Snowbone

by Cat Weatherill

  “That Skua!” said Snowbone. “I'd like to skewer him, on a sharp pole over a hot fire, double-dealing roach that he is.” For the umpteenth time, she bent down and examined the shackles. “But there's one thing I don't understand. If he was being paid, why didn't he wait till Blackeye and Figgis were back?”

  “Too risky,” said Tigermane. “Can you imagine the fight with all of us there? No, better to be paid for two than lose four.”

  “I can't believe I let them get us,” said Snowbone angrily.

  “Don't be so hard on yourself,” said Tigermane. “You didn't see it coming.”

  “But I did see it coming!” said Snowbone. “I knew it was dangerous to come here.”

  “Well, we all knew that,” said Tigermane. “We came anyway! But for it to happen so soon … None of us saw that. And once a net is over you, there's nothing you can do.”

  “I should have fought harder.”

  “If you'd done that, they would have hurt Filizar. Forget it. It's over.”

  Snowbone fell silent. They listened to the wheels rumbling along the road and the wind whipping the canvas cover.

  “Where do you think they're taking us?” she said at last.

  “I have no idea,” said Tigermane. “But I think we're about to find out.”

  The wagon was slowing. Then it stopped and lurched as the slave catchers jumped down. Next came voices—easily heard through the canvas—as a price was agreed on. Then a flap was opened and the girls saw the ruddy faces of their captors peering in.

  “Time to go,” said one. He took a key from his belt and unlocked a padlock, freeing the chain that passed through the shackles. “Out,” he growled.

  The girls emerged, blinking, into bright sunshine—and found themselves in the middle of nowhere. There was nothing to be seen in any direction. No trees, no bushes, no houses, nothing. Just the road they'd come in on. Snowbone felt her heart sinking. They couldn't escape from here. There was nowhere to escape to.

  With a grunt, one of the slave catchers dropped to his knees and removed the shackles. Then he joined his mate on the wagon, turned the mule in the dust and they started back for Farrago. The girls were left with a great barn of a man, as wide as he was tall, with a thick thatch of black hair.

  “My name is Dunamis,” he said. “Mister Dunamis to you. I am the master here. Come.”

  He started walking and the girls followed. Snowbone couldn't help staring at the master's enormous body. He was wearing nothing but boots, a vest and a huge pair of baggy shorts—definitely not enough to contain the mounds of lumpy, bumpy flesh that covered his bones. At first, Snowbone was hypnotized by his backside. The canvas shorts were straining and bulging as the blubber rearranged itself inside them. Then her eyes descended to his legs. The white flesh was rippling with each heavy step, like two pillars of porridge. Snow-bone felt her stomach churn. She wondered whether she could ever face breakfast again.

  Suddenly Dunamis veered left and the girls saw why: the ground ahead fell away into a vast quarry. The air was thick with dust and clamor: the tinking of pickaxes, the poom of explosives, the rattle of dislodged stones. The quarrysides were crawling with workers. They clambered over the stones like spiders, breaking off pieces here; hurling them down there; carrying loads on their backs in wicker baskets. Way down below, Snowbone could see several rows of wooden barracks. She assumed that was where the workers lived.

  Dunamis was still lumbering on, leading them down into the bowels of that terrible place. Snowbone looked at the workers as she passed. They were covered in dust, but she could tell they were Ashenpeake slaves—adults mostly, but plenty of youngsters too, struggling under massive loads. Snowbone was quivering with anger at the injustice of it all.

  “This will be stopped,” she muttered. “I will make sure of that.”

  Dunamis took the girls to a shed, where he gave them a pickax and a basket each. Then he pointed a fat finger at the quarryside and said, “There's a space there, see? You chip off the stone, fill your basket and bring it down here to the wagons. Empty it, go back up and start again. You understand?”

  The girls nodded.

  “I didn't hear you,” said Dunamis.

  He leaned in so close, the girls could smell what he'd had for dinner. Broccoli and beans.

  “Yes, Mister Dunamis,” they chorused.

  Dunamis grunted in satisfaction, and the girls turned and began the steep climb into slavery.

  The day seemed to go on forever. The girls were strong, with great reserves of stamina, but as the sun snailed across the sky, they felt a creeping tiredness in their limbs. They were panting, grunting, moving slowly, but still they toiled on. They had to. Dunamis and his overseers were watching.

  Snowbone realized they were in no great danger as long as they stayed where they were. Far away to their left, things were much scarier. Men were dislodging enormous boulders, which hurtled down the quarryside with terrifying force. Anything in their path was squished like a fly. Snowbone hoped the men didn't come any closer.

  But although the girls weren't in any danger, they were suffering. Snowbone studied her arms. They were pitted and chipped. Her fingertips were rough and splintery. Her joints were stiffening. She reckoned the heat and dust were drying her out.

  There was a young girl working to her right. She had a friendly face, so Snowbone decided to ask how long she had been at the quarry.

  “Five years?” said the girl, struggling to stand upright. “I don't really know. Time has no meaning here.”

  “What's your name?”

  The girl looked around to see where the overseer was.

  “We're not allowed to have names here,” she whispered. “But if I had one, I'd like it to be Daisy.”

  “So tell me, Daisy,” said Snowbone, relishing the naughtiness of the name on her tongue, “do you have family?”

  “No!” said the girl, smiling. “I'm a slave! I don't have family. That's for humans.”

  Snowbone couldn't believe what she was hearing. “How can you put up with this?” she said. “Don't you get angry?”

  “Sometimes,” said Daisy, “but what can we do? We just hang on and try to help each other.”

  Snowbone returned to her work with a passion, smashing her pick into the hard rock. Every stroke was a blow against slavery. Every cascade of stones was the crumbling of the system. Every new ache in her body was a sign to remind her that she was still alive. Still fighting.

  And one day she would win.

  Chapter 56

  anu slipped into the back alley, clutching his bags. He slid into a doorway. Waited. Listened to hear if anyone was following. Satisfied it was safe, he walked on. Paused briefly by a shabby black door. Turned the handle and stepped inside.

  “Food!” He grinned, holding the bags high. “All thanks to Filizar.”

  “What's one ring when I have so many?” said Filizar, wiggling his jeweled fingers in the air. “I'll probably lose them all by the time we're through, but I don't care.”

  “I'm just glad you've got something worth selling,” said Figgis. “We can't eat fresh air.”

  “You'd have a hard job finding any of that in this town,” said Manu. “It stinks out there! It's hot and muggy—and I've never seen so many people in my life. Every street, every building is packed.”

  “Except this one,” said Blackeye, glumly indicating the workshop they were in: the oil-stained walls, the cobwebs, the rusting machines, the empty sacks they were intending to sleep on.

  “We were lucky to find it,” said Figgis. “It'll do.”

  They began to eat. The food cheered them a little, but the general mood was still miserable. Damp and clinging, like a rain-soaked coat they couldn't throw off.

  “What are we going to do?” said Manu. “Farrago is like another world. When you're out there, in the thick of it, it's completely overpowering. I felt dizzy just looking up at the buildings. Where do we begin?”

  “I don't know,” said Figgis with a si
gh. “I can't remember ever feeling so helpless. Back home in the forest, I felt like this when the slavers came. But then Snowbone arrived.” He smiled at the memory. “She was small, but she was so fierce! So confident. She gave me hope. That's what it was: hope. And it shames me to admit it, being a grown man an' all, but I felt safe when she was around. Now …” He paused, wanting to choose the right words. “With Snowbone by my side, I felt anything was possible. Now I'm not so sure. I don't know where we go from here, and that scares me.”

  No one spoke. Figgis had spoken for all. The sounds of the metropolis filtered in through the cracked windows. The rattle and hum of the traffic. The banging and hammering of construction gangs. The hustle and bustle of people.

  Suddenly Blackeye sat up straight. Why hadn't he thought of it before? He turned to his friends, and his gaze was so bright, it was frightening. “I think I can find her,” he said. “Right now, without leaving this room.”

  He went over to the empty sacks and started to gather them. “It's something Butterbur taught me,” he said. “Late at night, when you were all in bed.” He piled the sacks into a reasonably comfortable heap and sat on top. “I'm going to go on a journey,” he explained. “My real body will stay here with you, but my shadow-body will fly away and, hopefully, find the girls. When I'm gone, you won't be able to talk to me. Don't touch me; I need to concentrate. Just watch over me, eh?”

  And with that, Blackeye lay down on the sacks, closed his eyes and said no more.

  Chapter 57

  lackeye breathed deeply, concentrating on each breath, feeling the air moving up his nose and out of his mouth. In, out. In, out. Soon he felt the familiar heaviness creeping into his limbs. In, out. In, out. He started to think about where he wanted to go. He pictured Snowbone: her gray eyes; her mischievous smile; her white hair, curling like wood shavings. Then the heaviness was slipping away. He was floating toward the workshop ceiling. Looking down, he could see his friends. They were crouching by the empty shell of his body, looking at each other in amazement. And Blackeye floated higher, out through the roof and up into the sky above Farrago.

  It was twilight: that magical, middle moment when the sun has gone home to supper but the moon is running late and simply won't come out till she's washed her face. And the sky, glad to be free of the pair of them, clothes himself in purple with a smattering of stars at his hem. And the people, wandering through a world that is neither gray nor black but somewhere in between, look twice at everything, because nothing is quite as it seems anymore, and they might, just might, be looking at a fairy or a unicorn.

  And Blackeye, flying low and invisible over the rooftops, thought he had never seen anything so beautiful as the night and this town, embracing like lovers. The lights on the ground outnumbered the stars in the sky. Gas lamps puttering on street corners. Oil lamps smoking in saloons. Lanterns swaying in the hands of night watchmen as they came on duty. Candles, comfort-lighting children to bed, to stories, to dreams.

  But Snowbone wasn't in the town. Blackeye knew it instinctively. He wheeled in the air and headed back to the harbor. Flew down over the great magpie's nest of rigging and ropes. Soared out into the bay. Swept along the beach. But she wasn't there either.

  Blackeye stopped flying and allowed himself to drift. Re-member what Butterbur said. Listen to your heart. Feel your way.

  Then he heard it. A whisper on the wind. A call. A sigh. A sleepless prayer.

  Find us.

  Blackeye grinned and started flying. Back over the town and beyond, into the wilderness. Here there were no lights to cheer him. No landmarks to guide him. But still he flew on, following the call, feeling it strengthen by the minute. He was hurtling through the night now, like a stone from a sling. Faster, faster, faster. Then he noticed a yellowy glow up ahead and, when he got close, he found it was a quarry, lit with work lights.

  There was no one around. Just a dog, sniffing for scraps by a bin. But Blackeye felt drawn toward one of the barracks. He dropped down, through the roof, through the ceiling, into darkness.

  He was in a room. A tiny, boxlike room with three beds, one of them empty. But in the other two: Snowbone and Tiger-mane.

  Blackeye floated over to Snowbone's bed and whispered her name. She didn't waken. “Snowbone,” he whispered again. “Snowbone.”

  She began to stir. Was there a draft? Had the skylight window fallen open? She turned in her bed and opened her eyes.

  “Blackeye?” She thought she was seeing a ghost. It looked like Blackeye, but he was transparent. She could see a nail on the wall behind him. “Have you come to rescue us?”

  “I can't,” said Blackeye. His voice was strangely distorted, as if he were talking through water. “I have no body.” He reached out toward Snowbone, patted her arm and his hand passed right through her. “I can't open locks or bolts.” He looked around the room. “I assume you're locked in?”

  Snowbone nodded. “This door's locked and so is the one at the end of the corridor. The window is barred. The walls are wood, but very thick.”

  “I'll come back with Manu,” said Blackeye. “Tomorrow night. Hang on till then.”

  He smiled and closed his eyes and was gone. Out of the barracks, out into the night, flying, flying back to Farrago. In time, the moon appeared from behind a cloud and he saw the road they would need. Then he saw the city again, a bright bead of light on the horizon. And Blackeye flew down over the jagged rooftops, down into the workshop, back into his body and opened his eyes.

  His friends were still there, exactly as he'd left them. Three big, worried faces staring down at him like moon daisies.

  “Well?” said Figgis.

  “No problem,” said Blackeye with a wink. “We rescue them tomorrow.”

  Chapter 58

  nowbone told Tigermane the good news as soon as she awoke.

  “I can cope with anything today,” said Tigermane as they trekked up the quarryside that morning. “Do you know what I mean?”

  “I do,” said Snowbone. “But keep it quiet, eh?”

  As they reached their workplace, Snowbone noticed the men with explosives had moved closer. Not dangerously close, but the noise would add to their discomfort. She shook her head despairingly and began.

  BOOM! The first explosion reverberated around them. A choking cloud of dust rose majestically into the air and an avalanche of stones rattled down the quarryside. The men waited for the dust to settle, then started work.

  First they searched for cracks in the stone face. Then they took long iron bars and prized them in. Finally, after some strenuous pushing and pulling, they dislodged the mighty boulders, which rolled down unstoppably to the wagons below.

  The men worked all morning, loosening stone after stone.

  Snowbone kept her eye on Tigermane. She didn't want her getting too close. This was dangerous. Out of control. The men were reckless. They never looked down. Someone was bound to get hurt. It was just a matter of time.

  It was late in the afternoon. Snowbone had been thinking. Now she stopped working and turned to Daisy, who was working alongside her again.

  “Do you know where slaves come from?” she said. “I don't mean originally—I mean here, in the Nova Land?”

  “No,” said Daisy. “I've never been away from the quarry. I have no idea.”

  “I know,” said a man behind her. “There's a slave market at Barrenta Bay. It's on the coast, north of Farrago. All the slave ships unload there.”

  Snowbone nodded her thanks. Barrenta Bay. She would remember that.

  She took a deep breath, stretched and looked around. To her left, a man was trying to free an immense piece of stone. He was pulling the bar savagely, angrily, shouting encouragement to himself. Eventually, with a great cry, he set the mighty stone loose.

  The boulder bounced down the quarryside like an enormous football. As it descended, it seemed to take on a life of its own. Every new bump sent it spinning: joyous, wild, free. And then, halfway down, it hit a sharp outcrop o
f rock. It spiraled crazily through the air and Snowbone, watching from above, saw instantly that it was going to crush one of the slaves below.

  Oh! It hit him before she could call out. A cloud of dust rose, obscuring her view. She began to run, bounding over the rocks like a rabbit, down to the fallen man. When she reached him, she found he hadn't been crushed. The boulder had caught him sideways and thrown him into the air. But he was in a shocking state. Snowbone was glad he was unconscious.

  But as Snowbone stood there, feeling sick to her stomach, an incredible thing happened. Two slaves picked up the broken body of the man and, as they carried him down the quarryside, the other slaves started cheering. Cheering! They were clapping, whistling, stamping their feet, laughing out loud, hugging each other, dancing in dust circles.

  Snowbone couldn't believe it. She grabbed the arm of a woman beside her. “What's going on?”

  “We're celebrating!” cried the woman. “He's escaped!”

  “What?”

  “He's free!” said the woman. “He isn't a slave anymore.”

  Suddenly Snowbone understood. “Where are they taking him?”

  “To The Forest,” said the woman. “The master's men will take him there on a wagon. He'll Move On in peace and live there for evermore. They say it's a beautiful place—a green valley covered with ashen trees. We all hope to go there someday.”

  Snowbone looked at the woman's face. It was so radiant with hope, Snowbone couldn't bear it. If there was such a place—and she strongly doubted there was—it wouldn't be there for long. Not now, when slavers had learned the value of ashen sap. That slave they were carrying had no real future. A couple of years, perhaps, before they cut him down.

  Snowbone stumbled back up the quarry, blinded by angry tears. “Tonight,” she said to herself. “Tonight we go. And we keep on going until Barrenta Bay is burned. Every timber of every wall—burned!”

  Chapter 59

  t was the darkest of nights. No moon. No stars. Manu smiled. Just what he wanted.