Echo Quickthorn and the Great Beyond

by Alex English

  Horace’s face was frozen in fear as they marched him across the deck.

  ‘No!’ shouted Echo. ‘I can explain. I didn’t steal it, I promise you!’ But her voice was drowned out by the baying mob.

  ‘It’s my mother’s pin, I swear it!’ said Echo with a sob. She jerked away from the hands grasping her and the pin went skittering over the boards, landing by the woman’s boots.

  Indigo Lil froze. ‘Stop, all of you, stop!’ she bellowed. She bent down slowly and picked the pin up, turning it over in her hands. She turned to Echo with a frown. ‘Where did you get this?’

  ‘It . . . it was my mother’s. She left it for me when I was a baby.’

  Lil grabbed Echo’s chin, tilting it to look up at her, and examined her with piercing grey eyes. ‘Left it where?’

  ‘In . . . in my basket, pinned beneath the blankets.’

  Lil’s frown turned to a look of utter shock, and then, as she looked again at Echo, one of wonder. ‘Echo?’ Lil said, her strong voice suddenly weakening to a croak. She shook her head and took off her hat, revealing a mass of dark curls pinned with an identical hairpin. Her eyes, stormy grey with flecks of gold, met Echo’s. ‘Echo, is it really you?’

  Echo stared back in astonishment, trying to take in every detail at once. Lil’s eyes, grey and gold, were like a mirror of Echo’s own. Her skin was freckled even darker than Echo’s and her hair flowed to her waist in a wild black mane. Impossible hair, thought Echo, like mine.

  ‘M-mother?’ Every muscle in Echo’s body felt like it might burst. ‘You’re Indigo Lil? But the woman in the photogram had white hair . . .’

  For a long moment, Lil just stared at her, and Echo faltered as a wave of fear washed over her. Her mother, a sky pirate? And not just any sky pirate, but the terrible Indigo Lil. A violent thief! A murderer!

  ‘Let me look at you.’ Lil took Echo’s face in her hands and stared into her eyes, oblivious to the rest of the sky pirates, who looked at one another in confusion. ‘My Echo. Is it really you? But how?’

  Echo could hardly move as Lil touched her hair, her face, mesmerized. She breathed in cinnamon and gunpowder. Was this really happening?

  ‘Of course it is. As if I could ever doubt it. I don’t need proof.’ Lil threw her arms round Echo, her voice muffled in Echo’s hair. ‘I’d know you anywhere, Echo. My darling Echo.’ She pulled back and stared into Echo’s eyes again. ‘How well you’ve grown.’

  ‘I came to find you.’ Echo scrubbed her eyes with her sleeve. Her head was spinning so fast she couldn’t take it all in. Was this where she belonged? With thieves and murderers?

  ‘A proper adventurer!’ Lil smiled for the first time, and her own eyes filled with tears. Then she shook her head and her voice cracked as she said, ‘They told me you were dead. They told me . . .’ She took a deep breath and anger suddenly flashed in her eyes. ‘That no-good Alfons told me you were dead. I should have known he was lying.’

  Echo swallowed. So Lil hadn’t forgotten her. She hadn’t even known she was still alive. ‘They lied to me too,’ she said. ‘All I had left of you was the hairpin.’

  Lil turned it over. ‘I used to hide it in your basket so King Alfons didn’t take it away. He didn’t like me having anything that was different.’ She passed it back to Echo. ‘It’s yours, Echo.’ Then she enveloped Echo in a hug again and, despite Echo’s fears, despite her shock and worry and confusion, Lil’s arms somehow felt like home.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Echo and Lil finally drew apart, and Lil stepped back, wiping her eyes on her sleeve. She turned to the rest of the pirates, who were shuffling their boots nervously and looking at the deck. ‘Right, you lot, I think Echo here is owed an apology.’

  Bulkhead, the huge, thick-necked pirate, stepped forward. ‘Yes, Cap’n. Sorry about the mix-up,’ he said, flushing all over his bald head. ‘I’m Bulkhead, first mate and chief navigator. Honoured to meet you.’ He thrust out a huge hand with fingers as big as sausages. Echo grabbed one and shook it.

  ‘And this is Beti,’ said Lil, as the woman with the skirt full of bottles stepped forward. ‘She’s the ship’s doctor.’

  ‘I was just joking about yer organs.’ Beti grinned, showing her gapped front teeth. She took a little corked bottle from one of the many pockets sewn into her skirts and waved it at Echo. ‘I’ve got tonics for whatever ails yer. Any aches or pains, just come find me.’ She gave Horace a wink. ‘Although you do have a bit of a bruise on that arm, young man.’ She examined the scrape on his elbow. ‘Sure you don’t need me to . . .’ She reached into another pocket and brought out the little saw again.

  ‘No thank you!’ Horace’s face turned ashen and he stepped backwards in horror.

  Lil waved Beti away, as the rest of the crew giggled. ‘Put it away, Beti. The lad’s fine.’

  ‘Yes, Cap’n.’ Beti shuffled back in place, her skirts clinking.

  Bulkhead bent down and whispered in Echo’s ear. ‘She’s dying to cut a limb off. Never done it before, see.’

  Lil continued. ‘Where were we? This is Flora, the ship’s boy. ’Cept she’s a girl, of course.’

  The peg-legged girl who’d found them on the beach took one hand out of her breeches pocket to wave shyly at Echo and Horace.

  ‘You’ve met Slingshot.’ Lil pointed at the white-haired pirate. ‘He mans the crow’s nest and keeps the rigging shipshape. And these are the kitchen boys, Spud and Skillet.’

  Two identical-looking men in grimy white overalls stuck their heads out of the hatchway and grinned at Echo.

  ‘Hello,’ said Echo to all of them. ‘I’m Echo, and this is my lizard, Gilbert, and my friend, er . . .’ She shot a nervous glance at Lil. If Lil hated King Alfons, then she wouldn’t want his son aboard. She thought quickly. ‘Bob.’

  ‘Good to have you aboard, Gilbert and Bob,’ said Lil. ‘Any friend of Echo’s is a friend of ours.’ She clapped her hands together. ‘Right, lads, we need to prepare a feast,’ she said. ‘A feast worthy of a new member of the Black Sky Wolves.’ She looked at Echo, then remembered Horace. ‘And new friends.’

  ‘Spud, Skillet, get to the galley. Flora, you can help too. Slingshot, Bulkhead and Beti, get down to the beach and see what you can forage from the rock pools. I thought I saw some juicy urchins down there among the seaweed.’

  The crew all marched off and Lil turned to Horace. ‘You can help Spud and Skillet,’ she said. ‘They always need a hand skinning sea urchins.’

  Horace glanced at Echo in panic, but she shrugged.

  ‘If you need me or Echo, we’ll be in the captain’s quarters.’ Lil patted Echo on the shoulder. ‘We’ve got a lot to catch up on,’ she said softly.

  As the crew and Horace headed off to prepare the feast, Echo followed Lil to the captain’s quarters, a dark, woodpanelled room lit with flickering gas lamps and a wide oak desk littered with sky charts and treasure maps. Echo was still dizzy with the turn of events. This version of her mother was so different to the one she’d dreamed of. What if Lil was thinking the same? What if Echo wasn’t tough enough to fraternize with sky pirates? What if she was a big disappointment? She tried to push her worries away, but still they lingered as she shyly sat down at the captain’s desk.

  ‘I suppose I should explain a few things,’ said Lil, taking the seat opposite. ‘I don’t know how much you know.’

  Echo cleared her throat. ‘I don’t know anything. They told me you abandoned me when I was born. I was found on the steps of the castle in a basket of almonds.’

  ‘Abandoned?’ Lil’s eyes narrowed and she slammed her fist on the desk. Echo flinched in alarm.

  ‘Who told you?’ snarled Lil. ‘That no-good Alfons, I’ll bet.’

  Echo cast a guilty glance back outside at the deck, but Horace was deep in conversation with Flora. Lil’s eyes were still fixed on Echo.

  ‘I… I suppose he must have,’ said Echo. ‘I mean, I don’t really see him much. It’s Martha who looks after me.’

&nbs
p; Lil shook her head in disgust. ‘He’s always hated me, from the first moment your father brought me back to Lockfort. Alfons can’t stand outsiders, you see. Prefers to pretend they don’t exist.’

  ‘My father brought you to Lockfort?’

  ‘I can see him in you.’ Lil smiled sadly. ‘Although I still think you’re more Quickthorn than Lockfort.’

  ‘Quickthorn?’

  ‘That’s our name.’

  Our name. Echo turned it over in her mind. She’d always been Echo, or Lady Echo, or Echo of Lockfort. But Echo Quickthorn! It seemed to fit.

  Lil continued. ‘I met your father Edmond in Port Tourbillon. He’d developed Lockfort’s first airship and was on a mission to explore the outside world. Lockfort had been a strange, secretive sort of place ever since the Great War when they put that wall up. They didn’t welcome outsiders and everyone out here knew to keep well away. But when the old king, your grandfather, died and Alfons became king, his brother Edmond persuaded him to change things and venture out to Port Tourbillon to form ties with their royalty. He dreamed of opening up the gates of Lockfort and making it a free city.’

  ‘Wait, my father was a prince?’ Echo’s eyes widened.

  ‘You mean you didn’t know that either?’

  ‘But . . .’ Echo’s mind was spinning. ‘But . . . that makes King Alfons . . .’

  ‘Your uncle,’ said Lil. ‘More’s the pity.’

  All this time, Echo had thought the king had taken her on as a charity case, and he’d been family all along! Why had he done it? Separated her from her mother. Lied! She felt dizzy with it all. And, if King Alfons was her uncle, then that made Horace her cousin. There was so much she didn’t know!

  She turned back to Lil, her head still swirling. ‘So what happened? How did you meet my father?’

  Lil flushed and stared intently into the distance. ‘Well, he . . . he got sidetracked on his expedition. Edmond never met the queen of Port Tourbillon. Instead, he bumped into me. The Black Sky Wolves were on the run after holding up the royal coach, you see, and when Edmond heard what we’d done he helped hide us. Of course, Indigo Vi was captain then. I was just a deck-swabber and pot wash.’

  Echo swallowed, her bubble of happiness suddenly bursting. Her mother was a sky pirate. A murderer and a thief! And Echo’s father had helped her. Echo’s hope that there had been some kind of mistake, some kind of explanation for her mother having the stolen pins evaporated. Heaviness settled on her. ‘So . . . it’s true. You did steal the Crown Jewels.’

  Disappointment must have shown on her face because Lil suddenly frowned. ‘We had good reasons,’ she said.

  ‘Are there good reasons for stealing?’

  ‘Plenty, unfortunately,’ said Lil. ‘Princess Serafine wanted a new solid-gold fountain in the royal gardens and Queen Valberta had decreed that the city orphanage be closed to fund it. It wasn’t the first time they’d pulled a stunt like that either. Under their rule, everyone in Port Tourbillon was suffering. Children didn’t eat! Well, the Black Sky Wolves don’t stand for that sort of thing. We relieved Princess Serafine of her jewels, melted them down and used the proceeds to build a brand-new orphanage on Harris Avenue. Vi gave me this for my bravery,’ she said, putting a hand to her hairpin.

  ‘Wait, so you didn’t keep the treasure for yourself?’

  ‘Steal for good, that’s our motto,’ said Lil, rolling up her sleeve to show a tattoo saying the same on her upper arm.

  Echo frowned. ‘But why is everyone scared of you then? If you’re so honourable?’

  ‘We have to keep up appearances,’ Lil said. Her face grew serious. ‘There’s plenty of other bands of sky pirates out there who aren’t like us. If they knew the truth, they’d be hunting us down and plundering our treasure.’ She leaned back. ‘Flora’s great at spreading all those gory rumours!’

  ‘So you don’t really cut your enemies’ fingers and toes off?’

  ‘And feed them to the cloud eels?’ Lil laughed. ‘That one’s certainly got around! No, and we don’t burn their bones to run the ship’s engines either. Bulkhead would faint clean away if he ever had to cut off so much as a toe. He’s very delicate.’

  Echo’s mind wouldn’t stop spinning. Was anything as she’d thought? Although it was a relief to know her mother wasn’t a murderous criminal, stealing for good was still stealing.

  ‘Anyway,’ Lil said, ‘your father and I got married after that and a good pirate knees-up that was! I left the Black Sky Wolves so we could travel the world together, but I agreed to go back and visit Lockfort with him first. He was loyal to his brother and I was in love with him. I was expecting you by this point, of course.’

  Echo shook her head. No wonder she’d always had this burning desire to be free. And no wonder she felt so at home out here. Exploring was in her blood! But royalty was too. There was so much to think about. ‘No one ever told me my father was an explorer.’

  ‘Alfons never liked the idea,’ said Lil. ‘He wanted Edmond to explore in secret until they were sure they wanted to connect with the outside world.’

  ‘And so what went wrong? Why didn’t they connect?’

  Lil looked down and cleared her throat. ‘By the time we got back to Lockfort, your father . . . he was sick. He’d caught frost fever out in Port Tourbillon and he just couldn’t fight it off.’ Lil looked away into the distance and took a deep breath before continuing. ‘Alfons blamed me, of course.’

  ‘But it wasn’t your fault!’

  ‘For all his weaknesses, Alfons did love your father and, when Edmond died, Alfons just couldn’t see straight,’ said Lil. ‘He vowed that nobody would enter or leave Lockfort again. He came up with that silly prophecy to explain why the gates could never open.’

  ‘He made it up?’

  Lil nodded. ‘And the people bought it. Nobody wanted to leave. He spread rumours of a sickness out beyond the walls.’ She sighed. ‘But he was terrified that I would tell everyone about the real world outside. And so he kept me a prisoner.’

  ‘And that’s when you escaped?’ asked Echo.

  ‘Not exactly. He threw me down that chute of his and I found my way back to Port Tourbillon and the Black Sky Wolves. But you’ve got to understand, Echo.’ She took both of Echo’s hands in hers. ‘I thought you were dead. They took you away from me soon after you were born. Alfons told me they were putting me into quarantine, but I ended up in the dungeons.’ Her voice cracked. ‘Then they told me you’d died of frost fever too!’

  Echo nodded, the lump of sorrow in her throat stopping her from speaking. The king had lied about so much. Her mother. Her father. Everything! She clenched her fists. He’d made her feel like an outsider when he was part of her own family. ‘I believe you,’ she finally whispered.

  Lil stared off into the distance. ‘At one time, long ago, I vowed to go back to Lockfort and finish what your father started.’

  ‘Opening the gates?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Lil. ‘Throwing them wide open and showing the people of Lockfort what Alfons was keeping from them.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘I had grand plans, Echo. I was going to liberate the people. Show them freedom. I thought Alfons would see sense once he got over Edmond’s death. But he didn’t; he just became madder and madder. When I tried to go back, I was met with cannon fire and fury. And if I’d known you were alive . . .’ Her voice cracked and she swallowed. ‘I thought I had nothing left in Lockfort. After everything that had happened, I was glad to be out. I never wanted to see that place again. The Black Sky Wolves were the only family I had left.’

  She squinted out to sea for a long moment, then looked back at Echo and smiled. ‘But that’s all history. Tell me about you, Echo. I want to know everything.’

  So Echo told Lil everything: about the castle, about finding the professor’s airship and the hairpin and Port Tourbillon, about Abena, and the Explorers’ Guild, about their escape to the Violet Isles and rescuing Horace (or rather Bob) from the mantrap.

  ‘And
then we saw your ship,’ she finally said.

  ‘And here you are,’ said Lil, gazing at Echo with piercing grey eyes, as if trying to take everything in at once. ‘And where is this borrowed airship of yours?’

  Echo swallowed, guilt suddenly swirling in her stomach. ‘On the other side of the island. I ought to take it back to the professor. I owe him an apology.’

  ‘Why don’t we go and get him?’ Lil said. ‘You can invite him to your party.’

  ‘Party?’

  Lil grinned. ‘You’re home, Echo. I think it’s time to celebrate that, don’t you?’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The sky pirates prepared a spectacular feast, but it was only once Echo had eaten her fill of salted fish and seaurchins that the real celebrations began. It was late evening now, and the sun had almost dropped below the horizon, casting an orangepink glow over the water.

  After collecting a rather bemused Professor Daggerwing from Doctor Beetlestone’s laboratory, Lil had steered the Scarlet Margaret back to the beach on Tyrian where Echo had landed the Hummerbird and they had tethered it several feet up above the bay. Now Echo sat between Horace and Beti at a huge makeshift table that had been set up on the main deck of the airship. Gilbert perched by the edge of her plate, nibbling at some chargrilled squid. Professor Daggerwing sat opposite, enthusing about pickles to Spud and Skillet.

  A hush fell over the crew as Indigo Lil, two stripes of indigo clay on each cheek, climbed up to the prow of the ship, a tankard of grog in one hand. She stood silhouetted against the night sky as the ship swayed gently in the warm island breeze and cleared her throat.

  ‘Listen up, you lot. Tonight is a momentous evening!’ She waved her tankard and sloshed foam on to the deck. ‘It’s not often we initiate a new member into the Black Sky Wolves, and never have we welcomed one as important as Echo, the daughter I thought I’d lost. Come up here.’ She smiled proudly down at Echo.

  Echo scrambled out of her seat and up on to the bow where she perched beside her mother, her chest strangely full. From their seats at the table, the crew of the Scarlet Margaret raised their tankards and Echo couldn’t help grinning back. She caught Horace’s eye and blushed with pride. The daughter I thought I’ d lost.