“It’s weird having this memory back. It feels like mine, but not like mine all at once.”
“It’ll settle after a day or two. But it can feel a little weird at first.”
She shrugged. “I guess it’s a happy memory.”
“We always used to sleep in the same bed. We would whisper stories in the darkness until we fell asleep.”
She nodded.
“Would you like the rest of your memories back?” I asked.
“I don’t know.” She sighed. “That probably sounds so wrong, but I’ve lived most of my life without them, and this one feels like it belongs, but doesn’t. I don’t know, it’s not exactly a nice feeling. It feels like another lie somehow. Something else I’m expected to trust.”
“But if you have the rest as well—”
“Please don’t push me, Kioto. This is my head, and it’s my decision.”
“I’m sorry. You’re right. It’s just—” I fell silent.
“What?”
“No, forget it, it’s not your problem, and I don’t want you to feel pressured into anything.”
“Tell me.”
“Malia, the smudger, she’s got the shivers. Really badly. She’s going to die.”
“Unless I take my memories back.”
“It’s not enough. She needs to be emptied of everything she’s carrying. She needs a vessel.”
“But I’m not—” Realisation darkened across her face. “You want me to train up so that I can save her.”
“Actually, strictly speaking, you can’t be trained with memories missing. But you can be talked through the process. As soon as your memories are back in your head, while the others flow away, then you can be trained.”
Omori turned and stared across the square. We sat quietly for some time, watching people go into the coffee shops, buying hot drinks, pastries, bagels, carrying them out in recycled paper bags.
Omori stood. “I need to think about this.” And then she was gone.
48
KIOTO
Omori had barely vacated her seat when Dai dropped into it, stepping over the back of the bench.
“How did it go?” he asked.
“I really don’t know.” I could still feel the warmth of Omori’s forehead on my hand.
“So… she didn’t agree to anything?”
“She agreed to think about it. With what I’ve thrown at her today, that’s probably better than we could have hoped for.”
“Well, she better not spend too long thinking about it.”
“We’re asking a lot of her.”
He shrugged. “If you say so.”
I opened my mouth, but then closed it again. There was no point in arguing. Despite the trader blood that flowed through him, Dai had absolutely no empathy for us. Perhaps that was the only way he could justify what he did. He couldn’t let empathy get in his way.
“Do you think you can close the deal, or what?”
“’Close the deal’? This decision will change the rest of her life. It’s a big choice to make.”
Dai smiled. “But, of course, you and I both know that she doesn’t really have the choice. Don’t we? Besides, your smudger is dying. So, if you want your sister back, you need to hurry along this little decision of hers. Neither of us can afford to have her mull it over for too long.”
“I guess not.”
“And we need her trained up quickly. I’ve got a lead on another vessel, so we need to move soon. They don’t tend to hang around in one place for too long, especially if they get wind that we’re after them.”
“Just give her some time.”
“Like I said, we don’t have that luxury.” He cracked his knuckles. “I could just grab her if I wanted to. Job done.”
“You know why you can’t do that,” I snapped. “I’ll convince her, just leave it to me.”
“You seem very sure of yourself all of a sudden.”
“I don’t want to see her get hurt. Who knows what will happen if you go in there guns blazing. I want my sister back, even if it’s not the way I imagined it will be.”
Dai leaned back. “Think you can run, do you?”
“What?”
“I know what you’re planning. You and Narata.”
“We’re not planning anything.” My heart was hammering. I was certain he’d hear it.
“Train Omori up, and then make a break for it. You probably have some half-baked romantic notion of setting up the Okaporo colony again.”
“That’s not true.”
“Look, I’ve known Narata almost her entire life. I know her almost as well as I know myself. And I know when she’s planning something.”
“If she is, I know nothing about it.”
He patted me on the leg and laughed. “Don’t bother denying it.” He shrugged. “Do it. I dare you. Just try to run.” He turned to face me. “You will always be watched, you will always be heard. Even when you think you’re alone.”
49
SENETSU
I stepped back and gripped hold of the railing beside me. My head was swimming, not quite believing what my eyes were reporting, but unable to deny it too.
“I’m sorry that you had to see that,” said Tokai, without an ounce of sorrow in her tone. “But you needed to know the truth. Narata’s been in league with rogues almost her entire life.”
I shook my head. My mouth made the motion to say “no”, but there was no sound available for it.
“I know it’s hard to accept,” Tokai continued, “but it’s true. You’ve just seen it yourself. As you know, Narata grew up in a liberation orphanage, but what you don’t know is that she grew up alongside a rogue. A boy called Dai. He was born on a colony, but became the worst kind of traitor. And he poisoned Narata’s mind too. He’s the leader of a rogue gang now, a particularly nasty one responsible for hundreds of trader deaths. I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t shed some blood with his own hands in Okaporo.”
I shook my head again. My hand slipped from the railing and I found myself on my knees without the strength to get back up.
“Narata came here today to find Omori, to kill her. You see how vital it was that I had her liberated? If Narata had knocked on your door, you’d have let the wolf right into your home without even knowing it. But I kept your daughter safe. I protected her. Narata tried to rip the information from me, using her training as a weapon against a fellow trader. The worst kind of traitor. But in the struggle, I managed to rip her memories of Omori being here from her head. I protected her. And now Narata will never be able to find her.”
I nodded, my eyes brimming with tears. Everything I’d ever trusted in had turned out to be a lie. The one person I thought I could trust above all others, turned out to be an enemy.
Tokai crouched down and rubbed my back. “I told you that you could trust me, Senetsu. I told you that I was doing the right thing for Omori.”
“I can’t… I can’t...” I sobbed. I didn’t even know the words to explain the devastation that was sweeping through me. My entire past had become a wasteland, a battleground long after the dead had been buried. It was a dried up lake, a felled forest, a derelict town. Everything had been scooped out of me. The very essence of everything I was, my understanding of myself, my foundations, and everything I’d ever built on them. Everything was gone in just the briefest of moments. An entire lifetime erased in just a couple of minutes. I was a hole. A vast, gaping, empty maw.
“It’s hard to accept, I know. Maybe you need to see it for yourself. I have Narata’s ripped memories in a young trader in my house. There’s some information in them that I think you’ll find enlightening.”
I shook my head and raised a defensive hand. I didn’t have the stomach for any more truth right now.
Tokai took hold of my hand. “I think you’ll find it helpful. A place that you can restart. Rebuild.” She pulled me to my feet. “Come on, you really need to see this.”
My feet followed Tokai’s, but my mind wasn’t in
control. It was racing through everything. Cataloguing, analysing, ordering every memory I had. I was looking for a clue, a sign that I might have missed. Something that may have seemed innocuous at the time, but would now hold weight and importance. I was looking for a whiff of betrayal. Searching for a needle of treachery. And all the while, I was hoping I would find none. Hoping that this was just a terrible misunderstanding. A muddle that, one day, we’d be able to laugh about.
Tokai lifted my hand and placed it on the trader’s forehead. I was so numb that I could barely feel her skin under my fingers. I pushed forward into her mind, looking for the memory that she should be pushing forward to me. But she wasn’t. Nothing was illuminated. I looked around in the darkness of her mind. And then I saw a light, and I made my way towards it. As I did, the space around me became floodlit. Every memory was ablaze and flowing towards me.
I opened my eyes and looked at the girl in front of me. Her pale blue eyes, her flawless skin. No scars. She wasn’t a trader. She was a carrier. A smudger.
Tokai’s arm shook as she held my hand against the smudger’s head.
“That’s right, Senetsu,” she whispered. “Don’t try to fight it, just let those memories in.”
It was far too late for fighting. The rush had begun.
50
KIOTO
A light drizzle chilled me as I sat on the bench watching the coffee shops again. It ached its way through to my bones. My toes felt like wood, and my hands, despite being pushed deep into my pockets were raw with the cold.
My phone buzzed again, and I reluctantly pulled it out, exposing my hands to the icy damp once more.
‘Malia’s really bad. She’s not even aware that I’m here anymore. Any sign of Omori at all?’
I pushed my phone back into my pocket without replying. After all, what was I going to say? The situation hadn’t changed. We were waiting for a miracle when we had no time to wait.
I looked back across the square, watching people closely. Looking to see if I could spot someone watching me. I could feel eyes on me all the time. If Dai had been bluffing about the surveillance, it had worked perfectly. I’d been eaten up by paranoia ever since.
I analysed the movements of every passer by. Tried to see under their hoods, hats, and umbrellas. Who were they? What were they doing here? Did they just glance at me?
Another message.
‘There’s nothing I can do for her anymore. She doesn’t respond to anything. The shivers have taken over completely.’
I frowned. What could I do?
“Come on, Omori,” I muttered, pulling my hood further forward. The front edge of it was sodden, and the drizzle gathered there as droplets.
This was hopeless. All I was doing was freezing to the bone for nothing.
My phone buzzed.
‘I think she may only have a few hours left. You should be here at the end for her.’
I grunted, and punched in a quick reply.
‘Of course. I’m on my way.’
51
KIOTO
I’d never felt so helpless. All I could do was hold Malia’s hand as the shivers ate away the final pieces of her. I could only hope that somewhere, somehow, she knew that I was there for her.
Narata was laying out an altar, ready to assist Malia’s passing into the afterworld. We wanted her to have a trader’s passing. That, at least, we could do for her.
A bowl of herbs smouldered, filling the room with wisps and curls of sweet-smelling smoke.
I wiped at my face, but it was pointless: the tears were streaming out of me, and there was no stopping them.
I lay my head against Malia’s and whispered to her. “I ask that you find peace in the afterworld, that the shivers leave you along with any memories, either yours or others, of this physical world. Let your soul fly, Malia.”
I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed her tightly. The convulsions and shouting had ceased, and she lay still, her breathing short and shallow. She was looking into the afterworld now, seeing with her soul instead of her eyes. At least she would be free.
I looked up at Narata who nodded gently at me. I sat up and lifted Malia’s head into my lap.
The bedroom door opened and Dai stepped in. He looked at me and grinned.
“Do you mind?” I snapped. “You, of all people, are not welcome here right now.”
“I have some news you might like to hear.”
I made a show of sighing deeply. “What could possibly be more important than this?”
“You have a visitor.”
I glanced at Narata. “What? Who?”
“Your sister is here.”
I stood in the corridor outside and waited impatiently as Omori was brought up to us.
“You came,” I said as she rounded the corner.
“I did.”
“Does this mean you want to train up?”
Omori shook her head. “My whole past is nothing but lies, and I want nothing to do with it. I’m sorry.”
I swallowed back more tears. “Does that include me?”
Omori nodded quickly. “I’m sorry, Kioto. I’ve actually made a new life for myself, and I want to be allowed to live it. I need to move forward.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I want to help your smudger. She doesn’t deserve to die for something that someone else did to her. Plus, I can complete my own story.”
I led Omori into the bedroom and closed the door behind us.
“Let’s do this,” I said to Narata.
Omori looked over at Malia on the bed. “Is she…?”
“Not quite, but she doesn’t have long,” Narata said. “You arrived just in time.”
“I followed Kioto back here. I stood outside for so long trying to decide whether to come in or not.”
I reached out and squeezed Omori’s hand. “I’m so glad you did.”
She pulled her hand away. “I only did it to save her. No one deserves to die like this.”
Narata stepped forward and placed her hand on Omori’s shoulder. “I’ll talk you through the whole process. It should be simple enough. Your own memories want to return. They’ll come out with practically no work on your part at all. The others will follow. It will be fast and forceful.”
“A rush,” Omori whispered.
I looked up at her. How did she know that word?
“That’s right,” Narata continued. “You have to try not to panic, and don’t break the connection. Just let them flow through you.”
“Let’s get started,” I said.
Narata knelt in front of her altar.
“We don’t have time for that,” I said.
“There’s always time to do things properly.” She tapped the floor beside her and I dutifully knelt.
As we completed the Dedication, I watched Omori from under half-closed lids. She sat on the edge of the bed, hands in her lap, eyes closed. She mouthed the words along with us.
When the Dedication was finished, Narata rose and took Omori’s hand gently in hers. She placed her other hand on top.
“Are you ready?” she asked.
“I guess so,” Omori replied.
She followed Narata to the side of the bed.
“One hand here,” Narata pressed Omori’s hand onto Malia’s stomach. “And the other here.” She placed Omori’s other hand on Malia’s forehead. “That’s the important one. That’s how the memories are transferred. The other one—” she pointed to Malia’s stomach “—that’s more of a comforting thing, to stop your extractee from panicking, or from feeling too detached from the physical world. Merchants don’t use the second hand. That’s just something traders do. Now, when we start the transfer, it will come slowly at first, but when the rush comes it might feel a bit like you’re drowning. But it’s only for a few seconds. Don’t break the connection, and don’t panic. Just let it wash over you, keep breathing, and remember that it will pass in just a moment.”
Omori nodded.
; “Are you ready to begin?”
Omori nodded again.
“I’ll start the transfer myself and pass the memories through into you. This is called tandem, or relay extraction. It’s not commonly done, we don’t even teach this technique anymore, but it’s the only way that we can do this today.”
I’d never even heard of such a strategy. I couldn’t imagine what situations you might want to use it in. Other than this one, of course. But this was hardly regular. I wondered when they stopped teaching it.
“Close your eyes,” Narata said. She placed her hand on top of Omori’s. “Here we go. Just focus on your breathing. In and out, in and out.”
I watched Omori’s body tense, and then relax a little. I couldn’t remember my first experience of an extraction, I’d done countless of them since. But it was something that you never got used to. Either the feeling of having an intruder inside your own head, or the feeling of being an intruder in someone else’s.
She leaned forward slightly when the rush started, as if wading against the current. I thought that I’d feel happy seeing this, validated. This is what I wanted; my sister trading alongside me. Continuing the Okaporo traditions, wherever we were in the world. But that wasn’t what I felt. It was more like regret, sorrow, guilt. Had I dragged my sister into a life that I myself hated and despised?
“We’re done,” Narata said. “How do you feel?”
Omori raised her hand to her head. “Dizzy.”
“You’re lucky, you won’t get the throw like the rest of us do, because you’re not keeping something in your body that doesn’t belong. That’s what the throw is; your body trying to eject the foreign object. But it’s already gone from you.”
“Except my own memories.”
“Yes. Can you feel them settling back into place?”
Omori nodded.
“It’s a bit weird, isn’t it? Don’t worry, that feeling won’t last for long.”
The Smudger Page 17
