21
They had driven to flatland by the sea. They found an inauspicious wooden and stone hovel by the beach, and slept there. They were exhausted, Alana and Kirwyn slept on the living room floor by the bikes. Saburo claimed a brown rotting sofa. The one bed, upstairs, was taken by Loma.
Alana was first to rise, raising her head from the crumpled poncho that served as her pillow. Her body was stiff and felt misaligned from the journey, she stretched and heard something pop in her neck. She winced, then hung her head, wiping her eyes. She walked to the window and swept the curtains open. She saw a man in a mask staring back at her. She screamed.
Saburo was up in a flash, he saw Alana – her back turned to him. He crouched over to her. “What is it?” he hissed.
“Look,” she said softly. He popped his head up to the window for a second, then returned for a longer look. It was a child. It wore a flat wooden mask. It had a frozen look of happiness. With two big irregular eyeholes and a cartoon smile. Its only other garments were a loin cloth and some kind of dry grassy rings it wore on its ankles. It stood completely motionless. Kirwyn came next, groggy and irritable, he looked out and was sobered. The three looked at one another in confusion. Loma either did not hear the commotion or pretended not to. She slept in her sealed suit upstairs.
“Creepy little fucker,” said Saburo quietly, eyes glued to the thing.
“Why is he just standing there?” asked Alana, concerned.
“Maybe it’s a scout,” said Kirwyn. “Or maybe it’s… mad.”
“We have to go out sometime,” said Alana.
Alana went out first, creaking the door open and walking slowly. The mask turned to meet her.
“Hello,” she said. “Alright?”
The mask didn’t respond.
“Is this your house?” she offered. She walked up to the stranger until she was almost within touching distance. She confirmed that the child was unarmed. She looked at it for a while, and it looked back at her. “Do you speak Inglish? Salut. Ni hao.”
The mask cocked its head to one side, but still remained silent and still. Alana looked to the window and shrugged her shoulders. Kirwyn came out next, gingerly. The mask immediately fixated on him, the child walked away from Alana, until it was a few feet away from both of them. Kirwyn stopped in his tracks. “Can you speak?” he asked. “Do you understand us? Nod if you can.”
The mask looked down, and across the beach. Kirwyn furrowed his brow and sat down in the sand, he put his fist under his chin and studied the beach. Alana crouched over, resting her hands on her knees. She too looked across the beach, and all around, but saw nothing of interest.
“Hey kid,” said Saburo, kicking open the door. The child jumped in the air. “What are you doing out here mate?” He walked confidently to the child. It span around and ran up the beach on skinny little legs like a doe.
Alana glowered at him “What’d you that for, dickhead.”
Saburo was nonchalant. “What were you gonna do? Take it with you?”
“Where’s she off to?” said Kirwyn. They stared at the child, running into the sand dunes.
“I’m going for a swim,” said Saburo whipping off his t-shirt.
Kirwyn stared at Alana absent-mindedly. He got up and followed the child. Alana joined him.
“Those two are driving me fucking mental,” she hissed.
“…Yeah,” said Kirwyn, sighing. The kid disappeared into the beach grass in the dunes. They followed its footsteps in the sand.
“What do you think’s wrong with the kid?” he asked.
“Probably just scared. Probably lost its mum. That’s why it went to me,” she said. She felt a cold twist in her stomach. “What are we going to do when we find it?”
“I could take it to a Tacitus sect. I know of a few temples.”
“Really?” she said. “You think that’s a good idea?”
“They took me in when I was around that age,” he said, hurt.
‘And look how that turned out,’ she thought. “Can’t you take him to Retragrad?”
“Isn’t that the place you ran away from?” he said, coldly.
Alana stopped “He’d be safe there. Is all I’m saying.” Kirwyn stopped too. He nodded, and they continued their walk.
“It’s a girl, I’m pretty sure,” said Kirwyn. They walked up to the beach grass, little hills, and dips with pools of sand in them. It stretched out far, but the hills concealed the true distance. They had lost sight of the child but continued to walk a little while longer.
“A future nun,” said Alana, smiling joylessly.
“If she wants,” said Kirwyn, matching her joyless smile.
“Somehow, I reckon a lot of kids end up nuns, when they’re raised in a nunnery.”
“I was raised by munks, I’m not a munk.”
“But you wanted to be.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Most people don’t want to be.”
Kirwyn didn’t know what to say, he stared at her, and she at him. Till a man screamed and blocked their path with a wooden club.
They stepped back, Kirwyn had his sword, and Alana her pistol, they drew them. But they were surrounded. Men and women in masks, like the child’s. Some more elaborate, with seashells and feathers stuck to them, others were ancient, like driftwood, green with algae. They all had clubs. Some rested them on the ground and had bows and arrows that they would constantly nock, pull, but then slowly release, never firing. They howled and whistled. Eyes wide with terror and rage behind the masks, white teeth flashing, tongues dipping out of wooden mouths.
In the throng, a path eventually parted, and as it did silence spread. An old woman appeared, wizened and wind burnt. Her teats hung to her bellybutton, and she wore hundreds of sea shells in her white hair and around her neck. She carried a large white staff. Her mask was large and ornate. She stood in front of Alana’s pistol, seemingly without fear. She stared at the two of them.
“You drop weapons,” she said.
Kirwyn reluctantly dropped the sword of Barabbas on the sand. A child snatched it and ran off. Kirwyn stared after it, breathing hot air out of his nose in frustration. Alana hesitated, then locked her pistol and offered it to the old woman. The old woman took it and passed it to another tribal member, this also disappeared into the crowd.
“What you doing on our beach?” demanded the Matriarch.
“We’re travellers. We needed somewhere to sleep,” said Alana.
“How many travellers?”
Alana wondered whether to lie. “Four,” she said, shrugging.
“And why you chasing my grand-child?” she said, jutting her staff under Kirwyn’s chin. He looked up, shocked.
“We thought she was an orphan – we were trying to help!” he spluttered.
Hmmm breathed the old woman, eyeing him, but she released him. “Why?” she asked.
Kirwyn and Alana puzzled over this. “We – were worried about her… We’re orphans too,” said Alana at last.
“I don’t believe you,” said the old woman laughing coldly. “We been tricked by people like you before.”
“Please!” urged Alana “She was on her own, we just felt bad, we’ll leave, we’ll never come back, we have no reason to.”
A skinny youth scampered into the presence of the Matriarch. She held up the sword of Barabbas, pointing to a section of the scroll that had been unfurled. She whispered into the Matriarch’s ear and then ran off. The Matriarch slipped her mask onto her head, revealing a tanned, wizened old face. The Matriarch’s blue eyes opened wide. She reached into the pocket of her skirt and retrieved a bizarrely ordinary-looking pair of reading glasses. She popped these onto the edge of her nose and read carefully.