IT WAS QUIET IN THE SWAMP. Deep quiet—the kind that’s defined by the buzz of insects and the lapping of water and the thick wet heat of the day. The shade of the willow and sycamore trees that grew along the edge of the water dappled the golden light, but their shade wasn’t enough to cut through the weight of the heat. The hoppers rode slowly, easily—they shared an unspoken need to enjoy the calm of the swamp. It would be their last peaceful day. Soon, they’d reach the Mississippi Gate, and the chaos would begin.
Adelia rode Stasia, her heavily armored Arnesian Brown, without a saddle. She rode cross-legged, one hand wrapped around her belly; the other gripped the pommel of Stasia’s harness. Stasia, an exemplar of her breed, snapped at birds that flew too close to her snout. She grumbled at sticks that bumped into her legs, and squinted suspiciously at the other hippos. And yet, for all her aggression, she seemed devoted to Adelia—Adelia, who swayed with Stasia’s rolling gait, occasionally singing nonsense to her in lilting tones. “Stasia, my Anastasia, Ana Aña, Aña-araña . . .”
Neville rode next to her on her second hippo, Zahra. He knelt awkwardly in the borrowed saddle, but Zahra—an aging Standard Grey, nearly identical to Abigail save for the livid bolt of white across her brow—followed Stasia gamely, ignoring the way the boy pitched to and fro in the saddle.
“Miss Adelia, this is so hard,” he said, out of breath from struggling to maintain his balance. “How come you can do it without even a saddle?”
“I have been doing it since I was in my mother’s belly,” she replied with a wisp of a smile. “When my little niña is born, she will ride with me, and she will be just as strong as I am. Stronger, perhaps.”
“What if it’s a boy?” Neville asked, clutching at the saddle.
“It won’t be a boy.”
Neville stared at her for a few moments without speaking, his eyes lingering on her belly.
“You are wondering about the father,” she said, unsmiling. Neville stammered an incoherent denial, his blush destroying his credibility.
“There is no father,” Adelia said. “There is a man who gave me the child I wanted from him.”
Neville stared hard at his hands. “Alright ma’am,” he whispered, mortified. She grinned at his embarrassment.
“I am not ashamed, boy. I have no need of a husband. This girl will have no need of a father. Perhaps a second mother, someday—but if not?” She shrugged. “It makes no difference.”
A sharp whistle sounded from behind them, where Archie rode her diamond-white Rosa. Neville twisted in the saddle to look at her, then caught himself on the pommel as he nearly tipped out of the saddle. Adelia whistled back without looking away from the water ahead. Archie’s rich, deep laugh carried over the sound of the hippos’ splashing progress through the shallows of the swamp.
Ahead of them, Cal, Houndstooth, and Hero rode abreast. Ruby slid through the water like a shadow between runty brown Betsy and Hero’s grey Abigail. Shy, sweet Betsy bumped out of the way with a sidelong glance at the sleek black hippo, but Abigail didn’t seem to notice her. Ruby came close enough to Abigail that Houndstooth’s leg brushed against Hero’s. Hero startled.
“I didn’t—I didn’t hear her get so close,” they said, holding their hat on with one hand.
“Well, you wouldn’t, would you?” Houndstooth said. “Some things just sneak up on you like that.”
Hero tried to stop the smile that spread across their face, but it was too late; Houndstooth was already grinning back.
* * *
As dusk settled over the marsh, the hoppers clustered closer together. Houndstooth rode in front. Behind him, Adelia, Archie, and Neville clustered together. Hero and Cal rode behind, occasionally shooting wary glances at each other.
“So, I’ve been wondering,” Adelia said. “What is that for?” She pointed at the coiled chain that Archie wore on her hip. “It looks like the strangest bola I’ve ever seen. I can’t imagine using it to disable a man, much less a charging hippo.”
Archie smiled. “I adore your idea of small talk, Adelia. This is my meteor ’ammer.” She patted the smooth metal ball that swung beside her thigh. “I will show you ’ow it is used sometime. I think you will like it.”
“It’s really somethin’, she showed me on the way here,” Neville piped. “She swings the chain around her whole entire body and then she just turns and whips it and pow!” He slapped Zahra’s flank. The hippo didn’t seem to notice. “It just crunches whatever she aims it at!”
“I hope I don’t have a need to see it in action,” Adelia said, “but I would love to see a demonstration.” She looked at the meteor hammer and for a moment, genuine affection ghosted her features. “At any rate, we should find a place to tie up,” Adelia said. “It’s unwise for us to be in the water after sundown.”
“Oui,” Archie said. “And we should go over the plan for this caper before we turn in.”
“Why?” Neville asked.
“It’s not a caper,” Houndstooth replied, sounding irritated. “It’s an operation. All aboveboard.”
“Well, we still need to go over the plan,” Adelia snapped.
“If you see a dry patch I don’t,” Houndstooth said, slapping at a mosquito, “you go right ahead and point it out.”
“There was a petit island a mile back or so,” Archie mused, “but too small, I think, for all of us.”
“Why can’t we be out after dark?” Neville asked again.
“Too small for your fat ass, maybe,” Cal called from the back of the group. Archie’s fingertips played over the revolver that hung from her hip.
“He’s not worth the bullet,” Adelia murmured to her.
“Why shouldn’t we be out after dark?” Neville piped.
“I could stab ’im, perhaps,” Archie said, giving Adelia a wry smile.
“Si, but then the blood would ruin your lovely blouse.”
“Excuse me,” Neville said again.
“Strangulation, then. The cleanest death of them all,” Archie continued, ignoring him.
“Ask Hero for some poison, maybe?” Adelia and Archie both laughed. Hero smiled from under the brim of their hat. Neville looked back at Hero, eyes wide.
“You have a lot to learn, boy,” Hero drawled. “Never stare at someone you’re scared of.”
Archie smiled over at Neville. “Are you scared of Hero?”
Houndstooth chuckled. “I’d imagine he’s scared of all of us.”
Hero fanned themself with their hat. “Oh, son. You shouldn’t be scared of us. Us, you’ll see comin’. No, what you want to be scared of,” they said, looking at the boy with a wicked gleam in their eye, “is the ferals.”
Neville clung to Zahra’s back. “I ain’t scared of hippos.” His voice shook a little.
“Well, young man, there’s hippos and there’s hippos,” Cal said. “Now, Zahra there, she’s a sweet thing. Raised by people from when she was just a little hop. Slept next to her hopper’s raft every night, ate from her hopper’s hand every day. Loyal. Loving. But a feral?” He laughed mirthlessly.
“Let’s not scare the boy,” Houndstooth said. “He won’t be seeing any ferals anyway. They’re all between the Gate and the dam, and he won’t be going in there with us.”
“You never know,” Cal intoned.
“Is . . . is that why we have to find a place to camp before nightfall? Because of ferals?” Neville asked.
“That, and Cal is scared of the dark,” Archie said loudly. “So let’s ’urry it up, oui?” She snapped her fingers twice and Rosa surged ahead, nudging her white nose against Ruby’s coal-black flank.
They found an island just as the sun dipped below the horizon. The hum of insects intensified as the last light of the day died, and the hoppers guided their steeds toward the little hump of land that rose out of the water. Archie whistled to Neville. “Would you care to give Rosa’s teeth a brush before we turn ’er loose for the night?”
Neville grinned, his sweat-damp blond hair falling into his eyes, and he held up a leather pouch. “I’ve already got her toothbrush, Miss Archie!” He splashed down the riverbank, cooing to Rosa. The white hippo had already begun to wander away from the sandy bank of the islet. She had been riding all day, and was reluctant to come back to the shore before she’d eaten. The sound of Neville’s coaxing entreaties for her to come back for a brushing drifted through the stillness of the dusk, blending with the buzz of cicadas.
“’E is a good kid,” Archie said ruefully, settling onto a log beside Hero.
“He’s too green to be out here,” Hero responded. They pulled out a pocketknife and began scraping the bark off a fat stick.
“Ah, ’e’ll be fine. I couldn’t leave ’im behind,” Archie said. “Rosa, she likes ’im too much for me to tell ’im no, when ’e asked to come. Just like Houndstooth. I could never say no to ’im, either.”
The sounds of Houndstooth and Cal arguing over where to start the fire drifted to them through the warm night air.
“You really care about Houndstooth, eh?” Hero asked.
“I could ask you the same question, couldn’t I?” Archie responded with a grin. Hero looked up, not returning Archie’s smile.
“You know, when I first met Houndstooth, ’e had just had ’is ’eart broken. ’Is dream—it was in ashes. I watched ’im meet someone, a woman. I watched ’im fall in love with ’er.”
Hero’s brow furrowed, but they did not interrupt.
Archie waved her hand vaguely. “She ran off with a postman. They were going to go north, to the cities. Tried to take Ruby with them, but of course Ruby, she would not go. She is devoted.”
Hero considered Archie. “So . . . what happened after that?”
“Ah,” Archie said. “Houndstooth started to sow ’is wild oats. As for the girl? Well, I will not say. Houndstooth . . . ’e does not need to know what I did to the girl when I found ’er trying to steal Ruby. But I will tell you this”—Archie looked at Hero, her face serious—“what I did to ’er will look like a kindness, compared to what I will do to anyone who breaks ’is ’eart like that again.”
Hero stared into Archie’s eyes, unblinking. “I understand.”
Archie clapped them on the shoulder, hard, smiling warmly. “I know you do. I can tell. I just ’ad to say it—you know ’ow it is. Ah, don’t be too scared. I think you are good for ’im! You should see ’ow ’e smiles at you when ’e thinks you are not looking. Plus, you keep ’im from thinking ’e is the smartest in the room.”
Hero smiled, ducking their head; then, they looked up, the smile suddenly gone. “Did you hear that?”
“What,” Archie said, “are they finally just comparing their cocks and ’aving done with it?”
But Hero was already on their feet, running to the water’s edge.
They were too late.
By the time Hero had reached the riverbank, Neville was half-submerged in the water. There came a fierce splash, and the boy surged into the air before landing, caught, in the gaping mouth of the feral bull.
He hung in the mouth of the beast, stunned. His left leg hung between the bull’s front tusks, the angle wrong. It bled freely, and his blood spilled over the hippo’s whiskers. Archie covered her mouth with both hands when she caught up with Hero as though to catch the boy’s name even as she shouted it. Cal and Houndstooth looked up and came running. The bull was still for a long, thick moment. Then, with a lightning-quick twist of its thick neck, it snapped its jaws closed.
The boy was dead. There could be no question, even before the feral bull shook him below the water. Archie turned away; Hero put an arm around her, shielding her as much as possible from the bloodied swamp water that sprayed the shore. Cal and Houndstooth stood frozen a few yards from the water’s edge, empty-handed. Cal’s toothpick dangled from his slack lower lip.
They did not see Adelia coming.
Neither did the hippo.
It wasn’t until the beast was bleeding that Houndstooth registered her standing next to him, her arm outstretched toward the hippo as though she was offering it a handshake. Houndstooth looked from her to the bull, which twitched and writhed spasmodically in the frothy pink water.
He put a hand to his pocket, as though he’d find anything there; but of course, it was empty. The long, slender, ivory-handled knife he’d taken from the marshjack back in Georgia was gone. A mere inch of the handle still protruded from the bull’s eye socket. The rest of the knife was buried in the beast’s brain. A trickle of blood spilled over the hippo’s cheek like tears as it gave a final thrash, and then sank below the surface of the water.
As the ripples stilled, Adelia lowered her throwing arm.
“That,” Cal said quietly, “is why you shouldn’t be in the water after sundown.”