Among the Nameless Stars

stinging into a blunt and bitter agony. His head had stopped bleeding, as had the cuts and scrapes on his arms. He had deep gashes on his hands, at least one broken finger, and a few cracked ribs, but they concerned him less at this moment. Who needed fingers if you were going to die at the bottom of a fire field canyon? He had no material for a splint or a crutch, and crawling only netted him a few meters out of the ravine, even after hours of fighting the slide of dust and gravel.
    The next day, he felt no better. He also ran out of water. That night, he had fever dreams.
    Dreams where Elliot came to him, and laid a cool hand on his burning face, and gave him water to drink, and kissed his battered face, and let the ends of her silky dark hair brush over his dusty skin. He reached for her with broken, bloody fingers, but she slipped through his hands like mist.

    Among the Nameless Stars by Diana Peterfreund
    | 5
    He’d left her there, on the North Estate. He’d gotten her letter, and instead of storming her big fancy house, instead of barging through the rooms he’d never walked through, breaking down the door he’d never seen, marching into the bedroom he’d never entered, and demanding the answers he needed, he’d turned his back on her—on the only friend he’d ever had—and walked away from everything he’d ever known. He’d walked away from Elliot.
    And now he’d never see her again.

    Among the Nameless Stars by Diana Peterfreund
    | 6
    Two

    To Elliot North of the North Estate,

    Dear Elliot,
    If you’re reading this, it means I’m dead. I’m sorry. I left for a better life, but now it turns out I’ll have no life at all. I’m glad, now, that you aren’t here. I’m glad that you haven’t been dragged with me to the bottom of this awful ravine. I’m glad that I don’t have to look you in the eyes when it turns out all your fears were well-founded.
    I hope this letter will somehow find its way back to you. I hope you know that I’ve always lo—

    “You there!”
    Kai looked up from the page toward the lip of the ravine. There, silhouetted against the sun, stood a man leading a mule.
    “You write?”
    That was not what he’d expected the man to say.
    Kai raised his hand weakly. “Please,” he begged. “Help me.” Kai didn’t care if this man was another kidnapper. Better to be enslaved than die here. He’d been born a slave. It didn’t have to be permanent.
    The man half walked, half slid down the scree, and when he got to the bottom, he remained a few feet away from Kai, his expression at once wary and calculating. “You look terrible.”
    “Please,” Kai said. “I’ve hurt my leg. I can’t move. Can you help me?”

    Among the Nameless Stars by Diana Peterfreund
    | 7
    “Might.” The guy jerked his chin at the page in Kai’s hand. “That real writing?”
    Kai nodded, baffled. The guy leaned over and picked up Kai’s knapsack, then slipped his hands under Kai’s arms and hauled him to his feet. They made their slow, huffing way up the side of the ravine, and then the man threw him like a sack of grain on the back of the mule.
    “Thought you was Reduced at first, looking so beat-up,” the man said. “They come out here sometimes, wandering away to die like animals.”
    Kai wasn’t sure how to respond to that. “My name’s Kai.”
    The man grunted. “Teb.” He said nothing else, and Kai did his best to stay upright and conscious as the man led him into who knows what.
    Eventually, they reached a shabby gathering of mud huts. Kai collapsed off the side of the mule. Before him, in the dust, squatted a girl about his age. She was wearing a shapeless gray sack and nursing the scrawniest baby he’d ever seen. There were a few other children around, all skinny as sticks and covered in dirt.
    “What’s this, Teb?” she asked his savior. “We don’t need no more bellies ’round here.”
    “He writes,” Teb mumbled as he took the rest of the packages off the mule.
    The girl raised her eyebrows. “For real? Get Jin.” She motioned toward one of the dusty children. “Get this man some water, now, you hear me?”
    Kai gratefully accepted the water, and tried to keep his eyes averted from the girl’s bare breasts. She finished feeding the baby, handed it off to one of the other children, and covered herself up. Then she sat back in the dirt, watching him warily.
    “How do you know writing?” she asked. “You Luddite?”
    “No,” Kai croaked. “I’m