Screams came from everyone, and then silence.
Merit couldn’t say when he got to his feet or if there was pain. But he was mobile enough to run, and what he did first was unfasten Diamond’s belts and then the other children’s. The knee didn’t complain until they were out on the barren, eroded coral, and he was counting every head, not believing the number but still thinking that this was so much better than he dared guess. Karlan’s hair was burnt, and maybe some flesh. And Nissim had gotten only one belt fastened, and now he was bent double and looking sick. Bountiful’s bridge and upper quarters were destroyed, the wreckage scattered along the higher portions of the ridge. The various fires were awful but growing weaker, and Merit wished the crew were alive, and he was thinking about Fret . . . and that’s when Seldom asked somebody, “Did you see him die?”
See who die? Merit thought of Good, but the monkey was here too.
“Something grabbed him and took him,” Seldom shouted.
“That’s what I saw,” Elata said. “Was it real?”
“What was real?” Diamond asked, stepping out of his fire suit.
“That papio man,” Seldom explained. “When we got over the reef, he threw that box out the door. And then . . . ”
“Your sister picked him up,” said Elata.
“It had to be Quest,” Seldom said.
“She was going to eat him,” Elata said.
“No, I don’t think so,” Seldom said, shaking his head. Those kinds of thoughts troubled him.
“Where did you see Quest?” Diamond asked.
“I didn’t,” Seldom said.
“She was higher on the ship, riding on the bags.” Elata said the words and then believed them, pointing up the long slope.
Diamond turned, and after a moment of saying nothing, he began to run toward the brilliant blue fires.
Merit tried to follow. The knee fought him, but the man refused pain and weakness and his own gathering age. He wanted nothing but to take care of the last shred of his family, and that’s why he managed to sprint for a fair distance. Nobody followed. He discovered that he was alone, limping along the ridge’s crest. Then he stepped wrong on the weak leg, tilting and recovering. But as the pain escalated, his strong leg slipped out from under him. He fell hard and spun down the far side of the ridge, and his cheek shattered and one wrist snapped before he came to a rest inside a wide bowl where rainwater clung to the sandy coral grit.
Merit lay on his back.
Machines were flying, approaching from every direction.
For a moment, he could hear Diamond calling for him. Or he imagined the familiar, wondrous voice. Either way, Merit sat up and remained sitting upright, and a creature that was scampering up that same slope spotted him and turned its course, approaching close enough that there was nothing in the world but the coral beneath and the titanic beast that overwhelmed—a papio’s shape but enlarged, juvenile in the face but powerful and sure-footed, strange pink hair that wasn’t hair, and lungs like bellows breathing hard after a very long run.
“Divers,” said Merit.
“And you are?” a booming voice asked, in papio.
He said his name both ways. “Merit,” and then, “Deserve.”
“I know you,” said the creature. “Yes, I know all about you.”
Then Divers reached down with both of those huge hands, one set of fingers carefully cradling the injured body while other fingers closed together, and that was the hand that pulled, removing the man’s tiny head.
TWELVE
The life inside him had never been so full and rich.
But the life outside, what Diamond carried on his shoulders and soul, was nearly lost. Home and that wonderful room were lost. The wooden soldiers were ashes, and so was Mother. Mother was lost everywhere but inside his mind, and he didn’t have time or the resolve to make those memories even passingly real. Not thinking about his mother, Diamond felt ashamed. His good brief life was in ruins. Besides the tattered school uniform, he owned nothing physical. There was nothing to carry but thoughts and shifting urges, memories on the surface and memories buried and ideas that didn’t deserve being called plans and emotions that scalded and brightened, too quick and far too restless to be tamed. Diamond had to shoulder his misery. Huge and relentless, the sense of grievous loss made his body tremble while roiling, bitter sensations kept finding ways to share the agony, the despair. A perfect indestructible mind could never leave any notion behind. The boy was convinced that he would never stop suffering, and indeed, he would have argued and maybe fought with any voice claiming that one day, with time, these horrific losses would stop slicing him down the middle.
But even now, more than devastation lived inside him.
That bizarre, wonderful sister emerged from hiding long enough to give him glimpses of the world she saw, which was different from the world Diamond knew. Quest was wondrous, and if she wasn’t blessing enough, in those last moments together, Quest gave Diamond their second sister—another splendid creature, but this one more similar to him than different.
Even at its worst, the immortal Creation was inventive. What might happen was inevitable, and every event and circumstance and loving face would find ways to repeat itself. That great odd thought meant that if nothing ever ended, and Diamond realized that if the world could live on and on, with him or without him, then every good soul would come around again.
Woven through his misery: beauty.
Sitting inside the little cabin, he asked the walls and Good, “Where did that thought come from?”
No voice had spoken to him from outside. Plainly, this notion grew out of some secret piece of his mind.
But the beauty proved unreliable. Bountiful was about to crash, and Diamond was begging with the Creators for everyone’s survival, and that’s when the papio man ran into the machine shop. He was the man with the knives. The padded box was under his arm. Suddenly the world was nothing but stark and sick and horrible. Old pains returned. Scalding embarrassment stole his breath. What had been cut away from him was aching again, and the boy instantly dropped his gaze, closing his eyes and making new wishes. Then the box was thrown overboard, and the man who cut him had vanished. Diamond presumed that he fell or jumped when Bountiful began to shake. That made it seem as if one wish had been answered, which gave those next moments a rich sense of magic . . . and what was magic if not the finest beauty . . . ?
As the airship crashed, Diamond focused hard on a single thought: everybody who died now would ultimately emerge again from the trees and sunlight, from the rain that washed every dawn and the ashes of the dead mixed into that rain.
That seemed a pretty, perfect thought.
And after the crash, it was possible to believe that everybody survived because of Diamond’s thinking. He must have cast some spell, yes. Clambering barefoot out onto the dusty coral, the boy felt miraculous. All of his people were alive. They emerged from the wreckage hurt but whole, and Good was equally blessed. Diamond didn’t think about the human crew or papio soldiers that he hadn’t saved. He was a gruesomely tired boy who didn’t have time or the urge to imagine the suffering of unseen faces. The bare soles of his feet were bleeding against the rough coral, growing hot while healing. Then Elata and Seldom began talking about the papio man, about the half-invisible shape that had yanked him upwards. Quest had to be responsible—they said it and Diamond believed it—and all at once he was running, sprinting on toes already healing as thick leathery callus.