Free Pickers 3: The Valley by Garth Owen Page B

insulation and low energy use. Nix had recovered more rapidly than Zaragoza from the disease that killed so many of its inhabitants. Including her mother, Veronique remembered. She looked back, but there was no window to give a view in the direction she wanted to see. She had forgotten to look for the communal grave marker that stood over the spot where so many people she had known had been cremated en masse. Later, when she was ready, she would visit it.
    The heart of the town was on the other side of the river, but they were directed to pull up on a large open spot beside the road bridge. The middle truck made some terrible noises as its engine was turned off for probably the last time. It rattled and coughed, then made a sad little grinding wheeze and expired, leaving the vehicle wreathed in black smoke.
    There wasn't enough room for the wagons on the parking space, so Tony followed wagon one, as Remy took it down the street to park looking down on the river. "We're here." said Veronique.
    Tony slid from his seat and stood by Veronique's seat so he could kiss her forehead. "How does it feel?"
    "Very strange."
    Remy and Maxine were out of wagon one. Remy was stood in the street, staring along it, over the roofs at the end and up to the mountains at the head of the valley. Maxine had clambered onto the railing separating the street from the drop down to the river, and was looking all around, trying to take in all the details of the town she had last seen aged ten.
    "We should see if your uncle, or anyone else important, will talk to us, I suppose." Tony said. "And get this little person back to his family."
    Veronique bounced the child in her arms when she had stood up. She had hoped this would rouse him. It woke him just enough to grasp the material of her shirt and snuggle his head under her chin. "Come on, you, time to get up." Veronique said, quietly. Maybe that was too soothing a tone, because he didn't stir at all.
    Only as Veronique was clambering, one handed, from the cab- with Tony standing below her to catch them if she slipped, did the boy show signs of waking. He squirmed in her arms as he looked around, at the street and buildings and the side of the wagon, then up at the woman carrying him. He made a sound that could have been a question, but was no recognisable word. "We're here." Veronique told him. "Of course, you don't know where here is, so that means nothing to you, does it. Here, let me...." She twisted him around so he was facing forwards, then she pointed at the growing group of, mostly, children spilling from the car park onto the road to look over the railings at the river and town. "Let's go and talk to your friends and see if you've got a name, shall we?"
    The woman who had talked to them earlier separated from the group of excited children and walked toward them. "He wasn't any trouble, was he? He's.... Inquisitive, is Luke."
    "He is good at hiding." Tony said. "But quiet as a lamb once we found him again."
    "We thought he should get back to his family." Veronique shifted Luke's weight, ready to hand him over.
    The woman's smile was brittle. "Luke, like most of our lost children, doesn't have family. Well, he has us, but mother, father, brothers, sisters, no. He's an incredibly lucky one, sort of. He was found wandering near a farm. No clothes, no identification, and no clues what happened to his family. Wherever he came from, they hadn't taught him any language, so he couldn't tell us anything, not even baby speak that might hint at his story."
    The woman reached out for Luke and Veronique handed him over. He didn't fight the exchange, but did twist in the woman's arms to reach back to Veronique. She let him have her finger to comfort himself with for a while. "We picked him up as we passed through." the woman continued. "He can't talk, but he is very clever. Seems to learn a new trick every day. I think that, one day, he's just going to start speaking in whole sentences, like he's been storing it