‘The one we see from the river bank I imagine,’ said Croydee. ‘It’s obvious that the reason for the holograms is this cavern. It must be a portal of sorts that displays past and future images.’
<><> <><><> <><>
‘Lena, how did you guess?’ For a moment Rosetta played along with Lena’s comment that the drive Adam suggested was a visit to the local garbage tip. ‘Actually, you’re not far wrong.’ Remembering how deflated she’d felt at the next place he’d driven her, she gazed at the Hansel & Gretel counter where a woman ordering a Vienna and babycino was trying to make herself heard over a face-painted child’s impromptu song about the barista’s chocolate shaker. ‘Adam stayed mysterious about where we were going. He hadn’t said much at all, and I felt sorry for him because the night he’d planned had been altered with the escape from Dette. I reasoned that he would have been feeling bad about the meal. I wanted to reassure him that dining anywhere decent on a Friday night without a reservation was virtually impossible, but at the same time I didn’t want to insult his choice of eatery.’ Rosetta shook her head at the craziness of it all. ‘So we were heading for the cinemas, and I wondered whether he wanted to surprise me. He’d asked my favourite movie on the phone the day before. I’d told him about my sci-fi fetish, and he’d talked about that re-make they’re promoting now. You know the one, Lena. Invasion of the Star People. It was about 8 p.m. by then.’
‘So you would have caught the late screening.’
‘I didn’t catch anything. Unless you’re counting a lift back home.’
‘Aha! You invited him back to your place instead.’
‘On the contrary.’ Rosetta made a face and relented to laughter. ‘At first I thought he was joking. Most people going on dates were still at home deciding what to wear!’
She thought back to her incredulous response to Adam turning into Ashbury Avenue. ‘I’m going home already?’
The car pulled to a stop. Adam didn’t answer. He leaned back against the headrest, drew in a breath and sighed. Then he turned to Rosetta, raised an eyebrow and slowly slid his arm around her shoulders. He drew closer and her breathing quickened. She caressed his forearms. Adam’s muscles radiated warmth beneath his full-length shirt sleeves. The feel of his body invoked such euphoria she forgot her bafflement at him dropping her home.
‘You don’t have to be by yourself,’ Adam said in a growl. ‘I can keep you company if you like.’
Adam was under the illusion that Rosetta lived alone. She hadn’t yet told him she was a mother. Surely it wouldn’t be up to her, though, to suggest they go to his place! This was all so inappropriate. The night was still criminally young.
An avalanche of forceful kissing. Adam untangled his fingers from her spray-stiffened semi-beehive and said: ‘So Rosie, I kept this time aside for you. For us. I couldn’t have made it a long evening out ’cos I’m in training for a marathon. Have to be up at four tomorrow morning.’
‘Uh-huh.’ She was still partly lost in that other reality, reeling from the enchantment of getting close to Adam again.
‘So. Rosie. As I said. I want to spend that time with you, I’ve gotta get up early, I don’t want to risk a bad start to the marathon, I need to know what you’re thinking, need to know pretty much now. Are you gonna invite me in?’
Rosetta’s spellbound state fizzled abruptly. ‘My apologies,’ she droned. ‘I didn’t realise we were in a traders’ meeting. Great pitch, Adam.’
‘Whaddya mean?’
She turned to glare at Adam. His green eyes, now two glittery shadows piercing the darkness, were narrowed in confusion. ‘I hadn’t thought you’d be working towards a deadline.’
Adam’s arms, looser in their embrace once he’d begun on his reasons for loving and leaving within the pre-dawn hours, fell raggedly away from her. It was happening a third time. She glanced away from Adam’s pouty lower lip. His seduction tactics were consistent: a bout of nagging followed by thundercloud scowls, which cancelled out any notion of shimmying between the sheets with him.
Tapping her fingernails softly on the car door, Rosetta gazed out of the car window, at the purple dahlias in the Dalfreys’ front garden.
Why don’t I give up now, she thought.
A breeze sprang up. The dahlias rocked forward and back, nodding their heads in affirmation.
Apart from that fleeting blast of passion, it had so far been an unremarkable date. Conversing with Adam was more like conducting an interview with a self-absorbed celebrity. And now, after a few half-hearted attempts to impress her, he assumed she’d obediently agree to his conditions and topple into bed. ‘I’m pretty busy this evening,’ she said. ‘And like you, I have to get up early.’
‘Cool! Early night suits me.’
‘Goodnight then, Adam.’
‘Together, I mean. An early night together.’
Rosetta opened the car door. ‘The deal-breaker was that list of restrictions of yours. Thanks for dinner.’ She hurried across to the verandah. Deal-breaker? She winced. Not the cleverest retort. She’d failed to find a finance term that sarcastically replaced ‘turn-off ’.
Adam shouted from his wound-down window, ‘I’ll call you. Tomorrow.’
‘Farewell to you too, Adam.’ She marched up the verandah steps as smartly as she could.
...A remark from Lena jolted her back to the conversation in the coffee shop. ‘Craig thought Adam was a phoney all along. Sounds like jealousy to me.’
Rosetta contemplated a painted tulip on the corner of the cafe’s wooden table. ‘I think he was just being big-brother protective. It’s six years now since I went out with him. Craig moved on ages ago.’ Remembering Craig’s latest call, she said, ‘And he’s super-duper smitten with this new girl he’s seeing.’
‘Name’s Soozi, apparently.’ Lena stirred another sugar through her latte. Amid the rhythmic clatter of stainless steel on glass, she added, ‘With a double “o” and a “z”. Wonder if she’s got anything to do with Craig’s “secret project”. Has he invited her to the book group?’
‘He hasn’t as far as I know. And I’m not sure he will. She thinks it sounds bizarre.’
‘Do you blame her? A bunch of space cadets getting together every fortnight to meditate and study a book about elves? Andrew reckons I’m cracked. After twelve years of marriage he still doesn’t know me!’
‘Shame on Andrew.’ Rosetta tut-tutted.
‘I’ve got to speak to Craig though,’ Lena said. ‘He’s overselling the idea that Our True Ancient History is actually true.’
‘Poor old Craig. He’s anything but discreet.’
‘And as for Adam, don’t go missing him too much.’
‘I’m not missing Adam at all. I know I’ve blabbed on about him ad nauseam throughout our coffees but—’
‘You really don’t miss him?’
‘Not at all.’ At that moment, Rosetta remembered a side of Adam she loved. On their dinner out the night after Royston’s lunch party, he’d confided in her about his upbringing, and it had moved her to tears. His manner that evening had been so much gentler and he’d caressed her hand with such tenderness, she could easily picture him as the dreamy-eyed child he once was, a sensitive novice poet and the tearful object of his father’s disgust. Adam’s tough-guy stance had made sense to her then. Just like Rosetta, he was vulnerable beneath the surface. Adam had been affected by his dad’s vindictiveness; Rosetta by Angus’s belief that marriage and fatherhood placed unhealthy limits on a man. Both of them had been rejected by the people they’d loved most. She could understand, too, why Adam felt compelled to sing along to Doctor Cyanide in his car, embarrassing and all as it was for the person beside him. Embodying the nasty mannered ’70s rock god would have given him a sense of control. Perhaps he was demanding what was denied him when he snarled the lyrics to ‘Gimme’: the love of disinterested parents.
‘He’ll be back,’ Lena assured. ‘Your men always seem to call after you get angry with them.’
‘Y
ou’re a gem to say that, Lena, but trust me. This one won’t. But, ahhh! So amazingly good looking.’
‘Yup...he should’ve been in movies.’
‘He did happen to be on the small screen, on Queensland TV.’
‘I know. He told me at Royston’s lunch party. Former newspaper journo turned finance reporter for Brisbane Eyewitness News. Why did he become an investment banker?’
‘He got tired of standing on the sidelines.’
‘What’ll you do if he does call?’
‘I’ll rant and rave until he puts down the phone. I’m already feeling sorry for the poor sod.’
‘I’m feeling sorry for him myself. Remember the time you told off the guy with the black stubble?’
Rosetta sat upright. ‘But that guy stood me up! And…I can’t remember his name…Think it began with a ‘G’. Hmm. My memory’s crazy lately. Maybe Izzie’s right. Maybe I am going senile.’ She eyed the table’s painted tulip and ran a finger across its glossy surface. ‘Although, I probably forgot his name deliberately out of spite. Seriously though, if Adam did happen to phone I’d make it clear I want nothing more to do with him. Ever!’ To highlight her resolve, Rosetta slapped her hand down on the table. The latte glasses tinkled, their contents sloshing ominously. ‘But that’s enough about me, Lena. I’ve been gabbling all afternoon.’
‘You’re forgetting about the curtain conversation. You endured my deliberations in La Draperie for at least an hour-an-a-half. Maybe you are losing your marbles.’
‘Finding those curtains wasn’t an endurance. It was important. Whatever the case, from this point on, I’m determined to zip up this big mouth of mine.’
****
Back on her verandah, Rosetta waved to Lena amid the three predictable farewell toots, grimaced at a cobweb that had settled in one of the verandah eaves and took a step towards the door.
The sole of one of her ballet-flats settled onto something softly crackly. Cellophane. She’d stepped on a Floral Fiesta bouquet!
As though attempting to comfort a small, helpless animal, she cooed and caressed the flowers’ wounded stems before lifting them from her doorstep. More roses. Pale and pretty, a card attached to them with the same message accompanying Adam’s previous delivery: Am I forgiven?
‘Sweet, very sweet,’ she said, cradling the bouquet in one arm. Juggling her eco-friendly shopping bag, she unlocked the door in three staccato moves. ‘But it won’t change my mind.’
She unwrapped the cellophane from the roses in a series of loud crunches and went on a search for her chunkiest vase. They were a clean, almost iridescent white, these roses—not unlike Adam’s bleached teeth—and their variegated edges were a whirl of deep pink.
She placed the vase on a side-table opposite Izzie’s room. The phone bleated.
‘Eadie for sure,’ she announced, rushing to the entrance end of the hallway. Their psychic link was uncanny. Rosetta seized up the phone in a dramatic swoop. ‘You won’t believe this,’ she said into the receiver. ‘The Gorgeous GEG’s gone all grovelly now with roses.’
‘Good for you,’ a deep voice purred on the other line. ‘Although I’ve never heard “gorgeous” and “geek” used together like that.’
Altering from dramatic to deadpan, Rosetta said, ‘Hello Adam.’ Thankfully, he’d misheard her Green Eyed-Guy abbreviation.
A yawning gap of silence. At last Adam said in a groan, ‘Rosie...’
Abruptly Rosetta said, ‘Yes, Adam?’
‘I’m going crazy being away from you. When can we meet up?’
‘Er...well...’ Never. She’d planned to say never, and yet the shock of hearing Adam again after thinking he was gone for good had caused her words to drift away. The effect of Adam’s voice, too, was more than slightly dizzying.
‘Silence, huh?’ Adam was saying, the texture of his voice as luxuriant as his roses. ‘This doesn’t sound like my Rosetta. Why are you playing games with me, Lush-Lips?’
‘I’m not...playing—’
‘I’m a desperate man. I’m dying here...I’ve got to see you again. Soon.’
‘Really?’ Had she actually said that? Said ‘really’ in a hopeful schoolgirl squeak?
‘Listen, Rosie, can’t talk long. I’m overseas on a business trip.’
‘Where overseas?’
‘Vanuatu.’
What was Adam doing in Vanuatu? Trying to sound disinterested she droned, ‘Lucky you.’
‘On the contrary. I’ve seen nothing but the four walls of the conference room all week. It’s crap knowing the ocean’s just a few metres away when you have to discuss the Asian economy with a bunch of trumped up suits.’
‘Hmm.’ Rosetta couldn’t help feeling pleased he wasn’t enjoying himself. ‘Doesn’t sound anything like the romantic commercials.’
‘Romantic? Ha! This place is a romance desert. There’s one romantic thing happening to me though.’
Rosetta’s heart dived. He was gloating. Telling her he had someone. In the most patronising tone she could muster, Rosetta said, ‘And what’s that, Adam?’
‘Listening to you. That sensuous jazz-singer’s voice: it’s sexy beyond belief.’
Her wariness gave way to bashful laughter.
‘I want to make it up to you, Rosie, for that stupid rushed date we had. I’m thinking dinner at Chavelle’s Saturday night. It’s a five-star restaurant near Circular Quay. Overlooks the harbour. Food’s as French as it can be.’
‘Ooh...um...French sounds tempting.’ Going on a third date on Saturday with an amazing looking man who had worked as a writer in his early days and so might have been interested in all things literary, including Friday Fortnight—fourth if she counted Royston’s lunch party—or stitching her tapestry in time to Danna Nolan’s ‘Wallflower Blues’? Not a difficult decision. But no. She couldn’t allow herself to weaken.
Syrup-coated blarney would not get in the way of her resolve.
She drew in a breath and mouthed her refusal in readiness for the real thing, while Adam continued with, ‘So I’ll see you Saturday next, okay? I’ll pick you up at eight.’
<><> XXXIII <><>
At the emergence of dawn, and while the other Brumlynds were extinguishing the campfire and readying the sleeping wagons, Croydee toddled through the forest dwarfed by tall grasses. He was bound for the Grudellan Palace, a place where Pieter and Fripso might be imprisoned.
At last the structure came into view, emerging beyond the river bank in colours he’d rarely observed. The rays of dawn reflected upon its myriad spiralling turrets.
He had concluded that he must find the true palace, one that wasn’t a projection of either the past or future. He must hasten silently through its grounds in an effort to rescue two forest dwellers in peril.
Pools of sunshine, gleaming past the gates upon cobblestone roads, dazzled Croydee’s eyes. He was unaccustomed to absorbing so much yellow light—it was normally too harsh for those of devic heritage—yet the need to discover where his cousin and the rabbit might be was far greater than the fear of solar searing.
There ahead of Croydee stood the eagle-winged guards, half gold-skin, leaning upon spears made of the ore they adored so much. Beyond them splashed and sparkled their dragon font, the hideous container of blood the Grudellan Palace’s cold-hearted mortals insisted on drinking. While doing so made them a little more magical, the power they inherited through these callous deeds was tainted. It manifested darkness and deterioration and furthered their already voracious need for more of anything they already had.
Seventy season-cycles ago, when Croydee was a young elf, his former Clan Watcher presented him with a gift from the gods, a dragon he’d chosen to name Sluken. A gorgeously jewel-scaled creature was Sluken, as wise as the Oracle and as gentle as the wavelets of a fair-weather sea. The dragon loved nothing more than to bound about the forest with his master. Croydee and his friend were inseparable. Sluken taught Croydee Saurus language and also helped him in his study of magic.
One day, Croydee awoke to a stifled scream. He leapt from his place by the campfire to search for the dragon and was perplexed to find that Sluken was not in his usual spot. When returning to his camp to alert the other Brumlynds, he heard an agonised wail.
The bracken children visited him later, telling him they had seen a hooded one pass by with Croydee’s poor, frightened friend in tow. Sluken had been dragged off in the direction of the palace.
Saddened by the loss of his dear friend’s presence, he searched for the creature in the Dream Sphere. As with their search in that world for Pieter and Fripso, the dragon was unable to be found.
While this might in a way have been hopeful, meaning Pieter and Fripso had probably not severed their lives in Elysium Glades to pass over permanently to the Dream Sphere, Croydee believed that something in the Grudellan Palace—if this was where they were—was preventing the two from making contact with their clans when they slumbered. Alcor had remained reticent when asked. ‘Croydee, let it be,’ he had said. ‘And take heed of The Oracle’s mention of a fruitless quest.’ But Croydee refused to be deterred by Alcor’s unhelpful chides.
For Sluken, the story would have ended already and done so tragically. Croydee learned that body kings had conducted mass slaughtering of dragons. His idolised animal companion would have been among those trapped in that ghostly void between Earth and the Dream Sphere.
Maleika was the only Brumlynd who had managed to make contact with their imprisoned spirits. Her communication with disembodied dragons had been limited, however, a terrible mix of transparent wings and disjointed words. Croydee was determined to one day restore these lovable creatures to their rightful otherworld. Only then could he lessen his regret at failing to protect Sluken. Would his search through the palace prove that Pieter and Fripso had evaded this awful fate?
The Golding Page 29