Why would my Fireseed gods coax me in this way? Are they turning against me for leaving my home and taking my brother? I choose not to believe that.
More than once, I cheat by standing directly under a cut in the tarp, where the sunlight is streaming down, and where I tilt my head up, hungrily. This fills me. Because otherwise, I’m growing weak, I’m fading in the confines of The Greening.
The last burns were so bad that they formed a permanent pattern of pocked skin—on Thorn’s face as well. First our skin blistered, then oozed, then popped, then it peeled and scarred. It was always on the verge of terrible infection. My tincture helped to hasten our healing, but even my good medicine couldn’t totally stop the scarring. I feel bad for Thorn. Not so much for myself.
In a way, it’s a relief that my face is no longer flawless. My looks often got me unwelcome pinches and leers from the cult men—and always from Stiles. Now the guys here gape at my scars, not at my beauty. It’s helped lessen my need for the Oblivion Powder. I only needed it three times this week. My nightmares of Stiles are finally fading.
Today, before I head up to the project room I look in Bea’s mirror and examine the line of pocks running down one side of my nose and along my opposite cheek. They’re not separate marks and not all identically shaped, more a jumble of scars that form an uneven ridge.
From my side view it’s clear that in the span of about two weeks I’ve become scrawny as well. My appetite’s disappeared. It’s hard to say whether the red powder or the burns were to blame. But I’m shrinking! My pants hang off me. Bea’s been really nice to take them in at the seams, though they’re already loose again. Thorn too, has lost any little boy softness he had, and soon Bea will have to take in his clothes, if she’s willing. I tie on the apron I wear for mixing elixirs. It’s satisfyingly bulky and hides my ribs.
I’m in the middle of revising the concoction made from Antlered Purples that I’m hoping to test today—on my scars, and the Fireseed leaves too, when Thorn runs over to me, and tugs on my arm.
“What?” I say offhandedly. I have patience for Thorn, except when I’m absorbed in experimental work. “I’m kind of busy.”
He pulls on my arm again, and nods to the door.
I sigh, and wipe my hands on my smock. “Can it wait?”
He shakes his head.
I follow him downstairs to the garden door. When he starts outside, I call out to him, reminding him about his suit. But then the humming starts. It says now, now, now. For once, I give into it. Thorn is moving fast, navigating the thick jungle with ease. These days I find that it’s easier for me too. I’m practically flying. Faster, through the shivering, singing leaves.
Thorn is headed for the western quadrant. A couple of weeks ago, it would have taken us a half-hour to hike there. Now, we’ve gotten there in ten minutes. He shimmies under the first plant where Blane and I found him up in the branches.
“What are you doing, Thorn?” I crouch under the lowest branch canopy and crawl in on hands and knees.
He lifts his palm and holds it under a wide, curling leaf. Then he gazes over at me with a joy that’s so pure, so uplifting, it washes over me in fantastic waves. “What, Thorn?” He’s always such a puzzle. I’m not expecting the words when they come.
“My. Project!”
“Huh?” I duck further under and crane my neck to peer at the underside of the leaf, examine what his palm is cradling. “That? A leaf bud?” As I focus in closer, I see that it’s no regular bud. It’s bigger and rounder and the red plant skin is stretched so tight, it seems ready to explode. In fact, now I see a slight movement, a probing from the inside. “What is it? Is an insect caught in there?” I ask Thorn.
He laughs silently, and cups his hand around the swollen bud. There’s a harder poke as if something’s making a determined effort to get out, and the membrane rips with a sound like fabric tearing. My jaw drops. “The thing has … wings! What the heck is it?”
Its beaklike protrusion roots around in the air, and two eyes, set far apart, blink out at us. It shakes out its leafy wings like some kind of exotic red sun umbrella, and flaps down to the sandy ground by Thorn’s knees.
The thing has no real body; it’s more just a head with a beaklike snout. And well, a rudimentary body the size of Thorn’s fist that seems mainly designed to support the creature’s wings. Its eyes are expressive, eerily human, dark like Thorn’s. No ears, but tufts of stuff like feathery stamens, some with tiny leaf blossoms.
“What is this, Thorn?” As if he would know, as if anyone would know!
“A Red,” he answers, and reaches out to pet it. It flutters but doesn’t fly off.