Bayou Moon - Andrews, Ilona [8]
Lark gave her a weary look from under dark tousled hair. Her skinny legs stuck out of her capris like match-sticks. Mud smudged her calves. Fresh scratches marked her arms over the old bruises. She hid her hands, but Cerise was willing to bet that her nails were dirty or bitten off, probably both. Lark used to be a bit of a neat freak, as much as an eleven-year-old girl brought up in the swamp could be. All gone now.
Worry pinched at Cerise. She kept her face calm. Show nothing. Don’t make her self-conscious.
She came up the stairs, sat next to Lark, and pulled off her left boot, emptying the water out.
“Adrian and Derril are riding the Doom Buggy through the Snake Tracks,” Lark murmured.
The dune buggy was a hell mobile made of pure fun. In fact, Cerise had snuck away with it before and had so much fun, she flipped it over. But touching the dune buggy without adult supervision was strictly forbidden. Stealing it and wasting expensive gasoline was punishable by three weeks of extra chores.
Of course, both fifteen-year-old Adrian and his fourteen-year-old sidekick, Derril, knew this and could handle the consequences. The most pressing issue was that Lark just tattled. Lark never tattled.
Cerise forced herself to calmly pull the other boot off. The very basis of her sister’s personality was changing, and she could only watch, helpless.
“The boys didn’t take you with them?”
The answer was so quiet, she barely heard it. “No.”
Six months ago, they would have. Both of them knew it. The urge to reach out and hug Lark’s bony shoulders gripped Cerise, but she kept still. She’d tried that before. Her sister would stiffen, slide away, and take off into the woods.
At least Lark was talking to her. That was a rare thing. Normally, Mom was the only person who could get through to her, and even she had a hard time drawing Lark out lately. The kid was slipping away into her own world, and nobody knew how to pull her out.
“Did you tell Mom?” Cerise asked.
“Mom isn’t here.”
Odd. “Dad?”
“They left. Together.”
“Did they say when they would be back?”
“No.”
Cerise tensed. In the Mire, the resources were few and the people were many. The families fought tooth and nail over the smallest things. Almost every clan was in a feud, and theirs was no exception.
The feud between the Mars and the Sheeriles had started eighty years ago and was still going strong. Sometimes it burned bright and sometimes, like right now, it smoldered, but it could burst into open warfare at any moment. The last time the feud had flared, Cerise lost two uncles, an aunt, and a cousin. The standing rule was: you go out, you let someone know where you’re going and when you’re planning on coming back. Even their father, who was the head of the family, never strayed from this rule.
Anxiety rolled over her. “When and why did they leave?”
“At sunrise, and they left because Cobbler got his butt bit.”
Cobbler, an old wino, bummed about the swamp doing odd jobs for moonshine. Cerise never cared for the man. He was mean to the kids when he thought their parents weren’t looking, and he’d stab anyone in the back just out of spite. “Go on . . .”
“He came over and told Dad wild dogs got into Grandpa’s house. They chased him and one bit him on the butt. His pants had holes.”
Sene Manor had been boarded up for years, ever since their grandparents had died there of red fever twelve years ago. Cerise remembered it as a sunny house, painted bright yellow, a spot of color in the swamp. It was an abandoned wreck now. Nobody went near it. Cobbler had no business going there either. Probably was looking for something to steal.
“What happened next?”
Lark shrugged. “Cobbler kept talking until Dad gave him some wine and then he went away. And then Dad said he had to go and take care of Grandpa’s house, because it was still our land. Mom said she would go with him. They rode out.”
Getting to Sene Manor by truck was impossible. They would’ve ridden out on horseback.
“And you haven’t seen them since?”
“No.”
Sene Manor was half an hour away by horse. They