I want to say I didn't recognize him, he was so changed, but it's not true. I just didn't want it to be him. I didn't want him to have fallen so far.
I didn't want to have to deal with it.
Chalk dusted his bare chest and neck, the white cut through by smears and dribbles of blood. His nose was a raw wound, seeping pinkish fluid. Had he cut another inch of it off, seeking the help of the Unknowns? If he had, it didn't look as though they had answered.
I couldn't see any other wounds, but I could count his washboard ribs, and the bones of his hips jutted above the waist of his drooping pants. I scanned him for signs of death-palsy, for a contorted limb or stiff muscle, but I didn't know enough about the disease. I couldn't tell.
He looked half dead. But his eyes met mine and burned with the same righteous fire that had swamped them when he chased after Abursa's troupe.
I clung tighter to the automa's arm, and it wrapped me closer in its embrace. I felt like a child in the arms of my wooden mother.
"You," Amaz mouthed. He wobbled to his knees and slapped the bare dirt with his hands, his elbows digging trenches in front of him. "You."
I swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry. I couldn't sign like this, holding on for my life. I would have to speak.
I said, "Why are you here?"
He sat up, and his mouth twisted as though his lips wanted to writhe off his face. "You stole my wife."
"We didn't –"
"You stole my child."
My throat tightened at the accusations. "She chose to come here. We didn't steal anyone."
"You tricked her – convinced her–"
"I never even talked to her before she saved our lives! Even if I had, it's probably the only reason they're alive now. You should thank us."
He stilled, the rise and fall of his chest almost nothing. "I need to see her."
"I promised Grandmother I wouldn't let anyone in."
"She is my wife. She is bearing my child."
"Grandmother–"
"Do I look like someone who bows to your grandmother? I am a troupe leader."
His troupe was long gone, probably dead. "You came from the cities. You could be infected. You could kill them both." He could kill us all.
He snarled at me. "Two weeks. Two weeks in the desert. Do not tell me I am infected. Do not dare."
"You could be a carrier. You could've been infected and recovered–"
"Do I look a cripple?"
"You could already be dying."
Amaz heaved himself to his feet. His raw nose oozed. "I have sacrificed again. The Unknowns will not let me die. Not like this." His hand darted to his belt, a knife flashing as he drew it. "Should I do it again? Would that satisfy you? If I saw off my whole face?"
I took a horrified breath. "You're insane."
He slammed the knife back into its sheath. "I am trying to do what is right."
"Please don't cut anything off yourself."
He stepped closer, close enough he could've reached up and grabbed my ankle. "Perhaps I should cut it off you."
The automa shifted to cradle my body in one arm. The other arm swung.
A huge wooden fist caught Amaz in the belly, and his limp body flew. He landed on his back far from the gate and slid another dozen feet over rocks and brush, leaving shreds of skin behind. When he stopped, his nose bled tears down his face, and the dirt where he lay grew wet. For a long while he didn't move.
Had I gotten him killed? I trembled, my gasps rough in my throat. I struggled against the arm of the automa, but it had trapped me against its hard side. I rapped my fists against it. "Let me down. Now!"
If the automa obeyed verbal commands, it certainly didn't obey mine. I dangled, helpless as a scruffed fox.
Then Amaz twitched his head, and all the breath rushed out of me. He was alive.
He rolled onto his hands and knees, his face downcast. His shoulders and back washed away the mourning chalk as they bled.
I blurted, "I'm sorry! I didn't tell it to attack you."
Slowly he staggered to his feet, stiff like every part of him hurt. We stared at each other, my eyes wet with threatening tears, his bruised and red.
"I can't let you in." The words seemed too harsh the moment they left my mouth. I rushed on. "Grandmother isn't here. She made me promise to protect the town. So I can't... I don't know what to do."
The apple of his throat bobbed as he swallowed. "Then send her out."
I wasn't supposed to open the gate, and asking Lira to take an automa ride was out of the question. But I looked at him, standing desolate in the dirt, and I said, "Only if Lira wants to go."
"Then ask her." His mouth turned down. "I will be here."
I didn't doubt. He had nowhere else to go.
#
The trip over the wall was no more pleasant in reverse. Inside the town, everyone had gathered, clustered around Thesil like a troupe behind their leader. I couldn't spot Lira among their number. Thesil was staring at me, paying the crowd no mind. Her caterpillar brows steepled over her green eyes, and she crossed her arms when I tried to smile at her.
The automa swung me down, my toes touching the earth feather-light. It felt wrong. From such a height, I should've felt the impact in my bones. I hitched away from the wall, finding my feet properly after the sixth step. The step that brought me face to face with Thesil.
The sleepiness that had drooped the corners of her eyes half an hour ago had vanished. She stood straight, her shoulders squared under yesterday's wrinkled camise. Her hair flared into a pillow-flattened halo around her head, and she'd thrown the shirt on inside out. Somehow she still looked more qualified to run the place than me.
I licked dry lips and signed, "You didn't have to gather the whole camp. Where is Lira?"
Thesil frowned and unfolded her arms to sign, "I didn't. We all heard Amaz shouting, and you squeaking back."
The crowd swelled around us, cutting off escape to my paints and the stillness of our cottage. I hadn't dreamed the conversation could travel so far beyond the two of us. Almost all the conversations in my life had been private by nature, limited by the visibility of sign and my imperfect lip reading abilities. By the poor quality of my voice, no matter how much I practiced.
The weight of everyone's eyes on me weakened my knees. I focused on Thesil and pretended she was the only one trying to get my attention to tell me what to do; or say what Grandmother would do; or demand explanation, clarification, plans. Too much and too many. How did Grandmother do this? I wanted to melt into the sand and disappear.
Thesil was still staring at me, questions sharpening her face.
I signed, "We aren't in danger, I don't think."
"He threatened you."
"He didn't mean–"
"Did he have a knife?"
"Sheathed."
"Did he reach for it when he offered to hack off your face?"
"It doesn't matter! He was angry and alone, and the automa taught him better than to try anything."
Thesil tilted her head, foxlike and challenging. "Why are you defending him?"
No one else would, I didn't say. "Would you act any better if you had to watch whole troupes die of palsy? If you'd seen the perfectas die with them?"
"He tried to kill us, in case you forgot."
"He thought he was doing the right thing."
"Everyone does, or they wouldn't do it. Tell me you aren't planning something stupid."
"I'm not going to let him in," I protested.
"Just break the quarantine that keeps us alive."
"No. Just offer Lira the chance to rejoin him."
"And when she accepts, you'll open the gates."
"Only a crack. Only enough for her to slip through."
Thesil scowled. "Well, you can't. You have a town to protect. He could take your invitation, jam himself through the doors, and bring whatever he's carrying right in here."
"The automas–"
"Will hurl his corpse out of the camp. But do you want to gamble it'll be before he spits in someone's face?"
I sighed. "I didn't even think of that. Grandmother should've left you in charge."
Thesil shook her head. "I'm not her bloodline."
"What does that matter? You're better–"
"She can't give the town to anyone, not with a living descendant. If she'd offered it to me, I would have refused."
"What? Why?
"Because it's not right. The Cene positions pass to the children of the Cene. The Justry pass their burdens to the children of the Justry. Inheritance–"
My hands were fists, so I said aloud, "Shouldn't matter when everyone's life is at stake. But since you think I should be in charge, I'm letting Lira go out to Amaz if she wants." I felt helpless in the face of Lira and Amaz' personal tragedy. Any choice I made was wrong.
Thesil's glare met mine. Then she jerked her head left, her eyes tracking something beyond me. I turned.
Lira looked like a doll, standing perfectly still with her sunken eyelids and swollen stomach. Her hands cradled that belly and clenched tight. Her face drooped towards her chest. I could barely see her lips move, much less read them.
"She heard you," Thesil signed to me.
I glanced helplessly towards Thesil. "What did she say?"
Thesil rolled her eyes and signed, "My husband is outside the gate."
Having a translator was surreal. No one had bothered to perform that duty since I was torn from my parents. My irritation towards Thesil leeched away, replaced by a swell of gratitude, even as I spoke aloud to Lira. "He is."
"He is outside, starving, and our troupe and friends are all dead."
I faltered. "We don't know that."
Her hands twisted together over her stomach. Her face lifted. I suppressed a shiver. If she had eyes she would've been staring straight at me.
"Is he alone?"
"Yes."
"Then they are dead. He wants me to come to him."
Thesil frowned and stopped translating. I wondered what she was thinking.
I thought of Amaz and his washboard ribs. He had come so far. "Very much."
She nodded. "Bring me my donkey, loaded with food, and I will go to him."
"You don't have to go. Your baby–"
"I will go to him," she repeated.
Thesil signed to me, "Tell her she can't."
I ignored her. "We can't afford to give you much." I had too many stomachs to feed, and no way to replenish our supply.
I caught the edge of Lira's nod before Thesil stepped between us, making further conversation impossible. She signed, "If you open those gates, you're the biggest idiot I've ever met."
"At least I can read." I regretted the words as soon as I said them. Thesil had abandoned learning to read letters when learning to read hands and lips became so much more important.
Thesil's hands snapped a reply. "At least I can hear."
My throat closed until I couldn't guess if my next statement made any sound at all. "But not speak."
I couldn't tell, not until her face drew tight and her hands curled into meaningless fists, all words beyond rage smothered. She turned on her heel and stalked into the crowd, leaving me alone in front of dozens of people who wanted answers I didn't have.
If I could have, I would have followed Thesil. Taken back my stupid words. Held her fists in mine until they relaxed into the bony hands I knew so well. I could push through the people Grandmother had dumped on me and find her. But Thesil despised those who shirked their duty. Adding disdain to her anger would fix nothing.
Everyone's eyes were on me. I exhaled, a long, aching breath, and with hands and voice gave my orders.
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