by Gill Vickery
‘Stupid witch-brat!’ a dragonet sniggered. The others joined in and their chanting grew louder, their voices echoing round the cave – witch-brat, witch-brat, witch-brat.
With a start Tia woke up. It was daylight. Sunshine warmed her face and the voices of children rang in her ears.
Chapter Four
The Saffron Fields
Tia stood up and stared in amazement. Stoplar lay in a sun-drenched bowl scooped out of the snow-covered black mountains towering around it. In the centre lay a vast stretch of rich brown earth tilled into low ridges. This was patrolled by children who waved and called to each other as they passed. Several also walked around a wall that divided the plain from slopes of lush grass dotted with plump sheep and small black cows.
Here and there stood farms, and behind them, reaching right to the boundary of the mountains, were orchards of apples, pears, cherries and other trees Tia didn’t recognise.
On the far side of the bowl was the town. It was as strange and beautiful as the rest of this sunny land in the middle of the cold mountains. Brightly painted houses filled rows of terraces that rose in steps up the steep foothills, while above them was a shining white building with hundreds of windows. It was so dazzling in the sunshine that Tia had to shade her eyes.
As she squinted through laced fingers she thought, It must be Luona’s castle but it’s more like a palace – there aren’t any fortifications or gates. Tia supposed the High Witch felt protected by the ice-storm blocking the pass; her enemies would never be able to get through it.
Someone called out from quite close. It was a boy of about Tia’s own age. He was glaring at an enormous, long-haired white cat scratching at the soil, scattering it in all directions.
The boy shouted and threw a lump of earth towards the cat. It fell well short and the animal ignored him.
Tia grinned. She climbed on top of the wall, took her sling and a pebble out of her pocket, whirled it around her head and pitched the stone towards the cat. It landed – thud – just in front of the cat’s nose and the creature leapt straight up in the air with a screech of fright. It glared at Tia then ran away in a blur of white.
The boy stared at Tia as she wound up her sling, jumped down from the wall and walked up to him.
‘You nearly hit the Lady Luona’s cat!’ he said.
‘I wouldn’t hit it,’ she said indignantly. ‘I don’t hurt animals – I just scared it off. Isn’t that what you were trying to do?’
‘Of course, it’s part of my job. But who are you, Trader girl? And what are you doing here? Your people left yesterday.’
Tia told her familiar story. ‘I’m Nadya. I fell asleep and got left behind.’ She thought of another detail. ‘I suppose my parents thought I was with my cousin, Florian.’
‘What are you going to do? The Lady Luona won’t open the pass just so the Traders can come back for you.’
‘I don’t know. I suppose I could find work.’
The boy laughed. ‘You don’t know much about Stoplar, do you? You can’t have a job unless you get a work badge.’
‘How do I do that?’ Tia asked. She’d never heard of such a thing.
‘You need to go to the Great Palace and register as an Outsider.’
‘I’ll go now.’ Tia hefted her bag and started to trudge across the plain.
‘Be careful!’ The boy ran after her, jumping over the ridges as he went. ‘Don’t disturb the saffron bulbs – they’re near to blossoming.’
Tia thought furiously, trying to remember her lessons on the history of Tulay. What had DragonTeacher said about the precious spice that grew only in Stoplar? That the saffron flowers bloomed just once a year and had to be gathered quickly before they withered away.
She looked at the folds of brown soil. There wasn’t even a hint of green shoots anywhere.
‘How d’you know they’re going to flower soon?’ she asked.
He shrugged. ‘It’s always that way. They just suddenly appear.’ He glared at her. ‘If you don’t disturb the bulbs, that is – you’re as bad as the cats.’
‘I’ll be careful,’ she promised and lifted her leg high to take an exaggerated step over the nearest ridge.
The boy laughed. ‘Wait, you’ll need somewhere to stay if you’re going to register for work. Go to my mother first, her name’s Jofranka and she lives in the green house on Brekka Street.’
‘Jofranka – that’s a Trader name!’ Tia said.
‘Yes, she settled in a house with my father. As you’re a Trader too I know she’ll want to look after you. Tell her I sent you – my name’s Yonas.’
Tia thanked him and set off again. Striding carefully over each ridge meant she couldn’t walk quickly and it took her a long time to reach the other side of the plain.
The sun was high in the sky by the time she reached a gate leading onto a road running round the first terrace. She stopped a man in fine clothes and asked him the way to Brekka Street.
He looked her up and down suspiciously. ‘What are you doing here, Trader girl?’ he asked.
Tia recited her story and said she was looking for Jofranka.
The man sniffed haughtily and told her that Brekka Street was on the third level. She thanked him, even though she wanted to stick her tongue out at his rudeness, and ran off to find the green house. A plump Trader woman answered her knock. Tia explained that Yonas had sent her and why.
Jofranka opened the door wider. ‘Come in child,’ she said. In no time at all Tia was sitting at a well-scrubbed wooden table groaning with food. She ate while Jofranka asked questions about ‘Nadya’s’ family. Tia was glad to be eating – it gave her time to think of believable answers to the Trader woman’s sharp questions. She must’ve been satisfied because when Tia could eat no more Jofranka beamed, wrapped a sweet pie in a checked cloth, put it in a basket and said, ‘Up you get, child.’
‘Where are we going?’ Tia asked as Jofranka bustled them both out into the street.
‘To the Great Palace to get you a work badge. Only citizens are allowed to work here without one – outsiders have to be given special permission.’
‘Why?’
‘The Lady Luona likes it that way.’ Jofranka stopped and caught Tia’s arm. ‘You know little of our customs here which is strange for a Trader,’ she said in the language of her people.
‘I’m always getting told off for daydreaming,’ Tia said in the same language. ‘I should’ve listened more carefully.’
Jofranka let go of her arm and looked thoughtfully at her. ‘When we arrive at the palace, let me do the talking and follow what I say.’
Tia nodded, glad that she’d paid attention when her Trader friends had taught her their language and described the towns of Tulay.
Chapter Five
The Work Badge
Tia gazed in awe at the palace. She touched the pure white stone covering its walls. ‘What is this?’ she asked.
‘Marble, from the quarries of Iserborg,’ Jofranka told her and walked on, past the grand entrance of the palace guarded by two soldiers, to the far end where she turned into a narrow street running down the side. The further they went, the narrower and darker it grew. The marble facing on the walls abruptly came to an end revealing crudely cut blocks of black rock. The white stone was just for show.
Eventually Jofranka stopped at a mean-looking doorway with a grille set into it. She knocked at the door and the grille slid open. A grim-faced man peered out.
‘What?’
‘I’ve come to apply for a work badge for my niece. She was accidentally left behind yesterday when the Traders moved on,’ Jofranka said.
Tia almost let out a gasp of surprise. She hadn’t expected the Trader woman to pretend to be her aunt.
The grille slammed shut with a bang and the door opened. The sour man jerked his head. ‘In,’ he ordered.
His room was dark and musty; the only warmth came from a fire crackling in a tiny hearth. The man shuffled to a large desk piled high with papers
and shooed away a streaky grey and white cat with a flat face and spiteful blue eyes. It stalked to a sack in front of the fire, curled up and glared.
‘Now,’ the man said, ‘you want a work badge.’ He sucked his teeth and shook his head. ‘We have all the Outsiders we need.’
‘I’d be very grateful if you could give my niece a badge,’ Jofranka said.
‘How grateful?’
Jofranka took out the sweet pie and put it on his desk.
‘And?’ the man said.
The Trader woman held out her hand. Two silver marks lay in it. The man grunted. Jofranka added a third mark. The man snatched them and dropped them into a drawer. ‘Name of Outsider?’ he said.
‘Nadya, niece of Jofranka of Brekka Street,’ the Trader said.
He stamped a piece of paper and gave it to her.
‘And the badge?’ she asked.
He rummaged in another drawer and pulled out a square yellow and purple badge which he pushed across the desk to Tia. ‘Don’t lose it – you’re not getting another one.’
‘I won’t.’ Tia carefully pinned the badge to her jacket.
The man waved them away and started eating his pie.
Outside again they hurried back to the main street and the warm bright sun.
‘I’ll give you back the marks when I get paid,’ Tia said.
Jofranka smiled. ‘In good time – for now let me show you round Stoplar.’
Stoplar was a colourful town: as well as the brightly painted houses the terrace edges had flower-studded creepers draped over them like vividly dyed carpets. Jofranka led Tia up and down flights of steps linking the terraces and streets until she was familiar with the town.
The street on the lowest terrace was filled with shops, inns, eating houses and markets covered with striped awnings. They stopped at a market stall piled high with foodstuffs and the Trader woman greeted a large, cheerful-looking man.
‘Hawkon, our son’s sent us a guest. This is Nadya who was accidentally left behind by the Traders yesterday.’
‘That will never do,’ Hawkon boomed. ‘We can look after you till your people return.’
‘I’ve got a work badge,’ Tia said quickly. ‘I can earn my keep.’
Jofranka patted Tia’s shoulder. ‘Why don’t you go and look round the market while I talk to Hawkon,’ she suggested.
‘All right,’ Tia agreed, giving them a big, beaming smile before she wandered off. She knew that they wanted to talk about her, and as soon as she was out of sight she doubled back and crouched down behind Hawkon’s stall where she couldn’t be seen.
‘I’m not sure you should’ve lied about Nadya being your niece,’ she heard Hawkon say.
‘Claiming she was a relative was the only way to get her a work badge, you know that. Even then I had to use bribes.’
‘Oh well, it’s done now. And I’m sure she won’t have any problem working in the fields with the other children,’ Hawkon said.
‘That’s what I thought – and now I’d better find her. Yonas will be back home soon.’
Tia quickly crept backwards and then strolled round to the other side of the stall.
‘Ah, there you are,’ Jofranka said. It’s time for us go and for Hawkon to lock up the stall for the night.’
They waved goodbye and went back to the green house where Jofranka showed Tia to a simple, white-painted room on the ground floor. She opened the lid of a large chest, gathered up an armful of blankets and dropped them onto a couch underneath a small window overlooking the garden.
‘You can store your bag in the chest and make up a bed while I prepare our meal.’ She bustled away and Tia arranged the bedding on the couch.
Tap, tap, tap. Someone was rapping on the window pane.
Tia looked up in surprise to see Loki perched on the windowsill. He rapped again, impatiently.
As she scrambled onto the couch and opened the window Tia thought how strange it was that such an ordinary house had real glass in its windows. Usually only palaces and castles had glass panes. The people of Stoplar must be wealthy.
Loki flew in and landed on top of the chest. ‘I’ve had a busy day following you around,’ he said. ‘What’ve you learned from the boy and the Trader woman?’
She told him and then asked if he’d found out anything useful about Stoplar.
‘It’s full of cats. The white ones are the worst – I’ve had a few narrow escapes while I’ve been trailing after you instead of paying attention to my own safety.’
Tia got out a piece of pie crust that she’d put in her pocket for the jackdaw, crumbled it up and spread the pieces on the chest. ‘You should look after yourself first,’ she told him.
He was too busy pecking at the crust to reply and when Jofranka called Tia for a meal she left him eating the last of the crumbs.
Chapter Six
Purple and Gold
The evening was a very jolly one. Hawkon roared with laughter at his own jokes and Yonas encouraged him while Jofranka teased them both. Tia enjoyed being part of a family; she missed curling up with Finn and Freya in their cave in the Drakelow Mountains, watching firelight dancing on the walls and listening to Freya tell tales of mighty dragons and their deeds.
But if Tia was to steal back the magic topaz she needed to know more about Stoplar, and especially Luona.
So while Hawkon drew breath between jokes, Tia asked Yonas what she would have to do in the saffron fields.
‘Patrol the plain to make sure the bulbs don’t get eaten by mice or bugs and slugs, and check the wall around the plain. If animals get in they trample on the ridges and crush the bulbs.’
‘What about the cats?’
‘We try to keep them out too but they get in to hunt the mice and scratch up the soil.’
‘Are they all Luona’s?’ Tia asked.
‘The Lady Luona’s cats are the pure white ones. No-one else is allowed to keep those.’ Yonas yawned. ‘We ought to get some sleep now – we have to start at sunrise.’
Tia was tired too – she’d started her day even before Yonas – and was glad to go to bed. When she got to her room she told Loki about the work she’d have to do.
‘That sounds dull,’ the jackdaw said.
Tia agreed but they were both wrong; the next day turned out to be quite different from the one Yonas had described – and a lot more exciting.
Overnight the plain had been transformed into a sea of purple crocuses and people were everywhere, going up and down the ridges, stooping to pick the flowers.
Tia stared in astonishment. ‘But there were no flowers yesterday!’
Yonas laughed. ‘I told you, they just suddenly appear.’
‘And who are all these people? Where have they come from?’
‘Some are from the farms or the town but mostly they’re Outsiders from the sorting sheds.’ Yonas tugged at Tia’s sleeve. ‘C’mon. No time for talking – the really hard work starts now.’
He grabbed a couple of baskets from a huge pile by the wall and led Tia to the nearest ridge. He bent down, carefully pulled out one of the purple crocuses and laid it in the basket. ‘You do it like that. Don’t squash the petals or you’ll ruin the saffron threads inside.’
Tia looked at her basket. It was very big and the flowers were very small – it was going to take a long time to fill. She bent down and started picking. As she pulled the first flower out of the ground a smell of honey and warm hay wafted up from the three red threads inside.
This is easy, she thought but by the end of an hour she was beginning to ache all over from the constant stooping. She glanced at the other pickers. They were working steadily. She bent to her task again and didn’t stop till her basket was full. Then she straightened up and stretched. Yonas was also standing up; he’d finished at the same time. He grinned. ‘Bet you’re glad you’ve done your first basket.’
First! How many was she expected to fill in a day?
‘We can have a walk now.’ Yonas pointed to a dense stand of
apple trees. ‘The nearest sorting shed’s behind those trees.’
‘What are sorting sheds?’ Tia asked as they set off.
‘It’s where the threads are sorted from the flower and dried in ovens to make the spice.’
‘But you said that’s where the Outsiders live.’
‘They do. There’s living lofts over the sorting area and they stay there till the harvest’s done.’
‘Then what happens?’
‘The Lady Luona opens the pass and they leave.’
‘Where do they go?’
Yonas shrugged uncomfortably. ‘I don’t know. Stop asking so many questions.’
He quickly climbed over the wall and hurried off. Tia wondered why her questions had annoyed him.
When they reached the trees Yonas reached up into an apple tree and pulled down a branch so they could pick the fruit.
Tia tugged off an apple and risked another question. ‘How long does the harvest last?’
‘Only twenty days.’
‘Twenty days! I won’t have any back left at the end of it!’
Yonas laughed. ‘You’ll get used to it. Here we are.’
The ugly, long, two-storey building was well hidden by trees. Tia thought they looked as if they’d been planted on purpose to hide the grubby painted walls and the roof full of holes patched with branches and leaves. The windows running all down one side of the ground floor were filled with precious glass but it was cracked and dirty.
Yonas and Tia went inside. Three long tables stretched from end to end of the room with rows of people sitting at them on benches; each person had a pile of purple flowers in front of them and a small bowl. They were carefully opening the flowers, pulling out the three red threads and dropping them into the bowls. They did this in silence as a man and woman walked up and down inspecting the work. At each end of the room an open clay oven smouldered with fire-rock, making the air hot and oppressive.