City Under Ice

by TE Olivant

  There are more rumours than truths about the Seekers. Often they are called in as arbiters between other clans. Some people say that they can read your mind to see if you’re telling the truth. That always seemed like nonsense to me. They are just very good at reading people. If you can see the tiniest flaw on a distant iceberg that might mean it collapses in ten years then it can’t be too hard to read someone’s eyes when they are lying.

  “You seek out what is hidden or lost. No one else knows much about you. No one I know has ever even seen the Peak.”

  Swift shook his head. “Your parents saw it.”

  I waited for him to tell me more, but he moved on.

  “So, we choose to live on the edge of our civilisation, but contrary to opinion, we are not beyond it. Someone has to be out here, looking out for our people, Kyrk. It just happens to be us.”

  I wasn’t convinced by this, but I could see there was no point in arguing.

  “We’re not always popular, but we do the jobs that no one else wants to do. And that means that we are closer to the truth than anyone.”

  “What truth?”

  The Seeker smiled. “Now that’s a good question. Let’s walk to the Peak.”

  The black of the Peak stood out like a scar on the White. The great stone pierced up into the sky like it was angry with the clouds.

  “Stop gawking,” Swift said as I stumbled on some ice. The Seeker took me in a wide sweep of the Peak so that we stood in its shadow. Even though it was silhouetted in the sunrise I could make out the shapes of the Seeker settlement. There were tents of all shapes and sizes, made from animal hides and attached to the rock with thick ropes.

  It was just past dawn, but I could already see the slim forms of Seekers scurrying about wherever I looked. In the plains in front of the Peak there were patches of moss and lichen and there were even some animals grazing.

  Swift swept forward with his usual pace. I wondered if our days of non-stop travel from the city had affected him at all. I could still feel the heaviness in my thighs.

  As we got closer to the Peak we began to come in sight of other Seekers. As soon as they saw me they stopped and openly stared. I guessed they didn’t get many visitors. A young boy with pale eyes and light grey fur ran towards me until his mother pulled him back.

  “What have you brought back with you from the market this time?” the woman said, her voice low.

  “You’ll find out soon enough, Roanna.”

  The woman sniffed. “Not sure the Chief will like this one any better than that skinny deer you came home with last month.”

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood up at the note of challenge in her voice. But Swift just smiled and walked past her. I followed behind.

  “Friendly,” I said to Swift once the woman was out of earshot. “Really friendly.”

  “What, you want top spot at the fire and a hug from the Chief? What would happen if an unknown Seeker turned up at a Hunter assembly?”

  Swift had a point. “What happened to the deer?”

  “What deer?” His eyes were fixed on the Peak.

  “The one you brought home from the Meet.”

  Swift grimaced. “Pah, it was sickly. I should never have taken it. It died the same day it arrived at the Peak.”

  I had no idea what to say to that, but I was saved from replying by a piercing whistling sound. Swift stopped dead and placed his hand on my chest so that I did the same.

  “What is it?”

  “Your friendly welcome,” Swift said, his tone cold. “The Chief is coming down to meet you.”

  Now that I knew what I was looking for, I could see a change in the shadowy movement on the Peak. The Seekers were moving down towards us.

  As they came closer I could see that the entire clan had come down to meet us, from old men to babies in their mothers’ arms. The Chief was at the head of this impressive group. Like all leaders he clearly liked to make an entrance. Or she liked to make an entrance. It wasn’t until they were close by that I realised the head of the Seekers was a female.

  There was no real reason why it should have been a surprise. Chiefs are always referred to as ‘He’, but they need not be male. Still, it was unusual. This Chief was a woman, a beautiful one at that, and from the anger that flashed in her eyes as she stared at Swift, there was some history there that the man had neglected to inform me. Great, I thought, just what I needed.

  “I see they kept you busy at the Tyngvall, Swift.” The Chief had a voice that exuded power and control. She was only a few inches taller than me, but it took all my Hunter strength not to feel intimidated.

  “There is much we must discuss.” All of a sudden Swift sounded formal, almost pompous. His whole body was tense.

  “But not in this company.” I wasn’t imagining the dislike in the Chief’s tone. I swallowed. Why had Swift brought me here?

  “He followed me from the city,” Swift said as if reading my mind. “But I believe he has potential.” The Seekers had crowded around us and many were whispering to each other and shaking their heads. I hid my claws behind my back to stop them twitching.

  “He is to petition to become a Seeker?”

  The murmuring grew louder and I thought I even heard a few laughs. I drew in a great breath and urged my body to stay calm. It wouldn’t help to lose my temper in front of the clan.

  “Yes,” I said loudly, “I am.”

  The Chief looked at me, her face emotionless. “Very well then. We will hold a Meet.”

  “What will I have to do?”

  “I can’t tell you that,” Swift said, refusing to meet my eyes.

  “Great,” I muttered. “Just great.” I stood next to the old Seeker and watched the wind drag the snow over the ground. I wished I knew what I was being let in for. A test of strength? Or was that something the Hunters would do, not the Seekers? I tried to surreptitiously stretch out my muscles anyway. I hated not being prepared.

  The Chief had brought us to an empty stretch of White just below the Peak. Or at least, it would have been empty without the Seekers. There must have been a couple of hundred of them, men women and children, all sitting quietly on the snow. Each one’s eyes never left my face. It was unnerving.

  Swift led me to the front and even the sound of the wind couldn’t block out the whispers of the crowd. I wondered what they were saying about me, but perhaps it was better not to know. I felt a little giddy and light-headed. The last time I had stood before this many people I had lost my brother and sister. This time at least I had nothing left to lose.

  “You are here to learn the ways of the Seekers.” The Chief said, her voice raised so that it echoed over the ice. “Consider today the first day of your training. If you pass it, you may be permitted to learn the rest.”

  Stood in front of the Seeker’s Peak, surrounded by Seekers who looked at me with suspicion, I had never felt so alone.

  “Look up,” said the Chief.

  I heard a noise from above and craned my neck upwards to see a swift shadow pass by. It was an eagle. Not many birds survive on the White, but the ones that do are big, fast and fierce. Their wingspan is larger than even a Builder’s arms and their beaks are long and sharp. The eagle gave a shrill cry as it swooped above me. I planted my legs firmly apart on the ice and drew in a deep breath into my lungs.

  When I went hunting sometimes I would catch a rare glimpse of an eagle, soaring on an updraft in the distance or swooping down on some distant prey. I had never seen one up close. Eagles and Hunters avoided one another, from respect but not fear: we recognised our kinship out on the ice.

  I had heard that Seekers kept eagles as companions, and some of the darker rumours suggested that the birds were magical Seekers who had developed the ability to change their shape. This I knew was nonsense, but it seemed there was a shard of truth in it.

  The chief gave a high whistle and the bird banked round in a circle and came to land on the snow just in front of her. It seemed awkward on the ground compa
red to its graceful flight and its head whipped round nervously.

  “His name is Torr.” The chief said, and there was a fondness in her voice. I wondered what it would take to tame such a predator. For the first time I saw something attractive about Seeker life. To have a wild creature like that in your thrall, now that was interesting.

  At that moment the Chief walked past the bird and stopped in front of me. She held out her hand. For a moment I thought she wanted me to shake it, like some strange formal ceremony but then she spoke.

  “You must lose something to seek something.” I shook my head confused. The chief sighed. “Your knife.”

  She pointed towards my chest and my heart began to thud faster. My fingers suddenly clumsy I slowly untied my father’s knife from its strap and handed it over to her.

  “The eagle will fly for ten miles. You will follow his flight. Then the bird will drop the knife and you must go out onto the White and find it before it is eaten by the snow. This challenge will determine Seeker sight, Seeker speed and Seeker stamina.”

  I could feel the rage filling my body as she tied my knife to the bird’s leg. She had stolen that which was most precious to me, the final link to my parents and my lost brother and sister. The Chief knew I had no chance of getting it back. But I had no time for anger. The Chief whispered something to the bird and it suddenly rose to the air with its wings pulsing with loud claps. In seconds it was high above us.

  My anger gave way to despair as I watched it fly away. I didn’t have a Seeker’s speed – I would never catch it. Hunters could run in short bursts to catch fleeing prey, but we didn’t have the combined speed and stamina needed for such a task. And I didn’t have a Seeker’s eyes to follow the bird even if I could have kept up. I was a Hunter, not a Seeker.

  But perhaps that was my advantage. Suddenly I realised what I had to do. I couldn’t beat them as a Seeker. I was too slow, too big, too blind. But I could win as a Hunter.

  Instead of running I stood still and calmly reached into my pack. Thank god I had thought to bring it. I felt around the bottom and brought out my hand tightly closed. There were some murmurs from the crowd as I did not set off after the bird. They became louder as I reached for my pack.

  Steady I thought. I closed my eyes for a moment and my whole body stilled. I let go of my anger, my frustration, my embarrassment. All these emotions made the Hunter weak. I let my heart rate slow until it almost stopped. Then I let out a breath and opened my eyes.

  I threw the flint. As soon as I released it from my claws I knew that my aim was true. I let out a whoop of pure joy as the stone skimmed through the air. This was what I was born for. The eagle never saw it coming. The great bird fell from the sky like a stone and would have hit the snow had I not already ran to catch it. As soon as it hit my chest I ripped the knife from its leg and held it aloft with a cry of success.

  A few others cheered from the crowd. But most were silent. I had not played their game, and they weren’t happy.

  As I walked back to the clan I prayed that I had done no permanent damage to the bird. I had been careful not to let the stone hit any of the flight feathers, and the ruffled ones on its chest should grow back. The eagle cawed angrily and pecked fiercely at my fur until it drew small streams of blood. It was certainly as fierce as before; only its pride was hurt.

  Swift took the bird from me and handed it to the Chief. I held on to the knife so tight that I could feel its hilt mark my palm.

  I looked at the chief who cradled the injured bird in her arms. She looked back at me, her eyes steady but her expression gave no clue to what she was thinking. I couldn’t tell if I had just made a friend or an enemy.

  “Very well,” she said finally, and her voice was tired and flat. “There is one last thing you must do.”

  “What?”

  “You must stand before us and give up all claim to your old clan.”

  “But...”

  “Have they not already given up on you?”

  I looked over at Swift. The old Seeker had neglected to mention this part. What about my brother and sister? And the memory of my parents? How could I just give that up? I couldn’t. But I could lie.

  “Well... Alright, I give up my clan. I am no longer a Hunter. I am a Seeker.” It’s not true, I whispered to the kids in my mind, but it still felt like a terrible betrayal.

  Chapter 7: Lisanne

  The day after our fight Angel Sam didn’t show up for work. I kept glancing over at his desk, the empty space where I used to watch the tight curls on his head bow over his screen. No one mentioned him, and I was too scared to ask. If I showed that I cared, then everyone would know how I felt.

  I couldn’t let myself think about what he said about the supplies. He had to be wrong. He just had to be. I thought of my mother, whose only happiness was in her position as Historian. How would she feel if she learned that all her work was for nothing, that the city was dying?

  I bundled up my fear along with the pain of rejection and pushed it to the back of my mind. The first day I was glad he hadn’t turned up, every time I thought of our conversation together my face felt hot with anger. But as the days went on, I couldn’t help turning our last conversation over and over in my mind. And the more I thought about it, the more I felt that maybe it wasn’t just his fault. I was right of course: he shouldn’t have been talking like he did about the city. It was simple self-preservation – you had to follow the rules to survive in our world. But I wished I hadn’t lost my temper.

  By the Friday I woke up with an anxious emptiness in my stomach. I could barely eat, just pushed the food around the meal box until I could put it down the waste chute when my parents weren’t looking. Every time I closed my eyes I could see Sam’s face when I called him a low grader. When he didn’t turn up at work again, I could feel a pain in my chest. I needed to see him, to apologise, but I was trapped. If I went to his apartment, then the world would know that we were more than work colleagues. My parents might even hear... no, it was unthinkable.

  But, somehow, that evening I found myself standing outside a door in an unfamiliar corridor, my hand about to knock. I hoped that no one I knew had seen me as I hurried along the tunnel to the west quadrant where most of the seventies lived. There was no rule about living with others of your grade of course, in theory we all lived in equal status. In practice people kept to their own kind.

  I knocked softly at first, then with more confidence. Now that I had made the decision to come I knew I had done the right thing. I needed to apologise, for Sam but more for myself. When no one answered I felt nothing but frustration. I rapped on the door until my knuckles hurt, but there was no point. Sam had gone.

  I suddenly felt terribly exposed. I turned for home, only barely managing to stop myself from breaking into a sprint. But I was lucky – the corridors were unusually quiet, and I managed to get home without meeting a single person.

  My mother was waiting at the door to our apartment. As soon as I got there she pulled me in and slammed the door behind me. She leant back against the door as if she thought I would try to escape. And escape from what? I didn’t understand what was going on, but I didn’t like the wild look in her eyes.

  “Where have you been?” she hissed.

  Oh god, I thought, how could they know already?

  “At work. Why?” I tried to keep my voice casual, but my whole body was tensed.

  “Angel Sam. He Walked.”

  I felt like I was floating above her. She was wrong, she had to be. I shook my head to dislodge the image of Sam walking out into the White. He wouldn’t do that, he couldn’t. It simply wasn’t possible. Sam could not be a Walker.

  “Not Sam, not my Sam...” I didn’t realise that I had spoken aloud until I heard the high wail that emerged from between my mother’s lips. I turned to her just as she flew at me, her hands like claws that reached for my face.

  “You little traitor, hanging out with that, that subhuman –”

  She slapped me.
Once, hard, across my right cheek. In another second my father was between us, hissing words at my mother that I could barely hear from the blood pulsing in my ears. I stood back, and placed my palms behind me on the cool kitchen counter. I could feel the smoothness of the plastic under my clammy hands.

  “Enough,” he said quietly to my mother. She opened her mouth to speak but then closed it tight. She walked out of the kitchen and a few seconds later I heard the front door slam shut. She had not looked back.

  My father grabbed my arm. His face was pale with a greasy film of sweat across it. I shrank back.

  “Were you involved with him?”

  I shook my head, afraid to speak. I had never seen him so angry. Or so afraid.

  “No, not exactly,” How could I explain to him what Sam had meant to me? “We were friends, that’s all.”

  “That’s all? That’s more than enough.” At least he had stopped shaking. He sat down heavily on one of the kitchen chairs, and I did the same. I didn’t think my legs could have held up any longer anyway.

  “Mum...” I stopped, unsure how to go on.

  “Your mother is just worried about you. I’ll talk to her.” But it hadn’t been worry I had seen in my mother’s eyes. There had been fear there yes. But there had also been hatred, and disgust. And try as I might I knew I would never forget that look. I slipped out of the kitchen before my father could say another word and shut myself in my room.

  As I sat on the bed and stared at my pale face in the mirror, I realised that I had two options. I could fall apart, lie on my bed and cry until there were no tears left, or I could do something about it. The first plan was attractive. But as I lay back on my bed and stared up at the blank white ceiling, no tears came.