Curse Of Wexkia (23 page)

Unsure if the incoherent voices were in or outside her head, Nell fought to make sense of them. The arms
lowered her onto something soft. A bed? Yes. It was much too soft to be the floor. Still concentrating on the muffled voices, they began to clear. Just when she thought one voice sounded like Kandar’s, they retreated once more into the blackness until all was silent. A giant butterfly filled her hollow chest and smashed its wings against her ribs. Panic rose in her like lava pushing its way to the top of a volcano.

She was unaware of how long she lay listening to the butterfly. Time didn’t exist where she was. When the butterfly finally took on a gentle rhythm, Nell smiled. She thought her lips moved but couldn’t be certain. After a moment she realised it wasn’t a butterfly. It was her heart drumming and she relaxed her muscles. Her life pump was strong in her chest once more. The emptiness slowly evaporated with every beat. Her eyes fluttered and blinked.

‘She’s waking up.’ Sam’s voice was loud and coherent.

Nell blinked again and waited for her eyes to focus. When they did, a row of daisy flowers decorating the ceiling greeted her. She wasn’t in the prison room on Nadar’s ship.

S
am said, ‘You’re in the restoration. You’ve been out of it for hours.’

Nell’s body objected by cramping her upper arm and shoulder muscles when she sat up and hauled her legs off the side of the bed. ‘I feel like I’ve been hit by ten trucks,’ she said, rubbing the worst of the pain in her right shoulder. Sam’s words dawned on her. He had said she’d been asleep for hours. She frowned. She had to find Nadar.

‘No trucks, only one spaceship,’ Kandar chuckled as he moved to her side. ‘Do you feel up to eating?’

A corl nurse came in with something like French onion soup. The aroma had Nell’s stomach growling. ‘Are you kidding? Thank you,’ Nell said, taking the bowl and spoon. ‘I’ve never been so hungry.’

Sam and Kandar waited patiently and silently.

‘Cay-meka?’ Nell asked between mouthfuls.

‘She’ll be right,’ Sam said.

‘Yes,’ Kandar agreed. ‘Although she will have to spend some time here before she’s completely well.’ His hand touched Nell’s head. ‘You, on the other hand, are looking well.’

A piece of crusty bread mopped the last of the soup. Nell popped it onto her tongue and spoke with her mouth full as the nurse took the tray. ‘I feel fine, except for the ship
of course.’ She called after the corl nurse who was already on the way out with the tray. ‘Thanks, nurse. Can I go?’

‘I’ll send the physician in,’ she said.

While they waited for the physician, Kandar, Sam and Nell talked. Nell didn’t need a sixth sense to know Kandar was concerned about her. He watched her as if he was afraid of what he might see.

‘Where’s Dad?’ Nell asked quickly.

‘He was talking to the physician in the hall,’ Sam answered.

Nell was glad when her father finally walked into the room. She felt like some sort of specimen under a microscope, what with Kandar looking at her weirdly and Sam’s incessant questions.

‘Hello there, young lady,’ he said. ‘Feeling better?’

Surprised her father seemed in such good spirits, she nodded.

He bent down and gave her a quick hug. ‘How about we go back to Cape Hollow? The physician said you are well enough to travel.’

‘No. Dad, I have to get the book off Nadar. You know I wasn’t making it up and you know he’s the one that’s mad.’

‘Nell,’ her father admonished. ‘You are speaking of Kandar’s brother.’

‘Sorry,’ she said to Kandar and tried to mean it, but she wasn’t budging. She was too close to finding out where her parent’s races really came from and what she would be. ‘I’m not going home yet and you can’t make me,’ she said, and pounced to the door. Turning back to her father, she cried, ‘You should want to help me. You’re my father.’ She saw Kandar wince out of the corner of her eye.

‘Hey,’ Sam said, and shook his head at her.

‘I do want to help you, my daughter, but it is up to the
Corl authorities to deal with Nadar.’ Her father pushed his hair back.

‘Well, the Corl authorities don’t know, or even want to know, about the book.’

‘She is right,’ Kandar said, scratching his chin. ‘I think we must try to obtain the book.’

She smiled up at the green corl but her father tightened his lips so Nell was more than a little surprised at his next words.

‘All right,’ he said. ‘We all go. Where should we look first?’

‘Nadar’s house,’ Nell said without hesitation.

It was night. Lights of all colours shone from the high buildings, bringing them to life. As they ambled along the crowded corridor, the many beings appeared much more interested in the small group than the last time. They whispered to one another as she passed and knew they were whispering about her. Some eyed her curiously, but others stared with open hostility. Two older phib boys made silly faces at her. She looked at Sam.

‘They’re just galahs,’ he shouted over the noise, before his attention was diverted to three slender, red-haired women, dancing to a elfin-like man playing a type of miniature flute.

‘Take no notice of the boys,’ Kandar said. ‘They are the spoilt sons of two phib councillors and their fathers voted against freeing you.’

Nell said, ‘They put me to a vote?’

‘Yes. They lost,’ her father said and continued walking.

Nell was glad to hear she had more councillors on her side but the boys were still sniggering behind her. She turned around. With her anger barely contained, she glowered at them, fire heating her eyes.

Noticing a woman watching the interchange, Nell swallowed her ire. The woman’s smooth skin was stroked with vertical orange and blue stripes. The colours made it difficult for Nell to read the woman’s expression.

The boys stopped laughing and they ducked behind the woman’s table, piled high with cloth. One or both of the boys collided with her and she momentarily lost her balance. The trader bent over and, when she straightened, she held a boy in each hand over her head. Nell was more than a little surprised at her strength. The woman smiled at her, revealing perfect pearl-white teeth. She jangled the boys as if to ask if Nell wanted them.

Nell laughed. Not everyone was scared of her. She shook her head. Mouthing a thank you, she hurried to the others.

Was she being tracked by something other than the corridor’s inhabitants? She turned her head in all directions but couldn’t pinpoint anybody in particular spying on her. Feeling her wrist for a hair-band but not finding one, she looked at her empty arm. Darn. She must have lost them somewhere. She tucked her matted curls behind her ears. Phew. She really needed a bath. The feeling of being watched remained as they walked through the buzzing corridor.

After Nell stopped and looked behind for the umpteenth time, Sam finally asked, ‘What are you doing?’

Kandar stopped. ‘What is it, child?’

‘I feel like we’re being followed, but I can’t see anybody.’

Kandar thought for a moment and chuckled. ‘Orenda, show yourself.’

‘I was curious whether she could see me,’ Orenda said.

Nell spun around at the sound of a squeaky voice.

‘I couldn’t see you, but I knew you were there,’ said Nell. ‘By the way, it’s rude to follow people without them knowing.’

Orenda brushed her comments away with a wave of her hand. ‘Your abilities are stronger?’

Although it was a question, Nell sensed the grarl knew the answer, so all she offered was a quick nod.

The enchantress didn’t hide her irritation. She said to Kandar, ‘We must know all her abilities if we are to help her.’

‘Yes, yes, all in good time.’ He put his arm around Nell’s shoulders. ‘I am looking after this situation. I need you on Grarlon to quell any fears the people may have.’

‘That’s exactly my point,’ she huffed. ‘All grarls, including the king and prince, want to know about the child.’

If Kandar had a nose, he would definitely have looked down it at the grarl. ‘This is Corl, Orenda, and I have the last say here. You can tell your king that.’

She hissed a squeak and disappeared.

‘Do you think she is still with us?’ Nell’s father asked Kandar.

‘She is my friend, Dar-tern. She will always be with me.’

A short time later, they all stood in front of Nadar’s door.

‘It will be locked,’ Nell’s father said.

‘We could knock,’ Kandar said and did just that.

No answer.

He knocked again.

No answer and Nell waved Sam to the door.

He opened it.

It was the first time Nell had seen Kandar surprised. She let out a giggle. ‘He has perfect pitch,’ she said, and
stepped through the doorway instantly smelling vinegar. Nadar must have only just left. ‘The first time I saw the book,’ she said. ‘Nadar put it in a small urn, but the urn’s not here anymore.’ Striding over to the back wall of the living room, she touched her hand to the wall. ‘The second time, he took it from the floor of a concealed space behind here. There’s a stairway in it.’ Nell kept feeling for whatever it was that opened the door.

Kandar joined Nell at the wall. ‘That is interesting,’ he said. ‘I was raised in this house and I have no knowledge of a secret door.’ He shrugged one shoulder. ‘It must be a new addition.’

‘You look for the door,’ Nell’s father said. ‘Sam and I will try to find the urn.’

Kandar pushed with the heel of his palm onto a slight indentation in the wall. A door-sized opening appeared.

‘That’s it,’ Nell said. She rushed past Kandar and ran up the stairs.

‘Wait,’ Kandar called.

Too late. Nell was already at the top of the stairs by the time he’d finished the word. The space was decorated as a sitting room. The whole look and feel was the exact opposite to the cold décor of the house below. That room was cosy with comfortable armchairs and sofa, warm dark wooden sideboard and coffee table, a desk of the same type of wood and thick maroon curtains over the windows. But something was wrong. She hesitated. Goose pimples sprang up on her arms. Advancing, she was almost afraid of what she might find. She started her search with the small sideboard. Finding nothing there that could help her she looked under the cushions on the plush armchairs.

Kandar arrived beside her. ‘So this is what became of Mother’s furniture.’

A noise like laboured breathing floated to her ears. ‘Did you hear that?’ she asked Kandar.

‘No,’ he replied, as Nell’s father and Sam came up the stairs.

‘Nice,’ Sam said.

‘Shh.’ She put her finger to her mouth and listened. There it was again. She followed the sound to behind the sofa. In the corner, Tanat sat hunched and unconscious.

‘Dad! Here.’ She ran and fell next to the wintar. He was bruised and bleeding from a gash in the side of his head. The blood had dried into an ugly blotch. She shook him. ‘Tanat. It’s me. Nell.’

Her father knelt beside her. A feeble groan escaped Tanat’s mouth.

‘Is he all right?’ Sam asked, peering over the back of the chair.

Nell’s father picked Tanat up and placed him on the nearest armchair.

‘Why would Nadar do this to one of his own men?’

‘He isn’t one of Nadar’s men, Nell,’ Kandar said.

She opened her mouth to protest.

Holding up his hand to silence her, Kandar said, ‘He befriended Nadar at my request.’ Kandar’s face looked guilt-ridden. ‘We, your father, Tanat and I, believed there was some truth in what you said.’

‘Some?’ Huh. More like everything.

‘Nell,’ her father said. ‘At first your growing abilities alarmed us.’

‘Because of the other girl?’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘However, we had to take your visions seriously. Tanat agreed to pretend to hold Nadar’s belief that you were a danger.’

‘He wanted to find the book for you,’ Kandar said.

She thought about that for a moment. ‘That’s why he didn’t try to stop me when I took Cay-reace to the bridge and that’s why he went with Nadar when the scum left the ship.’

‘Yes,’ Tanat said in a small voice.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, kneeling beside the chair. ‘I should have known I could trust you.’

He gave her a weak smile.

‘I think you’d better take Tanat to the restoration,’ Dartern said to Kandar.

Kandar nodded. ‘Perhaps you should all leave before Nadar returns,’ he said, as he placed his arm under Tanat’s shoulders.

Nell moved away, expecting Kandar to disappear with Tanat. Nothing happened. Her eyes widened in a question. As if the reason dawned on him, Kandar’s baffled expression became troubled.

‘Why aren’t you going?’ Nell asked.

‘There’s been an enchantment placed over the house. I can’t travel,’ Kandar said solemnly.

All in the room looked stunned. ‘I thought only grarls used enchantment,’ Nell said.

He murmured, more to himself than to the others, ‘Only grarls do.’ He nodded to Dar-tern to help him and they proceeded to carry Tanat down the stairs.

Sam elbowed Nell as they followed. ‘Cay-meka said not to trust grarls. She said that they’re evil. Orenda’s the only grarl we know, so I suppose it was her.’

Nell didn’t want to believe it. There was something about the rat-fairy she liked but she wasn’t up to arguing that there were many other grarls on Corl.

As soon as they stepped into Nadar’s sitting room, Kandar pushed his palm against the same spot on the
wall and the door disappeared. Tanat didn’t look too comfortable on one of the sofas.

Dar-tern said, ‘I don’t think the time has come to admit Grarlon into the United Council.’

Kandar shook his head and Nell asked, ‘What is the United Council?’

‘Many neighbouring planets have petitioned for the formation of a United Council,’ Kandar said. ‘The three councils of Corl, Gramlax and Linque have agreed, and are in the process of selecting the worlds to be included in the first assembly.’ He clicked his teeth. ‘Dar-tern, you and the children take Tanat to the restoration. I will wait for my brother.’

Nell wasn’t sure if she heard, or sensed, the front door open. A presence was coming their way. She tried to gain Sam’s attention. Her eyes drilled into his brain until he finally looked her way. She jutted her chin at the entrance. He backed up against the wall and slid along, stopping just before the opening. Nell positioned herself on the other side of the doorway.