The Girl and the Stars

“Because Thurin was tainted and we need to know if he can be trusted again,” said Petrick with brutal honesty. “And you make the stars burn brighter.” The boy glanced back at her, his face lost in darkness, head silhouetted against the glow of Pome’s light.

“You know?” Yaz hadn’t been sure if they did or not.

“Of course. It’s why Arka told me to draw Hetta off you. That was quite a risk. It’s never safe to tangle with that one, however fast you are.” Petrick shuddered. “When you were fleeing from her in the outer caverns I could see each band of stars light up as you ran past. It’s harder to notice close up. But from a distance . . . I saw it before I saw you. Arka said we had to have you then.”

“What does it mean?” Yaz asked.

“Don’t know.” This time Yaz caught the gleam of the boy’s grin. “But it’s not something we’ve seen before. Pome’s the only one of us who can get close to the bigger stars and even he doesn’t like to touch them. Seems like you’re something new!”

At the front of their line Pome led the way through a series of low caverns. In places the slope of the rock reached the ice and gouged patterns in the roof as the flow moved on. Gravel and small round stones formed drifts here and there, giving off an eerie light from stardust caught in the voids among them. Once again Yaz wondered that all this beauty could have existed for so many years beneath her people’s feet without their knowledge. She wondered what else she might find and what other marvels lay silent, miles down, never to be discovered. Did beauty need an observer to matter? Was anything beautiful without someone to think it so? She found herself wondering in this world of different eyes, different hair, different faces, how others saw her. Did Thurin think her ugly? Again she felt guilty. All her thoughts should be bent on saving Zeen, not on childish worries.

The group walked on unspeaking for a while, just the splash of feet, the dripping of meltwater, and the groan of the ice echoing in the caverns. And then a distant roar that froze them in their tracks.

“What was that?” It had seemed to come from behind them.

“Another hunter? From the city?”

“I know what it was,” Petrick muttered.

“Black gods damn it!” Pome started off again, hurrying now.

“What? What was that?” Yaz hissed at Petrick’s back.

“Hetta.”

Yaz went cold, remembering those teeth. “She’s far away though, and we’re close to the settlement?”

“She’s cunning. If you know this place well enough you can use the tunnels to make it sound as—”

A huge shape burst from behind the cover of a rock ridge, diving into their midst. Quina and Petrick moved before Yaz even knew what was happening, both diving clear. Hetta bundled through the rest of them, shouldering Kao aside as though he were nothing, her great hand reaching for Yaz.

“No!”

Thick fingers grazed Yaz’s ribs, catching hold of her coat in a grip that with a better aim could have snagged flesh and bone, crumpling them up as easily as skins.

Yaz threw herself back, twisting. If she’d buttoned and fastened the coat there would have been no escape, but in the heat she wore it loose and open, and now writhed free of it even as Hetta lifted her to slam her against the ice overhead.

She ran then, gasping, outstretching the others around her, panic driving them all.

The sounds of Hetta’s raging fell away behind them and Yaz came to a halt, panting, leaning against the cavern wall. The darkness around them was almost unbroken.

“Why . . . why isn’t she following?” Yaz asked, looking round. “Where’s Pome?”

“Still running.” Petrick raised his arm toward a point of light bobbing away in the distance.

Thurin spat, wiped his mouth, then started to call names. Kao, Yaz, Petrick, and Quina answered when he spoke. “Maya?”

“Is she with Pome?” Yaz asked.

“She couldn’t have run that fast.” Quina shook her dark head. “She’s only little.”

“Hetta has her then,” Kao said.

“If Hetta has Maya, why is she still hunting around back there?” Yaz could see the tainted gerant, the shape of her black against the faint glow of the ice, striding back and forth, kicking through the drifts of stones.

“The girl must be hiding,” Thurin said.

“Well, that won’t work for long. Hetta will sniff her out. She can find you in the dark, that one.” Petrick shivered.

Only when Thurin caught her shoulder did Yaz realise she was starting to walk back toward the raging gerant. “Are you mad? She’ll tear you apart!”

“I was afraid to die once, and it killed someone.” Yaz shook Thurin’s hand from her arm. If she had owned up to her defect at the first gathering someone stronger would have been beside her youngest brother when he needed help and her parents would have Azad with them on the ice today.

“What can you do against Hetta?” Quina shouted after her.

“Finish what I started.” Yaz kept on walking, breaking into a jog now. Her certainty was fading as the black shape grew larger and memory painted detail onto darkness. She wished she had her knife, or better still one of the iron weapons she’d seen the warriors carrying.

“Slow down.” Thurin came up on her right. “We need a plan.”

“Keep stabbing her till she falls over?” Petrick caught up on her left, an iron dagger glimmering in his fist. Some might call Petrick ugly, his face too narrow, mouth too wide, nose long and crooked from some old break. But when he smiled, as he often did, the unbalanced collection of his features found its purpose and he became someone Yaz wanted as a friend.

“Good plan,” she said.

More footsteps behind Yaz: Kao’s heavy tread and Quina’s quick patter. Neither looked eager but perhaps something of her own determination had struck an echo inside them. They had all been thrown away the day before and discarding Maya to her fate wasn’t something any of them could swallow, whatever common sense might dictate.

“Can you do that thing with the roof like Tarko did with the hunter?” Yaz asked Thurin.

“No. Well . . . I don’t think so.” Doubt creased his pale brow. “And if I could, how would I stop it from crushing Maya? We don’t know where she’s hiding.”

It was true, and staring ahead Yaz could see very few places Maya could have concealed herself, unless she was just circling to keep the outcrops of rock between Hetta and herself.

“Kao will have to grapple her legs then, get her on the floor, and the rest of us can pound her while Petrick cuts her throat.”