First Fall: The Canoe Thief Page 6

  Fox was rigid with frustration, breathing shallow, teeth bared. Each time Tare slowed he would groan in frustration, his own hand working Tare’s member harder and faster. It was almost painful, but that only made it easier for Tare not to get lost in the moment.

  When Fox was only moments away from going completely insane, or taking matters into his own hands, Tare took Fox’s cock deep into the back of his throat. His tongue whipped wildly back and forth across the base and sucked Fox hard until the thick taint of seed spilled into his mouth. He swallowed and didn’t stop until he was sure Fox was completely dry and limp.

  Sitting up, Tare looked down at Fox. His eyes were closed, his chest rising fast, but as Tare watched it started to slow. He sat very still, not even wanting to breathe too loud, lest Fox open his eyes and become aware of his surroundings again. His own cock was still hard, forgotten by Fox completely and tapping against Tare’s thigh. He ignored it, eyes locked on Fox as his body started to relax.

  It was still warm, but the tree overhead kept them shaded from the sun. Insects buzzed, but few birds were active. There was only the murmur of the stream and the hush of the leaves.

  It only took two minutes, less perhaps, and Fox was sleeping soundly.

  Slowly, as silently as he was able, Tare rose to his feet. He waded back into the creek and pulled himself back up onto the far bank. Taking the canoe meant leaving Fox stranded, but Tare would come back for him later in the evening.

  Or perhaps he’d send someone else. Fox was not going to be in a good mood by then at all.

  * * *

  India missed little about Eden. It had been a prison, a decorated cage, and the Varekai like dogs, compelled to obey or suffer deprivation. However there had been lots of edible and medicinal plants in Eden. They had gardens and books there. Sometimes, the teachers would show them videos of other places and other Varekai. But after the world had been born, those things hadn’t worked anymore. The screens were black. The plants, in the lightless shell of Eden, had died.

  The tribe had gone back several times, in those early months when they still had no home and no understanding of the seasons. They’d looked for new sisters, waiting for Eden to deliver as it always had, but it had remained dark and dead and silent. India had gathered books on those brief ventures into the pitch-black shell, and when they had crossed the channel to the archipelago she had taken them with her.

  She read them over and over until she had memorized the plants within. Their names, scientific and common, and their uses. When she could, she took her canoe out and looked for new seedlings, ones from her books that she hadn’t found yet, so she could clip them and propagate them closer to home.

  Many of the herbs and fruits wouldn’t grow on the islands because of the climate. There were some she was still hoping to find. Some she hoped would help Whiskey with her blood sickness and some better antibiotics.

  Still, nothing she had come across had told her how to make new Varekai. How to replenish their numbers. Even so, it was important work, and the other Varekai appreciated it. Though, the undercurrent of expectation was always there, the problem they all expected her to solve. Sometimes she just had to get away. She was too small to be a hunter, and she got bored staying at the village, tending the garden and mending things. Searching for answers that just were not there.

  Some gathering places were more dangerous than others, though, and collecting along the northern islands was the worst. It was also the most fruitful. Seeds would blow across from the more temperate mainland and take root on the harsh cliff faces. If India didn’t look often, the little plants might die before she could replant them.

  She had brought an anchor and a tomahawk with her ropes. Yesterday she had spotted what she hoped was night-blooming jasmine, twelve feet up a rock face. She hadn’t been able to reach it then, but if she could stabilize the boat, she was willing to try to climb to it.

  She tied the bow to a barnacle-encrusted rock, turning the boat so it was facing the east, the rope pulled taut by the southern flow. She hoped the canoe would not be bumped around too much and leak while she was climbing.

  She pulled herself up, hand over hand, toes digging into the niches in the stone. The rocks were jagged and crumbly, and to keep herself from falling she had to really dig in. In minutes her fingers and toes were bleeding. She drew level with the little plant and grinned. It was night-blooming jasmine. And it was doing well in the crevasse it had found in the stone.

  She wriggled her toes, then glanced down at the water a dozen feet below her. She could see the way the island seemed to curve into nothing under the waves, eaten away by the channel. The deep blue surface of the ocean twirled with the fierce currents below.

  Swallowing, she turned her attention back to the jasmine. No need to uproot it when it looked so healthy. She would just take a clipping and leave the parent plant to flourish.

  She squeezed a healthy shoot with her fingernails, pinching it off and tucking it into the strap of her leather top. There was a sudden grinding sound, and India jolted downward. She gasped, her arms pinwheeling as she tilted back into empty space.

  She clawed at the rocks, her fingertips shredding. For a moment, her balance stabilized, then the rocks she was standing on gave way, and she plummeted downward, her knee and head clipping the canoe as she torpedoed into the deep blue water.

  She sank, stars in her vision, and then felt a tug. She thought it was her own buoyancy pulling her upward, and she relaxed, expecting to break the surface. But when she ventured to open her eyes, she saw the rocky side of the island rushing by and the surface shimmering far above her. She was already caught in the current, being dragged along like seaweed. She was going to drown here, alone. She was going to die for a jasmine clipping.

  She panicked, kicking wildly as her injured knee sent sharp stabs of pain up her thigh. Her head was spinning, everything seemed the wrong way up, and for a terrifying moment she thought she was swimming down. She popped up into the air, gasped once, and the current yanked her under again. She had to fight her way back, and when she broke the surface a second time, she heard someone yelling.

  “India!”

  She spun in the water and saw a canoe forcing its way across the current. The voice was Elikai, and she caught a glimpse of Tare before she was jerked under again. She wanted to scream, to reach for her, even if she was an Elikai, but the surface was too far over her head.

  India battled to keep her head above the water. She saw Tare, still paddling madly toward her. Her head was throbbing; her knee felt as if a shark had it. She couldn’t do this much longer.

  “Grab my hand!” Tare leaned out of the canoe, reaching for her. She reached out too, sank under the water again, then a hot hand closed over her own.

  She was hoisted upward with surprising strength and dumped into the bottom of the canoe, where she rolled over to cough up a mouthful of water.

  “Are you okay?” Tare was looking down at her with earnest blue eyes, the sun turning her gold hair into a shimmering halo around her head.

  India nodded, but was still coughing too much for words. The Elikai wasn’t paddling anymore. The canoe was slowly spinning in the current, and the islands whipped past at an alarming speed. When they passed the archipelago, they would be carried out into the open ocean. They needed to get back to land, any land, before the current turned south.

  “We have to paddle,” she croaked.

  Tare glanced at the islands, which suddenly seemed small and far away. “We can’t make it. We’re going to run out of island before we get back.”

  India looked north. They were closer to the mainland now. “There. We’ll land on the beach. We’ll walk east as far as we can and cross the channel again.”

  Tare nodded and grabbed the paddle, the muscles in her arms and shoulders bunching and rippling. But there was only one oar, and In
dia could only sit there, useless.

  The beach slid by, mile after mile, until it seemed to India they would be swept out to sea after all. Then quite suddenly the water under them became shallow, and the pull on the boat lessened. Tare was red and breathing hard, sticky with her own sweat.

  India took the oar from her and guided the canoe the rest of the way to shore. When she hopped out into the shallow water to pull the boat onto the sand, Tare was trembling with fatigue. She sank down in the shallow water and floated, letting the low waves batter her about.

  India pulled the canoe up the beach into the grasses, her knee protesting like a spear wound, then hobbled back down into the surf to catch Tare’s arm. “Come on. There could be crocodiles.”

  That got Tare to her feet in a hurry, but she still staggered onto the beach with the stiff gait of exhaustion.

  They sat on the grass. Across the channel the islands were just little stones, floating on the water. It seemed impossibly far.

  “Why did you save me?” They both could have died, and there was no reassurance they still wouldn’t. The mainland was more dangerous than the islands, and they were sorely lacking the tools they needed to protect themselves.

  Tare looked uncomfortable. “You were going to drown.”

  “Yes, I was. But the Varekai and the Elikai...we aren’t friends.”

  “I forgot,” she said gruffly.

  “How do you forget something like that?”

  “Just drop it, already. Aren’t you glad I was there?”

  India was silent for a moment. “Yes.”

  “Well then. Don’t complain.”

  She wasn’t complaining, exactly, but this looked too much like bloodlust. Now didn’t seem to be the time to bring that up, though.

  India’s knee was swollen, turning red already, and soon it would be purple. Her head hurt too, and when she held up a wet lank of her own hair, the water dripping off it was rust-red. She stood up. “We should move. It’s a long walk before we can launch the canoe again.”

  “No.” Tare stood up. “It’s too far. You’re tired and...” Tare noticed her injuries all at once and reached for her. India pulled back, alarmed, and Tare let her hand drop.

  “We need to get you dry and warm. Tomorrow we’ll build a big fire. They’ll be looking for us. They’ll see the smoke and come to get us. We just need to shelter here and find food for a few days.”

  India was silent. They had to get back to the islands. There were dangerous animals here that never crossed the channel. Jaguars and tigers. Giraffes, camels, horses and paraceratherium, which the old Eden videos said once wasn’t alive but now roamed the world again. Maybe worse things. Who knew what people from the world before had brought back to life?

  When India didn’t say more, Tare got up and took her knife, cutting down palm branches and finding dry wood. India helped as best she could, and soon they had turned the canoe into a makeshift shelter with a fire burning merrily on the sand nearby. Tare cracked some coconuts, and they drank the milk and picked at the white flesh. The sky was turning orange. Soon it would be night, and the trees would come alive with things they couldn’t see.

  “How are you feeling?” Tare asked.

  “I have a headache, but I am okay. My knee is worse.”

  “It looks bad.” There was period of silence and Tare added, “We aren’t very far from Eden.”

  India shuddered. “I’d prefer to be here than there.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t want to see the bodies. Or our little houses. I don’t want to remember how things were.”

  Tare stared at the fire. “Things were good. You ruined it for everyone.”

  She shook her head, feeling a vague sense of irritation. “It wasn’t like that. It was justice we wanted. We only drew blood when they refused.”

  “Justice for what?” Tare asked. “What was so bad you had to destroy Eden?”

  There was a long silence.

  “November,” India said quietly. It had been a long time since she’d talked about it. Once the world was born, they’d all wanted to remember November, but not what had happened to her. It was odd now, to be telling this Elikai. Odd that for all this time, none of the Elikai even knew how it had happened. Romeo should have told them. She was there, after all. “She was one of our sisters. One of the teachers in Eden took her away, and when she came back she was bleeding and bruised, and she said the teacher forced herself inside her. We demanded the teacher be brought and put to trial, but the other teachers refused. It was their law, their teaching, but they held themselves exempt.” Just remembering made India’s pulse rise.

  “Which teacher?” Tare asked.

  “Not one we had seen before. She was like an Elikai, hairy and big. Teacher Steve, they called her.”

  “So you killed them for that?” Tare asked. “You destroyed Eden for some blood and tears?”

  “No. November got worse.” India tried to keep her voice steady. “She cried for months. She wouldn’t eat or wash. Then she cut herself, all over, until she bled to death. When they refused us Steve again, we were mad with grief. Our sister was dead. She would never come back. That’s when we killed them.”

  “Why would a teacher do something so bad? They raised us. They looked after us.”

  India shrugged. The anger and pain still felt raw after all this time. “We didn’t know Eden would end and the world would begin. We just mourned our sister.”

  Chapter Six

  Tare remembered the first blood. Life had been tranquil in Eden. The teachers, bigger and so much taller, gave the Elikai new brothers and food. They taught them algebra and linguistics, farming and sewing. They had played soccer and tended the animals.

  Then the Varekai had burst through the walls, slaughtering all the teachers with farming tools and broken furniture. The blooding had been so fast and so furious, the Elikai had no time to react. No time to decide if they should protect their elders or flee. Some of the teachers had died before the Varekai even reached them, bleeding out their eyes and ears, collapsing and convulsing, only to have the Varekai descend on them in their rampage.

  Eden had gone dark. For nearly a week they had survived in that darkness, with the maggot-infested bodies and the fetid pools of blood. It had been Tare who had become desperate and taken an axe to the wall. Then, together, the Elikai had hacked their way through the shell, like a chick chipping free of an egg. Somehow, the world was born. They had tumbled out into the sun for the first time, fresh and awed and stupid.

  Tare didn’t know what to say now India had told him the truth. He tried to imagine what he would have done if it had been one of his brothers broken and dead, and decided the Elikai would have acted the same.

  “You should lie down in the back of the canoe,” he said finally.

  India glanced at him. “Why?”

  “Because your knee is hurt. I can protect you if something attacks us in the night.”

  India crawled into the shelter awkwardly. The evening air was growing cold, and their clothes were sodden. India took his off, stretching out naked on the grass and sand. Tare followed his example and hung their gear on the back of the canoe, hoping it would be dry by morning.

  He stretched out in front of India. With the palm leaves covering the opening, they were protected from the breeze. The air inside the canoe quickly grew warmer, and they could see the glow of the fire, just outside.

  “Thank you,” India said quietly. He could see the witchdoctor’s eyes glittering in the darkness. “I didn’t say it yet.”

  Tare smiled, shuffling closer so their sides were pressed together for added warmth. His cock, always lacking tact and timing, was rock-hard against the sand.

  “You owe me. Just sleep, okay? We’ll work on getting back home tomorrow.”

&
nbsp; * * *

  India had not come home.

  A mad panic had ensued shortly before sundown, and after hours of searching Tango had come back with India’s canoe. She had found it empty, still secured by its rope to one of the islands by the channel.

  The news was received with grim misery. It was likely India had fallen and drowned, or been swept away out to sea. With night falling, searching was pointless, and it seemed they had lost another sister. Their witchdoctor. Their last, best hope to ever find a way to make new sisters. India’s death did not just mean losing another member of the tribe, but also their future.

  Dinner around the fires was muted. Many women had already retired to their huts, and the soft sound of sobbing carried in the evening air.

  Charlie held her own elbows, empty and cold. The food in her bowl nauseated her, and she wanted nothing more than to sink into her furs and sleep, but she and India shared a hut. Tonight, that hut would be empty, and in the morning Charlie would wake up alone.

  She couldn’t bear the thought of it.

  In a show of solidarity, Whiskey sat beside her. She wasn’t eating either. Rather, she was making a little map of the archipelago in her stew.

  “Do you want to sleep in my tent?” she asked. Whiskey slept alone. She did not enjoy the company of others. She could be affectionate, rarely, but she avoided true intimacy. Shunned it, with a faint sense of revolt. Just offering to share her bed was a big gesture on her part.

  Charlie sighed. “No, I think I’ll go for a walk.”

  “Alone?”

  Charlie shook her head no.

  They rose as one, padding into the trees. Charlie intended to go to the spring for a drink, but instead, when they reached the junction in the path, she turned toward the alcove they docked their canoes in. There was a cluster of young crocodiles on the sand, their eyes glittering in the moonlight, and they scampered back into the water as Charlie and Whiskey approached.

  India’s canoe was there, pulled up onto the sand with the others. Charlie caressed it with her fingertips, willing time to go backward, so she could stop her sister from leaving.