Aroha Whitmore's Arc

Chapter 2 of 2

The colors faded fast. The moment enforcers drew their batons, hands closed and cloth vanished. The crowd Aroha had woken still stood there, but they had nowhere to go. Out in the open, the black uniforms would break them apart in minutes. Aroha grabbed the old woman's arm. "We need cover," she said. "Fast." Scarlett shoved through the press of bodies to reach her. The pirate had pulled Aroha free of an enforcer moments before, and now she looked half-amused. "You lit the fire," she said. "You don't have a hearth to put it in?" "Do you?" Scarlett's grin widened. She clicked her tongue. Her long-legged dog wheeled and trotted ahead, tail high. "I know a place. Off the map. Follow the dog and keep your colors hidden till we're inside." Aroha turned to the crowd. Thirty faces, maybe forty. Frightened, but still there. "With me," she called. "Quiet now. Walk, don't run." She pulled her gray coat shut over the red thread and moved. They slipped down a narrow lane while enforcers shouted behind them. Scarlett led them past a stand of tall trees heavy with spiky blue blossoms. The flowers blazed bright against the gray walls. Aroha stared. No one had cut them down. "They missed these," she said. "Nobody comes back here," Scarlett answered. "Bad luck ground, they say. Suits us fine." Beyond the trees stood a barn. Its wood was carved and painted soft, its arched door framed with faded stars. It looked like something from a child's book, left to sag in a forgotten yard. Two black horses watched from a paddock beside it, horns rising from their heads, manes shining faint colors in the light. Aroha slowed. She had never seen such animals. "Stable," Scarlett said. "Old keeper's dead. I use it when I dock nearby." She hauled the door wide. "Get them in." Aroha waved the crowd through. They filed into the dim barn, one after another. The old woman clutched her blue cloth. The boy who'd torn off his cap stayed close to Aroha's side. When the last of them was in, Scarlett dragged the door shut and dropped a beam across it. Inside, the noise of the street fell away. Aroha looked at the faces around her, no longer scattered, no longer alone. She let her coat fall open. The red thread showed again. This time no one flinched. "Now you have them," Scarlett said. She leaned against a stall. "A whole shipload. And they're your problem." Aroha nodded slowly. She had won them a roof. But forty hungry, hunted people now looked to her for a plan, and outside, the enforcers were already hunting the trail they'd left.