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Then she sorts through the room for flammables, gathering what she can -- paper, some remnants of a smashed chair, a stack of CDs. There's a second floor, but Blanco's blocking the door to what must be the stairway and she's not ready to get that close to him yet. She searches under the trees for dead branches: with the barbecue lighter and the paper and the CDs, they catch eventually. She makes bone soup with the Mo'Hair leg, adding the mushrooms and some purslane from the flower bed; they eat it sitting in the smoke of the fire, because of the mosquitoes.
They sleep on the flat roof, using a tree to climb up. Toby drags the packsacks up too, and the other three Mo'Hair legs, so nothing can steal them during the night. The rooftop's pebbly, and wet as well: they lie on the two sheets of plastic. The stars are brighter than bright; the moon's invisible. Just before they go to sleep, Ren whispers, "What if he wakes up?"
"He'll never wake up," says Toby.
"Oh," says Ren in a tiny voice. Is that admiration of Toby, or simply awe in the face of death? He wouldn't have lived, Toby tells herself, not with a leg as bad as that. Attempting to treat it would have been a waste of maggots. Still, she's just committed a murder. Or an act of mercy: at least he didn't die thirsty.
Don't kid yourself, babe, says the voice of Zeb in her head. You had vengeance in mind.
"May his Spirit go in peace," she says out loud. Such as it is, the fuck-pig.
70
TOBY. SAINT RACHEL AND ALL BIRDS
YEAR TWENTY-FIVE
Toby wakes just before dawn. In the distance there's a liobam, its odd plaintive roar. Dogs barking. She moves her arms, then her legs: she's stiff as a slab of cement. The dampness of the mist goes right into the marrow.
Here comes the sun, a hot rose lifting out of peach-coloured clouds. The leaves on the overhanging trees are covered with tiny droplets that shine in the strengthening pink light. Everything looks so fresh, as if newly created: the stones on the rooftop, the trees, the spiderwebbing slung from branch to branch. Sleeping Ren seems luminous, as if silvered all over. With the pink top-to-toe tucked around her oval face and the mist beading her long eyelashes, she's frail and otherworldly, as if made of snow.
The light hits Ren directly, and her eyes open. "Oh shit, oh shit," she says. "I'm late! What time is it?"
"You're not late for anything," says Toby, and for some reason both of them laugh.
Toby scouts with the binoculars. To the east, where they'll be going, there's no movement, but to the west there's a group of pigs, the biggest gathering of them she's seen to date -- six adults, two young. They're strung out along the roadside like round flesh pearls on a necklace; they have their snouts down, snuffling along as if they're tracking.
Tracking us, thinks Toby. Maybe they're the same pigs: the grudge-bearing pigs, the funeral-holding pigs. She stands up, waves the rifle in the air, shouts at them: "Go away! Piss off!" At first they just stare, but when she brings the rifle down and aims it at them they lollop off into the trees.
"It's almost like they know what a rifle is," says Ren. She's a lot steadier this morning. Stronger.
"Oh, they know," says Toby.
They clamber down the tree, and Toby lights the Kelly kettle. Although there's no sign of anyone around, she doesn't want to risk making a bigger fire. She's worried about the smoke -- will anyone smell it? Zeb's rule was: Animals shun fire, humans are drawn to it.
Once the water has boiled she makes tea. Then she parboils more of the purslane. That will warm them up enough for their early walking. Later they can have more Mo'Hair soup, from the three legs remaining.
Before they leave, Toby checks the gatehouse room. Blanco's cold; he smells even worse, if that's possible. She rolls him onto the blanket and drags him out to the rooted-up earth of the flower bed. Then she finds his knife on the floor where he dropped it. It's sharp as a razor; with it she slits his filthy shirt up the front. Hairy fishbelly. If she was being thorough, she'd open him up -- the vultures would thank her -- but she remembers the sickening reek of innards from the dead boar. The pigs will take care of it. Maybe they'll view Blanco as an atonement offering to them and forgive her for shooting their fellow pig. She leaves the knife among the flowers. Good tool, but bad karma.
She heaves the wrought-iron gate shut behind them; the electronic lock's non-functional, so she uses some of her rope to tie it shut. If the pigs decide to follow, the gate won't deter them for long -- they can dig under -- but it may give them pause.
Now she and Ren are outside the AnooYoo grounds, walking along the weed-bordered road that leads through the Heritage Park. They come to some picnic-table clearings; the kudzu is crawling over the trash barrels and barbecues, the tables and benches. In the sunlight, which is hotter by the minute, butterflies waft and spiral.
Toby takes her bearings: downhill, to the east, must be the shore and then the sea. To the southwest, the Arboretum, with the creek where the Gardener children used to launch their miniature Arks. The road leading to the SolarSpace entrance ought to join in somewhere around here. Nearby is where they'd buried Pilar: sure enough, there's her Elderberry, quite tall now, and in flower. Bees buzz around it.
Dear Pilar, thinks Toby. If you were here today you'd have something wise to tell us. What would it be?
Up ahead they hear bleating, and five -- no, nine -- no, fourteen Mo'Hairs scramble up the bank and out onto the road. Silver, blue, purple, black, a red one with its hair in many braids -- and now there's a man. A man in a white bedsheet, belted around the waist. It's a biblical getup: he even has a long staff, for sheep-prodding no doubt. When he sees them he stops and turns, watching them quietly. He's got sunglasses on; he's also got a spraygun. He holds it casually by his side, but lets it be clearly seen. The sun's behind him.
Toby stands still, her scalp and arms tingling. Is this one of the Painballers? He'd turn her into a sieve before she could even get the rifle aimed: the sun's in his favour.
"It's Croze!" says Ren. She runs towards him with her arms outstretch
ed, and Toby certainly hopes she's right. But she must be, because the man lets her throw her arms around him. He drops his spraygun and his staff on the ground and clutches Ren tightly, while the Mo'Hairs amble about munching flowers.
71
REN. SAINT RACHEL AND ALL BIRDS
