A Solitary Journey

by Tony Shillitoe

  Around them, Meg saw screaming people running from the camp and smoke billowing from the burning shelters. She felt detached suddenly, as if she was seeing the terrifying events from another place. The men approached, but their attention was diverted as a boy leapt from behind Meg and crashed into the dark-bearded man. The warrior met the boy’s charge with his forearm and smashed the lad to the ground, but the boy scrambled to his feet, ready to make a second attack. ‘No, Magpie!’ Meg screamed. ‘Run! Get out of here!’

  ‘I’ll kill them first!’ Magpie yelled defiantly.

  ‘They’ll kill you!’ she screamed. ‘Get out of here!’

  The Kerwyn warriors seemed amused by the argument and two more ambled out of the smoke to join the group. They assessed the situation and one threw a sword to land at Magpie’s feet. His words were unintelligible, but his motioning hand invited Magpie to pick up the weapon. ‘Don’t touch it!’ Meg hissed, glaring at the boy. Magpie met the steady gaze of the Kerwyn who’d thrown the sword and he began to bend. ‘No!’ Meg yelled angrily. She was startled by the reaction of the warriors because all four were instantly alert and wary.

  ‘Now, little bird,’ said a gruff voice behind Meg, and she turned to discover Wombat holding an axe, ‘I suggest you and the boy start climbing into the hills.’

  Confronted by Wombat’s imposing mass, the Kerwyn warriors crouched in readiness. ‘You heard Wombat,’ Meg said to Magpie.

  Seeing the Kerwyn distracted from him, Magpie snatched up the sword. ‘I’m staying,’ he said earnestly, eyeing the enemy, his sword point trembling like Meg’s legs.

  Wombat strode past Meg and lurched into the melee, putting his bulk between the Kerwyn and the boy as his axe circled and struck down his first opponent. The three standing Kerwyn eagerly entered the challenge as Meg crept back several paces, horrified and fascinated by Wombat’s audacity and strength. A second Kerwyn dropped silently, the brown-haired man, his face full of shock as he understood that the Shessian giant had cut him fatally.

  Wombat bellowed, ‘Run!’ at Magpie, adding, ‘Look after Meg, lad!’ Seizing a chance to strike, a Kerwyn stabbed at Wombat, but the big man nimbly sidestepped and his fist smashed the unlucky warrior’s jaw. Groggy and clutching his face, the man stumbled sideways and Magpie swung his sword into the man’s leg. The warrior yelped and jumped before falling. Wombat blocked the dark-bearded man’s sharp blows, before his sweeping axe knocked the Kerwyn’s sword away and sent the warrior bolting for safety. ‘Come on!’ Wombat ordered, searching the smoke and fire quickly engulfing the camp for immediate danger. He wrenched Magpie forward, pulling him roughly in the direction of the hills, and beckoned for Meg to follow.

  As the trio ran between burning shelters Meg tripped on the body of a woman and stared into her dead, wide terror-stricken eyes, rooted to the earth by the vision until Wombat grabbed her arm and pulled her away. ‘No time for that, little bird,’ he said. Then he pushed her aside and engaged a Kerwyn warrior. A swift exchange of blows ended when Wombat smashed the butt of his axe into the warrior’s stomach and brought the head down across the falling man’s neck. Meg wanted to vomit, but Wombat pushed her along the shallow slope, heading north instead of up the hillside. Twice more he intercepted and brought down attackers before he directed Meg and Magpie into the bush on a diagonal ascent of the hills.

  Fifteen refugees squatted under a jutting ledge, huddled against the night cold, staring at the orange glow along the western horizon. ‘It’s as if the whole forest is burning,’ said Magpie.

  ‘It is,’ Meg murmured, and she drew the boy closer.

  ‘Why do the Kerwyn want to kill us?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she replied.

  ‘Greed,’ Wombat said bluntly.

  ‘They hate us,’ said Wombat’s wife, Ochre.

  ‘How can people we don’t know hate us?’ Magpie asked.

  Silence answered his question. Meg couldn’t understand the reasoning, although in her memories she felt the presence of hatred that she had experienced a long time ago—the feeling that people hated her for what she was.

  ‘I’m hungry,’ Wombat’s son, Digger, complained.

  ‘Me too,’ chimed in his sister, Petal.

  ‘Hush,’ Ochre hissed softly. ‘We can’t eat tonight. There’ll be something tomorrow.’

  ‘I’m thirsty,’ Petal pleaded.

  A woman’s screams raced across the face of the hills, coming from the south, and Meg squeezed Magpie closer as the screams intensified and faded like whispers in the darkness. ‘They’re hunting everywhere,’ a woman at the edge of the huddled group noted angrily. ‘What will we do?’

  ‘They’re chasing down people who went straight up the mountain,’ Wombat explained. ‘Get some sleep if you can. We’ll go deeper and higher before sunrise. By the time the Kerwyn start spreading wider we’ll be gone.’

  ‘What if they come before we leave?’ the woman persisted.

  ‘I’ll keep watch while you rest,’ Wombat promised. ‘If they come, they come.’

  Whispers and muffled shuffling of people searching for warmth and comfort broke the silence. Meg let Magpie snuggle against her and smiled at the growing boy’s inner childlike needs. She felt Ochre pressing against her back. Wombat’s wife was someone she wanted to get to know. Behind the young woman’s dark eyes sparkled a bright intelligence that attracted Meg, though circumstances in the past few days had not allowed them much chance to speak. She sighed and gazed up at the sliver of moon on its back. She was living in a violent, ever-changing world and all she wanted was the opportunity to rest.

  You know how to come here, the commanding voice of the dream told her. You came before. I need you. You’re the only one left who can save me. I need you.

  But I don’t know how, she whispered desperately.

  Make a portal, the voice ordered. Make a portal.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Meg’s legs ached, and she was wet and cold and tired by the end of the next day from climbing slopes and descending valleys to climb again. The Kerwyn were persistent and ruthless. Five times Meg and her companions glimpsed Kerwyn hunting parties scouring the surrounding hills and at midday they watched helplessly as a Kerwyn party chased and trapped a large refugee group in a box canyon in an adjoining valley. They didn’t stay to see the fate of the prisoners. Standing still was certain capture or death. Wombat, the only man among five children and nine women, urged them relentlessly on. ‘Hard work now will save us,’ he said when two women complained that they couldn’t continue and he directed the group’s progress from the rear, making Magpie his forward scout.

  Late in the afternoon, when they crested the largest hill and reached the base of the first real mountain towering above them, its snowy peak seeming to drift through the grey clouds, Wombat called a halt. He walked to the front of the group, puffing furiously, and wheezed, ‘We go through that pass over there,’ as he pointed to a V-shaped gap between two mountains visible to the left side of the one they stood before. ‘Magpie will lead.’

  The group straggled after the boy, but Meg lingered beside Wombat as he waited for Ochre and his children to follow the others. ‘So you’ve been through here before?’ she asked.

  Wombat shook his head. ‘No.’

  ‘Then how do you know we go through there?’

  He scratched his shaggy hair and said, ‘Well, call it a smart guess. It’s the most likely place, given the only other way is to climb over the mountain,’ and he grinned cheekily. Meg, unable to argue with his simple logic, nodded and shrugged. ‘Come on, little bird,’ he said, ‘we have to find somewhere to shelter and keep warm. The air’s already turning nasty.’

  ‘I’ll follow,’ she said. ‘I just want one more look.’ Wombat touched her shoulder affectionately with his broad hand as Meg stared towards the west. The sky was still stained with smoke and the sun was swallowed yet again, as if the entire kingdom was on fire. Everything she knew was gone. She sighed and turned to follow the others,
unaware that a small black shape emerged warily from behind a rock and scampered after her.

  Heat radiated through the huddled band of refugees. ‘You are Lady Amber,’ a woman whispered as Meg lifted her hands from the glowing stone.

  ‘Stay close around it,’ Wombat warned. ‘We don’t want the Kerwyn spotting any light.’

  ‘How do you do that, Meg?’ Magpie asked.

  She cuddled him, saying, ‘I don’t know. I just think it and it happens.’ She looked at the tired, gaunt faces over the warm glow. Everyone was already starving before the Kerwyn attack on the camp, but running from the enemy was rapidly wearing them to their bones.

  For four nights she brought them warmth as they clambered through the rocky pass, and while Wombat hunted small animals and birds in the early morning and evening the women and children scavenged for leaves and berries on the strange mountain plants. The Kerwyn ceased their pursuit, but there was no returning to Western Shess for the refugees. ‘I heard the land over the mountains is called The Valley of Kings,’ the woman named Whitebird told them as conversation circled. ‘My father travelled to the east when he was younger. He said the people there used to call their land Shess like ours, but they interbred with other races and they look different.’

  ‘How different?’ asked Lace, the youngest woman and the one who still had energy despite the hardship. Her dark blue eyes always sparkled with life.

  Whitebird squinted from under her brunette fringe. ‘They’re tall men, he said, but their skin is darker than ours, and they don’t speak like we do.’

  ‘And their women?’ Lace asked.

  ‘Like the men,’ Whitebird replied.

  ‘Our lives will be in their hands when we get through the mountains,’ Ochre said as she fed a morsel of bird meat to her daughter. ‘We will be their guests.’

  Wombat rose, hefting his axe. ‘What is it?’ Whitebird asked.

  ‘Shush,’ he hissed. The group strained to listen. The night was colder, darker. Then they heard a strangled half-growl.

  ‘What is that?’ Lace gasped.

  Wombat took two paces away, staring into the darkness. ‘Can you make that light brighter?’ he whispered.

  ‘Everyone cover their eyes,’ Meg warned, before she held out her hands, imagining a bright light flowing from them. The familiar tingling rippled along her spine as white light radiated around her, driving the shadows back fifty paces from the overhang where they sheltered. At the edge of the light a tawny creature crouched, eyes glittering. It blinked and leapt out of the light.

  Covering his eyes to avoid the glare, Wombat looked back at Meg and asked, ‘Did you see that?’

  ‘What was it?’ she asked.

  ‘A cat—a giant cat.’ He lowered his axe. ‘You can turn out the light.’

  Meg imagined the light gone and the night rushed in, smothering Wombat in shadow as he waited for his eyes to adjust to the golden glow of the warming stone. Questions from the others flew as Wombat squatted at the circle. ‘It was like a great big cat. It was sort of tan in colour. I’ve never seen anything like it.’

  ‘Will it eat us?’ Digger asked, wide-eyed.

  ‘Cats don’t eat people,’ Magpie retorted.

  ‘That cat might,’ said Wombat.

  ‘Don’t tell him that,’ Ochre chided.

  A howl echoed across the mountains. ‘I didn’t think dingoes would come this high,’ said Whitebird.

  ‘They don’t,’ said Wombat and he stood again uneasily. ‘That wasn’t a dingo howl.’

  ‘We’re going into strange lands,’ Whitebird whispered, as she rubbed her hands above the warming stone. ‘My father said it was full of different creatures. He said there are no kangaroos or dingoes on the other side of the mountains.’

  The howl repeated and was mimicked by another. Meg stood beside Wombat. ‘Are we safe?’

  He looked at her, his eyes gleaming in the magical yellow light. ‘I don’t know,’ he said quietly.

  ‘I’ll help keep watch tonight,’ she offered.

  Solid rain dogged their path, turning the ground into treacherous mud and surging rivulets, and the cold turned bitter as the rain soaked through their clothes to their skin. Wombat led them up a slope to a small cave and ushered everyone in after he checked that it was uninhabited. Cramped, forced to huddle in the tiny space, they sat and shivered until Meg created light and warmth. ‘We’ll stay here until the rain stops,’ said Wombat.

  ‘How much further do we have to go?’ a woman asked.

  Wombat shrugged. ‘At a guess, two or three days—no longer than that, Glitter.’

  ‘I’m hungry,’ a little girl whined in the centre of the huddle. Whitebird crooned to her and the girl was quiet.

  The rain persisted all day, but by nightfall everyone in the tiny cave was cosy and asleep, and even Wombat at the entrance was snoozing, exhausted and close to starvation despite his efforts to provide. Only Meg was awake. Magpie was pressed against her so she carefully extracted herself from his hold and eased past Ochre to the cave entrance. Wombat blocked the exit and his eye opened as she shuffled beside him. ‘What are you up to, little bird?’ he asked.

  ‘Just not sleeping,’ she said. ‘Thought I’d give you a break from watch.’

  He grinned. ‘If I was an honest man, I’d admit to quite a bit of sleeping while I was supposed to be watching.’

  ‘Then get some more now,’ she offered. ‘I’ll wake you when I can’t stay awake myself.’

  Wombat nodded gratefully and folded his arms across his barrel of a chest. ‘I’ll see what happens,’ he said. ‘If I don’t sleep, so be it.’

  Meg smiled at the big man and glanced at his wife and children nestled beside him. She wished she could remember everything about the journey he told her they’d shared years ago, but only the pieces he described actually formed into memories. The spaces between did not return despite her efforts to recall them. He’d said that she went in search of her lover, but didn’t find him. Who did I love? she wondered. Was it Button Tailor? Did I find him later, after Wombat parted from me? She couldn’t fit the jigsaw together and his stories only complicated her memories. But she had a bigger issue to resolve. Why could she make magic? Who was Lady Amber?

  A sharp snore snapped her out of her reverie. The sleeping Wombat was growling like his namesake. She smiled and carefully slipped past the big man into the cold and dark night. She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. I wish I was warmer, she thought. Then she decided to experiment. She concentrated on feeling warmth through her body—soothing, calm warmth—and to her surprise and delight she felt warmer, as if she had a fire simmering within. How can I do this? she pondered. What can I do? On a whim she imagined herself floating above the ground. She closed her eyes and concentrated and felt the familiar tingle, and then lost the feeling of the rough earth beneath her feet. When she opened her eyes and looked down she was sure that she was a hand’s span above the ground. She broke the spell and landed softly, her heart racing. Have I gone mad with hunger? she wondered. She opened her palm and imagined a small ball of light sitting there and before her amazed eyes a ball of light formed. She thought of it floating above her and the ball left her hand and drifted up until it sat an arm’s length above her head. It was the colour of firelight, so she concentrated and it changed to a soft white light, and then green and then blue as she consciously altered the colour. ‘Who am I?’ she whispered.

  ‘Don’t move.’

  Meg turned to find Wombat’s massive frame crouching three paces behind, axe ready, staring past her. She followed his gaze to the edge of her faint magical light and saw a gleaming pair of red eyes and a dull squarish feline shape.

  ‘Take a step back, slowly,’ Wombat instructed quietly. Fear thrilling through her, she eased her left foot back slowly, eyes fixed on the creature. Her magical light waned. ‘Don’t lose the light!’ Wombat hissed. She refocussed and the light sharpened, redefining the giant cat.

  ‘What’s going on?�
�� Ochre’s silhouette crouched in the warming stone’s light.

  ‘Stay there,’ Wombat ordered, without looking back. ‘One more step,’ he prompted Meg. She eased her right foot back, slowly, trying to keep calm—and the wild cat charged.

  Meg dived, her light vanishing. She heard the animal snarl and Wombat grunt. In the dark she panicked. Light! she ordered in her mind, but nothing happened. Precious moments passed in the desperate vicious struggle near her, the cat hissing, Wombat wheezing and grunting. ‘Light!’ she screamed, but nothing changed. A heavy furry weight smacked against her shins and she jumped, and kicked blindly, her foot sinking into soft, coarse hide. The animal snarled and she was struck solidly across her shoulders and face, and sent reeling to the ground. Instinct warned her to roll and get to her feet, and clumsily she did so, only to trip in the dark and fall again. The invisible cat hissed before scrambling madly away. She got to her feet warily. ‘Wombat?’ she queried.

  ‘I’m here, little bird,’ the big man answered. ‘Make that light again.’

  She went to say that she couldn’t, but she took a deep breath and imagined the light forming in her open right palm and it appeared, leaving her wondering why she couldn’t conjure it when she needed it. The light revealed Wombat leaning on his axe handle, his tunic and waistcoat soaked in blood. She gasped in shock, and said, ‘You’re hurt,’ but he seemed to be staring at her strangely. ‘What?’ she asked.

  ‘Are you—’ he began, and hesitated.

  She approached, aware that Ochre and the others were emerging from the cave. ‘Am I what?’ she asked.

  ‘Your face,’ he said.

  Sensing something wrong, she let the light sphere rise from her hand and touched her face curiously. It was sticky and wet, and when she looked at her hand as she drew it away she had blood smeared across her fingertips. She looked down and found that her tunic was shredded along her right arm and her flesh was torn in deep gashes from the cat’s claws. The revelation made her feel sick and a throbbing pain rose from her wounds. She looked at Wombat. ‘I didn’t—’ she tried to say, but couldn’t finish her sentence. Ochre reached Wombat and started crying when she saw her husband’s injuries. Other women pressed around Meg, gasping and telling her she would be all right as they tried to steer her back to the cave. I will be all right, she thought, confident from her experiences in her innate capacity to heal, and so will Wombat.