by Tim Stead
It was only in the middle of the afternoon that the mist began to lift, and Felice found that she could see the three wagons in front of them; a distance of about a hundred and fifty yards. The lights were put out again, and she began to think that they had beaten the swamp. In a few hours they would cross the second bridge, take the road that bent North West, and all this would be left behind.
So they were quite relaxed when she heard the noise, a faint thrumming, a vibration in the air that passed swiftly over their heads. She looked up, and was about to ask Barker what it could be when the noise came again, and this time finished with the sound that an axe makes when it strikes wood. An arrow sprouted from the wagon just by the drover’s seat. Felice stared at it, but Barker reacted at once. He shouted and cracked the reins over the horses’ backs, reaching for his whip. The wagon jolted as the animals strained, began to roll and judder as it picked up speed.
More arrows flew. One struck the side of the wagon, and Felice pulled the children to her, forcing them to the floor behind the cloth bales. There was protection there.
The wagon suddenly slewed round to the right, tipping up and then falling back, jarring them all together, and there was a terrible noise. She looked up to see that one of the horses had been felled. Several arrows had struck it, and it had gone down screaming. Barker had been thrown from his seat, and as she watched she saw him run off, without a backward glance, in the direction the other wagons had disappeared.
“We must move,” she said to the children.
“I’m hurt,” Pasha said. A quick glance showed nothing more than a bruised knee, but Felice did not think they had time for niceties, so she snatched up the girl and jumped down into the road. Tann followed.
There were voices to the west, and she could see torches coming through the trees from the direction of the river. There was no way that they could follow Barker and not get trapped by the men, bandits they must be, who were approaching.
“We have to hide,” she said to Tann and Pasha. Can you keep very quiet?” They both nodded. She picked a dark cloth from the wagon, a thing used to cover the cargo in case of rain, and led them off the road towards the marsh. There was little cover here, even in the mist, but after a minute she found a low bush and told the children to lie down. She covered them with the cloth and crouched down nearby, hiding as best she could, drawing her blade. She doubted that the knife would be effective, but it was all she had.
The torches drew closer. She could hear men’s voices, but the air took the strength out of them, and she could not hear the words. The men spread out around her, and she could see the torches moving away – all but one.
The torch stayed still, not moving the smallest amount, just fifty yards away. The nimbus around the light prevented her from seeing the man, but she stayed silent, and watched it carefully.
“You can’t stay here.”
She nearly jumped in the air. Just to her left, not ten yards away stood a man. She turned towards him, letting him see the blade.
“I mean you no harm,” he said, putting away his short sword.
“You are one of them.”
“Yes and no.” He drew nearer, and she could see that he looked typical of the type, dirty and unshaven, dressed in an assortment of armour and mail that could have been picked off any number of bodies.
“Stay away,” she said.
“Fine, but you can’t stay here. They’ll search the whole area again. They know there was someone in the wagon. They’re looking for you. So am I.”
“What do you suggest?” Her tone was sceptical.
“Go further east, as far into the marsh as you dare. With a bit of luck it will be further than they will go.” He turned, looked north along the road. “They’re coming back,” he said. “Go now.”
She looked at the man, who was already walking away. Why? Why was he helping them? There was no time to puzzle over it. She went back to where the children were concealed and lifted the cloth, signalling to them to keep quiet with a finger to her lips.
“Follow me,” she whispered. “We have to go further into the marsh.” She picked up Pasha again, and began to move with as much stealth as she could manage, trying to stay low.
A cry from behind them revealed that she had not been stealthy enough, and she began to run, jumping over small pools of water and running around the larger ones. An arrow flew overhead, and another tore through the grasses and sedges. She ran as fast as she could and as she ran the mist became thicker. Tann kept pace with her, sometimes alongside, and sometimes following.
More arrows flew past, and she was grateful that they were such bad shots. Her left foot landed in mud, and it took her a moment to free it. Then they were running again, for what seemed like a long time, but gradually the noise of their pursuers died away until Felice could run no more, and sat down on the ground with Pasha still in her arms.
“Are we safe now?” the girl asked.
“I don’t think they’ll find us now,” she replied, but looking around at the thick mist she felt anything but safe. How far had they come? She did not even know which direction the road was in, and they had no supplies, no food, no clean water.
“We’re lost, aren’t we?” Tann asked, as if reading her mind.
“We must rest,” she told him. “Night is falling, and we cannot move in the dark, not here. In the morning, things will be clearer.”
There was nothing to do but lie down on the damp ground. Felice found that she still had the cloth from the wagon, had run with it wrapped around Pasha, so she used that as a sort of ground sheet, and they lay close together for warmth.
For a while she could not sleep. In the morning she would have to determine where the sun rose. That would be the East, and from there she could work out the direction of the road and safety. But was the road safe? Would the bandits move on, or did they stay in this part of the road all the time? If she went back to the road she might be walking back into danger. Never the less, it was what she had to do. There was no other way.
She slept poorly, and when she woke it was to a misty dawn, the air thick and white around them. Tann was already up, and sat by the edge of a pool of brown water, poking a stick into it and examining it from time to time to see what he had retrieved. When he saw that Felice was awake he put the stick to one side.
“Do you know which way we have to go?” he asked.
She looked at the sky, but everything was obscured by the fog. One part looked lighter than the rest, but it could just have been that the air was clearer in that direction. It was all she had to go on. If the lighter sky was East, then its opposite would be West, and the road was West.
“That way,” she said.
They roused Pasha and the girl volunteered to walk for a while, and so they began to move in the direction that Felice had chosen, skirting pools, jumping over small channels and trying to stay out of the mud. It was hard work, but they had only run for a few minutes the previous night. If they were heading towards the road, then it shouldn’t take so long.
Time passed, and still they were walking. Felice was hoping to see trees. There had been trees by the road, and she guessed that she would see them from a greater distance than the road, but the lighter area of mist seemed to be moving, and she grew less and less certain that it was the sun. About the time she guessed it to be mid day they sat and rested.
“We should have reached the road by now,” Tann said.
“I know,” she replied. “If I could only see the sun clearly.”
“It should be to the south?”
“If it is noon, yes. I’m not even sure of the time.”
Tann looked at the water and the shrouded world of pools and tussock that surrounded them. It was remarkably similar to the place they had started from that morning.
“We’re lost,” he said.
Felice didn’t answer, but the boy was right. If the lighter patch of sky had been to the East they would have reached the road by now, so she had no idea where they were, o
r which direction they had been heading.
“We’ll wait until the sun sets. Perhaps we’ll get a better idea where the road is then.”
“I’m hungry,” Pasha said.
Thirsty, too, Felice thought. We have no food and the water around us looks poisonous, but we’ll have to drink soon. Perhaps there was a way to filter the water, though a cloth. It would be better to boil it, she knew.
“Let’s see if we brought anything useful with us,” she suggested.
She laid her knife in front of her, and searching through her clothes brought out an assortment of things that had no apparent value. There were some pins, a few coins, some paper. Tann produced a metal cup, a small knife, a few stones, a piece of coloured glass and a small block of salt. Pasha’s offering was a small wooden doll, reluctantly parted with, and a leather ball, about three inches across.
Felice studied the items. It was like a puzzle, a riddle, and she liked riddles. She picked up the cup and examined it. The thing was sound and quite solid.
“Why do you carry this?” she asked.
“It was my father’s,” Tann replied. “A gift – when we had nothing.”
She picked up the ball and crushed it in her hand. It seemed to be filled with straw. She picked up her knife and began to pick open one of the seams. Pasha looked mournful.
“I will buy you a new ball, Pasha,” she said. She was right, though. It was full of straw – dry straw. And now the stones.
“What are these?” she asked.
“Flints,” the boy replied. “Father wrote that they were rare in the north. There were more in my bag.”
“Not needed,” she smiled at him. “You are a mobile treasure house, Tann.”
Taking her knife and one of the flints she gathered together a collection of the driest things she could find, and piled them carefully on top of a small portion of the dry straw and some shreds of paper. She had made a fire with flint before, but this was the first time that it had mattered. With great care she struck the flint against the blade, and sparks flew onto the straw. She struck it again and again, and eventually there was a wisp of smoke. She blew on it gently, but it went out. She started again, and this time a small flame appeared. She guarded it, and fed it on scraps until it blossomed into a small fire, drying and burning the small twigs and straws that she had gathered.
“More,” she said. “Bring me more.”
Both children rushed off, and soon there was a small mound of vaguely damp twigs and sticks piled next to the fire. Tann looked impressed.
“That was clever,” he said.
She smiled at him. “What use is a fire?” she asked. “Are you thirsty?”
He nodded.
“I’m hungry, too,” Pasha said.
“One thing at a time.”
She tore a length of cloth from her sleeve and folded it into a cone shape. This she placed into the cup, to act as a crude filter. She scooped water from the nearest pond in her hands and dropped it carefully into the cone. Very slowly, the cup began to fill with water. She scooped more, careful that all the water fell into the cone of cloth.
In a minute the cup was full, and she placed it carefully onto the fire, putting damp sticks across the flame to support it. In a few minutes they would have a cup of filtered and boiled water.
She gave the first cup to Pasha, and the second to Tann. Neither commented on the musty unpleasant taste, and as Felice was sipping the third, still very hot, the girl spoke again.
“Will you make some food, too?” she asked.
“I’m not sure if anything is safe to eat, Pasha. I’m sorry.”
“The frogs might be,” Tann said. “Eels, too. They eat eels in the west.”
“Can you catch them?”
“I can try.” He took back his small knife and tied it to a stick with a bit of cloth that he tore from his own shirt, and then went over to one of the ponds, but after a good half hour he had not found anything, and it was beginning to get dark.
“You can try again tomorrow, Tann. It was a good idea.”
So for a second night they huddled together, but this time there was a fire, and Felice built it up with as much as she dared. It would help to dry out other fuel, too, and she was sure that she could make another fire. There was still straw and paper. She was still thirsty, but they had each had three cups of hot, unpleasant water, so they should live. At least for a few days they would be all right.
9. Stone Island
Felice opened her eyes, but at once she knew that she was not awake. It was the same sort of vivid dream that she had experienced back in Pek, just before she had awoken from the fever. An unnatural stillness surrounded her, and she found herself sitting in the marsh by the fire, which burned silently. The children were gone, and in their place was a different child, a creature with golden hair, dressed in the finest clothes, but it was not the clothes that struck her. The child had no mouth. Where it should have been there was only smooth, unbroken skin. The eyes, too, were different. They were blue, and really a little too large, and they were staring at Felice.
Felice stared back. The child looked away from her, and raised an arm to point, but the arm was feathered, like a wing.
“Who are you?” she asked. The child shook her head and pointed again. Felice looked in the direction of her arm, but could see nothing but mist.
“What are you trying to show me?”
The child nodded and pointed again. This time when she looked the mist was gone, and just a few yards away there was a fireplace, roaring with stacked wood, and in front of it a table. On the table were plates of food, steaming gently, and beside it a glass of red wine that caught the light of the fire, glittering like rubies. Felice felt her hunger sharply, and was about to stand, but the table was gone as suddenly as it had appeared, and there was just the mist and the swamp.
She turned back to the child, could see a sparkle in her great eyes.
“You want to show me the way,” she said.
The child nodded, and rose from the ground, spreading both arms, which were now nothing less than wings. She beat the air and began to rise slowly into the mist as though she were some giant bird, her head turning, those great eyes staring into the distance. Felice realised with amazement that those astonishing eyes could see through the mist, could see everything laid out before them, as naked as a map.
The noise of beating wings died away, and she was left alone again. She reached for her knife, and it was gone.
Felice opened her eyes.
There was a hint of dawn in the sky, and the mist spread it evenly through the air. She sat up and looked around carefully. She could not be sure where the sun was, but she felt positive, and images from the dream stayed with her. The children were still asleep, turned towards the cooling embers of the fire. She reached for her knife and drew it out, looking at the blade. She traced the feathers etched into its surface with a finger, and saw again the outstretched arm of the dream child. Feathers.
She balanced the knife carefully on her hand, and it was perfect. The weight of the blade exactly matched the weight on the hilt so that the whole weapon supported itself on the guard. She moved it with her finger and it spun gently, easily, though a full circle. Was there magic here? Was this knife, Jem’s gift, more than just a knife?
She closed her eyes and tried to feel something, but there was only darkness and the tiny sounds of the swamp. She looked at the blade again.
“Show me the way,” she said.
And the knife turned, on its own. The point spun smoothly through an arc and pointed. Magic. It was a magic knife. To be sure she turned it back again and set the point to the opposite bearing.
“Show me the way.”
The knife moved again, settling on the same direction. She touched the blade.
“Thank you,” she said.
It took a couple of minutes to rouse the children. Tann was gloomy, and Pasha was silently hungry, but they set about the tasks she asked of them, boiling w
ater, feeding the fire, and Tann looked for eels again, peering into the pools of water with his makeshift spear at the ready.
After an hour they had each drunk two cups of water, and Felice decided it was time to move. She pulled out her blade, placed it on her hand and commanded it again to show her the way. It pointed.
“That’s magic,” Tann said. “Are you a mage?”
Felice laughed. “No,” she said. “It is the knife. The knife is enchanted. It was a present from a friend, and I do not think that he knew.”
They followed where the blade pointed, and from time to time it would swing around to point in a different direction as they skirted impassable stretches of water and mud. At first she strode confidently through the marsh, and her belief in the enchanted knife was firm, but as the hours passed and the day wore on they all became weak and tired. They had to stop and rest.
“You’re sure it is a good knife?” Tann asked.
Felice could not be sure. There were stories, it was true, of such things being made to trap people, to lead them astray, but the image of the girl had not been sinister, and they were already lost. There was no need for an evil enchantment to lead them into a predicament in which they already languished.
“I am sure,” she said, but with a conviction that she did not entirely feel.
They walked again. Now they walked slowly. They had not eaten for two days, and Felice was light headed, her feet so reluctant to move that they stumbled at every opportunity. It was a torment. Pasha was nearing the end of her strength, and Felice herself was regretting not spending another few days with Ella in Samara. She would have been stronger, better able to cope. She did not feel that she could carry the girl very far if it came to that.
They stopped early, well before night had fallen, and sat for a while in silence, exhausted by the day’s efforts. After a few minutes Felice roused herself and began to prepare the fire. Tann helped. Both of them were clumsy, but eventually they managed to start a fire and fill the cup. Between them they managed to boil three cups, one for each, and drink them. Then they fell asleep.