The Other Side of the Sky - Amie Kaufman Page 0,35
to blow.”
“Oh, a kind of magic,” she says, as if she’s saying, Oh, gravity, got it. “I would like to learn it—is it a magic you know, or have you only seen it done?”
“It’s not magic,” I say. “It’s science. Science means you can explain it, that you know how each part of it works. Magic is—I mean, it’s science you haven’t figured out how to explain yet.”
“I can explain my magic,” Nimh replies. “And you just said you could not explain your engines.”
Well. Maybe I should shut up, then.
“North,” she says gently, “I will do all I can to help you. I could not be sure, at first, whether you were a friend or an enemy, and I am sorry if I frightened you—but I do not believe you are an enemy. So if you will call me friend, I will keep you safe.”
Her dark eyes are on mine as she speaks, with a directness and sincerity that would feel almost intimate among my own people. It must be normal among hers, but it makes me want to shift my weight, clear my throat, look away.
I have to clear my throat to find my voice.
“Thank you, Nimh.” I’m beginning to think I must have gotten very, very lucky that she was the one to find me.
She smiles and tips her head. “We are close now, cloudlander. Come.”
We reach the edge of the trees—and, I realize a moment later, the edge of more water. This isn’t the shallow, reflective stuff we saw earlier. This is more water than I’ve ever seen outside the city reservoirs, a thick river of it slowly drifting past the shore on which we stand.
Nimh leads me down the muddy bank to where a raft’s moored, and as we climb onto it, it wobbles gently beneath our weight. This probably isn’t the moment to tell her I don’t know how to swim, so I keep my mouth shut as she guides us across with a paddle. I breathe more easily when we reach the other side and climb onto dry—or rather, damp—land again.
A few steps from the edge of the water, though, she slows, and with a soft chirp, the cat creature halts by her feet. She leans on her spear, tilting her head, and I try to listen too.
“Nimh?” I venture, instinctively keeping my voice soft.
“You said you came here alone,” she says, and it’s not a question. It’s one final opportunity for me to revise my story, suspicion back in her tone.
“Yes,” I say. “I give you my word.”
Her measuring glance reminds me she doesn’t know the worth of a prince’s word—or even that I am a prince. I’m not dumb enough to point out the value of my word, or of me, until I know what she’ll do with that information, so I stay quiet.
Eventually, she explains. “My people should be on guard. And they ought to be looking for me—we should have been challenged by now.”
There’s something about the way she says it: my people. It reminds me of the way my bloodmother speaks. Like a leader.
While I’m considering that, she leans down to run her fingers along the cat’s spine. As if the gesture was a signal, the thing prowls alongside her as she moves on once again.
“Stay close,” she says, and through the trees ahead, I see a glimmer of light. We’re reaching an open space, and the way she moves now—silent, careful, that spear thing at the ready—tells me she thinks there might be danger ahead.
“Nimh,” I whisper, keeping my voice low, almost inaudible. “Do I need something to use as a weapon?” There are plenty of sharp, broken sticks around. I don’t know what I’m going to do with a stick if things go bad up ahead, but I’d rather have something than nothing.
Without looking back she reaches down to one of the belts that circle her waist, draws a knife from a sheath, and offers it to me hilt-first, her fingers holding the very tip of the blade. I guess she really has decided to trust me, even if she clearly doesn’t want to touch me.
Maybe she thinks I have some kind of sky-sickness.
She doesn’t need to tell me to be quiet now. The sounds of the forest, a cacophony before, seem to have vanished here. I try to place my feet where she puts hers, easing them down gently as the two of us creep toward the light of several campfires ahead of us. But there