She’s lying, I think. She’s lying. The blanks wanted to leave. They wanted their own community. They fought and rebelled; they hurt us – that’s what it says in the museum.
“Those who didn’t move fast enough that day were killed. Men, women, children. They let a few of us escape, to come here. For years, I wondered why. Why not pursue us and slaughter us there and then?” She pauses for a beat and looks fixedly into my eyes. “And then one day I understood. They’re clever. They let us live because they need us.” The slightest smile lifts her lips, but there is no humour in it. “They let us live so they could have something to hate.”
Chapter Twelve
“And that was how the second wave of blanks came to Featherstone.”
She gestures around at the boxes. “These are the things we could salvage, the small tokens we could take with us to remember those who were killed. These are the memories we have left. They are all we have left.” I look around at box after box and wonder at how many people are represented here. Some of the candles have burned themselves out. I don’t dare speak. What would I say, anyway? How do you respond when someone tells you something so terrible? Lies, I think fiercely. Clever lies. They must be.
“Featherstone itself was founded by Belia, as you know from the stories, yours and ours. A small community of blanks, safe from the brutality of your Queen Moriah. With the Eradication – well, the village tripled in size in a day. No one was turned away. And with more people came need and heartbreak like the citizens of Featherstone had never seen. We arrived with our lives ripped apart – and lives don’t heal quickly. The numbers brought great pressure to the village – there were so many more to feed and home, and the land had to make way for new houses. There was less space to grow food or pasture animals. We came for refuge, and we brought with us nothing but hunger.”
I sense that our time together is almost over, but there is so much more I want to discover.
“Our stories are true, my dear,” Ruth says as she pats my hand, squeezing my fingers for a moment. “As true as yours.” And she heaves herself out of the chair, picks up her stick, which has been resting against the table, and hobbles away.
“Ruth,” I call out, and she stops. “Will you tell me about my mother? You knew her, didn’t you?”
She stops, her back still to me, and for a moment I think her shoulders tense. Then she keeps on walking.
My lesson is over for today.
Chapter Thirteen
The clouds whisper threats of a storm and the air is muggy and close. I tie my shawl around my waist. My arms are bare and I feel people’s eyes on me. I begin to see myself the way they do. I’ve never thought I was beautiful, but here I feel monstrous. They can’t read me, not like I could be read at home, but I still feel exposed. I had never considered that my ink might give my secrets away to outsiders; that all the wrong people might know all the right things about me.
Ruth has instructed me to do simple tasks to integrate, and I am briefly hopeful that I will learn something that will be useful to Longsight. Instead the week passes in dull, menial work. I shadow Gull and do whatever she does. We go where we’re needed. We build and whitewash a fence. We spend an hour digging in the vegetable garden one morning, unearthing a few small potatoes that we take to the central storehouse, where all resources are kept in different sections. We bake flatbreads and I see how low the levels are in the sack as I scoop up a cupful of flour.
“We’ll need more soon,” I tell Gull, but she just looks at me.
Every day people line up at the vegetable stall to collect their food allowance. We are allotted fewer vegetables and no fruit and the bits we are given are past their best.
“Something’s wrong,” the woman at the stall says. “A blight on the earth can only mean blight in someone’s heart. We are being judged. Or cursed.” She looks pointedly at me. Gull takes me gently by the arm and leads me away.
I’m listening all the time, desperate to find out something – anything that might be enough for Longsight. And really, I want a reason to keep on distrusting these people, something that justifies all those years of fear, information that will make what I am going to do feel less like betrayal. I am a citizen of Saintstone; I shouldn’t be easily swayed.
Another day we assist Tanya at the village surgery. I am struck by the paucity of the supplies – so primitive compared to home. No vaccinations, or drugs, or proper sterilization equipment. It’s run by willing volunteers but I don’t think any are formally trained. A small boy is brought in coughing, his cheeks red and eyes fever-bright, and I see the healer’s worried face and the fear in his father’s eyes. It’s just a cough, I want to say. But then I realize. A virus could spell death in Featherstone.
No wonder Gull isn’t thinking about dream jobs and her ambitions. They’re all just trying to survive.
A few days later there is nothing for breakfast at all.
One morning, still half asleep, my stomach aching with hunger, I shove my feet into my boots and yelp when I feel something stabbing the sole of my foot. I pull the boot off and reach inside and there’s a small, jagged white stone. I shake the boot to get out any other dirt and a slip of paper flutters out. I palm it before anyone can see.
“Are you all right?” Gull asks, swigging back the last of her drink and joining me at the door.
“Yeah, just a stone in my shoe.” I smile, feeling the crackle of paper between my fingers. I pocket the note, waiting for a moment alone so I can read what it says. And I realize: someone in Featherstone must have slipped that note into my shoe. Someone must know why I’m here.
Monday. Wait until full dark.
A lantern will be left by the blue barn.
Follow the stones.
Monday. That means I have two days. Two days to find something out. Two days to find enough evidence to prove myself to Longsight and save my loved ones. Two days until I betray the blanks.
“When will you tell me about my mother?” Ruth has me collecting water from the well today. (Monday. The day and still nothing has happened.) It’s hard and heavy work, but it’s one resource the people can count on. The well is just a little walk away from the main settlement. They call it Belia’s Well.
As I release the bucket and hear a distant splash, I wonder if this is the same well where Saint met the White Witch. In the story – our story – Saint crosses a boundary, leaving the safety of the inked community he knew. He meets the witch and he hopes to save the blank people he meets. He’s so kind in that story, and the witch … oh, she’s so cruel. Full of falsehood she flayed him. But even that couldn’t stop him. Our Saint.
I’m tired, hungry and frustrated. It’s Sunday night, and I know nothing more that I can give to Longsight – no information to feed his hunger.
Ruth is sitting on a big square stone, eyes closed, freckled face turned up towards the sunshine. I keep meaning to ask about these stones – I saw them when I was walking to Featherstone. We stand by a large cluster of them, pale rock showing though lichen and moss, like the ruins of an old building – but I’m not going to ask today. Today I want to find out about Mum.
“I’ll tell you when the time is right.” Ruth’s voice is rasping, as though she is fighting a cold.
“I could just ask someone else.” I heave on the rope until I feel the bucket rise, and I pull hand over hand, my palms burning. “I’ll ask Tanya.” My patience has never been a strong point, but with the sun on my head and my aching shoulders and my empty belly and Ruth just sitting there, I feel irritated. Tonight I am meeting my contact, whoever it will be, and I have nothing of use to give them. I don’t apologize when Ruth is splashed by water when I lift the bucket over the edge of the well.
“You’ll wait,” is all she says as she wipes her arm dry. And she’s right, I’ll wait – even if I don’t like it. Because it seems as though Ruth has more to tell than most.
I carry the buckets back to the village centre, not waiting when Ruth stops to cough and whee
ze.
I’m stacking the empty buckets in the storage barn when I hear footsteps and the door opens. I retreat further into the shadows behind a broken cart. I can’t face yet more unfriendly Featherstone locals.
“I can’t go on like this,” a gruff voice says quietly, and I realize it’s Fenn. “Waiting, like rats in a trap. They’re starving us out. I … I just wish I could do something.”
“Our time will come.” I see the dim light from the window shine on Justus’s face. “We have to be patient—”
“I’m sick of being patient!” Fenn tosses the metal spade he’s carrying to the ground, where it clangs horribly.
He sighs and sits on a wooden box. Justus draws up a stool and joins him.
“I know you’re tired of waiting, but we can’t rush this,” Justus says. His head inclines and he gives a brief smile. “The riders are working – hard. They want what we want. Our time will come.”
“You’ve been saying that for months – for years.” Fenn leans his forehead against clenched fists. “Some days I wish I could take a torch from the fire and go to Saintstone and burn it to the ground.”
I swallow, and it seems so loud I almost expect them both to turn and see me.
“I know, my boy,” Justus says. “In fact …well, let’s just say you are not alone. Sana and her riders are less than patient also – this visit of theirs might prove very interesting for the good people of Saintstone.”
“What do you mean?” Fenn’s dark brows furrow. “I thought they were just going to get resources – and hopefully get into the hospital…”
Justus nods knowingly.
“The hospital?” I can hear the excitement in Fenn’s voice. “Would they attack it?”
“I can’t say,” says Justus maddeningly. “You know I can’t. But the riders had explosives on them. Now, no more. We have to tread carefully. But a new beginning is coming, you can be sure of that.”
“This changes everything,” Fenn says, and I catch the excitement in his voice. I don’t hear the rest of their words over the noise of tools being put away, but a cold shiver makes me certain I don’t need to know any more. A planned attack on Saintstone – on the hospital of all places.
Fenn’s right. This changes everything.
There is no danger of me missing my meeting with Longsight’s contact that night; I couldn’t sleep if I wanted to. I keep thinking of Sana, the rider with the curling hair and dancing eyes, and a satchel full of explosives. What if she hurts the people I love? I toss and turn in the semi-darkness until it’s time. Gull does not stir as I slip from the room.
I catch up a coat from the hooks by the door and keep a careful look out for Lago as I tread past the kitchen. The front door closes soundlessly and I pull the coat on, allowing the great hood to cover most of my face. I breathe in the scent of the fabric as it enfolds me and take in a lungful of Fenn. I hadn’t noticed it before, but this is definitely him: it smells like ice and smoke, dry mud and wet bark and like the air after lightning. I do up the top button and smile grimly to myself. It feels apt that I am wearing his coat as I reveal all he has told me tonight.
The lantern is where the note said – a place cleverly chosen because no one would see it from their houses or any of the footpaths. I lift it.
Follow the stones.
I hold the lantern out and squint my eyes, looking into the darkness. Nothing.
Except. I see a little gleam as the light bounces off something bright on the ground ahead. Treading forward, my soft boots making scruffling sounds on the gritty ground, I see it – a stone – a white stone like the one that was left in my boot. A white stone like the ones Gull picks up – and another, just a few more metres away. I don’t know how long I walk for – an hour maybe. The light of the lantern casts evil-seeming shadows that make me gasp and jump.
My heavy footsteps scare the animals, and more than once I jump as a fox or a rabbit leaps out of my way. It occurs to me that this might all be a blank trick, one of Ruth’s clever tests: they suspect me of spying and are luring me out into the woods to my doom.
I look behind me to make sure that the stones are still there – I would never find my way back without them.
A sudden cackle makes me drop the lamp in fright, and the flame is dashed out. A flutter of black and white, a caw and the beating of wings are all I can sense of the magpie as it flies away and I am left in absolute darkness. I reach out to find the lantern and burn my fingers when I scrabble hold of it. I can’t see the stones; I don’t know which way is forward and which way is back. Trees and clouds refuse to give way to moonlight, and as cold mud seeps through the knees of my trousers, tears well in my eyes, making me blinder than ever.
“Effortlessly elegant there, Leora.”
The voice is quiet – so quiet I think I must be imagining it, because it is a voice I have missed so much, my soul hurts. Verity.
“Come here, and I’ll light your lamp.” The warmth of her voice is like a hot bath, like a deep breath, like a belly laugh, like a friend.
A dim torch flickers on and I see her.
Verity. My Verity.
I’m crying – and I’m laughing too – as I run and sink my face into her hair, clinging on and relishing the Verity-ness of her. She seems taken aback by my embrace, but after a moment’s pause brings her hands up to hug me back.
“How did you get here?” I’m incredulous, greedily gazing at her face, trying to soak it up.
“I was brought with a couple of Longsight’s men – they had me riding a horse, Lor – can you believe it? You know how much they scare me.” Verity takes my hand but drops it a second later, as if remembering how things are between us. She leads me to a little clearing where a small pile of twigs and branches is waiting to be lit. With nimble fingers Verity lights a match and gets the fire started. I take a burning twig and relight my lantern. “We rode all day.”
“Where are they now?” I look around, anxious at who might be listening in.
“They’re back at the camp – they’ll come back in an hour or so.” She rubs my knee. “Don’t worry. They seemed frightened of this place. I don’t think they would be able to stay even if they wanted to. We’re alone.”
“How are you?” My question seems so small, but it holds everything: Is she safe? Is she afraid? Are her family OK? What about everyone else? Mum, Obel, Oscar … Oscar.
“I’m fine.” She closes up. “Anyway, I had no idea I had been chosen for this great mission” – I can hear the eye roll in her voice – “until this morning. Jack Minnow came to the house at dawn to tell me.” She warms her hands by the fire and I think about the night we went into the woods near school for the party. We’d just got our results and had our trades confirmed. We sat around a fire then, and she drank beer and almost sprained an ankle with those ridiculous shoes.
Too much has changed since then.
A cold wind blows through the trees and leaves me blinking smoke from my eyes. When I wipe away tears and soot it’s like the whole atmosphere has changed.
“You didn’t tell me you were leaving.” Verity’s voice is quiet and she’s gazing at the flames. “I’m always the last to know your plans these days.”
If I had known I was going to be seeing Verity, I could have prepared for this, but the words I blurt out are messy.
“There wasn’t time – I just had to … go.” I rub my knees where my trousers are drying; the damp patches have become scaldingly hot, the mud beginning to dry in crusty patches. “The more people who knew … well, I just couldn’t risk it.” I want to tell her everything but I don’t know if she’d believe me.
“I’m sorry I am a risk to you,” Verity says in clipped tones. “I suppose I thought I might have mattered enough.”
“I’m sorry,” I murmur. I’m tired of those words, but I’m only going to have to say them more and more often. “It was Longsight’s decision.”
Verity is silent for a while, and the crackle of burning twigs has drowned out th
e sounds of the forest. Eventually she sighs.
“I realize that now.” She throws a leaf at the fire but it flutters to the floor before it reaches the flames. “Anyway, I’ve been told to take back a message. Information on the blanks. So, Leora the spy, what have you got for me?” She is efficient, businesslike now.
“It’s not at all like we were told, Vetty,” I whisper, scared of all the truths I have to tell. “They’ve – some of the blanks – have been kind to me.” Verity’s lip curls in disgust, and I know it will take more than my words to convince her. “They aren’t the savages we imagined. There are no crops, they have barely enough food to feed themselves, yet they share it with me.”
Verity shrugs impatiently. “I don’t think this is the kind of thing Longsight was hoping for,” she says derisively.
“But there is something.” I steel myself to tell her the news. “The riders are at Saintstone right now.”
“Riders?” Verity asks.
“They’re the ones who go to Saintstone and collect resources – food, medicine…”
Verity shakes her head. “Stealing from us, you mean.”
I interrupt her.
“I think they’re planning something bigger than just taking food this time. I overheard something about an attack on the hospital.” I swallow. “I think one of the riders has explosives.”
Verity’s eyes flit to mine. She’s thinking of her parents, Simon and Julia.
“Mum’s working nights this week.” Verity’s eyes are wide. “When?” She leans forward. “Do you know when?”
“All I know is what I’ve just told you.”
Verity stands and begins to stamp out the fire.
“I’m sure they wouldn’t attack the maternity ward…” My voice trails off.
“Can you hear yourself?” Her voice breaks. “If they’re willing to target a hospital, there are no limits, are there? What, do you think they’ll bomb the fracture clinic but leave the babies? Anyway. I have to go.” She gives me a brief, contemptuous look. “Longsight will be pleased with you.”
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