Transformation Space - Marianne de Pierres [3]
‘Wait! Stay here in the bushes,’ Trin told his band of survivors. ‘We’ll search the caves just before sunrise.’
Djes moved closer to him as the others sank gratefully to the ground.
‘Are these the caves you saw when you came here before?’ Trin asked her.
She sat down on the moist ground, legs curled out to one side, and waited for him to join her.
His stimulants had worn off as well, and a stale aftermath crept over him. He reached for her as he settled, and she leaned into his arms. Around them, others were doing the same, squatting or lying in the undergrowth close to each other, staring at the dark shadows that signalled cavities in the mountainside.
‘Not sure. I think the ones I saw might have been lower down. Perhaps we missed some. We’re so close to the summit here. I don’t think I climbed this high; I didn’t have time. It was dark … I’m not sure.’
He stroked her arm. Her skin still had an odd texture from spending so much time in saltwater – slippery, like an eel’s, and yet wrinkled. How did he find her even remotely attractive? he wondered. She was not familia, and she was part alien.
Yet, her part-Miolaquan heritage – her ability to swim like a fish – had saved their lives. And he’d watched as she’d changed a little more with each passing day she’d spent at sea. The webbing between her fingers and toes had become thicker, her hair thinner, even her eyes; the aqueous membrane showing as she blinked and adjusted to the bare sunlight.
She ventured no further comment now, and Trin found himself drifting to sleep, one arm around her and his back wedged against the trunk of a stunted tree.
He woke like that a short time later, his arm cramping. The lightening sky showed the caves as gaping holes in the pale rock. The mountain is soft, he thought. No wonder the wind has eaten at it.
Around him, others stirred. For so long now they had slept in short grabs, through the daylight, as they sought to escape the invading Saqr. It was impossible to imagine a full night’s sleep.
Juno Genarro, Trin’s most trusted carabinere, crawled from the arms of his cousin Josefia and over to them. ‘Principe? What are your orders?’
‘We should eat, Juno. Then take Tivi and look inside the caves. Joe will stay in command of the group. If the caves are not safe, we’ll need to find thicker cover before the sun rises.’
Juno nodded. ‘And you?’
‘Djes and I will walk to the top. It is only a short distance now, and it is important that I see how the land lies from above.’
‘You’ll have to hurry, or you will be caught without shade, Principe.’
Trin touched the carabinere’s arm briefly. ‘Tell Tina to bring us some food. And be careful in the caves. The checclia that we saw at the base of the mountain might not be the only mutations on the island. The vegetation is lush by Araldis standards; other creatures could survive here.’
Juno nodded and crawled away.
‘Djes?’ Trin shook the sleeping girl.
She woke quickly and fearfully, her webbed fingers grasping at the air and her eyes flickering open, revealing her secondary lids.
Trin still experienced a shock when he saw them, yet he’d grown to depend on her devotion; her belief gave him confidence even though his feelings for her see-sawed.
Recently, when it had seemed that she knew more than him, he’d resented her. Trin wondered whether his attachment to her would survive her growing assertiveness and his men’s tacit approval of her decisions. There was a place for only one leader among them, and it was not the bitter and gaunt Cass Mulravey, nor the dour Kristo, nor Djeserit, nor any of the others. This was his world, his birthright, and he would do anything to see that it remained so.
‘Trinder?’
Djes’s gentle question broke him from his trance. He held out his hand and pulled her to her feet, smoothing away his guilt with action.
‘We should go to the summit before Leah rises,’ he said.
She glanced upward