Ambergate

by Patricia Elliott

  And then I’d drop into space.

  I would cry out in terror and wake to find Gadd by my pallet, hushing me, smoothing my hair back from my face. Then I’d whisper over and over again, “How did I survive such a fall?”

  Gadd said nothing. He sat there quietly, a dark soothing presence, until at last my trembling ceased.

  But there was a curious thing. Sometimes on waking I had the sensation of wings beneath me. A sea of feathers held me up so that I floated on the night wind. It seemed that I skimmed the air, rose into the glittering, dark blue firmament, and sailed beneath the stars. I flew on, light as a bird, and all the time there was a force beneath me, supporting me, guiding my way. Whether it was dream or memory, I had no notion.

  All day long, the seagulls mewled over the rush dome above my head. I stared into space for hours, hearing their plaintive cries above the spitting of the fire, and my mind felt dull and empty. I wondered if I were going mad. When Gadd and Erland came back they often found me sitting on my pallet, huddled in the sheepskin coverlet and gazing fixedly at nothing.

  One afternoon, Gadd came over to light the rush lights on the shelf above my pallet, and surprised me. I’d pulled my screen across to give them the impression I was asleep, but I was lying on my back staring blank-eyed at the patterns the plaited rushes made as they met over my head in the darkening shadows.

  He sat down on a stool close by me in the pool of green light and sucked on his pipe in silence for a while, not looking at me.

  I sat up and pushed back my matted hair. “It’s the dratted seagulls,” I said fretfully. “They are sending me mad.”

  He said nothing.

  “I’m sorry,” I muttered at last. “I don’t know what can be wrong with me.”

  “Your soul yearns for what it’s lost,” he said calmly, “and for what it’s not yet found.”

  It was the truth, I realized, and my eyes pricked.

  “I’m thinking that soon it will be time to set about your new life,” said Gadd.

  Panic gripped me at once; I clutched the sheepskin.

  “Please, I beg you—could I stay here? I could cook for you both, keep house?”

  He looked about him, smiling. “A housekeeper, here? But it would not be seemly, the three of us living together in one room. Besides, Erland be away most times. It would not do—the two of us together.”

  “Please, Mr. Gadd!”

  “During the winter it be bitter cold in here. In the summer I be out all day and sometimes nights, given good weather.”

  “I wouldn’t mind,” I said, but he shook his head.

  “It be no life for a young girl,” he said gently. “Be there nowhere else you can go?”

  I thought of the letter in the pocket of my cloak, and said with reluctance, “I have an address where I may find employment, a house in Poorgrass Kayes.”

  “Aye, it be where I sell my work. Erland will take you there in the dory.”

  My heart sank. “But not yet, Mr. Gadd?”

  He considered me a long moment. “Not yet.”

  11

  After that day, things changed for me.

  The following morning, after the animals had been tended and we had eaten our breakfast of oatmeal and dried herring, Gadd set off with his fishing rod. I expected Erland to follow. By now I knew he hated being inside during daylight. Even in the evening he was never still. He moved restlessly around the cramped space by the fire and never settled to his weaving as his father did.

  Now he beckoned me to the opening in the rush wall. “Close your eyes,” he said.

  Puzzled, I obeyed. I felt him guiding me, then gentle fingers on my face. He turned my head to the light. “There! Don’t you feel it? The change in the sunlight?”

  Radiance lit the insides of my lids; I could feel warmth on my upturned face. It stole through me from the tip of my head to my feet. It bathed my cold skin, warmed my thin blood. When I breathed I could smell it in the air: a green warmth, as if everything in nature were breathing.

  In pleasure I opened my eyes and saw Erland’s smile. “Summer’s on her way.” He held out his hand, as if to pull me outside.

  At once I was frightened. “What are you doing?”

  “Going to check the boats. Come with me.”

  “But I…” I couldn’t think of what to say.

  Somehow I found myself outside the shelter, clutching the amber at my neck. The light was strong after so many days in darkness. It was as if I’d emerged from the cellar. I rubbed my dazzled eyes, and the light softened into a green-brown water-world.

  I saw the grass-and-wattle dome of the shelter where I spent my days. I saw shingle and tall grass and pools, glistening like tears, all the way to the rim of the sky. There were islands of silver birch and gorse, with bright yellow flowers like tiny drops of egg yolk, and high in the sky, seagulls wailing over a strange, flat land.

  It was the first time I had raised my head to look at it. I took my hand away from the amber. “It’s beautiful!” But there’s too much space, I thought.

  “It’s a wild, magic place, with its own rules,” said Erland. “You have to respect it.”

  He began to pick his way along a finger of shingle between water and reeds. His leather bag swung against his side. He wore no jacket over his rough calico shirt, as if it were already summer; his hair shone in the sun. I knew he was smiling again, a secret smile, at the fairness of the day.

  My legs were weak from lying around so long, and it was difficult to keep up. Erland was disappearing into a sea of reeds; at my feet, silver water oozed over the shingle. “Wait!” I wailed.

  He halted at once. His contrite face looked back at me.

  “For a moment I forgot,” he said, and held out his hand to guide me.

  I should talk to him in an interesting way, I thought, then he won’t forget me. But I didn’t know what to say. I knew he wasn’t one for idle conversation; he would be more used to birds and fish than girls. The silence grew heavy between us, but Erland seemed content with it, looking ahead, his face lifted to the sun. After we had been walking on firmer shingle for some time, I could bear it no longer.

  “Where do you fish?”

  “By the river or in the creeks,” he said, still gazing ahead.

  “Sometimes I cast from the bank, sometimes take the punt out.”

  “What’s a punt?”

  “A long boat, flat-bottomed. You pole it through the water. My father uses it when he cuts reeds for thatch.”

  I stared about, seeing nothing but tall grasses and splinters of still water. “Where are the creeks?”

  “You come on them suddenly. The river’s not far off, running near parallel with the sea. There’s more water than land in the Wasteland.”

  “Gadd cuts the reeds in summer?”

  Erland nodded. “He’s only two months at most to cut and spread. If I’m here, I help him.”

  “Spread?”

  “You spread the reeds out to dry them,” he said patiently. “You have to dry them in the open air. He’ll harvest by moonlight too, if the night’s clear.”

  “What does he do all winter?” I said, nonplussed.

  He gave a sudden laugh. “Struggles to keep himself and the animals alive. It’s hard, here on the Wasteland. If he’s time to spare, he weaves baskets and matting.”

  “And you? What do you do?”

  “It’s hard enough making a living for one, let alone two. My work takes me elsewhere. But if I’m here, I’ll sail the dory down to Poorgrass Kayes for him—sell his work in the market.”

  I did not want to think about Poorgrass Kayes. My legs ached; there was no sign of the river. “Let me sit a minute,” I begged.

  Erland nodded, and I sank down on the bright turf, between cushions of pale pink thrift. The water around us mirrored the reeds: I could see the sky reflected, a gull winging overhead. I leaned forward, parting the reeds, and suddenly saw a face gazing back: large eyes; pallid cheeks; long, matted hair. I’m ug
ly now, I thought.

  Erland sat down beside me and unfastened his leather bag. He took out a long mahogany box. “This was my grandmother’s toiletry box.”

  With great reverence he showed me what was lying on the faded silk lining inside: two yellowing lace collars; some faded hair ribbons, neatly rolled; a little waxy square of what looked like soap sitting in a glass bowl; a tortoiseshell comb. He held the box out to me. “Borrow it, if you like.”

  “Are you sure?” I said, touched.

  “She’d like to think of it being used.”

  I took out the glass bowl and sniffed at the soap: it still contained the faint, pleasurable fragrance of lavender. When I tried to fit the bowl back in, something was stuck in the lining, something that pricked me: a sharp point sticking out. When I pulled it, more and more came out. It was a single feather, long and white, the barbs crushed. A shiver went through me. I laid the feather quickly down on the grass and touched the amber stone at my neck.

  Erland picked the feather up, holding it to the sun. “A swan’s feather.”

  “You dare touch it?” I saw he wore no amulet himself.

  He smiled. “My grandmother always watched the swans at Murkmere.”

  “Murkmere? But that’s where I came from!” It slipped out carelessly. I hadn’t meant to tell him where I’d lived—Erland or his father.

  “I know,” said Erland. He was still looking at the feather, smoothing the barbs with his careful fingers.

  “How do you know?” I demanded, bewildered and suddenly apprehensive.

  “I know because that’s where we met, you and I.”

  I shook my head. “We’ve never met before.”

  He laid the feather down and turned to me, his eyes on mine: eyes, deep-set. For the first time I noticed their color: dark gray, almost black. “Don’t you recognize me, Scuff?”

  I shook my head again, fiercely; I was frightened now.

  “I lived at Murkmere too,” he said softly, “when I was a little boy. One day by the mere you rescued me. You took me home. Don’t you remember?”

  I did remember.

  “The little lost boy was you?” I said in disbelief. I stared at the youth beside me: long limbs and fair, stubbled beard, the little child long gone. And yet there was an ageless quality about his face.

  He nodded and gave a small smile. “The other girl wanted me to live with the swans, I believe!”

  “That was Leah. She was a strange girl.” I hesitated; I stared at him still. “But you are older than I am. The child I rescued then was young, younger than I was by a good deal.”

  “Haven’t we told you that time passes differently in the Wasteland?”

  “How can it?” I said. “It must obey the same laws, surely?”

  “This is not a place for formal measurements, for mechanical clocks or even sand timers,” he said curtly. I thought I’d irritated him. “I feel I’ve spent many different lifetimes here.”

  “But that can’t be so,” I said, half smiling.

  “You know nothing,” he said, suddenly angry. “You think I’d lie to you?”

  “No, no,” I stammered, taken aback. “Of course not.”

  “Well, then. Believe it.”

  After a while, I said timidly, for I could see he was brooding on it, “But if you lived at Murkmere, why did you leave?”

  There was a long silence. I thought he was still angry but then saw he was mulling over his words. “My father has told me that after my grandmother died, I wandered off— perhaps to look for her, he thinks. I don’t remember. He searched the estate, begged Silas the steward to order the keepers to drag the mere, but Silas refused. I don’t know what brought my father here to search for me in the Wasteland.”

  “You were here?”

  He nodded.

  “And you never went back?”

  “We never went back. My father wouldn’t work for Silas anymore. He’s always been good with his hands. Somehow he managed to make a life for both of us here.”

  “But—weren’t you ever lonely?” I couldn’t imagine it. I thought of the bustle and chatter of Murkmere in the days of the Master, all the servants rushing in and out of the steamy kitchen quarters.

  He grimaced. “I never missed the company of other children, but my father made me go to the village school. Each day I’d have to leave the reeds and water to go and study books.”

  “Then we must have had the same teacher, for I know Miss Jennet, who taught in the village. She now lives at Murkmere and has taught me!” It gave me pain to think of Miss Jennet.

  “She was a fine teacher,” said Erland, “though I was no scholar. She would box my ears.”

  “Mine too!” I said, forgetting my bitter thoughts. We smiled at each other.

  “You look nice when you smile,” he said. “Not frightened anymore.”

  “I’m always frightened,” I said in a low voice. “The world is too big.”

  “Is it the birds that frighten you? You wear an amulet.”

  “Most people wear amulets,” I retorted. “Are you so brave you’d defy the birds, or aren’t you a believer? Did you never attend Devotion and listen to the scriptures in the Divine Book, never learn the Table of Significance?” He is heathen! I thought.

  “How can any bird mean wickedness?” he said. “They are all the Almighty’s creatures. They behave as their natures guide them, and He has given them those.”

  “Oh,” I said. I thought a minute. “Do you believe He has given us our natures as well?”

  “Indeed He has.”

  But mine is a bad nature, I thought. He can’t have given that to me.

  “You look frightened again,” said Erland. “Is it because you think they will catch you?”

  He gently touched the brand mark on the inside of my bare forearm; it was showing where I had rolled up the sleeve of my blouse in the warmth of the sun. I snatched my arm away at once and bent my head so that my hair hid my face.

  “I’ve noted it before, I couldn’t help it,” he said. There was such compassion in his voice I pushed my hair away and looked at him.

  “I came to Murkmere from one of the Orphans’ Homes in the Capital,” I said at last. “In the Homes they brand the children when they first arrive.”

  He looked grim. “They should not do such a thing to any child.”

  He was so innocent, I thought. “It’s to identify us. They can reclaim us to work for them without wages if we run away later and are found by the Capital’s Enforcers. It’s called—Recompense.” I stumbled over the word. “They see it as a return for our keep when we were small. You can never escape if you’ve been in a Home.”

  In silence we looked at my scar, a raised whiter mark on my white skin—the number 102, and a square to show I was from the Gravengate Home—then I covered it up again. But I had not minded showing it to him.

  “You escaped,” said Erland.

  “I was sold to Silas, the steward at Murkmere. Sometimes they’ll sell off the children as servants. I was small and weak. They thought I wouldn’t be any use to them.”

  “So that’s why they’re looking for you? For their Recompense?”

  His eyes were gazing into mine, clear, concerned. I would have to tell him the truth, or some of it; it would not be right to keep silent. “I’m putting you and Gadd at risk,” I burst out. “I’m a wanted criminal, Erland! Soldiers of the Lord Protector are looking for me. They’ve traced me after all this time. If I’m found they’ll take me back to the Capital and try me in the Courts. I’ll get the death penalty, most like!”

  He was silent; I couldn’t tell what he was thinking.

  “You’ll be sorry now that you took me in,” I said in a small voice. “Shall you tell Gadd?”

  He shook his head. “He may know already—he knows most things. We looked after you because you needed us, not merely because you rescued me long ago.”

  He paused. “I think my grandmother took a fancy to you. She often talked about you afterwar
d—the girl with no name.”

  “You must wonder at my wickedness,” I said nervously. “You must want to know about my crime.”

  Erland looked away from me, at the soft feathery tops of the reeds. “Let the Almighty judge what’s wicked and what’s not,” he said. “It’s not for men.”

  The Almighty has allowed me to survive in spite of my crime, I thought. A tiny flicker of hope stirred inside me. Then I said, “But it’s men who make laws. And I’ve broken the law, and so I must be punished. That’s why the soldiers came for me.”

  “There are no soldiers here,” said Erland.

  “Does anyone ever come?”

  “Sometimes we find the drowned bodies of vagrants in the marshes. Bands of them sometimes group near the river in summer. But the Lawman keeps the only chart of the Wasteland and the ground is always changing. You are safe.”

  Later, when Erland took me back to the shelter and left me there to rest, I heated water and washed my hair with the soap, its lather still richly creamy and soft. Then I combed my clean hair free of tangles.

  It took a long while, but when it was done I sat in the afternoon sun until my hair was dry. The evening clouds were darkening overhead when I went back inside to stoke up the fire for supper. Canvas sail bags were lying against the wall. One had rolled too close to the fire for safety, so I picked it up to put with the others.

  It was strangely soft. Curious, I looked inside the neck of the bag. At once I flung it away from me and clutched my amber. I had to sit in Gadd’s chair until I grew calm. Feathers.

  But they were beautiful, not threatening, those silver-white feathers, like the single feather in Erland’s grandmother’s box. I knew the sail bag contained the swanskin I remembered seeing in their cottage long ago. Erland cared nothing for blasphemy; he had kept the swanskin in memory of her. All he’d said to me was true.

  Erland returned before Gadd, as I was setting bowls on the table. I had recovered, was in control of myself, the bag safely with the others.

  He stared at me. “You look different.”