Half Discovered Wings Read Free Page B

fact that
someone actually lived there . He slept
alone on the bare floor, in the dust and with the
insects.
    Samuel arrived
and sat next to him in silence for nearly half an hour.
    ‘ This place is too lonely, Joseph,’ he said
eventually.
    ‘ It’s not lonely,’ Gabel replied. ‘That’s just you, Samuel.
You’ve been that way for all these years: lonely. This place is
just empty, which is not the same thing.’
    ‘ You could at least get a bed.’
    ‘ A bed costs money. There was no furniture here when I begged
this space from the man downstairs, and I had no need of it then,
nor do I need any now. I have not changed in the time between. I’m
happy here.’
    There was another period of silence. Samuel made a pretence
of looking around the empty room for interesting objects to look
at, all at once boy-like and curious. Finally the silence grew too
heavy for the hunter, and he blurted:
    ‘ I had to put a dagger through her heart.’
    ‘ I understand,’ said the boy, nodding as he spoke.
    ‘ She’ll be buried today, I think. Tomorrow is the
Sabbath.’
    ‘ I shouldn’t think Father will wait until Monday.’
    Gabel watched
the strips of light play over the walls. He looked over at Samuel
occasionally and saw that the strips passed him by. They seemed to
be absorbed by his grey skin and clothes.
    Gabel tried to think of a face, other than his own, that he
had never seen smile. The only one was Samuel; even Bethany,
who spent most days in the mental world she created in order to
retreat from her own insecurities, smiled occasionally. Even Rowan,
who lived in the dark hollows of the church along with Bethany,
found a reason to curl her lips every now and again. But
Samuel … He, for as long as Gabel had known him, found difficulty
in expressing himself. Gabel often saw far too much of himself
reflected in Samuel's pearlescent features.
    ‘ What do you advise?’
    ‘ Find the dark-skinned man,’ said the boy.
    ‘ Where will he be?’
    ‘ I don’t know.’
    Samuel stood and left, and Gabel found himself alone once
more. He stood and left as well.
    ~
    Weeks later he
was waiting in the forest, surrounded by damp fern and the
evergreens, sniffing the warm air. Moving slowly forward, he pushed
the pine branches from his face. They were heavy with water from
the previous night’s rain, each drop trapping the surrounding
smells.
    He pulled a
large, flat leaf from its plant and rubbed his fingers over the
waxy surface. Then he sniffed his palms carefully, detecting
amongst the odour of pollen and chloroplast the scent of the
creature he pursued.
    The wet leaf slipped from his fingers to the ground, and soon
it would dissolve into mulch and become the soil. He didn’t think
of this as he stepped over it and continued on his way through the
trees.
    He came into a clearing in the forest where the ground-ferns
were flattened and soggy leaves made a grubby nest in the centre. A
small bloody rib-cage, partially stripped of its meat, festered
quietly. The jagged mess was home to fat white larvae, and flies
buzzed monotonously around it, setting down then taking off again
in an endless, undulating cloud.
    He stepped on a brittle twig and, with the snap, the flies
disappeared upward into the silently dripping trees. Beside the
corpse was a heap of dung, hard and cracking in the heat.
Crouching, Gabel pushed in two fingers and then tasted, feeling the
warmth on his tongue; still fresh.
    He stood and spat, and when he moved the various objects
fastened to his belt rattled against each other. Unseen inside his
jacket, his silver pistol with five smooth bullets hung with
satisfying weight against his chest, and at his side was fastened
the short kris blade. The serpentine icon of the H’ouando church
hung from his neck, gold-plated and glistening whenever the
sunlight caught it through the netted canopy above. He’d gotten it
from Father long ago.
    A sudden rustling of leaves erupted into a storm of shifting
sinew and