ARC: Sunstone

by Freya Robertson

  She supposed she should have trawled through the taverns to find her father to say goodbye, but she didn’t think he would miss her. Her fingers rose to trace the faint scar on her right cheek, caused by a blow from his belt buckle when she was younger. He’d always been a cruel man, and he resented her position at the castle. She would not waste her time tracking him down only to have him shower her with sarcastic comments.

  The lane turned south and she dismounted and tied the horse to a beech tree outside the Temple wall. Then she turned the handle on the wooden door and went through.

  Catena paused as the path forked, wondering which to take. To the right stood the old stone Temple that had once encased the town’s primary oak tree, which had been moved stone by stone thirty feet to the right at the beginning of the Second Era. The Temple still housed plaques to the dead and places to light candles and pray, but the tree to her left now grew exposed to the elements.

  It stood in a ring of grass, surrounded by half a dozen wooden benches for people to sit in quiet contemplation, although now the place was empty; she made her way to one and sat. The sun filtered through the oak leaves, casting a pattern on the grass below that moved and shimmered in the slight breeze like a flock of butterflies.

  She released a long, slow breath, not conscious of the tension she had been holding in her body until that moment. She was leaving. Finally leaving. Her heart rate increased at the thought. It would be a long journey to Heartwood, probably at least eleven days, taking into account that the Prince did not ride often and would be saddle-sore within a day or two. Eleven days! She had never travelled further than Prampton, a journey that had taken a day and a half and had required a stop at an inn on the way.

  Eleven days with the Prince. Hopefully she wouldn’t strangle him before the journey’s end.

  And eleven days with the mysterious emissary. Demitto fascinated Catena. He was both irreverent and strangely enigmatic. At first glance, as she had ridden out of the castle to escort him, he had seemed like an ordinary man in a very fancy suit of armour, hot and uncomfortable in the sub-tropical climate of the south. Later on, after they had bathed, he had left off his armour and joined her in the taverns in the normal garb of a traveller, and had not drawn a second glance from anyone, save the wenches looking to earn a coin for the night, of whom he had selected two – two! – and proceeded up to a room for an hour before emerging with a satisfied smile on his face. Catena had rolled her eyes and ordered another ale, hoping that nobody would recognise him at the ceremonial parade when they left a few days hence.

  She knew that was extremely unlikely. Because Demitto the man seemed an entirely different person to Demitto the ambassador. When he had first walked into the hall to meet the King and Queen, it was as if someone had lit a candle inside him. The man had radiated wealth and power, his blue eyes blazing, the tree on his breastplate glittering in the sun and blinding them all as he walked up to the dais. She would have said it must have been down to the armour, but that morning when she had joined him and the Prince at the breakfast table, he had done it again and talked to Tahir in a low, mesmerising voice that sent them both into a trance.

  He had played down his role as emissary, claiming he had gained the position only by dint of being well travelled, but she suspected there was more to his gaining the position than met the eye. He had poured scorn on her description of him as holy and on the city of Heartwood and its king, and yet when he had spoken of the Arbor, he had said It lives. It breathes. It knows. And his face had been filled with awe and reverence. He had touched the tree, connected with it. Catena suspected there was more magic within him than he realised.

  Above her, the oak tree rustled in the sea breeze. A shiver ran through her. Demitto had said the Arbor was as tall as ten men, maybe even twenty. Was he using artistic licence? Surely no tree could grow to that height? Its roots spread through the land, connecting every oak tree in Anguis, including the one before her. She had not been to any of the Nodes, but she had heard tales of the energy that could be felt there.

  She closed her eyes. Nowadays the earth rumbled frequently. She was used to the tremors, the heat, and the occasional shower of ash in the air. But as she planted her feet firmly on the ground just yards from the oak tree, she was sure she could feel something different, a thrumming, as if someone were playing drums far off in the distance, the sound reverberating through the ground, up through her spine, into her ribcage, into her heart.

  She opened her eyes. The sun continued to filter through the leaves, casting tiny gold shapes on the ground. They shimmered and flickered, looking for all the world like flames leaping between the blades of grass.

  Unbidden, thoughts came to mind of the way Demitto had turned the blade on the table at breakfast, how the steel had caught the candlelight. She had been hypnotised at the time, the same way she felt hypnotised now. She could not tear her gaze away from the flickering lights. They grew taller, licking up the trunk of the old oak tree, and a scream formed in her throat. The tree was burning! Panic made her chest heave. The fire burned her face and hands. Everything was turning to ash…

  And then she blinked and she was sitting in the garden under the tree, the leaves dancing in the sunlight.

  Foreboding filled her. The future loomed darkly, like black thunderclouds on the horizon. Something terrible was going to happen. And she didn’t have a clue what it was or how to stop it.

  III

  Sarra hovered on the edge of the crowd, her neck aching from continually craning her neck to look up at the Caelum. Her heart pounded – from the excitement of seeing the White Eye, which had appeared over the rim of the Caelum just an hour before; from the risk of being out in public when she’d been trying to keep a low profile; and from the fact that – tonight – they were due to make their escape.

  She kept her gaze fixed on the Caelum, trying not to look around and catch the gaze of one of the many Select patrolling the streets who were trying to keep a presence during the bubbling atmosphere. Everyone was excited – after all, the White Eye only made an appearance every hundred years or so, and nobody living in the caverns had been alive to see it the last time.

  Even though the Select forbade the physical recording of historic events, the story of the White Eye’s previous appearances had been handed down verbally through generations of families. Most people agreed that last time it had appeared along the lower edge of the Caelum, passing from left to right if you stood by the palace gates looking up, but apparently it was different every time and nobody could predict how much of it would be visible. Various families had tried to calculate when the Eye would next appear, and although people differed on the day, everyone had agreed it would be that year, and several people had forecast that month.

  As soon as Nele heard that Sarra knew of a possible way out, he had immediately suggested their best chance of success lay in putting the chaos of the ceremony to good use. It would be a perfect time to start their journey, he had said, when the streets were filled with movement and the curfew was delayed due to merrymaking. It would take several hours for their absence to be noticed. As a member of the Select, Turstan had his own room in the palace grounds, but he was the only one of the Veris. The rest of them slept communally, and on a usual night they would immediately be missed once the curfew bell had rung.

  They had quickly begun to plan their escape, not sure exactly when the festivities would begin, and in the end it had only been three weeks before a child had spotted the glimmer of white at the edge of the Caelum. Immediately, everyone had flooded to the Great Lake to watch the appearance of the White Eye with awe. People were saying the whole of the Eye was going to be visible. The Embers had erupted into celebration mode, and excitement filled the air like smoke.

  Sarra’s heart thudded. She hadn’t seen any member of the Veris since the arrival of the White Eye was announced, but they had gone over and over their plans until they all knew them off by heart, so she had no worry that she wouldn’t rem
ember what to do.

  She breathed deeply, forcing herself to keep calm, conscious that when she was agitated, the baby stirred in her belly. It had been a long few weeks, and she had been jointly comforted and alarmed by the movement of the child within her – comforted at the thought of Rauf’s child nestled in her womb, and alarmed that her abdomen was rapidly swelling, and would surely be visible very soon, even through her loose tunic.

  Sarra wrapped her arms around herself, staring up at the shining white orb now clearly visible over the rim of the Caelum. Over the past few weeks, the Veris had met half a dozen times, and during each meeting Nele and the others had related to her the dreams that each had experienced over the years. Sarra had listened with wonder to the accounts of the Arbor and life on the Surface, but it had been the stories about the sky that had fascinated her the most. Kytte had been the one with the clearest description, learned through her dreams and tales handed down from generation to generation.

  Kytte spoke of the sky above their heads like the roof of the cavern, arching from horizon to horizon so high it would take a hundred thousand years to climb up to touch it. And in the sky was the sun, a huge ball of glowing yellow light that rose above the horizon in the east in the morning and sank down into the west as the day grew old. During the day the sky was blue, or occasionally grey with rain – droplets of water that fell from bunching and furling clouds to fall on your face and hands. At night the sky was black, and sometimes if there were no clouds, the stars came out, tiny twinkling pinpricks of light like the glint of minerals in the black rock down by the river.

  This was what they had been calling the Caelum, which appeared to be a hole in the roof through which they occasionally glimpsed the world above. And the White Eye was actually something called the Light Moon, an object in the sky that circled the Surface like the sun did, going around and around them like a ball swung by a child from a piece of string.

  Sarra stared at the Caelum until her neck ached and her eyes burned. At first only a thin band of pinkish-white showed, but as a hush fell over the waiting thousands who surrounded the Great Lake, the thin band widened and became a segment. The Light Moon. She was seeing above the Surface, up into the sky. It made her head spin.

  Around her, people starting singing, a well-known song about the cycle of life they had all learned as children, the haunting melody rising and spiralling towards the ceiling. Sarra hummed along, her eyes pricking with tears. Her mother had sung this to her, and she associated it with the safety and security of childhood, before she had found out what a harsh and difficult place the world was. Or, rather, what a harsh place the Embers was.

  How big was the world? Nele had told her it was vast, and it would take a hundred times longer to travel from one side of the land to the other as it did to travel across the Embers. How was that possible? She couldn’t even conceive of a place so large.

  She dropped her head, ostensibly to massage her aching neck, but taking the time to glance around as she did so. The shores of the Great Lake were choked with people, and the water was also full of boats and rafts on which private celebrations were going on. Stalls had been hastily erected on the quay to sell cheap ale and hot food, as well as crafts made by those with a talent for the creative, to keep as a reminder of the night’s festivities, such as small woven bags embroidered with white eyes or colourful decorations for the hair.

  The Select stood out with their golden sashes, patrolling the quay and occasionally reprimanding a reveller whose behaviour had got out of hand. More than one of them had an ale in his or her hand, taking advantage of the relaxed atmosphere and joining in with the revelries, but still she shivered as they passed her, and she shrank into the shadows, fearful of drawing attention to herself.

  Suddenly she spotted Turstan across the lake, talking to a couple of men who had started a fight and calming them down. The bell tolled in the palace gatehouse, the watchtowers following its lead and echoing the bell throughout the city, marking the late hour. Turstan stopped beneath one of the lamps hanging from a hook in the wall, and she watched as he grasped his sunstone, placed his hand on the metal cage and closed his eyes. After a brief moment, the ball of flame inside the cage died. Similarly, other members of the Select extinguished every other lamp around the lake, and a cheer went up as the cavern darkened to twilight, the White Eye now dazzling against the black Caelum.

  Sarra’s heart rate increased. The moment of their flight was drawing near. Nele had instructed them to meet at the western edge of the quay at the next bell. By then the celebrations would be in full swing, most of the Select would have a few tankards of ale inside them, and they would have a few hours before their absence would be noticed.

  She turned and made her way across the quay, heading for the Primus District. Lots of people were still to-ing and fro-ing, and she passed unnoticed along the high street, crossed the bridge over the river and headed north into the heart of the district.

  She walked calmly, but inside her heart pounded. This would probably be the last time she would ever walk this path. The thought excited her and scared her at the same time. She had spent her whole life walking these streets and knew every lane, every room, every dip and crack in the rock. In spite of her desire to leave to save her baby, the thought of fleeing filled her with a panic she wasn’t sure how to deal with. What if the visions she had been receiving were just dreams, images her mind had conjured up to torture her? What if she risked the lives of the others in the Veris by encouraging them to escape, only to find there was no such escape route after all? By the time they realised the truth, their absence would probably be discovered. And the Select – who were always looking for excuses to reduce the population – would waste no time in putting them to death.

  As she walked through the unusually quiet trade areas, she tried to calm herself with thoughts of what it would be like to live on the Surface. Kytte had described how people purchased land and built individual houses of wood and stone as big as they liked, instead of having to put names down on the very long list for one of the new rooms the crews were currently carving out of the rock. It took years to carve new passages and rooms and demand was high, and the newest rooms always went to the richest people, like the Select and guild leaders and the most important merchants. People like Sarra would never be granted new living quarters. When she’d been with Rauf, she might have stood a chance, but alone she was worthless, a nuisance to society, just an extra mouth to feed and a body to house.

  But although daydreaming about the grass and the sky had brought her comfort over the last few weeks, this time it only served to heighten her panic. She had never touched grass, other than the abundant mosses that grew down on the riverbanks, and the only trees she had seen were the stunted brackens that grew profusely along with various other plants in the fields on the outskirts of the Embers, where the ground turned moist under foot and made further cave expansion impossible. Her world was cold and dark, hard and cruel. What did she know of warmth and the light?

  She turned into the narrower alleyways leading to the living quarters, her stomach churning with nerves. The area was mostly deserted now and she passed only two people making their way towards the Great Lake. By the time she reached her section the only sound came from the rush of the water channel in the middle of the alley, and when she climbed the wooden ladder, she found her communal night room empty.

  She crawled over to her corner, curled up on her pallet and fumbled for the cord she wore around her neck. After pulling it out, she grasped the key on the end, slotted it into the lock of the small wooden box that lay to one side of the pallet and lifted the lid.

  Heart continuing to hammer, she took out the contents. Regular inspection by the Select made the keeping of any family belongings difficult, but occasionally they would let the little things go by, especially if they were practical. A headscarf her mother had made, painstakingly embroidered with beautiful coloured circles. Her father’s skinning knife, recently sharpened, t
he handle bound firmly with a new strip of cloth. Her bone needles and skeins of coloured threads she had worked so hard to save up for. The silver clasp Rauf had given her, which she took out and kissed. And at the bottom, on a small, thin piece of cloth, the embroidery she had been working on herself, a yellow circle surrounded by green and blue lines – her way of representing the Surface, innocuous to most eyes, and yet full of meaning every time she looked at it.

  She put the items in the bag she wore permanently on her hip along with some bread and cheese she had been saving from her daily rations for the very purpose of their escape, and pulled the drawstring tight. Then she pulled up her knees and rested her cheek on them. Now she just had to wait.

  She closed her eyes. Her heart pounded so loud it seemed to echo in her ears like the drums she could hear far off in the distance. The dancing must have started, marking the high point of the White Eye across the Caelum. She should get back there and watch it, she thought, but suddenly she didn’t want to leave the room.

  She pressed her face against her knees. She was doing this for the baby, not for herself. It didn’t matter if she was scared. She had to take this risk, because otherwise the baby would die, and how would she feel then?

  She bit her lip, ashamed at the temptation that swept over her to abort the baby so she could stay where she was and continue with her life. Rauf, she thought miserably, missing him so much it made her ache. I wish you were here.

  Inside her, the baby stirred. And with the movement came the flash of an image in her mind. Like an eye opening, darkness gave way to light, the sun so bright it momentarily blinded her. Clean air brushed her cheeks, so fresh as it filled her lungs, bringing with it the aroma of the sweet plants, which grew nearby, the smell more beautiful than any of the cloying scents the perfumers could create.

  Sarra opened her eyes with a gasp. That moment of emergence from darkness to light stayed with her, though, bringing with it a feeling of hope and excitement stronger than any she had felt before. The baby was trying to tell her everything would be all right.