Seeklight

“Junk,” stated Rennie in disgust, straightening back up. “No wonder they left it.”

She strode out of the room and into the corridor. Daenek could hear the sound of her opening another of the doors further on.

Kneeling beside the mound in front of the cabinet, Daenek poked through the old clothes as he held his own candle over them. He quickly saw that Rennie had been correct—they were little more than rags, tattered and frayed from age and wear.

Whoever had worn the stained workshirt that he spread out on the floor had not been much larger than himself.

And now he’s up in the hills somewhere, thought Daenek, running a hand over the threadbare fabric. No more factory, no more village—just simple hunger and cold, probably. Or maybe he’s dead already.

Out in the night, past the noises of Rennie prowling in the other rooms, he could hear the distant shouts and laughter from the other mertzers who had sneaked off the caravan. Beyond that, though, was silence. Somewhere in the open spaces around the village, things that had spoken and moved like human beings, but now had not so much fallen as had let things fall from them, were sleeping huddled under the bushes and trees of the hills.

How easy it would be, thought Daenek, gazing at the empty shirt. You wouldn’t even have to really die.

He stood up from the pile of clothing and walked out of the room and into the hallway. Rennie emerged from the last door at the corridor’s far end.

“Nothing,” she said in disgust. She carried her candle gripped in her fist like a dagger as she strode towards hims. The seeklight in her other hand glowed its usual faint red. “It’d cut out, too, if I didn’t have anything more to keep me around than this junk.”

“Maybe,” said Daenek, “they took it with them. Up into the hills.”

“That’s stupid,” she snapped. “What use would they have for anything valuable?”

Her anger made him smile despite the oppression the deserted village had created in his gut. “Very inconsiderate of them, all right, not to leave their money here just for you.”

“Come on.” She brushed past him and headed for the stairs.

“Let’s get out of here.”

The other mertzers had broken into another inn further toward the village’s center. Unseen by them, the candles in their hands extinguished, Daenek and Rennie watched for a little while as the men tossed bottles out through the door and windows, smashing them in the street and against the opposite buildings. The smell of stale liquor and the sound of raucous laughter hung in the air.

“What’s the point of that?” muttered Rennie. She turned and strode down another dark alley, away from the noise.

Daenek thrust the dead candle into his jacket pocket and followed after her. At least she’s looking for something, too, he thought. Anything to keep moving. He watched her narrow-shaped outline walking a couple of meters ahead of him, the silhouette of her head turning every now and then to glance at the seeklight in her hand.

A larger shape than the village’s low buildings finally loomed in front of them. Daenek gazed up at the factory, immense against the dark sky. Beside him, Rennie struck a match and re-lit the remaining half of her candle.

The entrance, two wide metal doors, was directly at the head of the street they had followed from out of the village. A broken lock dangled from its hasp on one of the doors. When they had squeezed through the opening, Daenek took his candle from his jacket pocket and lit it from Rennie’s.

The combined light from the candles seemed to barely reach beyond themselves in the factory’s vast interior. The edges of a few shapes, like cliffs or rock formations, towered at the yellow fringes of the light.

“Looms,” said Daenek, pointing to one side. His voice echoed for a moment, then was swallowed up by the unlit spaces. “This must’ve been some kind of a mill.”

“Yeah?” Rennie lifted her candle higher. The deep shadows shifted almost imperceptibly. Daenek no-ticed that she had put the seeklight away in one of her pockets.

Farther into the factory’s center, they came upon a tiny room, set off from the rest of the open space by panels of dust-smeared windows. Beyond the glass they could see several desks Uttered with papers. Daenek found the door and stepped inside the room with Rennie close behind him.

Clouds of dust lifted from the papers as he pushed them about on one of the desktops with his hand. Records, he thought.

Maybe the man who made them was the last to go.