The Stray Read online

  Every lesson, our numbers dwindled. Girls gave up, or lost motivation, or became distracted. Soon, we were no more than a handful.

  “Screw them,” Nahaya said. “If they want to throw away their futures, let them.”

  “And their pasts,” I muttered. “If we’re not traders, then what are we?”

  “Exactly; we’re nothing.”

  “And we can never escape. They will never escape.”

  “Escape what?”

  “Kagosaka.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I looked at her, searching her eyes. “Seriously? You want to stay here?”

  “Are you still thinking about becoming some kind of wandering trader?”

  “It would be far better than staying here.”

  “Would it?” Nahaya touched my hand. “There are good things to be found here. Or, if you really can’t find anything good, then you can make something good.” She pulled her hand away, looking down at the ground. “Do you ever wonder if, maybe, it’s your own attitude that’s stopping you from settling here?”

  I paced back and forth like a caged animal. “Yes. Of course it’s my attitude. That’s exactly the point. My attitude is that this is not my home. My attitude is that I do not want to be here. My attitude is that, as soon as I get the chance, I’m leaving.”

  “And leave your roots?”

  I stopped, and stared at her. “Okaporo are my roots.”

  “Okaporo doesn’t exist.”

  “Yes, it does.” I flung my arm towards the coast. “It may not exist out there anymore, it may be no more than a burnt patch of earth. But here—” I pounded at my chest. “Okaporo is alive and thriving here. And it should be alive in you, too.” I stepped closer to her. “The rogues killed everyone in Okaporo first time, but you killed them all over again when you started to accept this place as your home. This will never be my home. Never.”

  “What about Akikai?”

  “What about him?”

  “Don’t you want to make a life here with him?”

  I roared my frustration at her. “Don’t you understand? There is no life to be had here. It’s not a choice I’m making. It’s a cold, hard fact.”

  She looked back at the ground. “I don’t think that’s true.”

  “What, so you want to live here, in the mountains, and get married to Taka, and have his babies, and live happily ever after? Do you really believe that can happen?”

  “It can happen if I want it to.”

  I resumed my pacing. “No, Nahaya, it can’t happen. Because he’s a brute. And your children will always be ‘tainted’ by their Okaporo blood. They’ll be bullied, and pushed aside. What if they choose not to teach your daughters? What if your daughters are refused their birthright because of the Okaporo blood in their veins? What if, every night, as you tuck them into bed, you have to look into their dumb, ignorant eyes, and know that they will never become traders, all because you chose the easy option?”

  “You think this is the easy option?”

  “Yes. I do. The lazy choice. The choice that requires absolutely no courage on your part.”

  Nahaya placed both of her hands on my chest, shoving me backwards. “How dare you!” she yelled. “How dare you, Kioto! You walk around here with your air of superiority, as if you’re the only one who lost people. As if you’re the only one who’s hurting. You know what, Kioto? It’s not my choice that lacks courage. It’s not me that lacks courage. It’s you. You cowardly hold onto your hurt and your pain as an excuse for checking out of life altogether. You’re so afraid of making something for yourself, you’re so afraid of trying something new. That’s the cowardly choice, Kioto, not the one I’m making. I’m being brave. I’m rebuilding from scratch. You’re just standing in the ashes of Okaporo too scared to move. Too scared to try again. You’re the coward, Kioto, not me.”

  17

  KIOTO

  Nahaya’s words were still echoing in my head as I looked up at the dingy sign above the door of the trader exchange in Kagosaka.

  Kagosaka was a small city, barely a city at all, in fact. It had been built around heavy industry, and it always felt like there was a film of grease over everything. Tucked into a valley, it was caught between the peaks like it had been accidentally dropped, and forgotten about. The air was heavy and hot, completely bypassed by the fresh breezes that ran through the colony above.

  I’d been into the Okaporo exchange with my parents several times, but I barely remembered it. Besides, I hadn’t been paying attention to anything other than the cakes on display in the cafe area. One of the traders who worked there always gave me a lolly. That, I did remember.

  Lifting my chin, I pushed the door open and stepped inside, with as much confidence as I could summon.

  The interior of the exchange was surprisingly bright and airy. It was clean, and well-managed. The cafe was busy, and not just with traders waiting around for jobs. The job counter was busy, too. A small group of traders were leaning over it, pointing up at the screens behind, chatting animatedly. Arguing, possibly.

  A wiry man was standing behind the counter, waving his arms wildly.

  With a forced smile, I approached, casting my eyes over the screens. The information on them reeled too quickly to read, flicking through jobs as they came in, and were snapped up. Either by traders at other exchanges, or by memory merchants, muscling in on the network.

  I caught the man’s eye, and he nodded to me.

  “Come on, you lot,” he said, shooing the other women away. “Let the girl through. Take your argument elsewhere. Some of us have work to do.”

  They parted, peeling away from the counter, and drifting towards the adjoining cafe.

  The man eyed me closely. “How old are you?” he asked.

  “Sixteen,” I lied, drawing myself up to my full height. “I know, I look a lot younger.”

  “Good skin. You’ll be glad of that one day. Newly graduated?”

  I nodded.

  “Thought I hadn’t seen you before. Throwing yourself in at the deep end, eh?”

  “Huh, yeah. Something like that.”

  He swept his hand towards the screens. “As you can see, jobs come and go very quickly, so you can’t spend time dithering. You need to leap on opportunities here, just like you should in all of your life.” He winked. “I bet it looks like a whole load of confusing mumbo-jumbo, eh?”

  “It does.”

  “Don’t worry about it. That’s what I’m here for. Think of me as an interpreter. Eventually, you’ll learn to read these screens yourself, but, honestly, it won’t give you that much of an edge. I get to know my ladies. I get to know the kind of jobs they want. And I often take them for them, even when they’re not here.” He winked again, lifting up a handful of cyber cards from behind the counter. “But, that’s between me, you, and the wallpaper, right?”

  “Sure.”

  “So, in light of that fact—” He extended his hand over the counter, and I took hold of it. He gave one firm shake, and slipped out of my grasp. “I’m Achi. I know, I’m only half Lobayan. But I’ve always claimed it’s my better half. And you are?”

  “Kioto.”

  “So, now we’re friends, right?”

  I nodded. “Of course.”

  “Then, Kioto, how old are you really?”

  I swallowed, looking down at the front edge of the counter. “Thirteen,” I mumbled. “Nearly fourteen.”

  “You know what, Kioto? That’s good enough for me. We all have our reasons for doing stuff, and I’m betting that you have a damn good reason for walking into my exchange looking for work at the very tender age of thirteen, am I right?”

  I nodded, keeping my eyes lowered.

  “That’s all I need to know, honey. The rest is your business. Just be honest with me. You know what you’re doing, right?”

  I looked up at him, forcing myself to keep eye contact. “Yes,” I said. “I know what I’m doing.”

  “That’s good. This p
lace thrives on recommendations and repeat business. If clients like you, they’ll request you personally. No point in doing a bad job, because you won’t ever do another. Will you do a good job, Kioto?”

  I tossed my head. “Better than most, actually.”

  Achi reeled with laughter, slamming his hand down on the counter. “I like that attitude!” he howled. “An attitude like that will get you a long way in life, girl. ‘Better than most’. I like that. Bless you. Right, let’s get to business.”

  He held his hand out expectantly, and I stared at it, dumbfounded. He twitched his fingers impatiently. “Cyber card,” he said.

  I patted my pockets, even though I knew I didn’t have one. “I didn’t…”

  “Fear not.” He ducked behind the counter. “I always have spare.” He reappeared, holding up a cyber card triumphantly. He pulled a pen from behind his ear, crossing out the name written on the cyber card’s paper label. “Kioto, right?”

  “Right.”

  He wrote my name on the card, and tapped it against the counter. “I never forget a name, me. It’s a gift.” He shrugged. “Don’t lose this,” he said, holding the card out to me.

  I took hold of it, cradling it in my hand like treasure.

  “There.” Achi pointed to a small screen embedded in the counter top. “Be ready to grab the job the second I pass it over.”

  I hesitated.

  “Hold your cyber card over the screen. You have to be quick. And, simply loading the job onto your card isn’t enough to guarantee that it’s yours. Those merchants will steal it out from under you. So, once you’ve got your directions, you go. No stopping for anyone. You run, and make sure that you get there first. Understand?”

  “Yes.” I lifted the cyber card to the screen.

  “Now, given your age, and your unproven track record, I can’t give you my best clients, or the better paying jobs. You understand that, right?”

  “Of course. That’s fair.”

  “But, once you build up a reputation for yourself—and if you’re as good as you’re pretending you are, then that shouldn’t be hard—you’ll get better and better pick of the jobs. We all have to start at the bottom here.”

  “I understand.”

  “But, having said that, I’m betting that you’re not going to be too choosy about jobs that might be just a little bit less than entirely legit, right? Bending some morals, pushing the limits of some codes of practice, right?”

  I shrugged.

  “Some of those jobs can carry pretty high price tags. Not many traders will take them, and there are even some merchants with a strong conscience. But, don’t make that all that you do, Kioto. That is not the kind of reputation you want to get for yourself. Get known for that, and you’ll end up attracting some attention you really don’t want to. From both sides of the law. Got it?”

  “Thanks for the tip.”

  He winked at me. “I look after my girls. I’ll see you right.” He turned towards the screens. “Right, let’s find you something suitable, eh?”

  As he surveyed the screens, he clicked his tongue thoughtfully. He mumbled to himself, inaudibly assessing the suitability of each job.

  “Aha,” he said. “This one’s been here a while, actually, so you shouldn’t have any competition. Nice easy one to start off with. It’s low pay, but simple. That’s why no one wants it; too much of a trek for such little compensation. But, I think it might just be perfect for you.” He flicked the job information to one side, and it appeared on the screen below my cyber card.

  I lowered the card, touching it to the screen.

  “There you go. It’s all yours.”

  The cyber card flashed with the first directional arrow.

  “Just follow the directions. Everything you need to know about the job is on there too. When you collect the payment, the commission is automatically deducted. That comes flying through to here, and I get notified that you’ve completed the job. And you start building your reputation. Best of luck, Kioto.”

  I looked down at the cyber card, the arrow still flashing on its front. My first job. My first step towards independence. My first step away from Kagosaka. I grinned.

  “Thanks, Achi. I’ll be back soon.”

  18

  KIOTO

  I’d barely returned to the colony when I spotted Akikai striding across the ground towards me. I glanced around, looking for an escape route, but he was already within reach of me.

  “What’s going on?” he said.

  I pushed past him. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  He grabbed my arm, spinning me around. “Kioto. You’ve been avoiding me.”

  “And, you’re surprised?”

  He frowned and pushed his hands into his pockets, his shoulders rising up to his ears. He stared down at the floor between us.

  “I am so sorry,” he said. “I was in a bad mood, the others— That’s no excuse. I took it out on you. I shouldn’t have.”

  Spurred on by his remorse, spurred on by the cyber card tucked into my pocket, and the raging headache the throw had left me with, I stepped close to him, looking him directly in the eye.

  “You treated me like I was nothing to you. You were demanding, pushy, insistent.”

  He stepped back, making some kind of choking noise as he tried to get some words out. He covered his face with his hands, before dragging them back down to his sides.

  He nodded. “I was. You’re right. And, if you can’t forgive me, I’m going to have to live with that. Knowing that I pushed you away. I’m so sorry, Kioto, and I don’t know what more I can say. How can I make this better?”

  I sighed. “It’s not my job to fix this,” I said. “I didn’t break it.”

  “You’re right. I don’t want to lose you, although, I’m afraid that I might have done so already.”

  I looked at him, into him, as deeply as I could. I lifted my hand towards his head. At first, he turned away, just the flicker of a motion, and then he stood still. I touched his forehead.

  “Would you let me in?” I asked.

  “Yes,” he said without hesitating. “Yes, I would.” He moved my hand to his chest. “You’re already in here, so why not? I have nothing to hide from you. I have nothing I want to hide. I want you to see me, Kioto. Really see me, and hear me, and know me.”

  I tugged my hand free from his. “I need to sleep,” I said. “I’ve got a headache. I’ll come and find you later.”

  “I’ll be waiting.”

  He did wait for me. On the steps outside my dorm. And I almost fell over him.

  He grabbed hold of me, deftly managing to swing me around so that I found myself sitting on his lap.

  “Sorry,” he mumbled, helping me to my feet. “I just keep messing up, don’t I?”

  “Come on,” I said. “Let’s go somewhere private.”

  He set off towards the cave, as I knew he would. I grabbed his wrist and pulled him towards the farms instead.

  “Not there,” I said. “I’m not ready for us to be back there. Not yet.”

  He nodded. I hoped that he understood. The cave was our intimate place. Mine and his. Our hole in the world. It was a place that I should have been able to trust him. It needed to be. I needed that. I couldn’t trust him right now, so we couldn’t be there.

  I climbed onto the low branch of the black pine, and Akikai lifted himself up next to me. It was safe here; nothing could happen between us. The privacy wasn’t complete, and balancing on a branch wasn’t a place that he could push an agenda. I nodded to myself. If it wasn’t for the butterflies going insane inside my stomach, I could almost convince myself that I felt relaxed.

  We sat in silence for a while. He waited for me to speak, to give him some condition that he could fulfil in order to restore my faith in him. But, there was no condition, or, if there was, I didn’t know what it was myself. This was another one of those moments that appeared to be wrapped up in a complicated set of rules that no one had explained to me. I thought o
f my mother, and found myself swamped by such a swell of longing for her, that my mouth let out a whimper.

  “What is it?” Akikai asked, his hand landing on my arm.

  I shook my head. “I just miss my family.”

  He slowly took his hand back. “I can’t even imagine what that might have been like. To return home and find… nothing.”

  “We didn’t find nothing. We found the bones of our families, still smouldering in the rubble of our home. We found the stench of death, and the everlasting curse of heartbreak. We didn’t return to nothing. We saw it all.”

  “I’m sorry…. I didn’t mean…” He looked off into the trees.

  “It’s alright. It was years ago. I’ve almost got the smell out of my clothes.” I laughed, trying to lighten the air between us. “Look, Akikai, you have to remember that the massacre changed everything for me. It changed who I am, and it still governs that. Every decision I make, everything I do, it’s all shaded by what happened at Okaporo. And it always will be. That will never change. I am Kioto of Okaporo, and even if I lived here for the rest of my life, I would never be Kioto of Kagosaka. Not really.”

  “Marry me,” he said suddenly, leaning forward as if the force of the words had unbalanced him.

  “No,” I said. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “I don’t mean now. I just mean… Will you consider it, maybe, some day?”

  “We don’t know what’s going to happen. We can’t make that kind of commitment. It’s still two years before I turn sixteen.”

  “I can wait.” He took my hands in his. “I’d wait for you.”

  “You can’t say that, Akikai. Anything can happen in two years.”

  He looked at me for a moment, searching my face. “You’re leaving,” he whispered. “Aren’t you?”

  I turned away. “I’m thinking about it.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  I stared back at him. “You’d do that?”

  “Of course. I want to be with you, Kioto. Whether that’s here, or another colony, or wandering the world. Or, perhaps, someday, a rebuilt Okaporo.”