Although Abe’s beating left me hurting every place from the waist up, the exercise feels good, and the cold’s left me numb. I’ll pay for it tomorrow, but tonight I’m okay. Even the hefty load I’m carrying didn’t bother me too much. I’ve got three bear skins, four sizeable jugs of melted snow water that are starting to freeze, and the “extra cargo”, which basically looks like some big bags of some kind of herb. I want to ask about it, but at this point a question might get me killed.
My muscles start locking up during the hike to the border, but I bite back my grunts and soldier on, determined to bear it like a man. I don’t know why, but I want Abe’s respect now more than ever.
As the cloudbanks roll away overhead, the brilliant night sky looms above, full of more stars than I even knew existed. It’s like the whole sky is stars. And the moon is a pale globe, bigger than I’ve ever seen it, fuller than full. An owl hoots softly somewhere in the forest, as if asking us our names.
We don’t offer them.
The sound of axes tearing into wood clucks through the forest. There are jackers working this late? I wonder to myself. And this far down the mountain—all the way at the border? It doesn’t make sense. There are trees aplenny around the Districts, and more are constantly being planted. We could never harvest them all. Then who?
Abe sticks two fingers in his mouth and whistles. The chopping stops and his whistle is returned. Clearly someone’s expecting us.
We trod on, breaking out from the trees and stepping onto the hard-packed dirt that runs right up to the trees. Further on into the flatlands the landscape is powdery, what the Heaters call sand. I wonder what it’d feel like to walk on it, but I know now’s not the time to find out. We have a job to do.
Out of the tangle of the forest, we walk faster, skirting the edge of our two countries. Ahead of us a group of Heaters emerge from the shadows, lugging axes and picks and shovels. The choppers. Not Icer lumberjacks after all, which makes more sense. But are the Heaters allowed to harvest ice country trees?
Abe doesn’t seem bothered at all, just strides right up, dumps his cargo on the ground in front of them. “It’s all here,” he says. “Extra cargo, too, this time.”
The rest of us catch up and unload everything we’re carrying, save for our sliders. I straighten up, feeling instant relief in my back and bones, hoping there’s no pick up tonight. Hiking back up the mountain will be hard enough without tugmeat strapped to our backs.
With coppery eyes and more black hair than a Yag, a short, barrel-chested man steps forward, hand extended as if ceremonially accepting the trade items. “Thank ye,” he says, his voice scratchier than a gnarled thicket. “Load up, you tugs!” he bellows.
The Heaters behind him move forward and grab the packs and sling them over their backs, staggering under the weight. These men don’t look like the two muscly border guards I saw before. They’re tanned and lean, yah, but their leanness is over the border to skinny. The rags they wear around their midsections are tattered and dirty, like they’ve been wearing them for weeks, maybe months. Scars crisscross their backs, arms, and chests in a pattern that matches the leather, multi-tasseled whip hanging from the bushy-bearded spokesman’s belt.
To me, they look like prisoners.
Chapter Ten
We transfer goods to the fire country prisoners three more times that winter, always at night, always to different locations. The day trips are pretty stock standard, trading ice country goods for fire country goods, but the night trips always include the strange bags of mystery herbs.
“Do you think those herbs are some kind of drug?” I ask Buff as we walk through the Blue District. We’ve given up on the Red District. If someone took my sister there, she’s well hidden, because we’ve scoped out every last shivhole in that shivvy District.
“Can’t be,” Buff says. We’ve talked about the herbs a dozen times, but always end up chasing ourselves in a circle. “The only drug I’ve ever heard of is ice powder. If there was some herb floating around, we’d know about it.”
“Maybe it’s the king’s secret stash,” I say.
“It’s possible,” Buff says. “You mean, kind of like a leader to leader exchange thing.”
“Yah, with the fire country guy—what’s his name?—uh, Roan.” It’s the only explanation I can come up with. Other than that, the herb is just an herb, and why would it require all the night work, secrecy, and smuggling in by Heater prisoners?
I know I shouldn’t care about the herbs, or the trade with the Heaters, or anything other than getting Jolie back, but my theories are the only thing keeping me sane. Every day that passes without seeing Jolie is like a bruise on my soul, an ache in places that are impossible to reach and that don’t heal, not with time, not with talk, not with sleep.