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Long-abandoned, now they are nothing more than ghosts. The crew step carefully, as if they are afraid that their weight might crush the rails below them.
“Sacrifices need to be made for the good of the train, I’m sure we don’t need to explain further.” Mr. Li’s tone is saccharine.
The smell of peppercorns and spices reaches her nose and she knows what they are doing, they are covering up leftovers with strong flavors, the better to eke out the food as long as possible.
They fear she is not who she says she is … She could go to First right now,
“These English fellows,” says Guillaume, “I’m sure he’ll not have picked anything up, they never do. Their miserable climate makes them immune.”
Some of the phenomena in the Wastelands have been studied and understood; the effects of the weather and atmospheric pressure causing mirages—the sudden appearance of what seems to be an encampment, for example, flags flying from the tops of tents—or the spectral light of Valentin’s Fire.
They look close enough that she could leap from one to another, as she had done as a child, splashing from puddle to puddle in the lane outside their dacha, watching the sky and the trees shatter beneath her. In St. Petersburg she had always had an adult clutching her hand, forcing her to walk beside them.
It was only in the countryside that she had had the freedom to leap and splash, away from watchful eyes.
But she backs away. She needs to be away from him, from the way his body is an etching of the hungry lands outside; from his restless, changing
This is why we have our rituals, she thinks. This is why they are needed—so that we can lose ourselves for a while.
“Don’t you know it’s bad luck to talk about ghosts? They will hear you and think that they’re welcome.”
“We were shown the different parts of ourselves. And then…” The glass cracked. The connection was lost. She can feel its absence, like the ache she gets
Crows. Yes, an apt name, though the crow is a much maligned bird—a creature cannot be good or evil, not like man, who is born good and pure, who must learn evil.
She has finished defying the Wastelands,
All summer we keep the windows open. We breathe in transfigured air. It is not only the landscape that has changed; our own bodies are alive with transformations. I watch as the sunlight catches the new silvery scales on my
Where will the great train take us? We stand at the open windows and we watch the horizon approaching.
