Iriya the Berserker by Hideyuki Kikuchi Read Free Book Online

work?”
    “He’s the mayor.”
    “Seriously?”
    “The mayor of McCrory.”
    “And yet he was refusing to take you in?”
    Though there were plenty of things Iriya wanted to say, she stopped herself. Even though she was on his side, she knew anything she’d say would wound Meeker.
    “Everyone except family is dead weight. And when it comes right down to it, killing family’s not a problem either.”
    Iriya shut her eyes. To her right, there was an oddly amused chuckle from D’s left hand.
    “Even at his age, he’s seen nothing but trouble. Should grow up to be quite a realist.”
    “Didn’t your family get along all right?” Iriya said to change the topic.
    “Not really,” he said to the warrior woman, who was looking up at the heavens. “My father was in charge of the village treasury, and he and my mother didn’t see eye to eye. They fought a lot. My mother even shot him with a gun!”
    “Sounds like a million laughs.”
    “But everybody said that was to be expected. Since she was from the Capital, she should’ve known from the start she wasn’t cut out for living way off in a little Frontier village, they said. I think so, too. After all, whenever she had any spare time, my mother would sit by the window and sing songs from the Capital.”
    Iriya let out a sigh, taking care that the boy wouldn’t notice.
    What did Meeker make of his mother, who had no escape from reality but her songs? How did he feel when he heard her singing?
    “So, your mother—”
    The boy started speaking, cutting off Iriya.
    “She took the village’s money and ran off. When I went to bring my father his lunch, there was no one in the room, but the strongbox had been left sitting on his desk. An official who came to my father’s funeral told me about it. I haven’t seen my mother since.”
    “Do you hate her?”
    “Not at all.”
    Out of the corner of his eye, D saw the little head shake from side to side.
    “She wasn’t cut out for that. She was more suited to the automated houses of the Capital and silk dresses and the fine food of expensive restaurants where the staff waited on you hand and foot—not keeping house in a deep forest where the sun never shines or by the lakes where the water beasts live, wearing heavy clothes and working in the fields till her hands were callused. We only get one life to live, right? So it’s clearly right to live in the world that suits you best. My mother made a mistake. She was wrong to marry my father and go back to a village on the Frontier, and she was wrong to have me. And the sooner mistakes can be corrected, the better.”
    For a while, Iriya fell silent. “A mistake, eh?” she murmured after a moment. “I think there’s only one mistake your mother made.”
    “Oh?”
    “Leaving a kid like you behind.”
    Meeker laughed sadly. “That’s nice of you to say. I like you, lady. But—”
    “We have to put ourselves in her shoes?”
    “That’s right.”
    “You must take after your father, I’m sure.”
    Iriya reached one arm back and patted the boy on the head. Immediately bringing it back again, she trained a trenchant gaze ahead. “D, you see that, don’t you?”
    “It’s a stagecoach,” D replied.
    Squinting her eyes, Iriya said, “It doesn’t have a driver. No one’s riding shotgun, either.”
    “Wait here.”
    As he spoke, D nudged his steed’s flanks. Quickly closing on the coach, he seized the reins and stopped the team of four cyborg horses drawing it. Quickly, he opened the door.
    Seeing that he was looking in her direction, Iriya advanced on her horse. Pulling up alongside D, she peered in through the open doorway. The seats were empty.
    “There’s no one inside! They weren’t attacked, either—there’s no sign anybody was onboard.”
    “The horses somehow ran off with the coach.”
    “Without anybody noticing? Hardly seems likely, does it?”
    Stagecoaches would usually stop for about an hour for feeding and maintenance of the