Seeker

by William Nicholson

"As to coming back, let that fall as it may."

  "And maybe I'll bring Mama with me."

  "And again, maybe not."

  He gazed at her with his shrewd and gentle eyes.

  "There's those that think we hill people a little foolish and backward in our ways," he said. "And I'm not saying it isn't so. But don't trouble yourself to tell them they're wrong. There's all sorts of uses to being thought foolish."

  "You're not foolish. You're the wisest person I know."

  "And how many people do you know?"

  "So you must give me some wisdom, to carry with me.

  "So now you're wanting wisdom?"

  He made a show of fashioning great thoughts. Then he spoke with gravity, and slowly, giving his advice.

  "Never miss breakfast. Know more than you say. Leave rooms quietly."

  She kissed him, and he held her close for a moment or two, and both knew that all that needed to be said had been said. Even though they had their arms tight around each other, there opened up a gap between them. For Morning Star, this was the beginning of what she thought of as her real life. For her father, it was an ending.

  So they separated. Her father reached into his pocket and took out a little roll of black cloth tied up with string.

  "There's for you," he said.

  She untied it and found inside a braid of pure white lamb's wool. She put it to her face and felt its softness and smelled its smell.

  "A tickle of home," he said. "In case you forget."

  "I won't forget."

  She went outside. There was the book factor, his pack on his back, the strap over his brow. He now tipped himself forward and had no option but to set off. Barban strode along by his side. Morning Star followed.

  She looked back once and saw her father still standing in the doorway, solid and silent as ever, watching her, with Amik by his side. She raised her hand to wave, but he did not wave back. He stood there, glowing rose red with his love for her, and all around the rim of his aura was the tinge of deep violet, because his heart was breaking; but there was nothing she could do. So she lowered her hand and walked on.

  On the edge of the village, where the pathway forked, the book factor bade them farewell and turned north. Morning Star and her escort kept to the track that ran due west.

  As they went along, they heard the bleating of goats; and there on the steep hillside above was Filka, leading his flock down the mountain. He had a bag over one shoulder, and poking out of the bag was the furry white head of the puppy. He increased his pace when he saw Morning Star, so that he would reach the track before she passed by.

  At first Morning Star pretended she hadn't noticed him, because she didn't want to give him the satisfaction of knowing how much he distressed her. But he leered at her as she came closer, and put one hand on the puppy's head, as if to say, "No, you can't have him back." Then, getting no reaction, he held the puppy's head in his hand and turned it from side to side, so that Lamb too seemed to be saying to her, "No, no, no."

  Morning Star felt herself tremble with the intensity of the anger rising within her. She gave a low whistle in the direction of the village. Then she walked directly up to Filka, taking care to make no threatening gestures, and spoke to him in a humble and pleading voice.

  "You will be kind to him, won't you?" she said.

  "So long as others is kind to me," said Filka, grinning.

  Behind her she heard the patter of a dog running from the village. She glanced to her right and saw Barban waiting.

  "Oh, I'll be kind to you," she said.

  All at once she stumbled, fell against Filka, and screamed out, as if he had struck her.

  "Don't hurt me!" she cried. "Don't hurt me!"

  Barban acted with gratifying force and speed. He seized the goatboy and jerked him high in the air.

  "You want trouble?"

  "No—no—no!" stuttered the terrified Filka.

  "You touch her, I snap you in two!"

  He threw him back down onto the ground. The goatboy fell with a thud and lay there, whimpering. Morning Star pulled his bag free and lifted the puppy out, just as Amik came bounding up to her side.

  "Go, little Lamb!"

  She pushed the puppy at Amik.

  "Home, Amik! Home!"

  Obediently the sheepdog turned and headed back to the village. The little puppy trotted bleating after her.

  "Home, Lamb! Home!"

  Morning Star didn't take her eyes off the puppy until he was safe back in the village. It wasn't far. For a flicker of a moment, she thought she might change her mind and follow Lamb home. Her father would never think the worse of her for it; he would just be happy to have her back. Those few simple houses, straggling along the hill stream beneath the mountains, were the only world she knew. But there was Barban, standing over the goatboy, scowling and prodding at him with the toe of one boot.

  "Do I let him go?"

  "Yes. Let him go."

  The village was the past, as was the goatboy, and even little Lamb. She knew she couldn't go back, any more than she could bring back yesterday. So she turned her eyes away to the west and set off once more down the track.

  10. The Axer Repaid

  "SO NOW YOU'VE SEEN AN AXER IN ACTION," SAID BARban, "I hope you're satisfied."

  "Yes," said Morning Star. "Thank you."

  This wasn't quite enough for the big man.

  "I'm surprised you've not heard of axers," he said. "Axers are famous the length and breadth of the empire."

  "The empire of Radiance is far away," said Morning Star. "We hill people keep to ourselves."

  They were making steady progress along the ridge way, rising and falling with the undulation of the hills. Behind them, in the hazy distance, rose the mountains. Before them, the plains. By now Morning Star was farther west than she had ever been in all her life. She tried not to look back, not to think of home, reaching forward with her eyes and her mind across those plains to the faraway forested banks of the Great River and down the river all the way to the sea. She had seen rivers before, but she had never seen the sea. Hard to imagine looking out over a distance that has no markers, that goes on seemingly forever. And hard to imagine the place to which she was travelling, the rocky island in the river mouth, where her mother was waiting for her.

  Until we meet again.

  "The empire of Radiance is never far away," said Barban. "If you were to go to the lake city, you'd see a thing or two you've not seen before. There's nothing like it in all the world. There's houses there with golden tiles! Roof tiles made of real gold!"

  Morning Star said nothing to this. She wasn't interested in the empire of Radiance or the city by the northern lake. But after an hour or so in which they had walked in silence, her escort had begun to talk, and had kept up a ceaseless chatter ever since.

  "I expect you're thinking, Don't thieves come in the night and steal the gold from the roofs? But what would you say if I told you there are no thieves in Radiance?"

  Morning Star said nothing at all. Barban didn't mind. It suited him to conduct both sides of the dialogue.

  "You'd say, How can that be? And I would tell you, Because no one breaks the law in Radiance. And you would say, Surely, Barban, there are evildoers everywhere. Why don't the evildoers do their evil in Radiance? And I would answer you, Because of the axers!"

  This was always his conclusion: the fearsome glory of the mighty axers of Radiance.

  "We axers trained every day," he told her. "We did rock running—that's running races, carrying great rocks. And log splitting. Not with our axes. Oh, no! With our fists!"

  "Had you mislaid your axes?"

  "Mislaid? No, not at all. That was the training. To strike with the fist, but with the power of an axe!"

  He struck the air before him.

  "We axers could stun an ox with a single punch."

  "Poor ox! Why did you do that?"

  "Training! All training! Do you have any idea how much armor an axer wears? Or how he
avy it is?"

  "None at all."

  "The chest guard alone would be heavier than you are. Thick iron plates, overlapping each other, stitched to heavy canvas. Like wearing two smallish adults on your back. Imagine that!"

  "Very peculiar," said Morning Star.

  "And the helmet. Put that on and you know about it! Solid iron; sits on your shoulder pads, heavy as a child."

  "So you go about wearing two smallish adults and a child?"

  "Now you're getting the idea."

  "Very peculiar indeed."

  "That way, when you go out on a strike, no one can touch you. Great Sun, that's a sight to see! When you're an axer on strike with your team about you, you're a god come down to earth! One sweep of your chain and nothing's left standing. The little people scream and run, I can tell you! It's a sight to see when an axer's on the march."

  He stomped down the track, reliving the moment, sweeping the air before him with an imaginary chain.

  "Get the height of the chain just so, you could slice the little people's heads off, plop! plop! plop!"

  "You must have liked that," said Morning Star.

  "Best time of my life," he replied. "I was never happier."

  "So why did you leave?"

  The smile fell from his face. The sweeping arm dropped back down by his side.

  "Retirement," he said.

  "Oh, I see. You're old."

  "I am not old" He spoke with sudden bitterness. "Look at me! Do I look old? I'm stronger than ever! Watch this!"

  He jumped down off the track and planted himself before a tree that grew in the ditch. Raising his right fist, he took aim at one of the lower branches.

  "Ya-ha!" he cried.

  His fist struck the branch close to the trunk, where it was as thick as his thigh. With a rending crash, the branch tore away from the tree and fell to the ground.

  "Does that look old? Does it?"

  He glared at Morning Star. She looked down at his right hand. The knuckles were raw and bleeding.

  "That must have hurt," she said.

  "Didn't feel a thing. Look at that! Look at it!" He dragged up the heavy branch and thrust it in her face. "Could an old man have done that?"

  "No."

  "Well, then. Maybe you'll agree now that I'm worth two hundred shillings."

  "That was my father's agreement. It has nothing to do with me."

  "Except you've got half my money."

  "Deliver me safe to Anacrea, and it's yours."

  They walked on. Barban discreetly nursed his bruised right hand. When they reached a stream, Morning Star said,

  "You'd better wash that hand."

  He knelt and bathed the bruises, wincing as he did so.

  "Of course," he said, "if I'd been an axer on a strike, I'd have been wearing armor-plated gloves."

  "So they don't let you keep your armor when you retire?"

  "No," he said. "You get a medal."

  He pulled it out from where it hung round his neck: the sun in splendor, issuing rays to the world.

  "That's the sun, isn't it?"

  "That's the Radiant Power. The source of all life."

  "You believe that?"

  "Of course. Look!"

  He shaded his eyes and pointed up at the sun, burning in the cloudless sky above.

  "What could be more powerful than that?"

  "The one who made it."

  "Who could make the sun? No, trust me. That's where it begins and where it ends. The Radiant Power rules the world, and the king and the priests of Radiance are its favored sons. You know how I know that?"

  "How?"

  "Because nowhere is as powerful or as rich or as glorious as the empire of Radiance!"

  I see.

  "So that's the proof of it. The strongest people have the strongest god. It stands to reason."

  I see.

  They walked on in silence for a little while. Barban was feeling better now. It seemed to him that this odd moonfaced child was at last beginning to understand the realities of the greater world.

  "Look who we have here," he said.

  Ahead of them, approaching from down the track, was a little family of spikers: a scrawny woman, a man with tired eyes, and a two-wheeled cart drawn by a half-starved bullock. Two small children rode in the cart, on top of what looked like the family's entire worldly goods.

  "Road scum!" said Barban with disgust.

  As they passed, he struck the bullock to make it pull off the track.

  "Out of our way!"

  "Stop that!" said Morning Star. "Leave them alone! It's their road as much as ours."

  "They're spikers! Homeless gutter-filth!"

  "Forgive my companion's rudeness," said Morning Star to the spikers. "He's an ignorant man."

  She led the bullock back onto the track, watched in a cowed silence by the spiker family. She didn't need to study their colors to know that they were frightened and hungry.

  "Who are you calling ignorant?" growled Barban.

  "You," she said.

  She felt in her money bag and gave the spiker woman a gold shilling. The man bobbed his head in mute gratitude. The woman held the coin tight and tears welled up in her eyes, but she had no words. Who knew how far they had come? Perhaps they even spoke some other language. The roads were full of sad little families like this, driven from their homes by war or plague or famine.

  Barban couldn't believe his eyes.

  "That's my money! You're giving away my money!"

  "It's not your money."

  "You gave money to spikers!"

  "It's my own money. I do as I please."

  Morning Star walked on, to force the big man to follow after her and so leave the spiker family in peace. One gold shilling was a substantial sum to such poor people. It would buy them food and lodging for the next week.

  "You're no better than a fool!" said Barban.

  "I'd rather be a fool than a brute."

  "Give me my money! Right now!"

  "No."

  "Then I stop here!"

  He came to a stop and stood with his trunklike arms folded across his chest, bristling with injured pride. Morning Star simply went on walking.

  "You come back here!"

  She did not even look round.

  "You stupid, wicked girl!"

  He came striding after her and seized her with one great hand.

  "Give me my money!"

  She clutched the bag tight to her chest. He shook her violently.

  "That's mine, and I'll have it!"

  He squeezed her arm in his powerful grip. She winced with pain but did not let go.

  "Do I have to rip your arm off?"

  "Yes! Go ahead! Rip my arm off!"

  "I could crush you like an ant!"

  "Go on! Crush me! Kill me!"

  For a moment it seemed he would. Then he gave her a push, which sent her staggering away down the track, and growled at her.

  "Don't think I won't!"

  Morning Star calmed her pounding heart and made her face smooth. She held her head high to show he had not frightened her.

  "You can go now," she said. "I don't want your protection any more."

  "I go where you go," the axer replied, "till I get my money."

  After that, they kept well apart from each other and did not speak. Barban walked ahead, making no concession to the girl's shorter legs, and from time to time she was forced to break into a run to keep up. But she was too proud and too angry to ask him to slow down.

  The big axer was a good hundred paces ahead of Morning Star when they came to the river. This was not yet the Great River that flowed down to Anacrea, but it was too wide and too deep to cross on foot. A canoe was moored by the riverbank, and there were two boatmen lounging beside it beneath a makeshift sun shelter. Even from this distance, Morning Star could tell from their colors that something was not right about the boatmen. She saw Barban reach them and speak to them. She saw them nod in response and unhitch the canoe. The
closer she came, the surer she was that the boatmen were not what they pretended to be.

  Barban now turned towards her, waiting with open impatience for her to catch up. He reached out a hand and snapped his fingers.

  "Money!" he said.

  He meant money to pay the boatmen, as she well understood. But she stopped short.

  "No," she said. "Something's wrong."

  The orange glow that hovered round the boatmen was now all too clear.

  Barban lumbered towards her.

  "Wrong?" he said. "Why should anything be wrong?"

  Morning Star backed away, but he was too quick for her. His hand shot out and seized her bag and ripped it from her, snapping its cord. He ran back to the riverside and jumped into the canoe. The boatman with the mooring rope followed him. The canoe shot out into mid-river.

  Barban held up the bag in triumph.

  "Nobody gives my money to spikers!" he called out to her. "Nobody cheats an axer!"

  Morning Star was speechless. She had been so focused on the boatmen that she had failed to guard against Barban.

  "Show more respect next time!" he crowed from the canoe. "Nobody insults an axer!"

  The boatman with the paddle turned the canoe upstream, while the second boatman rummaged for a bundle in the bottom of the canoe. Morning Star was still bewildered. The boatmen's colors had been strong and clear, even before Barban had spoken to them. How could she have misread the situation so completely?

  "Evil little witch!" shouted Barban. "I hope the spikers get you!"

  The second boatman gave a flip of his arm to unloose the bundle, and a net swooped upward like a wave and fell down over Barban even as he called out his taunts. The net was weighted all round its edges, and the man who threw it was skilled in his business. Before Barban knew what was happening, the net had closed tight all round him and dragged him down into the canoe bottom. There, both working together, making swift well-practiced movements, the boatmen covered him with a heavy blanket and pinned him down with iron bars. Trussed, bundled, and caged, the bewildered axer could be heard howling out his muffled rage as the canoe carried him away upriver.

  Morning Star had no idea who the boatmen were or why they wanted Barban; but her faith in her colors was restored. Barban had schemed to rob her, certainly; but the boatmen were cleverer schemers and robbers than he. Now, already, the canoe was gone from sight. Slowly the rapid beating of her heart became calmer, and she turned her thoughts to her own situation.