Read Xeelee: An Omnibus: Raft, Timelike Infinity, Flux, Ring for Free Online Page A

muscles were like a man’s; and his hands were the battered product of hours of labour. The lad’s eyes were dark-ringed. Pallis remembered the imploded foundry and wondered what horrors this young miner had already seen. Now the boy filled his chest defiantly, his hands bunching into fists.
    Gover sneered, arms folded. ‘What do we do, pilot? Throw him to the Boneys?’
    Pallis turned on him with a snarl. ‘Gover, sometimes you disgust me.’
    Gover flinched. ‘But—’
    ‘Have you cleaned out the fire bowls yet? No? Then do it. Now!’
    With a last, baleful glare at the stowaway, Gover moved clumsily away across the tree.
    The stowaway watched him go with some relief; then turned back to Pallis.
    The pilot’s anger was gone. He raised his hands, palms upwards. ‘Take it easy. I’m not going to hurt you . . . and that idler is nothing to be afraid of. Tell me your name.’
    The boy’s mouth worked but no sound emerged; he licked cracked lips, and managed to say: ‘Rees.’
    ‘All right. I’m Pallis. I’m the tree-pilot. Do you know what that means?’
    ‘I . . . Yes.’
    ‘By the Bones, you’re dry, aren’t you? No wonder you stole that water. You did, didn’t you? And the food?’
    The boy nodded hesitantly. ‘I’m sorry. I’ll pay you back—’
    ‘When? After you return to the Belt?’
    The boy shook his head, a glint in his eye. ‘No. I’m not going back.’
    Pallis bunched his fists and rested them on his hips. ‘Listen to me. You’ll have to go back. You’ll be allowed to stay on the Raft until the next supply tree; but then you’ll be shipped back. You’ll have to work your passage, I expect. All right?’
    Rees shook his head again, his face a mask of determination.
    Palls studied the young miner, an unwelcome sympathy growing inside him. ‘You’re still hungry, aren’t you? And thirsty, I’ll bet. Come on. I keep my - and Gover’s - rations at the trunk.’
    He led the boy across the tree surface. Surreptitiously he watched as the boy half walked across the foliated platform, his feet seeking out the points of good purchase and then lodging in the foliage, so allowing him to ‘stand’ on the tree. The contrast with Gover’s clumsy stumbling was marked. Pallis found himself wondering what kind of woodsman the lad would make . . .
    After a dozen yards they disturbed a spray of skitters; the little creatures whirled up into Rees’s face and he stepped back, startled. Pallis laughed. ‘Don’t worry. Skitters are harmless. They are the seeds from which the tree grows . . .’
    Rees nodded. ‘I guessed that.’
    Pallis arched an eyebrow. ‘You did?’
    ‘Yes. You can see the shape’s the same; it’s just a difference of scale.’
    Pallis listened in surprised silence to the serious, parched voice.
    They reached the trunk. Rees stood before the tall cylinder and ran his fingers over the gnarled wood. Pallis hid a smile. ‘Put your ear against the wood. Go on.’
    Rees did so with a look of puzzlement - which evolved into an almost comic delight.
    ‘That’s the bole turning, inside the trunk. You see, the tree is alive, right to its core.’
    Rees’s eyes were wide.
    Now Pallis smiled openly. ‘But I suspect you won’t be alive much longer if you don’t eat and drink. Here . . .’
    After letting the boy sleep for a quarter-shift Pallis put him to work. Soon Rees was bent over a fire bowl, scraping ash and soot from the iron with shaped blades of wood. Pallis found that his work was fast and complete, supervised or unsupervised. Once again Gover suffered by comparison . . . and by the looks he shot at Rees, Pallis suspected Gover knew it.
    After half a shift Pallis brought Rees a globe of water. ‘Here; you deserve a break.’
    Rees squatted back among the foliage, flexing stiff hands. His face was muddy with sweat and soot and he sucked gratefully at the drink. On an impulse Pallis said, ‘These bowls hold fire. Maybe you guessed that. Do you understand how they’re