The Reef (9 page)

Yayle held up his hand to protect his eyes from dust.

Jella looked at the horses and her eyes widened. They ought to have been dead, they couldn’t possibly be alive. They were grey, gaunt, each appearing to be no more than a walking skeleton. Jella’s vision followed every bone that seemed to stick out like a fossil; their skin looked as thought it had been sucked inwards. Each rider wore similar black cloaks, and hoods were drawn over their faces. The central rider pushed off, jumped to the floor, airing his cloak. Muscular and tall, he stood still whilst it raised its right hand. Jella saw that it was not a hand at all, more of a claw that was like a crustacean’s. She let go of Lula’s hand and raised her own, then walked forward. It advanced towards her with its cloak flapping in the breeze. Menz, Yayle and Lula did not move, but stared with their mouths open slightly.

‘Welcome to the seas around the Aarc,’ the rider said. Its voice was frail, a hiss. ‘You have not drowned in these sands then?’

‘No, not at all,’ Jella said. She looked straight at the creature and her gaze travelled around the body as if to see what it was, but there were no clues under such loose clothing. There was another long silence.

‘Why’re you here?’ he said. ‘We don’t normally expect any visitors.’

Jella remembered all the stories about the Qe Falta, the false people. She remembered that they were used to scare children who misbehaved. Rumour being the main source of lore, in the absence of information. There were stories that they were a leftover from before the rebellion against science. The Qe Falta had all sorts of combinations of animal parts grafted onto them, in the previous age. Legs exchanged with those of a dog or a cat or worse, and stitched on by science. Monsters were grafted, the stories said, and the people of the age couldn’t stand them or the science that accompanied them. They were forced underground, hidden, secret. They did not want the world to hunt them down, to kill them.

An Age passed, the Qe Falta rose again. Some took to the cause to fight for their recognition, for them not to be shunned as ghouls. Some began to focus on the cities, mainly Escha, since it was industrial, anti-nature. More recently, lives were taken by ‘equality bombs’. A wave of terrorism emerged just so that they could be treated as normal, to live in peace. Small battles were fought. There was much blood, a failed attempt to rid the world of them once again, but they stayed. They remained undetected.

Now they were in front of her: the
ghouls,
the terrorists.

Jella said, ‘We need your help.’

The creature turned his head without moving its torso, taking everyone of the other riders in view, before it gazed at her again from within the darkness of his hood. ‘Help you? Why should we help you? What do you want that would possibly be in our interest to help you?
’

Jella turned to her companions, looked back. ‘I’ve contacted others of your kind race. We’ve a plan that you may be interested in. We think you’d want to support our cause.’

The Qe Falta said, ‘Oh, really? Please, tell more.’

Jella wasn’t sure if the creature was humouring her, but she walked back to the horses to fetch her plans and charts. ‘I’ll show you,’ she said out loud. She couldn’t look at anyone, so she stared out to the desert.

That evening, Jella had watched what thought was possibly the greatest sunset she had ever seen. She was in awe as she sat on the sand with Lula in her arms, staring at the sun as it enlarged. The sky turned purple, and she could see desert mammals rising in the cooler climate. It had become cold now, so they had made a fire using a small pile of wood that the Qe Falta had brought for them. They cooked spiced meats, which satisfied even Menz, who sat with his legs crossed alongside Yayle, playing dice. The four of them remained seated under a dark sky, which seemed somehow larger than they had ever seen, now that they were so far from civilization. The stars came out in their billions.

Lula had said that it was quiet, calm, pretty-which was exactly what Jella thought of the woman in her arms. She did not tell Lula this, as she thought it would be patronising. Sometimes, Jella felt that she was controlling to the point of misogyny-a strange concept for a woman. She wanted a pretty, young girl, one who would not answer her back, and one who would pretty much just sit there, being attractive. It helped if she could shoot well, too. It wasn’t shallow,just that Jella simply couldn’t connect with people on a personal level. The problems she’d experienced in life forced her to focus internally. She was not capable of sharing experiences with someone.

Jella had worked through dozens of ‘relationships’, none of which she had told Lula about. She remembered her teen years where she wanted to have sex with as many women as she could, just to prove she could. She felt an absurd level of control and power when she had her tail inside a girl, rumel or human, though she always preferred the latter. She wondered if she was mistaking sensation for emotion, but in the end she didn’t really care. It wasn’t important. But what she had with Lula was special. Jella could lie in her arms sometimes, and let the girl’s soft nature take over, or she could get a kick out of pleasuring the woman endlessly. There was always something so satisfying about that. Lula wanted simply to be loved, and that was not difficult-in the sense of showing love, tenderness.

Jella combed Lula’s black hair with her fingers.

Yayle glanced towards them, pulling a hood over to conceal his face. He stared at them holding each other.

The group stood up as they heard hooves strike the ground. The low bass sound rode the sand across some distance. Lula could see that there were only three riders this time, silhouetted even against the night. They approached the fire, came to a halt. The claw-man dismounted and landed on the floor within a beat of her heart. He walked towards one of the other bone horses, which did not carry a rider but instead several large bags. Sounds seemed to travel across the horizon. The rider extended his claw, took down the bags, two at a time then placed them on the sand before her partner. She was discomforted by his presence, and feared for Jella a little. Lula wanted no harm to come to her. Sometimes she resented the fact that Jella was involved in such a dangerous lifestyle-but that was who she was, and she respected that. She’d not ever leave her, and that meant putting up with these shady operations.

‘We have the rock boring equipment and explosives that you asked for. The devices are simple, and you should be able to use them. They’ll detonate in deep water, so you needn’t worry.’ He turned, pointed his thick claw in the direction of the other rider then turned his hooded head back.

‘Allocen knows how to use them. He is what we’ve promised to you.’

‘Allocen?’ Jella asked.

‘Yes. He doesn’t talk, but he understands what you’ll say. He can sign to his kin, but you won’t understand that. We have briefed him of his role-it’s only protection that he’ll offer. He won’t do anything he deems too risky.’

‘What good’s that?’ Menz said. ‘What use is he if he ain’t taking a risk?’

The claw-man was silent. He looked back at Allocen who was sitting still on top of the horse, beneath a cloak, hidden in darkness. The claw-man nodded towards Allocen who removed his cloak, dropping it to the desert floor. The group gasped.

Allocen had the head of an insect. Two hemispheres containing hundreds of tiny hexagons were bolted onto his shoulders. There was no discernible face, except for his proboscis and antennae. The abdomen was dark and glossy, resembling the musculature of a human, but it reflected the fire, as the claw-man’s skin did. Lula could see a pair of thin, translucent wings protruding from his back and she wondered vaguely if they would be able carry such creature. She was hypnotised as muscles slid underneath the skin of his thin body, bulging, pushing ropy veins. Attached to his waist were two brown sheathes.

This fly-man twisted his head around his body as if looking far, far out into the desert night. It was as if he could hear and see and smell something that they couldn’t.

The Qe Falta with the claws spoke, his tone lighter. ‘Now, could someone throw something? You, human girl, do you have a musket?’ Lula nodded. ‘Me? I do, why?’

‘Shoot him,’ he said.

‘Sorry?’

‘Shoot him.’ Lula looked to Jella , who nodded back.

It didn’t seem right somehow, but Lula walked to her horse, opened one of her bags, pulled out a long, polished musket. She prepared the weapon, returned to the others. As she did she feared what would happen. ‘You want me to fire, then?’

The man said, ‘I want you to fire. At him.’

She took aim, a little uncertain as to why she was being asked to kill this creature. She raised her weapon at it. He had not moved in the few moments she was away. She placed her finger on the trigger. He still did not move. Lula waited, thinking this some joke. She could feel her pulse in her hand.

‘Shoot him,’ the claw-man said.

Everyone else stared. She pulled the trigger. There was a snapping sound, followed by a high-pitched crack and a spark spat out into the darkness. Lula’s musket smoked.

The fly-man was sitting calmly on his horse and there was a scimitar in one of his hands. The other Qe Falta walked a few steps away, bent down, picked something up off of the sand and carried it to Menz. The rumel couldn’t help stare at the claw as it was extended. His jaw lowered as the claw-man dropped the distorted piece of metal that Lula had fired, and stepped away to rejoin Allocen. Menz showed it to Lula, and it took a second before she realised that this Allocen had sliced the projectile from the sky. They looked up at each other without sharing a word. The sound of the fire crackled in the background. The temperature was falling further.

‘And so you see, he has his uses,’ the claw-man said. He mounted his horse and reached for the reins of the horse without a mount. He slid the bags on to the sand. Then, he looked across at Allocen and nodded. The others said nothing. They looked up from Menz’s hand towards the Qe Falta.

‘If your plan works you’ll be considered to be heroes by many, especially us. You’ll be welcome here. We share your ideals, and so give you our most efficient fighter and some explosives. Not enough to destroy the whole urban sprawl of Escha. There will never be enough for that. I know, from an age ago, and from my travels, that what you seek will very much be able to destroy Escha, providing everything you say is performed accurately. If not destroyed, then damaged greatly. We support this move. Other Qe Falta have spoken of your plans of the contact that you had made to our kind previously, and they remembered both you and the plan. But, to cover our costs -’ He held out his claw. ‘Yes, right.’ Jella walked to her horse, opened a bag. She drew out a purse, walked to the Qe Falta. ‘More than enough.’ He nodded, reached out his claw, which snapped shut on the purse then it disappeared into his cloak.

‘Good luck,’ he said. ‘Your plan’s inventive.
If
it means anything to you, apparently someone received a message from our west coast contact. Your guide, if you recall. He remembered that you would travel at the end of this season, this year, but not so soon. For your plan to succeed for sure, you must not delay. There’ll be a boat waiting for you in a town called Gaya on the west coast, on pier nineteen. Approach it by water, from any village that lies to the south, just to be safe. Make sure no one follows you. That boat’s well equipped.’ He turned his horse, drew the other with him. The animals kicked up sand before they ran off into the night. The thunder of feet could be heard for another minute or so, but after that, there was only the sound of the fire.

One by one they found themselves staring at Allocen. The fly-man did not move from the top of his horse. It left Lula with a strange feeling of protection and unease. Menz fingered the metal shot still. Lula couldn’t tell if Allocen was staring back at any of them. Slowly they sat by the fire, but they all kept an eye in the stranger’s direction.

Jella said, ‘No one can know of our plan, surely? Only the guide knew, I hope it was him. Still, we’ll find out in a few weeks when we get to that boat.’

Lula saw the worry on her face, so held her hand, as if the touch of another would be calming. ‘Do you think someone’s found it before us?’ Yayle said. ‘Officials in Escha or Rhoam maybe.’

‘No, it’s well hidden,’ Jella said. ‘We found it as our knowledge and assistance was advanced. Our guide was the best. Don’t kid yourselves that a government know anything about the natural world.’

Yayle nodded. ‘Well, let’s just hope it’s still there.’

‘It is,’ Jella said. ‘It will be, right. So don’t worry.’

Ten

There is a single beam of sunlight on the table that highlights a book. The little rumel girl runs into the room, looks at the book with a strange sense of awe-and the recognition of potential mischief to be had. The room is full of such books, diagrams, animal specimens. It smells musky. The child picks up the book, sits on a chair, commences reading. She reads for minutes, then what seems like hours. Outside she can hear the sea, a pleasant and soothing sound that only contributes to the moment’s timelessness.

Her father is standing in the doorway, his arms folded, a wide smile on his face. His eyes are fixed on her with all the love a father could muster. Then he walks over to her, picks her up, sits down, places her on his lap, and all this time she is still holding the book as if nothing else exists.