The Wish Kin (19 page)

‘What about Father?' he hears her say.

‘What do you mean?'

‘The others, on the inside, they can push,' she says.

She calls to their father in the Inner Speech, but so that Colm and Moss can hear.

Father!
she calls.
Father!

There is another rush of water, another increase in its level.

Lydia!
they hear from beyond the cell door.
Colm!

Father! Father!
cries Lydia.
You must push the door. You must get everyone to push on the door!

And then a strange thing happens to Colm. He feels as though he is beyond the door with his father, is on the inside of the cell with him. He is both here in the corridor pulling at the door handle with Lydia and Moss, and is also inside the cell standing beside the frail form of his father. Rafe Bell, seated now on the hard floor, has deteriorated still further. His eyes are sunken and hollow, his cheekbones stand out like razors in his face. He raises a feeble arm to his son.

Colm,
he says.
Tell the others, those there who are stronger, to push. I am too weak.

He drops his arm and lowers his head, exhausted, it seems, with the effort of speaking to his son. Colm feels a tearing in his chest, but turns to several men and instructs them in the opening of the door. He too pushes, and from the outside he pulls, and the door, wanting to open to free those within, is at last able.

A wash of water floods into the room and several people disappear into its depths. There are screams and those who are able plunge beneath the water and draw their loved ones to the surface. Colm wades back to where he last saw his father, drops into the torrent to search for him. His breath runs out before he finds him, and he surfaces. Again he plunges, and again and again and again. But every time there is nothing. He comes up for air.

‘Colm!'

The boy turns at the sound of his name, hoping to see his father. But it is Moss.

‘I need you to lead them to the top, to the podium! Lydia too. I'll stay till everyone is out then unlock the other cells.'

‘But Father!' shouts Colm. ‘I can't find him!'

‘Go, Colm! You have to go. They don't know the way. You need to show them.'

‘I can't go without Father. I have to find him. I'm not leaving.'

‘You are! Colm, you must go now! These people need you. Go! GO!'

Colm plunges beneath the water one last time, hoping, praying, that he might see his father. There is nothing now but darkness.

He surfaces, reels under the punch of pain, the great iron-knuckled fist of pain, in his gut. ‘This way!' he calls to the people. An elderly woman clings to his arm, a child drags at his shirt. He lifts the child onto his back, motions to Lydia who holds in her arms a small baby. ‘Let's go!'

This, Colm knows, is the hardest thing he has ever done in his life. There has never been anything harder. Never, not even when he was so long without food and water, or when he was crushed up inside the belly of the aeroplane. Not when he ran and ran through the tunnel till his body screamed at him, or when, exhausted, he hurled himself down the side of the plateau. No. This is it. This is the hardest thing. He has to abandon his search for the one he loves in order that these others might live.

Remember who you are. Remember who you are.
And he does remember, and he knows that this is his duty, his obligation. He is the Cloud Drawer, a member of the Wish Kin. And as such he must serve his fellows.

He presses on through the torrent, grasping tightly the legs of the child on his back, keeping his arm strong for the elderly woman who clings to him. ‘Hurry!' he calls over his shoulder to the others. ‘Please hurry!'

The corridor twists and rises. Colm has never walked this way before, has only ever viewed it from
the space above. But he does not let doubt set in. He turns his mind from it and thinks only of moving upwards. He keeps his eye on Lydia, keeps her near.

It is a slow journey, this one. It is slow for the many people behind them, for their weakness, their exhaustion. It seems hours before they reach the ledge overlooking the great cavern, hours and hours of pressing through fast-flowing water – though it lessens a little the higher up they climb – hours and hours of the weight of a child on Colm's back, of a woman on his arm, hours and hours of wondering, agonising, about his father.

But here, now they are here. Colm and Lydia and the first few of them struggle to the ledge, look down into the filling space. It is unrecognisable. The machinery is drowning in the rising water. The surface is thick with debris. The great generator and some of the workings are still in motion, but others have ground to a halt, waterlogged, suspended. The electric tubes overhead glow whitely onto the grey surface of water.

Colm turns away from the sight, looks back at the people as they gather on the ledge.

‘We are close now,' he says. ‘It is not much further. Please, keep together.'

His eyes meet his sister's.
Gander, Lyd?
he asks.

She smiles at him. Her face is weary, drawn, but there is a light beneath her skin, and that flame in her eyes. Her step does not slacken as she sets out before him onto the path.
Gander,
she says in return, and strides through the tunnel.

Suddenly, there is a crashing ahead, a downfall of rocks onto pathway.

‘Lydia!' Colm shouts, terrified. He cannot bear that he might lose his sister too.

There is an instant of uncertainty as the dust from the fall fills and settles. ‘I'm gander, Colm!' he hears after a moment. ‘We're all gander.'

But the ceiling of the tunnel they are in is piled as an impassable barrier of rubble on the ground.

Lydia hurries back to Colm's side. ‘We'll have to take the podium exit,' she says. ‘That's what the man in black boots said to the keeper, do you remember?'

Colm looks at the rising water below. ‘It will mean going down into
that
!' he says.

‘Do we have a choice?'

Colm! Lydia!
they hear. It is Moss from far away.

What is it?

Have you got them out yet? Colm, I need your help to release the other prisoners! Can you come back?

Colm stands still and silent, thinking what to do.

‘Go, Colm,' says Lydia. ‘Find the podium exit. I'll stay here with the people until you give us a signal. Then you can go to Moss.' So saying, she helps the child from his shoulders, takes the hand of the elderly woman in her own. ‘Be careful,' she says at the last.

Colm turns, examines the ledge for a way down. Not far to the left is a stairway cut into the rock. He descends this and crosses the flooded floor of the
cavern. The water surges around his legs. He is shocked by the strength of it.

The podium rises high and imposing out of the water. Another stairway takes him to its summit and he crosses at once to the rear of it. Directly behind the chairs of the Mater and the Pater are sleek panels, and behind these is the dark cut of an opening, wide enough for several people at once. But it is difficult to determine the level of safety within; even from here Colm can see that the floor is awash with running water.

A shout and he sees several of the people from the ledge wading across the flooded cavern floor towards the podium. Lydia is behind them, calling for them to return.

‘We cannot wait,' says one of the men as he climbs onto the podium. ‘Better chance this than be drowned back there.'

‘But this may be no better!' Colm replies.

The man, though, does not listen to him but steps through the opening and disappears. Several others follow after him. Colm is uncertain, distressed.

Remember who you are
, and he too steps through the opening, tracks the course of the tunnel. It is flooded, yes, but the water here is shallower than lower down in the caves, the tunnel seems shortly to reach upwards, and the air within it to be fresh.

All right, Lyd,
he calls.
Bring them across.

Colm returns to the mouth of the opening in time to
help Lydia and the elderly woman. They pass through and upwards, out of sight. One by one Colm hands the folk into the tunnel, watches them ascend, turns back to help another. When the last of the group are inside, he descends the podium and crosses back towards the staircase. The water is now thigh-high.

Where are you, Moss?
he asks when he reaches the ledge.

I'm on the third level,
he hears his friend say.
Can you find your way?

I think so.

Colm hastens down the flooding tunnel to his right. Here and there piles of rubble emerge from the stream like little rocky islands. In the distance he hears the crashing of stone into water. Small showers of sand trickle from the ceiling above him.

Moss's voice urges him on.
Hurry, hurry! Do not stop. Do not look back.
Colm keeps his head down, concentrates on the length of his stride, the sure placement of his feet.

As he travels along the tunnel, Moss's voice of urgency is joined by threads of another. At first, he assumes that this is Lydia's, but listens more closely and realises it is not.
Hurry,
the voice says. It is scratchy, barely audible, but the deeper Colm goes into the earth, the more the voice speaks and the stronger it gets.

We are here, waiting. Hurry! We need you,
he hears.

Colm runs and runs, through the rising water, over the slippery, difficult path. After a few minutes he hears
a shout, sees movement ahead. It is Moss with a band of weary prisoners trudging up the path.

‘Moss!' he calls, and surges through the water to meet his friend.

Moss's eyes are aflame. ‘Take these people to safety,' he says. ‘Then come back down. There are still many more to release.'

Colm nods, strengthened by his friend's seriousness, his intent. He turns and begins again the climb to the engine room, his arms once more supporting the exhaustion of others. He speaks to Lydia as he climbs, prepares her to receive these weary folk.

And the new voice does not stop but grows stronger, and urges, encourages, advises when he is uncertain.
Hurry, hurry,
it says. The owner of the voice seems to know well the lie of the land.
The left fork, the further stair, the right tunnel
. Colm follows the directions, tentatively at first, but then with more and more confidence. He leads the group through the streaming, crumbling corridors to the vastness of the engine room.

Lydia is waiting for them at the mouth of the podium exit.

Gander?
she asks.

Gander,
he replies. He passes the prisoners into her care, turns, and heads back to find Moss.

As he ploughs again through the tunnel, taking the left fork here, the right there, the voice grows stronger, is joined by another voice, and another.
Hurry,
they say.
Hurry, hurry
.

Who are you?
he asks as he runs.

The Kin,
they say.
We are the Kin
.

How do you know the way?

The Clan have had us here for a long time. We know the tunnels well. But hurry, now. There is much to be done.

So he hurries, alert for instructions, for the next sign of Moss and the prisoners. Back through the water to the podium exit and Lydia, then into the tunnels once more.

Now as he runs there is a loud boom, and the tubes of light in the ceilings go out. The tunnel is in darkness, and Colm can see nothing. He finds the wall with his hands, follows the roughness of it slowly. But the water is up to his waist now, and he is unsure how long he can do this.

Moss!
he calls.
Moss, are you far?

I don't know,
Moss replies.
I'm not sure where I am
.

Colm can hear Moss breathing, wonders if it is in the Inner Speech that he hears this, or if his friend is really that close. He hears then a whisper, one of the voices,
Remember who you are,
in the darkness. There is silence, a strangled commotion, then Moss's voice booms into the tunnel: ‘I am the Fire Keeper!' and the place is ablaze with light.

‘Moss!' cries Colm. His friend is all fire, his eyes, his mien, the flaming torch in his hand. Moss roars again, ‘Fire Keeper!' then reaches in to a crevice where the wall has given way to the water. From within he tears
two wooden struts, wraps cloth from his back around them, touches them to the torch in his hand. They flare up, burning, bright. ‘Here,' he says, and passes them to Colm. ‘Take these and the people and hurry back,' he says. ‘I will be on the highest level.'

Again to the podium, to Lydia ecstatic with the news. ‘Fire Keeper!' she says over and over. ‘Of course!'

‘We're nearly there, Lyd,' Colm says. He gives her one of the torches, then charges back through the water. Stone from the ceiling crashes downwards.

Come, hurry, come,
the voices call. There are more of them now, he thinks. More of them, and they are louder too.
Almost there, almost done, hurry, hurry!

Colm takes the left tunnel, travels along with Moss's torch making plain the way. The tunnel makes a sharp ascent and as he reaches the crest he can see light ahead of him. He joins Moss as his friend struggles with the key in the lock of a cell door, struggles while the water level mounts, while the ceiling falls in sheets about them.

Hurry, hurry!
the voices say, and the key engages, the lock releases, and the door bursts open with a great force from the inside.

‘Storm Holder!' they hear, and they are met with the sight of the man previously seen only from above, he who had sat so still and quietly, eyes closed, mouth moving, hands gently in his lap. Now he stands, eyes aflame, chest expanded with the enormity of knowing, and a voice like the roar of a storm.