Chapter 13 – A River Runs Through It

Mas spent a little time choosing a suitable craft. He annoyed the hells out of the boat seller on the quay, picking at this thing or that. Were those seams doped enough? Was this one made from the right kind of wood? Did he have to have a coracle? In the end, he chose a canoe. It was made from a found-thing plastic barrel, but it had well-mounted stabilizers, tucked in on either side. There was enough room in the thing for three, but there’d only be him. Going back. To find, what? To start with, some answers from the only living member of his family. His mother.

Everything was still when he pushed off and started across the great lake. No breeze. And ominous quiet. Only moisture and brackish water on the air. He took his jacket off, checked for his spring-spear in the pocket, stowed them both and started to paddle.

He spent three full spans in the same way. Eating fish that he caught with hook and line over the side of his canoe in a way he hadn’t for— he didn’t know how long. Part of him wanted to enjoy it, but every paddle stroke made him twitch. The echoes in the river-tunnel made him think he was being followed. Each night when he tied the canoe up at the nearest mooring point he could find, he went to sleep dreaming about smoke and strangling.

His last sleep-span was spent about one span’s travel away from the fairly flexible borders of the River-folk. He knew he’d need his wits about him, for all the world of Dark had changed since the fall of its erstwhile dictators, the Overfolk. The war had been over for some time, but River-folk never quite could followed anyone else’s rules. They could scarce follow their own, what rules there were.

Mas’ attention snapped to as his Air-sense tickled with an increase of headwind. He splashed to an abrupt stop and sculled to the side of the pipe. Ahead, he could hear the faintest whine. A tiny singing noise from something awakened by that breeze. As the breeze died down, so did the whine. He moved the canoe slowly and silently, by edging forward hand over hand on the wall of the tunnel.

“Ssss,” Mas had to make a sound, the sharp slice in his finger hurt already.

He gently reached up and felt for what had caught his attention. A thin metal wire was slung at a lazy head height across the pipe. Someone was fishing. The technique was frowned upon of course: outlawed in all civilized River-folk families but that didn’t stop it being used. It was a massively effective way of catching prey. Dump the headless body back in the water and let it float downstream, once it was stripped of anything of worth, obviously. Except that the person who’d set this line up was an amateur. The line was way too tight. A little slacker, it would’ve been silent. Who was teaching the pups their heritage these days?

Now, what to do? Mas lifted his weight out of the canoe and slid over the side without as much as a plop. For an out of shape Lakesider, it was all coming back to him at speed. Maybe all that work his subconscious had been doing was paying off. He hung from the wooden toggle at the back of the canoe, with just his nostrils above the water, and let the canoe drift slowly as the trap had intended. A small hint of sweat and tar wafting to Mas was, slowly resolved into a person. Young. Female. River-folk.

He felt a bump on the boat: too sharp an impact to be a hand, a barge pole? The vibration told him it was on his right-hand side, about half-way down the boat. He held onto the toggle with one hand, ducked under the water and stretched along the canoe with the other, slowly to keep all profile and scent of him under the water.

“Huh?” said the girl from the side of the river.

In a click, Mas swiped his hand up and caught the long stick: a bamboo pole with a curve at the end he’d grabbed. He gave it a sharp tug. “Woah-oah-aah!” yelled the girl as her balance went from whatever hole or ledge she’d been perched on. Mas let the pole slide through his hands as she overbalanced and fell into the river with a splash. He grabbed at her with his free arm, writhing to get a good grip and keep a hold on the canoe. In the struggle, he wound up with an arm around her throat, keeping the canoe, but letting go of the barge pole. “You rat!” she said as she felt it go from her fingers. “You know how long that took me to make?”

“I’d think you’d be more concerned about why I shouldn’t kill you?” murmured Mas into her ear.

“Get bent.”

He ducked her under the water, felt her struggle for a few clicks and then brought her up. She spat water out noisily.

“Always an easy way—and a hard—way,” said Mas, coughing. In keeping the girl in a headlock as she fought him, he’d taken on water himself.

“Okay! Okay!”

“Good,” said Mas. “Now let’s get you and me up on the side and we can talk.”

They sat either side of a hot vent, steaming fish on sticks. It was a picnic that they’d both contributed to. The girl had a bottle of spicy sauce to drip on, too. It was sharp and warm and sour. Mas liked it enough to want to ask what it was and where to get it.

“I got it at the last Flotilla.”

The Flotilla was the name for a once a cycle meet-up for the main families of the River-folk. It was somewhere different each time, depending on movements and changing territories and alliances. It served as a loose political binding for the very disbursed River-folk, disputes were settled, and grievances aired, as well as news and produce shared. There was an ad-hoc market that spread across all the tied together boats, that spilled onto whatever shore there was, depending on where they were moored. The smells of different traditional food from each family tended to delineate passage through different territories on the boats, but while the massive conjoined raft that formed the Flotilla was moored, all boats were considered neutral territory. If Mas was to find his mother, the Flotilla would be the best bet.

“When’s the next one?”

“Two spans’ time.”

“Where?”

“The Stacks.”

“Oh good, not far. You’re taking me.”

“Ok,” she said sulkily.

“Least you can do for trying to murder me.”