She’d wondered when she was crowned why her uncle hadn’t been made the king. The law ensured that succession went first to the oldest surviving child before other blood relatives could be considered, but he was a man, the closest blood to her father, and a strong man. If having a girl succeed was so controversial, why didn’t the members of the Royal family simply bypass her? Once she grew into the role of queen her opinion changed. Why shouldn’t a woman rule a kingdom? she argued. What made a woman any less able than a man?
Her uncle Kingly died unexpectedly of a heart malady when she was in her early twenties, although suspicion was rife that he died from a poisoning meant for her. Now entering her fifties, with thirty-seven years of reigning supreme behind her, she gave no quarter on any issue to men. Her strength was not physical, but of heart and mind. The Seers would obey her or perish. For a long time she had wrestled with them over their status and rights, power that they justified in the name of their deity. She asked them to intercede on her part, as the Seers had for her father and grandfather in wars, but they refused. She begged them, she cajoled them, she ordered them and they refused, even when members of their ranks turned against her to support her son, Future Royal. The games were finished. She would show them, after all this time of patience and frustration, that she was the law.
‘We aren’t seriously going to allow this woman to dictate to us?’ Onyx protested. ‘How dare she threaten to imprison us!’
‘I don’t think she is threatening,’ Vale quietly said.
Diamond was rubbing his beard thoughtfully. ‘Well?’ Onyx asked. ‘She can’t be serious about putting us in the Bogpit, can she? I mean, she’s made that threat before and nothing happened.’
‘Many times,’ Diamond agreed. He stood by his chair. ‘Only this time I think our brother Vale is right. This time she isn’t bluffing.’ The assembled Seers waited for Diamond to continue, but he moved around the table towards the door.
‘Then what will we do if she’s having us arrested?’ Seer Gold asked.
‘I, for one, won’t be spending time in the Bogpit!’ Onyx roundly declared.
Diamond turned to his colleagues. ‘No. None of us will be spending any time in the Bogpit.’ He drew a breath. ‘But we will send to our brothers and inform them of the Queen’s latest outburst, and we will do what we can to hasten their arrival with the Prince.’
‘How will we keep out of the Bogpit?’ Vale asked.
Diamond smiled. ‘We will tell the Queen that we have been mistaken and that we will help her to defend the kingdom.’
‘Against our brothers?’ Onyx asked.
‘Defending the kingdom takes many forms, Onyx,’ Diamond said. ‘I never said from whom we were defending it, or in whose name we were defending it. Only that we will defend it.’
‘She’ll send us to the battle lines,’ said Gold. ‘Then what?’
‘Magic is such an unpredictable skill. Our Blessings are from Jarudha and if He does not bless us on the battlefield we can hardly expect our magic to work, can we?’
‘It’s still a battlefield,’ argued Onyx. ‘We can be killed.’
Diamond shook his head. ‘The Bogpit? Or possibly a battlefield?’ He spread his arms in a questioning gesture. ‘I know which is safer for me,’ he declared, ‘and we will already be standing among our friends. Our foes are our liberators.’
The Seers looked at each other as they assessed Diamond’s wisdom and nodded approval. ‘There is a reason you are our leader,’ said Onyx.
‘I will tell the Queen personally that we are contrite and committed to defending the kingdom. Then we must consider quickly advancing two or three disciples to Seer status so that they can be the first to go out to battle. While I’m gone, you four can make the choices. Jarudha bless our work.’ In unison, the Seers echoed Diamond’s prayer for blessing.
Sailors scurried up the mast, adjusting the sheets to catch more wind. The ship heeled to port in a sharp gust and Prince Future stumbled, grabbing the railing. On the slippery deck, thundermakers slid and fell as the ship rolled, and all throughout the Kerwyn shipmaster bellowed orders. A grappling hook thudded into the woodwork, and another, and sailors frantically scrambled to cut the ropes as the Shessian ship pulled closer. Seeing the Shessian soldiers preparing to board, Future unclasped his hilt strap and drew his sabre. ‘Get below, Your Highness!’ Sharpaxe yelled, but Future ignored the warning. It had been too long since he’d last felt the thrill of hand-to-hand combat. Too many people were mollycoddling him because he was the prince and heir to the throne.
Three more grappling hooks thumped on the deck and jagged against the railing. The black canvas of the Shessian ship towered overhead and the shouts and cries of men eager to fight mingled with the scraping of wood as the two ships crashed together. Kerwyn soldiers and sailors pressed around the Prince as the Shessian soldiers leapt aboard and thundermakers boomed.
Future stepped back and waited for his foe to break through the cordon. Swords and knives and pikes bristled in the struggling pack of men. A Kerwyn sailor slid backwards to lie at Future’s feet, his stomach torn open, blood squirting across Future’s dark grey trousers, and a Shessian soldier pushed through the battling crowd, long knife in hand. He crouched, facing the Prince, and Future smiled when he saw that the man recognised him. The hesitation gave Future first blood as he punctured the soldier’s left arm with his sabre. Prompted to fight, the soldier retaliated, his knife sweeping a finger-span past Future’s face, but then he was knocked aside by a Kerwyn sailor swinging a cudgel who leapt on him and beat him to death. Future stepped around the bloody struggle and headed for another Shessian soldier pressing a wounded sailor against the railing. He stabbed the soldier in the back, wrenched out his sabre and turned to hunt another victim. The noise of battle, the cries and screams, excited him. He slashed at a soldier and ducked a sweeping pike before he retreated to safety.
The Kerwyn sailors were winning. An explosion rocked the Shessian vessel and a ball of flame curled through its sails. Shessian soldiers close to the Prince threw down their weapons to surrender and the Kerwyn sailors cheered. ‘No prisoners!’ Leader Sharpaxe yelled. The shipmaster repeated the order in his Kerwyn language and his sailors attacked the unarmed Shessian soldiers, cutting them down or driving them back into the water separating the two ships. The thundermakers loosed a volley at those aboard the burning Shessian ship who were frantically fighting the spreading flames while their stricken ship drifted aimlessly.
Prince Future sheathed his sabre and studied the wider scene. The Shessian fleet was in ruins. Caught downwind in the open ocean by the Kerwyn fleet that came like ghosts out of the heavy morning fog, the Shessian ships, though greater in number, couldn’t match the Kerwyn vessels with their thundermaker and thunderclap magic. One by one, the Kerwyn rallied and ran down the Shessian vessels throughout the day, until only a handful of the demoralised Shessian ships were able to turn and run with the wind for shelter in the Port of Joy bay. In every direction ships were burning, yellow flames flickering along the wide ocean, white and black smoke filling the sky. Dots with waving arms bobbed among the flotsam from the sinking vessels.
‘It is a pleasing sight, Your Highness.’
Future turned to the speaker, a blue-robed Seer with sparkling green eyes. ‘Jarudha’s will is very powerful, Weaver,’ he acknowledged.
Weaver smiled. ‘Jarudha has tolerated abominations in the kingdom for too long, Your Highness. He guides us to cleanse our people and make the foundations for His new order. This small victory is His word to us that He is our Lord and Master.’
‘I am blessed that He has chosen me to lead this change.’
‘We are all blessed by Him, Your Highness. I am pleased that you can see with your own eyes what Jarudha will do for you if you let His work be done.’
‘I’m surprised to see you here,’ Seer Diamond whispered to his unexpected guest whose face was hidden in the shadows of his blue cowl. ‘I thought you’d come when Future
was in the city.’
The guest smiled and bowed his head in deference to his superior Seer. ‘The Prince will be here within a handful of days, old master.’ He threw back his hood, exposing his long auburn hair. ‘I’ve just heard that the Queen’s fleet is burning.’
‘How?’ Diamond asked, studying the lined face of the man he’d trained as a disciple.
The younger Seer fumbled in the folds of his robe to extract a fragment of beige parchment. ‘Weaver sent this message with a seagull.’ He handed the parchment to Diamond who opened it and read.
‘So the Prince will be here within five days,’ Diamond confirmed.
The younger Seer nodded. ‘It is time to make the preparations.’
‘You’ve done well, Vision. Your father would be proud of you.’
Vision’s brown eyes sparkled. ‘My father planned for this time. Had he not died at the hands of the Abomination, he would be delivering this message.’
‘Jarudha’s justice is wise, but He unfolds it in His own time, not ours. Truth knew this. So do you.’
Vision bowed his head. ‘Thank you, Your Eminence.’ He lifted his head and said, ‘I will see to the preparations. The Prince must not be weighed down with unnecessary complications.’ Then he withdrew from the chamber.
Diamond watched the young Seer depart with mixed feelings. His father, Seer Truth, had been a ruthless man, impetuous and ambitious, determined to see the coming of the new Jarudhan Age, but he had lacked the patience of someone who would ultimately triumph. That he had died fighting the Abomination, the term the Jarudhan Seers used for the young woman who’d brought and destroyed the Conduit a decade ago, was inevitable in Diamond’s view. Jarudha’s sense of justice was always ironic. So Diamond had taken Truth’s son, the acolyte Vision, under his personal tutelage as a disciple for the five years following Truth’s death to ensure that the young man had more patience and more craft to his character than his father, and when Vision was promoted into the Seers’ ranks he was sent north to serve Prince Future. The past five years of political manoeuvring and war had matured the young Seer into a calculating, calm servant of Jarudha—exactly the kind of man Diamond hoped he would become. But—and he had no evidence to support it—he retained a cautious doubt that Vision could remain patient if he rose to higher power. Only Jarudha knew the full answer. The preparations in Vision’s charge would be the catalyst.
‘I have no time to see one of them,’ Queen Sunset replied. ‘I’m about to negotiate new terms with the Coalition of Chiefs’ representative.’
‘But, Your Majesty,’ Goodman begged, ‘this one is insistent. He claims to have the latest news about Prince Future.’
The mention of her rebellious son’s name stopped the Queen. ‘Is this true?’
Goodman nodded. ‘Yes, Your Majesty, I believe so.’
‘Should I know him?’
‘His name is Seer Vision, Your Majesty, the son of Seer Truth.’
Sunset’s face blanched and she glared in disbelief. ‘Truth was a Rebel!’ she snapped. ‘He killed Lady Amber. How could I trust his son?’
Goodman nodded as he said, ‘True, Your Majesty, but Vision has been tutored by Seer Diamond and Diamond said to assure you that the son is nothing like the father.’
‘Then bring him in,’ Sunset instructed, ‘but see that the Elite Guards are alert.’
‘Yes, Your Majesty,’ Goodman replied. He signalled to an Elite Guard to escort the visitor into the chamber, before he motioned to the remaining seven guards to stand at the ready. The door opened and the blue-robed Seer entered, his long auburn hair bouncing on his shoulders as he approached, and he bowed respectfully before the Queen.
‘I’m pleased to see that at least one Seer knows protocol,’ Sunset said in greeting. ‘You are the son of Seer Truth?’
The young man raised his eyes. ‘Seer Truth was my father, Your Majesty, yes.’
‘Is it true that sons are like their fathers?’
Vision smiled sweetly. ‘Is your son like his father, Your Majesty?’
Sunset heard the mild impertinence, but she expected that tone from the Seers who set Jarudha higher than herself. ‘My son is like neither of his parents. He wasn’t raised to forsake the love for his parents for the love of a god.’
‘Jarudha isn’t any god, Your Majesty. He is God.’
Sunset laughed politely. ‘If I wanted spiritual advice, young man, I would seek it from your master.’
Vision bowed his head again, saying, ‘As would I, Your Majesty. His wisdom far exceeds mine.’
‘My time is precious. What news do you have of my son?’ Sunset demanded.
Vision straightened and met the Queen’s blue-eyed gaze. ‘Prince Future will be in Port of Joy within four days.’
Sunset’s eyes widened. ‘Here?’ She looked at Kneel Goodman who shrugged to show his ignorance of the news. To Vision she said, ‘How did you come by this knowledge?’
‘A colleague sent word.’
‘That’s all you have?’
‘It is enough. My colleague is Seer Weaver and he sails with your son. Their ship will be in Port of Joy within four days.’
‘But my Royal fleet is already intercepting the Kerwyn ships. They will be captured and brought here in chains.’
‘Perhaps that is how it is meant to be,’ Vision conceded. ‘If I may be excused, Your Majesty?’
Sunset studied the young man. He had an intelligent face, but there was steeliness to his eyes and a surly edge to his thin mouth that she knew she couldn’t trust. ‘You are excused. I have an important meeting.’
Vision bowed and retreated, but after he had covered ten paces and was within reach of the door he slipped his right hand inside his robe and turned, calling, ‘Your Majesty?’ Sunset, who’d issued an instruction to Goodman and was about to leave the chamber, stopped to look at the Seer. ‘The real news is that your Royal fleet is nothing but wrecked hulks on the sea floor and my colleagues have this gift for you,’ Vision announced. He flicked a spherical object that bounced along the tiled floor to rest at the Queen’s feet and, before Goodman or the Elite Guards could react, the object exploded and engulfed the Queen in a vicious fireball. Vision lunged for the door.
CHAPTER FIVE
‘Blossom Beekeeper,’ the woman with the greying hair tied back said. ‘And you?’
She gazed at Blossom blankly. ‘I—I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know your name?’ Blossom asked.
She shrugged. ‘No.’ Water lapped against the side of the boat. She was conscious that the women and children closest to her were staring. The grey-green eucalypts on the river bank were crowding in like the people.
‘Well, where are you from?’
She pointed north. ‘I think that way.’
‘What village?’
‘I don’t know. I woke up and everyone was dead.’
The boat people nodded and sighed. ‘We know what that’s like,’ said an older woman with her hair under a ragged blue shawl. ‘The barbarians attacked my village at night.’
‘You don’t look like you were hurt,’ Blossom said. ‘You must have been lucky.’
‘I guess,’ she said. ‘Where are we headed?’
‘As far as we can go upriver,’ Blossom told her. ‘You really can’t remember your name?’
She shook her head despondently. ‘No.’
‘Call her Found,’ a wizened older woman suggested.
Blossom smiled. ‘Is that all right by you?’
‘I guess,’ she said.
‘Found it is,’ Blossom said, pleased with the idea.
Found was glad when the questions stopped. Squeezed between two other women and with three children pressing against her legs she sat in the boat’s leaking hull and watched the panoply of gum trees drift past. Black cormorants and black-and-white pelicans glided across air and water, dipping and diving for fish. She closed her eyes and let the dappled light play across her eyelids as they passed under overhanging boug
hs. It was good to be among people.
The man in the blue robes was laughing at her. In his arms he held a bundle and she felt fear for what he held. He pointed at a group of people to her right. There were two women, one much older, and several men and children, and there was also a dingo and a rat at their feet. They were all looking at her as if they knew her. And then they vanished. The man in the blue robes threw the bundle into the air, holding one end of the cloth wrapping, and the bundle also vanished as it unravelled.
She was woken by cries and shifting bodies. ‘Oh Jarudha!’ a woman screamed beside her. Found twisted to see what was happening ahead. The leading vessel in their river party, the sailboat, was burning and people were struggling in the water. The people on the raft following it were also falling and leaping into the river. Thin, dark arrows flitted across the space from the northern bank and buried into victims. A boy flipped backwards into the river, two shafts jutting from his body, and then the raft exploded in flame. On the northern bank a man in blue robes was pointing at the raft.
‘Magic!’ a woman screamed.
‘Get to the bank!’ Blossom yelled. ‘Hurry!’ The two rowers turned the boat towards the southern bank and pulled furiously on the oars. A woman leapt into the water, followed by three children, and they started swimming to escape. The second raft was heading for the south bank as well, but already it was under the archers’ fire.
‘They’ll never make it!’ someone screamed.
‘As long as we do!’ Blossom yelled. ‘Row!’
As the boat crunched into the muddy bank under a towering gum tree the passengers scrambled out of the boat and fell into the water. ‘Come on!’ Blossom yelled, ‘Run!’ and she wrenched Found’s arm, pushing her after the receding backs of the women and children. ‘Run!’
A Solitary Journey Page 4