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water gives us our power,” Josh pronounced. “I can make fire from water.”
The man with the hirsute face violently shook his head back and forth. Beauty looked ready to leap.
Josh walked away from the bank with slow, deliberate movements. He gathered up a handful of dried grass and bark, then brought it back down to the river and set it on the shore. The crossbow and the zip gun followed him like afterthoughts.
He picked a long blade of green grass and tied a little loop in it, too small to let a berry pass through. Then he dipped the blade of grass in the river. When he pulled it out there was a bead of water balanced delicately in the loop. The others watched these mysterious manipulations in fascination.
Holding one end of the grass blade, he positioned its loop six inches over his pile of dry grass, as the hot postmeridian sun glared through the refractive bead of water. He moved the liquid lens up and down a few inches until the focal point fell into the center of the kindling. Then he simply sat, motionless.
They watched him. No one spoke.
In a few minutes smoke began to rise from under the tiny glare of the water-beaded grass-loop. Joshua blew lightly on it. The smoke disappeared and then floated up heavier until the dry tinder erupted in soft yellow flame.
The creatures backed off except for the hooded woman. She stood, unmoving.
“Your power is from the water,” she said finally. She made a sign to the others, and they ran off into the forest that lined the south side of the river.
Beauty was amazed. “Where did you learn that?”
“In a book,” shrugged Josh.
“Scribes,” Beauty shook his head tolerantly. “You are lucky you were not hanged for a sorcerer.”
“Words make the strongest magic sometimes.”
“Silence is stronger,” said the Centaur.
“I’m talking about written words.”
“Then why did you not just scribble something in the sand for the BASS to read?” Beauty snapped.
“BASS don’t trust people who read or write.” He spoke with the tolerant condescension of one who knows himself to be right, but appreciates the ignorance of others.
Beauty became thoughtful. “They are far north for BASS.”
“Raiding party, maybe,” agreed Joshua.
Just then there was a soft humming noise behind them. They turned. Sitting on the bank was the Flutterby, its red-and-gold wings moving slowly up and down with a hopeful expectant smile on its black little face.
“She followed us!” exclaimed Josh.
“Go back, little one,” Beauty spoke calmly to the timid creature. The face remained upturned at Josh.
“You can’t come with us,” said Josh. “We’re hunters.” The frequency of the hum rose as its tiny heart beat faster.
“She cannot keep up,” concluded Beauty. “Come.”
Josh and Beauty turned and trotted east upriver, looking for signs of their prey. The Flutterby’s face fell, but she lifted herself airward and floated calmly, high above her new friends.
*****************************************************
There was no trace of the Accident upstream, so the hunters returned west. They found evidence of the wounded creature’s exodus from the river around sundown, and followed the trail into the woods until those thinned out to clear, open fields.
It was near midnight when they saw the red light in the distance, the creature’s foul footprints leading directly toward it. They looked at each other and started walking in the same direction. It was the old brothel they were approaching, and the Accident was there.
In Which It Is Seen That Life Is A River of Pain
TORCHES filled the cave with grimy light. Close to ninety Humans cowered at one end, herded into the corner by a dozen Accidents, as the vile creatures exchanged harsh mutterings in their guttural language. At the other end of the cave a flock of vampires mingled. Many slept among a cluster of empty tumbrils. Some were talking, some made plans. Two were feeding off the white dying body of a man named Moorelli.
The smoke from the torches twisted, like so many wraiths, to the ceiling, where it hid in the recesses, breathlessly still. The Accidents chose a few of their group to stand guard, while the rest went to sleep in whatever stagnant pools they could find. Accidents loved to repose in the thin slime of moldy caverns. It was near midnight.
None of the Humans slept.
“What are they going to do with us?” Dicey asked Rose for the twentieth time. They huddled near the center of the confined area, surrounded by the terrified faces of their fellow prisoners. “Are we going to die?” she begged for reassurance.
Rose stroked her young friend tenderly. “They won’t kill us, child. If they were going to, they’d have done so by now.” She almost believed this herself. In any event, her words eased Dicey’s mind. Each time Rose spoke like this, the young girl’s face became visibly soothed. Ollie wasn’t so fortunate. He’d remained mute and transfixed ever since the ordeal at the cabin. He sat in Rose’s lap now like a too-real doll.
“If I only had something to write with,” Dicey went on whispering, “I know I could get us out of here.”
Rose nodded patiently. Though she could read somewhat, she didn’t belong to the religion of Scribery; she had no real faith in the magic of writing. Still, she would do nothing to quell Dicey’s hope.
Dicey went on. “If Josh were here he could write some powerful lines. He can turn Word into Sword. He could read them all to sleep and we could walk out of here.”
Rose smiled. “I don’t think Accidents care much about reading.”
“Why are they doing this to us?”
“Accidents hate Humans and that’s just the truth. Don’t know about these Vampires and the others. My mother used to talk about vampires back south. Hateful creatures. The Accidents look horrible, I know, but I just pity them.”
“How come Accidents hate us so much?” Dicey asked, passing her gaze over the loathsome beasts.
“Accidents used to be Humans, a long time ago, before there were Scribes, when Centaurs lived on their own land, and Vampires never flew north of the line. Used to be Human, but they drank a potion they thought would make them Gods, and that’s what they turned into. Now they hate the Humans who are left for not taking the potion.”
“That’s not what it said in the book.”
“Books don’t know everything, child.”
“Don’t call me child,” Dicey pouted. “And books do too know everything. And the book I read said there were no such things as Accidents, they were just figments of imagination that we invented to punish ourselves.”
“These Accidents are real. Their smell alone ought to be enough to gag you.” That was the trouble with Scribery, as far as Rose was concerned. Much of it was fairy tale; it didn’t distinguish between history and metaphor.
The young girl was silent. Two monstrous fiends near the wall squabbled over the remnants of an old man they were eating. Dicey looked like she might become hysterical. Rose turned her around by the shoulders.
“Let me read your eyes,” she told the girl, to keep her occupied. She stared into Dicey’s left eye. It was dark, opaque. Like an endless night.
“What do you see?” asked Dicey.
“Happiness