Gullstruck Island

by Frances Hardinge

  ‘You know why the Ashwalker’s been roaming around? Because someone went and told him that the Lost deaths were murders and that all the townspeople wanted to see him given a licence. And then, because he’d been seen around, the towners got it into their heads that the Lost were murdered, and they’ve been turning up daily at the governor’s door to ask why the Ashwalker hasn’t yet been hired. Then the way Inspector Skein’s letter has been repeated and misquoted . . . and somehow she got hold of his journal . . . but for the life of me I still can’t work out why she’s been stirring things up.’

  ‘It doesn’t really matter,’ Hathin said limply, barely caring what he was talking about. Her beaten, battered brain could hardly make sense of the wildfire accusations back at the tidings hut. But she understood one thing: Arilou had been stoned out of Sweetweather. The townspeople had rejected her. The long game had been lost, and nothing now stood between the Hollow Beasts and destitution. ‘It’s over. All I had to do was one thing, and I couldn’t do it, and now I can’t see how it can be mended. There’s no reason for me any more, and I’ve let the whole village down.’

  They had reached the top of the cliff above the village, where once the Gripping Bird had stationed his jaguars of grass.

  Lohan halted, biting his lip. ‘Those old women won’t give you any trouble,’ he said at last. ‘They’d better not. You’ve got more guts than all of them put together. You’ve done more than any of them would dare to protect the village – I know what you’ve done, Hathin. When Skein was found I worked out why you happened to be down by the water’s edge, near those rocks where my mother took Arilou. It’s the best place on the beach for urchin quills.’

  ‘What?’ Hathin could not manage more than a single quavering note.

  ‘I haven’t told anyone,’ Lohan said gently, ‘and I won’t. I’ve been helping to keep your secret from the start. When you were herded off home with Arilou and couldn’t act for yourself, who do you think it was that cut the rope on the other Inspector’s boat?’

  ‘You . . .’ Hathin stared at him. ‘You loosed the . . . You think I killed Inspector Skein?’

  Now it was Lohan’s turn to stare, and Hathin saw his face start to mirror her look of horror. Above them the King of Fans trailed fans of mourning black, at their feet the orchids rocked with silent laughter and beside them gaped a hissing gulf of darkness. There was no comfort for either of them.

  ‘We have to go down to the village,’ Lohan said at last, his voice strained and rapid.

  ‘I can’t,’ whispered Hathin numbly. ‘I just . . . can’t.’

  ‘All right – you stay here with your lady sister.’ Lohan gave a long sigh, but Hathin was staring at his feet and could not judge why. ‘I’ll go down and tell everybody what happened, and then I’ll come back and tell you what they say. Will you be all right up here?’

  Hathin nodded but could not look at him.

  Lohan said nothing more. He clambered to the cliff-scramble path and dropped himself over the edge. At the very last moment he glanced over his shoulder and Hathin was struck by the hurt, aghast look that had etched itself on to his face. Stung by sympathy she gave a wider smile and a little wave, but by then he had dropped below the lip of the cliff and he did not see it.

  Hathin sank to her knees beside the seated, trance-like Arilou and peered down at the beach, towards the village that no longer felt like hers. Her future seemed utterly unfaceable. If the townspeople had decided that Arilou was part of the conspiracy that had killed the Lost, how could the Hollow Beasts take her back? Surely they must drive her away for the safety of the village? And as for Hathin . . . perhaps Lohan was not the only person who thought she had killed Inspector Skein. Perhaps everyone thought that.

  Lohan was taking an eternity. Of course, the village must have told him not to go back up the cliff. Hathin was no longer useful and neither was Arilou. They would be left there on the clifftop until they starved or took the hint and vanished into the darkness.

  But no – there he was, down on the beach! Even if the village hated Hathin now, they did not want her to starve waiting for a message; they would at least let Lohan return to talk to her.

  Lohan was carrying a lantern, perhaps so that he could guide Arilou’s steps back down to the village. The lantern was half cloaked and only a sliver of light emerged. He was running along the beach at a stoop, as though fighting a strong wind. Then he straightened, and Hathin realized that the figure was too tall and strongly built to be Lohan. The next moment the man swung back his arm and flung the lantern which smashed against the side of the nearest hut.

  Hathin could only stare like a dreamer as the flames flung loving, golden arms around the summer-roasted palm thatch. From the rocks all around other lanterns rose like fireflies and hurled themselves against the stilted huts. And in the new flood of light, the black rock-line grew heads and arms and legs and suddenly there were dozens of people on the beach, hacking holes in the sides of the burning huts with hoes and scythes.

  An animal-sounding cry, and somebody burst out through one of the holes. White hair spiralled upwards from its head like smoke, and the frail shoulders were winged with fire. A hoe swung and the apparition fell. The crowd closed, and all Hathin could see was a forest of hoes and sticks being raised and swung down, sparks of red light occasionally gleaming on the metal.

  ‘Father Rackan,’ croaked Hathin. She could barely hear her own voice. ‘Father Rackan.’ She balled her hands into her eyes, trying to push out the image, but the darkness of her closed lids was full of it. Oh no, oh no . . . Father Rackan . . .

  The crowd was staring down now, wavering. They were slowly lowering their weapons, realizing what they had done. In a moment they would run for it, try to escape their crime . . .

  An eerie, high-pitched whistle echoed through the cove. There was a figure standing apart from the crowd, the firelight throwing her shadow into monstrous proportions across the sand, her flickerbird flitting about her head like a familiar. She shouted some words that Hathin could not hear, took out a bottle, swigged from it and then hurled it at the nearest hut. Instantly the flagging flames found new life, and with thin, childish screams short figures jumped down from the door of the hut and fled.

  Jimboly flung back her head and laughed her inimitable laugh, which rose up into a screech as she chased after the fleeing children with a dozen men at her heels. It was her gull-witch-game screech, but now her erstwhile playmates were screaming and running in earnest.

  Hathin could only watch, and watch, and press her fists against her open mouth until it hurt.

  More Lace had realized what was happening now, and were charging from their huts, some flinging nets over their waiting adversaries in the hope of slowing their attack, some parents bursting forth with skinning knives to cover their children’s flight.

  Oh no, oh no, oh please no . . . Paralysed, horrified, Hathin saw little knots of Lace scatter as they were caught in lantern-light, heard the rattle as others tried vainly to scuffle their way up the cliff scramble-path. The caves, the caves, oh please run to the caves . . .

  A couple of the Lace women ran naked down the beach and dived so cleanly into the water that it hardly offered protest. Barely a moment later there was a red-tinged flash from the nearby rocks, and a loud bang echoed around the cove. The black skin of the water spat white as something struck it. There were men, Hathin realized, standing up on high rocks aiming long-barrelled guns down towards the water.

  One of the women had looked a lot like Eiven.

  ‘Eiven!’ Hathin was on her feet, but her cry was lost as the ragged echo of a second gunshot rebounded through the cove. As the bullet kicked another flash of foam, Hathin suddenly guessed that the two women had been deliberately leading attention away from the cave of the Scorpion’s Tale, and the fugitives who would be crowding through it even now.

  . . . please reach the caves, please, holy ancestors, let the rest all reach the caves . . .

  And Hathin wan
ted to scream it aloud, even if it meant she was shot by the long-barrelled guns and fell into the fire-stricken madness below, for she almost felt that by doing so she could force the others to run faster, to get to the caves. But before she could do so she realized that she could hear someone calling out in Nundestruth.

  ‘Caves!’ It was Jimboly, raven-voiced and exultant. ‘I know where runoff! Caves behind crack like fishhook!’

  And as the beach blackened with a seethe of forms running cliffward Hathin could hear another voice screaming in Lace over and over again.

  ‘Run!’ came the scream. ‘Run! Run!’ It was Lohan’s voice, and as silence scythed suddenly through his words, Hathin knew that they were meant for her.

  Hardly able to see or think, she grabbed Arilou’s hand and ran.

  10

  Amid the Ashes

  Arilou stumbled again and again, but Hathin dragged her to her feet mercilessly, ignoring her faint pained mewls and keeping an arm tight around her waist to support her weight.

  As Hathin thrashed through brambles and cobweb hammocks she was painting over the images she had seen on the beach, trying to imagine escapes, feints. Father Rackan had simply fallen, stunned by the blows. The musket on the heights had missed Eiven. The children had lost Jimboly amid the rocks and had been herded back to the caves by Mother Govrie, Mother Govrie who thought of everything. Lohan had stopped screaming because he had been spotted, nothing more. And there was no way Jimboly could know about the Path of the Gongs . . .

  Right now the whole village would be escaping down the water tunnel, leaving their pursuers to stare perplexed at the unspeaking blackness of the pool. Soon the villagers would haul themselves dripping into the cavern of the teeth, and wait there to rendezvous with stragglers and those who had fled by other routes. If Hathin could only drag Arilou all the way to the Sweetweather shaft, she could enter the caves that way, and there she would find them . . .

  It was at the edge of the Ashlands that Hathin’s life was saved by a tussock that hooked her foot and sent her sprawling, so that she brought Arilou down with her. Winded, Hathin could only lie and gasp while all around green fireflies spiralled and winked and cruised as if they were dizziness sparks spinning from her own eyes. She was just recovering her breath when her attention snagged on a pair of distant fireflies nestling in the grass. They were red instead of green, and as she watched one of them pulsed four times, gradually increasing in brightness.

  ‘I not sit in thisere grass.’ A male voice speaking Nundestruth. ‘Lace train snake. I want sit where can lookout snake come.’

  ‘All right. You lookout snake, I lookout Lace.’ There were two men crouched in the grass, smoking their pipes and watching the path. Hathin had been running so blindly, she would have stampeded right into their line of view if she had not fallen.

  So the Lace trained snakes to attack their enemies, did they? Another fable traded as truth in the town. Very like a snake, Hathin slid through the undergrowth on her stomach, pulling on Arilou’s sleeve to guide her after her.

  A faint thudding behind her, and Hathin froze. From the direction of the pipe-smokers came a faint click-et of a gun being readied, followed by an exchange of softly called hails.

  ‘Bywater how fare?’

  ‘Deed done but Lace Lost runoff. Think she walk on water, runoff downcoast.’

  ‘No. Bullet wait above water, man wait by all path. Lace Lost must runoff in cave already.’

  Slowly the meaning of these words sank into Hathin’s shellshocked mind. The mob had not simply seethed to the beach on an irresistible tide of anger. No. There was planning behind this. Somebody had got hold of muskets, and posted sentries to make sure nobody could escape the village – and had known even before the attack about the retreat into the caves.

  She remembered Lohan’s words during the flight from the tidings hut. Yes, this was somebody’s handiwork. Somebody with a long face, and a warm, hoarse laugh, and a flickerbird on a string.

  If only Hathin had been crawling alone! But she was with Arilou, who wanted to slump dull-eyed on the grass, who needed to be guided every inch, who tangled in everything. Tears of desperation trickled down Hathin’s cheeks as she nudged her sister’s recalcitrant knees and elbows forward.

  Only when they were over the next ridge did Hathin dare pull Arilou to her feet again. Here her nose stung with the smells of the foothills: orchid-dust, damp ash and the volcano’s breath like old egg.

  There were more men on the paths nearer to Sweet-weather, exchanging whispers and beating at the bushes with restless savagery as though hoping to startle Lace into flight like partridges. The Lace who had killed Milady Page and Inspector Skein and all the other Lost so that only their own Lady Lost would survive. The Lace who used their eerie powers to poison crops and move boundary stones and put ague-juice in the springs. The Lace who spoke to volcanoes and trained snakes to kill and cut children to pieces with obsidian knives. Hathin could feel the grass jaguars’ growls through the soles of her feet like a tremor in the rock.

  As she led Arilou past them at a stoop Hathin counted her own heartbeats and felt the time slipping away from her. How long would the rest of the village wait for them in the cavern of the teeth? Would they wait for them at all?

  Jimboly’s smile had melted off her face, leaving her mouth with the crinkled cruelty of a clam-lip. Her eyes darkened as she scratched out letters on the vellum with a jade nib. She was happier with pictograms, but the person to whom she was writing was particular about receiving his letters in Doorsy script.

  She felt that having to write this message might yet ruin her evening. Until now her delight in the events of the day had been that of an artiste watching a few finely introduced sparks result in a peacock fan of explosions across the sky. But she was writing to a man who was interested only in the charred aftermath, the cold, blackened facts. A man, furthermore, that even Jimboly regarded with a shrinking of her spirit.

  The facts were that despite all precautions the Lady Lost Arilou had escaped, along with one of her sisters. Arilou was of course a drooling imbecile, whether or not she was Lost, and Jimboly had little respect for her. It was quite possible that Arilou had seen nothing to make her dangerous, and even if she had there was little likelihood that she had managed to communicate it to anybody. However, Jimboly’s instructions had been very specific.

  ‘If we cannot say whether a flagstone is dirty,’ the last message had read, ‘it is as well to give it a good mopping just in case.’

  Jimboly had given the cove of the Hollow Beasts a mopping unlike any the coast had seen in centuries. Now she was wondering, with some trepidation, how to tell her employer that she had somehow missed a couple of important specks.

  While she was pondering this, Ritterbit hopped through the ink and across the page to leave his own message.

  ‘Foot,’ the message ran. ‘Foot foot foot foot foot.’

  Jimboly laughed a long laugh, her good spirits entirely recovered.

  The governor’s hand trembled as he reached to pull the curtains back from his window. They were good thick curtains made for the chill, honest, snowbound climate of the Cavalcaste plains. But here on the Coast of the Lace their main use was as a shield against blame. If the governor did not see something past the curtains, he could not be blamed for it.

  How hard it was to protect a tiny haven of order here! He looked sadly around at his carefully aligned paintings of distant hunts through pine forests, which he maintained with the fastidious reverence of one who had never ridden a horse or seen a pine forest.

  Dealing with the village face to face had been the job of Milady Page, and he had hated her for it, for making him feel absurd and useless in his town. But now he had to step forward and try to fill the ragged hole she had left. He sighed and opened the door, letting in the world in a flood of flies, smells and voices. As soon as he did so he tasted volcano-breath on the breeze and knew that the town was no longer his town.

  The gove
rnor held himself erect throughout the conversation with the crowd, but all the while he could feel the red earth of his world crumbling under his feet. There was nothing for it but to yield ground to their demands one step at a time, trying to dissemble his retreat from the approaching abyss.

  He had done everything he could to avoid bloodshed. He had summoned the Lace’s Lady Lost to town hoping to test her, investigate her, perhaps arrest her, safely away from her village so that none of the other Lace could get involved. And his people had seemed happy with that. What had changed?

  Confronted with the crowd and their bloody hoes, he told himself he had only one option. What had been done was brutal, horrible, but there was no undoing it. What was he to do – arrest the whole town as bloodthirsty murderers? If they turned on him too, farewell to all order! Better to side with them, ride the dragon and try to get a bit between its teeth.

  And so he guided the townspeople’s halting, surly account of the doings in the cove. When you say that you went to teach them a lesson, he suggested, I assume you mean that you followed the Lady Lost after she fled suspiciously, and tried to arrest her. But there was resistance, causing a regrettable fight? A hesitation among the crowd, looks of suspicion and then slow nods.

  But their rage had not burned itself out. It had found more fuel. A journal was placed in his hand, and eager, soot-grimed fingers turned the leaves to show him where two pages had been torn away. It had been done skilfully, the ripped fragments picked out, but the two corresponding pages were now loose and could be pulled out to show the frayed edge.

  There was also a letter which came from a port further up the coast. As the governor read it his eyebrows rose and his cravat damped and started to chafe. Such a letter should have been sent straight to him, and he could not guess how it had fallen into the grasp of this hungry horde.

  He turned the letter to and fro in his hands to buy time while the crowd hung like thunder. At last he made the decision they had forced on him, and tried to make it sound like his own.