“Are you working for the Empire, Darin? Are you working for the Martials?” “Laia, listen.” Ten hells, I don’t want to hear this. “Did you tell Nan and Pop? Did they see?” I found it when I changed the rushes this morning.” “I saw your drawings.” The words tumble out in a rush, and Darin’s up in an instant, his face stony. But he just shakes his head, drops down into his bunk, and closes his eyes like he can’t be bothered to reply. I wait for him to tell me that I don’t understand. I want to back down, but I think of Pop’s slumped shoulders this morning. The smile’s already dropped off Darin’s face. Now the trader won’t pay us, and we’ll starve this winter, and why in the skies don’t you care? Which left Nan to bottle the trader’s jams by herself. Where were you?Īnd I filled in for you because he can’t do so much alone. He likes hearing stories as much as I like telling them. “Gather in the Night,” he reads the title. A familiar look-the one he gives me if I wake from a nightmare or we run out of grain. Lots of practice.” He rests his chin on my bunk and smiles Mother’s sweet, crooked smile. “It’s past curfew, and three patrols have gone by. I sit up on the bunk as he lights the lamp.
He has a cat’s sense for traps-he got it from our mother. “You shouldn’t be awake.” Darin’s whisper jolts me from my thoughts. I don’t want him to shut me out like he has everyone else.īut tonight’s different. Why do you keep disappearing? Why, when Pop and Nan need you? When I need you?Įvery night for almost two years, I’ve wanted to ask. Where have you been, Darin? In my head, I have the courage to ask the question, and Darin trusts me enough to answer. His sketchbook falls to the floor, and he nudges it under his bunk with a quick foot, as if it’s a snake. A hot desert wind blows in after him, rustling the limp curtains. He folds his scarecrow body through the window, bare feet silent on the rushes. My big brother reaches home in the dark hours before dawn, when even ghosts take their rest.
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