Kingdom of Cages(23)

“Because it’s not true,” said another woman. She sat to Sadia’s right and wore her graying hair in a braid long enough to tuck into her belt. “Listen, what’s your name?” Chena told her. “Listen, Chena.” She leaned forward, and Chena couldn’t tell if she was faking being serious or if she was really trying to be earnest. “The idea is to create and maintain a series of ecologically stable communities so we can continue to live here and be healthy, without any of the troubles they have on the Called worlds, where they just landed and started hacking away at things.”

“You tell her, Mae,” said one of the men, shoveling the last of his cereal into his bearded face.

“ ’Cause we heard already,” said another man, elbowing his friend in the ribs. A general chuckle rose from the crowd.

“We’re not dying,” said one of the younger men, from the back of the group.

“No, none of us die,” said a squat, dark woman with lines on her face and thick calluses on her hands. “Not unless we get sick, of course. Mostly, we just disappear.”

“Stop trying to scare the kid,” snapped Mae. “The hothousers only take volunteers or lawbreakers, and you know it.”

The shadow of the door-watching uncle fell over the lunch crowd. “And if you’ve got time to talk about all this, obviously you’re done with lunch.” He stood aside and gestured toward their abandoned posts.

There was a general groan and a bunch of dirty looks, but no one protested. They just all got to their feet and piled the bowls and cups in the bin that one of the kitchen kids carried and all went back to work. Even Sadia, but not without giving Chena a look that said, Told you.

After lunch, the work got shifted and she and Sadia got put on the pedal bikes to roll the compost drums around. Sadia had said that some of the stuff in there came out of the toilet shed. That could not be true.

At least, that was what she believed until she and Sadia got taken off the bikes and given a barrow to follow Mae and some other old woman around to the various toilet sheds and help them empty the boxes and cart the dirt and clay away.

For kids under fifteen, the shift was only six hours long, but it felt like forever. By the end, every fiber in Chena’s body ached. Despite the gloves, fat white blisters appeared on her hands. She staggered out of the shed next to Sadia. Sadia wasn’t looking at her, though; she was scanning the paths. Chena knew she was looking for Shond.

“Gods below, I am dead,” said Chena. She reached up to rub her shoulder, and winced as the motion made her elbow and hand hurt worse. “Where do we get the relax patches?”

Sadia glanced down at her and then away to the paths again. “The what?”

Chena frowned and leaned back against the shed wall. “The relax patches. Or an aspirin. I’d settle for an aspirin.”

“What’s that for?”

“The pain.” Chena was about to ask if she was kidding, then she saw the complete lack of understanding on Sadia’s face. She was not kidding. She had never heard of these things.

“But there’s got to be something. I’m not going to make it back to the dorm like this.”

That got Sadia to look down and really see her. “Are you serious?” she asked. “How bad do you hurt?”

“How bad do I have to hurt? Come on, Sadia. If there’s something, you’ve got to tell me. I’m dying!” She was too. Her legs were shaking, and the top of her head felt like it was going to come off. She could barely hear the rush of the wind or trees, her ears had been so deadened by the rumble of the compost drums.

Sadia sucked on her cheek and looked around once more for Shond, who wasn’t anywhere in sight. There were just people everywhere coming and going with the change in shifts.

“Come on,” said Sadia. She headed for the stairway up to one of the catwalks.

The last thing Chena wanted to do was to climb, but if it was going to take her to a relax patch or an aspirin, she would do anything. Maybe it would only be one level. She couldn’t take that long anyway. She had to get back for Teal. Sadia knew that. Well, Teal would be okay waiting for a little bit.

It wasn’t just one level. Sadia led her up three levels. The higher they went, the thinner the crowds got and the farther spread out the houses were. Eventually the noise of the village just fell away, replaced by the rattling of the leaves and the chatter of the birds.

Sadia took her up one more short set of stairs, and Chena felt like her legs were going to scream out loud with pain. She was about to open her mouth to tell Sadia that even a whole-body anesthetic wasn’t worth another step when Sadia turned to her.