Forever the Road (A Rucksack Universe Fantasy Novel) Page 26

  Jigme sat on his knees and moved to the side of the bed. “Amma?” he said.

  No reply.

  “Mum?”

  Asha’s eyes opened. She looked at Jigme, then rose and sat. “Son,” she said, her eyes gleaming red and black, her voice rasping and harsh. “How many more can you bring?”

  Jigme shook his head. “There can be no more. I’m so tired. And people suspect now. There have been so many children, so quickly. I could hear the whispers as I brought the last child. They don’t understand and they are wary. If I try to bring another, I may be caught.”

  “You must bring one more.”

  Something hot pressed at Jigme’s eyes. All he could feel was the weariness in his legs, his feet sore from pounding over kilometer after kilometer of the city, nearly without halt. “I can’t.”

  “I am not strong,” said the voice in her mouth, becoming softer, gentler as she spoke. “If I am not strong, I will die.”

  “Mum,” Jigme said, shaking his head. He reached for her hand, but she pulled away. Something inside him tore. “I’m so tired. I can’t do this anymore.”

  Asha lay on her back. “Then you kill me,” she said, her voice harsh again. She stared at the ceiling.

  Every cell and muscle in Jigme’s body begged for rest. But he saw the pain and weariness on his mother’s face.

  What is my own pain compared to hers? Jigme thought. What is my own compared to the Smiling Fire’s? At least I can go about freely. They’re both so trapped. All they want is to be well.

  “If you want us to be well,” Asha said, “then bring one more.”

  “The last one?”

  “Yes.”

  Deep inside, from his toes to his head, strength trickled into his muscles and spirit.

  Just one more, he thought. Surely I can do that, if it’s to make her well?

  The weariness faded. Not completely, but enough.

  Jigme stood. “I will bring the last child.”

  Asha smiled and squeezed his hand. “I knew you would not disappoint me.”

  A chill cut through the alley as Jigme closed the red door behind him. Even in the center of Agamuskara, few lights lit the dark. Above the city, dark clouds crowded out the stars. Jigme walked through silent streets. Around him, people slept on the pavement, in doorways, on top of carts. Families huddled close. He could take no children here.

  How far can I go? he thought. I can’t go to the far corners of the city. I feel stronger but I must be smart. I must be fast. For Amma.

  At an intersection he stared down the different directions. “I don’t know where to go,” he said. His strength flickered. Weariness stabbed his legs again.

  “Just surrender,” said the voice. “Just follow the darkness.”

  Jigme turned right. The clouds were thicker over that part of the city, and for blocks he wandered, staring into doorways, looking down side streets. Adults. Families. No children alone.

  The weariness grew. Am I going too far away? Will I make it back before I collapse? What if I make a mistake?

  The thoughts scratched at him, a seeping fear that made him want to crawl into a doorway and sleep.

  All he wants is to be better, Jigme thought.

  “And the children are better too,” said the voice. “Think of that. Tonight a child from these streets will go somewhere better.”

  The strength came back. Jigme passed another alley.

  Behind the statue of a god lay the huddled body of a sleeping child. No one was near. No one would know.

  Jigme kneeled by the child. He had no thoughts, no plan. Something else was guiding him now. The boy was thin and small, skin like paper. He seemed to rustle when Jigme touched him.

  “Who are you?” the boy said, his voice heavy with fatigue.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Jigme replied. He looked into the child’s eyes. He was dirty, but his clothes weren’t ragged. They looked new. This wasn’t a street child. Jigme smiled. “They’ll be so relieved you’re okay.”

  “Amma?” the child said. “Appa? They know where I am?”

  “I was sent to find you, and I’ve been looking everywhere, all day. It’s a big city to find such a little person in. But I’ve found you. It’ll be okay. We can go now, if you’d like.”

  The boy nodded and got up. The statue of the god did nothing. There’s nothing to do, Jigme thought. The boy is safe. He is going somewhere better. Parents or not. Mum and Dad. A dad, even. Isn’t he lucky. I wish I knew what it was like to have a dad. The jealousy felt like flames.

  They wandered back to the main street. Jigme turned them toward the alley.

  “This isn’t where I live,” the boy said.

  “We aren’t going there,” Jigme replied. “Your parents had learned that you may be in this part of the city. They’re waiting for you.”

  Finally, they reached the street near the alley. “What’s your name?” the boy asked.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Jigme replied.

  The boy stopped. “What’s my name?”

  Jigme looked at him. “We’re nearly there.”

  “What’s my name?”

  “Wouldn’t you rather hear it from your amma and appa?”

  The boy took a step backward. “Where are we going?” he said loudly.

  Jigme walked toward him. “We are going to where you need to be,” he said, grabbing the boy’s arm.

  “No!” The boy kicked Jigme’s shins and knees. “No!” he shouted, struggling as Jigme grabbed him. “Let me go! Let me go!”

  Murmurs reached Jigme’s ears.

  “People are waking up,” said the rasping voice. “If they see…”

  Jigme pulled the boy forward and curled his right hand into a fist. A power flowed into his arm and the rest of his body. The impact of Jigme’s hand on the boy’s head reverberated through his arm, making it feel dull and dead. Pain bloomed through his fingers as if something had broken.

  The boy cried out once, but the blow to the temple dropped him. Unconscious, he collapsed. Hand screaming, Jigme caught the boy before he fell to the street.

  More voices. People were up, looking around for the trouble. Soon they would look down this street.

  What am I going to do? he thought. I’ll be caught!

  “If you’re caught,” said the voice, “she dies.”

  Jigme looked at the child, his breathing slow but steady, eyes closed. He could have been sleeping again. Hand screaming as he squeezed, Jigme picked up the boy and draped him over his shoulders, behind his head. The boy was heavier than Jay’s backpack, and Jigme felt more tired than ever. He ignored it though, the tiredness in his legs and the pain from the boy’s kicks. The mouth of the alley enveloped him.

  But not quickly enough.

  Cries followed. Someone had already come into the street. Someone had seen.

  The cries brought other people. Jigme heard their footsteps pounding down the street and into the alley. The noise will wake the people who live here, Jigme thought. What if I’m seen by someone I know?

  No voice replied.

  He looked toward the main city then down the dark alley. The boy felt heavier with every moment. What if I were caught? Jigme thought. At least it would be over.

  Over for Amma.

  Jigme poured all his energy, all his soul into his legs. Run, he thought. Run like you’ve never run before.

  His tired legs carried him down the alley toward the red door. Behind him, closer now, the people ran too.

  Jigme ran faster, the child’s limp limbs bouncing. So heavy, he thought. But there was the red door. Soon we’ll be inside and this will be over.

  No it won’t, he thought. Someone will see me take the boy inside. They’ll know it was me. Everyone here hates me and Mum. They’ll kill us. Plus, if we’re surrounded, we’ll have no way to get the boy to the temple.

  With a cry Jigme stumbled and fell to one knee. He tottered under the child’s weight, about to fall. His knee hit a stone, and pain blazed through
his body.

  People were getting closer.

  Jigme stared at the door, thought of Amma inside. “Get up,” he said. “Get up.”

  With every inch his knee threatened to buckle. The child nearly pulled him over, but Jigme fought back. Trembling, he stood up again.

  His fingers were made of broken glass as his hands squeezed tight around the child. His knee swelled. But the voices were close now, too close. Jigme ignored the pain and began to run again. He limped slightly from his knee, but he ran past the red door. Above the alley, the clouds were thicker and blacker. A fog swarmed down.

  He smiled at the cries from the crowd—even more so at the absence of the sound of their footsteps. They were next to the red door, he thought, but she is safe. No one has seen my face. They do not know it is me. And none will pass into this part of the alley.

  Jigme ran. Despite the thick fog, he trusted his footsteps, knew that nothing would obstruct him. He ran down the alley, between the statues, and into the temple.

  The warmth inside made Jigme realize how cool it had been outside. The Smiling Fire beamed. Something in his grin seemed almost proud.

  Jigme set down the child, who was still unconscious.

  “Soon you can return,” the Smiling Fire said. “Tomorrow I will do as I promised. Sleep now, child, then return to her. And then, Jigme, the time at last will have come for you to bring your mother to me.”

  Jigme smiled as he sank down against a black wall. I’ve done it, he thought. It’s over. Amma will be healed.

  He ignored the sounds and drifted into sleep. There was no burning or screaming. He would endure just one last nightmare before waking into a brilliant new day.

  IN THE WEAK LIGHT of the foggy, just-dawned morning, the blood on Jay’s shin shone with a strange brightness.

  “Walking around the boats is easier than walking through them,” Rucksack said. “Though you’ve made our choice easy. We’ll take this one.”

  Jay rubbed his shin through the tear in his thin cargo pants. “Why?”

  “It knows you now.” Rucksack pointed at the bright red smear on the faded brown-and-black metal of the long, shallow boat. “A boat that knows your blood will take you anywhere safely.”

  “You say that like you’re being serious.”

  “There wasn’t exactly a luxury charter service when I first went to Ireland,” Rucksack replied. “I got to the boat in a bit o’ a hurry. Already had blood coming out aplenty, so I left a bit on the hull as I got aboard. Lots o’ boats left that day, and we were halfway there when a terrible storm blew up around us. Our boat was the only one that made it.”

  “I don’t see how we’re going much of anywhere today,” Jay said. “This fog is so thick I can hardly see in front of me.”

  Rucksack was quiet for a moment. “Just feck it,” he said finally. “We need to be off.”

  At the river’s edge, the fog embraced Rucksack, as if he had slipped into another world, but his voice rang clear and strong. To Jay, it sounded like Rucksack could have ordered the Indian subcontinent to plow into Asia and create the Himalayas.

  “You know who I am and why I’m here,” Rucksack said to the fog. “Now enough with the buggerin’ theatricals. Clear off.”

  Slowly at first and then in a hurry, the fog thinned and cleared. Jay’s skin warmed in the dawn light.

  “Did you really just do that?” Jay asked.

  “It would’ve cleared eventually,” Rucksack replied. “But we don’t have time for eventually. There’s a lot you need to know, and we need to get away to do this properly.”

  Jay took some rupees from his wallet and tucked the money under a rock at the spot where the boat had been sitting. He stared at the bills, counting in his mind, and then added a few more. “That should more than make up for any temporary distress,” he said, going to the side opposite Rucksack. The murky waters of the Agamuskara wet their ankles as they pushed the small boat into the river.

  “I’m glad you’re better,” Rucksack said as he settled in, facing downriver and taking up the oars. Jay stared at the city and set his daypack on the floor of the boat, between his knees.

  Rucksack nodded at the pack, but Jay shook his head. “No change in the dia ubh,” he said. “Gray and lifeless as ever.”

  Soon they were making a brisk pace with the current. The river’s cool, wet morning air filled Jay’s lungs and soul. “I feel like a new man today,” he said.

  “Up for a wee hike?”

  “Where are we going?” Jay asked. “And remember, you promised me straight answers.”

  “I did at that, didn’t I?” Rucksack grinned. “Right, then. In return, though, I expect you’ll have enough o’ an open mind to accept them. We’re going to a wee place I know. Can’t get there by car. It’d take too long to walk. Hence the boat. Technically, this place is at the city’s northwestern outskirts, but you’d think you were in the middle o’ nowhere. It’s greener, cooler, with a bit o’ small forest and a hill.”

  “I saw a hill when I first entered the city,” Jay said. “It was off in the west.”

  “That’s the one,” Rucksack said. “I used to go there as a boy. The top o’ the hill is as calm as a pub at dawn. No staring eyes, no listening ears. Just you and me and the world. I’ll tell you all I can there.”

  Jay nodded and glanced down at his red t-shirt. An image of the Buddha faced forward while sitting on a small boat and holding a paddle. Above it, in large black letters, were the words, “life is but a dream.” The wooden plank where he sat was hard against Jay’s arse. He shifted around, trying to get comfortable. The boat swayed.

  “Take a bit o’ care,” Rucksack said. “You don’t want to fall in.”

  “No kidding. Amazes me how dirty this holy river is. Still surprises me how often dirtier means holier.”

  “Any eejit can dress himself fine and talk about being divine,” Rucksack replied.

  “Sounds like Guru Deep and those orange suits of his.”

  “A perfect example.” Rucksack snorted. He rowed faster. “If you want to see holy, really holy, you show me someone who’s half in to his last breath, covered in ash and shite, and still shines through all o’ that with a light that makes the world worth keeping on. That’s a trick I don’t think Guru bloody Deep could pull. But it’s all I know o’ holy, and it’s all I know to be worth a damn.” Rucksack eased off the oars. “Sorry. Something got my wind up. No, the main reason I want you to be careful is a river like the Agamuskara is a tricky one. A lad like you falls in, who knows where you’ll wind up.”

  “Well, after the river hits the Ganges to the east,” Jay answered, “you’d eventually reach Kolkata and then the Indian Ocean.”

  “Physically, sure, that’s how the river flows.”

  “Let me guess,” Jay said with a laugh. “There’s an invisible river that flows in a different direction.”

  “Right,” Rucksack said. “In one direction. And here I thought I was going to tell you something you didn’t know. The eastern flow is only a physical manifestation of the river. The real Agamuskara, the river behind the river, flows north, up into the Himalayas.”

  “I could point out that rivers don’t flow uphill,” Jay said, “but I’ve seen too many weird things over the years, especially since I’ve been here.” He shook his head. “I know what you’re saying shouldn’t be possible, but I also know it’s not possible; it’s actual.”

  “It’s a weird one, I’ll grant you that. It’s not the only one either. Other rivers have both their physical course and their actual course. If you followed the Agamuskara’s real course, you’d arrive at a place, way deep, called the Heart o’ the World. Ever hear o’ it?”

  “In stories,” Jay replied. “It’s the sort of thing you hear in a hostel common room after everyone’s had a bit beyond their fill of guitar tunes and cheap red wine. People say the Heart of the World’s some sort of Himalayan utopia, where everything is perfect and everyone is happy.”

  “Ama
zing the wisdom that gets passed along as legend,” Rucksack said. “Then again, myth is the best camouflage for the real. Heart o’ the World exists, Jay. It’s where Mum’s from. And when the time came for me to join the world, it’s where I was born.”

  “If it’s so perfect, why did Kailash leave?”

  “She was among the first with a true wanderlust.” Rucksack smiled with a wistful look in his eyes. “Mum wanted to see the world. She soon learned that the world is not the Heart. In time, I think Mum came to understand that she could not change the world as it was, so she decided to become part o’ the world as it could be. There’s more, o’ course. Much o’ it I hardly understand. She was going to explain.” His voice trailed off.

  “But then she was gone.”

  “Aye.”

  The men said nothing else. Jay watched the city thin out, the buildings getting smaller and sparser as Rucksack rowed. Soon there was no city to see, only small white, squat blocks set back a few meters from the water. Past those, only trees and grasses covered the riverbanks. Yet Jay could sense that somehow they were still in Agamuskara.

  The boat bumped against the shore. On the far side of a patch of forest, the lone hill rose high in the morning air. The men hauled the boat out of the water and stowed it against a tree. After a few moments of silent staring, Rucksack smiled. “Right, that’ll stay put. Off we go.”

  If there was a path, Jay couldn’t see it but Rucksack clearly could. The weariness of his anywhere face faded with every step over the hard ground, with every breath of the clear air, fresh and moist from the river and the trees growing all around. It isn’t a forest like home, Jay thought, recalling the vast woods of the US Northwest, oceans of green stretching beyond what the eye could see. Jay wondered how much of Agamuskara’s forest now existed only in the city’s buildings.

  The morning sun wove green and gold through the leaves of the trees, landing warm and alive on Jay’s skin. The silence enfolded him, soothing and relaxing his body and mind.

  They were deep in the trees when Jay finally understood why they had come here.

  There’s no one else here, Jay thought. Seems like the first time in years I’ve been somewhere that hasn’t been packed with people. But now I’m out in the middle of nowhere.