Siberia (8 page)

But the Lindquists didn’t run away. They tumbled out of the nutshell, fell off the edge of my skirt, and dived into a bundle on the lumpy mattress, their almost invisible whiskers quivering madly, ten tiny berry eyes shining.

My heart welled up with love and tenderness.

“It’s all right,” I whispered. “I’m here. I’m your guardian now.”

Mama had said I should talk to them. They would hear my voice as a distant booming, but they would feel—by magic, I supposed—that I was telling them things, and they would like that. It worked. The kits slowly dared to unbundle, and began to creep around: making tiny forays, and scuttling back to huddle again.

I had not remembered how sweet they were. They were
lovely
. They had whiskery snouts and tiny pink noses, black eyes and round ears set close to their heads. Their limbs stood out at the shoulders and the hips, so they scurried like bugs, not slinking or striding like a dog or a cat, but there was nothing disgusting about them. Their tiny tails were covered with fur, not naked like rats’ tails. Their coats were bright brown, with minute bars of darker brown across their backs, and running down their arms.

I felt a tickling on the palm of my hand. I opened my fingers, and saw the sixth Lindquist busy licking up a smear of berry jam from my finger. Its tiny claws caught on the white raised lines which were the marks of Nivvy’s love bites, of long before. Without a thought I reached for the jar Nicolai had given to me, which was on the shelf beside the lamp. I dug out a fingertipful, and offered it. The little creature grabbed on to my giant finger with its doll’s house paws, and licked with its doll’s house tongue.

A tingling shock ran through me.

I was sure this
special
kit, the kit I had chosen without realizing it, must be Nivvy. It was Nivvy, come again. My mama’s magic had caused me to pick him out, and caused me to feed him so he would start to grow into the second stage. He would be my dear companion. I held my cupped hand close to the lamplight—very careful not to get too near the flame—and examined my new friend carefully, while its brothers and sisters continued their miniature adventures. I wasn’t afraid anymore that they would run away. I
knew
they would always stay close.

Suddenly a different shock swept over me, a shock like waking up from a dream. I was not little Rosita anymore. I was thirteen. How could I believe in this fairy tale? I had done all the practical things, I’d started the Lindquist process without a slip, but I had been sleepwalking. I couldn’t make sense of what I knew. It was all in pieces, a muddle of childish ideas and bewildering explanations, that wouldn’t fit together. My head started spinning, in wild confusion.

What
are
these things? Is this really
magic
?

How did my mother get hold of them? What does it all mean?

The kits got into a very tight huddle. That was the first time I found out how easily they could read my feelings: I’d frightened them. I put the kit that had eaten back with the rest, because my hands were shaking too much for me to hold it, and set the open nut down beside them. Eagerly, obediently, they all climbed in.

“Go to sleep,” I whispered. “We’ll play again in the morning.”

I’d sealed them into their home, with my shaking hands. I got the oil and topped up my lamp, and went through everything again. My heart was beating so it drummed in my ears. There
must
be a message! A few words, anything, anything, that would explain what was going on. . . . I took out the extra tubes, the tightly packed envelopes, the new-treat and cleaning powders from the base of the white case. There was something else in there, tucked in at the bottom. I pulled it out. I was holding a small photograph: head and shoulders of a man. I’d never seen it before. I thought it couldn’t have been kept in the case when I was a child: Mama must have put it here while I was away. It had been a color photo, but the colors had faded to shades of yellow and brown, and the surface was all cracked. A man with a long straight nose, arched eyebrows, a short dark beard; wearing glasses.

There was no name, no date, nothing written on the back. I could only guess that this might be my father. There was a lump in my throat, as I tried hard to see the
person,
through the cracks and the fading. When had this picture been taken? What would this man look like now? If Mama had left me a picture of my dadda, what did that mean? But maybe she had not “left me” anything. Maybe she’d had warning that they were coming for her. She’d put all her treasures together, getting ready to escape, but then—

I heard the noise of a motor engine.

A car, not a tractor, was snarling as it struggled up our horrible track. I quickly shoved everything back into the box, shoved it into the locker under the bed-cupboard, and put out my lamp. The room didn’t go dark. . . . There was light outside, which I hadn’t noticed before: and I could tell it wasn’t the dawn. I tiptoed to our hut’s only window, which was small and grimy. I could make out a group of people standing on the corner of our “street” of mud and rocks and holes, carrying flickering rag-and-oil torches. They looked like big teenagers, or very young men. They were obviously waiting for the snarling vehicle, which was getting closer.

There were no vehicles in our Settlement except the Community Tractor, which was Nicolai’s prize possession. The only people in the wilderness who had their own transport were the bandits: who had no fixed towns or villages, they lived in great caravans, continually on the move. Only the bandits we called the Mafia had actual private cars. I watched as a powerful brute of a car came lumbering out of the darkness, its headlights cutting swathes of yellow light. I saw the figures on the corner waving their torches, and the men getting out when the car stopped: the kind who have guns. I knew straightaway that this had something to do with me.

It was mostly women and children who were sent to Settlements like ours: the families guilty of being related to criminals. The few men were either old, or broken in some way, like Mr. Snory the senior teacher with his lung disease; or they were small-time officials like Nicolai. Boys who grew up here got taken off to labor camp when they were about sixteen, if they didn’t run away first. The figures out there, waiting to show the gangsters where I lived, were probably boys I’d gone to school with, boys only a year or two older than me. I didn’t expect that to make any difference.

Mafia.

I backed away from the window.
“They’re crazy,”
I muttered.

What did they think I had in here? Gold and jewels?

I found my knapsack, put the Lindquists’ box in the bottom of it, then piled in the food Katerina had brought. Better not leave anything: I stuffed the makings of my lamp and my hank of string into the outer pocket, and added Nivvy’s grain jar. I did all this without pausing for breath, thinking only: I’ve got to get out of here!

Our hut had been searched long ago, but the Mafia have long memories. Someone must have tipped them off that the city woman’s daughter was coming back today. They believed in my mother’s legacy, and they thought I could be made to talk. . . . I tiptoed into the workshop, heading for the back door, not caring about the red light. But where could I go? I couldn’t knock on anybody’s door. If there was any neighbor brave enough to take me in, I couldn’t do that to them. It wouldn’t save me, it’d just mean they suffered the same fate. I’d have to spend the night outdoors, hiding while the bandits ransacked my house. At this season I’d survive, but was there anything I could use to cover me? Yes! There was the tarpaulin that covered the nail machine.

I dragged it off, bundled it up, and slipped out into the night. It was darker and colder than I’d expected. I could hear the men hammering at the door of our hut. All else was silent. The people who had collected their spare food for Maria’s daughter weren’t going to help me now. I wished I could still run like the wind: except there was nowhere to run. . . . My knees got weak, I was so afraid. All I could do was crouch down in the pillar space, under the hut at the corner of our back alley, with the tarp pulled over me like a stiff, thick cloak. The bolt on the door of my mama’s hut gave way soon. I heard them breaking in, and wondered how long it would take them to realize there was nothing to find.

I could see a swathe of the potholed track, and the big black car, all plastered with mud. A lookout, wearing a cap with earflaps, was walking up and down, holding a rifle. I didn’t see how I could get by him. Terrible crashing sounds came from inside the hut. They must be breaking up the concrete floor! “What do you think I’ve got?” I muttered, hiding my face. . . . I don’t know what happened after that. Maybe someone was careless with one of the rag-and-oil torches. Maybe the bandits set fire to Mama’s hut on purpose, out of frustration. All I know is that there was a lot of yelling. Shots were fired, figures burst out of the open door. When I dared to look again, flames were leaping into the sky.

The men jumped back into the big car and it thundered away. My neighbors came leaping from their huts, shouting and carrying buckets. They had to put out the blaze, to save their own homes. For me, there was nothing left to be saved. I straightened my stiff limbs and limped away, in a daze, still under my tarp. No one noticed me.

By the time I’d left the last huts behind it had started to rain: the hard, biting rain that comes before the first snows. Sleety drops rattled on my carapace. Once I stumbled into a pothole that sent water spilling down inside my boots. I kept going until I reached the potato patches. I had remembered the blackthorn hedge: the only shelter I could think of, between here and the distant forest, where I would not be turned away. I burrowed under the branches, my stiff cloak protecting me from the thorns. I tugged a fold of it between me and the wet ground, and it made a good bivvy. I longed to make sure the Lindquists were safe, but I was afraid to get them out, in case something else suddenly happened . . . so I just cuddled the knapsack in my arms. Soon I was even warm.

I must have dozed, listening to the machine-gun rattle of the rain. I didn’t notice when it softened into a gentle, cat’spaw pattering. When I roused myself and looked out, it was full daylight and everything had changed. The sordid mud and withered litter had vanished, the ground was pure, smooth white. I sat under my snail-shell tarp, and thought about my options.

I was afraid to go back to the Settlement. I had nothing left there: nowhere to live, no work; nobody who would take me in, and the Mafia would be back, looking for me. They knew I hadn’t been in the hut when they torched it. What would they do when they caught me, or when my neighbors handed me over? Maybe this is it, I thought. Time to lie down and die.

But I was too proud to die right there.

It came over me that there was only one thing left to do. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. . . . I had the Lindquists, I had the map and the compass. I had a bit of food. I had everything of value I possessed, right there in my arms. Obviously, I must go north. North to the forest, through the forest to the sea. I had thought of waiting until I was grown up, but there would never be a better time. I would take my mama’s mysterious treasure to the city where the sun always shines, and maybe, who knew, she would come and find me there.

It was a plan, anyway: better than having no plan at all. I took out my hunk of con cheese, broke off a fragment, and ate it while I thought about how to start.

The first thing was to get right away from the Settlement, before anyone came looking for me. Then I’d need somewhere to regroup, and collect supplies. I couldn’t start on a journey of hundreds of miles with just a few scraps of food. When Mama and I had planned our trek we’d imagined saving up for years, putting together stocks of cans, rope, lamp oil, all the things we might need. . . . I couldn’t do that, but I knew where I should head for, though the thought of it scared me.

I didn’t mind being on foot for a while. I had a limp, and I was certainly slow: but I was strong, after the years at New Dawn. The snow was more of a problem. Every step I took I’d be leaving a trail visible for miles. My tarp was another poser. Though it had kept me warm, it was completely sodden: but I was determined to take it with me. I crawled out from under the hedge. There was no one in sight, and there’d be no reason for anybody to come to the potato patches this morning, so I felt reasonably safe. I spread my sodden house and folded it into the neatest bundle I could manage, which I tied to my knapsack with the string.

I’d hardly started walking, trying to keep to puddles and stones where I’d leave less of a trail, when I heard the tractor. I ran for cover, dodged down behind the nearest heap of boulders, and looked back. I could soon see that the driver wasn’t Nicolai. It was a boy, a teenager: someone I recognized. I ducked out of sight, and looked up into the gray sky. There would be more snow. My trail would be covered: but I would be out in it, without a coat, a wet mountain of tarpaulin on my back. Just getting as far as my boulders had shown me what it would be like trying to tramp across this country before it was frozen. . . .

I made up my mind and set out at a trot, cutting across the next bend. Then I stood and waited, the bundled tarp in my arms. The tractor stopped, and Storm looked down from the cab.

It was four years since he’d tried to help me over the plain names business, when I was a conceited kid. He must be sixteen now: I wondered why he hadn’t run away. Wasn’t he afraid of being taken to labor camp? I couldn’t tell anything from his expression. In the Settlements we didn’t show our feelings very much.

“I heard you were back,” he said, dryly. “Word got around.”

I nodded. “What’s my mother’s house look like this morning?”

“Like a hole in the ground,” said Storm. “You’re in trouble, girl. They all think you’ve got some secret stash. Have you any plans?”

“Yes. . . . I have a plan. What are you doing, driving Nicolai’s tractor?”

“Delivery run.” Storm glanced over his shoulder, and grinned. The cart was half full of bulging sacks. No more needed be said: we both knew how our world worked. He was part of an empire like the one Rose and I had made, involving an unofficial trade in Settlements Commission supplies.