Hoa’s still standing where you emerged from the ground, hands still positioned to press down on yours, perhaps for the return trip. He doesn’t answer, but then you’re mostly talking to yourself.
“I always heard that Antarctic was small,” you continue, “but this is nothing. This is a camp.” There’s no Ring Garden. No Main building. Also, you’ve heard that the Arctic and Antarctic Fulcrums were lovely, despite their size and remote location. That makes sense; the Fulcrum’s beauty was all that official, state-sanctioned orogene-kind ever had to show for itself. This sorry collection of shacks doesn’t fit the ideology. Also—“It’s on a volcano. And too close to those stills down the hill.” That village isn’t Yumenes, surrounded on all sides by node maintainers and with the added protection of the most powerful senior orogenes. One overwrought grit’s tantrum could turn this whole region into a crater.
“It isn’t the Antarctic Fulcrum,” Hoa says. His voice is usually soft, but he’s turned away now, and that makes him softer. “That’s farther to the west, and it has been purged. No orogenes live there anymore.”
Of course it’s been purged. You set your jaw against sorrow. “So this is somebody’s idea of homage. A survivor?” Inadvertently you find another marker underground—a small round pebble, maybe fifty feet down. NINE is written on it, in ink. You have no trouble reading it. Shaking your head, you rise and turn to explore the compound further.
Then you stop, tensing, as a man limps out of one of the dormitory-looking buildings. He stops, too, staring at you in surprise. “Who the rust are you?” he asks, in a noticeable Antarctic drawl.
Your awareness plummets into the earth—and then you wrench it back up. Stupid, because remember? Orogeny will kill you? Also, the man isn’t even armed. He’s fairly young, probably only in his twenties despite an already-receding hairline. The limp is an easy thing, and one of his shoes is built higher than the other—ah. The village handyman, probably, come to do some basic caretaking on buildings that might again be needed someday.
“Uh, hi,” you stammer. Then you fall silent, not sure what to say from there.
“Hi.” The man sees Hoa and flinches, then stares with the open shock of someone who’s only heard of stone eaters in lorist tales, and maybe didn’t quite believe them. Only belatedly does he seem to remember you, frowning a little at the ash on your hair and clothing, but it’s clear you’re not as impressive a sight. “Tell me that’s a statue,” he says to you. Then he laughs a little, nervously. “Except it wasn’t here when I came up the hill. Uh, hi, I guess?”
Hoa doesn’t bother replying, though you see his eyes have shifted to watch the man instead of you. You steel yourself and step forward. “Sorry to alarm you,” you say. “You from this comm?”
The man finally focuses on you. “Uh, yeah. And you’re not.” Instead of showing unease, however, he blinks. “You another Guardian?”
Your skin prickles all over. For an instant you want to shout no, and then sense reasserts itself. You smile. They always smile. “Another?”
The young man’s looking you up and down now, maybe suspicious. You don’t care, as long as he answers your questions and doesn’t attack you. “Yeah,” he says, after a moment. “We found the two dead ones after the children left on that training trip.” His lip curls, just a little. You’re not sure whether he doesn’t believe the children have gone off training, whether he’s really upset about “the two dead ones,” or whether that’s just the usual lip-curl that people wear when they talk about roggas, since it’s obvious that’s what the children in question must be. If Guardians were here. “Headwoman did say there might be other Guardians along someday. The three we had all popped up out of nowhere, after all, at different times down the years. You’re just a late one, I guess.”
“Ah.” It is surprisingly easy to pretend to be a Guardian. Just keep smiling, and never offer information. “And when did the others leave on their … training trip?”
“About a month ago.” The young man shifts, getting comfortable, and turns to gaze after the sapphire obelisk in the distance. “Schaffa said they were going far enough away that we wouldn’t feel any aftershakes of what the kids did. Guess that’s pretty far.”
Schaffa. The smile freezes on your face. You can’t help hissing it. “Schaffa.”
The young man frowns at you. Definitely suspicious now. “Yeah. Schaffa.”
It can’t be. He’s dead. “Tall, black hair, icewhite eyes, strange accent?”
The young man relaxes somewhat. “Oh. You know him, then?”
“Yes, very well.” So easy to smile. Harder to wrestle down the urge to scream, to grab Hoa, to demand that he plunge you both into the earth now, now, now, so you can go and rescue your daughter. Hardest of all not to fall to the ground and curl into a ball, trying to clench the hand you no longer have but that hurts; Evil Earth, it aches like it’s broken all over again, phantom pain so real your eyes prickle with pain tears.
Imperial Orogenes do not lose control. You haven’t been a blackjacket for going on twenty years, and you lose control all the rusting time—but nevertheless the old discipline helps you pull yourself together. Nassun, your baby, is in the hands of a monster. You need to understand how this happened.
“Very well,” you repeat. No one will think repetition strange, from a Guardian. “Can you tell me about one of his charges? Midlatter girl, brown and willowy, curly hair, gray eyes—”
“Nassun, right. Jija’s girl.” The young man relaxes completely now, not noticing that you’ve tensed that much more. “Evil Earth, I hope Schaffa kills her while they’re on that trip.”
The threat is not to you, but your awareness dips again anyway, before you drag it back. Ykka’s right: You really do need to stop defaulting to kill everything. At least your smile hasn’t faltered. “Oh?”
“Yeah. I think she’s the one who did it … Rust, could’ve been any of ’em, though. That girl’s just the one who gave me the shivers the most.” His jaw tightens as he finally notices the sharp edges of your smile. But that, too, isn’t something that anyone familiar with Guardians would question. He just looks away.
“‘Did it’?” you ask.
“Oh. Guess you wouldn’t know. Come on, I’ll show you.”