Pledged

by Gwynneth White

  “And when you get back from Botswana?” What she really wanted to know was whether he had a girlfriend. But that would be too forward – even for her.

  “School of Art in New York. I got a scholarship. I’ve wanted to do CGI for movies for as long as I can remember.” He opened his mouth again, seemingly about to ask her something, but Erin was still on a roll with her own questions.

  “So Kyle’s quite a bit older than you?”

  “Five years – he’s twenty-three.”

  Although Erin knew she was prying, she couldn’t resist saying, “I guess Kyle’s been like a father to you. Bringing you up and all that.”

  He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “He’s definitely important. Anyway – enough about me. What’s your life story?”

  Erin guessed she’d gone too far with her questions. She ran her fingers through her hair, trying to decide what to say about her dysfunctional family. “Nothing dramatic. Born in Cape Town. Parents divorced a week before my eleventh birthday. Mother remarried a year later. To an American, actually. From Buffalo. He brought Izzy and Mia into the family. Mia is also seventeen. But I’m really older than her by two months. And my stepfather’s an orthodontist.” She grinned at him. “Look, perfect teeth.”

  He laughed. “We could pass you off as an American, no problem. And Buffalo’s real close to Rochester, where I was born.”

  “I’ve never been there.” Her nose scrunched up with dislike. “But Izzy and Mia keep telling me how much more civilized and cultured you up-state New Yorkers are to us plebs from Cape Town.”

  “So why did you come for Izzy’s wedding?”

  “I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.” She giggled. “Izzy always said she’d be a queen one day. That some prince would rush by on a flaming steed and sweep her off to his palace on the hill. Then she’d eat caviar off solid gold plates for the rest of her life.” She gave Seth a coy look. “Is Kyle a prince on a flaming steed?”

  “Not that I’ve noticed. And he doesn’t like caviar either.”

  “Who does?”

  They chuckled.

  “So where are your mom and stepdad?”

  Erin picked at the corner of her new journal lying on her lap. “Divorcing. Mia now lives with him, and . . . how can I put this? Frank isn’t overly concerned with what his daughters do.” She paused. Somehow it didn’t seem right to tell Seth that her mom had disapproved of nineteen-year-old Izzy’s elopement so much that it had taken all of Erin’s persuasive powers just to come on her own. Unlike Frank, her mom was hyper protective. She would not have been happy if she’d known her only daughter had spent the morning with some weirdo woman in a witchdoctor’s house. And, worse, that she was now driving into nowhere with a strange guy from New York whom she hadn’t vetted and approved. Just as well she knows I’ll be out of cellphone range for most of this trip.

  Seth sensed her concern talking about her family and changed the subject. “You seem excited about that journal Sophia gave you.”

  “I love writing and sketching my thoughts.” She flipped open the cover and saw a serpentine flow of words across the facing page. “Oh! Sophia’s already written something. That’s disappointing. But she writes beautifully. I’ve been practising calligraphy for years and I can’t write like this.”

  “What’s it say?”

  Erin cleared her throat and read aloud:

  “The two-headed Lightning Bird rages over the land of Shenaya

  Four eyes to see all

  Four ears to hear all

  Two beaks to lie

  One head to defend ignorance and darkness

  One head to conceal progress and light

  Both heads to enforce compulsion.

  Only my thoughts are safe

  Only my thoughts are mine

  Free from the Lightning Bird’s scrutiny, but not free from invasion.

  All can enter my head, but none can remain unless I choose it.

  This is my right, my only guarantee, my only sanctuary during my waking-sleep in the amnesia of mortality.

  Although the Silent Note-Takers watch and listen to all that I say and do,

  I am yet free – for my choices are mine.”

  Seth tore off his sunglasses, dropped them on his lap and ran his hands over his eyes.

  Erin didn’t notice. “The Lightning Bird. I researched it in grade nine for a project on African myths and legends.” When Seth made no comment, she looked at him. “Why are you suddenly looking so freaked out?”

  “I dunno. And I’m not freaked out.”

  She thought for a moment. “Does this have anything to do with your dream?”

  “Sort of, I guess.”

  “Well? Don’t keep me in the dark.” Her eyes were bright with curiosity.

  “The dream had this really powerful bird in it. But it was mean. Real mean.”

  “How so?”

  He sighed, obviously reluctant to speak of any of this. “You’ll think I’m crazy, that I’ve been watching too many movies . . . but it shoots lightning at people from its wings and talons.” Seth reddened as he glanced at her to gauge her reaction. She nodded encouragingly. “It also eats souls.”

  She smiled. “Was the bird a sort of drab brown colour?”

  “Yeah. How do you know?”

  “I told you, I did a project. Lots of people in southern Africa think the hammerkop is an incarnation of the mythical Lightning Bird.”

  “Hammerkop?”

  “It’s a bird. Kind of a cross between a heron and stork, and its head’s shaped like a hammer – like it has two faces.” Having easily solved that riddle, she frowned. “And Shenaya? What’s that all about?”

  “Please don’t think I’m crazy, but – according to the dreams at least – that used to be the ancient name for Botswana.”

  “It doesn’t sound very African.” She paused. “Is there any more to this dream of yours that you haven’t told me?”

  Seth stared ahead of him for a while and then abruptly shook his head. “I’ve kind of told you everything.”

  “Kind of? Meaning there’re things you still aren’t telling me.”

  He replaced his sunglasses and tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “Look, I know this all seems kinda weird and maybe exciting to you, but I need to focus on the road . . . what with driving on the wrong side, and all the suicidal cows that keep leaping out of the bush at us. It would never happen in the States.”

  “Oh. So what you’re really saying is you don’t want to talk about it.”

  “You got that right.”

  “Okay,” Erin muttered, disappointed that the growing connection between them had been broken. She began doodling in her journal with the pen Sophia had given her. Every now and again Seth peeked over to look. To draw him out, she sketched her favourite motif: a comic chameleon with bulging eyes and a huge curved tail. She looked up to see that crooked smile on the corner of his lips. But still Seth said nothing.

  It was the nasal whine of the GPS lady who finally broke the silence. Seth zoomed into the GPS map. “Great, this is where we leave the tar and hit the rough stuff you know about.” He smiled at her. “Would you mind if I catch some shut-eye? It feels like forever since I slept last.”

  “Go for it.”

  He pulled over to the side of the road and hopped out of the car. By the time Erin had walked round the driver’s side he had his headphones shoved into his ears and his eyes were closed.

  * * *

  Seth awoke when they stopped. He pulled out his headphones and looked over at Erin. “And now?”

  She pointed at the windscreen. Before them lay a vast grey-white expanse of nothingness, shimmering like untrodden snow in the late afternoon sun.

  “The pan?”

  She nodded.

  “Awesome.”

  “My guidebook says it’s so flat that on a clear day you can see the curvature of the Earth.”

  “No kidding? I’d kill to see that.”

  “I
think all we’re going to see are heat-shimmer and whirl-winds.” She pointed to flurry of dust devils swirling and dancing in the distance. They were skimming across the pan, sucking up great clouds of white sand into towering sky castles.

  “That’s not something you see everyday in Brooklyn,” Seth said in wonder.

  “Do you ever see them in Brooklyn?” Erin asked, laughing.

  “Not exactly.”

  “Well, they say travel broadens the mind.”

  “That it does.” Seth and Erin exchanged smiles.

  When he looked back across the pan the dust devils had multiplied. The speed at which they now travelled was frightening. At times they seemed to swerve in the direction of the car; then they would hesitate, reeling back on their tracks.

  Seth whistled. “Are you sure those things are okay? They look a lot like the start of a Kansas tornado to me – the kind that use to terrify me when I was a kid, watching The Wizard of Oz. Only here, with a blue sky.”

  “So you watched The Wizard of Oz? You surprise me more and more, Mr Hunt!” Seth found himself blushing. Erin quickly said, “I know what you mean though. It’s like the elements are holding their breath, waiting for some kind of decision to be made . . . some signal.”

  Seth frowned at her. “That doesn’t sound like you talking. And wind and dust don’t make decisions.”

  “Maybe not,” Erin said. “But I’ve never seen anything that looks like that either.” She pointed at the dust devils, which had now mushroomed, swelling and uniting into a single black mass that began to block out the sun and the sky. The first gusts of wind were already eddying around them as the tornado closed in.

  “Get us out of here!” Seth shouted. “Now!”

  Erin hit the gas pedal, powering the vehicle onto the pan, racing them in a straight line towards the far shore. They had not gone far when she said, “I’m losing it! It’s like the pan’s sucking the engine’s power.” She pushed her right foot hard onto the floor, but the vehicle slewed sideways.

  “What’s happening?”

  “I can’t keep it straight!”

  Bags strewn on the back seat dropped onto the floor and Coke bottles clattered around their feet, drowning out their yells. Huge clods of graphite-grey mud flew past the windows, and with a grinding whine the Land Cruiser came to a stop. They sat motionless, breathing heavily. Seth poked his head out the window into the raging wind for just long enough to report, “We’ve got mud everywhere – the wheels are buried up to the bodywork.”

  Erin’s head slumped onto the steering wheel. “I hope Sophia put a spade in the back.” They had stopped close to a scattering of black, slate-like rocks. “Listen, we’ve got to dig the mud away from the tyres, and then pack some of those rocks under the wheels. Then maybe we can drive out, away from this hurricane.”

  “Done. You look for a spade and I’ll start with the rocks,” Seth said as they tumbled out of the car into the buffeting wind.

  “That’s a perfect one,” Erin shouted back at him, pointing close by, but the wind carried her words away. Fighting her way forward, she fell on her knees, tugging at the rock, trying to prise it out of the grey clay.

  Seth clawed free a few smaller stones, which he carried to the truck. Shielding his face and eyes with both hands, he looked around for her. She was still at the rock, fighting against the battering wind. “Hang in there! I’m coming to help you.”

  But the dust devil gave a decisive swirl and stormed down upon Erin. Howling in fury, it lifted her up, sucking her into its spinning centre, juggling and tumbling her, before flinging her out onto the pan.

  Without stopping to think, Seth threw himself into the storm, crawling on his stomach to where she lay. He tried scooping her into his arms, but the wind seemed determined to snatch her from his grasp.

  “Forget it,” he screamed. “She’s mine!” Hunkering down over her, he wriggled forward, dragging her with him, inch-by-inch, towards the truck.

  He managed to open the door far enough to heave Erin into the back seat. Then he scrambled in after her, and grabbed her wrist to feel her pulse. Her heart was still beating. For a moment, the comfort of its steady throb silenced the demented choir of the storm.

  “You’re good.” He rubbed his filthy hands over his grit-covered face, and looked her over. Most of her blouse had been ripped away and her body was scraped red and raw. He eased her matted hair, caked white by the dust, off her face. With a gentle touch he ran his fingers across the grazes on her cheek and neck. She moved, groaning. In response, the wind threw all its howling strength at the vehicle, rocking it on its axles, swirling around them in black fury.

  Seth waited for the gale to pick up the truck and fling it onto the pan, but it stayed fast in the mud, as if the clay itself had become an ally in the battle.

  Erin cried out in pain as she tried to flex her body.

  “Wait! Don’t move. Let me check for broken bones first.” He ran his hands down her arms and legs, waiting for her to cry out, but she was silent. “How’s your back?”

  Seeing her mouth move but hearing nothing, he leaned closer.

  “Hurts. But my whole body hurts. And you?” She touched his face.

  “Just battered and bruised.” He smiled. “You had me worried. I thought I’d lost you.”

  He reached for her hand to help her to sit up, but her fist was locked around some object. “What’s this?”

  “The box fell open and I saw it inside.”

  “Box? What box?”

  “The rock. The rock I was trying to pick up. It was shaped like a kind of box and this was inside it.”

  In the eerie half-light in the car, Seth saw what looked like a grey, mud-caked strap dangling from her hand. It crumbled in his fingers as he touched it. Intrigued, he rubbed at it, sprinkling more grey dust around them until his fingers closed on a hard metal link. “I think it’s a chain. Let’s see what it’s attached to.”

  She opened her fist. “It’s a stone, and it shines.”

  He fell back against the door. “A stone!”

  “What? Why are you acting so weird again?”

  He shook his head. “No . . . no reason. Nothing weird.” But he grabbed her hand, pulled the chain from her fingers – and exhaled a slow breath of relief. “This is just a lump of clay.”

  “Impossible. I know what I saw and it was a stone. The rock was like a box and it came apart, like the top of the rock was a lid, and the stone was inside. It was flashing and gleaming like . . . like a diamond. That’s why I grabbed it – and held on to it when the wind took me.” But staring at the lump of clay hanging from Seth’s fingers, her conviction faltered. “Honestly, that’s what I saw.”

  A single black rock smashed against the windscreen, catapulting the GPS from its mounting. It struck the gear lever, fracturing its face.

  Seth dropped the clay-lump on the floor and they cowered between the seats, waiting for the storm-wind to rip them out of the car. But the air in the car remained still.

  At last Seth poked his head up to look at the windscreen. “Man, I don’t believe it. Sophia said this car was tough and she wasn’t kidding.” He picked up the GPS. “This is buggered, but the windscreen’s not even cracked. Go figure.”

  But still the storm raged around them. They settled down to wait.

  And wait.

  At last Erin said, “I think it’s subsiding.”

  Seth nodded, and climbed back up onto the seat to look out. The vortex had lost its rhythm. Instead of swirling around them with determined upright power, it now seemed to stagger, losing impetus. Erin climbed up and together they watched the wind stumble away like a punch-drunk boxer, all fight blown from its heart. It died a few yards away from the car.

  The lacerating dust, blood red from filtering the crimson sunset, settled around them like snowflakes. The fury was over.

  Stiff, aching and exhausted, they stumbled out of the vehicle in time to see Venus rising, remote and uncaring, in the mauve evening sky. Feelin
g like the only people on earth, they stared at each other, their eyes alarmed, questioning. Neither had any answers.

  Seth turned to the car and grabbed a hoodie from his backpack. “Here. I know it’ll be huge on you, but it’s better than what you’re wearing now.” He gave her a wry smile. “Or rather, better than what you’re not wearing now.”

  She tried to smile, but her cut face would only allow her to grimace.

  “C’mon, let’s do something about your grazes.” He rummaged through his bag, coming up with a clean t-shirt, which he doused using the last of the water in the bottle Sophia had left in the truck. “I know this is going to hurt, but it’s a priority.”

  She tilted her face towards him and bit her lip while he wiped the salt and grit from her grazes. And then she leaned her forehead against his chest. An unexpected shiver shot through his body at her touch. Surprised, he hesitantly wrapped his arms around her and rested his chin on her head. Her body fitted perfectly into his arms. No other girl he’d ever held had ever felt so good, so right. But after a few brief moments, Erin pulled away from him. He instantly released her.

  “We’d better check the damage. We still need this magical car to get us out of here.” Erin didn’t look at him as she spoke.

  Arms brushing, they walked around the car. The paintwork had been sand-blasted away from the edges, revealing shining raw steel, while the remaining surfaces were dull and matte. They searched for the rocks Seth had piled at the front tyre, but they were gone.

  “This is some car,” Seth said. “What did you call it? Magical?”

  She nodded. “Without it, we wouldn’t be alive.”

  “No kidding.” He sighed. “Now for the spade; I reckon I’ve got some digging to do.” He opened the tailgate, but the back of the truck was empty. Not a tool in sight. “Oh jeez! And how does the all-wise Sophia think I’m going to un-bog this vehicle with nothing but a fancy sword?”

  Erin squatted down on the pan, burying her face in her hands.

  “Hey, maybe I over-reacted.” Seth crouched down next to her. “Kyle’s expecting us and when we don’t pitch he’ll come looking for us.”