by Sarah Driver
I nod.
‘We won’t be hurting that one. The Protector just wants to scare it off.’
‘Thank the sea-gods for that!’ I blurt, making Pangolin grin. Then I frown. ‘Did the Protector find Stag? Was he as close as the mystiks said?’
Wear your armour close to your heart and your enemies closer.
Her eyes harden. ‘We found no trace.’
Then she shakes the snow from her hair and smiles at me. ‘Will you come into the long-hall? Our Protector is desperate to meet your father!’
But before we reach the steps to the long-hall, Crow bounds up to me and grabs the back of my cloak. Yapok races after him. ‘Mouse!’ they both yell at once, making Da chuckle.
‘Crow and Yapok, I presume?’ he asks. ‘But which of you is which, I wonder?’
‘No time!’ says Crow roughly, knocking the hair from his eyes.
‘Ah,’ says Da. ‘You have answered my question.’
‘You have to come and see this!’ shouts Yapok, dancing on the spot.
‘What?’ I ask. But they pull at my sleeves, bundling me through the snow towards the gap in the rock where the storm used to rage.
‘Look!’ says Crow. There’s a wide opening now, and my breath catches in my throat when through the gap and a few feet below I see a swirl of red and gold. I hurry away from Crow, my blood jolting hard enough to make my heart twitch in my chest. I run to the gap in the rock and squeeze through and a sob bubbles into my throat when I see that below me a girl with a bundle of red braids climbs towards the stronghold, with a sea-hawk flying high above her.
It can’t be. My chest expands wider, wider, wider. I blink, waiting for my hope to explode to ash. But then the braids bob closer, and Thaw calls out for me.
Two-legs! Healing girl! She hereherehere! She breathes!
I run. I slip. I whack my hip on a rock and Crow’s fingers are under my armpits pulling me to my feet though I never knew he was with me. We pause on an outcrop of rock and stare down and – ‘Oh, my gods!’ I exclaim.
‘Told you, didn’t we?’ says Crow. When I meet his eyes, his grin is wide and bright and full of golden warmth, like his eyes.
Egret staggers through the snow in Kestrel’s wake, and behind them – wonder spreads through my chest. Behind them hike a long, snaking trail of Tribesfolk. As they grow closer, I can’t stop yelling her name.
‘Kestrel!’
She gets close enough to hear and looks up, a proper sunbeam-beautiful smile cracking like an egg over her wind-burned brown face.
I race down the mountain trail towards her, ignoring Crow’s warnings about eagles and snow-cats and breaking my bones. I don’t care a jot about any of the risks. I need to be with this girl, in this heartbeat, right now.
When I reach her she sweeps me into the tightest, warmest hug, and I press my nose into her neck and breathe her sweet smell. ‘I thought I’d lost you.’
She puts her fingers under my chin and makes me look at her. ‘That Stag knocked some sense into me,’ she says, wiggling her red eyebrows mischievously. ‘When I woke up, leagues from anywhere in that canoe, with a very sore head, I knew I must waste no more time putting my plan into action. The youth will unite, whether the full-growns like it or not.’ She looks warily up at Hackles.
‘Kes, I’ve got proper good news,’ I say, taking her hands in mine as Egret catches up, grinning at me. ‘Your ma, she . . . weren’t herself before.’ Then I explain how I got her back in her body and Kestrel picks me up and swirls me around, kissing my cheek, which has healed pretty well since she stitched it.
‘You wondrous girl,’ she tells me, over and over ’til I flush painful-red.
‘Kes, I was wrong before, about the other Tribes. I thought I’d never have a chance to gift you my sorry.’
‘Hush.’ She takes my hand. ‘Walk with me?’ And she leads her army of kids up the mountain towards her home.
We keep ahead of the trail of youngsters, talking in low voices about all that’s happened. ‘Once Stag and the mystiks discovered the Sky-Tribes they must’ve guessed they could strengthen their power by making the war last until the Tribes destroyed each other,’ says Kes.
‘Aye. That’s why he didn’t kill your ma – her being Protector of the Mountain makes her proper important and powerful. They twisted her power and made it his own.’
Kes takes up my thread, nodding. ‘He could see that our Hackles was a place he could use to rule over the mountain-folk, a place of ancient power.’
I nod, churning through my thoughts. So could Stag and the mystiks be trying to gather strongholds? My ship, to rule the seas. Hackles, to preside over the Sky realms. They’ve already got a foot wedged in the door of the Wilder-King’s domain. What about the Land?
‘And the thing is,’ mulls Kes, ‘both he and these mystiks seem to think they’re the ones in real control. Which way round is it, I wonder?’
When we reach the long-hall, Kes brushes down her torn and stained dress, wipes her face with her hands and ties her braids tighter on top of her head. ‘I can’t go in,’ she whispers, stunning me again cos this strong-limbed girl says she can’t do stuff and then challenges the whole world to battle.
‘You said you couldn’t leave, either,’ I remind her.
‘Mouse, I haven’t told you everything,’ she says, warmth making her freckles glow. ‘My mother didn’t just burn books.’ She lifts her eyes to my face and they’re scorched with pain. ‘She burned Wilderwitches, too. How will the witches ever truly forgive us? How will she forgive herself, if she remembers what she did? Part of me wishes she’d never woken up, into a world where she’s going to know all the terrible things she’s done.’
‘You’ve gotta deal with that later,’ I tell her. ‘It weren’t really her, don’t forget.’
She tightens the laces on her fur-trimmed snow-boots and counts each dagger pommel on her circular scabbard for heart-luck. Then we push open the double doors to the long-hall. The thrones have been taken away and windows have been cut into the shallower rock near the entrance, letting light in. Tribesfolk chatter, helping former prisoners to bowls of soup. The Protector glances up and when she sees us she catches hold of the back of a chair for support. She steps towards us, staring at Kestrel as though she’s been gifted a second chance at living the life she ought.
As they reach for each other, I’m already slipping away.
I spend the gloom-time before dawn talking with the Protector and her closest riders and Spearwarriors. Lunda eyes me suspiciously, but when I pass her a mooncake before taking one for myself she blinks and risks a small smile. I gift her one back and look away. Might be we’ll never be real friends, but I know what it’s like not to trust anyone outside your own Tribe. Now that the Protector’s spirit has come home, Lunda’s gonna have a lot of learning to do about unity.
‘It got in while I was grieving,’ the Protector tells me, eyes as green and gentle as Kestrel’s. ‘When my husband’s ghost worried these walls and I lost myself.’ She shudders, staring round her. ‘You have restored me to my people. I will do whatever I can to help you, and you and your kin will always have a place in my long-hall.’
‘Heart-thanks,’ I tell her, beaming.
‘Now it’s time I earned my title again,’ she announces. ‘I’m flying to battle. I must seek revenge on Stag and all those land-lurkers helping him. Not to mention the Wilder-King.’ Her jaw sets. ‘And I must regain the trust of the mountain-dwellers; the shepherds and villagers.’
‘No!’ I cry, and Kestrel nods. ‘War is exactly what Stag wants! He is the one driving home the bolts to keep the witches out! Please, for all we have fought for already, let us foster unity with witches!’
‘I have brought two young Wilderwitches here to the meeting,’ says Kestrel, lifting her chin proudly. ‘It is a start, huh?’
I remember the Wilder-King and how his forest is descending into just as much chaos as Hackles was. But I gift her a grin and squeeze her hand. ‘Aye. A prope
r good start.’
‘Very well,’ says her ma with a sigh. ‘I need to regain my strength, in any case. We will test out your plan.’ She smiles broadly.
I glance around the long-hall. You don’t earn trust easy with these Sky-folks. But as their suspicions fall away like rain, their eyes grow lighter when they look at me. Still the question rises in me. What am I, without my ship? But now my own voice answers, heart-strong. I am something, wherever I am in the world, because of my kin and the friends I have made along the way. If I’d never left my ship, I wouldn’t be who I am now; a girl looking at all these eager Sky faces, searching for unity.
Now I’m heart-certain that Grandma was right about what the fire spirits saw for me. That I will be captain. That’s why I have to go home and set things right, once I’ve taken the Land-Opal from Stag and gifted it to the crown along with its kin.
When the last of the trail of people have reached Hackles, there’s a feast cobbled together from the snippets of food everyone brought. While I’m eating, Sparrow comes to find me. ‘I’ve had another nightmare,’ he tells me, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand.
I pull him to one side. My heart clamours. ‘A vision? What did you see?’
Dread nips at my bones. He opens his mouth to reply when a heavy hand touches my shoulder. I spin to look. ‘Pike!’ I can hardly believe the heart-luck that he survived the battle with Stag and his cronies.
‘I’m a tough old boot,’ he tells me, eyes twinkling. ‘I’ve brought some friends to meet you.’ He beckons, and a small girl with a thick red braid flowing over her shoulder comes to his side, followed by a tall boy with short black hair and a smaller one with a shock of white locks. I blink, gasping at the grinning faces in front of me. My heart riots. ‘Squirrel! Hammer! Erm!’
Squirrel leaps for me and wraps her arms round my neck and we’re laughing and weeping together, sharing memories of home without needing to say a word. Then she and Sparrow start babbling to each other. I turn and Hammer’s swept me into a hug before I can breathe and Erm looks around awkwardly, until I step closer. Then we’re pressing our foreheads together in a Tribe-kiss without a second thought.
‘I can’t flaming believe I’m seeing you again!’ I tell them. They tell me their stories – how Pike and his kin sheltered them until the great burning, when they all had to run again. When they see Da, they jump around him like crazed beans, heart-glad to see a full-grown from our Tribe. They beg him for stories and he sits on a bench with them, bundling them into his arms. ‘So you’re finally back from your trade, then?’ says Ermine, in his usual grumpy way. Then Da musses his white hair and he breaks into a toothy grin. ‘Heart-glad to see you, Fox,’ he says.
Before Da can reply, Pike steps in front of him and the squirming bundle of kids. Da’s mouth falls open. ‘Friend,’ he says, voice thick with feeling.
‘Yes,’ says Pike, stamping over to sit on the bench and eyeing the long-hall. ‘We’ve heaps to talk about. But first, shall we eat?’
As I watch them, the Protector pushes through the crowd to find me. ‘It’s time for your Sky-naming!’ she tells me. I wanted to talk to Sparrow again, but now he’s playing with Erm and it’ll have to wait.
Yapok and Kestrel lead me to the platform where the thrones once stood. I sit on a goat skin and two Wilderwitch kids push bronze bracelets onto my wrists. They paint a rune onto my forehead and feed me sugar-dusted mooncakes. I try to gift them my heart-thanks but that makes them try to feed me more so in the end I stay quiet, cos my belly’s swelled near to bursting with cake.
‘Your sky-bow keens for a name,’ Egret tells me, mountain tattoos silvery bright on her cheeks.
I stare at the longbow, and the rune staves Egret etched into the wood, ones that I hope she’ll teach me. But why do Sky-folk name their weapons? I stare around at all the keen faces and let my eyes rest on Da. My da – his love is stronger than any blood-taint. My blood will not define me, and I will choose who I become. ‘I will call it Kin-Keeper,’ I tell them.
‘I am sorry for the mistreatment of you and your kin,’ says the Protector, stepping forwards. ‘Also for the behaviour of the so-called Wilder-King. My daughter is right about the need for unity – but perhaps the witches need a new leader. You have done a better job than any of the full-grown leaders of the Tribes. I believe Stag wants to destroy them and bring about war for all time. If it had been left to me, he would already have won.’ She looks away, eyes bleak. I climb down from the throne and take her hands.
‘What happened weren’t your fault, Protector,’ I tell her. Then I remember something and give a sudden shout, startling her. ‘The dream-dancing! You are the first one I ever met who could do it, too – I mean, some of the younger ones in my Tribe could do it ’til they turned about six, but no one else ever kept dream-dancing as they grew up.’
‘Do you know something?’ she replies, leaning closer. ‘I have never met another! When I was about your age I tried to tell my mother about it, but she told me never to speak of it again. Thank you for giving me the chance to accept myself openly, sea-sister.’ She smiles. ‘You should know my namesake. It is Leopard, but you may call me Leo.’
Next day, Yapok leaves for the Iceberg Forest, to check on the Skybrarian. Two days after that, Kestrel and Egret prepare their draggles. I swallow away a lump in my throat. I’ve grown close as a sister to the sawbones girl, and now she’s off to Nightfall to start secret talks with the young scholars there.
‘Then we’ll aim for other Tribes,’ she tells me, around a mouthful of snowy mooncake. ‘Ah, take heart, sea-sister! We’ll see each other again soon.’
‘Dunno what you’re on about,’ I grumble. But to make her heart-glad, I hold up a tear-vial and use it to catch a tear inside.
‘There you go,’ she says. ‘By the time I see you next, the air will have drunk your tears and all will be well.’ But when she sweeps me into a hug, she holds me so tight it’s like my bones are gonna snap and I know she’s gonna miss me as much as I’ll miss her.
‘Time to go,’ says Egret gently.
GogogogogogoHUNT, mutters one of the draggles, while the other snaps its teeth at Ettler, who squeals.
Kestrel pulls away and holds me by one shoulder. Her wide green eyes look into me, down to my bones, and sudden as lightning a picture of a merwraith flashes behind my eyes. A merwraith with one blind white eye, and one gaping, empty eye socket. I gasp, but Kes don’t notice cos she looks down and takes a scroll from her pocket. ‘Whoops! Almost forgot. Will you give this letter to my mother? I know she wouldn’t want me to leave so soon, and if I tell her in person I won’t want to, either.’
I nod, taking the thin scroll from her and rubbing my fingers over the wax seal.
Then she and Egret climb onto their draggles and I stand and watch them soar through the sky. I stay there, clutching Kestrel’s letter, long after I lose sight of the draggles’ orange fur.
I ent ready to head back to the shindig. Da’s there, with Sparrow and Crow. And the Protector wants to break hearth-bread with me. But I need some time to myself, to gather close the threads of my thoughts. I still feel numb. Even though we’ve done so much, we’ve brought the Sky-Tribes together and freed the Protector and found Da and claimed another Opal, I still feel too drawn to the shape-dancing world, and I can feel my spirit thirsting to fly.
I feel drawn to the shadowy other world where Grandma waits, beneath the waves, maybe – just maybe – slowly remembering the truth about who she is. The distance between us stretches taut as a bowstring.
I go to the courtyard, as the full moon rises and spills her milky light over the edge of the mountain. The weight of everything we must still do presses my shoulders, and my bones are weary.
Cos the rare times I sleep, I can feel the merwraiths pulling at my nerves, plucking my hair ’til it waves like seaweed. When I dream, I see the faces of Grandma and Rattlebones, blurring into one ancestral spekter. I can feel them stirring beneath the distant waves.
The clouds thin, and between them is a bright white beam like the fire spirits are searching me out on the mountain. A white streak like Grandma’s hair, waving in the sky. Grandma knew I could do this – all of it. Now comes the time to believe her.
When the moon is high, I turn to make my way back to the long-hall, but then I freeze. ‘Sparrow!’
My brother is curled on the steps of the long-hall. He must’ve followed me outside. There’s just enough moonlight to see his foggy eyeballs twitching here and there, like he’s watching another vision. ‘No!’ he mutters, tossing his head.
All the hairs prickle along my spine like needles, as purple fire kindles and then splurts violently from his fingertips. He didn’t get the chance to tell me what his vision showed. How long have we got until whatever he’s seen comes true?
Huge thanks to the amazing Liz Bankes, for shaping and shining this story into the best book it could be. Thank you for letting me know that you were a big fan of Sky, and that you also loved Sea. That ‘also’ meant everything during those famous book two nerves. Thank you for your thoughtful edits, warmth, humour and patience. And for inventing ‘best wish-teas!’ It’s been the best fun getting to know you.
Endless thanks forever to the wonderful Ali Dougal, for another expert edit and for continuing to be such a joy to work with on this trilogy. I’m profoundly honoured and grateful to have met a person as magical as you.