Come over here, he said. Someone wants to talk to you.
It was already night inside, almost colder than outside but they’d lit the fire again. Rich walked alongside her easily. He was solid, muscular, everything about him was capable.
Most of the group were sitting around the fire, eating out of bowls they hadn’t had this morning. A metal pot of soup or stew sat near the fire. No sign of Adam, but she saw a bicyle, propped carefully against the wall, and there was someone new sitting on a packing crate talking to Safia while the others listened in.
This is Yara, Safia said when they reached them. She’s with Friends of the Camp.
Yara stood up. She was young, early twenties at most, and Li thought she’d seen her before, maybe in the kitchen van or the Kids’ Tent. Friends of the Camp was the main relief group in Port Howell. She shifted the pad and pen she was holding into her left hand and held out the other to Li. Assalamu alaikum.
Wa alaikum assalam. Do you know something about my daughter?
Your friends told me. I’m very sorry. What I know for sure is that the Population Distribution Agency took a busload of unaccompanied minors from the holding facility up the Northern Highway yesterday morning, to a temporary facility up there. At least seventy children. We tried to take statements from them, get a list of status numbers, but we couldn’t get access.
What temporary facility?
We were told they’re setting up in an old army barracks north of Kutha. They’re going to hold them there while they try to trace relatives.
I know where that is, Rich said. That place got decommissioned years ago.
Yara passed the pad and pen to Safia. Why don’t you finish the list? She turned back to Li and Rich. There’s a larger group but they could only spare one bus. I saw Agency staff loading food and bedding. Cooking gear, camping gear, high-thermals.
Why would they need camping gear?
Barracks’ll be pretty basic, Rich said. They might end up camping inside.
Yara said, It’ll be better for them up there. She looked straight at Li, trying hard for adult certainty but her ladybird hairclip gave her away. There’s about another thirty older minors in holding, waiting for the bus to come back. We’re trying to monitor their wellbeing but we have to reapply for access every day.
Li stopped listening. Something was loosening its grip a little in her chest. This was how Frank saw the world, she thought. This was the system working. She hadn’t kept her daughter safe, so now government was doing it for her. It was just hard to have faith in it. She realised Yara was asking her something.
Is there anyone in West who could claim her?
She hesitated, unwilling. My sister-in-law and her husband back in Valiant. They might.
That’s good, Yara said. They’ll try them first but their tracing database is a bit of a mess. I think you have time to get to the barracks first.
What happens if they can’t trace? Rich asked.
Yara nodded, thinking. If it’s just a few children left they might try to negotiate a limited humanitarian intake with Sumud, but that won’t be quick either.
Li said, I’ve already lodged a missing-minor claim. How far is it?
Kutha’s almost three hundred kilometres north. Yara looked at Rich. I’m not sure about the barracks.
Bout another two hundred from there to the turnoff, he said. Big walk.
Li said, I’m starting tonight.
There are taxis running up the highway, Yara told her. Do you have any dollars? Li shook her head. Watched Yara sifting and discarding options. Let me see what I can do, she said.
She turned back to talk to Safia and Rich explained. Friends of the Camp had been waiting on two containers of supplies to help winterise makecamp, mostly donations from inside Sumud. The containers had cleared customs the same day the camp was demolished.
They offered the stuff to holding, he said, but holding won’t take it. They don’t want to winterise, you betcha, that’d just make it harder to shut the place down. They want everyone processed and gone.
If the supplies weren’t unloaded by the end of the week, they’d be sent back to Sumud, so Friends of the Camp were distributing them on the quiet. Rich had heard about it from Yara in the port that morning, told her where to find them.
Yara and Safia were talking through their list. Do you have any tents? Li asked.
Yara looked up. No, but we have plastic sheeting. We have groundmats, sleeping bags, cooking gear, ready meals. I can get you some high-thermals too – the nights are going to get colder. She lifted the top page of her pad, tore off the one underneath, and passed it to Li, with another pen. It was a list of supplies in neat, handwritten bullet points. Write your name at the top. Circle what you need. I’ll bring the van back after dark.
Before Li left Port Howell, Rich gave her back the empty gun. Self-loading nine-millimetre, semiautomatic, he said. Army issue. Not easy to come by was what he meant.
She resisted the memory of the trader pressing it into her neck.
Rich said, I reckon if you can get hold of a pistol, maybe you can get hold of bullets too.
So the others didn’t know. Li put it in a side pocket of the pack Yara had given her, crammed with gear. She tested the weight, checked the straps and buckles. She’d need to dirty it up a bit or she’d be a walking target.
You can’t get lost, Rich told her. The highway sticks to the No Go, so you’ll be hugging the fence the whole way. There’s a bit of a town called Ruddock about two hundred clicks north. Just get through there. You can resupply in Kutha, should be Source there too. Not much left in the way
