Nightpeople Read Online Free Page B

slowly stood up. The sensation of her fingers in Saria’s hair seemed to last long after Ma finally lay down in her corner of the room.
    Saria lay still in the darkness, wide-awake, listening to the sounds of night from the bush outside. Rolling over, she was surprised at the amount of moonlight coming through the open doorway; the long rectangle of silver cast everything in monochrome hues that seemed to belong to a world different from the one she was so used to. On the other side of the room Dariand was only vaguely discernible as a dark lump beside the door. She knew he was there, though. She could hear his soft breathing and feel his presence, alien and yet strangely at home in this silvery, unfamiliar darkness.
    A wheezy rumbling snore slipped through the silence from Ma’s corner, and Saria closed her eyes, enjoying the sound for the first time ever. It had a gentle familiarity, and softened the strangeness of having the man in the hut. The first waves of sleep began to creep over her. Just as she was slipping completely into its grip, she stiffened.
    Saria!
    The call. The one she had felt earlier through the lizard. Fierce and yet gentle, the summons came from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. Distant and pleading, it echoed through the earth and straight into her.
    She’d never felt anything like it. Even when she went riding out into the world on the senses of some willing creature, there’d never been anything this strong, this … personal.
    It lasted just a second, shivering up from the ground and sending a tremor through Saria’s thin body.
    Saria!
    The voice was disembodied. A night spirit, there for the briefest of moments and then gone, leaving Saria alone and trembling.

It was impossible to say what woke her. Some strange rustle or unexpected movement of air, perhaps. Whatever it was, she came awake instantly some time in the small hours of the morning.
    Saria sat, peering around the shadowy interior of the hut. Ma Lee still snored gently in her corner, and everything seemed normal.
    Then she noticed: the man – Dariand – was gone. There was no sign of his sleeping form by the door. No sound of his breathing in the darkness.
    Perhaps he’d changed his mind and gone without her.
    Even as she dimissed the thought, Saria was startled to realise that a tiny part of her was disappointed at the possibility.
    Beyond the open door the dim light of the nightvault beckoned. Usually there was no silent way to creep outside after Ma had put the shutters in place, but not tonight. Saria rose and shrugged on her robe over her skinny shoulders. Then, careful not to disturb Ma, she slipped across the dirt floor through the darkness and stepped into the night.
    After the close atmosphere inside, the air tasted crisp and fresh. Saria stood in the shadows, savouring the feel of it, the slightly damp coolness against her bare arms. The vaultlights were dull, masked by intense moonlight, and not a breath of air moved. Shivering slightly, Saria looked around as her eyes adapted to the light. There was no sign of the man; no footprints in the dirt, no movement in the bushes, nothing.
    Somewhere high up on the nightwards rim a dog howled, its cry reverberating around the ancient stone walls of the valley, and Saria took an involuntary step back. But the sound quickly echoed off into silence again, leaving Saria alone with the regular noises of the night.
    Outside, the noises all seemed somehow more intense. She was used to hearing them from inside the hut, muted by the mud walls and tin shutters. Out here, though, standing in the coolness, her breath fogging slightly, each nocturnal rustle and chirp floated through the still air clearly and insistently. Down by the creek she could hear frogs croaking gently and in the scrub on the far side of the clearing something – a couple of rock-hoppers, perhaps – sent silvery shivers through the bushes as they grazed, hidden in a tangle of