Chapter Seven, Across the plain

The coaches in this area of the continent were undoubtedly unique. The long distances between settlements and the harsh desert terrain meant that coaches had to be robust, reliable and able to support it's passengers for possibly weeks at a time. These demands had caused the coaches to be designed double story, allowing the lower half to be filled with food, water and cargo and the top half for passengers. They had also not been intended as luxury transportation and this was clear by the raw steel shell. Even when brand new they looked unappealing, after decades of service they looked more like a portable prison. Heat was also an issue as ventilation was not included.

Things had been uneventful for the first few days onboard. Starcloud and Diviant had found their place at the back of the bus where the open windows along the side allowed a breeze to amount before them, the best airflow anywhere on the bus. The fourth day on the bus was the day when things started to go wrong. The morning light was increasing by the minute. After a long cool night the passengers were refreshed but not looking forward to another day of heat and boredom. Then, as the sun was just settling in to its position in the sky, the bus came to a halt. Diviant could hear noises from the front of the bus, the driver was shouting and he could hear other voices too. He got up, leaving Lyra to remain sleeping and walked to the front of the bus. At the window he looked down to see that they had reached a small village, armed guards in desert attire were holding up the bus. He could hear the bus driver talking to the patrol leader downstairs.

"Look man, I carry many people about, women, children, all sorts of people. With a description like that I can't give you an answer." Said the driver in an indignant tone.

"What about a name then," the guard replied. "A Lyra Starcloud."

Diviant's eyes widened. He could only assume that she was wanted for putting a man in hospital, or possibly he had died. Maybe she was wanted for murder.

"I don't ask for the names of my passengers, they pay me the money, load up their belongings and it's no questions asked."

"I don't believe that's the policy of your organisation. Co-operate or I'll use that as reason to have you arrested. Security is something we insist of here."

"You can go upstairs and check if you want." said the driver, obviously having given in to the demands of the officer. Diviant walked over to Lyra as if he'd got bored of listening in. He didn't want to give the wrong impression to the other passengers. He nudged her to get her awake.

"What?" she murmured.

He tried to remain calm and stared at the stairway. "There are armed guards looking for you about to come up those stairs. What do you want to do?"

She sat upright suddenly and joined him in staring at the stairs.

"A 'Good morning' would have been nicer" she replied. Then, without even telling him of what she had planned she began to gather her magic force in the same motion as if she were cleaning her hands and a moment later had turned into a rat like creature, a leet. Diviant tried to grab the leet but it evaded him causing a commotion that attracted the attention of all the passengers. The leet then ran along the side of the bus on the floor. After failing to grab the rodent he instead turned his attention to packing up her equipment into her backpack, getting ready to leave if necessary. Then, having cleared everything up he looked up and about the room. He had lost sight of it and now the guards were entering the section from the stairway.

The search was brief and surface-deep. They looked around at the passengers, asked several different people several different questions and then left, all this time without spotting the orange brown fur of a leet. Problem for Diviant was that after the guards had left and the bus had resumed its course to Old Meyn the leet was still nowhere to be seen. He waited for her to return, cursing himself every now and then when he thought it best she not come back. Sure, she had not been what he remembered, maybe she was worse than before but he was here to help her not just to meet her. He was going to get her back on the right road. He took a step back in his mind and looked back at what he had just thought. Why was he setting himself up like this? He didn't owe anything to her, he didn't have any attraction to her that might explain it, he didn't even usually think at all about other people. He was a self-sufficient soldier, needing no one, ultimately relying only on himself. The day then proceeded just as the other days had; the nauseating heat, the metal walls that were hot to touch and the desert landscape with seemed to never end, but all without Lyra showing.

Diviant awoke in the middle of the night in response to the bus going over a deep rut in the road that shook it. He didn't move, believing that if he did then the cold of the night would get to him. Then he realised that Lyra was beside him, leaning against his arm and not awoken by the disturbance. Lying there, lit by moonlight, she looked like a mere girl, innocent to the world and in need of protection and guidance. Then he reminded himself of what she looked like, storming out of the canteen of the Gyromus with a look of intense anger. But then he thought back again, was it anger? Or some reason he could not picture that face, he could only see a face that seemed to know she had let herself down. He was tired, that was it, he was just tired and not thinking straight. He let his eyes fall down and allowed his mind to drift from the focused to the unconscious.

In Lyra's dream she was alone, standing in a dark forest with no sound. Her could not hear the wind, the animals, nothing. The sky above her was black, no stars and no clouds, just a void. She looked down to her side and saw.

She awoke abruptly, it was day and the bus continued to shake along the dusty track. Diviant was not beside her, he was further down the bus talking to a person she did not know. After lying on the seat waiting for him to come back she got up, stretched and walked down to them holding onto the railings for stability.

"Hi there, sleep well?" Diviant asked her.

"Slept fine." She answered, looking a state and clearly still tired. "This is Thraves, he's a merchant on his way to Old Meyn as well."

"Hi" he said, extending a hand and expecting to be received gracefully. His voice was strangely unfettered, Starcloud was used to Merchants and they all had a weary substance to their voices even if it was covered by an artificial 'trading' voice which was meant to appeal. She shook his hand for the sake of activity, but she wasn't one for giving trust to strangers.

"I hear you're going to Omni-1, that's a big place, I have many friends there. I try and stay away from built up areas personally, I get claustrophobic around tall buildings."

"Shame," she replied. "I've learnt from experience that those who don't like cities don't belong in them."

Diviant was hoping she wouldn't respond this way but didn't show it.

"Well, as we're all here travelling together, might I interest you to a trade?" Thraves continued, unaffected by the remark. He reached under his seat to a brown old suitcase, tatty and worn to the extent that Lyra immediately looked at Diviant with a look of disapproval upon seeing it. Thraves opened the case to reveal a gleaming metal interior loaded with exotic handguns and high-tech ammunition.

"My trade is a discrete but profitable one. I noticed your arms at the back among your other belongings and assumed you'd be interested. Am I right?"

Lyra sat down beside him and looked inside, her face bright from the reflected light and eyes wide with wonder.

"I think you may be. This is going to make the rest of the trip a lot more interesting."