’Fore I can respond, Polk lets out another shriek that’d shatter the glass windows in my family’s hut. “Shut that vomit-hole of yers, Polk!” Veeva shouts, which only serves to enhance the volume of the squirming baby’s cry.

“Lemme take him,” I say, dodging puddles of barf to grab Polk, who’s rolling around on a tugskin blanket. “You clean up the mess.”

Veeva’s shoulders drop, and she gives me a grateful half-smile. “Yer one of the good ones, Sie,” she says, tucking a blanket between Polk’s mouth and me. A precaution against the barfing. Maybe I shouldn’t’ve been so quick to scoop the little bugger up.

Veev goes about mopping up the floor, talking a mile a second. “Ya know, kid,” she says, even though she’s only a year and a half older’n me, “’sides gettin’ to lie every night with my man…” She pauses, looks up at me, licking her lips.

“Eww, gross, Vee!” I exclaim. Polk’s surprisingly quiet, staring up at me with big eyes that would almost be cute if he weren’t such a little vomit-sprayer.

“What? I ain’t gonna lie. Grunt may not look it, but he gits a scorch of a lot smokier when the sun goddess goes to sleep.”

I shake my head as a mental image of Grunt’s fat belly bounces across my mind. “Agh, too much information, Vee!”

Veeva laughs, goes back to her cleaning. “Well, it’s true. Anyway, ’sides the fun parts, this whole baby-makin’ business ain’t as fun as it sounds.” I’m not sure when it ever sounded fun, but ignore it and let her continue. “Gettin’ waked up in the middle of the burnin’ night, havin’ to change his bundle, havin’ to feed ’im, havin’ to figure out what the scorch he wants when nothin’ seems to work.”

Ugh. Even with what Veev calls “the fun parts,” the whole thing sounds like a whole lot of work. I still got half a year, I remind myself, trying not to think about how things’ll change when I’m a Bearer.

~~~

“Why would the Wilds whisper lies in my ear if they’re going to kidnap me anyway?” I ask Circ the first chance I get after leaving Veev’s tent. My voice sounds funny ’cause I’ve pinched my nose shut with my finger and thumb.

Circ laughs at my voice, and then says, “They’re not going to kidnap you, Sie.” I snort, ’cause his voice sounds even funnier with his nostrils clamped tight. My fingers come off my nose for a second and I get a whiff of the blaze pit that sits a stone’s throw to the side. Screwing up my face, I pinch harder, until it hurts. A little pain is better’n the smell.

“I don’t mean me me. I mean hypothetically speaking. If the Wilds were to try to kidnap me”—I look at Circ, trying not to laugh at the sight of his squashed nose—“or any other Youngling girl, why wouldn’t they just grab her from behind, put a hand over her mouth, and carry her away in a tugskin sack?”

“Maybe they’re all out of tugskin?” Circ says, cracking up and losing the grip on his nose. He sticks out his tongue as the foul odor sneaks up his nostrils. The tips of his moccasin-covered feet are touching mine as we sit cross-legged across from each other. We’ve sat this way since we were Totters.

“C’mon,” I say, clutching my stomach, “I’m being serious.” The only problem: it’s hard to be serious when I can’t stop laughing.

“I don’t know, Sie, maybe it’s easier if they can convince you to come with them, rather than having to haul your tiny butt away with you kicking and screaming.”

It’s a good point, but still…

“Something just doesn’t smell right,” I say, and we both crack up, but then just as quickly fall over gagging from the thick, putrid latrine air.

“Let’s get this over with, then we can talk,” Circ says, covering his mouth and nose with a hand.

I smile behind my own hand. “Thanks for helping me with Blaze Craze,” I say.

“Just promise me you’ll stop daydreaming in class. I don’t ever want to have to do this again.” He plucks his moccasins off with his spare hand, one at a time, and then pulls his thin white shirt over his head. I’ve seen him shirtless a thousand times, from Totter to Midder to Youngling, but this time I force myself to look closer, ’cause of what all t’other Youngling girls are saying about him. Circ is so smoky. What I wouldn’t give for five seconds with Circ behind the border tents. You’re close with Circ, aren’t you, Siena? Could you give him a message for me? Of course I say I will, but I never do. If they don’t have the guts to say whatever they want to right to his face, then they’re not good enough for him. Plus, the thought of Circ behind the border tents with some shilty Youngling makes me a bit queasy.

Anyway, I try to see Circ from their perspective, just this once. To call his skin sun-kissed would be the understatement of the year, like calling a tug “Sorta big,” or a Killer “Kinda dangerous.” It’s like the sun is infused in the very pigment of his skin, leaving him golden brown and radiant. He’s strong, too. Almost as strong as iron, his stomach flat and hard, his chest and arms cut like stone. But he’s always been this way, hasn’t he? Still staring at his torso, present-day Circ fades from my vision and is replaced with images of him growing up. Circ as a Totter, five-years-old, small and a bit pudgy in his stomach, arms and face; Circ turning eight and becoming a Midder, less chubby but still awkward-looking, with too-long arms and legs; Circ at twelve, a full-fledged Youngling, much taller and skinnier’n a tent pole, not a bulge of muscle anywhere on him.

The images fade and Circ stares at me. “What?” he says.

“Uh, nothing,” I say, shaking my head and wondering when Circ became so smoky. It’s weird how when you’re around somebody so much you don’t seem to notice the changes in them. It’s like with every passing year he’s become more’n more capable, while I stay just as useless as ever. He’s good at everything, from hunting to feetball to Learning. And all I’m good at is daydreaming and getting in trouble. He’s smoky, and as my nickname suggests, I’m Scrawny.

“You were daydreaming again, weren’t you?” His words are accusing but his tone and expression are as light as the brambleweeds that tumble and bounce across the desert.

“You caught me,” I mumble through my hand.

I see his grin creep around the edges of his fingers. He stands up and offers a hand. “Care to shovel some blaze with me, my lady?”

Despite my self-pitying thoughts, he manages to cheer me up, and I take his hand, laughing. He pulls me up, hands me a shovel. While I carry my shovel, Circ wheels a pushbarrow, and we follow our noses toward the stench, which becomes more’n more unbearable with each step. You’ve done this ’fore, I remind myself. You just hafta get used to the smell again.

If the smell is bad, the heat is unbearable. Although the heart of the summer is four full moons distant, you couldn’t tell it by the weather. The air is as thick as ’zard soup, full of so much moisture that your skin bleeds sweat the moment you step from the shade, as if you’ve just taken a dip in the watering hole. All around us is flat, sandy desert, which radiates the heat like the embers of a dying cook fire. With summer nipping at our heels and winter approaching, almost everything is dead, the long strands of desert wildgrass having been burned away many full moons earlier. A few lonely pricklers continue to thwart death, the usually green, spiky plants turned brown by the sun, but rising stalwart from the desert; we call them the plants of the gods for a reason, bearing milk even in the harshest conditions. Without them, my people might not survive the winter.

We reach the edge of the blaze pit and look down. It’s a real mess, as if no one’s been here to shovel it for many quarter full moons, maybe even a few full moons. It’s gonna be a long afternoon.

“Maybe we can just cover it with durt,” I say hopefully.