I raise a hand in farewell.
Old Fang mirrors the gesture.
The rest of them follow suit.
Even Vee, nearing Old Fang’s age and typically too stoic to get sentimental. The only person who doesn’t wave is Ma. She clutches both hands to her chest, eyes pained as she watches us—the only blood she has left in the world—venture into the wastes.
* * *
There’s nothing this way but dirt and sand and the dry beds of Dead River. I’ve never been far beyond camp except to check traps for jackrabbits and quail, but I know if I follow the river south, it will eventually open onto the parched ocean bed. If I carry on from there, I’ll run into Zuly.
Flint told me the way once, with precise directions. I had to give him some moonblitz to even get him talking, but I trust his word more than Clay’s. Not every trader is reliable.
If Indie were with it enough to talk, she’d say that’s because I rolled with Flint once over the winter and now I have a bias. I wonder if that’s what makes her oblivious to Clay’s faults, if sharing something so intimate makes you drop your guard, grow blind to the things that matter. I hope not. I can’t have Flint’s directions steer me wrong.
By midday, I’m tiring. The dragger strap has managed to rub me raw near my neck, even with the collar of my leather jacket protecting my skin. My muscles are racked with exhaustion, my lips cracked. I’ve sweated through most of my clothes, but I know better than to take off layers. It would only be a brief escape from the heat, and if I stripped enough to give my skin a chance to breathe, I’d be sunburned within an hour. Besides, old habits don’t die. The more layers, the better. The more hidden my back, the safer.
I trudge on until a small dust squall hits without warning. Once my goggles are pulled into place, I throw a blanket over Indie to protect her from any debris. I don’t trust myself to move during the squall, so I stay crouched beside her, breathing through my nose, with my scarf wrapped up over most of my face. I clench Indie’s palm beneath the blanket. There’s nothing to worry about—it’s only the storms you can see coming, bearing down like a wall, that tend to last any length of time—but it’s impossible to keep my mind from wandering. What if this squall strengthens? What if we’re stuck out here without shelter, breathing in dust while we’re buried, one grain of sand at a time?
If Indie is concerned, she doesn’t show it. Her hand remains limp in mine, clammy. I worry about her face. She’s not wearing goggles, and sand is surely finding its way through the woven blanket. It’s a good thing she’s barely conscious. Her eyes are probably closed.
To my relief, the wind suddenly lets up and the squall dies as quickly as it hit. Dust settles in delicate swirls.
I yank the blanket off Indie. “You all right?”
She nods weakly. It’s not like her to be so quiet. Any other day, she’d at least give me a sarcastic Scorched skies, no. But to only nod . . . I need to move faster.
I shove to my feet. My tracks are gone, and the sun hangs high overhead. I turn in circles, trying to find the wide, flat marks of the dragger. There’s nothing. The brief flurry of dust has hidden everything.
Grumbling, I fiddle with the neck of my jacket. The zipper’s been broken since I bartered it from Flint a few years back, but I’ve patched it up good, putting reinforcements over the elbows and a lone button near the throat so I can hold my scarf in place and keep the collar flipped up to protect the back of my neck. I unbutton it now and reach between my scarf and woven undershirt until my fingers find a leather cord. With a tug, I pull my necklace into view and hold it out before me. Hanging from the cord is a black lodestone, shaped like two pyramids stacked together, one summit pointing to the sky, the other to my feet. A small indentation is carved into one of the faces.
The lodestone spins freely for a moment, its metallic luster glinting in the sun. Then it quivers to a standstill. The indentation points at my left collarbone, meaning due north is over that shoulder. I angle myself until north is directly behind me and south straight ahead, then I tuck the lodestone away.
I wouldn’t want to be traveling these wastes without it, but I also know it’s the type of tech someone would kill for. It finds north no matter the weather, pointing true even in the worst of the gods-sent silent storms. Not even the Old World tech does that.
I button my jacket at my throat, wrap my scarf over my nose.
Then I’m trudging south again.
* * *
We come upon the Old Coast as the sun begins to sink behind the horizon. I slow to a standstill, taking it in for the first time. Flint’s descriptions are accurate. It’s like the wastes—just as endless, just as desolate—but witnessing it with my own eyes is harrowing.
The ground dips before me—the remnants of a shoreline—and I have to run to keep from getting clipped in the back of my ankles by the dragger. Once I’m on the dried ocean bed itself, things are easy for the first time since we left Dead River. No scrub to slow me down. No ruts to claw at the dragger. The ocean bed is hard-packed rock, a cobweb of cracked dirt. I’ll make good time.
I confirm my heading with the lodestone again, then check on Indie. Her usually bronze skin is sallow, and despite the sweat on her brow, she feels cold.
“Hey, can you drink?” I ask.
She mutters something in response, which I take to be a yes. I tip the waterskin toward her mouth, and half the liquid dribbles uselessly down her chin.
“How much . . .” Her eyes flutter.
“Farther?” I glance out across the ocean bed. If I squint, I can make out a lump the height of my thumb in the distance. That’ll be the oil rig Flint spoke of, Zuly’s watch-pack. “Little over three clicks? Four at most.”
Indie’s head lolls, and her eyes fall shut.
“Just hang on. We’re almost there.”
I take off at a jog, the dragger strap burning my chest and torso. My feet are chapped now too, sweat having put blisters on my heels. I press on, ignoring the sting, my eyes pinned to the lump on the horizon. Soon it’s not so much of a lump, but a small grave marker, a large boulder, then a hut on wide stilts. I pull a pale flag from my rucksack and hold it overhead. Flint said a white flag announces that you mean no harm, but with each step I can’t help but feel that I’m waving a target and shouting, Aim here!
As twilight falls, my destination morphs into the behemoth rig Flint described. I’ve never seen something so large. The stilts are rusted and reddened from the elements, and slightly crooked too, as though the wind has tried to blow them over. Rungs are built into each of the stilts, turning them into ladders. They extend up to the hutlike portion of the rig, which is four times as large as our huts back home and encircled by a deck with a railing. It towers above me like an impossible island.
A figure appears on the deck, the unmistakable shape of a rifle aimed my way. I freeze, and the dragger slides to a halt.
“Name and business?” the figure calls down.
“I’m Delta of Dead River. My sister is sick. Pregnant, but something’s gone wrong. I need to see Zuly.”
His rifle lowers slightly, and if I squint, I can make out a weathered face, dark and wrinkled. “Patients outside of Zuly’s pack aren’t allowed on the Ark. If you need meds, you should have sent a trader.”