Separation. James Axler

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СКАЧАТЬ her nausea, making her vomit and strain muscles that already ached.

      But she knew it had to be faced, so she opened her eyes.

      Slowly…

      Yeah, it hurt. The light was like an incredible volley of tiny needles that pierced the membrane, making her wince, despite the fact that it was low level. Probably a lamp of some kind and not located directly over where she lay. All she could see was a whitewashed ceiling, decorated with paintings of huntsmen and dancing women. There was something about it that she knew should mean something to her, yet she couldn’t quite grasp it. The women were dancing a little too vigorously at present, and she closed her eyes again to try to gain respite from the spinning. No good, even the lights that danced behind her closed eyelids spun in a way that made her want to—

      Opening her eyes wide regardless of the pain and dizziness, and moving swiftly despite the pain from her protesting stomach and ribs, Mildred turned onto her side and leaned over the bed. Rush matting lay at the side, on a packed earth floor that was remarkably flat and dry…though dry for not much longer, as the spasm in her gut reached its conclusion and she retched heavily, vomiting bile and seawater that splattered onto the matting.

      Feeling a sweat break out at the effort, she reached down into her guts and willed herself to vomit again. If she expelled it all in one spasm, then she may be able to settle and regain her equilibrium. Once more, she splattered the rush matting, but this time with less force. Feeling the aching muscles begin to lose the force of the spasm, she spit the sour taste from her mouth and returned to her position on her back, breathing heavily. She had closed her eyes to stop the room spinning as she moved once more, and was surprised—but too weakened to protest—when she felt her head gently lifted and a wooden cup pressed to her lips. The water in the cup felt cool and sweet as she sipped it. Her throat cried for more and she tried to gulp, realizing how dehydrated she had become. But the cup was taken away.

      Mildred opened her eyes once more, holding her breath as the room spun then slowed so that she could see who had given her the water. The woman leaning over her was, she figured, about the same age as herself, with lines at the corners of her large, hazel-brown eyes that creased the skin deeply. Her skin was darker than Mildred’s, almost mahogany in the dim light of the lamp. Her full mouth was also lined at the corners, the lines being up rather than down, laughter rather than frown lines. Her nose was pierced with a single diamond stud on the right side. Despite the darkness of her skin, she was finer boned than Mildred would have expected, with high cheekbones that came to a logical point in a chin that, on any other face, would have seemed pointed. She reminded Mildred of the Abyssinian women she had met when a child, exiled from Ethiopia in the early 1970s when Emperor Haile Selassie had died, leaving the country in the grip of a military junta and a continuing famine. Certainly she didn’t resemble the central and western Africans from whom the majority of African-Americans Mildred had ever known were descended.

      And when she spoke, she had the gentlest, softest voice, like the tinkling of a brook over smooth, worn stones.

      “So, you will feel better for that. Nature is like this. That which does not belong under the skin must eventually find a route from which to emerge, like the burrowing of mammals that need to come into the light to feed and live.”

      Mildred tried to speak. At first a dry croak was all that emerged, but as she swallowed, she regained the power to articulate and express herself.

      “Is that how you’d put it? I don’t think I would, frankly. How I’d put it is, Where am I? Who are you? Where are the rest of my people? And not necessarily in that order.”

      The woman looking over her laughed, a mellifluous sound that echoed her speech. “You have the spirit of a fisherman in a storm. I think I would be more inclined to thank my benefactor and then rest before asking any more questions.”

      Mildred raised herself up on an elbow, ignoring the sharp pains in her ribs and the insistent throb at the back of her skull as she rose.

      “Lady, I am not you. And I’ve been in too many positions where the only reason I’ve been kept alive is for the benefit of those who are doing it—not for me—that I’m not inclined to give anyone the benefit of the doubt.”

      As she spoke Mildred scanned the room. It seemed to be the living quarters of the woman who sat on the bed. It was sparsely furnished, but what there was bespoke of comparative riches. The furniture was well made, the hangings on the wall of silk and the finest dyed cottons, and on a table stood sculptures and ornaments, mostly of animals, that were made of what appeared to be gold and silver. This was no poor woman’s abode, but rather the home of someone with taste and jack to spare. It also seemed that she lived alone, as there were no signs of anyone else sharing. And there was no one actually in the room, no sec guard of any kind. As her benefactor appeared unarmed, she was either taking a risk and had somehow rescued Mildred alone, or she was of such a high rank that she could dictate her own terms. The presence of the precious metals made this the likely bet.

      The finely boned woman watched Mildred with an amused expression on her face. Mildred was so preoccupied that it took her a moment to realize it.

      “What?” Mildred asked sharply. She knew she should be triple-red, but she still felt shaky, and this woman gave no air of threat to which she could respond.

      The woman’s full lips broke into a smile that showed strong teeth, stained by herbs and betel nuts.

      “You are suspicious, and perhaps a little scared. This is no bad thing, and perhaps in your position I would feel the same. But, truly, you have nothing to fear. You are among your own people now, and need no longer talk of those who would wish to keep you alive for your own benefit. They have been dealt with.”

      Mildred felt a lurch of panic deep in her guts. “Dealt with…What do you mean?”

      The woman shrugged. “I mean what I say. Markos’s patrol found you before they were about to chill you as the wolf chills the rabbit. You had all been washed ashore, and they had carried you with them until such time as they were ready to do as their will. Fortunately, we were able to prevent your chilling and bring you back to the fold like the stray that seeks shelter.”

      Mildred hoisted herself up into a sitting position, the pain in her ribs and the intensity of her headache drowned in the wave of panic and concern that threatened to engulf her.

      “Let’s back up here for a minute, lady,” she began, trying to keep calm and to keep her voice level. “When I asked you about my friends, I meant the people I was traveling with. The last thing I remember was being in the raft and…Shit, some kind of big mutie fish turning the damn thing over. We were tied to the raft, but the rope must have broken.” She shook her head gently, as if to clear it, being careful not to aggravate her headache. “I don’t know anything about anyone trying to chill me when I was out, but the people I was with were friends, and whatever this Markos thinks he saw, they were trying to help me, okay? Anyway,” she added almost as an afterthought, “who is this guy Markos?”

      A strange expression crossed the woman’s face. It was hard to work out exactly what was running through her mind at that point, but the question seemed to stir up a greater answer than she was prepared to give.

      She contented herself with saying, “He is our chief of security and law. Answerable only to my father or myself. He was told of a sighting of boats at sea, falling prey to the sea devils and the turning of the tides. It was observed that the boats were washed ashore and that the ones with the shining skin carried a sister into the woods, with an albino in their wake—”

      “That’ll be Jak,” Mildred affirmed.

      “Another СКАЧАТЬ