Oksa Pollock: The Last Hope (18 page)

O
KSA HADN’T SEEN HER MUM OR HER GRAN FOR TWO
weeks. Marie Pollock was still holed up with her sister and Dragomira was convalescing with Abakum in the countryside. This left Oksa and her father alone in the house on Bigtoe Square, which suddenly felt far too large for the two of them. The situation had forced Pavel to reorganize his schedule and he was spending less time in the restaurant: he had to put his family before his career. Anxious to do the right thing, Pavel was getting up before Oksa and making hearty breakfasts, and he was always there to lavish attention on her when she got in from school. They spent all their evenings together. Although it was still only late summer, Pavel would build a roaring fire in the hearth and they’d enjoy each other’s company until bedtime. Taking a keen interest in her homework, he rediscovered the pleasure of sharing in his daughter’s daily life. Oksa had decided to buckle down to her studies, which was her way of showing her parents that they could be proud of her, despite the mistakes she’d made. And her hard work was beginning to pay off: her first marks had been excellent and Oksa was receiving well-deserved praise.

“A mind sharp as a sword blade and the speed of a vigorous body—the perfect ninja!” Gus had exclaimed, punching her on the shoulder.

“A sharp mind, I’m not so sure about that,” Oksa had retorted. “Look at the tight spots I keep getting into!”

She was obviously thinking about her new powers. As her father had predicted, they could easily get her noticed, which wasn’t all that clever, as she’d quickly realized. She hadn’t been able to refrain from reoffending a few times, though, particularly with the girl who, in her opinion, was getting too close to Gus. “
Much too pretty for her own good
,” she grumbled to herself. When she’d again caught her friend deep in conversation with that
schemer
, she hadn’t been able to stop herself from making a button pop off her blouse, from a safe distance. The poor girl dashed off to escape prying eyes, which had earned Oksa a horrified grimace from Gus.

“Why did you do that? You’re horrible!”

“That girl gets on my nerves. Always hanging around…”

“Hanging around? Oksa, don’t tell me that’s why you did it? That’s really
pathetic
! Anyway, what if I like her hanging around?”

Those words, added to the events of the last few days, had given Oksa serious food for thought. That evening, curled on the sofa in front of the crackling flames, she’d talked to her father in a way she’d never been able to do before and their closeness made her feel so much better. She did however keep a few secrets to herself, particularly the unsettling “McGraw File”, as she now called it. She had tried to talk to him one day about her pseudo-teacher and how keen he was to torment his students, but without even knowing the details her father had smiled, saying that he didn’t know anyone who hadn’t encountered an odd or
questionable
teacher at least once at school. Telling her not to overdramatize, he’d encouraged her to hang in there and put on a brave face about this awkward situation.

“Awkward?! I’d like to see you handle it,” she’d grumbled, while deep down she was still sure that McGraw wasn’t who he claimed to be.

Her father had also insisted that she tell him about her magic
experiments
and she’d even been able to give him several dazzling
demonstrations
. Impressed and anxious, he had admired them gravely and had repeated his warnings, with just cause. And even if she didn’t always enjoy hearing them, she knew he was right.

“You’re very gifted, Oksa. But please be careful. You know, I personally always avoided using those
gifts
. I’m not saying I never wanted to, but I was too afraid someone might ask questions.”

“You restrain yourself, is that what you mean?”

“Not really. But I absolutely don’t want anyone to find out about it, it’s more to do with an instinct for self-preservation. It’s not quite the same for you, it’s better and, at the same time, it’s worse, because you’re a Gracious.”

Pavel looked at his daughter sadly with a small, weary smile, which made his face appear even more lined.

“Dad? You discovered your powers when you were in Russia, didn’t you? That’s where you were born, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it was called the Soviet Union back then. Strictly speaking, I was born in Siberia. When your gran, Leomido and Abakum were ejected from Edefia, they found themselves in a place which had nothing in common with what they’d always known. Siberia was a terrifying place for Insiders. Coming straight from a temperate, luxuriant and fertile land to cold, hostile Siberia was an appalling contrast, I can tell you. Your gran was terrified. Just imagine: until then, she’d been living happily with her parents in a land of harmony and plenty. And in the space of a few hours, she’d faced chaos, flight, abandonment and then Siberia. You must have heard of Siberia, darling, haven’t you?”

“The country where they had the gulags? The place where there were so many prison camps?”

Pavel looked at her in surprise and amusement.

“That’s not the first thing I would have remembered about it, but I see things differently from you—Siberia is where I was born. You’re not wrong though and it’s not a complete coincidence that they put the gulags there. You can go hundreds of miles without spotting a living soul, apart from animals and the spirits of nature. Nature reigns supreme there—a magnificent though very cruel ruler with the power of life and death. Abakum, young Dragomira and Leomido wandered
for several days, frozen to the marrow. On Edefia, the temperature never fell below twenty degrees and it never snowed, so you can
imagine
what a shock it was for them. Abakum kept them fed with roots, berries and fish he caught in the rivers. And Leomido kept them warm by using his Fireballistico—the power of fire, which was vital for survival in those lands. A few days later, they met a very powerful shaman who lived in a small isolated village on the edge of a forest. Winter was fast approaching and Metchkov, the shaman, gave them shelter and protected them during the bitter icy months until the thaw, when he could show them the way to a large city. Abakum and he were very similar and quickly became as close as brothers. Both were capable of hearing, understanding and communicating with the natural world. In their company, Dragomira became an exceptionally gifted student. When spring came, only Leomido decided to leave. He travelled across Europe as far as Britain, where he became the great conductor you know. Twelve years later, I was born in the same small Siberian village.

“So… your father was the shaman Metchkov?”

Pavel laughed gently.

“No, not Metchkov, he was over 100 years old! My father was his grandson. Life was hard but we were very happy together until I was eight. Then everything fell apart. My father was killed by the KGB and political conditions had become so difficult that we were forced to flee our small village and leave Siberia. Abakum came with us—he’d given Malorane his word to protect Dragomira and even though she was now a wife and mother, he always kept his promise. We had many problems leaving the Soviet Union. It was during the Cold War and the country had become a vast prison for its inhabitants. You risked your life trying to leave. Your grandmother and Abakum made frequent use of their powers at that time, which was a great help to us. But, without Leomido, I don’t think we’d ever have succeeded. He was on a world tour with his orchestra and it was during his visit to
St Petersburg—which was called Leningrad then—that we managed to leave the country illegally.”

“How?” asked Oksa, thrilled by her father’s story.

“Well, would you believe he passed us off as members of his orchestra. It was extremely dangerous for him and he was brave to do it, because he could have lost everything: not only his freedom but his life too. The real problem was deciding what to do with me, because how do you justify the presence of an eight-year-old child in an orchestra? Well, the answer was simply to sacrifice a cello and shut me inside one of the cases! The KGB carefully examined the double-bass cases, which were large enough to hide a man, but, luckily, not the cello cases, which were smaller. We had a narrow escape, though—thanks to Leomido. He’d become such a well-integrated Runaway.”

“So had you!” remarked Oksa.

“Yes, we had too but, still, we were living in a rather
peculiar
environment
. For the first eight years of my life, I was surrounded by people like your gran and Abakum who’d never made a secret of their powers, as well as a father, grandfather and great-grandfather who were all
remarkable
shamans. On top of that, we lived a relatively isolated life in a small Siberian village, so you can imagine the way I viewed the world. My native village was my whole universe—those were the days! I would have liked them to last for ever—because I wasn’t all that impressed by what I found out about mankind after that. My integration into society wasn’t easy, I can tell you. It was even worse for your gran and Abakum: they’d been living in a remote area for twenty-one years! All the same, they did amazingly well and I’m full of admiration for them; they fitted into that new world with incredible ease, blending in by a process of imitation, like chameleons. They did a lot of people-watching and copied what they saw. But I could see from the inside how hard it was for them. I think Leomido had realized very early on that he had to leave our small circle if he wanted to live successfully as an Outsider. He quickly abandoned all hope of returning to Edefia, unlike your gran and Abakum, who in
some ways continued to live as before—just taken down a notch or two. The three of us were experiencing things the other way round: magic, extraordinary powers and strange creatures had always been part of our daily lives, the villagers accepted and respected us just as we were. It was all
normal
! I’d been convinced that the whole world was like us. But as soon as we left, we had to be careful and it was crucial to camouflage ourselves. I had no idea how ordinary Outsiders lived.”

“You’d never seen normal people?” asked Oksa, interrupting him. “Er, sorry Dad, I don’t mean that you aren’t normal…”

“No, I know what you mean, don’t worry. By ‘ordinary Outsiders’, I mean those who couldn’t accept how different we were. From now on our gifts had to become a secret which could never be revealed. Anyway, I quickly learnt this to my cost.”

“How?” broke in Oksa.

“Leomido had arranged for us to live in Switzerland in a small,
peaceful
town in the mountains. Dragomira lost no time at all in enrolling me in school.”

“Was this was the first time you’d gone to school?”

“No, we’d had a school in our Siberian village. And my parents had taught me a great many things.”

“And how did you manage with the language? You spoke Russian, didn’t you?”

“Ah, you’re so practical, sweetheart! Yes, I spoke Russian since it was my mother tongue. But also French, English, German, Chinese, Spanish, Swedish…”

“WHAT? You’re making fun of me, Dad!” exclaimed Oksa.

“Not at all,” protested her father. “We Insiders have the power of Poluslingua.”

“Which is what?”

“The ability to become fluent in the language of whatever country we’re in in just a few hours. It’s sort of an ultra-fast immersion in a
language
, if you like. In Edefia, no one knew about that gift, but those of
us who left discovered it and immediately put it to good use, as you can imagine. And there’s no doubt that this skill has done wonders for our integration. You might have noticed that Mercedica and Leomido have no accent when they’ve never lived in France—and even less learnt the language. And yet, after a few hours with us, they can speak French like you and me. Or Russian like your gran and Abakum. Or Finnish with Tugdual. That’s Poluslingua!”

“Then I’ll soon be able to speak English as well as the Queen of England, won’t I?” asked Oksa hopefully.

“Perhaps,” smiled her father.

“Amazing! I’ll be getting wicked marks! But you haven’t told me what happened in Switzerland.”

“Oh, Switzerland…”

After a few long minutes lost in thought, Pavel continued.

“It was awful; I spent my time trying not to overstep the mark. But after a few days, my true nature got the upper hand.”

Pavel fell silent, upset by the memories he’d buried for so long.

“Well? What happened, Dad?” asked Oksa, impatiently.

“What happened? It was a bit of a catastrophe,” he replied. “I performed several Magnetuses at the bakery I hated.”

“Why did you do that?”

“Anger, Oksa, anger… that’s something you’re familiar with, isn’t it?” he remarked casually. “This baker was a spiteful woman who wasn’t very tolerant of foreigners. She made the big mistake of saying something which particularly upset me, then all the loaves of bread took off like rockets and crashed into the ceiling while the cakes dropped down on her like bombs. She didn’t really understand what was going on, but the next day Leomido came to get us, so it was my fault that we had to leave Switzerland as a matter of urgency.”

“Like Tugdual’s family,” remarked Oksa. “And like us too, isn’t that true?”

“Why do you say that?” asked her father, taken aback.

“We had to leave France,” explained Oksa unable to restrain herself, her heart pounding. “We ran away because of that journalist who died.”

Pavel Pollock scrubbed his hand over his forehead, his face white as a sheet. He looked helplessly at his daughter, then shut his eyes with a deep sigh.

“T
HAT JOURNALIST
, P
ETER
C
ARTER—HE DIED BECAUSE
of us, didn’t he?” pressed Oksa.

She felt some remorse when she saw how upset her father was at this question, but all the guilt in the world couldn’t overcome her need to know. With a resigned expression, her father said:

“Yes. Peter Carter died because of us.”

“But that’s horrible!” shouted Oksa furiously, staring at her father in alarm. “Why? Who did it? Which one of you?”

Pavel Pollock flinched.

“Which one of us? Why do you ask me that, Oksa?” he said in
amazement
. “And anyway, how do you know? Who told you?”

“I overheard you and Baba,” replied Oksa miserably.

“Oh Oksa, one day your annoying habit of listening at doors will land you in big trouble. Fine, since you heard us, I may as well tell you everything—but, I warn you, it may be a bit of a let-down, because I don’t know very much. You really are the most infuriating daughter a father could have!”

He sighed noisily before continuing.

“It all began with one of us, Petrus, a Runaway who found himself ejected into the United States. He’d decided to make a living as an art thief, a career which, thanks to his gifts, soon took off in a big way. For years he travelled the world ‘visiting’ scores of museums, galleries and
private collections. But one day his luck changed and he was caught red-handed. In his haste to escape, he used his powers to get out of the apartment of a wealthy collector he was robbing, which was on the forty-seventh floor. The police officers who’d come to arrest him panicked and fired at him, killing him instantly. At his house they found hundreds of pictures, some of them priceless, whose disappearance had mystified the most experienced detectives. And with good reason. How could they have imagined what was going on? The problem was that a journalist, Peter Carter, had already been on his trail for a few months. He’d met Petrus at an art sale and had been intrigued by him. He’d begun to follow him, slowly becoming convinced that he was an extra-terrestrial. When Petrus was killed, Peter Carter continued his investigation and discovered things which enabled him to get closer to us.”

“What sort of things?” asked Oksa, fascinated.

“Oh, souvenirs from our land which Petrus had kept very carefully, particularly a notebook containing names, dates, information about Edefia and newspaper articles about Leomido.”

“Oh no!” said Oksa.

“Yes, exactly,” agreed her father. “Carter arrived at some conclusions which weren’t altogether unfounded. And that’s when our problems started. He investigated Leomido, then your gran and our family. Shortly afterwards, he contacted us asking us to pay him to keep quiet.”

“Really!” exclaimed Oksa. “What a lowlife. I hope you didn’t give in to him.”

“What choice did we have? He was threatening to reveal everything. Imagine what a disaster that would have been. We paid, once, twice, three times…”

“And then, off to London, is that it?”

“Too right! Because of that man, we had to disappear as a matter of urgency and in the utmost secrecy, without leaving a trace. And it wasn’t easy, I can tell you.”

“Now I understand why you were in such a rush,” breathed Oksa. “But the guy is still dead.”

“Yes, and that’s very worrying,” added her father. “Carter was an unscrupulous predator and I can’t say I’m sorry he’s dead. But we should never take delight in a man’s death.”

Oksa narrowed her eyes, vaguely suspicious.

“Dad?”

“Yes, Oksa?”

“Who killed him? Who killed Carter? Do you know? Why did Baba say it had to be one of you?”

Pavel Pollock’s gaze grew troubled and he gave an annoyed scowl.

“Carter was killed by a Pulmonis, a substance which can only be made by the Runaways,” he explained. “But all I can tell you is that neither I nor your gran are responsible for his death.”

“That’s a relief!” exclaimed Oksa. “Oh Dad! You don’t know how worried I was—this business had me imagining all kinds of crazy things. But do you think it could be Abakum or Leomido?”

“No, neither of them could do that. None of us is capable of it. That’s what makes it even more mysterious. It’s as if whoever did this wanted to protect us.”

Pavel Pollock stood up and went to pour himself a fizzy drink, which he downed in one gulp, trembling, then slammed the glass on the mantelpiece so hard he almost broke it. Oksa jumped and stared at her father in concern. But before she could ask any more questions, he gave her such a grave look that she changed her mind about continuing her cross-examination.

“We’ve had to run away a great deal, you know,” he continued. “Edefia, Siberia, Switzerland, France—”

“How did you get to France?” broke in Oksa, listening intently.

“That’s partly down to Malorane, believe it or not. You remember when Dragomira told you about the powers of the Gracious?” asked her father.

“The one that made it possible to escape from Edefia?”

“Indeed, the Graciouses do possess that enviable power: to open the Portal and leave. But Malorane was familiar with France because there’s another power that only Graciouses have—the legendary power of Dreamflying.”

“Dreamflying?” asked Oksa, interrupting him.

“Dreamflying involves travelling by thought alone while your body stays put. The mind or consciousness undergoes some kind of
transformation
, if you like. Malorane was an inquisitive woman, so she Dreamflew frequently to see how the Outsiders lived. Unlike most of the previous Graciouses, she preferred to know what was happening on the Outside, instead of shutting her eyes and pretending that Edefia was alone in the universe. Afterwards, she’d put on public Camereye shows of her travels. She Dreamflew several times in France, a country which she liked a lot and she’d hold special screenings just for Dragomira to ‘show’ her France the way other mums tell their children bedtime stories. That’s why we set off for that country which has become so dear to my heart. It’s an odd story, isn’t it?”

“An odd story? You mean am-az-ing, surely!” replied Oksa
enthusiastically
. “But you have to admit it isn’t the most unbelievable thing ever—I can tell you at least a hundred more bizarre things I’ve heard over the past few days, if you like!”

“I don’t know what you mean,” said Pavel, playing the innocent. “
E.T.
phone home
,” he added, rolling his eyes, his little finger in his ear. “No, nothing weird here.”

Oksa burst out laughing, exhaling with a loud whoosh. Then, looking serious again:

“Dad, something else has occurred to me.”

“What’s that, sweetheart?”

“If the Graciouses have the power to Dreamfly, does that mean I can too?”

She looked at her father in excitement. Pavel gave a deep sigh, stretched his long legs out in front of him and paused for a couple of seconds before replying.

“It’s perfectly true. You do possess that power. But you could only use it if you had entered the Cloak Chamber. The Cloak activates the power.”

Oksa felt a little disappointed; she would so love to Dreamfly! Seeing her vexed expression, Pavel hugged her tightly.

“You know, it’s something I’d love to do too. And I don’t think I’m the only one. But there are many other powers we’re going to teach you. At least, your gran and Leomido will for the most part. Abakum will also be a very good teacher for you; he’s very strong, the strongest of us all.”

“Stronger than the Gracious?” asked Oksa.

They were interrupted by the telephone ringing. It was Marie Pollock. Every evening she called to talk to her daughter for a while. Her voice sounded strained, emotional and choked, but Oksa tried not to notice how deeply this whole affair seemed to have upset her. It was all because of her. It broke her heart to hear how sad her mum was, so she tried to take her mind off things by telling her about her day, as if she were at home, as if she were sitting opposite her at the kitchen table in front of a plate of steaming
piroshki
. And when she sensed Marie was smiling at the other end of the phone, she felt better.

“Eighteen out of twenty in maths, what do you say to that, Mum?”

“Not bad,” Marie replied, feigning indifference.

“Mum! Let me remind you that it was with frightful McGraw, the fearsome dictator of St Proximus!”

“Ah well, given those extreme conditions, I accept and acknowledge your excellence, my darling daughter.”

“You should have seen his face when he gave me back my paper. It was a scream!”

“I’m proud of you, sweetheart. Are you okay otherwise? Is your dad okay?”

They chatted like this for a few minutes, as they did every evening, then wished each other goodnight, blowing kisses down the phone. Oksa asked if she wanted to speak to her dad, but when he took the handset, Marie had already hung up.

“Why does she do that every time?” asked Oksa angrily, a lump in her throat.

That evening, more than usual, it would have been nice to hear them talk to each other. Talk normally.

“Is she that angry with you? But why?” she continued, her cheeks flushed with frustration and her heart near to breaking.

“You were also angry with me, if you remember,” replied her father sadly. “Things will sort themselves out, you’ll see.”

“Do you think so?”

“I’m sure of it!”

Oksa rested her head on her father’s shoulder and closed her eyes, as if making a wish.

“So long as she’s here for my birthday.”

“Don’t you worry about that, I don’t think she’d miss that for the world.”

After a brief pause, he continued:

“Would you like a bit of light relief?”

“You bet!” exclaimed Oksa, suddenly interested. “What did you have in mind?”

By way of an answer, Pavel took her hand and led her up to Dragomira’s apartment.