Rebel Fires

by Tara Omar

  “Sir?”

  “Don’t believe everything you hear,” said Wilhelm, tapping the guard’s cheek. “Come.”

  C h a p t e r 8 5

  Liza sat on a crate in the purplish-blue lights of the ballroom under Raphael’s library, the white patterns on her scarf glowing like merish markings in the mist. Stacks of boxes had been pushed to the walls and the humidity increased to sauna-like conditions. David played the cello and Sasha his gum leaf as Raphael danced, coaxing long ribbons of filament to float gracefully into shape. Natalie sat next to Liza in the mist, watching as the filament slowly took the shape of the falcon frame projected in her computer’s fountain. Suddenly the graceful ribbon crumbled to dust. David and Sasha stopped playing.

  “No, no, no!” shouted Raphael. “The music needs less nobility and more longing. The filament needs to meld into metal, not simply greet it.”

  “It appears the fibres will be stretched too thin no matter how they play,” said Natalie. “I don’t think one mer can spin a structure of this magnitude alone.”

  “I am not dancing with David,” said Raphael, crossing his arms.

  “Can’t you make smaller pieces and weld them together?” asked Sasha.

  “What do you mean by weld?” asked Natalie.

  “You know, melt the seams together with a welding tool,” said Sasha.

  “Mers don’t use welding tools. Seams are very…unseemly,” said Raphael.

  “If we made smaller pieces, could you weld it for us?” asked Natalie.

  “Yes,” said Sasha, “though I’ll need more car batteries to make a welding machine.”

  “May I see the battery?” asked Natalie.

  Sasha disappeared up the lift, which ran like a platform around a large, cylindrical jellyfish tank at the edge of the room. Natalie typed into her computer. The model of the falcon split into pieces. She pulled a piece to the centre, showing a simple rod with a slight curve. Raphael glared at it with disgust.

  “Humans… I’m surprised they just don’t stick their things together with chewing gum and horse glue. No offence, Your Majesty.”

  “Please, call me Liza,” she said.

  Sasha returned with the battery in hand. Natalie scanned it into her computer and moved the piece of frame to the far end of the fountain screen. She rotated the model of the battery and sliced it in half, reading a column of information that appeared alongside it.

  “Lead-acid flooded battery…it doesn’t look too complicated,” said Natalie. She turned. “Raphael, do you use lead in your pottery glazes?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Then I think this is going to be easier than expected,” said Natalie. “One lead-acid battery, coming up.”

  She scanned the parts list floating next to the dissected model.

  “Hmm…I think we’re going to need more sulfuric acid though.”

  David shook his head. “No, we’re not going back up there, Nats. Not after what happened.”

  “We could maybe make some if we can manage a sample of pyrite,” said Natalie.

  “Why bother when you can just send the birds?” asked Raphael.

  “What?” asked David.

  “Take Kiwi and Mozart to the base of the mountain. Tell them what you need from Lion’s Mouth and have them bring it,” said Raphael.

  “And that will work?” asked David.

  “Of course it will work,” snapped Raphael. “Do you think I keep Mozart because I enjoy the music?”

  David stared at him, suspicious.

  Raphael huffed. “David, if you had any modicum of intelligence, you would realise that it is not in my interest to lose the only person here who has enough brains to help me be rid of the rest of you.”

  “Thank you, your advice is always appreciated. Isn’t it, David?” asked Natalie.

  “What she said,” he grumbled. “Should we get ready to go then?”

  “No, I’ll go myself,” said Natalie. “You can work on the frame while I’m gone.”

  “Are you sure?” asked David.

  “Yeah, it’s fine,” said Natalie, waving her hand. “I’m only going to the base of the mountain, and I’ll have the birds with me.”

  “Okay, Nats, if you insist,” said David.

  “Yeah,” said Natalie, thoughtful, “I insist.”

  “Right. Shall we start on the rods?” asked Raphael, clapping his hands. “David?”

  David watched as Natalie disappeared up the moving platform. He leaned against the cello.

  “Yeah, let’s get started,” said David, picking up the bow.

  “Wait for my cue with the gumleaf,” said Raphael.

  Sasha nodded and took a seat next to Liza. The mist thickened and filled with the long, yearning moans of the cello. Out of Raphael’s wrists stretched a purple filament strand. He leaned forward, pushing the floating ribbon through the mist as though he was willing the very atoms of the universe into motion. Liza chuckled.

  “What’s the matter?” whispered Sasha.

  “I’m just thinking how strange it is that we all survived and came together, each with precisely the right skills needed to pursue Paradise,” said Liza.

  Sasha shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. If the circumstances were different, you could have perhaps attained the same outcome through another way. We’re just using what is available.”

  “Possibly, but perhaps not probably, else it would have been done long ago,” said Liza. “The desire to reach Paradise Island is certainly nothing new.”

  “That’s true. Despite much desire, reaching the island has historically not been probable,” said Sasha.

  “No,” said Liza, a glimmer of hope in her eyes, “it has not.”

  Along the grassy edge of the Chumvi River, Natalie paced, ignoring the coldness that seeped through her rubber boots as the water splashed against them. Kiwi and Mozart perched on a nearby tree branch, waiting for her to return to the trail, but Natalie kept pacing, her eyebrows furrowed with intense brooding. In her hand she held a purple gold ring and a silver pocket watch.

  “Why can’t I just let it be?” she asked. “Is it right to risk our lives chasing the wisps of a daydream? What if it ends up being a nightmare?”

  She stared out across the river at the thick tangle of trees on the opposite bank, her mind filled with thoughts of David, her father, home and the spectral imaginings that had served as a mother throughout so much of her childhood. She knew pursuing answers in Paradise could—and would very likely—change life as she knew it. After all these years waiting and hoping for this opportunity, now that it was upon her, Natalie wasn’t sure if she was ready to say goodbye. She glanced at the purple gold ring as it rubbed against the timepiece, remembering the happy, somewhat ignorant life she had lived at Ten-on-Farm with her dad. Natalie smiled as she thought of how David, with no memories or home anywhere else, had become part of her family.

  This could be goodbye, she thought. “Agh! I just wish there was some way to ensure this doesn’t end in disaster,” said Natalie, glancing at the silver timepiece.

  Kiwi screamed impatiently from the tree branch, shattering Natalie’s concentration. She turned.

  “Right you are, Kiwi. It’s time to carry on. We must keep moving,” said Natalie, pocketing the ring. “I guess I’ll just have to trust Silence that things are going to work out.”

  Kiwi and Mozart flew ahead as Natalie clambered over moss-covered stones along the edge of the trail, her thoughts turning to lead-acid batteries and other practical things as she headed toward Lion Mountain.

  a c k n o w l e d g e m e n t s

  My sincerest gratitude goes out to the following people for their contributions to the production of Rebel Fires:

  Terry McMahon Putz, for her invaluable support and commentary; Michelle Kasper, for her elegant design work; Nassar Omar, for encou
raging me to write; and Lee Ann & Donald, for always championing creative thinking.

  Special thanks also to Chestine Trzupek, Kristen & Paul DiCostanzo and all the readers of The Merman’s Mark; to Anna Bybee-Schier, Sara Hale & Angelica Marshall: three amazing women who never cease to motivate…

  And to Louis, the feisty sun conure who gave Crusty her voice and La Cloche her bite.