Nightrise

and the blood that covered him. There were no towels. He had pulled on his pants and dried himself in front of the flames.
    After that, he had been fed. Corian had cooked some sort of meat over the fire. It tasted like chicken but it was tougher, harder to chew. Jamie had no idea what it was and decided it might be better not to ask. It had been served with beans and solid slabs of bread. He had been given a bowl of steaming liquid to drink. It tasted bitter and sweet at the same time, and Scar — who had returned in time for the meal —
    had told him that it was made with acorns and honey. Jamie was glad to have it. Just holding something warm between his hands made him feel better.
    And now they were talking. The two brothers were resting against a wall, leaning against each other shoulder-to-shoulder with their legs stretched out in front of them. Finn was squatting on a broken piece of column, gnawing at a bone, his fingers covered in grease. Scar and Jamie were sitting cross-legged in front of the fire. As she spoke, Jamie could see its reflection, dancing in her eyes.
    "Finn has often told me that the world wasn't always like this," she went on. "A long time ago there were no shape-changers and death squads and overlords and fire riders and all the rest of them. But this is all I've ever known so don't ask me for a history lesson. I never met my mother or my father. By the time I was born, most people never knew their parents. All I can remember is being carried around by different people. Someone would take me with them and just when I was getting to know them and thinking that they were kind, they'd be killed and someone else would take their place. And everything was always ruined, like this city. I don't think I ever spent more than a few days in a house before it was broken to pieces or burned down." She raised her bowl in mockery of a toast. "Welcome to the end of the world, Jamie. Because that's where you are."
    ''You called me Jamie." Jamie wasn't sure where to begin. It was all too much to take in. "But before, you said I was Sapling." He glanced in the direction of the main square. "They called me Sapling."
    "There is no point calling you Sapling," Scar replied. "Because you're not him even if you do look exactly like him and all those people think you are him." She gestured in the direction of the square. "I imagine you're confused."
    ''You could say that."
    "Well, so am I. I just hope Matt will explain it all eventually, although he can be very annoying at times and never gives you a straight answer to anything."
    'You mentioned Matt before," Jamie said. "Who is he?"

    "Matt's the one in charge. He's our leader. The first of the Five. He's the one who's supposed to understand what's going on." .
    The Five. When he was at the prison, Joe Feather had said he was one of the Five. Had Joe known something about this world and the events that had taken place here?
    "Tell me about Matt," Jamie said. He pictured someone like Finn, gray-haired and battle-scarred. "Is he old?"
    Scar laughed. "No. He's the same age as us. Do you really not know who we are? You and Flint and me and Inti and Matt?"
    "Flint is my twin."
    ''Yes."
    "Then he's Scott. I was looking for him when I was shot. That's how I ended up here." It still made no sense to Jamie, even as he tried to explain it. Then he remembered. "I have seen you before," he said.
    "But it wasn't real. It was in a dream."
    He thought Scar would laugh at him, but she nodded, perfectly serious. "People used to think that dreams didn't mean anything," she said. "That they were just things that happened when you went to sleep. But we use them all the time. There's a dream world that we visit sometimes, and that's how we found out who we were. That's how we found each other in the first place."
    'You should start at the beginning," Finn called out. He had finished his food. He threw the bone onto the fire. The flames devoured it as if they were as hungry as he had been. 'You're a rotten storyteller."
    "There was no beginning for me," Scar retorted. "Or if there was, I don't remember it. Matt's the only one who knows the whole truth, and he never tells us anything."
    "Start with the Five!" Finn insisted.
    "All right. All right." Scar sighed. "But don't interrupt me, Finn. You only make it more difficult."
    "Adults taking second place to children!" Finn shook his head in despair. "That's what I really call the end of the world." He fell silent.
    Scar turned to Jamie.