‘Disappeared.’ She told him all about that terrible moment up on the rooftops under the Wolf Tide moon. ‘That was over two months ago. He’s not coming back.’
‘Wrong. Let me spell out the legal ramifications here: your liberating him was conditional upon his agreeing to the terms of your deal. He can’t rescind the deal without forfeiting his freedom.’
‘But he did.’
‘What, he chose to be enslaved again? Not a chance. He was lying.’
‘Butros, watch my lips: He. Can’t. Lie. To. Me. The deal specifically said—’
‘Bullshit. He’s been lying through his pointy little teeth from the word go. Tell me again exactly what you said when you made the deal.’
She thought long and hard. ‘I said, “if I ask you something, you must always tell me the truth”. Oh crap.’
Butros broke into sarcastic applause. ‘And there we have it. You left yourself wide open. He only has to tell you the truth when you ask him a direct question. The rest of the time he’s free to fib like a Candacian catamite.’
Her mind raced through the things Paran had told her. Lies, all of it! Or not. Just because he could lie to her didn’t mean he automatically had done.
‘Yes, but hang on,’ she said. ‘He rescinded the deal because I’d infected him. He said my crime wiped out the debt and he didn’t owe me… Oh. Right. That was a lie.’
Butros patted her hand. ‘Go home and write a hundred times All Fays are lying filth and not to be trusted. You haven’t seen the last of your Mister Paran, believe me.’ He got to his feet. ‘Before I leave, is there any way in which I, your humble unpaid counsel, can serve you?’
‘Yeah. Make them let me go. I want to go home, Butros.’
‘Consider it done.’ To her amazement he took out a psych-tab and made a note.
‘My God—you’ve got one too!’
‘Catch up, please. Everyone’s got one.’ He tucked it back in his pocket. ‘Everyone important, that is.’
He was as good as his word. A couple of days later she was finally heading back along the river bank towards the Gullgate. Loxi had been sent along too. He was carrying enough food to last Anabara about a year. Or as Aunt Malla put it, ‘A few bits and bobs to tide you over.’
A fine bright late autumn morning. Gulls wheeled and screamed in the blue round the Minstery towers. She could hear the wind flutes singing. It was high tide. Part of the flood plain was still submerged. Everywhere she could see signs of the wreckage left behind by the Wolf Tide. Broken branches, silt-covered rocks, an abandoned fishnet tangled in a tree top. But Larridy shimmered up from the water like a holy vision.
‘I’m going to be fine, Loxi. You don’t have to come with me.’
‘Yeah, I do. Or auntie will skin me. Told her I’d see you safely in the door, eh.’
They walked on a bit in silence. Loxi kicked a skull stone that lay on the river path. The wind hissed in the blond rushes. She thought of Dal Ramek. Still confined to the Precincts under the protection of St Pelago. Remember you are mine! whispered the breeze. Tscha!
‘Still want to work for me, you?’ she asked Loxi. ‘Fetch a few more library books?’
‘If you need me.’
‘Might be kind of tricky, though, eh.’ She nailed him with the Gullmother ball-shrivelling glare. ‘With you being banned from the university and everything.’
He blushed. ‘Aw, Nan, man! You weren’t meant to hear about that. Anyway, it’s all sorted, eh. I’m allowed up there again.’
‘All right. But no more ear-biting, you.’
He bared his teeth at her. ‘Psycho Gull warrior. Scary, eh?’
Certainly was! Paran would be proud. She hoped to God Loxi hadn’t eaten the ears he’d chomped. Better not to ask. Instead she said, ‘Are they real diamonds?’
‘Tscha!—like I could afford that!’
But he was blushing again. Woo, wealthy lover? Then her mouth dropped open. No! Not Butros?!
Better not ask that either.
They passed through the Gullgate. The air was full of the smell of starch and blueing. Sheets and bolster cases billowed on the lines. Her heart fluttered like a baby gull. Home. What was waiting for her in her little house?
‘It’s going to be weird without Paran, eh,’ she said.
‘Mmm. Who’s going to do the security stuff?’
‘No idea. Butros says he’ll be back, because the deal’s still valid. But God knows when. We’ve still got that bloody mimic charm to sort.’
‘Nah, he did that, him,’ said Loxi. ‘Fixed it so it shouts “thief!” when you try and nick a book.’
She laughed. ‘Seriously?’
‘It yells your name, and what books you’re trying to take. And if you don’t hand them back in, it starts shouting out what you did last night. Woo! Sharp decline in unauthorised loans, you better believe it. Here we are.’
The familiar blue door. Paint still flaking. Must get on to that. She hesitated a moment. ‘Well, here goes.’
Home. Everything was exactly the same. Hearthrug, table, chipped blue and white crockery on the dresser. The main mast pillar. But it looked strange, like she was watching someone else’s dream. There was a vase of flowers on the table. Purple harvest daisies. And she could smell beeswax polish.
‘Someone’s been in,’ she said.
‘Eno and me. Tidied the place up, eh. Your granny sent us.’
She punched his arm. ‘Hey, thanks.’
‘Oh, and your brother sent your mum’s locket.’ Loxi handed her a small velvet pouch.
The amulet. Ba-boom! went her heart. ‘Tell him thanks.’
She fastened it round her neck. Felt again the cold of the stone against her breastbone. Instantly, a memory reared up: the fifth slave! She’d managed to banish him from her mind. Been telling herself he’d be long gone. Off to the Mainland to join the nomadic Fairy tribes. Come on, he’d have found her by now if he was going to. Surely. She hadn’t got round to mentioning him to anyone. God, maybe she should tell Butros after all? Except he’d go mental. A survivor who could contradict the scholasticus’s testimony? That would totally screw up his case.
Loxi was busy unpacking Aunt Malla’s supplies. Anabara wandered up the stairs. The eighth step creaked, just like it always did. She opened her bedroom door. Another little vase of daisies on the window sill. The bed was made up with freshly laundered sheets, pillows plumped. Grandmama’s linen. She could smell the lavender.
Her heart began to pound again. Do it. Check the spare room. She crossed the little landing and opened the other door. Empty. Of course it was empty. Bed stripped. Quilt neatly folded. Not a single sign that she’d ever had a Fairy guest. With a sigh she turned and went back down the stairs.
‘All done,’ said Loxi. ‘Want me to stay for a bit?’
‘I’ll be fine.’ A sob caught in her throat. She disguised it with a cough. ‘Don’t worry, you. Life goes on, eh. Got to pick up the pieces. Make some more money. I’m totally broke again.’
‘Not going after the library for compensation, then?’
‘Nah. There’s too much grief going round the Precincts as it is. I’m not going to add to it.’ She gave him a hug. ‘Hey, thanks for everything, you. Love you lots.’
‘Love you too, babe. I’ll be back tomorrow, eh. Sort those account books out for you. Stay safe.’
The door closed. She was alone.
Right! No moping. On with life. Do the next thing. The next thing, obviously, was a bowl of hot chocolate and a honeycake. She set the milk to heat. As she waited, her eye roamed once more round the room. She doubted it had ever been so tidy.
Tscha! A perfectly decent sheet of blotting paper in the bin, though. Enobar. Fine for him to use a pristine sheet of Dame Bharossa’s paper for every new message he wrote. She plucked it out and looked at the backwards scrawl. What had she last written all those months ago, back in her old life? Out of curiosity she crossed to the mirror over the fire and held it up. Looked like some kind of urg
ent warning: ‘[something something] he’s coming for you. He’s going to kill you!’ The rest was too faint to make out. Probably a message for Mooby about Golar. Well, it was all over now, whatever it was.
She shrugged and laid it back on her desk, then went to fetch down her favourite bowl from the dresser. But what was this? Money?
She weighed the leather purse in her hand, peeped inside. Gilders. Lots of twenty gilder pieces. She ground her teeth. Grandmama. Yes, she needed cash. But for God’s SAKE! Please give me at least the opportunity to be a responsible adult!
She dumped the gold out on the table and began to count it. Sixty, eighty, a hundred. I wish she wouldn’t keep doing this—hundred and forty, hundred and sixty—it’s so bloody patronizing—hundred and eighty, two hundred.
Two hundred gilders. Her hand went to the amulet. You will pay me no wages until I have paid back your two hundred gilders.
Paran. He’d been here! Her heart leapt. But then she realized what this meant. Trust me: I always repay in the end. She took a deep breath. Squared her shoulders. So that was it. The end. Butros was wrong: he wasn’t coming back.
As she stood with her hot chocolate, looking out across the street, she waited for the tide to wash over her, grief for Paran. But it didn’t come. She watched the old familiar world go by again. Signs creaked. The wind flutes sang. Washer-wenches flounced past. The big Minstery bell began to toll for Morning Prayers. Then one by one, all the little shrine bells joined in. She really ought to get herself up to the Precincts for prayers some time. Say thank you to old Pel. Or bawl him out for the mess he’d landed her in. Probably both those things.
Laundry snapped on a hundred lines. Far off the blacksmith’s hammer, clang-clang-clang. She tossed the last crust of her honeycake out on to the cobbles. A gull swooped down and snatched it.
So. No more tears. She shrugged. All back to normal.
But deep down something warned her there wasn’t going to be any such thing as normal from now on. This was not the end at all. It was another beginning.
THE END
About the Author
Catherine Fox is the author of three adult novels and a memoir about judo. She lives at the top of a hill under the shadow of a cathedral, looking out across a river, making things up. Wolf Tide is her first novel for teenagers.
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