Read Fire Country for Free Online

something I can’t identify. A hint of sadness, maybe. But there’s something else, too, something harder, like stone, noticeable only in her eyes, which don’t match up with the rest of her face. Save me , I think as hard as I can in her direction.
    “My snapper!” my father yells. “Now!”
    The steel in her eyes disappears and I know she didn’t hear my silent plea. Hidden beneath her dress, her feet carry her across the room and behind the barrier, where my father spends the night with each of his wives on a rotational basis, although lately I’ve noticed Sari’s there at least two out of every three nights. I know it’s just the way of my people, but seeing my mother get ignored for Sari, who I barely know, grizzes me off more’n anything.
    A moment later she reappears, a black swatch of leather dangling from her hand. At one end is a handle, which wraps around my father’s palm for greater grip, and at the other side it splits into ten strips, each of which comes to a knot intended to add a bit of sting to each snap. The teeth of the snapper my father calls them.
    Her eyes on the floor, my mother hands it to him.

Chapter Five
     
    I n Learning they told us about a time when men and women were gods and goddesses, and lived until they were sixty, seventy, even eighty. Some of the kids even said their parents told them people used to live until they were ninety or, in rare cases, a hundred, which I think is a bunch of tugblaze. I draw the line at a hundred.
    But that was all before the rogue god, Meteor, attacked us. Going against the sun and moon goddess, Meteor snuck by and gave the earth a real beating, fists and feet and head swirling, knocking over mountains and drying up rivers and wiping out most of the tribes. When Teacher told the story, we were riveted to our seats. It was the first time he had all our attention at once. When he got to the part about how the first Heater crawled out of their hiding spots, in caves and deep pits, we cheered and clapped our hands. They were survivors, just like us. We don’t know where the Icers came from, but they musta survived Meteor, too.
    Unfortunately, Teacher’s lesson today is much less interesting, all about Laws and duty. A lthough I hate to admit it, the lashing my father gave me taught me a lesson. Since then I been careful in class. No daydreaming, no problem. I keep my head up, try to focus on what Teacher is saying, and try to ignore the nasty comments directed my way by Hawk and his gang.
    The snapper scars’ ll be the worst yet. Worse’n the time I thought it’d be funny to dump a bunch of sand lice under my sister’s pillow. My mother spent three days scrubbing them all out of Skye’s hair. Father wasn’t too happy and gave me what I thought would be the beating of my life. Skye even said she’d never speak to me again, but a quarter full moon later we were best friends again. Until she snuck a handful of dead eight-leggers into my tugtail soup one night. I didn’t even realize it until I crunched one in my mouth. Blech! She got a pretty bad whooping for her little revenge prank, too, but even that one was nothing compared to what my father gave me t’other day. I screamed like a banshee as he snapped the leather again and again, across my back, my legs, even my buttocks. He was whipping it so hard I could hear him grunting with exertion. It’s times like that I wish I had just a bit more meat on my bones for padding. Or maybe some muscle—that woulda helped. Instead, each blow went straight to my bones, penetrating so deep I thought he’d cut me wide open.
    I couldn’t see a searin’ thing ’cause I was bent over, tears and pain and hair in my eyes, but I did hear my mother scream a few times for him to stop; and she musta come at him, ’cause I heard him curse and then there was a crash. Sari’s kids were crying and she was trying to comfort them, but compared to me, they had nothing to cry about.
    It still hurts to sit down, but I