Echo City Read Online Free Page B

evidence of fire, even after so long, and to Peer the ruin seemed recent, not a hundred years old. She breathed in deeply, closed her eyes, smiled as she tried to drive down the dark thoughts that always haunted her, then went to work.
    She knew most of the stoneshroom gatherers, and they were a friendly group to work with. They were all out for themselves—picking the ’shrooms was only the first part of the process, the next being their cleaning, preparation, and sale—but often, if a good spread was found, word would filter quietly to the several other harvesters in the vicinity. They were a prized plant because of their heavy meatiness, and they were one of the few foodstuffs harvested within Skulk Canton.
If ever we claim independence
, Penler had once quipped,
we’ll all turn into stoneshrooms
.
    Peer worked hard, delving down into the spaces between collapsed walls, shifting small blocks aside where she could, and spending long moments of stillness sniffing for the fungi. Some hunters sang, and the song was taken up by others, but Peer remained silent today. She was looking forward to seeing Penler for lunch, and she hoped to have several ’shrooms prepared for him by then.
    As noon approached, storm clouds drifted in over the city to the north. Peer derived some small satisfaction from knowing that it rained on the rest of Echo City before it rained on Skulk Canton. She made the most of the final touch of sunlight, then set off for the city walls.
       Penler was sitting on a wooden bench looking out over the Markoshi Desert. Peer saw something symbolic in that. The bench must have been placed atop the wall by Watchers long ago, because the Marcellans and their Hanharan religion looked only inward, and Penler knew her Watcher history.
    “Penler,” Peer said as she approached. The old man glanced up and smiled, wiping his lips. He nursed a bottle of Crescent wine in his lap, a good ruby red, and she smiled at his flagrantdisplay of resourcefulness. Close though they had become, he had never told her how he still procured such produce from outside.
    “Peer, my dear,” he said, shuffling along the bench. “Been keeping it warm for you.”
    The first drops of rain spattered the stone paving around them as she sat down. Penler was wearing a heavy coat with a wide hood, and she pulled up her own hood. The sound of rain striking it made her feel isolated, even though she sat there with her friend.
    “I brought some stoneshrooms,” she said, taking the folded cloth from her pocket. “Not the best of the crop today, but I arrived at the fields late.”
    Penler nodded and ran his fingers across the proffered fungi. He moved his hand back and forth, then paused above one of the smaller, darker slices. He leaned in and sniffed, then grunted in satisfaction. He could always hone in on the best of everything.
    “I have some fresh bread,” he said as he chewed, “and the wine is good.”
    “They’ll execute me for drinking it,” Peer said, laughing and taking a swig from his bottle. He was right; it was excellent.
    “Even the Marcellans themselves won’t be drinking better wine today,” Penler said, and beneath the humor lay the familiar seriousness. He’d been sent here many years before when he published a book exploring the Dragarians’ beliefs. The prosecuting Hanharan priests had claimed it was not the publication that marked him as a heretic but his sympathy for the Dragarians and their dead prophet—murdered by the Marcellans’ own Scarlet Blades, after all—that shone through his writing. Proud, stubborn, Penler had confirmed or denied nothing, and his future was set.
    “Fuck the Marcellans,” she said, “and get that bread out.”
    They ate in silence for a while, comfortable in each other’s company without feeling the need to fill it with noise. Peer looked out over the flat, featureless desert, watching the line of rain progressing outward as the clouds drifted overhead. Sands darkened,