The Amber Legacy

by Tony Shillitoe

  The morning was already hot. She crossed the bridge, glancing down at the glassy river before she diverted onto a narrow walk that eventually reached the cluttered, overgrown wild herbs and flowers of Emma’s garden. She weaved along a gravel path to the old crone’s unpainted and decaying front door. This is the last time, she reminded herself. This time my mother will have to accept that I do not have the Blessing. Magic belongs to fairy tales.

  She knocked, and while she waited, Sunfire foraged in the undergrowth, startling a pair of rosellas into flight. Meg watched the patches of yellow, red, blue and green flash towards the gum trees higher up the hillside, before she knocked again, and waited, playing with the silver shilling Emma charged for her services. A shilling was enough to buy five days’ flour or pay a workman for a day’s labour. With no father to work the farm, and two lazy boys, and a toddler, money was not easily come by. They grew enough to feed themselves, and sometimes enough to sell as market produce. Dawn took in seamstress work to raise copper pennies when they were in dire need. That’s how Meg learned all of her needlework and fabric skills. A silver coin was a waste for the lies of an old woman. When there was still no answer, she turned to leave. It was getting hot, there was work to do at home, and she knew she would have to scold her brothers again for their slackness. Her mother was too easy on them. Uncertainty in her heart, she knocked on the door a final time. ‘No one can say I didn’t try,’ she muttered to Sunfire, whose inquisitive snout was raised as if to question her intentions.

  ‘That is true,’ a voice rasped. Meg spun to her left to find a white-haired woman, hunched by age, smothered in a multi-coloured robe made from assorted patches of animal skins and fabric, standing beside a wild, scraggy and massive lavender bush. ‘Patience, young woman, is a virtue too few know the value of possessing,’ Emma said, as she approached, using a twisted and rough mallee branch for her walking cane. ‘If you’d knocked twice and gone, I’d have known you weren’t here for any good reason. Three knocks is a sign that the visitor means to visit.’ She paused at the door, squinting up, studying Meg. ‘Jon and Dawn Farmer’s girl. You’ve grown into a rare beauty,’ she said, and shook her head. ‘Too beautiful for these parts. Beauty’s wasted in small villages like Summerbrook.’ She eyeballed the dingo. ‘So you’ve come to watch over your mistress?’ Sunfire cocked his head, amber eyes staring back at the wizened old crone. ‘You’re a clever one,’ she said, and petted his head. She reached for the gnarled wooden door handle, and as she opened it, she said, ‘You’ve come to know what I can tell you, so you’d better come in.’

  Meg motioned to Sunfire, ordering ‘Stay,’ as she went to follow Emma inside.

  ‘He can come in too,’ Emma told her. ‘He has a right.’ The dingo tipped his head again, as if he was listening to the old woman. ‘Come on,’ she invited. Sunfire’s long pink tongue appeared, and he trotted through the door ahead of Meg.

  The interior was dark and the ceiling low, and it smelled of jasmine. The two windows that opened to the outside were shuttered, gaps spilling narrow shafts of sunlight across patches of the floor and jutting angles of furniture. The air spun with sparkling dust motes. As she entered, a sudden thrill sparkled along Meg’s spine, reminding her of the sensation she’d felt in old Samuel’s cave. Emma’s shadowy figure shuffled through the room and a dull light emanated from the corner where she paused. She revealed a glowing stone cupped in her hands, which she set on a table, announcing, ‘A little light is always useful.’

  The glowing stone surprised Meg, but she knew there had to be a clever trick to the source of light; a ruse the old woman used to enhance her image as a maker of magic. The soft light gave form to the furnishings. Two high-backed, padded chairs pressed against the black wood oval table. One wall became ramshackle shelving, overflowing with books and yellowed parchments. A black door led into the cottage’s adjoining room.

  ‘Sit,’ the old woman instructed, and when Meg hesitated, she repeated the order, adding, ‘I’m about to have rosemary tea. Want some?’ Meg politely declined. ‘Suit yourself,’ Emma said, and turned to the small hearth in the corner. She knelt, coughed and rubbed her hands, and a small fire flickered into life. She suspended a fire-blackened water pot above the fire and dropped rosemary sprigs into it. Sunfire shoved his snout under her arm and she scruffed the big dingo’s smooth ears. Satisfied with the attention, Sunfire retreated to lie on a small rush mat at the entrance door. ‘So,’ Emma began, as she took her seat, ‘what has that silly old fool told you?’

  ‘How do you know someone’s said anything to me?’ Meg asked.

  ‘What did he say?’ Emma replied calmly.

  Meg outlined the essence of Samuel’s fortune telling. ‘And he finished by saying that the crystal was singing to me.’

  Emma rose, and bent to lift the steaming water pot from the fire. As she removed it, the fire went out. She filled a yellow cup before returning to her chair. Holding the cup at her lips, she blew softly across the top of her tea, and stared into space. ‘Well?’ Meg asked.

  ‘Patience,’ Emma said, and sipped at her beverage. ‘Are you sure you don’t want some? It’s good for relaxing.’

  Meg shook her head, irritated by the old woman’s slow manner. Her attention shifted to the room. Like the soothsayer’s cave, the old woman’s cottage was cluttered with a weird assortment of items. She spotted books. No one else that she knew in the village bothered with reading, except Saltsack Carter who did his sums for work costs and customer orders on paper. A multitude of jars were stacked along shelves around the hearth. She counted five battered travel chests pushed against the walls, and large ochre-coloured pottery jars of assorted shapes were scattered around the room. A stuffed kookaburra was mounted on a tall perch, and a red fish swam in a glass bowl on a grey marble pedestal.

  ‘He said the crystal was singing to you. Are you sure that’s what he said?’

  ‘Perfectly sure,’ Meg replied. ‘In fact, he said the crystal knows me. What’s that mean?’

  ‘How did he react?’

  ‘When?’

  ‘When he told you this about the crystal?’

  ‘He was scary—a little. He ordered me out of his cave.’

  ‘What did he do with the crystal?’

  ‘He snatched it up as if he—’ she stopped, trying to find the word to describe what the old man had done.

  ‘As if he was afraid you were going to take it away from him?’

  ‘Yes!’ Meg realised. ‘That’s what it was like. Which is stupid because I don’t care about his little slice of amber. It’s not worth anything. And I don’t steal.’

  ‘No,’ Emma agreed. ‘That’s very true, Megen Farmer. You are a good and honest girl. I’ve seen you and I’ve heard people talk about you.’

  ‘Who?’ Meg demanded, curious.

  ‘Different people,’ Emma answered. ‘Who said what isn’t important. Who else have you told about this?’

  ‘Mum. But I haven’t told her everything.’

  ‘Anyone else?’

  Meg screwed up her face. ‘Why?’

  ‘I need to know who else knows.’

  ‘Why?’

  Emma coughed, and sipped at her tea. She sighed, and said, ‘Why did your mother send you to me?’

  ‘Samuel told me to come,’ Meg replied.

  ‘Yes he did, but you wouldn’t have come if your mother hadn’t insisted. So why is she so keen for you to bring me this news?’

  Meg didn’t like the old lady’s interrogative manner, and considered leaving. She didn’t have to be here. But the old lady’s eyes—eyes that seemed warm and friendly despite the stern and haggard face in which they sat—compelled her to answer. ‘You’re right. I didn’t want to waste our money. I don’t believe in the stuff everyone else believes in, especially prophecies. I’ve never seen one come true. I think people like you and Samuel just take money and tell people what they want to hear.’

  ‘Very astute for one so young,’ Emma interrupted. ‘Ast
ute, and cynical.’ She glanced at Sunfire curled on the mat, canine eyes watchful, and looked back at Meg, observing, ‘No wonder he follows you so faithfully.’

  ‘What’s that mean?’ Meg asked warily.

  ‘Animals, clever ones, understand the nature of people better than people do. They choose to serve those who deserve service. He trusts you. He knows you.’

  ‘I feed him,’ Meg rejoined. ‘I pat him. I’m kind to him. That’s why he follows me.’

  ‘If you say so,’ Emma replied. ‘So why has your mother sent you to me?’

  Meg shrugged. Reluctantly, flushed with embarrassment, she said, ‘She thinks—I might have—the Blessing.’ She snorted, and shrugged again, adding, ‘She hopes I have the Blessing—which is stupid.’

  ‘Why is it stupid?’

  The question caught Meg unprepared. ‘I—because it is. I don’t have the Blessing.’

  ‘What makes you so sure?’

  Meg noted how the old woman’s stare intensified. ‘This is silly. I can’t do magic. I—’ She hesitated before saying, ‘Look, I’ve even tried.’

  ‘Tried?’

  ‘You know, I’ve tried to conjure things—by concentrating really hard—wishing things to happen. But nothing ever does. I was stupid to even believe in magic.’ Emma started quietly chuckling. ‘What?’ Meg asked.

  ‘I was just thinking how much like you I was when I was your age.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘In lots of ways, girl, lots of ways.’ She stood. ‘Come back and see me in the phase of the full moon. Keep what you’ve heard from Samuel to yourself. The old fool should know better than to say these things, even if they are true. Don’t even discuss it with your mother, even though she’ll ask about it as soon as you return home.’

  ‘Why all the secrecy?’ Meg asked, perplexed by Emma’s sudden familiarity.

  ‘I’m asking you to see me again,’ Emma replied. ‘As for the rest, we’ll see.’ Sunfire rose and stepped aside as Emma opened the door. ‘Now I have a lot of work to do. And so do you. Your brothers will be home demanding something to eat.’

  Meg fumbled in her pocket and withdrew the shilling. ‘Here,’ she said, thrusting it at Emma.

  ‘Keep it,’ the old lady answered. ‘I didn’t answer your question.’ And she ushered Meg out of her cottage.

  Heading home, Meg flipped the coin in her hand, wondering why the old woman hadn’t taken the money, why she wanted her to return during the full moon, why she wasn’t happy that Samuel had told her whatever it was that he’d said. ‘She even thinks you’re smart,’ Meg said to Sunfire. The dingo’s ears twisted towards her and his tail bobbed slowly. She laughed and skipped several paces, until she saw Iris Baker staring at her from her shop window. Remembering the flour and the silver coin, she changed direction and headed for the baker’s shop.

  She was drifting above a battleground. Everywhere she could see men fighting and dying, arrows flying, shields glinting in the sunlight. Fires burned on wagons and on bodies. A river ran with blood. Then she zoomed in to a knot of struggling, wrestling soldiers—in to the face of one soldier, matted red hair framing a red bearded face smeared with mud, blood, sweat—her father’s face. He grimaced and looked down, and Meg looked down as well and saw the lance piercing his leather armour. He looked up at her and mouthed the silent words, I’m sorry.

  She sat up, breathing fast, as if she’d run quickly. She was sweating. Silver moonlight streamed through her bedroom window. The house was silent. She pushed aside her blanket and eased up to the rough wooden sill. Moonlight lit the stark white gum tree trunks, making them appear like ghosts. Her father was dead. Sorrow stirred, but strangely she had no desire to cry.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The black bush rat stopped preening its whiskers and listened. Its nose twitched, tracing the afternoon scents on the hill. The world was changed. The rat shivered, dropped from the rock beside the sun-glittering brook and scampered towards the cave entrance. In the lee of the cave it paused again, sitting up on its haunches to sniff, before it ran inside.

  Samuel flinched as the rat leaped onto his bench, and he glared at being rudely interrupted, but he softened and, lowering the small pottery jar in his left hand, he asked, ‘What is it?’ The rat cocked its head to one side, and Samuel turned towards the entrance. ‘Someone’s here?’ He picked up a black rag to wipe his hands. ‘Who would visit an old man at this hour of the day uninvited?’ he mumbled as he shuffled towards the daylight. Shadows appeared in the entrance. He stopped, and called, ‘Who’s there?’ The shadows lengthened, and three men entered the circle of his yellow lantern light. Two were soldiers. The dark-haired man in the middle wore a light blue robe. ‘What do you want?’ Samuel asked warily.

  ‘Some friendly hospitality would be a good start,’ the man in the blue robe said, as he surveyed the clutter in Samuel’s cave. ‘You know we’ve travelled a long way to come here.’

  ‘Then you know how far you have to travel back,’ Samuel replied.

  The Seer smiled wanly. ‘It is a harsh world when a disciple of Jarudha cannot feel welcome in another man’s home.’

  ‘What do you want?’ Samuel repeated. The Seer nodded to one of the soldiers and the two men pushed past Samuel into his den. The old man protested, ‘This is my cave. There’s nothing here of any use to soldiers.’

  ‘Evidently true,’ the Seer remarked, appraising the chaotic jumble of odds and ends scattered across the cave and its crude furnishings, ‘but you and I both know that what I’m here for isn’t of any use to soldiers either.’

  ‘Leave,’ Samuel ordered.

  ‘Or you’ll do what?’ the Seer taunted.

  A pottery jar smashed, and Samuel turned to see a soldier sweeping his hands along a shelf, knocking the contents to the floor. ‘Stop that!’ he demanded. He hobbled towards the soldier, who stopped and waited for the old man to reach him. As Samuel lowered his lantern and squatted to retrieve parchments that had been brushed from the shelf, the soldier kicked the old man’s shoulder and sent him sprawling. The lantern tipped and burning oil spread across the ground.

  ‘Put that out and light another one,’ the Seer ordered. As the soldiers hurried to obey him, he stood over Samuel, who was struggling to sit up. ‘Now, old man, the time for games is over. I know who you are, I know why you are here and I know what you have.’ Fresh lantern light filled the cave as Samuel went to rise, but the Seer used his boot to push him back down. ‘You sit there and listen. I don’t want you to think that this is going to get any better for you.’ The Seer paused to lick his lips, and to the soldiers he gave the quick order, ‘Find it.’ As the rummaging through Samuel’s possessions recommenced, he returned his attention to the old man. ‘My father spent his lifetime hunting down the Conduit. The records are confused, and the myths and the legends even more so, as I suspect you already know. But he searched until he was certain that it had come on a long journey out of the ashes of the old Empire, and that it had come to this place.’

  ‘I have no idea what you are talking about,’ said Samuel. Another pottery jar smashed and he flinched.

  The Seer snorted, and grinned cynically as he rubbed his hands together. ‘Samuel Kushel, son of Erol Kushel, grandson of the sea captain Kosek Kushel, on the descendant line of Julian Kushel, son of Sardek Kushel.’ He shrugged and squatted beside the old man whose craggy features had blanched. ‘My father was a scholar, old man, of considerable intelligence and diligence, and a committed disciple of Jarudha. To have the Blessing is a rich reward for serving our Lord, but to have the Conduit to amplify the Blessing—now that is what every Seer has sought, and my father’s scholarship has brought me to you.’ He rose. ‘No more games, old man. Give me the Conduit.’

  ‘I don’t have whatever it is you’re talking about,’ Samuel said, in a quiet but shaky voice.

  The Seer snarled and kicked the old man under the chin. Samuel, spreadeagled onto his back by the kick, rolled his head to his left and coughed and spat broke
n teeth between his bloodied lips. As he raised his bony right arm to use the sleeve of his ragged green robe to wipe away the mess, the Seer sank a boot into his exposed ribs, curling the old man into a spasm of agony. ‘Anything?’ he growled at the soldiers, who were standing in the detritus of Samuel’s shattered and scattered possessions.

  ‘Nothing, Your Holiness,’ one replied.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘There’s nothing here like what you described, Your Holiness,’ the soldier confirmed.

  The Seer strode across the ransacked space and kicked random items out of his path as he searched for anything that could hide the Conduit. ‘Look for camouflaged shelves or hiding places. It’s got to be here,’ he said, his anger snapping in his tone. The soldiers resumed their investigation.

  ‘Bloody rat!’ a soldier bellowed as a black shape leaped from beneath a rag. He kicked empty air as the rat dropped to the ground and bolted for the exit.

  ‘That was pathetic,’ his companion jeered.

  ‘Find the Conduit!’ the Seer roared, infuriated by their interplay.

  ‘We’ve searched everything, Your Holiness,’ a soldier reported.

  The Seer clenched his fists and glared at both soldiers. ‘Burn it,’ he hissed. ‘Burn everything.’ He stormed across the cave to Samuel who was still huddled, clutching his side. ‘Where is it, old man?’ he asked, forcing the words through his teeth like bitter rind. Samuel’s wheezing silence evoked another kick to the old man’s ribs and Samuel cried out, trying to curl into a tighter ball. ‘Where is it?’ the Seer repeated.