Ben Dover's Arc

Chapter 4 of 150

They walked the ridge road until dusk. Justin kept one headphone off, listening past the wind. Ben watched the trees behind them. The sealed box thumped against his ribs with every step. He had the box, and he had a boy who could feel relics through the floor. He had no map. He did not know where the next relic waited, or which direction to walk at the fork ahead. Somewhere behind them, the blue-scaled thing was closing. Guessing would kill them. At the fork Ben stopped. "Which way?" Justin closed his eyes. He turned a slow circle, drumstick loose in his hand. He shook his head. "Nothing. Yours is the only hum out here." Ben swore under his breath. He sat on a stump and pulled the box into his lap. He thought about the shrine. He thought about Anita, hands quick over copper bands, telling him something had followed him to her door. She had known things she did not say. "We go back," Ben said. "Back where?" "The craftsperson. She knew about the boxes before I told her. She knew the repair would hold to the border. She knows more." They cut down through the pines by moonlight. Justin never asked to rest. By the time they reached the hidden back path, Ben's shirt was soaked through. He knocked twice on the shop's rear door. Anita opened it in a yellow jacket, hair still damp, a sleek metal case tucked under one arm. She was already moving before she saw his face. "You're early," she said. "I was leaving." "Leaving where?" She held up the metal case. It was small, streamlined, the color of a knife. "North. Same as you should be." She looked past him at Justin, then back. "You don't know where you're going." "No." She stepped aside. "Inside. Fast." On her workbench she flipped open the metal case. Inside, packed in foam, sat a folded square of oiled cloth. She spread it flat. A map. Six marks in red ink. One was the dairy shrine, crossed out. One was her own shop. One was the music hall, crossed out. "My grandmother traded with his grandmother," Anita said, tipping her chin at Justin. "The boxes came from these six places. Wherever a box was carved, a relic was hidden nearby. That's the pattern." Justin stared. "She never told me that." "She told mine." Anita tapped the nearest unmarked point. Two days' walk, north-east. "Start here." Ben folded the cloth into his coat. His hands were shaking and he did not care. "Why help me?" "Because it followed you to my door," Anita said. "I don't sleep until it's dead or you are." She shouldered a pack. "And I'm faster than both of you. I'm coming." Ben did not argue. He had a direction now. He also had two people at his back, and a creature that would reach this shop by morning.