The Wish Kin (15 page)

He exhales, exhausted. I am Colm Bell, he says at the last. He feels fragile, but whole. He turns his face to Lydia once again. She pushes her chin into his shoulder. He squeezes her hand in response.

• • •

Some time later Colm hears a change in the roar of the engine and they begin their descent. His ears block and squeal, his neck screams with the weight of his body forced upon it by the decline, but they make it, the wheels touching and bouncing on the runway, the brakes dragging at the thrust of the plane. They taxi for a time, then stop, the engines sighing to silence. At once the voices overhead become audible, the footsteps plain upon the boards. There is much activity above the heads of the three young people, and they lie there, quiet and still, waiting until the moment is right.

At last there is silence, and Moss cautiously pushes the panel above them. A square of light breaks into the dark hold; Colm blinks with its brightness.
Wait
, says Moss, and the older boy unfolds himself and disappears stiffly up through the bench. Colm hears his uneven footsteps; he follows them the length of the plane and back again, along each of the windowed walls, over and across the plane's width. He can't imagine how it is that they are going to get out.

Moss's face appears in the square of light and he gestures to them to come. Colm feels as though he has to will his body into action, feels as though he is made of stone. His legs scream as he shifts them to kneeling, as the blood begins to flow through them once again. He bites his lower lip to prevent from calling out with the pain.

The light is clear and white inside the body of the plane. Colm and Lydia stretch their cramped and aching muscles in its warmth, then follow Moss through to the front of the plane and into the cockpit. They keep down, hunching their bodies low so that they can't be seen.

Here
, says Moss.
The escape hatch
. He wraps his hand firmly around the chrome handle beside the pilot's seat, presses the black knob at its centre. The lock is released and the hatch lifts upwards.

Colm leans forward and looks out from the cockpit. The first thing that hits him about their new location is the smell, something profoundly familiar
yet impossible to identify. Colm breathes it deeply; it is delicious, invigorating.

The ground is a long way below, but a series of metal tines pressed into the plane's shell form a spine of descent. Beyond this the tarmac is a sheet of grey, potholed and broken, and scattered untidily with miscellanea. Colm sees at once, though, that the remnants of prefabricated buildings and empty packing crates will provide cover for them to make their escape from the plane. The main entrance to the plane lies on its other side, as do the airport buildings. This side of the airport pans off to nothingness.

Moss looks carefully about in all directions, then gives Colm the nod. The younger boy lowers himself through the hatch, touches his foot to the first of the metal tines. He tests its strength carefully before placing his weight upon it fully, then peels himself down the side of the plane. He fastens his fists about the last of the tines, lowers himself so that he is hanging by his hands, then drops the final metre or so to the ground. His knees buckle under him, his hands graze the tarmac as he falls, but he is out of the plane and, so far, safe.

He looks up to where Lydia is beginning the descent, watches her take the tines lightly. She reaches the last of these, and swings her legs under the belly of the plane. Colm catches her and lowers her to the ground. She stands smiling before him.

And then Moss. Quickly, carefully, after drawing closed the escape hatch, he descends, lowers and drops.
A wooden packing crate standing empty a little way away provides the first of their cover. From here they can look out across the tarmac, see under the plane's silver belly to where a series of dilapidated blond-brick buildings sit fading in the sun.

Where are we?
Colm asks.

Moss shrugs.
Not sure
.

Colm thinks about the picture he has of Wonding in his mind, of the whiteness of the light, of the vast expanse of thickening ocean, of the emptiness, the ghostliness of the town. The light is true, he thinks, squinting. The buildings look suitably decayed. But, if it is Wonding, there must be ocean somewhere.

They take the tarmac in stages, running from cover to cover. From their various vantage points they see that the airport is a small one, though only a section of it appears to be in use. It strikes Colm as strange that the rest of it couldn't be cleaned up a little, though clearly it is to their own advantage that it has not been.

This is the Clan we are talking about
, says Moss
. You've seen their methods
.

But they need the airport. What about all those planes we've been watching for the past two days?

They care only about what is of use to them. This section, for whatever reason, is of no benefit and so they have no care for it
.

Colm is slightly disturbed by Moss's manner.
These are your own people
, he says.

I know
, says Moss sadly.

The edge of the tarmac is not far now. It is difficult to see beyond a certain point for the crates, the bits of buildings, the scraps of vehicles. A breeze passes over the area from beyond the rim of tarmac and brings with it a fresh burst of the smell that Colm noticed earlier.

What is that?
he asks.

Neither Moss nor Lydia can answer him, but all of them take full, deep breaths and come up smiling.

It's amazing!
says Lydia.
It's like nothing else!

It's very good
, agrees Moss.

Colm wants to go to its source, to find out what it is. But it seems to be all around them, seems to have no specific origin. It can't be nothing, though, he thinks. It has to be something.

They continue to run quickly and carefully from cover to cover, until only the grey ground lies between them and the long line of blocks that mark the edge of the airport. They do not know yet what is beyond this line; only when they are actually there will they be able to see.

Come on
, says Moss, and they pound their feet into the tarmac, fists clenched, hearts racing, less with the fear of being caught, more with the thrill, the anticipation, of discovering the sight beyond the line. They run so quickly that they can't stop, that their bodies slam into the blocks, but they are smiling, excited.

Ready?
asks Moss.

The three of them raise themselves slowly: who knows what danger lies beyond? A fresh push of
breeze blows that smell into their nostrils again and now they cannot wait. They lift themselves up so that their eyes are above the rim, so that it is their eyes that first welcome the sight, then their hearts, then all of them. Beyond the line of blocks and all the way to the great arc of sky lies, blue and blistering, the sea.

The sea is bright, astounding. The children undress, walk slowly into its frilly edge, feel the bright wetness of it on their skin, the sink of sand beneath their feet. They sit in the shallows, uncertain yet of the depths, with the little waves breaking against them and the grit of journey and difficulty washing away. When they venture further out, carefully dip their heads beneath the surface, they taste at once the sharpness of salt and realise that it is this that they have been smelling. It is the smell of the salt, of the sea.

Have you been to the sea before?
Colm asks Moss.

Never
, says the older boy.

They wash out their clothes, spread the ragged garments on the dry sand further up the beach and lie down beside them. Lydia sucks the wet salt from her hair, which lies on her shoulders like yellow snakes.
Their skin dries to a salty crust in the sun.

Colm feels sobered by the sea, feels sobered by the presence of such a vast liquid entity. It is alive, he thinks. It is as though it is its own self. He thinks about what he knows of the ocean, about what he has read in books or been told by his father, but none of it ventures near to representing the truth of it, the fullness of it that he can see and feel before him, within him, around him now.

They walk along the fine white sand that trims the bright blue sea, stopping every so often to lower themselves into the water again. They have to get used to it; it is nothing like the dams and little creeks in which they have paddled in the past. It is far more a force, an authority.

The airport is behind them now. Ahead lies a small bay, the silvery mouth of the town. There is a wildness about this place, Colm thinks, despite the fact of the airport, the buildings. He wonders if it is because of the sea that he thinks this, the sea that is so utterly without restraint.

They draw closer to the town. The white beach is sprigged with a sharp grey-green grass. Sand dunes push upwards, and the children climb these, look across to the approaching hamlet. There is a main road, broken, gutterless, with a row of scrappy palm trees running down its centre. The town spreads out from these towards the western hills, streets stretching out like exhausted limbs. And others, though smaller,
turn from these, so that the effect from the dune is like a tree with emanating branches, a star with radiating points.

But more than this is the thick, grey haze that hangs at the craggy edge of the town, are the great dark sears that stain the outlying roads running up into the hills, are the deep fissures that split one side of a street from the other. In places smoke-plumes rise, strangely weighted, from the ground. Trees stand, black with charring, in wounded knots. A large fault reaches from one end of the town almost to the other.

So it
is
true, Colm thinks as he looks at the wreck of the town. He remembers the tale Parsefal told him way back in Yarran of the small coal-mining town, of the smouldering rubbish that became a vast underground fire, of the sinking of the houses into the burning earth, of the creeping of the fire to the south and to the west. He remembers, too, the story of the small boy fascinated by the pillar of steam that appeared suddenly in his grandmother's garden, of the collapse of the earth beneath him, of the hellish and near deadly swallowing that ensued.

Wonding
, he hears Lydia whisper, awed. And he nods his head slowly.

They make their way down the dunes and across to the main road where the palm trees give skeleton shade. The children are cautious, wary, but intrigued.
Is it safe?
they keep asking one another. But none of them know the answer.

The main road, lined as it is with sun-bleached shops, seems little affected by the fire. Ragged weeds hang dry and brown from window boxes. The breeze is yet from the sea, so the smell is fresh, sweet, not, as one might expect in such a place, pained, burned.

The streets are wide, flat. Sand sits in swirls along their edges: the beach creeping quietly in. No one is about. The children's footsteps compete only with the soft push of the ocean upon the shore, of the wind in the carcass of palms, of the creak of an old sign swinging on its hinge.

Do you think anyone lives here?
Colm asks.

Moss shrugs.
It's hard to imagine
.

The streets open and fall away before them, behind them. From what they can see, there are no sections currently burning in this part of the town nearest the ocean, though plenty of evidence that once the heat was ferocious. Vast tracts of land lie open like old wounds. Roofs of houses and public buildings appear level with the ground, the rest of the buildings engulfed by once-burning earth. The children take these sections carefully, walk as though trying not to let their weight settle fully on the ground.

We should find our aunt's place
, says Colm.
We don't know what's going on here. It's too dangerous to just walk about
.

Of course
, replies Moss.
Any idea in which direction?

The beach road
, and they turn back towards the sea, take the street to the right with a view across the sand.
To the north, they see another plane circle and prepare to land.

Colm is only going by the picture he has in his mind, by the feeling that has resided in him since he first heard his father talk about his aunt and her little house by the sea. He doesn't know where the house is, doesn't even know the address. Not that that would have helped him anyway: very few street signs remain erect. No, he is simply following a picture in his head, a sense in his chest.

The houses along the beach road are all on stilts, with bare cool spaces underneath, high enough for a man to stand upright. Deep flights of stairs ascend to wooden doors. Shutters tilted for the breeze shade wide verandahs. The children walk slowly past these, observe the sorry gardens, the peeling paint on porches.

They hear a sound, a scuttling on bare boards, and lift their heads to look. A young blue heeler, thin but healthy, is trotting along a nearby verandah, its claws tick-ticking against the wooden flooring, its tongue lolling thirstily from its gums.

Here, boy!
calls Lydia, and holds her hand out to the creature. The dog galumphs down the stairs, his tail high and happy, his gums stretched and open in a doggy grin. He sniffs briefly at Lydia's fingers, then turns his head so she can scratch him behind the ears.

Good dog
, she croons. She runs her hand along his coat and fondles the collar about his neck.

Does he have a name, Lydia?
asks Moss.

Lydia twists the collar, finds the little metal tag. Colm thinks of Brae's gift, the shining disc, that hangs about his own neck. He looks again at its engraven image of the dove, smiles, and wonders at it.

Derry
, reads Lydia.

Pleased to meet you, Derry
, says Moss, and shakes the dog's proffered paw. The dog turns to Colm, bows his head slightly, then looks up at him, grinning.

I like this dog
, says Colm. He pats him, feels the warm grease deep in the fur behind his neck. He thinks of the dog at home, misses him. He remembers the sight of him that final morning, of the way he was lying there in the yard, his head angled awkwardly. He feels as though he has just walked into a wall of sadness and so presses his face into the dog's coat. The smell of it comforts him.

Derry
, he croons.

Derry gives a short bark, though it is only later when they have become used to one another that Colm realises the bark was in the Inner Speech. It is then, too, that he realises why: there is a greater understanding between species when the Inner Speech is used. Derry nuzzles at Colm, pushes his head into the boy's legs, then springs backwards, tail high.

He wants to play!
says Lydia. Derry leaps around Colm like a mad thing, jumps back and forth. Colm laughs, grabs at the dog's fur when the creature comes close, roars when he gets away. Moss and Lydia cheer the pair on. All of them are laughing.

Enough!
cries Colm at last.
I'm too tired!
He flomps to the ground, exhausted. Derry flomps next to him, rests his whiskery chin on the boy's foot.

You've got a friend for life there
, says Moss, and Colm knows it.

The afternoon sun beams red upon the windows of the houses. The wind direction changes, comes now from the west, and they can smell the burning reaches of the town.

All right
, says Moss.
We need to be getting on
.

Colm stands up. Derry, too, lifts his tired body from the ground.
I think we might be here
, says Colm.
I think this might be it
. He looks up at the house from which Derry came and suddenly has no doubt.
Yes
, he says.
This is it
.

Moss and Lydia follow the boy and his dog up the wide wooden stairs and across the verandah. Colm knocks on the door, waits, but hears no answer. He tries the handle. The door opens a crack and he pokes his head through, calls out. ‘Hello! Anyone home?' Again, no answer. Derry nudges the door open and makes his way up the hallway. He stops halfway along and looks back at the three children standing still on the verandah. He gives a short Inner bark and waits until they have crossed the threshold, then continues on through the house.

The house is clean, light. The walls are scrubbed and white, the floors sanded back to raw, smooth wood. There is little furniture: a straight-backed chair sits by
a window; a table stands nervously on three legs. The children walk through the house, find corners and cushions, curl themselves up in balls on the floor and sleep.

• • •

When Colm wakes, it is nearing dark. For a moment he wonders where he is, then hears the sound of the waves on the beach and remembers. He unfolds himself from his position on the floor and moves from room to room looking for Lydia and Moss. Derry, with him all the time he slept, trots happily behind.

The back of the house opens onto the beach, to the sea, and it is here that he finds his sister and friend studying papers by the small, flickering light of candle. They look up on his approach.

Look
, says Lydia, and hands him a stiff piece of paper. It is a photograph, he can tell, but only by the feel of it, not by the look. It is too dark now to see.

What is it of?
he asks.

Father
, says Lydia.
There are others too. Of Mother. And of Aunt Ilena
.

Colm moves closer, leans over the table. Moss holds the candle so that Colm can see. Lydia shows him photograph after photograph.

And here's you!
she says, and shows him a picture of a baby in the arms of a smiling young woman, his mother, flanked on either side by his father and aunt.
In the background Mount Nebo stands proud and strong; Colm even thinks he can see the ring-road around which they ran so many times. It makes him feel strange to look at the photograph, to see his parents and his aunt and the landscape so familiar. It is as though he is looking at some strange world, part real, part imagined, part forgotten.

I didn't realise Aunt Ilena visited Hirrup's Range
, is all he says. He looks out at the darkening sky, the blackening ocean.
How long was I sleeping?

A couple of hours. Want some food?

They eat the last of the supplies taken by Moss from the airport the evening before, drink the last of the water.

Do any of the taps here work?
Colm asks.

No
, says Moss.
But we haven't tried outside yet
.

Colm and Derry walk back through the house and down the stairs to the tap in the front yard. Colm holds his water bottle to its metal mouth and turns the stiff handle. A mass of tiny scorpions pours out and into his bottle. He flings the thing from him, disgust a ball of bile in his throat.

• • •

In the morning they walk cautiously through the town. They are uncertain of what to do, of where to go. They look about for food, for water, for a sign of occupancy in any of the houses or other buildings. They hope for an
indication that their father is nearby, or perhaps their aunt. They wonder about the Clan, about the planes that continue to fly in and out. They look over their shoulders constantly.

The children traverse the length and breadth of the beach, follow the curve of the bay from one end to another. At the southernmost tip, where sand smoothes out onto rock, they find the remains of some sort of makeshift contraption, which Moss recognises at once as being a water desalinator.

I've used these before
, he says.
On water from the salt lakes. The Clan would have died of thirst without these
.

He spends the afternoon repairing and experimenting with the desalinator, feeding it the salty water from the sea. Colm, Lydia and Derry search the rockpools for shellfish and return to find Moss filling the first of their bottles with bright, clear water. They drink and drink, feast on fresh oysters cut from the sea side of the rocks with Colm's sharp knife.

They lie on the sand, bellies tight as drums. Above them drifts a wisp of cloud, formless, feathery. Colm in his satisfied state sings to it, watches it follow the pattern of his song. It is a love song that he sings and the cloud has never been so loved. It fluffs itself up, fills itself out like a woman adored after years of neglect. Colm sings and the cloud comes to life, gathers more unto itself, flourishes, till its feathery lengths reach out across the pan of sky over the bay. Colm sings and sings, and cannot believe that he sees what he sees.

Stop!
says Moss suddenly. And Colm does.

What is it?
he asks.

The Clan
, replies Moss.
They'll see
.

Colm is confused.
It's a cloud
, he says.
They appear from time to time. They're empty, but they do occasionally exist
.