Free Dusk by Tim Lebbon Page B

for a few moments, his thumb still working at the rock, the other fingers on his hand stirring now as the puppet-miners rose from their food break.
    “What happened?” said one of the children.
    Lufero glanced up at his young audience, looking over their heads and along the main street to where it ended against a rock wall. “Petra woke the Nax,” he said.
    Even though he knew what was about to happen, Trey still jumped when the old miner brought his hand out from behind his back. His pale fingers were painted bloodred. He clawed his hand at the pitiful finger puppets, clasping, letting go, clasping again like a spider hugging its prey. His long nails slashed, tracing red lines across the puppets’ intricately painted faces and chests. In the flurry of movement, blood splashed onto the cloth-covered table. Trey had never been able to tell whether it was real or not.
    Some of the children screamed. Two of them stood and ran away, their parents casting scolding glares Lufero’s way when they emerged from shops or food caves. A few of the braver children watched wide-eyed as Lufero’s bloody play drew to a close. The finger puppets lay down one by one as the ravenous Nax continued to whirl and slash at them like a tornado of disc-swords. And finally, a few quiet moments after the Nax had slunk away behind Lufero’s back, Petra emerged once again from behind the rock to survey what he had done.
    The children left, some of them clapping as they walked away. Trey stood back, watching Lufero. The old man seemed to be asleep, but then his thumb moved again slightly, Petra casting his gaze across the destruction he had unwittingly brought down upon his folk.
    “I always thought Petra should have died,” Trey said.
    Lufero looked up, startled. “He did,” the old man said. “Nothing escapes a fledge demon once it’s woken.”
    “We’ve not heard of one for years. Maybe they’ve gone. Maybe they’re used to us now and they’ve gone deeper, down into veins we’ll never mine. Down past the Beast.”
    “The Nax sleep,” Lufero said. “They don’t run. No, they’re still there. Hibernating in the fledge, dreaming whatever it is they dream for years and years on end. It’s just that mining’s such a slow process now. And if a band of miners working in the Pavisse range or the Widow’s Peaks ever did encounter one, you think we’d hear about it? Not anymore. People don’t talk anymore.”
    Trey dug into his rucksack and brought out a lump of bright yellow fledge. “Here,” he said. “It’s fresh.”
    Lufero smiled and accepted the drug. He closed his eyes and rolled it beneath his nose, and in his smile Trey saw a thousand precious memories.
    He walked on, left the main street and climbed a series of rock terraces and steps to his cave. His mother had lit a small fire at the entrance, and she was cooking a stew of cave rat and blind spider. A pinch of Trey’s fresh fledge would make it exquisite.
                   
    AFTER DINNER HE went to the back of the cave and slid into the dust bath. The dust was so fine and light that it slipped around his body like oil, its inherent warmth soothing Trey’s tired muscles. A little firelight found its way back here, and Trey enjoyed watching it flit across the walls like lost insects. He imagined that it was performing its own play for him, and as he drifted away he made up stories to follow the dim light’s movements.
    His mouth was sweet and sensitive from the fist of fledge he had chewed as part of the meal. His mother had taken some too, and she had fallen asleep soon after. She was old now, and she rarely made any effort with the fledge. It must haunt her dreams, but there was nowhere specific she wanted it to take her. Trey pitied her sometimes, and other times he was jealous. His own life seemed so meaningful that he wondered what it would be like to not care anymore.
    The fresh fledge was so much purer and more powerful than anything sold or used