Motherstone (11 page)

‘The lake is half a day’s walk, and the sea lies beyond. Islands spread out in a great circle. One of your boats would take a day and night to sail across. How will you reach this Furthermost?’

Jimmy raked his meat from the fire. ‘You tell me.’ He glanced at Soona, sitting on the other side with Dawn. ‘That Stone geezer didn’ give no hint. Go to Furthermost in the Thousand Isles. That was it. You’da thought he had lockjaw.’

Soona looked up from the embers. ‘He said that I must go, Susan needed me. He said no other word had come to him. But that she had asked for Nick and Jimmy.’

‘Well, here we are,’Jimmy growled, ‘and it looks like we’re gunner have ter swim. Any houses on these islands?’

‘No,’ Yellowclaw said. ‘A few fishermen’s huts, but no one lives in them. We saw the outer islands where this Furthermost must lie. Nothing is there.’

Nick swallowed the piece of meat he was chewing. ‘If the Stonefolk say Susan’s there, she’s there.’ He had no doubt of it. Since meeting the Stoneman Seeker, who had saved him and Susan from the Priests of Ferris (and died from the luminous dial of Nick’s watch), he had looked on Stonefolk as having special knowledge. If Susan was in their care she was all right. He was more concerned about Soona. The girl seemed to be waiting for something, preparing. Nick could tell she was afraid, and Dawn too found something strange in her. It was as if, she said, some new thing was growing in Soona, like a flower, but though its bloom was beautiful its roots fed on her life. That meant nothing to Nick, it was too poetic. He wanted to know what she was thinking about all the time, but when he asked she told him she was making up tunes – and remembering old ones. To prove it she played them on her flute. The Varg swayed and nodded in time with the rhythms. They moved about Soona with gentleness and slowness. It was as if they looked on her as a special person, but when he tried to question them they sent no pictures back. Dawn confessed that her friend – Nick had named her Bess and no one minded – would not speak of Soona with her. It was all very strange and it worried Nick and made him angry.

Silverwing said, ‘There’s another thing. Osro’s army has sent bands of scouts out. One of them is camped on the north side of the lake. Fifteen warriors, men and women. They are Hotlanders, not at home in these forests, and they make no attempt to hide themselves. But when they come round the lake they will find your trail.’

‘We better be gone then,’ Jimmy said. ‘I’d sooner tangle with Bloodcats than them geezers.’

They dowsed their fire and shouldered their packs. The Varg came out of the trees, where they had been hunting, and the band set off down-river. Yellowclaw and Silverwing flew low overhead, keeping a ridge between them and the Hotlander camp. By noon they reached the lake. It was several kilometres wide and vanished round a bend towards the sea. On the southern side the land went sweeping up to the summit of a flat-topped hill which the Birdfolk said ran along to cliffs on the shore. Several ways led down to the sea, and on the rocks the yellow weed grew. Seafolk lived there.

They climbed to the top of the hill and started along. It was as flat as a table, but prickly scrub growing head-high prevented them from seeing lake or sea. Yellowclaw and Silverwing kept to the south, out of sight. Ben broke a trail, crushing bushes flat with his paws.

They came to the plateau rim in mid-afternoon, broke through the scrub, and saw the sea. The sight made them gasp. It was as if someone had flung islands out in a handful. Some were small, no more than smooth-topped rocks standing a metre or two clear of the water. Others, equally low, managed to grow trees or grass and from the cliff-top looked like enamelled shields, or basking monsters growing forest patches on their backs. Five or six large islands lay amongst them, stretching arms. They reached out to the horizon. Channels made a web between, deep blue, almost purple. It would take years, Nick thought, to land on each. But only one of them was Furthermost.

‘There’s more than a bloddy thousand,’ Jimmy said.

‘There’s millions.’

‘The Seafolk will know which one,’ Dawn said.

Nick looked south down the coast. Far away, beyond the haze, was a grey smudge of land. He wondered if it was the cape where the Seafolk had saved Susan from the whirlpool. If so, the swamp lay inland, and Sheercliff and the Temple further in; and the city where Otis Claw had ruled was south again. The cave in the mountain, where he and Susan must travel when he found her, seemed so far away he could not imagine reaching it – and Earth, for a moment, was beyond memory.

‘She’s a big land,’ Jimmy said. ‘She’ll do me.’

‘Not me,’ Nick said. ‘I’m from Earth. I’m going back.’

‘Give ’em my love,’ Jimmy said. ‘Here come the Pollies. I hope they’ve found an easy way down.’

Silverwing and Yellowclaw came beating up from the shoreline. They rode on a current out from the rim and Yellowclaw cried, ‘The Seafolk are waiting. They have a boat. But you must hurry. The Hotlanders saw me as I flew down. See, by the lake, they are coming.’

Nick shaded his eyes. The lake ended in a short river that flowed to the sea. It cut through a yellow beach, and there he saw what seemed to be a coloured centipede. It ran, it ran fast, with legs flickering in the sun. It took him a moment to make out the parts – men and women, red and blue. Their heads and breasts gleamed like an insect’s shell, their long spears bristled like antennae. They came to the river and ran through. Broken water flashed in the sun.

‘Yeah,’ Jimmy said, ‘they got our scent. An’ they’re butchers, every one. Let’s make ourselves scarce.’

Silverwing guided them, while Yellowclaw flew down to keep watch on the Hotlanders. She took them along the rim and down the sweep of land to cliffs rising sheer from the sea. There she led them to a giant landslip, where the bears found a path through boulders to a stony beach held in the curve of two reefs. Beyond the narrow opening islands lay. A boat was nosed on the shingle and the heads of Seafolk showed on the waterline like a string of buoys.

‘Get aboard, they’re coming,’ Silverwing cried. Nick looked up to the top of the slip and saw the Hotlanders. Their speed seemed impossible. Their long thin legs, their fleshless arms, jointed in a way that seemed unhuman, terrified him. Yellowclaw was overhead, loosing arrows. Silverwing flew to help. They kept out of spear range and sent down a stream of arrows, trying to slow the Hotlanders, but it barely made them pause. They carried small oval shields buckled on their forearms and with these warded off the arrows. Their speed of limb and eye seemed unnatural. Savage, primitive; yet to Nick they seemed like something from the future – humans mass-produced by a machine. Their shaven skulls gleamed like plastic bowls.

‘In,’ Jimmy yelled. He picked Nick up and hurled him into the boat. Soona and Dawn were already in, and Jimmy vaulted up like a boy and turned to face the land with his axe. The boat was wide and flat, with a low deck-house. It was more barge than yacht and its heaviness held it on the stones. The Seafolk strained along the sides but it moved only an inch or two. Then the Varg, Bess and Ben, added their strength. They put their paws on the bow and heaved and the barge grated out and floated free. They plunged into the water, keeping it going, and together, Seafolk and Varg, they drove the heavy craft at the gap in the reef.

The Hotlanders were almost at the beach. One huge man – he must, Nick thought, be two metres tall – jumped on a boulder and hurled his spear. It came on a flat trajectory and hissed into the sea a boat length short. His shout of anger came as shrill as a gull’s cry. No one else threw. They ran. They burst on to the beach and made no pause, but were in the black rocks of the reef. One fell with an arrow in his leg. They were not pausing to ward off arrows now.

‘Inside,’ Jimmy yelled. ‘They’re gunner be in range.’ He pushed Soona and Dawn into the deck-house. Nick followed and Jimmy came in last. ‘Keep down from that winder. Yer’ll get skewered.’ He pushed Nick down. They heard the hissing again, and the thud of spears striking the barge at the waterline. The Hotlanders were attacking the Seafolk. The barge lurched and halted, then moved more heavily.

‘The Seafolk have gone round the other side. Ben and Bess too,’ Dawn said. She and Jimmy were getting messages. Nick felt pressure on the keel. It must be hard keeping the barge straight, but he knew the Varg would get them through. The Hotlanders would come up though almost to point-blank range. He crouched as low as he could, close to the wall. Dawn and Soona lay beside him and Jimmy was on the other side of the window, near the door. Now and then he risked a glance out the window.

‘Gettin’ close. But we’re gunner make it.’ A spear hissed by his face and struck the wall. ‘O.K. Keep down. It’s us they’re pottin’.’ Spears struck the deck-house. Several pierced the wood and jutted like nails into the room. Others, in a flight – five, seven – came through the window and stood trembling in the wall and floor. Long spears, iron tipped, with shafts that seemed to hum, and spiky feathers tied below the head.

‘Use up yer ammo,’ Jimmy said. But each warrior had four or five spears. The attack went on, the spears in the room stood as thick as hair and the window was framed in shining points. At last it stopped. A cry came from above the boat. ‘No more spears,’ – Yellowclaw, Jimmy and Nick looked out the window. The reef was only ten metres away, with Hotlanders crowded by the water. The barge had passed the closest point. They had missed their chance to jump for it.

‘What are they doing?’

‘Dunno,’ Jimmy said. He went outside and the others followed. The Hotlanders broke into two groups. A man uncoiled a rope and ran it between them. It was as if they meant to have a tug of war. But they lowered the rope until it touched the ground. Now they seemed about to spin it for skipping. But Jimmy yelled, ‘They’re gunner chuck ’im at us.’ A Hotlander crouched further back – one smaller than the others, just a boy. He began to run. Yellowclaw and Silverwing had seen the danger too. They let fly arrows at him, but his start was too swift. The arrows struck the reef and bounced away. The boy was at the rope, his foot was on it, and he leaped. At the same time the warriors heaved and the rope jerked tight with such force it snapped in two. The timing for a feat like that was so fine Nick could not believe it – yet the boy was thrown twenty metres. He made a red flash in the air, and with arms stretched out came down at the barge like a dragon-fly. His fingers found the rail and locked on it, his legs splashed in the sea. For a moment he trailed, then hauled himself up. He was coiled like a spring at the rail, and he reached for the knife clamped in his teeth.

The Varg had swum to the rear of the boat and they lunged at him. From overhead, Yellowclaw and Silverwing shot arrows. Just for a moment their target was still. One took the boy in the shoulder, the other struck him above the hip. The shock made him cry out and his knife fell into the sea. For a second or two he clung to the rail with one hand. Then he let go and splashed into the water, staining it red. The Varg plunged forward, but Seafolk lifted the Hotlander clear and made a raft of bodies under him. One, lifting her head, croaked in her painful voice, ‘We do not kill. It is not our way. We will return him to his people.’

‘If yer do he’s a goner,’ Jimmy said. ‘They sent ’im ter take out some of us and he ballsed it up. They’ll chop ’im in little pieces.’

‘Bring him here,’ Soona said. ‘We won’t hurt him.’

‘He is dying,’ Dawn said. ‘I must treat his wounds.’

The Seafolk brought the boy to the side of the boat and lifted him, standing like dolphins on their tails. Nick and Jimmy grabbed him and pulled him on board. The boy was conscious. He twisted and flapped like a fish and would have got free, but Ben climbed on to the barge and held him down with a paw on his chest. Dawn knelt beside him. She looked at his wounds, which leaked blood on the deck, and said, ‘Nick, my pack. I must make him sleep. Then I must close these wounds or he will have no blood left.’ The boy’s eyes, glazing over, still had life to look at her. No trace of fear showed. His lips snarled and he made a feeble bite at her hand. ‘Nick.’ He ran into the deck-house. Soona came and looked over Dawn’s shoulder.

‘He’s so young.’

Her voice convulsed the boy. It was as if she had splashed scalding liquid on him. His eyes jerked to her face, widened as though from a blinding pain, and his mouth screamed. An eruption of strength ran through his body, jerking him from under Ben’s paw. His wounds were nothing. He was on his feet as quick as a cat, before the bear could move, and he tore the arrow from the wound on his hip, and holding it like a dagger sprang at Soona. Dawn was quickest. She caught the boy’s arm and hung on it, and was dragged along. She slowed his thrust so that Soona was able to twist and the arrow pierced her robe. Then Jimmy was there, with a bellow, and Nick, coming from the deck-house, and Ben too, and they wrestled and beat the boy down. Finally they had him on the deck. It was like trying to hold a greased wrestler, Nick thought. He lay on the arm that held the arrow, putting all his weight on, but it twisted like an eel, and it took all his strength to hold it down. ‘Kill,’ screamed the boy, his eyes on Soona, ‘enemy, kill.’ Ben held him with claws unsheathed and Jimmy lay on his legs. ‘Soona, my bag,’ Dawn cried. ‘The bottle. Quick.’ Soona thrust it into her hand and Dawn poured liquid in her palm and cupped it on the boy’s nose. He gasped. He sighed. He slept. But still his teeth were bared and spasms of rage and ferocity twitched the muscles in his cheeks.

‘You can let him go.’

Cautiously they freed him and stood up. The boy lay sleeping, twitching, while Dawn worked on his shoulder and hip. She poured a sweet-smelling oil in the wounds, then smeared on a pungent cream. The blood stopped oozing. Next she sprinkled black and white powder on them. It’s a recipe, Nick thought sourly. There’s the pepper and salt. He wasn’t very fond of this Hotlander. He’d done his best to kill them and now they were busy saving his life. His thinness and hairlessness seemed unhuman, and his colour, his red skin, was like a disease. It was the red of strawberries, and though Nick knew it was paint, he shivered. On the boy’s chest a bright blue lightning bolt was tattooed.