threw Eykar into a spasm of indecision. In the end, the chance to find out the ‘truth’ of DarkDreaming proved irresistible, and he went with Servan to meet the DarkDreamer – as an observer only.
The DarkDreamer had not been strong enough. Servan had slipped from his mental grip and had begun the descent into manna-madness. Eykar had interrupted the process and forced the DarkDreamer to help him carry Servan back to the Boyhouse and into the care of the Teachers.
‘Must have scared you to death,’ Servan said, ‘the whole thing. I should have checked that hack out better before putting myself into his hands. How did you know I was in trouble?’
‘By your breathing. I don’t know what he used, but it was much stronger than anything we’d had in the Boyhouse; Board-quality manna, judging by the effect.’
Servan hugged the beer jug to his chest with both arms. ‘It was a near thing, let me tell you. I was out for two whole days, and when I came to I was ready to be a good boy. They couldn’t believe it; those old Hemaway screws kept nagging and bullying until I got fed up and told them a few things about some of their own brothers. I’m sure they knew that some Teachers were DarkDreaming pretty regularly themselves, but they had to put on a show of outrage when I named names. They started shouting about burning me, as a throwback to the Freaks. In the middle of it all, with old Varner roaring away at the top of his lungs and blaming everybody around him for the whole situation, I passed out again.
‘The next thing I knew, a bunch of sweaty Rovers came and dragged me out of bed and down into the courtyard. You remember that courtyard, the scene of so many of our debates? Well, the whole pimply population of the Boyhouse was turned out to watch those
famishing Rovers truss me up with ropes and sit on me so the Teachers could cut my shoulder and use acid to obliterate the boy-mark. Christ, you must have heard me, even in iso!
‘They tied me up in a hammock and ran me to the edge of the Holdfast and dumped me on the ground. Not a word, nothing. They left me in the Wild to die. That was the first I knew that they’d decided not to burn me after all. I can remember the taste of blood and dust in my mouth to this moment.’ He swigged deeply at the beer. What he remembered best was the silence of the Wild, a silence towering up into the crown of the sky above him and spreading under him down into the heart of the earth.
‘Varner and others of that time have come to me since at Endpath,’ Eykar observed, drily. ‘The Rovers are probably long-since killed in Hemaway skirmishes. But here you still are, Servan, to tell the tale.’
Servan laughed. ‘Eykar, you have a hard heart! Even you would have been moved, though, if you’d seen me lumping around in the dust and the thorns, swearing and roaring and bleeding, until the Scrappers came and got me. You know, it’s not true that Scrappers make their living salvaging stray bits of metal and such. Their best source of income is the trade in bondboys. Somebody at the Boyhouse gets paid to tell them when a promising lad – like me – is due to be dumped in the Wild. The Scrappers go and fetch him in, giving rise to all those tales of demons eating up the bodies.
‘What the Scrappers do with the lucky fellow they’ve rescued is soften him for sale. It’s a manly virtue, after all, not to waste anything useful that comes to hand.’
Eykar stopped. ‘We’d better turn back, if we don’t want to waste an hour of darkness. Go on; there’s more, surely? Or are you going to tell me that you were sold to Senior Bajerman, who is waiting for us at the shelter with a troop of Rovers at this moment?’
‘Christ,’ Servan laughed, ‘that would be hard on me, friend! The bondboy business trades on the fact that a lot of rich old Seniors are cunters at heart. That isn’t surprising, considering how unappetizing old men can be and the access they have to all the
The DarkDreamer had not been strong enough. Servan had slipped from his mental grip and had begun the descent into manna-madness. Eykar had interrupted the process and forced the DarkDreamer to help him carry Servan back to the Boyhouse and into the care of the Teachers.
‘Must have scared you to death,’ Servan said, ‘the whole thing. I should have checked that hack out better before putting myself into his hands. How did you know I was in trouble?’
‘By your breathing. I don’t know what he used, but it was much stronger than anything we’d had in the Boyhouse; Board-quality manna, judging by the effect.’
Servan hugged the beer jug to his chest with both arms. ‘It was a near thing, let me tell you. I was out for two whole days, and when I came to I was ready to be a good boy. They couldn’t believe it; those old Hemaway screws kept nagging and bullying until I got fed up and told them a few things about some of their own brothers. I’m sure they knew that some Teachers were DarkDreaming pretty regularly themselves, but they had to put on a show of outrage when I named names. They started shouting about burning me, as a throwback to the Freaks. In the middle of it all, with old Varner roaring away at the top of his lungs and blaming everybody around him for the whole situation, I passed out again.
‘The next thing I knew, a bunch of sweaty Rovers came and dragged me out of bed and down into the courtyard. You remember that courtyard, the scene of so many of our debates? Well, the whole pimply population of the Boyhouse was turned out to watch those
famishing Rovers truss me up with ropes and sit on me so the Teachers could cut my shoulder and use acid to obliterate the boy-mark. Christ, you must have heard me, even in iso!
‘They tied me up in a hammock and ran me to the edge of the Holdfast and dumped me on the ground. Not a word, nothing. They left me in the Wild to die. That was the first I knew that they’d decided not to burn me after all. I can remember the taste of blood and dust in my mouth to this moment.’ He swigged deeply at the beer. What he remembered best was the silence of the Wild, a silence towering up into the crown of the sky above him and spreading under him down into the heart of the earth.
‘Varner and others of that time have come to me since at Endpath,’ Eykar observed, drily. ‘The Rovers are probably long-since killed in Hemaway skirmishes. But here you still are, Servan, to tell the tale.’
Servan laughed. ‘Eykar, you have a hard heart! Even you would have been moved, though, if you’d seen me lumping around in the dust and the thorns, swearing and roaring and bleeding, until the Scrappers came and got me. You know, it’s not true that Scrappers make their living salvaging stray bits of metal and such. Their best source of income is the trade in bondboys. Somebody at the Boyhouse gets paid to tell them when a promising lad – like me – is due to be dumped in the Wild. The Scrappers go and fetch him in, giving rise to all those tales of demons eating up the bodies.
‘What the Scrappers do with the lucky fellow they’ve rescued is soften him for sale. It’s a manly virtue, after all, not to waste anything useful that comes to hand.’
Eykar stopped. ‘We’d better turn back, if we don’t want to waste an hour of darkness. Go on; there’s more, surely? Or are you going to tell me that you were sold to Senior Bajerman, who is waiting for us at the shelter with a troop of Rovers at this moment?’
‘Christ,’ Servan laughed, ‘that would be hard on me, friend! The bondboy business trades on the fact that a lot of rich old Seniors are cunters at heart. That isn’t surprising, considering how unappetizing old men can be and the access they have to all the
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