TRAVELLER (Book 1 in the Brass Pendant Trilogy)

by Amanda May Bell

  Other students walked to different schools along this street too, and as I walked, I passed by rowdy groups of them. They laughed and talked loudly to each other and I listened to the local phrases they used, and to the pattern of their speech. Mothers walked with small children and adults walked along this street too. Two old ladies with scarfs tied over their hair pulled covered trolleys on wheels behind them as they walked. Life moved and bustled around me and, except for the old ladies, everyone hurried. It was a clear, fresh day and I quickened my step a little to match the pace of the locals.

  Traffic flowed on the road beside me and, on my other side, I walked past narrow terrace houses similar to my own. They had high front fences, and hedges were cut neatly around their security coded gates. This was an affluent area. Our people always based ourselves among affluence as we moved throughout the eras. More than once, over the turns, I’d asked my tutors the reason for this and I’d been answered with pained expressions and much shaking of heads. I’d been told firmly that to be of a low station was acceptable and that servants were necessary for any Kingdom to function well. But, to be so poor as to be without a task to do was to be without honour, and neither Aldirites nor Denborites would tolerate such poverty in their Kingdoms, therefore we shouldn’t have to tolerate it anywhere else.

  Of course, this was an early twenty first century city and poverty wasn’t confined to fenced areas here like it was in some eras. As I walked to my exclusive inner city school through expensive inner city houses and past upper class inner city stores, I walked past the entrance to an underground train station, and it was here that those without homes to warm them sometimes sat against the steps.

  There was one man in particular I’d seen here more than once, and as I walked towards the steps now, I looked for him among the other unshaven men and uncared for women who sat amongst their grimy belongings. Sure enough, he was there this morning and he sat with his back against the stair rail. He held his thin coat around himself to protect his chest from the cool autumn air and his legs were crossed beneath his coat as well. His hair was medium length, and grey, with slightly matted ends as if it hadn’t grown, or been combed, for many years. His face was lined, but surprising clean compared to his homeless friends, and his beard was neatly trimmed. I knew he watched my approach, as always, and for some reason, I could never tear my eyes from his.

  I wasn’t sure what it was about him that had originally caught my attention, but I think it was his eyes. He had pale, aqua coloured eyes, but I knew it wasn’t the colour I’d noticed most. It was the way he noticed everything and everyone who went by him. As I walked towards him now, I knew he saw I enjoyed my walk, and I knew he saw my guilty glance at his homeless friends too. It was like he saw inside my soul as I passed, and every time he was here, he asked me the same question in a surprisingly rich and mellow voice.

  “Are you lost?” he asked me, as always……and I couldn’t look away. It was as if I was the one without hope and he was the one offering hope to me. That was what it was about his eyes……they weren’t without hope like the eyes of the others on the stairs……they were full of a fierce hope that burned deeply within them. I shook my head awkwardly and walked passed him quickly, and I let my breath out slowly before I continued towards my school.

  I took a short cut through a public courtyard with a water fountain in the middle, and I walked beside benches and under evergreen trees growing in large pots, before I walked down some concrete stairs. When I turned onto the street at the bottom of the stairs, I could see the school building and I smiled at little. This structure was considered to be old by the people here. Stone gate posts supported the large iron front gates and wide stairs led the way to heavy wooden entry doors set into red brick walls. The rectangular windows were edged with white, painted bricks and others students wearing the same scratchy uniform milled about the steps, or were dropped at the gate where they stepped from shiny, expensive cars.

  I was a turn or so older than the other students in my year, but I wasn’t here to pass exams or compete with them in any way, so it didn’t matter. Most of what was taught here was either wrong or very basic, but I wasn’t here to learn inaccurate facts either. I was only here to copy the language phrases and to learn to blend in.

  As I waited to cross the street, Evangeline alighted from a sleek, black car which had pulled up in front of the school.

  Evangeline was training as a quester too and she was my partner for the final challenges. We’d been placed together about six months ago in order to get to know each other in preparation for the finals, and unfortunately, we’d disliked each other instantly on sight.

  I’d been looking forward to finally having someone to work with. Some questers worked in groups for most of their training, but I’d been privately tutored the whole time, and Evangeline’s reaction on meeting me had been disappointing. My similar reaction on meeting her however, had surprised me completely. We’d spent the first few days pretending to be nice while we’d both gritted our teeth and tolerated each other’s insincere words. After almost a week though, I’d found I couldn’t take anymore falseness, and while waiting for a weapons training class, I’d suggested we avoid each other whenever circumstances allowed and work together without speaking whenever it was required. Thankfully, Evangeline had been very glad to comply, and after that, it was much easier for both of us. Surprisingly, we worked very well together under this new agenda.

  I watched Evangeline join a group of girls and boys who waited for her at the school gate, and she glanced at me and nodded briefly before the group followed her into the school. I nodded to her as well before walking swiftly across the road beside a group of boisterous, younger boys.

  “Hey, Livia, wait up.”

  The cheerful voice came from just behind me and I turned around.

  This local boy was the reason I was enjoying my time at this school, and I smiled and greeted him just as cheerfully as he fell into step beside me. I’d met him a few weeks ago on my first day here and we’d been friends ever since. I’d been walking alone towards my first class when he’d appeared suddenly beside me and asked me conversationally if I was lost. I’d told him I knew exactly where I was going, but he’d walked me to my classroom anyway, and all the way there, he’d talked nonstop.

  Josh was lean with sandy brown, untidy hair and pale blue eyes. He was enthusiastic about everything and he was always in trouble from his tutors for running in the halls. He was usually in trouble for the poor state of his school uniform too. This school had very strict dress rules, and this morning, Josh’s shirt was only half tucked in and his tie was already loose.

  “You’ll get another detention if you don’t tuck your shirt in before we reach the front gate,” I said to him cheerfully, and I grinned as we walked briskly along the path together.

  “Phew…….just made it,” he said, with mock seriousness. He half tucked in his shirt as we walked between the gate posts. He didn’t seem to mind getting into trouble.

  “Did you finish your experiment?” I asked him, as we headed up the steps into our school.

  “No, I hit another snag, but I’ve already worked out a way around it and I set up new controls last night,” he said enthusiastically. Josh considered himself to be a scientist who was working far ahead of his time and he was always telling me about his latest experiments. He was generally not very forthcoming about the details of what he was actually working on, but his passion for his work was very clear.

  “What are your new controls?” I asked him curiously, and he glanced at me as we followed a rowdy group of younger students up a flight of stairs.

  “It’s all to do with matter and how it behaves around compasses. It’s very complicated,” he said vaguely, before he took the last few stairs two at a time. “Hey, are you still listening to those songs?” he asked me, as he waited for me at the top of the stairs.

  “Oh, do you want your music back?” I asked him, and I tried not to sound too disappoin
ted.

  “No, you can keep it. I was just wondering if you wanted more songs,” he said, and I looked at him and frowned.

  “You’d do that for me?” I asked him carefully. I hadn’t realised he was able to add new songs to the cartridge, but it was important I didn’t sound too naïve about +2013 technology.

  “Sure; you can listen to my new playlist at lunch today and you can choose which songs you want,” he said, as if this was a perfectly normal thing to do.

  “Thanks,” I said, and I smiled as we turned into the classroom and sat down together for our first class of the day.

  Evangeline was already in the classroom and she nodded to me again as she sat down with her noisy group of friends…….

  Neither of us were supposed to make friends here.

  It was very strongly discouraged, even amongst those who’d finished their training and officially joined the Quest. Anything that put our activities under scrutiny amongst the locals of a time segment was discouraged. We were meant to move about unnoticed within a society, not join it and form close relationships with the locals. I’d heard rumours once of a quester who’d been escorted home by guards. She’d had her pendant removed permanently for getting too close to a local in an Exploration Era time segment. And it wasn’t just questers who had to follow this rule. Guards, tutors, trackers, and anyone else who time travelled out of Aldiris was expected to follow it too.

  Since we’d been together though, Evangeline had routinely made friends with the locals wherever we went. I wouldn’t say they were close friendships, because it never bothered her to leave these people behind when we made the drop to a new place, but she was definitely what the people of this era would call ‘popular’. She had rich, dark brown hair that hung in spiral curls down her back and her eyes were a very deep blue. Wherever we went, she attracted a following of locals, both boys and girls, and she clearly enjoyed her position as leader in her new found group. She’d been cautious around me at first, and had glanced at me anxiously when I’d seen her making friends. I guess she’d been worried I’d tell my tutors about her activities, but she soon learnt I was very happy to mind my own business, so long as the same courtesy was applied to me. As I said, Evangeline and I worked very well together as partners now that we understood each other perfectly.

  I nodded to her too as I sat down in a chair beside Josh and I listened to him talk about a new band he’d been listening to while we waited for our tutor to arrive. Josh called him the ‘teacher’ and although Josh treated him with the utmost respect while within his hearing, the things he said about the man behind his back were truly shocking to me. Even now, as the ‘teacher’ rushed into the room, Josh muttered something about him under his breath that made me shake my head. When I frowned at him though, he just grinned at me innocently and we opened our printed, bound paper books.

  The day passed quickly despite the boring, inaccurate classes. Josh kept me entertained with a running commentary of the events of the day and, at lunch, I listened to more of his music. I liked all his new songs, which pleased him, and as usual, he told me school would be closed for the holidays by the time I was finished if I took any longer to eat my lunch. Today, he sat back in his chair and watched me cut a small piece off a roast potato, and I glanced at him and paused as his cheerful smile faded slowly.

  “You remind of someone when you eat so slowly like that,” he said, and he looked lost in thought and almost sad for a moment. I put my fork down carefully.

  “Who?” I asked him suspiciously. I half suspected him of teasing me in some way. He wasn’t usually so serious, but he didn’t smile again or make a joke. Instead, he shrugged and looked away.

  “Just someone. I can’t place who exactly,” he said quickly, before he asked me if I’d finished a biology paper we had to complete by the end of term. I told him I hadn’t even started it and he was impressed by this for some reason. I didn’t tell him I hadn’t started it because I didn’t intend to do it at all. My tutor set my study tasks, not this school, and there was no need to hand in homework when I knew I wouldn’t be returning here next term.

  “You’d better get started. You only have two weeks until the holiday break, young lady,” he said with mock sternness, and this time he was joking. His smile had returned. I smiled too, but a little sadly. I’d miss Josh when it came time to leave here and I hadn’t yet had the heart to tell him I wouldn’t be back after the holidays.

  It was Friday today which, in this time segment, was the end of the working week so we had no school tomorrow. Friday afternoons always infected the students with a sense of expectancy and relief, and the whole atmosphere of the school changed after lunch as the end of the school week approached rapidly. Josh was looking forward to two uninterrupted days to work on his experiments and even the tutors seemed affected by the fact that it was Friday. They reminded us cheerfully about overdue homework, and they mentioned the end of term exams before telling us all to enjoy our weekends. They thought this was amusing.

  I didn’t approach the weekend with the same attitude as the people of +2013. I would have preferred the school week to continue indefinitely. For me, the weekends usually meant more solitude, more study, and some weapons classes with Evangeline. Lately, the solitude meant more of the restlessness, so half my weekend was going to be spent pacing aimlessly around the second story of my house while I was supposed to be studying. Next weekend was an orientation for the commencement of the final challenges, and Evangeline and I would be travelling to our Quest house to meet the rest of our group and our supervisor for the finals. Maybe, that was what I was waiting for. After all these years, maybe the restlessness was just my reaction to being so close, finally, to making my final challenges and officially joining the Quest.

  “Livia, wait up. You have to ride home with me this afternoon.”

  Evangeline took me by surprise as I walked out of the school gate. I stopped and she looked at me almost apologetically.

  “Mirren forgot to tell you. We’re travelling home this afternoon and we have to be ready to leave at set four,” she said, and I closed my eyes for a moment. I would have much preferred the weekend of solitude and pacing. This wasn’t good news for me and Evangeline was smart enough to have guessed this, having accompanied me home before. I opened my eyes and nodded to her slowly before I followed Evangeline reluctantly towards her waiting car. As if my afternoon wasn’t already going from bad to worse, Evangeline’s tutor was accompanying us too and he couldn’t get out of the car fast enough. He opened the door for us with an over exaggerated, extravagant flourish and I was glad that Josh had already said his goodbyes. He’d run through the gate ahead of me in order to try to catch an early train home. If he’d seen this, it would have been very embarrassing……and rather difficult to explain.

  Evangeline’s tutor was called Jonah and he sat with us in the back seat of the car. He was well meaning, but he fussed all the time and I had no patience today for his flowery speech or the dramatic hand gestures which always accompanied his words. He was a slight man with a long face and an aristocratic nose. His grey hair was always cut very short on the sides and his neatly trimmed beard only added to the length of his face. He had teal coloured eyes, and he was known to be an excellent swordsman despite his profession as a travelling tutor. Evangeline adored him and she teased him and chatted quietly with him while I sat next to them in silence. Jonah adored Evangeline as well, and I listened, a little enviously, to the relaxed familiarity with which they spoke to each other. They spoke together in the old language. This was the language of Aldirites, and of Denborites too, and it had been the language spoken in the old cities before the day of our Destruction. We called it the old language, but in truth, there was no new language. The old language was simply the name we gave to our native tongue, and usually, I loved to hear its smooth, almost lyrical sounds; but not today………….. Today, it reminded me we were going home.

  When the guard who drove us parked the car in front of m
y house, I followed Evangeline past more of Jonah’s unnecessary fussing. Mirren was waiting for me by the open front door of our house and she looked as unexcited about our trip home as I did. Evangeline and Jonah lived next door to us, and as I closed my front gate behind me, I could still hear Jonah’s over excited voice and Evangeline’s laughter.

  “Good set, Livia. We leave for Aldiris at set four,” said my tutor formally, as I approached the door. I paused as I passed her to enter the house.

  “Do you want to go home, Mirren?” I asked her suddenly, and she looked at me in shock for a moment.

  “Ah…I’m….I’m not……I’m not aware that my……..thoughts on the matter……are relevant,” she said nervously, before she ushered me quickly inside and closed the door behind me.

  “I mean….It would be nice if we could go home and just…….be at home,” I said, as I turned back to my tutor on my way up the stairs. Mirren glanced up at me and I thought I saw a brief flash of surprise at my words, but I couldn’t be sure, and she hurried into her own rooms before I could speak again. I turned and kept walking slowly up the stairs.

  We wouldn’t be going home for long, at least. We never did. I took a leather travelling bag out of my wardrobe and laid it on the bed. The bag was very similar to the back packs of this time segment, except it opened at the top by means of a leather draw string, and it had a leather pocket which folded over the top. This pocket was fastened by double silver clasps and I undid these quickly to put a change of clothes inside the bag. At the last minute, after a slight hesitation, I added Josh’s music cartridge too, and I wrapped a finely woven shirt around it guiltily as I stuffed it into the very bottom of the bag. There was time for me to change into my home clothes and I removed my school uniform gladly to dress in soft pants and a finely woven, ivory coloured shirt. Our clothing was made from the fibres of plants and from wool shorn from the backs of ancient sheep breeds. These fibres and strands were then woven together in different combinations that produced a soft, breathable, slightly stretchy fabric. Our pants, dresses and shirts were all made of this fabric and a thicker, more coarsely woven material was used for jackets. There were also combination weaves which produced waterproof fabrics, and thicker or lighter seasonal versions of all of these materials as well.