Tim Lebbon: Echo city

And, if so, what had happened to those who helped?

"This is so much more than me," she whispered. The man stirred, turning his head as if looking for whoever had spoken, but his eyes remained closed. His breathing was ragged and dry, his dark skin burned by the sun and raised in countless minute pustules, his white hair clotted with sand. Those few times he had opened his eyes, she had seen how green they were. He was unlike anyone she had ever known.

She suddenly remembered that she was supposed to be eating with Penler that evening. For a moment she considered taking the stranger over there right away, but night in Skulk was dangerous. There were the gangs, and there were rockzards the size of humans living in the ruins, emerging only at night to feed. She could not risk him for anything. And, besides, she had never been the most reliable person. Penler would be annoyed at her absence but not worried.

Tomorrow she would make it up to him.

As the night drew on, and the man seemed to drift into a deeper, calmer sleep, Peer stood by her table, looking down at his shoulder bag. She touched it but did not recognize the material. Not silk, not canvas; it felt brittle but looked so strong. And those things she'd seen, protruding from the bag's open neck and still there now…

It felt so wrong, but she reached for the bag and loosened its string tie.

The man did not stir.

Guilt already weighing heavy, Peer opened the bag and emptied its contents across her table.

Later, staring at the man's belongings, terrified and excited in equal measures, she sensed that she was being watched.

She glanced at her bed and he was looking at her, blinking softly. He raised his left hand to his mouth to mimic taking a drink. She handed him a cup and he sipped at the water, then drank more greedily.

"Not too much," she said.

"More," he said, and his rough hand closed around hers to tip the cup farther. When he'd finished the water, he lay back onto the pillow, panting slightly and staring at the ceiling.

"You speak Echoian?"

"Echoian?"

"You do." She stood beside the bed, not quite knowing what to do. He forms his words strangely. They sound different but mean the same.

"I don't know," he said, but he did not elaborate.

"Where are you from?"

"Not here," he said, shaking his head. Desert dust fell from his hair, and Peer wondered whether she could die from that.

But he hadn't died. What did that mean?

"What's your name?"

"Name?"

"My name is Peer Nadawa."

"Peer." He looked at her, and his mouth lifted in a faint smile. "You're not her."

"Not who?" she asked. He turned away. "Your name?"

The man closed his eyes, the frown returning. "No name."

"Listen…" Peer began, then she sighed and sat on the edge of the bed, relieving the weight from her aching hip. The man's hand was close to her thigh. She lifted it gently to examine his sunburn and the grit of his incredible journey collected beneath his fingernails.

"You're not scared," the man whispered.

"I'm fucking terrified!" She realized that she was crying, surprised at the aching nostalgia she suddenly felt for simpler times. Like yesterday. "I'm terrified because you're going to change everything. I need to take you to see some people, and they'll be amazed, and some other people will hate that you're here. They might even try to…"

"Why?" he asked.

"Why what?"

"Why… all of it?"

Peer shook her head. She'd lit some candles earlier, and now one of them went out with a gentle hiss. The room grew fractionally darker, but she did not notice the difference.

"Because that's just the way we are," she said. She kept hold of his hand. His eyes closed and his breathing softened. Peer looked down at where their hands touched. He's from somewhere else, she thought. He's no wandering god, no straggler from Echo City gone out and come back again. If he was, he'd be growing sick by now, not getting better. She tried to let go of his hand, but he squeezed.

"My name…" he said, frowning again.

"Let me give you one," she said, and the man nodded against his pillow. "Well… my father was called Rufus."

"Rufus."

"And for a second name… there are people who believe that seventy-seven six-legged gods wander the desert."

"I saw no gods," he said, smiling.

"It's just a belief," she said, shrugging. "One of them is called Kyuss. He's supposed to be the god of new things. It's his job to make sure Echo City moves forward."

"Echo City?"

"That's where you are."

"Where is Echo City?"

"It's…" Peer did not know how to answer. No one had ever asked her that before, because the question made as much sense as Where is the air? "It's here," she said. "It's everywhere. It's the whole world."

"No," the man she had named Rufus Kyuss whispered, "there's more." And then he fell asleep and did not wake until morning.

Penler answered the door, bleary-eyed and with a knife in his hand.

"Peer? It's barely dawn. I was expecting you for dinner last night, and I-" He saw the shape standing behind Peer. "Who's this?"

"His name's Rufus." She ushered him through Penler's door, and the old man stood aside to let him enter. Penler glanced back and forth, confused, but Peer didn't give him time to object. By the time she was inside and closing the door behind her, throwing the bolts and checking through the peephole to make sure they had not attracted any attention, Rufus had disappeared into the house's shadows.

"Crap, Peer, what's going on?"

"Sorry about last night." She pushed past him and followed Rufus inside. He was in the large living area, standing in the center and turning a full, slow circle as he stared in wonder at the walls. Penler was a collector of maps, and he had some parchments that dated back many hundreds of years. One showed an area of Mino Mont that was now an Echo, built over seven hundred years before.

None of that would mean anything to Rufus. Yet Peer watched his amazement, and her heart skipped a beat.

"Who the crap is that?" Penler whispered behind her.

"He's a new arrival," Peer said.

"Oh," he said, raising his voice slightly. "Well, sorry. Welcome to Skulk."

"Skulk?" the man said, confused. "This is not Echo City?"

"No, no," Peer said, turning and placing her hands on Penler's shoulders. Exhausted though she was, and terrified, and in pain from the air shards in her arm, she could not contain the smile that warmed her face. "Penler, he's from outside. Out there!" She waved her hand in the general direction of the desert, frustrated because she could not properly voice what she had to say.

"Not Echo City," Rufus said.

The blood drained from Penler's face, and he swayed a little. Peer guided him to a chair, terrified that she'd sprung this on him too suddenly. He was an old man, and though he seemed fit, decades in Skulk had done him no good. She'd never forgive herself if "The Garthans," he whispered.

"What? No, no, Penler. They don't know about him. No one knows."

Penler looked past Peer at Rufus, who was now slowly pacing the perimeter of the large room, examining the maps.

"And no one can know," she said. She leaned down so that he had to look into her eyes. "Penler, this is what we've been waiting for all our lives!"

"We?" he said, still pale, shaking his head slightly. "Peer, it's a trick. It has to be. How can you be sure?"

"I saw him walking in across the Bonelands."

"When?"

"Yesterday, not long after you left me at the wall."

"No." He shook his head. "Impossible."

She was annoyed at Penler's reaction, and confused. He was the intellectual, the philosopher of Skulk, banished because of his great ideas. And yet here he was doubting instead of questioning, falling back on indoctrination instead of considering the fantastic possibilities that stared him in the face. He shook his head slowly, and she had never seen him looking so old.