Evan Burl and the Falling, Vol. 1-2

by Justin Blaney

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Claire

  I woke up sweating; I'd been dreaming again, always the same dream. Why couldn't I dream about gigantic chocolate cakes or swimming through a sea of custard or soaring with a flock of seahawks over a mountain made of baby blankets—flying is my absolute favorite. Why did I always have to be falling? I realized I was lying on a sofa outside my sister's room, but I couldn't remember how I'd gotten there. My sister, Ani, called it sleepwalking.

  I couldn't remember anything before the dream, except...

  Papa was coming home today!

  Jumping up, I banged on the lavender double doors that led to Anastasia's bedchambers.

  No answer.

  I banged again, feeling smaller as I stared up at the towering doors. Everything in our house is so big, sometimes I feel like a miniature figurine hiding in a land of giants.

  Sometimes I feel like I'm all alone.

  "Let me sleep," Anastasia moaned—her voice muffled by doors and bedcovers.

  I peeked into her room through a serving cupboard. "Cummon, Ani! Get up." I used to sneak into her room through that cupboard, but I was ten-years-old now—practically grown up—and Mother would have a fit if she caught me crawling around on my hands and knees. 'Not befitting of your station,' she would say.

  "It's my birthday," Anastasia said into her pillow. "Leave me alone."

  I fell into the chair. "If you don't get up soon, your birthday will be over." I kicked my feet against the wall, until a few moments later, the door lock clicked. Springing from the chair, I flew into the room as Anastasia stumbled back to her bed. My sister's room always smelled of peaches and vanilla. Papa shipped spices in from all over the world so we could make our rooms smell like sunshine or the sea or whatever we wished.

  "The sun isn't even up yet," Ani said.

  "It's been light for an hour." I ran to the windows, struggling to throw back the drapes. Mother says I'm too skinny. Ani says I'm too fat. When I can barely open the curtains, I tend to side with Mother.

  Anastasia made a funny sound. I imagined a milk cow rolling under the covers, moaning from overfull udders. I giggled—then, pressing my face up to the window, gasped. "The ships!"

  Ani jumped out of bed, elbowing me aside for the better view. "Papa!"

  I shoved her back, pushing open the window. The smell of salty waves warmed by the sun-bathed walls of our home blew in—the breeze tickled my skin. Our house was nestled in the foothills of a great mountain range, high above the ocean. Three ships with bright sails and flags flapping rounded the cliffs floated into the harbor. I jumped up and down, screeching and waving, thankful mother wasn't there to scold us for 'acting beneath your station.'

  Anastasia ran to her dressing room. Climbing into a window seat, I pinned my face to the glass. I watched the ships bob slowly into the harbor, catching my own reflection in the glass. My face didn't look as happy as I thought it should—I reminded myself of how Ani looks sometimes when she's angry, when she calls herself by another name. I remembered the fight my parents had before Papa left, something about having to go away for a long time. Maybe forever. Papa often traveled for weeks, even months at a time, but what if he was gone for years? What if he never came back?

  I would be all grown up when I saw him again, if I ever did. Papa was the only one in the world who really understood me. I hated it when he was gone. I didn't think I could survive if he left for good. But maybe I would be happier if he wasn't coming home today, if I was never going to see him again. Might be easier than having to say goodbye forever.

  A mouse crawled around inside me, twisting my insides, as I slid out of the window seat and tiptoed to the door. Before I could decide between running away or hiding, Anastasia burst out of the changing room. She caught me by the shirt. "Hurry, we're going to miss him."

  Two handmaids with trays of hot pancakes, maple syrup, and spiced sausages walked up the stairs.

  "Don't ye want yer breakfast?" Sophia said. "We was ordered t' bring it up early." From her accent, I guessed she was born in one of the poor towns of South Masr. She leaned close, her glasses pressing against Ani's ear, whispered without the accent, "We've been waiting a long time for this. Don't forget what I told you." I wasn't sure if she was talking to me or Anastasia.

  "We should eat," I said, inspecting Sophia with squinted eyes. Around her ankle was a chain I'd never noticed before.

  "But the ships are almost at dock." Ani stomped down the stairs, pulling me after her. We passed four more servants and turned three more corners. Rounding into the entrance hall, we skidded to a halt. Next to the three-tiered fountain bath in the center of the hall stood Duckie—and the giant mole on her nose—feet planted, arms folded tight. As far as I could tell, Duckie's job was to ensure Ani and I were dressed as uncomfortably as possible for whatever occasion presented itself.

  I looked at Anastasia, then myself—white chemises and petticoats. Hundreds of people in town dressed less modestly, but they weren't Amadeuses. Our last name entitled us to 100,000 acres, a city of servants, and the finest armada on the seas. I'd trade it all for a swift ship and an endless horizon, but Mother said life didn't work like that.

  The old woman straightened her portly body. The mole stared at me. "I 'spect you're not thinking on going out like that. Master Terillium won't like see'n his daughter look'n like a tuffin."

  I sighed. "We better go put on a ruff and gown. Probably a hat too in this heat."

  Anastasia raised her chin. "There's no time." She darted for the front door. I ran after her, and I swear, that mole followed me as I passed.

  "Jus' a min'it, if you please!" Duckie caught Anastasia's arm, but my sister twisted free and pushed her backward. The old woman wobbled then fell into the fountain with a splash. I tried to go back for Duckie, but Ani pulled me out the front door and past a frowning, grumpy old man who had been the butler for as long as I could remember. We stepped onto the porcadia and into a bath of sunlight. In the distance, a dozen servants collected rose stems from the gardens that swooped down from our house.

  "We should help Duckie," I said.

  Ani slammed the door shut. "That's what servants are for."

  "You didn't need to push her."

  "She shouldn't have tried to stop us."

  "It's her job."

  Ani shook her head. "You're impossible."

  "Just go without me." I sat on the wall of the fountain bath that filled the middle of our circular drive. The fountain's spray reminded me of playing behind waterfalls during summertime vacations to the mountains above our town.

  She folded her arms. "Papa won't give us a present if you don't come." Ani insisted that we do everything together. Sometimes I hated her for it. I hesitated for a moment, wondering how much she'd hurt me if I refused to come, then slipped off the wall and followed. As the horse barns came into view, a stable boy—cutting off a yawn—jumped up to meet us.

  "My horse," Anastasia said.

  The boy's shoulders tensed. "Begging yer pardon m'lady, but Stablemaster Braxton said you aren't t'ride alone."

  Anastasia twisted his ear. "Don't question me pig. Besides, I won't be riding alone, obviously." He bowed low then ran into the stables, appearing a minute later with Anastasia's chestnut Connemara. Grinning shyly at me, he tightened the saddle.

  "Quit gawking at Claire and help me."

  "I'm sorry m'lady. Here ye are miss—"

  Anastasia pushed his hand away, yanked the pony's mane, and shoved her foot into the stirrup. The pony moved and she slipped. The boy caught her waist and lifted her into the saddle.

  Anastasia whipped the boy across the face with the leather reins. "Touch me again and I'll have you lashed in the square."

  "I'm sorry m'lady, I—"

  She looked at me. "Should I make him cut his own skin?"

  I pulled myself up behind Anastasia, wondering if the small horse was strong enough to carry two. "Oh shut up. He kept you from falling on your fat butt."

/>   "I'm so sorry m'lady. It won't happen again."

  Anastasia kicked before I was ready and we jolted into a gallop. "What's with the servants today?"

  I barely stayed on. "Careful!"

  "Don't be a ninny." Anastasia kicked the pony again and we surged forward.

  I wrapped my arms around her, trying not to think of the times she made servants cut themselves, or hold their hands to a flame. She made me call her by a different name sometimes. She talked about herself like she was someone else. "Terisma wants to play." Or, "Terisma doesn't like you very much Claire." Or, "Terisma will slit your throat while you sleep if you ever tell on us." Last week she said, "You won't know it's coming. One day you'll make Terisma so angry I won't be able to stop her. That will be the last night you go to sleep."

  The wind swept through my hair; the Connemara ran as fast as if she was carrying just one. If anything could make me forget Terisma, horses could. To ride an animal so powerful and beautiful, sprinting across the ground like I weighed no more than a feather—as close as I could get to flying. I wondered if there were horses deep in the jungles that had wings, horses that could fly. I'm going to find one someday, when I'm grown up. I'll be a great explorer—like Papa.

  I looked up at a flock of geese passing overhead. Lifting my arms from Anastasia's waist, I spread them in the wind. "If I could fly, I would carry you with me above the clouds, and we could go see Papa anytime we wanted."

  "If you could fly," Anastasia said, over the clicking of hooves on the cobblestone beneath us, "I would dissect you like a frog and find out how you worked. Then I would learn to fly and you'd be dead."

  I stuck out my tongue.

  Anastasia's eyes narrowed. "If you're not nice to me, I might forget to stop Terisma from hurting you. The only reason you're still alive is I tell her to leave you alone." Clicking her mouth, she squeezed her legs to push the pony even faster. The great wall that kept us protected from the jungles outside our estate blurred by as the Connemara's hooves pounded the pavement like wood blocks in Bilielle's 3rd Symphony. Soon we were passing under the archway. Another ten minutes of galloping and we veered off the road down onto the hard sand, splashing into the surf. Crystal waves tinged with the scent of seaweed lapped up onto the hot white shore like a bubble bath, but as the city and docks came into view, the knot of worry in my stomach grew into a lump.

  Didn't Papa want his family? Why would he leave us? But Papa had to love me. I could see it in his smile. My mind turned to the servant girl this morning.

  "What was she talking about?" I said.

  "Who?"

  "Sophia, the servant. She said you've been waiting a long time for something."

  Anastasia said nothing. After a minute of riding in the surf, we rejoined the stone road where many more people were also making their way to the wharf. We climbed several wide steps to the boardwalk, and the sound of the pony's hoofs changed from clacking on stone to the thud of worn timber. The crowds parted for us, bowing when they saw who we were. I saw dozens, maybe hundreds, of Papa's men about, readying for his arrival.

  The largest of the three barques was nearly to the docks when we arrived. Written in large green letters on the starboard hull was the ship's name, Elandian. It was twice the size of the other two ships. If our mansion made me feel like a miniature figurine, Papa's ships made me feel like a flea. Men yelled back and forth as the crew on the ship threw ropes over the side to those waiting below. A dozen hands heaved on the ropes, guiding the ship the last few feet into the wharf.

  The hull groaned as its shiny, perfectly cut timbers ground against the dock. Finally it stopped, bobbing gently up and down. I imagined Elandian was a wrinkled old woman like Duckie, but fabulously rich. Elandian even had a mole on her nose: a lantern hanging from the forepeak. Weary from a journey to the ends of the world and back, she was happy to finally be home.

  A ramp clanked into place. Everyone stopped working all at once, like when the conductor taps his baton before a performance. At least a hundred servants and huge crowds of men, women, and children stood quietly, facing the ramp.

  A white-bearded man stepped onto the plank, his skin wrinkled and tan. The uniformed workers remained silent, their arms stiff at their sides. But the crowd cheered for Papa, the great Lictor Terillium. I wondered what it would be like to have crowds of people cheering for me someday. I could be Lictora, Papa hadn't decided whether Ani or I would take over when he retired. He waved and smiled to the crowd.

  We slipped off our pony and ran, nearly knocking him over. "Papa!"

  With his arm around me, we walked the rest of the way down the ramp. I beamed so wide I felt my face might split in two. He seemed happy to see me, but I thought he looked tired—or sad—under the smiles.

  The noise of dock-work filled the air again. Once the ship was properly put in, the crew would pour down the ramp and the whole town would be filled with happy families, just like mine. I imagined other families hugging each other... except they would know how long they had together, and I didn't have that. Sometimes I felt sorry for the sailors' families, but sailing was their job. They had to go away to earn money to feed their families. Papa didn't have to leave. He had enough money to last for a hundred forevers.

  Townspeople bowed and cheered as we walked along the docks. Papa grinned down at me with a real I-love-you-more-than-anything smile. I squeezed him, as if to make sure that he was real. If Papa loved me that much, he could never leave forever.

  Papa braced himself on a rail. "I've got something for you." He pulled both hands out of his pockets, his fists clenched shut.

  We jumped up and down.

  He gave a big eye-twinkling grin, the kind he saved for when he was truly happy. "Pick a hand." He unfolded long wrinkled fingers, revealing two bright silvery-brown bracelets covered with trinkets. Mine had miniature elephants and shiny gems that shone like stars and a vialus in the shape of an hourglass with smoke swirling inside and a flowering bonsai tree painted in colors I'd never seen. I focused on the elephants and for a moment thought I saw his feet moving. I imagined dust kicking around his legs as he crossed the desert on the west side of the mountains. One of the trinkets, an engraved oval locket, felt prickly and soft at the same time.

  "Pretty!" Anastasia tried to grab the bracelet from Papa's hand.

  "Hold a minute," Papa said, pulling the bracelets back. He lowered his voice. "These are made from malledeum. One coin is worth more than a whole chest of gold."

  Anastasia tried to grab again. Papa held up a finger. "Patientiam, child. These little trinkets, they're called rubrics. Each has no equal. I've brought them halfway around the world just for my little lictora, even made a few modifications."

  "What do they do?"

  "They bring out your natural beauty, of course." He laughed, sliding them on our wrists. Then he whispered, "They also keep you safe." He stepped back and admired us. I shook the bracelet on my wrist. My skin tingled.

  "No one can take these from you," Papa said. "They sting when other people try to touch them."

  "I don't want to hurt anyone," I said. Papa smiled.

  "Just enough to keep people from trying to take them. And when you touch them, you won't feel a thing." He beckoned to Anastasia. "See?"

  She held out her finger, touched my bracelet, then jerked her hand back. "Oww." Anastasia gaped at her finger then put it in her mouth.

  He laughed. "Just a little trick I learned in my travels." That's how he explained anything strange.

  "Mine won't open." Anastasia's voice cracked as she pried at the side of the locket.

  "Well, that's something else. They only work when you really need them." He winked at me. I felt a frown grow on my face. He could be giving us these bracelets to soften us up for the news that he was leaving forever. I had to ask him for the truth. He wouldn't lie, would he? Papa seemed to notice something was wrong. He opened his mouth, but someone interrupted him.

  "She'll make a beautiful licto
ra someday, my Lictor."

  I turned. An expensively dressed man stared at Anastasia as he strode toward us. Papa had so many workers it was hard to remember any of their names, but I think this man might have been the Mayor. It was like I was invisible to him. Didn't he know I might be lictora instead of Ani?

  "Begging your pardon Lictor, but you have a visitor. He arrived just before you. Wanted to speak with you immediately after you came to land."

  "I'll see him when I'm done with my girls," Papa said. "Oh, did the shipment from Yarrow Point come in while I was away?" Papa and the Mayor began to talk about business. Anastasia played with her bracelet, but I didn't want mine anymore, not if it was meant to make me feel better about Papa leaving forever. The Mayor talked on and on and I began to wonder if I would ever get a moment alone with Papa.

  I wished the Mayor would just go away.

  Sometimes I wondered if I could make things happen just by thinking about them. I asked Mother about it one time—the one and only time Mother has ever slapped my face. She apologized later, but told me to 'never talk about such foolish ideas again.' Papa just hushed me when I asked him. But I swear, sometimes I can do things that aren't normal. I tried to move a ball once, and it rolled away from me. Ani said I was just making stories up, but I wasn't. If I could, I'd make this man go away. I'd make him roll backward, like that ball—

  The Mayor wobbled on his heels, waved his arms and fell backward off the dock. Papa's hand shot out, seized the Mayor by the shirt, and lifted him back to the dock.

  The Mayor patted his chest and face as if checking to see if he was really there. "Thank you Lictor... I must have lost my balance."

  Papa frowned in my direction. I thought he shook his head at me, a slight jerk of the neck that only I would notice. He turned back to the Mayor. "And here I thought I was struggling with my sea legs. Are you well?"

  "Yes Lictor. I'm quite in one piece."

  Papa's eyes settled on the man waiting for him. "Who did you say was here to see me?"

  "He didn't give a name."

  "I see." Papa stared at a man sitting on a bench at the far end of the docks. "Did he say whether he wanted to see my butler too?"

  "No, Lictor. Shall I tell him you're unavailable?"

  "I'll be with him in a moment."

  Just go away! And then, just like snapping my fingers, the Mayor whisked off to the man waiting for Papa. I wished for the Mayor to leave and he did. Crouching next to me, Papa lifted my chin. "Sometimes I wonder about you."

  "Are you leaving?"

  "I'll be back before you can say babblebox."

  I clung to him. "Babblebox."

  "Why don't you stop by Santo's on the way home," he said. "Pick out a big tangerine-lime flavored lollipop and get an extra for me. I've been craving that man's sweets for six months." He handed Ani an iron drachma.

  Anastasia glowered at the coin in her hand like it was a paulluse beetle. I imagined the beetle burrowing into her hand, then eating its way up her arm. That would teach her to be more thankful.

  "We have a whole box of Santo's lollipops at home," Ani said.

  "Hmmm," Papa said. "I see. Maybe you can sneak a peek at your present."

  "Presents!" Anastasia tore off down the road toward Santo's.

  Now I was finally alone with Papa.

  He nudged me. "What's the matter with you."

  "Oh, I..." My eyes fell to my toes. "I'm glad you're back." I hugged him, turned to go, then stopped. "I was just wondering..."

  "Go ahead. You can ask me anything."

  "Are-you-going-away-forever?"

  His eyebrows furrowed. I silently begged him not to make me ask again. His face turned serious. A long terrible pause, the kind adults make sometimes before they tell you something horrible, like 'remember that nice little kitten we gave you? Well, it died. And we're not going to be getting another'.

  "Yes," he said finally, "of course I'm going to have to go away again."

  "I'm talking about forever."

  "Forever?" He smiled, but there was no twinkle in his eyes. "Why would you think I was going to leave forever?"

  "I heard you and Mother fighting about it months ago, before you left the last time."

  "Ahh, well that would be why you're not supposed to eavesdrop. You might get the wrong idea."

  He hadn't really answered the question. "Well are you? Leaving forever?"

  "You remind me of your mother," he said. "Of course not. You're my little Bell. I could never leave you forever."

  I watched him carefully. He didn't look like he was lying—there was a sadness in his eyes, but he was being honest. I touched his hand. "I love you, Papa."

  "I love you too little Bell." He pulled off his coat and put it around my shoulders. "Wear it home for me, will you?"

  Wearing Papa's old leather coat was my absolute favorite. Breathing it in, I smiled. Papa's clothes always smelled like tool oil and cedar shavings and the cologne Mother bought him each year for his birthday. I walked to the edge of the dock and onto the beach. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw Papa talking with the man who came to visit. The man seemed so familiar. They seemed to be arguing. Papa pointed at him and the man shoved Papa's finger away. I'd never seen anyone push Papa like that. I imagine most men would lose their hands for touching Papa in a way that didn't please him.

  Shoving my hands into the coat, I walked slowly in the surf. Papa never explained how the worn old coat worked—it felt cool when the weather was hot and warm when the weather was cold. When I asked he said, "Child, you've got one healthy imagination," or "It's nothing. I picked it up from a street trader in the New Republic."

  Playing with the pocket flaps, I felt the smooth leather. As I flipped the pockets open and closed, I saw a tiny zipper I'd never seen before. I slid the zipper and found a tiny leather book inside. It was mostly blank pages, a few with writing. A number of pages looked to have been torn out. What I read didn't make sense, until I came to:

  Execute the boy immediately.

  I read the note again. At the bottom I found a signature.

  Terillium Amadeus

  My body shook. I'd read stories about bad men who killed people, but now Papa was one of them. I imagined him signing his name at the bottom of the letter, grinning at the thought of a boy dying. Suddenly, I hated Papa for making me love him, for making me care whether he was leaving or staying.

  I couldn't let him go through with it.

  I had to stop him.