The Foretelling of Georgie Spider

by Ambelin Kwaymullina

  Daniel said, “Starbeauty says he’s the sixth.”

  “There’s a sixth now?” Jules said. “And it’s him?” He turned towards me. “You sure about that?”

  “No! I didn’t even know there was a sixth!”

  Some things cannot be known until they are known. Now is when this is known. Starbeauty paced across to me and sat at my feet. Bringing you the sixth was my last choice.

  “Are you going back to Spinifex City?”

  This is not of a matter of who goes and who does not. It is a matter of choices ending. I can no longer change what is to be. She flicked her ears at Jules. You cannot either.

  “I’m off the hook, huh? Can’t say I’m sorry about that.” Only he was sorry, I could hear it in his voice. He looked at Ember, and added, “But don’t think you’re leaving me behind, Red. I’m coming with you to the Conclave whether my choices matter or not.”

  Hoffman was frowning and he was frowning at all of us. “Would someone please explain to me what you are all talking about?”

  I explained. It took a long time because first I had to talk about my ability since Hoffman didn’t know what it was. Then we all took turns at telling him about everything that happened since I’d Seen Ash was going to die, and how the world would end if she did, and what he had to do to stop it.

  When we’d finished, Hoffman heaved a sigh and said, “Must I save humanity again? It really is becoming rather tiresome.”

  “Dad!” Ember hissed.

  “I’m joking, Ember. Obviously the girl cannot be allowed to die. Who is going to repair me if I ever suffer another episode of instability?”

  “Do you understand what you need to do?” Ember demanded. “Make the choice you wouldn’t have made if you didn’t know about the danger?”

  “Yes, thank you, Ember, I am quite capable of understanding a perfectly logical explanation.” He looked upwards, and added, “I take it then that this is one of your ‘maps’, Georgie? Of the things that are to be?”

  “Yes,” I said. “And no.”

  I walked until I was standing in the centre of the cave and Daniel walked with me. I reached up to brush my fingers against one of the strands. “The spiders made this webbing specially. It’s lots of strands wound together. So it’s connected on the inside.” I let my hand fall. “Then the strands link to other stands. So it’s connected on the outside too. And all of it together – it’s the future if Ash lives.”

  Daniel added quietly, “Georgie wanted you to see what you were all fighting for.”

  Everyone looked up and so did I. It wasn’t quite the future I saw in my head. Nothing could be as shining and hopeful as that. But with the white webbing glowing silver in the light and the quartz glittering, it was enough.

  “I want this future,” Ember said.

  “We all want this future,” Hoffman said. “What you are speaking of, Georgie, is a true Balance. Harmony within and without. Besides,” he nodded at his daughter, “it is a family affair, now. The people whose choices matter are you, me and Dominic.”

  “Nicky!” Ember insisted.

  Hoffman shrugged, and turned his attention to me. “My understanding of the plan for tomorrow is that Dominic will be some distance into the grasslands in order to place him in sufficient range of Ashala to activate her ability, should it be required. But are you quite certain he should not be in the vicinity of the Conclave itself?”

  His next choice is not made at the Conclave. Starbeauty rolled to her feet and came over to stand with us. He must trust you to preserve her life. You must trust him to preserve her chance. Both are required to make the future.

  “Are you implying that there is a difference between Dominic’s choices and ours?” Hoffman demanded. “And what, precisely, is Ashala’s ‘chance’?”

  Starbeauty yawned. Explanations are not of cat.

  Hoffman kept staring at her as if she was going to say something else even though she’d just told him she wasn’t. Ember understood there were no more words coming from Starbeauty. She looked over at me and said, “Is there anything more you can tell us that might help, Georgie?”

  I shook my head. They knew the danger was greater than ever before because it was all we’d been talking about over the past few days as the Conclave drew nearer. They didn’t know what the blizzard was doing to me but it wouldn’t help them to know that I was always so cold now that my bones ached with it or that it sometimes hurt to breathe because it felt like I was inhaling ice. “I haven’t Seen anything else.” Except I hadn’t Seen the sixth. “Starbeauty?”

  What has needed to be said has been said. She stalked to the entrance and gazed back at everyone else. We are now elsewhere.

  “Hold on a moment!” Hoffman protested. “I still have questions!”

  Em gave him a push towards Starbeauty. “When an ancient spirit – or Georgie – tells you it’s time to be elsewhere, you go elsewhere.”

  Ember and Jules took Hoffman away, past Starbeauty and into the passages, and Nicky trotted after them. Starbeauty stayed where she was, looking back at Daniel and me. Her tail was in the air but her ears were flat. Something was making her sad and I knew what it was because she would have understood the map in the way the others didn’t. She could tear it with her claw. I could break it with my hand. The possibility of the future where Ash lived was fragile and easy to destroy.

  In whatever is to come you must know yourselves to be of cat. We do not fall. Even when we do.

  Then she was gone, disappearing into the passages after the others.

  I turned and threw my arms around Daniel, and held on very tight. The space inside his arms had become the only space where I wasn’t cold. The blizzard was taking my warmth and if we couldn’t stop it, it would take everyone else’s too. I was afraid for Ash and for Connor and for all of us.

  Daniel whispered against my ear, “Georgie? Let’s Run.”

  He lifted me up, and I wrapped my arms around his neck. Everything blurred, and when everything stopped blurring we were somewhere else, and then somewhere else, then somewhere else again. We lay by one of the small pools where the markings on the backs of the star frogs were glowing, and Daniel looked up at the stars in the sky while I looked down at the ones in the water. We sat in one of the hollows where the night jasmine bloomed and Daniel made me a crown of flowers. We stood at the edge of the cliffs and watched the hawks soaring across the face of the moon. Sometimes we talked and sometimes we didn’t, and in one of the times when we did Daniel said to me, “I will love you always and forever and in all the futures you can See and the ones you can’t.”

  We lived in one another’s arms, and shared each other’s worlds, and for one whole night, I looked into the now.

  THE CONCLAVE

  ASHALA

  Aingls were ahead. But we couldn’t see them yet.

  Em said we had about another ten minutes to go before we reached the staging area of the old rhondarite mine. That was the location she’d sent out to her family using the Conclave-calling device, and that was where they would be, waiting. Lurking … stop it. I was as safe as I could get, surrounded by my own aingls – Ember at my side. Leo hovering along on his flyer in front of us, using one arm to steer and the other to hold Starbeauty against his chest. And Hoffman striding along next to Leo. We’d left Connor and Jules a way back, sheltering in one of the many crevasses in the jagged white rocks that made up the Steeps. They hadn’t liked staying behind but as Hoffman had put it, a Conclave was an “invitation-only event”. There was nothing to be gained by breaking the rules, and besides, if there was any trouble we could contact them pretty much immediately. We could warn the Tribe too, because we’d set up a sort of mindspeaking relay system. Pepper and Wanders were in the forests near the centre, close enough that we could reach them from here. And once we’d reached them, they could mindspeak Jaz on the grasslands, and Jaz could reach Georgie or Daniel.

  I rubbed at my chest. It was tight and getting tighter with every step we too
k, even though I knew I wasn’t likely to die today, not when I had Hoffman and Leo to defend me as well as Ember. The three of them wouldn’t let the others kill me no matter what happened at the Conclave, and Em was carrying the weapon that would paralyse an aingl in her pocket. It was the days that came after today that worried me. Because if the aingls decided I was a threat – that the Tribe was a threat – we’d never have a safe day again. They could come for us at any time and I knew they’d never give up, not if they thought they were fighting for their lives.

  The wind suddenly picked up, and with it came the scent of eucalyptus. A Firstwood wind. I inhaled the familiar, comforting smell and seemed to inhale something else with it. A sense of calm filled me, pouring into my lungs and expanding outwards across my chest. My concerns abruptly seemed to be small things, not worth worrying myself over. They would pass, as all things did. Night would follow day, and the seasons would shift, and all that was would live and die and live again. And the Tribe will endure forever …

  I blinked. What had that been? But I knew. Grandpa, reaching out to comfort me from afar. And he had.

  “Ash? You all right?”

  “Fine,” I told Em. Then I studied her face and asked, “You?” Because there was danger ahead for her as well, the danger of the bleakness that threatened to overwhelm whenever she had to deal with her family.

  “I’m fine too.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She smiled. Ember’s whole face changed when she smiled, but never quite like this. She looked totally at peace with herself and the world. “I’m not sad.”

  “Good.” She seemed to be doing much better at coping with her family. It must have helped her to be with Hoffman and Leo and Nicky. Maybe the repeal of the Accords had helped as well, even if it hadn’t turned out as we’d hoped.

  Ember glanced at her dad and shifted closer to me. “Listen, Ash, I wanted to say to you – I know Dad can be a little … well, he is who he is. But he can be a real asset. He can do everything I can do with nanomites and everything, and he knows as much about human history. More, actually, and–”

  “Em,” I interrupted, “if you want your dad to stay in the Firstwood for a while, he can.”

  “Oh. Well, yes, I would like him to stay. I mean, I think it would be good for everyone, if he stayed.”

  Silly Em. You don’t need a reason other than him being your dad. “Then he stays.”

  She smiled that same smile of contentment again, and I smiled back. Then I caught a glimpse of something in the distance and looked up to see black wings flapping through the skies. Crows. Two – no, three of them, soaring overhead.

  I nudged Ember. “Your crows are here.”

  “I know,” she answered. “They’ve come to be with me.”

  There was a sudden heaviness to her voice and I frowned. Maybe she was sad after all? Before I could ask her about it the road began to slope sharply upwards and Em said, “This is it, Ash. The staging area for the mine should be over the top of this rise.”

  We can talk about her family later. We’d probably have plenty more to discuss after today anyway. I drew in another calming breath. I could still taste the eucalyptus in the air and I tried to pull as much of it as I could into my lungs as we walked up, and up. It seemed to take forever before we neared the crest of the rise. Leo and Hoffman got there first. Em and I arrived a few minutes later, and all of us looked down at what was below.

  The road we were on ran into a big, flat area and then out of it again, twisting away through the jagged white cliffs that loomed over the flat space on all sides. In the centre of it were the aingls. Most I recognised immediately – Terence in Gull-City-blue, Delta in Cloud-City-white, and Maleki in Jet-City-black. Then there were the two I didn’t know but had seen in the bunker, the black woman and the blonde one, both in Wattle-City-grey. Flyers were hovering in a neat row behind where the aingls were standing, and the aingls themselves were staring at us.

  Hoffman went striding downwards. He reached the bottom of the hill and kept on going, flinging his arms wide open. “My children!”

  With the exception of Terence, everyone came running. They crowded around him, all trying to hug him at once and talking over each other as they vied for his attention. Em had been right, the aingls loved their dad. Putting me under his protection might actually work. I didn’t want to get too hopeful, though. Once they got over being happy to see him they’d probably start to remember the times he’d let them down, and if they didn’t Terence would remind them. Besides which, I knew they feared dying more than they loved him, because the one thing they’d never been prepared to do for their father was get rid of the Citizenship Accords.

  Leo stepped off his flyer. He put Starbeauty onto the ground and she padded away to perch on the rocks. I will observe.

  Ember and I started down the hill and Leo hurried to join us, pacing along at my side. Em leaned in to whisper to me as we went, “The one dressed in black is Maleki. The blonde one wearing grey is Katya, and the other one is Nova.”

  I’d already recognised Maleki but she didn’t know I’d seen him before, in the bunker. My gaze slid over the other aingls to where Terence was watching his brothers and sisters bounce around Hoffman like puppies. Terence’s face was rigid and his mouth pressed into a thin line. Fury, and pain. He wants his family back. If he’d been anyone else I would’ve felt sorry for him. But not for a man who took other people’s families away.

  The moment we reached the base of the hill Terence jabbed a finger in my direction and shouted, “There she is! That is the girl who will kill us all!”

  The aingls stopped talking and swivelled to stare right at me. Ember and Leo moved closer, sheltering me between them. I looked back at the aingls, trying to appear – trustworthy? Harmless? Only I knew I could never be harmless enough, because whatever Terence had been telling them about me had worked. They were afraid. Delta went very still and Maleki shifted uneasily on his feet. Katya took an anxious step back and Nova stepped forwards, standing in front of Katya to shield her. I’m not your enemy! There was no point in saying so. They were like the people in the city who thought all Illegals were killers, the ones who Jules had said were made vicious and stupid by fear.

  I swallowed. I might be safe for today, but one way or another these people were coming for me and I didn’t think anyone was going to be able to stop them.

  Then Hoffman said, “Ashala Wolf saved my life.”

  There was a stunned silence which was broken by Terence. “I don’t believe it! When and how were you in danger of dying, father?”

  “I wasn’t ‘in danger’ of dying,” Hoffman answered. “I was dead. I had to shut myself down, you see. Because …” He bent his head and ran a hand over his face, shading his eyes. When he looked up again his expression was haunted. “Because I was insane.”

  I stifled a startled exclamation as the aingls stared at him in horror. I hadn’t expected Hoffman to tell the truth and from the expression on Em’s face, neither had she. I’d never considered for a second that Hoffman would be willing to expose a weakness. He wasn’t a man that did that.

  “There was some kind of instability,” Hoffman continued wearily, “caused by transferring my consciousness to an artificial body.”

  “You should have come to me!” Delta said. “Or to Ember. We could have repaired you.”

  He had gone to Em, but Delta didn’t know that, any more than Hoffman himself knew what the true cause of his instability had been. Hoffman patted her shoulder. “There was no way to repair me, my dear. Believe me, I tried. I was getting a little worse every day, forgetting things – forgetting numbers, Delta!”

  Katya’s lower lip trembled. “But I don’t want you to be mad, Father.”

  “I’m not mad,” Hoffman told her. “At least, not any more.” He gestured towards me. “Because she saved my mind. Ember found me, you see, and Ashala used her ability to heal the instability. So before you all decide to kill this girl, you should know �
�� without her your father would be dead.”

  The aingls were looking at me again, this time with a strange variety of expressions. Terence was white with rage. Nova was wary, and Maleki thoughtful. Delta was studying me with an intense, creepily detached stare, as if she’d like to take me apart and find out what was inside. But Katya – Katya was gazing at me something approaching adoration. She turned to grab hold of Nova’s sleeve, pulling at it. “We can’t let Terence hurt her, Nova. Not after she saved Dad. You have to protect her.”

  Nova glanced uncertainly from Katya to me. She opened her mouth and closed it again. Frowned. Then seemed to come to a decision. “You’re right, Katya. She cannot be harmed. Terence, I will not permit it.”

  Terence snarled, “This man is not our father.”

  “Terence!” Hoffman spread his arms wide. “I know we’ve had our differences, but really …”

  “That’s not what I mean. You’re an Illegal.”

  There were gasps of alarm at that, and Terence continued, “There’s an Illegal who can appear to be anyone. Delta can confirm that.”

  “That Illegal is dead,” Ember snapped, and I hoped Terence believed her, because none of us wanted him knowing Jules was still alive.

  “Then it’s another Illegal with the same ability! Think about it, all of you. Is he acting like Father?”

  “Of course I’m your father, and I’ll prove it,” Hoffman said. He looked around and then walked over to pick up a rock from the ground – a piece of rhondarite, left behind by the miners. “If I had an ability, I couldn’t use it while touching rhondarite.” He held it up, letting them see his hand clenched around it, then allowed it to fall. “Although I do understand why you might think that I’m not acting like myself. I was … lost, for a long time. And when I was found again, I realised I’d been wrong, about so many things.” He gazed at each of his children in turn. “I’ve been wrong in the way I’ve treated all of you.”

  There was a collective intake of breath. Maleki and Katya were mouthing the word “wrong” as if they’d never heard it before. Not even the revelation of Hoffman’s insanity seemed to have shocked the aingls as much as him admitting a mistake. I bet he never has.