Chapter 14 Riley
The apple trees have shed their rotten fruit and new green boles are appearing among the leaves.
The hornets are gone. The grass everywhere is growing long and glossy.
Flowers are coming out, the meadows and woods are starred with wild roses and horsemint.
The cicadas sing furiously and plump rabbits and wood pigeons find their way into the snares every day.
There seem to be birds’ nests with rich-yolked eggs in almost every tree.
‘Time for her to leave,’ Noon says. They’re in the Home Barn, eating roast pigeon for breakfast. ‘We’ve put enough blood in the land.’
Cal nods. ‘I can—’
Noon touches his hand. ‘Everett and Riley can take her.’
Cal nods. He spends most of his time out on the mountain, searching for his brother.
The woman’s head hangs, her chin resting against her chest. Her eyes are slitted, seeing something other than Nowhere House around her.
Her arms and legs stick out pale from her filthy nightdress, covered in band aids and dots of taped-on cotton wool.
Her hair is a greasy mat and she smells of her own bodily waste.
The odour, combined with the scent of the chloroform, makes Riley gag.
She doesn’t think they even need the chloroform; the woman seems to be unaware of her surroundings.
‘I saw him,’ Alison slurs.
‘Ignore her,’ Midnight preps the cloth. Riley’s eyes water.
‘Leaf Winham,’ the woman says. ‘He’s still here. He came to me.’
Midnight claps the cloth over the woman’s mouth. ‘Shut up,’ she says, comfortable.
‘Gentle,’ Noon’s voice is stern.
‘She doesn’t deserve gentle,’ Midnight hisses. ‘Everett and I watched her through the window those nights. The things she’s done …’
Noon puts a calming hand on Midnight’s wrist. ‘She has taken in all our hunger – she has put her blood in the land. We treat her with respect.’
Noon, Midnight and Everett give their breath to the house. The woman’s mouth hangs open and a slow string of drool drips from her chin. When they lift her into the blanket she feels as light as a bundle of sticks.
Rain begins to fall as Riley and Everett carry the woman down the trail.
‘Are we taking her back to Ault?’ Riley asks, panting.
Everett just shakes his head without turning.
‘Good talk,’ Riley mutters to herself. She has never heard Everett speak a word, and she has never seen him without the black ski mask.
Sometimes she wonders if he has a mouth at all under there.
She imagines pulling back the wool to find only a smooth blank surface where his face should be.
The mountainside is wooded, there is plenty of cover, but Riley still feels exposed. She realises that she has gotten used to being enclosed in the valley, cradled by the surrounding peaks. The sky is too big out here; she feels like an ant crawling across a stone.
They pass along narrow deer trails, along a high ridge, then start to descend. Below, Riley sees it snaking along the hillside. A road.
They crouch in the undergrowth by the roadside.
Everett motions for Riley to stay still.
Every part of him is alert, listening. There’s no sound but the rain and a wood pigeon somewhere, softly mourning.
Everett nods and they dart into the middle of the road, their burden swinging between them.
The road over the mountain pass is a dark river cutting through the trees.
Riley stares at it for a moment, the bright yellow lines and smooth black tar.
The woods and the road are side by side, but they are like things from two different universes.
Everett waves at her, impatient. She starts and nods.
They lay the woman down gently on the asphalt, right in the middle, on the painted line.
As they’re rolling up the blanket, there comes the distant sound of an approaching engine.
Everett claps Riley on the shoulder. It’s impossible to be sure, but she thinks he’s pleased. Together they run back into the forest, back up the mountain, through green leaves dripping with fresh rain.
Tonight there will be a fire by the Ferris wheel. Riley helps Oliver through the orchard, which is green and alive with birdsong. The evening air has a hint of autumn chill in it, and Riley pulls her rabbit-skin cap down over her ears. She has made one of these for everyone at Nowhere.
The wound in Oliver’s leg is somewhat better – it seems to have settled into a constant dark angry red.
It refuses to fully heal. Riley thinks the recent bad nutrition is partly to blame.
She hopes it will be ok now. Oliver says it doesn’t hurt much.
Riley tries to keep it clean. Sometimes she can smell the wound, its sweet rotten odour.
A bonfire of pine crackles at the base of the cliff. Sparks rise red in the night. Firelight plays on the rusting metal of the Ferris wheel.
The children are seated in a circle on the grass. Light dances on their uplifted faces. They are looking at the stars.
Noon gets up and draws Riley and Oliver into the centre.
Riley feels a stab of fear. What if her blood is to feed the land?
Maybe the woman’s blood wasn’t enough. But Noon touches her cheek and smiles.
She takes something from her pocket, and puts it around Riley’s neck, where it sits alongside her locket.
It’s a rib, a small one, from a baby deer maybe, pierced at either end, strung on a red cord.
The bone is pure white and polished by age.
Riley puts her hand over it. The bone is very cold to the touch. Just been dug up, Riley thinks.
‘You’ve been patient,’ Noon says. ‘I know it wasn’t easy. But you have proved yourselves, and you have waited long enough.’
Noon gives Oliver a necklace of small vertebrae that click together like beads.
‘You are both part of us now,’ Noon says. ‘No more doubt or fear.’ A hard lump rises in Riley’s throat. She nods.
Around the circle, everyone claps and whoops. They crowd in to hug Riley and Oliver.
‘Welcome,’ Noon whispers in Riley’s ear. ‘You will always be Nowhere and Nowhere will always be you.’
The children turn to the east as one, towards Nowhere House in the distance, and Riley finds herself turning too. As the others put their hands to their lips, she follows suit. For the first time, Riley gives Nowhere her breath too.
Now here.
They laugh and drink small sips of burning liquor from a bottle, something that tastes of liquorice, with weird lettering on the label.
It’s old, the neck of the bottle crusted with white sediment.
Each mouthful lights up their bodies like fireworks.
Midnight does an impression for the kids, of the men running away from the gate.
The children scream with laughter, jumping up and down in the light of the flames.
Noon comes to Oliver. ‘Do you want to go play with them?’
‘But it’s not allowed,’ Oliver says.
‘That was before. Now it’s allowed.’
Even so he looks to Riley for permission. She smiles and gives him a little push. ‘Go on, Oliver Olive.’
The children scream and chase each other, Oliver panting with his odd hobbling run.
Riley watches with a painful twist in her heart.
She looks at Cal, sitting across the circle in the firelight.
His head nods and sinks to his chest every so often.
He’s always tired from walking the mountain, looking for his brother.
But as she watches he looks up and meets her eyes.
Riley quickly looks away but she still feels his gaze, which sends blood coursing through her cheeks.
She realises that Everett is standing in front of her.
He holds a hand out and after a moment Riley takes it.
He shakes it twice, up down up down, then turns smartly and walks to the other side of the fire where Dawn is talking to Midnight about something that makes them laugh.
Everett sits down cross-legged nearby. He is still. He keeps his eyes on Dawn.
‘I’m sorry.’
Riley starts. Noon’s face is close to hers in the firelight. ‘Sorry for what?’
‘It’s hard, to take the blood sometimes.’ Noon’s words are a little slurred.
‘I saw what she did to those kids.’ Feeling and conviction well up. Riley hesitates. ‘Is it real?’
Noon smiles. ‘Depends what you mean.’
‘Does bleeding her make the land better?’
‘I think so,’ Noon says. ‘I think it makes the world better.’
‘Me too,’ Riley says, fierce, and Noon takes Riley in her arms. They hold each other tightly for a moment.
Midnight strides over, singing, something out of tune about hills and pipes calling.
She takes the bottle from Riley with a flourish.
‘I’m older than you, you shouldn’t even be having this.
’ Noon follows her, leaving Riley alone.
‘Come for a walk,’ Cal says in her ear. Riley nods.
They go into the dark, leaving the voices and the firelight behind.
Cal and Riley sit on the platform above the lake. The white moon ripples on the surface of the water. Above, the sky is velvet. There are night sounds of frogs, cicadas. Fireflies dance in the woods behind.
‘Does that happen often? People coming to the gate?’ Riley asks.
‘Sometimes. They want to see where he lived. Nowhere House.’
Cal salutes to the east and Riley does too. By the light of the moon, his missing finger makes his hand look claw-like.
‘How did that happen?’ Riley asks.
‘We tried to kill someone,’ Cal says. ‘Me and Danny. We got the same punishment.’
‘Is that why you ran away and came here?’
‘Nope,’ he said, throwing an acorn at the lake below.
From the far side of the lake, in the distance, Riley hears something that could be the squeaking wheeze of a dog toy.
‘It happened here,’ Cal says. ‘At Nowhere.’
‘Who did you try to kill?’ Riley asks. Her heart is beating fast. ‘Who took your finger?’