Chapter One: Round the Bend — Part 1

Arpie is bone tired as he starts to undress, hanging his clothes carefully up on pegs in the somewhat cooler than the shade adobe and wood cabin he has taken as his home on the outskirts of Tó Naneesdizí. It has been a mostly uneventful day of wanderment on horseback, breaking up mischief, and keeping the peace. Most days are utterly quiet, and Arpie rather prefers it that way. Today he spent a better part of his afternoon settling domestic squabbles, border disputes, and monitoring the arches for unexpected activity, and all he wants to do now is wash the ick of sweat and stupid off his skin, eat a small meal of flatbread and salted meat, and get some sleep. The sun is setting, after all, and Arpie hasn’t the luxury of electricity, just yet.

Walking lightly in leather slippers, Arpie steps outside to the shower, set away from the cabin, and turns on the water, which is fed by gravity from his private cistern. He drenches himself with the aching unheated drizzle, feeling the pressure between his legs, and knowing that the body will betray the mind. With the sun setting, the sky turns deep silver, and Arpie smiles a bit, working the soap across his leathered skin. Once refreshed, Arpie lets his hand drift, his mind wanders to his youth, and with practiced grip, finishes what he’s hardly aware he’s started. The water is cold and quickly steals away the mess. Arpie’s body aches a little less once his heart stops racing, and his thoughts return to the worries of a sheriff in a small town.

He isn’t cold for long, as tonight the heat is still holding to the land. Stripped down to nothing, Arpie dries himself and walks back to his porch, where a hanging swing bench waits for him, blanket already settled on it so he can cover himself as the night conquers the day. The heat screams against Arpie’s skin as he rocks the bench, and not for the first time, he finds himself wondering how anybody would consider Tó Naneesdizí to be habitable. The air will shift from sweltering to shivering chill too quickly, and soon he will be inside, buried under his blankets. He doesn’t want to waste wood for a fire, so he’ll cope with a cold face, and sleep well when sleep does finally come. He considers the chill, anticipating it like one might desire the company of an old friend. Being alone in a cabin at night, Arpie wonders when his roommate will be back, as hot air and chill night are such poor company.

Opus is still up near the Flagstaff remains, helping Tomas and his crew on their hunt, culling out the weakest of the feral herds and wild game. He knows right where they are, at least by day, when the gray smoke of the volcano is visible, even at a distance. It isn’t a full-blown eruption, but the cone smolders now and again since the Storm, hinting at a future black sky. It is a three-week run, but once the meat is cured, they will bring the bulk of it back to Tó Naneesdizí, and Beth will hold a feast in honor of spring (and in honor of her boy friend returning from the field). Arpie is tired of the heat already, his thoughts turning aggressive in the dry, stale air. He misses the moist humidity of his home, then thinks of the people living in it, sucks up his nostalgia, and throws it in the trash bin at the back of his mind. He wonders if this is how killer bees must have felt when they were imported into the tropics, having come to love their hot, dry world.

Arpie is still on the porch, naked but for his blanket, when he hears the beats of the heavy drum, repeated louder across the land. It’s a massive hollowed slit log, often used to call him back from his rounds, as it can be heard five miles around its location atop a tower, and is always repeated from manned outposts set at four cardinal points four miles around the central tower. The drums are not a native creation, but a product of research and necessity, and for them to call out his private beat so late at night means trouble. Arpie dresses up and readies his horse, working into a steady trot and finds himself headed into Tó Naneesdizí along the failing paved road on an otherwise dark night, hearing the signal whistle as he comes into town. He follows the shrill hospital whistle to its source, and is surprised to find Jenna, and not Kia waiting. He ties the horse at the Hospital entrance as Jenna hurries up, anxious, whistle still in one hand, note in the other. The Drum is silent and Arpie pulls himself up under the shade. Jenna is fidgety as she hands Arpie the note. As Arpie reads it under the lamplight, Jenna talks about needs.

“They say they will be coming in on the Lake by nightfall tomorrow. Kia is packing now, and we’re going to be set up by noon tomorrow. We’re going to have to use your hands, with Tomas so far to the north. Kia says she needs me at the hospital with her. Jon and Teri asked for your help.”

Arpie barely hears her, finding himself lost in the words. “The Edgewind has sent a distress signal. It says four crew wounded, two seriously, and one prisoner, also wounded.” Arpie clucks a little, a sure sign of concern. “What the fuck happened out there?”

“Tokyo happened, I guess.” Jenna says, sounding worried.

Arpie carefully puts the piece of paper in his pocket, and as he’s starting to worry, he fidgets into his pocket for a pipe. In the Glenn, those nine had shown more honor and bravado than any nine people he had ever met, and he can’t imagine what might have come against them that could put them down. Arpie is only somewhat familiar with arch travel, and then only from the sporadic reports relayed to Walker’s station via the Edgewind’s transmitter, but he does know that it took them close to seventeen days to get to Tokyo, and based on his notes, they managed to make it back across the Pacific in nine days, all in all that sounds to him like they are pushing the Edgewind to its limits.

“They’re in a rush.” He says out loud, though Jenna is already walking up the ramp and is out of earshot. “We’d best be too.”