Ursa

by Tina Shaw

  “I’m an orphan,” she says, with some satisfaction.

  I glance at her, surprised out of my shyness. I assumed that all Travester children have parents. “How come?”

  She frowns at the fountain. “It happened when I was quite little. My mother died of tuberculosis, and my father, heartbroken, threw himself out of an airship.”

  It’s staggering – all of it, and sends me into a tailspin. I once heard of a Cerel man throwing himself in front of a steamtrain rather than be sent to the wild camps, but that was ages ago. And TB? That’s something many Cerels get, the coughing disease. Not Travesters. I thought they were immune from such diseases. It turns my world upside down, that they might be the same as us.

  “I live with my aunt and uncle,” the girl continues haughtily.

  “Brothers and sisters?” I dare to ask.

  “No. I am the only child in the household.” Her fingers, on her lap, twine together. It sounds lonely, to be the only child in a house of adults, and I’m reminded again of the party. “And you?”

  “There are six of us.”

  It’s not worth mentioning all the others living on our floor and in the whole building.

  She shoots me a startled look. “Six!” Then turns back quickly at the fountain. “Sisters?” She sounds wistful.

  “Yes, an older sister called Marina. The youngest, Babet, is eight years old. She’s a little scamp. Then there’s my older brother Jorzy.”

  The dog has found a butterfly now and is making little prancing leaps at it.

  She sighs. “I had heard that Cerels had big families. I just didn’t think it was true.”

  “Don’t some of the Travesters have big families?” I ask, shy again, recalling who I’m speaking to – my superior, or so we are constantly being reminded in the broadcasts. Cerels! You are not equal to the lowliest Travester. Your forebears had tainted blood. You must work to better yourselves, to overcome your past. Work makes you free!

  Emee doesn’t seem to mind. “Not really. Three children is a lot for us. The Director has special incentives for families who have more than three, you know. He wants people to have more babies, so our race can grow bigger. Or something like that.” She sniffs. “When I get married, I’m not going to have any children at all. No matter what the Director says. I’m going to ride horses, and be a famous horse breeder.”

  I burst out laughing, can’t help it, it just sounds so ridiculous. But seeing her look of fury, I quickly swallow it down.

  “I don’t see what’s so funny about that,” she says coldly.

  “Horses,” I splutter, setting myself off again.

  She may as well have said giraffes – which I’ve heard are long-necked beasts that live in the Outer Islands. There are some carthorses around the city, and I’ve heard about the Travesters’ fast horses that race each other, but I’ve only seen a few such animals in my entire life. Once, on the day of the Home Parade, the Director went through the streets in a carriage pulled by a large black horse. The Travester horses are rumoured to be enormously expensive.

  “I might’ve known that an ignorant Cerel boy wouldn’t understand about horses,” she sniffs.

  “Sorry,” I murmur, “I didn’t mean to laugh.”

  She raises her chin, watching the dog. It’s given up on the butterfly and is lying panting on the ground. Its sparkly red collar is probably worth two or three meals for our family. Emee picks up her pet and sits on the side of the fountain, cupping water into her hand. The dog laps delicately at her hand, then pricks up its ears.

  A woman carrying a basket is hurrying into the square from the far side. She glances over at Emee, then smiles, not seeming to notice me hunched on the bench. It is a privilege to be noticed, I suppose. Though another kind of privilege to be invisible.

  Emee stands up, the dog in her arms. “I must go now,” she says, and walks off, as if I have suddenly failed to exist.

  Should I follow? I don’t know. Her abrupt manner confuses me, and I take only one step forwards. “Wait,” I call out.

  She stops and turns back, her pale eyes studying me.

  What can I say to her that won’t be considered offensive? She isn’t a Cerel girl, who I can be friends with if I feel like it. Cerels aren’t even supposed to talk to Travesters. But I can’t let her go just like that, my pride won’t let me; I want her to acknowledge that I exist.

  “Yes?”

  “Nothing,” I mutter, scuffing my boot into the gravel. “Goodbye.”

  “Yes, goodbye,” she says, walking away.

  6

  On my way home, I spot Jorzy and two of his workmates up ahead. I’m about to call out, but an air of tension about the men makes me hesitate. Instead, I trail them at a distance. The streets are busy with Cerels going home from their factory jobs and workshops. A crowded tram trundles past, the people inside looking blank as cattle. Jorzy and the two men turn into a pub. Cupping my hands to the thick, warped glass, I can see the place is full of working men standing at the bar and around tall tables. These will be the men who have in one way or another avoided the wild camps – whether they’re too young like Jorzy, or old, or disabled in some way. One older man looks to be paralysed down one side, while another is missing a hand.

  Hunching into my big jacket, I creep inside. Nobody takes much notice. Jorzy and a man with a thick moustache are standing at a high table, while a third man is hobbling back from the bar with a jug of beer and three mugs. I hunker down on the sawdust floor in a corner nearby, knees to my chest, like a boy waiting for his father. One or two glances are sent my way, but I ignore them and am left alone.

  Jorzy is talking to the two men, their heads close together. Maybe he’s telling one of his stories, except that all three of them are frowning. My brother is thin, I notice – thinner than most of the others. He looks like a twig that could be snapped in a wind. My brother, the storyteller. Then I catch something below the hubbub of the place, and the words jolt me out of my thoughts.

  “We are prisoners in our own city,” says Jorzy, though not loudly.

  Even among our own people, it’s best not to say things like that too loud.

  “Here’s what I propose we do,” Jorzy adds, eyes blazing like when he’s got some wild new idea or project, and I can tell he’s cooking up some kind of plan.

  Then my brother’s voice sinks to a whisper and I can’t make out anything more, no matter how much I’m straining to hear. The man with the moustache puts his clenched fist on the table. The other one drinks down his mug of beer in one long pull.

  The voices of the men in the pub rise and fall, like a rough kind of song or the telling of a long story. Feeling tired in the warmth of the place, I rest my forehead on my arms. My days spent roaming around the city fade into a loose dream of faces and sounds.

  Next thing I know, my brother is shaking me awake. “Ratfinks,” says Jorzy, looking into my face. His nickname for me doesn’t sound so friendly now. “Come on, time to get home.”

  I follow my brother groggily out into the amber street. A man pushing a handcart goes by, the cart’s wheels loud on the cobbles. Remembering that man’s clenched fist, I glance at my brother’s stern profile.

  “What were you talking about in there?”

  Jorzy sends me a swift glance. His hands are shoved into his pockets. He has a sack containing his lunch box and his goggles slung over one shoulder. His strides are long, and I’m having trouble keeping up.

  “D’you know,” he asks, side-stepping the question, “the story about the mermaid?”

  Despite myself, I smile. “A mermaid?” It sounds too fantastical, especially for someone like me who has never seen the sea. “With a tail?”

  “Aye, with a tail,” says Jorzy, tipping his cap at a young woman who is walking the other way. “And you might think that mermaids only live in the sea, but it’s not true. This mermaid – her name was Elsa – lived in our river. Not near the city, of course, that would be too noisy for a delicate thing like
a mermaid. No, she lived in a secret pond off in the countryside, where there were plenty of tasty fish and a nice cave to sleep in at night. Anyway,” he says, tipping his hat again and making another girl blush, “Elsa the mermaid, she had a curious nature and decided one day to explore the river. Secretly, she was probably hoping to find a boy mermaid – a merman.”

  That makes me flush a little, thinking about Emee, and I stick my hands in my pockets.

  “She came to a mansion overlooking the river, and thought, Ah, my merman is bound to live in this fine place. So she lay on the beach in front of the house and preened her long, sweet hair. Little did she know, however, that a bad man lived in that house, a man that walked on two legs and ruled the world–”

  “Like the Director,” I whisper. He might be talking in riddles, except I know what Jorzy is telling me.

  My brother frowns, and continues with his story as we turn into another street. “And that man imprisoned the beautiful mermaid. He put her in a horrible old pond at the bottom of his garden, with a fence all around it, so she couldn’t get out and couldn’t do anything except stay there. Every day the man would come down and ask her to grant him a wish.”

  We come to a vegetable barrow and Jorzy stops to buy a cucumber.

  “Some people believe, you see, that mermaids can grant wishes,” he says, handing over a coin. We carry on along the street. “However that’s not so. And Elsa tried to tell the man this, but he wouldn’t listen. Every day he grew a bit angrier, until one day he drained the pool of water and left her there to die.” Jorzy glances down at me. “For you see, a mermaid cannot live for very long without water.”

  I don’t like the direction this story is taking. “Then what?”

  “Well, the mermaid died, of course,” Jorzy says abruptly. We’re at our street door now, but my brother seems to be in no hurry to go inside. He leans against the wall, and this hanging about makes me nervous, though there aren’t any Black Marks in sight. “The thing is, that very day her soul went up to heaven, where the queen of the mermaids lives–”

  Jorzy turns his face to the darkening sky, as if thinking about something else. The clean, fine lines of his face are lit by a nearby gas lamp.

  “And this queen,” he continues dreamily, “gave the mermaid back her life, because it had been taken so unfairly from her. Elsa the mermaid went back to the river and the fine mansion and …”

  He trails off altogether, and I have to jog his elbow to hear the end of the story. “What happens?”

  Jorzy gives me a piercing, thoughtful look that I know has nothing to do with me and everything to do with the story. “Ah, and then,” my brother murmurs, “with one flick of her strong tail, she destroyed the evil man.”

  * * *

  The house is murmuring and breathing around me as I lie tossing and turning in my bed. I could’ve gone out into the night, to distract myself, but it’s raining, and I don’t like walking around in the rain. I roll over, trying to get comfortable.

  Normally sleep hits me like a sledgehammer as soon as I’ve crawled into my cubbyhole. And it is literally that – a cubbyhole that was once used to store coal. So I can touch the ceiling as I lie on my mattress and, by stretching out my arms, the walls. It’s a cosy cave, and I like it that way. Though not tonight.

  I keep picturing the man with the moustache and his clenched fist. I’m not ignorant; I know what they’re planning, even without Jorzy telling that silly story: an overthrow, is what I suspect. People talk about it often enough – or rather, whisper it in corners – how to assassinate the Director. If only … Then the city could go back to what it used to be like, before the Director came along with his Black Marks and his broadcasts and his hatred of Cerels. If only …

  But Jorzy. How can my brother think he can get away with something like that?

  Except, it’s only what Papa would have done – what he once tried to do, before he got taken away. It’s only what all of us secretly think about. And the idea that Jorzy might be plotting something makes me twist and wriggle like an eel beneath the rough covers, trying and failing to get comfortable. Curled on my side, I stare at the dim wall across from my cubbyhole.

  One part of me wants to join them. I hate the Director too. I would like to push the knife into his heart, or shoot the fatal crossbow arrow. Another part of me wants Jorzy to be safe. If you’re a Cerel, keeping safe means keeping a low profile. Keeping out of harm’s way. Not thinking, not planning, only accepting. Not that I can talk, with the explosive devices.

  I flop onto my back with a sigh, and look at the dark ceiling only a foot or so above my face.

  I’ve got a feeling that Jorzy and his friends have already made some kind of decision … maybe they’re even getting ready to act. The more I think about it, the more I’m certain I’m right. It’s like the instinct that tells me when to slip into a side alley, when to make myself scarce.

  With a huff, I flip onto my front, pressing my nose into the musty pillow.

  The way I understand it, there’s no real choice: I’ll have to help them. Even if they don’t know that I’m helping them. Better if they don’t know, or Jorzy might be angry. He might think I’m only a kid, yet I’ve got certain skills and I can use those skills to help my brother. Before it’s too late.

  * * *

  “Why’s your mother like that?” Bit asks out of the blue. It’s not something we’ve ever talked about before, though he must have heard the stories.

  We’re fishing at my special spot on the river. We’ve left the dog with Ma; dog and woman curled up together on the bed. The river flashes with morning light. It trickles and meanders along, making its unstoppable way through the heart of the city. Here, we are hidden from the street up above by trees and a high metal bridge used only by the steamtrains. When a train puffs overhead (which isn’t very often) we duck beneath the trees, so even the passengers won’t see us.

  The river forms a loose bend and there is a little island of river weed near the far bank. Fish might be sheltering in that bed of weed, so I like to cast my line up above it and let the float drift downstream.

  “Like what?” I reply, hoping to head off a subject that brings up bad memories.

  Bit is sucking his bottom lip, ready to cast. He has a jerky casting motion that tends to plop the float down onto the water too hard. I’m hoping he won’t scare the fish away. My friend casts, the orange float sailing through the air and landing plop onto the surface of the water. We both watch it bob there, out from the weeds, and already starting to drift downstream. Not high enough, though not too bad.

  “You know,” says Bit, watching the float, “blind.”

  “She’s blind?” I press the end of my hook several times through the body of a wriggling worm. “I hadn’t noticed.”

  Bit glances up, as if I might be serious, then gets it.

  “Sucker,” I say good-naturedly.

  My hook is made from the iron nail I found at the ruins and I’m proud of it, a good strong hook this one for a good-sized fish. I’ve hammered it into shape, and filed the end to a sharp point. Yes, a hook to catch the big fish that lives in this stretch of water. I hooked it once before and it leaped clear out of the water, a beautiful silvery fish, before it snapped the line and took off with my hook. This one, I’ve tied it onto my line with extra knots, a skein of strong knots, working on it back at the house, determined not to lose this hook. I’ve got a feeling this is going to be my lucky hook.

  “But why?” Bit continues.

  Bit has a way of persisting, like a terrier after a fox. He’ll wear you down with his “but why”s and “how come”s. In another time and place, he would be the teacher’s pet. By now Bit’s float is too far downstream. If he’s not careful, his hook will get snagged under the bridge.

  With a flick of my wrist, I cast the way my father taught me, the float landing softly onto the surface.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” I tell him finally, hoping to shut him up.


  My float bobs along, two or three lengths above the weed bed. Probably not much chance today of hooking the big one – not with Bit here – on the other hand, I might get a smaller fish. No matter how big, Nanna can always use it. Even the fingerlings – though, mindful of the future, I usually throw them back.

  “But–” Bit starts to say again, frowning. He’ll have heard the rumours from the old folk.

  Shouts come from up above, and the sound of boots on stone, running. Startled, we glance around, and I feel a tug of fear.

  Bit pulls in his line and hurries into the trees, hunkering down in the bushy undergrowth. With a regretful glance at my float, I also haul in, shove my rod into the hidey spot, and squeeze in next to Bit. There’s a special place to hide the rods in an emergency, a bush that’s got tall stalks coming up from the ground. Unless you look closely, the rods are just like all the other stalks.

  There’s a throttled cry, then thrashing noises from the bushes up near the street. Grunts, a thud and another cry, of pain this time.

  Bit’s face is white, his eyes big. I put a finger to my lips and start to creep out of our hidey spot. Crouched low, I worm myself between tree trunks, pull myself up a dirt ledge, wedge myself behind a mossy stump. My heart is in my throat but my curiosity pushes me on. Up above, and through the trees, I can make out splinters of movement.

  Two dark figures – Black Marks. They’re taking turns pounding their fists into something on the ground. From my angle, far below, it looks like they’re furiously beating the earth itself. Except the grunts of pain issuing from that spot tell me it’s not the earth they’re pounding, but a man.

  One of the Black Marks stands back. He stretches himself and shakes out his bloody fist. The other keeps pounding. Each time, there’s a cry, yet the sound is getting fainter. His companion, perhaps fed up now, starts walking away. The other man stops his pounding, and stands back to survey his handiwork. The expression on his face is brutal, and he’s panting like an animal in the middle of a kill. There is a moment of deliberation as the Black Mark stares at the ground. Then he aims a swift kick. No responsive grunt now, only silence. Then he too is walking away.