by Vashti Hardy
“We’ll head back where the Aurora crashed through the trees and pick up some wood, and we may be able to find some evidence of what happened on the way.”
Fractured trees and branches were all around, and the ground was littered with various bits of metal and wood from the ship.
“What will we do, Harriet?” Arthur said.
“We don’t wallow. We try and find out what happened, we re-gather and make a new plan.” Harriet pointed at one of the metal objects by Arthur’s feet. “What’s that?”
Arthur stooped and picked it up. It looked to be a piece of metal from the Aurora’s engine. Harriet examined it.
“It’s from the hydra-valve. But these marks are very regular, almost as though it was gnawed through by…”
“By?” Arthur said.
“A creature.”
“What are you saying?”
She stared at him, her eyes deadly serious. “It’s ruptured. It would have likely caused a pump to blow. This looks like the explosion was deliberate.”
Arthur raised his eyebrows. “The silver insect! I saw it when we reached the Third Continent shore. It was small enough to have slipped inside the ship’s engine unnoticed, but big enough to do some damage.”
Harriet ran a hand through her wayward hair. “You think it could be a sapient creature, working on instruction?”
He paused, he couldn’t believe he’d not made the connection. “Eudora Vane’s brooch!”
“How hard was that knock to your head, Arthur?”
“You’ve seen the silver brooch she wears. Except I’m betting it’s not jewellery at all, it’s probably a sapient insect.”
“You’re saying it was sabotage?”
Arthur nodded. “And the other two ships had to drop out due to sudden damage; it’s rather a coincidence, don’t you think?”
Harriet nodded. “Let’s gather the wood and get back. We need to tell the crew, in case you’re right and Eudora tries anything else. We need to be wary of her whole team.”
They fell silent as the forest darkened around them, and they gathered wood into a large pile. The trees seemed to squeeze in around them in the fading light.
Then he heard the voice in his head again. “Why do you come?” He flinched. It was probably the bang on the head messing with his mind.
Harriet stopped and looked at him. “Are you all right? Maybe we should go back.”
He shook his head. “I’m fine.”
“Why do you come?”
He looked through the trees. Dark shapes loomed in the gloom and he had the feeling they were being watched. “Did you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
He shook his head.
She paused and stared at him. “Come on – even in this light I can see how pale you’ve become. We’ve got enough wood for now. It’s time to head back.”
Arthur didn’t argue. He locked his iron arm into an arc which he used to hook a bundle of the firewood. They went back to the Aurora, Arthur glancing back over his shoulder every few moments.
Back at what remained of their ship, Felicity had gathered the scattered food supplies and organized them into rations. She was making soup in a big battered pot.
As the crew sat subdued around the fire, Harriet told them of Arthur’s suspicions. Then a familiar rumbling sounded in the distance – the engines of the Victorious. They froze as it flew nearer until it was almost on top of them. Harriet ordered everyone to the tree line. Arthur dashed behind a tree with Maudie, and Harriet behind one nearby.
From their hiding places, they watched as the ship appeared above them and came to a hovering standstill. Great gusts of smoke from the engines plumed into the devastated clearing made by the crash.
“Having a little problem, Miss Culpepper?” Eudora called.
Arthur looked from behind his tree, up through the clearing. Beside Eudora a man stood, holding a gun and grinning. It was Mr Smethwyck, the insurance representative who had visited them.
Maudie pulled him back. “Are you mad?”
“It’s him, the man from the insurance – he’s with her!”
“We’d offer to help, but time is short and we have the South Polaris to claim. If you could hand over your fuel – we could do with a little more,” Eudora called.
“I’m afraid we don’t have any pitch, Eudora,” Harriet shouted.
Eudora laughed. “No pitch? Don’t be absurd. What are you powered by?”
“All we need is water.”
Arthur couldn’t help but take another look. Eudora’s expression was ice cold, her lips tight with fury. She muttered something, as though talking to herself, then the silver brooch unfurled its wings, and took flight in the direction of the sky-ship wreckage. It was a sapient insect.
It whizzed past Arthur, sharp mandibles gnashing. He thought of the marks in the damaged hydra-valve. The insect darted quickly amongst the wreckage of the Aurora looking for pitch, but of course there was none. It flew back to Eudora.
“Pitch or not, it seems your journey is over. Enjoy your time in the forest, Miss Culpepper – the short night will be here soon. When the native beasts tire of their meagre pickings, you’ll be a veritable feast. If they don’t get you, the elements soon will.”
With that, the engines fired up and the Victorious headed onwards, leaving a great plume of pitch smoke choking through the trees.
“So much for the Explorers Code: ‘Assist fellow travellers first.’ Come on, let’s get prepared for the night,” Harriet said, shaking her head.
Arthur pulled Maudie to the side. “I can’t sit here while she gets away with what she did. Come on, Maudie, we’re going after them. We can sneak away while no one’s looking.”
“Arty, you’re not thinking straight.”
“We’ll lose them unless we go now.”
Maudie rolled her eyes. “We need to think – you can’t just go running off into the forest alone.”
But there was no time. The Victorious was disappearing, and Arthur hadn’t come all this way for nothing. He was going to find Dad’s ship – he’d chase the sound of the Victorious south until he found it. “Are you coming or not?”
She planted her feet and put her hands on her hips. “Arthur Brightstorm, you’re not thinking.”
“Fine!” he snapped.
Arthur stormed off into the forest.
Maudie shouted after him.
He broke into a run, trying desperately to keep up with the fading engines.
“Arthur, what are you doing?” Harriet called.
But he couldn’t stop, because if he did, reality would catch up with him; that Dad was really gone for ever, that he had no idea what the future looked like any more, and that he might never find the truth and be able to clear the Brightstorm name. He charged onwards, the snow dragging at his feet and pine branches clawing at his clothes.
After a while, the hurried slur of footsteps through snow caught up with him. Harriet grabbed his shoulder. They both came to a standstill, gasping for breath. The Victorious was miles away already. It was hopeless.
Harriet glared at Arthur. “What in all the Wide are you thinking? I have responsibility for the crew, Arthur Brightstorm, and I will do everything I can to protect their lives, and that includes you. I have a duty to keep you safe in the most trying of environments, and you’re not helping me by running off!”
“Eudora Vane had something to do with what happened to Dad. I need to know.” The tight lump in his throat stopped him saying any more. He swallowed back, trying not to burst into tears in front of Harriet.
She sat in the snow, leaning against a pine tree. “If you’d stayed still long enough to listen, I would have told you my plan.”
“You have a plan?” He sat against the tree beside her.
Harriet smiled. “Always. I’m thinking we rest here for the short night, and at first light we head for the frozen lake with a core team of four. I need as many as I can to stay and salvage what’s left of the Aurora. The front half of the ship
looks viable, and the main balloon is intact. The blown pump is irreparable, but the other is relatively undamaged, so I’m instructing the crew to make a half ship out of the useable parts. Welby will be in charge here, directing the majority on repairs, while the core team will attempt to make it to South Polaris. When we return, the crew will have hopefully made a sky-ship able to get us at least back to Solongo at the Last Post.”
He looked at the snowy forest floor, hoping beyond everything she meant he was going onwards with her. “We?”
“I want you to be part of the core team. I’ve seen your drive and resilience, and I know that I couldn’t separate you from Maudie – as much as I think her engineering skills would be of use here with Welby, Forbes will be sufficient. We can’t carry many supplies, so Felicity’s food knowledge can keep us alive when things become more extreme. Gilly can take care of the food for the rest of the crew back here. We’ll be on rations and it’ll be colder than you’ve ever experienced, but I know you can do this, and I know how much clearing your family name means to you.”
He could hardly speak. There was still hope.
Harriet continued. “Giving up isn’t in my nature, or yours, it seems. But you must stop and think before acting, and you’ll need to listen – not just to me, but to everyone. I can’t have you taking off like that again.” She raised her eyebrows.
“Sorry, it felt as though it was slipping away.” But Arthur stopped suddenly, sure he glimpsed strange shapes through the trees and small circles of light reflected in the dark. He stared, squinting into the forest.
“What is it?” Harriet said.
The breath froze in his throat as he realized the lights were piercing green eyes staring right at them.
CHAPTER 20
THOUGHT-WOLVES
In Arthur’s haste to chase the Victorious, he’d forgotten about the darkness within the forest.
“It’s the beasts,” he breathed.
Judging by the height of the eyes, the creatures were enormous, much taller than a person.
“Don’t make any sudden movements,” Harriet said. Piercing emerald eyes shone in every direction. They were surrounded.
Then Arthur’s head buzzed as though a wave of electricity passed through him, and he felt the creature in his thoughts, probing, testing, demanding. Inside his mind were powerful feelings which started to form words, like the messages he’d heard before, but it was too confusing. Harriet must have heard too this time, because they both clasped their ears to block it, but it was right inside of them.
“Run!” Harriet shouted, grabbing his arm.
But her sudden movement seemed to release the creatures, who charged from the surrounding forest, snow flying from beneath their great paws. Arthur and Harriet spun around frantically – but there was nowhere to go, and all he could see was fur and great white teeth coming for them.
An enormous beast, twice the height of him, pounced. It crashed into him and bowled him over, tumbling to the frozen earth, before pinning him with its great paws and huge muscular shoulders. Another held Harriet beside him.
Paralysed by fear, he shut his eyes tight, praying for it to be over quickly.
The creature’s paws were heavy on his chest, the pinch of claws threatening to bite into him. The feeling was in his head again, forming into a word. It said fear, but it wasn’t coming from him, it was coming from somewhere else. He tried to block it out and forced his eyes open.
The creature’s wolf-like face stared down at him, its snout curled with a fierce snarl and its hackles raised. “Do you fear?” Its great shoulders tensed as it seemed to wait for his reply.
Arthur’s whole body trembled, but he forced himself to stare back – Dad would have faced it head-on. If this was his end and it was to be the same as Dad, then he should at least try to be as brave as his father would have been. Terrible scenes raced through his head as he imagined these terrible creatures killing Dad and the crew.
The great wolf’s head tilted, and then came the feeling inside his head again. Words trying to form. He didn’t want it there.
“Fear, you fear,” the words said inside him. Perhaps his terror was sending him mad!
“Stop!” he blurted, shaking his head.
“Arthur, don’t provoke it!” Harriet urged beside him.
“Look,” the voice in his head said. The claws dug into his chest.
“Just kill us and be done with it!” Arthur urged, and squeezed his eyes shut.
The voice sounded in his head strong and clear, somehow calmer. “Look.” The pressure on Arthur’s chest eased a little. He opened his eyes, his pulse racing in a constant stream of beats. The great beast’s face was inches from his own, but for some reason it still held back from attacking.
More words rushed in Arthur’s head – the creature was trying to communicate something. A question formed inside Arthur, something about hearing or listening. He forced himself to look into its eyes, and the words seemed clearer. “Can you listen?”
After a moment, Arthur nodded shakily. Words flashed through his mind too quickly to grasp, and he felt too panicked still to hear them. The sound of his own heart thumping against his ribs was louder than anything. “Please don’t hurt us,” he thought.
The creature tilted its head again.
What did people say in situations like this, meeting strange hostile creatures? “We come in peace,” he thought, but it sounded ridiculous.
“You are in pieces?” came the reply in his head. The great wolf looked across to the one pinning Harriet. Arthur almost laughed despite the terror still gripping him. But the words were clearer this time, easier to comprehend, as though his brain was becoming used to these strange feelings and words. The wolf-like creature was talking to him through thought – and he couldn’t believe it, but he could understand.
“Peace, no harm,” Arthur thought.
The wolf eased his paws from Arthur.
“No harm,” came the reply in Arthur’s head.
“What’s going on?” Harriet remained pinned beside him. “Welby said to bring guns as back-up, but I didn’t listen, I said it was a slippery road, now I…” Her wolf growled.
“Harriet, I think we should just stay very still,” Arthur said. “And try not to think anything aggressive.”
Arthur slowly eased himself to sitting.
“What are you?” he thought.
The words were hard to understand but his brain turned it into something that sounded like, “Thought-wolves”. It seemed to describe them perfectly.
More words rushed him. “Slower,” he thought.
There was a pause, then the words came more slowly. “We know you two-leg creatures.”
He thought of Dad and swallowed.
“Coming with your flying beasts, breathing smoke on to our snow forest.” It growled and snarled at him. “You came before and attacked us, killed some of my pack.”
He looked across at Harriet who still looked terrified.
“Please let us go. It wasn’t us; we’re not like that.”
“The sickly scent is in the air again.”
Arthur understood what the wolf meant – Eudora. He remembered the pelt. “We are peaceful. The ones who harmed your pack before – their leader was a female two-legs? The one with the sickly-sweet smell.”
The wolf growled.
“The one with a sickly scent told us you had killed a two-legs crew, a human pack.”
“We feed from the forest only.”
Relief flooded through Arthur. The thought-wolves hadn’t killed Dad or the crew – they had no reason to lie. “We aren’t your enemy. We’re here looking for answers.”
The thought-wolf paused in thought, then looked at the one pinning Harriet. It released her. The others lost their aggression in an instant.
Arthur brushed himself down.
“What’s going on? Can you hear strange buzzing?” Harriet said, her voice still panicked.
“I can hear it. They’re communicat
ing with us. But don’t listen for words; listen for a feeling in their thoughts and they become words. It’s how they speak with each other. And they didn’t kill Dad and his crew – he said it was Eudora who attacked and killed some of their pack before.”
Harriet stared at him, dumbstruck. “You’ve … worked all that out with them? By thinking it?”
Arthur shrugged sheepishly.
“I am Tuyok.” The wolf bowed its head to him.
“My name is Arthur.” He gave a nod.
“Your sky beast crashed?”
“Our ship? Yes, the female pack leader, she’s called Eudora Vane. It was her fault. She doesn’t lead our pack – she has a different ship, sky beast. She’s flown onwards.”
Tuyok paced around him. “Why are you here?”
“We’re racing to South Polaris – it’s the furthest point south.”
“To search for food?”
“No, we’re going because, well we’ve never been there. Humans, that is. Two-legs.”
Tuyok looked curiously at him.
“And we’re also here because my father and his crew died here, and we want to find out how.”
“You seek truth?”
“Yes. And now we know they weren’t killed by wolves, it’s more important than ever that we find out what happened, and the answers are here somewhere, I’m certain.”
Tuyok’s thought presence left Arthur for a moment to speak with another thought-wolf.
“What’s going on?” Harriet said, looking uncharacteristically pale.
“Are you all right? They don’t mean us any harm.”
Tuyok returned to him. “We will take you where you must go, pack-leader Arthur.”
“Oh, I’m not pack-leader; she is,” Arthur thought. He looked towards Harriet. “Did you hear? They’re going to help us.”
“I’ve still no idea what you’re hearing. It’s just a buzzing in my head that I can’t make out.”
“We can get you through the forest to the frozen lake where the ghost sky-ship lies, but that’s as far as we travel.”
“The ghost sky-ship?” he thought, realizing Tuyok meant Dad’s ship, the Violetta. A small ripple of hope rushed through him.
“I am sorry, cub. The ghost sky-ship is a place of death and echoes. There have been no living two-legs in this land for many moon-cycles.”