Authors: Tony Shillitoe
The cluttered room would have been quite dark but for all the gaps in the walls and roof through which daylight poured, dividing the space into shafts of light and shadow. Cobwebs clustered along the roof joists
and in every corner, and the crockery and pots were in disarray, as if Emma no longer cared where things were. ‘Your messenger told me you were here,’ the old woman said, her voice raspier than Meg remembered. In the dappled light, she made out Emma’s shape hunched in a chair beside the dead fireplace, and Whisper appeared on the old woman’s lap. ‘We have a lot to talk about, child,’ the old woman said, ‘and only the truth is spoken in this room.’
She left the cottage when the sun was melting into the western hills, and painting the edges of the sky amber. The day had passed like a glance across a room, but it left Meg with indescribable sadness. Emma was dying. She told Meg after she listened to her story from beginning to tragic end. ‘I have the Wasting Death,’ she said. ‘It eats from the inside, sometimes slowly. If it’s merciful, it’s quick.’
‘How long have you been sick?’ Meg asked.
Emma chuckled and coughed with the effort. ‘I knew when you left for Port of Joy.’
‘Two years? Why didn’t you say? I could have healed you.’
‘No, child. Some things can’t be healed.’
‘How do you know? Perhaps I can still heal you.’
Emma’s face grew stern. ‘So, you would use your Blessing to save the blighted life of an old woman in a remote village, but not to save the lives of thousands within the Queen’s kingdom?’
‘It’s different,’ Meg pleaded. ‘This isn’t a war. I said I won’t ever use magic again to kill innocent people.’
Emma nodded, and sighed. ‘So you told me in your tale. I’m sorry for you, child, I truly am. Every Blessing carries its own curse, and every curse has its blessing. I don’t want your healing. Save it for someone who has more life to live and more reason to live it.’ She
coughed and spat into the fireplace. ‘My time is worn out. I have only enough time to pray.’
‘Pray?’ Meg gasped. ‘I didn’t think you believed in Jarudha.’
Emma chuckled, which made her cough again. She wiped her mouth with her ragged sleeve. ‘I pray, child. Not just to Jarudha. You said you’d read the books, didn’t you? All those books in the Royal library? How many gods were there in them? Jarudha. Hohda. Jaru. Berak N’eth. Asame. He Of No Face. How many names?’ She chuckled again. ‘Many gods? Or one god with many names?’ She shifted in her chair, and Whisper hopped down. ‘I pray in the hope that if—and “if” is the greatest word of hope in our language—if there is any god at all, and if there is a paradise, that I might at least know that answer before I die.’
‘And what if there is? What if there is and you can’t get in?’
‘That doesn’t matter,’ the old woman said. ‘The answer to the question is more important than what happens to me. I want to know the answer. If there is, or isn’t a god—if there is or isn’t a paradise.’ Her face crumpled into a smile. ‘But it seems the only way to get that answer is to die.’
Blindness was also robbing Emma of her independence, but she hadn’t told anyone how dramatically her eyesight was failing. That was part of why she was keeping to herself. Meg’s personal journey, at least for Meg, seemed to fade into insignificance against the journey that Emma was undertaking. ‘You are the only one who knows the truth,’ she told Meg solemnly, ‘and you must keep my secret, just as you kept the secret of Samuel’s death.’ So they talked, and shared the day and tears, until both were spent.
Walking down the winding path to the road, Meg was adrift in a familiar ocean of melancholy, a sea that
her mind had traversed many times on her homeward journey. Memories of the people lost in the vortex of the scramble for the Conduit, of people lost in the struggle for power, haunted her. They died pointlessly, fighting battles for other people, or died because of the greed of others. But now Emma was simply dying. She’d forgotten how death just came sometimes—without the bloodied edge of a blade, or the savage bite of flame. The years of violence since she’d stumbled upon the dying soldier and his horse had warped her perceptions of life and death.
At the road junction, she waited for Whisper to emerge from the long grass. The gum canopies had lost the golden flare of sunset and were brooding in seeping darkness. A flock of sparrows fluttered across the space between two trees and vanished amongst the foliage. A dog barked in the village, probably Fetchem at the Bakers’ house—a middle-aged cattle dog renowned for being the first to scent strangers coming into Summerbrook. She looked along the road to the south, but it was empty, so Fetchem was probably barking at a possum. She hoisted Whisper onto her shoulder and headed for the bridge—and was surprised to see a figure masked in shadow waiting there. She was more astonished when the figure addressed her. ‘Meg?’
‘Who are you?’ she asked, nerves tensed.
‘It’s me,’ the man said. He lurched forward on crutches, his left leg missing from just below the thigh.
In the fading light, she recognised him. ‘Button?’
‘Button,’ he repeated. ‘Surprised?’
‘Well, yes,’ she said, excitement rising in her voice. ‘Yes, I am.’ She remembered that the last time she’d seen him, marching to battle outside Greenhill, she’d noticed that he no longer smiled. Now he was smiling again.
‘I only got back today,’ he said. ‘Hitched a ride from
Quick Crossing with Carter. When I heard you were here, too, I had to see you. So I waited here.’ He laughed. ‘I’ve been waiting all afternoon. They all think I’m crazy.’
Meg felt laughter bubbling in her heart. She grinned, and said,
‘All
afternoon?’
‘Yes.’
‘You
are
crazy, Button Tailor.’
‘Thank you,’ he said, and performed a half bow. ‘Should I be calling you Lady Amber?’ he asked.
Her smile vanished. ‘Not any more,’ she said. ‘And not here. Not ever. Promise me that, Button. Please?’
‘I heard rumours that you’d gone missing many cycles ago. I was already trying to get home then. What happened?’
‘Nothing happened. You know what it’s like out there. Stories get exaggerated. People said I was something more than I ever was. Promise you won’t say anything here to anyone about that. You have to promise.’
He shrugged, dropped his smile, and said, ‘That’s an easy promise. But why?’
‘Because I’m not that person,’ she said. ‘I never was. Don’t ask me why. Not yet. One day, I might tell you why. Just let it go for me. Please.’
‘You’ve only ever been Meg Farmer to me,’ he said, smiling again. ‘I’m just so happy to see you. I’ve never stopped thinking of you, even when things were at their worst. You got me through them.’
She stared at the darkening figure in the dusk, saw the missing leg, and felt her heart lighten. The dream made sense. ‘I’m happy to see you, too, Button,’ she said softly. And she embraced him, glad to be enveloped within his arms, knowing not everything had been lost to the war.
T
he last kiss lingered on her lips as she wandered from the riverbank towards home. He’d teased her, calling her ‘Meg Tailor’, and told her of his expectations—cooked breakfasts, a clean house, ten children and a dingo like Sunfire. She had scolded him affectionately, and wrestled with him, culminating in that final, sensual long silence as they kissed. Their wedding preparations were in full flight. The Summerbrook women had rallied to her mother’s side and were organising a feast to be held in Archer’s Inn to celebrate the union, and the men were helping Button to build a two-roomed cottage—their first home—near the Farmers’ place. She smiled and touched her fingertips against her lips, lost in happiness and expectation, enjoying the gentle sun’s midmorning warmth. So Mykel startled her when he burst from the bushes, yelling her name. ‘What?’ she asked, grabbing his shoulders. He was shaking and blood trickled from his lower lip.
‘Soldiers!’ he told her. ‘And a man in a blue robe! They’re looking for you! They brought Sunfire with them. They’ve got Mum and Peter and Daryn!’
The news stunned her, turning her skin to ice. ‘Are you all right?’ she whispered, touching his lip.
He winced, but assured her that it was nothing. ‘The Seer hit me when I told him you weren’t here.’
‘Where did they come from? Did they come through the village?’
‘Out of the hills. From the north-west.’ Meg broke into a run, heading for the farm. ‘You can’t go there. They’re waiting for you!’ Mykel warned, as he started after her, but she ran on.
She dropped to a walk when she saw the soldiers and their horses outside her home. They weren’t Royal soldiers. They wore red ochre leather armour, similar to the style of the troops that had come with Seer Truth to Whiterocks Bluff. Mykel caught up and dropped into stride beside her. She stopped him. ‘Go and tell everyone in the village. Tell them to stay away from here,’ she ordered.
‘But they can help. I’ll get Button.’
She grabbed his arm, snarling, ‘No! Keep everyone away. It’s too dangerous!’ and fixed him with a look that told him to do exactly as she said. He nodded, and headed for the village centre, as she continued towards the house.
When the soldiers saw her approaching, they called out, ‘Your Eminence! Someone is coming!’ and came towards her to take her into their custody.
She stopped short and held up a hand, palm outward. ‘Don’t touch me,’ she said. The effect of her determined warning surprised her. The soldiers stepped back warily, as if they already knew what she could do, but from the house emerged a group of men led by a white-haired Seer. She recognised him instantly—Seer Light. And beside him, no longer in his trademark Royal black but in a grey tunic and ochre trousers, was Follower Servant. The other three men were strangers. One held Sunfire on a chain. ‘Where is my family?’ she demanded. She gazed at the
dingo and her heart ached for her long-missing companion.
Light descended from the veranda and faced her. ‘Under my protection,’ he said, scowling as always.
‘Let them go.’
‘When you agree to come with us,’ Light replied.
‘Let them go,’ Meg repeated flatly, her cold anger seething.
‘You are in no position to bargain, Amber.’ He motioned to a companion and the man went into the house. He returned, dragging Peter by one arm. The boy was crying and the man’s grip was clearly hurting.
‘Let him go!’ Meg screamed.
‘You can save your little brother by coming with us quietly,’ Light explained. ‘Or you can be responsible for the death of everyone you love by being a stupid little girl. Make a choice.’ The stranger produced a dagger and pressed it against Peter’s neck.
Her instinct was to call a spell and kill him, but even a spell wouldn’t be quick enough to stop the man holding Peter from slitting the boy’s throat. She bit her lip and clenched her fists, fighting her instinct, and said, feigning calm, ‘Let Peter go, and my dingo, and I will come.’
Light did not react, but held her gaze until something inside him was satisfied. He ordered, ‘Bind her tightly!’ As a group of soldiers hurried to seize her, he nodded to the man holding Peter, and the boy was released. Peter ran straight to Meg, pushing past the soldiers to reach her first. She squatted and hugged her little brother, but the soldiers pulled him struggling out of her arms and began tying her wrists as Peter was carried back to the house.
Follower Servant supervised her binding. ‘Don’t think we haven’t heard the stories, Lady Amber,’ he said. ‘I guess they are stories, but we’re not stupid
enough to trust you.’ She ignored him, staring stonily at the house, into which Seer Light had returned, with the man restraining Sunfire.
When Light emerged, sack in hand, he came straight to her. ‘Where is the rat?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘She never came back with me.’
Light muttered an obscenity, and said, ‘I know you’re lying.’ He dropped the sack. ‘It doesn’t matter. Something that Truth once told me has made me curious about your rat, but I don’t need the nuisance of it.’ He spoke to Follower, who issued orders for the small troop to mount, and he directed Follower to gag Meg. He waited until the soldiers lifted her roughly onto horseback, secured her wrist bonds to the saddle pommel and lashed her ankles to the stirrups. ‘You mightn’t be very comfortable, Amber, but it makes me feel better,’ he told her, and went to his horse.
As the troop wheeled to ride into the hills, Meg saw Dawn on the veranda with Peter, and Daryn holding Sunfire back. Her mother was crying and calling her name, and tears poured from Meg’s eyes, but the gag stifled her goodbyes. Follower took her horse’s reins and led it forward. A soldier’s shout made them all turn their heads. From the heart of the village marched a small group of eleven men, bearing swords and pitchforks and shovels and clubs. Meg’s heart sank. At the head of the group were Button Tailor, shuffling quickly on his crutch, and her brother, Daryn. ‘Shall I disperse the poor bastards?’ Follower called to Light.
Light glanced at Meg, before replying, ‘We don’t have time to play soldiers. Ride on. Leave them in our dust.’
Meg’s horse jumped as Follower prodded it, and the troop broke into a gallop, leaving her would-be rescuers
stranded and her heart bleeding its sorrow in the rhythm of the hooves.
‘Did you really think you could just go home and forget what you’d done? That you could just expect us to pretend that you didn’t exist? That you weren’t out there, a silent threat that the Queen might one day stir up against us again?’ Light paced before her, silhouetted by the campfire. ‘I know you killed Truth. It wouldn’t be a surprise to learn that it was you who killed his brother before you killed Treasure Overbrook. You are a work of evil, an abomination, everything that is anathema to Jarudha’s holy work. And you expected to be let go?’ He stopped, glaring down on her, his anger palpable in his stance, as if he was about to strike her. Gagged and bound, she could not respond. And if she could, what would she say or do? Caught between anger and misery—wanting revenge and feeling loss—how would she respond? If she wanted to, she could use an unmaking spell to unravel her bonds—but then what? More killing?
Follower Servant appeared in the firelight. He spoke quietly to Seer Light, and the pair walked away from her. Soldiers sat around the fire, talking and eating. She was glad that Light’s tirade was over. The man had hated her from their first day of meeting, hated her for everything she represented, hated her for reasons even she did not know. He’d mentioned Truth’s brother. She hadn’t killed another Seer, had she? The Seers in the Rebel forces at The Whispering Forest were slain by arrows. Then she remembered the Seer who’d chased her above the valley before Wombat and she had joined the army—the man Wombat killed.
He
was Truth’s brother?
She watched a possum wander along a shadowy branch overhead, and she heard kookaburras chortling
in the valley. Light and his men were camping on a ridge a half-day’s ride from Summerbrook, in the northern hills. The ropes had chafed her, but the amber was already healing her sores as she rested. The gag was the most uncomfortable aspect—that, and having to ask soldiers with a series of muffled grunts twice during the afternoon journey to pull down her trousers when she needed to piss. Light was offering her no dignity in her captivity and that only reinforced her fear that his intentions for her were brutal wherever he was taking her.
Her first reaction when she felt pressure against her hip was that a snake had gotten too curious, but as she flinched and glanced down fearfully she saw a rat’s black snout and glittering eyes.
Whisper!
she projected.
Found
, the rat replied.
Good.
The rat’s nose twitched and she stared at the men eating at the fire.
Hungry.
Meg panicked.
No. Bad
, she communicated to the rat, and Whisper withdrew into the darkness.
A soldier squatted beside Meg with a plate of food. ‘Something to eat. His Eminence thought you might like a little.’ Meg’s mouth watered. She was hungry. The soldier put down the plate and reached for her gag. ‘That will help,’ he said, slipping it down to her neck. ‘But I have to feed you. No hands.’ As the man held the first spoonful to her mouth, there was a shuffle of noise through the camp and everyone stood, including the soldier feeding her. They were looking into the bush, and some were already arming. Light and Follower stood side by side, staring intently. Out of the shadows hobbled a short bag-of-bones figure, leaning heavily on a walking stick made from mallee. Her white hair turned gold in the firelight as she stopped and straightened as much as she could. Meg’s heart leapt at the sight. Emma? Whisper? How?
‘Who are you?’ Light demanded.
‘You don’t remember me, do you?
Light hesitated, scrutinising the old woman. ‘I asked who you are,’ he finally said.
Emma shook her head, as if he had disappointed her. ‘Just poor little Emerald Shipswife. I thought you would remember me. I never forgot you, Day Blackridge.’
Meg wished that she could see Light’s expression. She guessed Emma had used the name that the Seer had before he took his new name as an acolyte and one of Jarudha’s disciples. But she was also shocked, because Emma
was
the woman that Seer Vale had told her about—the woman he loved—the one woman Potential before Meg. ‘My name is Light,’ the Seer said calmly and deliberately. ‘I’ve never heard of this other name you insist on calling me. You’re old and your brains are addled. I can forgive you for that. What do you want? Food? Company?’
‘I came for the Conduit,’ Emma replied.
Seer Light seemed momentarily perplexed, but he quickly regathered his composure. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. And if I did, I wouldn’t give it to an old Jarudha-forsaken hag who wandered out of the bush like a mad kangaroo. Go about your business and keep out of other people’s.’
‘I came for the Conduit,’ Emma repeated.
‘Alone?’ Light asked mockingly.
‘No.’
Follower barked an order and his soldiers drew their weapons, alert to the surrounding dark bushland. Meg silently cast an unmaking spell and her bonds unravelled. What dangerous game was Emma playing? ‘So where are your supporters?’ Light asked. ‘Did you bring an army, old woman?’
‘I brought what I needed,’ she said. ‘Release Meg, and you can go back to your political machinations and leave our village in peace.’
‘You know I can’t do that,’ Light told her.
‘I’m not giving you a choice.’ She raised her right arm. The surrounding bush echoed to the war cries of men, and Light’s soldiers shuffled and circled, feeling vulnerable.
‘You’ve made a very grave error of judgement,’ Light said, flexing the fingers of his left hand. ‘You should have stayed in your little village and kept out of matters that don’t concern you.’
‘My family always concerns me,’ Emma replied.
Light’s hand flashed up and pointed at Emma’s chest. The same instant a tiny black shape leapt from the bush at Light’s throat, and men burst from hiding. Shouts and cries filled the air and metal clanged. Meg jumped to her feet, her guards distracted by the fighting, and ran towards Emma, but a sudden explosion of fire and light blinded her, and she blundered into a soldier. Knocked to the ground, she scrambled along on all fours until she could rise again. Emma was still aiming her walking stick at the space where Light had been standing, but the Seer was crumpled on the ground and Follower Servant was staggering, groaning, his hands wrapped across his face, the dingo Sunfire tearing at his leg. The soldiers were fighting with their attackers, and one was pressing a young man who’d stumbled. Daryn. Her brother. As the soldier went for the killing stab, she loosed an energy bolt that exploded in his ribs. Then she ran to her brother to help him up. ‘You shouldn’t be here!’ she chided.
‘Neither should you!’ he retorted. ‘That was impressive!’ He grinned and snatched up the soldier’s sword to re-enter the fray, so Meg turned and conjured two more fiery arrows that brought down soldiers where Daryn was headed. Morale shattered by the ambush and show of magic, the remaining soldiers fled into the bush, abandoning their dead and wounded.
Button emerged from the celebrating villagers, one arm wide in greeting, the other gripping his wooden crutch. Meg laughed and melted into his embrace. ‘You shouldn’t have come.’
‘And lose you again? Not likely.’ He squeezed her and kissed her, until she pushed him back and saw the cuts on his arms and across his cheek. She touched each one, gingerly inspecting it and wiping aside the blood. ‘You shouldn’t be fighting,’ she scolded.
‘I think you’d better come over here,’ Daryn interrupted. ‘It’s Emma.’
Meg and Button followed him, past the semi-charred Seer’s corpse and Follower Servant’s body, to join three men kneeling beside Emma. Whisper sat beside her head, licking the old woman’s ear, and Sunfire stood guard. Emma’s eyes were open and moving, but she was staring blindly. ‘Emma?’ Meg crooned, as she knelt and took the old woman’s hand.
Emma’s wrinkled and tired face melted into deeper smiling creases, and she sighed. ‘I’m glad you’re safe, child,’ she rasped. ‘Light?’