Nomad

by R. J. Anderson

  “Ivy.” Martin slipped his fingers under her chin, turning her face toward him. “I won’t be gone long. I’ll be back tonight if all goes well, or at the latest tomorrow morning.”

  “If all goes well.” Ivy shook off the touch. “But what if it doesn’t? I could be waiting for days, never knowing what’s happened to you. Like the last time.”

  It wasn’t really fair of her to say so: it hadn’t been Martin’s fault they’d quarreled before he flew off that night, or that he’d fallen into one of Gillian’s Claybane traps and couldn’t get back to her. Ivy knew better now than to think he would leave her without saying goodbye. But after losing her mother to the human world and her father to the mine, Ivy was all too used to being abandoned.

  “Never mind,” she said, before Martin could speak. “I can do some exploring on my own, and eat and sleep in swift-shape. I’ll be fine.”

  “Why not go to Molly’s?”

  “It’s too soon for that.” Gillian’s daughter was still grieving for her mother’s death, and her father would be at the house with her. It would be awkward.

  “Well,” said Martin, “it’s your decision. But it’s getting late in the year for swifts, so be careful. And take this.” He picked something up from the rock beside him, spelled it clean with a touch, and held it out to her.

  It was a diamond-cut gemstone on a golden chain, big and green as one of Ivy’s eyes. “What—” she choked, then cleared her throat and tried again. “What do you want me to do with it?”

  “Wear it, of course,” said Martin. “As a token of my good faith.” The corner of his mouth quirked up. “After all, if there’s one thing I’ve learned about spriggans, it’s that they don’t give treasure away lightly.”

  If Ivy’s cheeks had been hot before, they were sizzling now. She could only hope that her sun-browned skin would hide it. “But don’t you think it’s a bit—I mean, I’m not old enough—and we haven’t known each other long—”

  Martin broke into the first genuine smile she’d ever seen from him: not the usual slow curl of the lips or wicked flash of teeth, but a boy’s grin of pure, unbridled delight. “I’m sorry, did I just propose to you by accident? Is that what piskey-boys do when they want to marry, give their sweetheart a necklace?”

  Ivy wished the hillside would open like the mouth of a hungry giant, and devour her whole. “You mean… faeries don’t?”

  “Not at all,” said Martin, and Ivy wanted to slap him for looking so amused. Couldn’t he at least have the decency to share her embarrassment? “I only meant to put your mind at ease. All right, what about this?” He dropped the necklace and picked up a copper bracelet.

  “You don’t need to give me anything,” Ivy protested, but Martin had already clasped it around her wrist.

  “Fits perfectly,” he said. “And now…” He laid his fingertips on the bracelet, and the copper grew warm. “Just like the old game. If it’s hot, I’m close; if it’s cool, I’m far away.”

  “And if it’s cold?”

  “Then I’m dead—or else I’ve flown to Iceland. But I doubt you’ll have to worry about that.”

  Ivy touched the slim twist of metal in wonder. It might not be a pledge of love, but coming from Martin, the gift was far from meaningless. As a fugitive he could ill afford to promise anything, let alone make it easy for anyone to track him down. Yet he’d done this just to reassure her.

  “So,” Martin continued, dropping the last few bits of treasure into his pocket and climbing to his feet, “When the bracelet turns warm again, I’ll meet you here at the carn. All right?”

  Ivy managed a smile. “All right.”

  When Martin was gone the bracelet on Ivy’s wrist turned cool, and the hillside seemed lonelier than ever. She checked the carn one last time to make sure it was safely shut, then took a running jump off the ridge and transformed to swift-shape.

  By the electric feel of the air, a thunderstorm was coming. The last time that happened Ivy had ridden it out, chasing Martin from one wild air current to the next until her pulse beat hard as the rain on her close-feathered wings and her head reeled with excitement. But a thrill like that was better shared, and Ivy had no heart for games right now. She dived past the ruined fogou, and shot off into the grey morning sky.

  The valley dropped away below her, receding to a mere ripple in the landscape. Ivy rose higher, a tiny black dart against the clouds, faster than any but the swiftest falcon and borne on untiring wings. Her sharp eyes scanned the landscape, marking the deliberate piles of carns and quoits, the lumpen outcroppings of the tors, the lines of drystone hedges—and most of all, the chimneys of the whim-engine and pumping-engine houses that marked the sites of former mines.

  Over the past few days Ivy had inspected many of those mineshafts, climbing as far down into the darkness as she could. But none of them had the cozy, welcoming feel of the mine she’d grown up in, and most of them were flooded so deep it would have taken months of labor to pump them dry again. It was hard to imagine even the toughest knocker choosing to live in a place like that.

  Yet her people couldn’t stay in the Delve much longer, no matter how hard they’d worked to make it beautiful. With hundreds of disused tin mines to choose from, was it mere bad luck that they’d settled on the one that turned out to be poisoned? Or were all the old workings contaminated the same way? Ivy wished she knew—better yet, that she could prove it. But even if she could identify the poison and track it to its source, it would take a miracle for her aunt Betony to listen to her now.

  The first drops of rain fell, trickling off her back and wing-feathers. The swift part of Ivy urged her to rise above the clouds and keep flying, but she suppressed it and veered southward, heading for the Delve. Yes, Betony still held the title of Joan the Wad, queen of the piskeys, and Ivy knew better than to defy her fire-wielding power. But she hadn’t seen her old home since the day she was exiled, and surely it could do no harm to fly past it? Especially since Betony had no idea that Ivy could become a swift…

  Or at least Ivy hoped not. Her brother Mica might have turned his back on her in disgust when he’d found out she could change shape, but she couldn’t bring herself to think he’d betray her. Surely his determination to hold on to what was left of their family honor would keep him quiet, if nothing else.

  Still, it wouldn’t do to make herself obvious, or Mica might be tempted to reconsider. She’d make a discreet survey of the Delve from the air, and continue on her way.

  But when Ivy caught sight of the engine house that had once belonged to the mine called Wheal Felicity, with its broken-down roof and stone walls overgrown with vines, Ivy’s resolve crumbled. She’d grown up in this place, and her exile had left an aching void inside her that not even her mother’s love or Martin’s friendship could fill. She couldn’t bear to leave without seeing at least one of the friends and neighbors she’d left behind, even if it was just old Hew stepping out of the Earthenbore to smoke his pipe.

  But not even the most determined hunters would go out in weather like this, so she’d have to wait until the storm blew over. As she swooped through the engine house, Ivy spotted the remnants of a jackdaws’ nest tucked into the crumbling brickwork, sheltered from the wind and rain. Her short swift’s talons were poorly made for such a perch, but she darted into the alcove and landed with only a little difficulty. Then she settled down in the damp straw and began to doze with one eye open, in the strange half-sleep of birds.

  She was dimly aware of thunder rumbling in the distance and the clouds roiling overhead, of a hissing downpour pelting the stonework all around her before gradually fading away. But it wasn’t the end of the storm that woke Ivy, it was the sound of two people talking.

  “I’m tired, lass. And it’s so damp today. Can’t it wait until tomorrow?”

  “It’s all right, Mum, I’ll help you. Climb up here and I’ll take your arm, and we’ll fly to the top together.”

  Ivy hopped upright in excitement. It was Jenny, her lif
elong neighbor and best friend in the Delve. If she could only find a way to talk to her…

  Jenny’s mother broke into wheezing coughs, and ended with a groan. “I can’t do it, Jenny. Don’t waste your strength on me. Let me go back to the cavern and lie down a bit, and I’ll be all right.”

  “Mum, please. Just try. Mum!”

  No answer. The older woman had gone.

  Ivy had to move quickly, before she missed her chance. She scrabbled off the ledge and dropped to the ground, landing in piskey shape. Then she leaned over the caged top of the shaft and called softly, “Jenny!”

  There was a long pause. Then a reply came, wary and tremulous: “Ivy? Is that you?”

  “Shh,” whispered Ivy. “Yes, but it’s a secret. Can we talk?”

  Light sparked in the darkness, growing from a pinpoint to a small, luminous figure as Jenny fluttered up the Great Shaft to meet her. Her moth-wings made no sound, but Ivy could hear her panting, and by the time she reached the top she looked exhausted. Ivy put her hand through the bars, and Jenny gripped it.

  “I can’t go any farther,” she gasped. She looked paler and thinner than Ivy remembered, or was that a trick of the light? “I musn’t. But I’m glad to see you.” With Ivy’s help she climbed onto the inside lip of the shaft and sat down, with the metal cage between them. “When the Joan said you’d gone to live with your mother I was happy for you, but I wished we’d had the chance to say goodbye.”

  Ivy hesitated, weighing how to answer. The laws of the Delve decreed that women and children had to stay underground, and Jenny was too mindful of her duty and her reputation to disobey. Yet she’d come this close to the surface, and she’d been urging her mother to do likewise, so she must have at least some doubts…

  Besides, Jenny had always been one of Ivy’s closest friends. If she couldn’t trust Jenny, she might as well give up on the Delve altogether.

  “I didn’t leave by choice,” Ivy told her quietly. “Betony banished me from the Delve, and told me I could never come back.”

  Jenny’s lips parted in dismay. “How could she? If you hadn’t broken the Claybane curse, we’d all have been trapped for the rest of our lives!”

  “But if I hadn’t gone up to the surface, the Delve would never have been attacked in the first place. Or at least that’s what my aunt believes.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense,” said Jenny indignantly. “Keeve disappeared long before you did, and so did your sister. If you’d stayed here, that faery would have gone on catching piskeys one by one until the Delve was empty, and we’d never have known what happened to us!”

  Ivy’s heart warmed. She’d despaired that any of her people would understand, but Jenny had always been clever. “Maybe,” she said, “But I still broke the law when I left to search for Cicely. And I broke it again when I brought Molly into the Delve.”

  “Molly? You mean the human girl who helped free us from the Claybane?”

  Ivy nodded. Gillian’s daughter had been the only one who could release the trapped piskeys, once her mother was dead.

  “But she was only a girl, not much older than Cicely! She wasn’t spying out our defenses or trying to steal our treasure, she was doing us a kindness. It’s not fair to blame you for that!” Jenny drew breath to go on, but her throat rattled and she doubled up coughing instead.

  Jenny’s mother had always had a weak chest, but this was the first time Ivy had seen her friend like this. “You’re not well,” she said in alarm. “How long has this been going on?”

  “It’s only—the poison-spell—that faery dropped—down the Great Shaft,” rasped Jenny. “I inhaled some when we were helping Mum and the others escape.” She coughed again, and sat back with a bleary smile. “But it’s nothing serious. The Joan’s been casting spells to clear the air, and she says we’ll soon feel better again.”

  Of course that was what Betony would say. The possibility that there had been poison in the mine before Gillian came was unthinkable, because that would mean she’d been wrong to banish Ivy—and six years before that, Ivy’s mother—for telling her so.

  “I hope you’re right,” said Ivy carefully, “but… I’m not sure that smoke-spell Gillian cast was poisonous.”

  Jenny blinked at her. “But it must have been. The way it smelled! And what about your father?”

  Flint had given his life to destroy Gillian’s smoke-spell, and the memory of the last time Ivy had seen him, standing in the hazy darkness with his thunder-axe in hand, still haunted her. “I know,” she said. “But if Gillian could have poisoned us all so easily, she wouldn’t have needed to use the Claybane. I think the smoke was only meant to frighten us, so we’d all run for the surface—and into her traps.”

  “Oh, Ivy.” Jenny looked stricken. “But that means…”

  Ivy cut in quickly, not sure she could bear it if Jenny finished the sentence. “I know this may be hard to believe, but the Delve has been poisoned for a long time. Look at me, Jenny.” She crouched closer to the bars. “Remember how sickly and pale I used to be when I lived underground. Do I look like that any more?”

  “No,” Jenny whispered, tears in her eyes. “But I do. Most of us do, especially the old ones. Mum’s chest is getting worse every day. Even my little brother Quartz coughs sometimes, and he can’t run half as fast as he used to. But if the Joan’s spells won’t help us, what will?”

  “The same thing that helped me and my mother,” said Ivy. “She was dying when she ran away from the Delve—so sick she was coughing blood. But after a few days of fresh air and sunlight, she started to get better. And now… I wish you could see her. She’s beautiful.”

  “She always was,” said Jenny wistfully. She leaned back, studying Ivy.

  “I haven’t grown any wings, if that’s what you’re wondering,” Ivy said, and Jenny blushed.

  “I’m sorry. I just thought, if being out of the Delve had made you so much healthier, maybe…” She broke off with a little laugh. “Never mind, I’m being silly. You don’t need them.”

  No, Ivy didn’t, not now that she could become a swift. But she couldn’t say that to Jenny. She hadn’t even told her own mother and sister about her shape-changing, for fear they’d be just as shocked as Mica.

  “The point is,” she began, but Jenny started and held a warning finger to her lips. Ivy froze as a croaking voice rose from the bottom of the shaft:

  “Eh, Jenny, what are you doing?”

  “It’s Nettle,” hissed Jenny, her eyes round with panic. “I have to go.”

  Old Nettle was the Joan’s attendant, so Jenny had good reason to be frightened. “I’ll come back tomorrow,” Ivy whispered.

  Jenny let go of the bars and floated downward, her skirts belling out around her. “I’m coming, Nettle,” she called, and vanished into the darkness.

  Ivy stayed by the Great Shaft after Jenny had gone, hoping to catch some snippet of her conversation with Nettle. Would the old woman scold her for going so close to the surface? Would she threaten to report Jenny to her mistress? When Ivy lived in the Delve she had often climbed to the top of the shaft, but she’d always been careful not to get caught. She feared what might happen to Jenny if Betony found out.

  Though by the looks of her, Jenny was suffering already. Even apart from the cough, it was shocking how sickly-looking the older girl had become. Had the poison in the Delve grown worse since Ivy’s banishment? Or had Jenny only ever seemed healthy to her, because Ivy had been so ill herself?

  Whatever the answer, something had to be done about it. The idea of her proud, stubborn aunt still refusing to let the piskey women and children go to the surface, all the while enjoying complete freedom herself, made Ivy furious. Someone had to make Betony see reason—and if she’d written Ivy off as a troublemaker, the impertinent, headstrong daughter of a sister-in-law she’d always despised, then maybe she’d listen to someone like Jenny, who’d never crossed her even once…

  Except that no matter how hard Ivy tried, she couldn’t i
magine Jenny standing up to Betony. Not that the older girl was a coward, but she was humble, and always respectful of her elders. Besides, it wouldn’t be fair to ask her friend to take such a risk when she had her mother and young brother to think of.

  But who else would speak for the suffering women and children of the Delve?

  Ivy put her ear to the cage, but all she heard was the slow drip of water falling down the shaft. Resigned, she changed back into a swift and flew away.

  Ivy glided through the air, shrieking as she went in the instinctive, ceaseless cry of the swift. Wind-borne spiders tumbled past her, and she snapped them up—a meal that would have revolted her in her own form, but as a bird she didn’t think twice about it. When she’d taken the edge off her hunger, she skimmed over a pond for a drink of water, then shot through the clouds to bask in the brilliance of the midday sun.

  Ivy never tired of flying like this: it was a pleasure she could never take for granted. Especially after all the years she’d spent creeping weak and wingless through the Delve, never seeing the world above except in the darkness of a Lighting night. Back then she’d envied Jenny for having wings, but now she ached with pity for her friend, and all the other piskey-women she’d once thought so much better off than herself. She wished they could know the feeling that thrilled inside her now, the wild, delirious joy of freedom.

  Ivy rode the wind down the coast to the tip of Cornwall, where she found some ruins she and Martin hadn’t visited yet, and stayed there exploring until the storm-clouds shredded into ragged strips of grey. By the time she winged her way back to the Delve the sky was clear, the sun had dropped behind the Engine House, and the horizon blazed purple and coral. Perhaps now she’d meet another piskey she could talk to.

  Ivy knew all the secret exits from the mine, the winding paths the piskey hunters took through the underbrush on their way to the fields beyond. Her sharp eyes swept the hillside, and before long she caught sight of two of the older hunters climbing out onto the surface. First came Feldspar, then Gem caught up to him, and before long they were good-naturedly teasing each other, with plenty of elbow-jabs and barks of hoarse laughter.