Finder's Shore Read Online Free PDF Page B

lad, you’ve a treat in store. They have buildings in Vidya that tower higher than trees, and gardens that grow inside houses. There are paths with roofs and walls, and floors that float on the ocean.”
    It’s a fanciful description, and one that catches the child’s attention. His mouth opens a little, his tongue caught between his teeth.
    “And lots of rubble,” someone adds quietly.
    “But no Paras,” the boy’s mother says, low but firm.
    “There’ll be plenty of children to play with,” I promise. “And lots of new things to learn.”
    “Someone once told me,” Farra says, “that there are tiny little people who live in the rubble and help us put everything back together.” He has several of the children’s attention now. “They’re only as big as your little finger, so it’s very slow work. But sometimes you can see where they’ve been along, fixing things up.” 
    A girl peers around her father’s knee. “What do they look like?”
    Farra begins to embroider his tale, shaping his words to fit the world that they know. As I watch their faces, I only wish it could be true. Once, a long time ago, I used to tell my cousin Sophie such stories, just as my father once told them to me. I wonder where the first stories came from.
    At the foot of the hill, one of the fathers joins Jofeia on the jigger arm and we skim along the coast. Sunlight scatters off the rumpled surface of the sea, waves breaking up around the skerries that lie like a broken necklace off shore.
    Soon after, we reach the first of the tunnels. Swinging her weight on the brake lever, Jofeia slows us to a crawl. Farra slides the door open and swings down from the carriage, jogging ahead of the jigger into the dark mouth of the tunnel.
    When he jumps nimbly back on board, I raise an eyebrow. “I thought Decon had checked the tunnels?”
    “No harm in checking twice,” he says, as we pick up speed. Farra glances at the woman seated across from us, as conscious as I of the fear that simmers just below the surface. “You sometimes get a rock fall,” he says.
    The jigger line weaves along the flat ground that lies between the rocky ridge of hills and the shore. As we pass the tumbled fences that a year ago surrounded a settlement, anger burns in my belly. The families who lived there were no threat to the Paras, but still they were obliged to abandon their hard-won homes. That they’re safe in Vidya doesn’t make up for all they’ve lost — and for what? Maybe Hetti or Flet could provide an answer to that.
    The rattle of stones jars me back to the present. A woman cries out as a rock thuds against the jigger’s side. Disturbed from sleep, a child wails. On the slope above, more rocks begin to roll.
    Farra leaps forward to join Jofeia on the jigger’s handle. I spring up and hurry in his wake. The carriage sways as we pick up speed and I lurch sideways, falling against two children. Someone screams as a rock crashes against the window, shattering the pane into splinters of flying glass.
    “Everyone down,” Farra bellows.
    A child sobs. Dropping to my knees, I crawl towards the young mother. Her face and neck are bleeding but not badly. Her son screams in protest as I pincer shards of glass from his arm.
    A second pane splinters as more rocks thud against the jigger’s side. “Anyone else bleeding?” I call.
    A slow, thudding rumble draws my eyes up the slope. A boulder the size of a cart has begun to roll on the hillside ahead. “Farra!”
    Impossible to tell whether we’re on a collision course; whether we’re better to speed or brake. The rock begins to bounce on the rough terrain.
    “Stay down. Wedge yourselves between the seats,” Farra shouts.
    I can’t take my eyes from the boulder’s bounding leaps. Its fall is perfectly timed. Someone begins to weep. The jigger’s brakes bite with the harsh shriek of metal on metal.
    The boulder lands with a thud I feel through my knees, rebounds and soars towards us. I grit