Kingdom of Cages(55)

Mom advised Chena to set her prices as high as she wanted, and let people argue her down, but not so low that she couldn’t pay her expenses. Mom wasn’t paying the bike rental anymore, and Chena had to buy canvas from the recycling center so Mom could make a backpack for her, plus there was food and water every day during the trip, and rain gear, and gloves for cold mornings.

Eventually she worked her prices out to five positives for a letter, ten for a letter and reply, and twenty for a package, with another ten tacked on for each kilogram over the first one. Her skin grew bark brown from the sunlight and her legs grew strong from the peddling. She learned the names of everyone in Offshoot, and half of Stem.

Best of all, she saw Farin almost every day. He showed her where she could buy food, and overpaid her for the raspberries, saying she was on commission until the growing season ended. His delight in her ability to acquire these small treats could fill her entire day, no matter how long the ride, no matter how hard it rained, or how hot it got. He still told Chena how much he loved her only in her mind when the lights were out, but she was certain that would become real too. One day, before her family left, he would take Chena in his arms and he would tell her not to go. He would say that he wanted her to stay with him. Or better yet, he would say he wanted to come with them.…

Those dreams, and the light in Mom’s eyes when Chena came home and handed over the day’s take, were all she needed to keep herself going.

“You’re a wonder and a half, Supernova,” Mom said, hugging her at the end of the first week. “We’ll have you two in school before the year’s out at this rate.”

Chena made a face. She didn’t want to be in school when she could be out on jobs and seeing Farin, but she consoled herself with the fact that she’d still be able to work two days a week. Anything was better than nothing.

The only thing that was not going perfectly was that she was breaking the rules Mom laid down. She was running errands for Nan Elle.

She hadn’t intended to, but she had to go up there. Farin had written Nan Elle a letter, and she took the money. She had to deliver it. She couldn’t let him down.

There were a dozen people sitting in front of the cluster of houses where Nan Elle lived, old men and women, women with babies, kids off the shifts. All of them had a bright red rash on their face and arms. Some of the blisters were the size of grapes. Just looking at them made Chena wince. She edged her way between them, trying not to touch anybody. Mom had warned her about touching anybody with a rash or a cough. She didn’t really need to be told. There weren’t any doctors, there wasn’t any medicine. If they caught something, there wasn’t any kind of help.

Chena really wanted to know which hothouser came up with that brilliant idea. That business Nan Elle had given her about disturbing the microsphere with antibiotics and antivirals must have come from a complete vapor-brain.

Nan Elle’s door was open. No one in the line said anything as Chena peeked inside the workroom. They all watched her, though. Chena could feel their gazes fastened on her shoulders, and it made her shiver.

Nan Elle had all her lamps on. A young woman a few years older than Chena sat in the examination chair. Tears slid down the woman’s ravaged face. Blisters the size of baby fists distorted her cheek and swelled her right eye completely shut. Nan Elle smeared her with something green, and the woman whimpered softly, obviously trying not to cry out.

“You wait where you are, station girl,” said Nan Elle, although Chena could have sworn she had made no noise coming in. “I’m not done here.”

Chena looked at the floor, the bookshelves, the aquarium pipes, the steam rising from the pots that simmered on the stove, the long table with its jars and boxes, mortars, and bits of plants and mushrooms, anywhere but at Nan Elle and the crying woman.

At last she heard Nan Elle say, “That’ll burst those tonight. When they start to go, you keep your face clean, you understand? Clean with hot water, I don’t care how much it hurts. Then you put this on the open sores.” She handed the woman a thin wooden box the size of her palm. “When they’re good and coated, you cover them up with clean cloth. You’ll be scarred, there’s nothing to be done there, but if you do as I say, you get to keep your eye.”

The woman nodded and stood up, clutching the box. She hurried away, like she couldn’t stand being in the room.

Only when the door had shut did Nan Elle turn her attention to Chena.

“It’s called nettle blight,” she said. “We get it every summer. There’s a weed in the fields with these nasty, hairy little seedpods. Burst them open when you’re swinging a scythe and those hairs dig into your skin and you get all kinds of infected.” She looked Chena up and down. “Not your problem, though. What are you here for that’s so important you’re jumping the line?”