man bustled around. He kept the door open with a
doorstop and unshuttered the windows. The effect was immediate.
Aerlid blinked to keep the spots from his eyes as the shop lit up
brightly. There was no glass in the windows.

The shop was quite small. A small selection
of clothes and other items were displayed along the walls. At the
back of the room was a counter, and behind this another room filled
with boxes.

‘So, have a look around. When you find what
you like I’ll fetch it from the back for you.’

Aerlid had a wander around and examined all
the items. It didn’t take long. Like the buildings of Astar, the
clothes were well made and serviceable but not much to look at. It
was more a matter of choosing the right size than choosing what he
liked. In a few minutes he had the sizes he wanted. The man
disappeared for a few moments before returning with his items; two
new pairs of clothes for Aerlid and Riley.

‘That’ll be a square bar half.’

It was then Aerlid realized he had a
problem.

The shopkeeper smiled as Aerlid looked at
him blankly. He took some money out from under the counter and laid
it out carefully. He pointed at the smallest piece, ‘this is an
eighth.’ he pushed two eights together and put them next to a whole
piece of the same size. ‘Two eighths make a quarter.’ He then
pushed the eighths and the quarter together. ‘Two quarters make a
half bar and two half bars make a bar.’ He glanced up at Aerlid who
nodded to show he understood. ‘Two bars make a square, two squares
make a half and two halves make a block.’