Moon-Flash by Patricia A McKillip

Author:Patricia A McKillip
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-09-18T16:00:00+00:00

7

SHE WOKE UP at dawn, when Terje stopped the boat. The river was flat grey, and so slow the boat barely drifted when he raised the oars. He held them suspended like wings while he stared at the banks. She lifted her head. The land was harsh, treeless; nothing moved around them but thin mists, uncoiling and wisping away from the great stone faces that were watching them.

Kyreol felt a finger of cold run up and down her spine. She moved forward, pushing herself against Terje’s back for comfort.

“What are they?” she whispered.

The faces were scattered all over the banks. They were black, elongated, with big, distant eyes under frowning brows, and full, straight mouths. They looked taller than houses. Stone giants, who had been buried to their necks in the earth, and then forgotten.

She felt Terje draw a soft breath. “They don’t want us here,” he said, trying to figure out what story they were telling. He was right, Kyreol felt; they made her want to leave quickly.

“But what are they guarding? There’s nothing here.” She was still whispering, as though the stone ears could hear. “Terje, they don’t look angry. Not like the mask-faces. They look…” What did they look? Cold, lonely, fierce, stuck in dead earth beside the still river… Sad?

“Ask the stone.”

But the stone didn’t answer; maybe it was still asleep. “Joran,” Kyreol said, correcting herself. “Joran is asleep.” Stones didn’t speak, not even this one. But stone faces seemed to speak, in a language far simpler than words. She wanted Terje to row again, quickly, but before she could say that, she heard her mouth say, “I want to go look at them.”

Terje turned around. His mouth was open; he closed it, a mute stubborness spreading over his face. “I don’t.”

“But, Terje—”

“Kyreol, you can hear what the faces are saying. There must be a reason why they’re telling us to stay away. I don’t want to find out what.” She drew breath; he gestured, almost losing the oars. “First we almost kill ourselves going down Fourteen Falls. Then we get captured by mask-people. Then we have to learn another language from someone who talks into a stone, when one language is enough for any world—Kyreol, what are you looking for? What is it you want to know? How much farther do you want to go?”

“I don’t know,” she said. She drew away from him. “I want to do what I want to do. You’re just afraid of missing your betrothal.”

“Kyreol, that doesn’t have anything to do with it!”

“They’re just old stones; they can’t hurt us.”

“They’re not just stones. They’re part of somebody’s ritual. Would you want strangers wandering around in the betrothal caves?”

She pointed, east and west. “Look. Do you see anyone?”

He angled the oars into the boat with a clatter. “But why?” he demanded, bewildered and angry. “Why?”

She was silent. Water lapped against the sides of the boat. Three black birds flew over the greyness. She realized then how far she was taking them both, not only from home, but from a way of looking at the world.

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