Astra

by Naomi Foyle

  Beyond Hokma’s elbow, just metres away, an unmistakable slim figure was tearing between the trees.

  * * *

  Astra launched into a run. Ahead of her, the girl’s lithe brown body twisted through the woods. She was clearly visible, all of her: thick hair flowing, elbows pumping, heels flashing. Astra tore off her glove and fumbled at her hydropac for Tabby. At last the pocket was open; gripping Tabby she activated his camera and, aiming as she ran, clicked again and again. She had got her this time. The girl was heading straight towards the fence where she would be trapped and Astra could wrestle her to the ground.

  But no – amazingly, the girl ran up a leaning tree trunk and flung herself over the fence and down to the rocky earth below.

  She’d need both hands to follow. Astra tried to stuff Tabby back into his pocket, but he slipped from her hand and she had to fumble to catch him before he hit the ground. She fell to her knees, clutching him safe, as Hokma crashed through the trees behind her shouting, ‘Astra! Stop this minute!’ She could only watch as the Non-Lander scrambled over a small rise in the land and disappeared into the woods.

  But she had still got her. She had. Her heart racing, Astra checked Tabby’s screen. Yes, yes, yes: there were six, seven, eight photos of the girl. She sprang to her feet. Her knees were stinging and her blood was coursing like boiling water through her veins but she had crossed the finish line at last. Her face was glowing like the summer sun, crowds were cheering in her ears and green and red and yellow ribbons were streaming in the air.

  ‘What in Gaia’s Name are you doing?’ Hokma was behind her, hoarse and panting, grabbing her wrist, wresting Tabby out of her hand.

  ‘It was the girl! The Non-Lander! I took pictures of her – look!’

  But Hokma didn’t smile as she scanned the photos. A thundercloud bloomed in her face, threatening to break over Astra, swamping her triumph. Holding Tabby high above Astra’s head, she deleted the photographs one by one.

  ‘Are you sure—? Are you sh—? Ar—? Ar—? Ar—?’ Tabby bleated.

  ‘No – don’t. Hokma, don’t,’ Astra shouted, leaping for Tabby, but not even grasping Hokma’s arm.

  ‘Stop screaming. Now, or you don’t get Tabby back and you don’t get to feed Silver ever again.’

  She’d won – running and Tabby-snapping like a constable and top scientist cross-Coded together, she’d done it: she’d proved the girl existed. And the very next moment, Hokma had snatched the trophy away. Astra’s ribs hurt. She sat down and punched her fist into the ground. ‘Why did you do it, Hokma?’ she wept. ‘Why?’

  Hokma put Tabby in the back pocket of her hydrobelt and knelt down beside her. ‘Astra, listen to me. There is no girl living in the woods.’

  ‘But there is … YOU JUST SAW HER,’ Astra screamed, and kept screaming, as loud as her burning throat and lungs would let her, until the high, searing scream ripped through the woods, and Wise House, and the whole world—

  Until, with a lightning-crack smack, her cheek flamed into fire and her breath was snatched out of her body.

  Hokma had slapped her. Hokma had slapped her. And now she was grabbing Astra’s shoulders and shaking her, trying to make her look her in the eye.

  ‘No. There isn’t. There’s an Is-Land girl who lives nearby and plays in the woods. If you tell anyone she’s a Non-Lander living in the wild, IMBOD will come and ask me lots of questions about her – and about you. We don’t want IMBOD to notice you now. You have to promise me you’ll never mention her to anyone again. Do you understand?’

  Astra was sobbing and hiccoughing. Her face was wet and hot, but inside she felt as black and empty as a rain barrel in high summer. Hokma tried to hug her, but Astra pushed her away.

  ‘I hate you. I don’t want to keep everything a secret! I don’t want to do everything you say!’

  She struggled to her feet to get away, but Hokma was everywhere. She lunged forward, hitting out at Hokma’s chest and face, scratching at her breasts, pulling at fistfuls of her hair. For a minute they wrestled and her nose was full of the fug of Hokma’s sweat, her teeth were burrowing into Hokma’s shoulder and her ears were buzzing with her own blood. Then Hokma was bending over her, her strong arm pinning Astra’s right elbow to her waist. Her left shoulder socket hurt. Her arm was crushed against Hokma’s neck and there was something soft in her hand. Somehow, Hokma was grabbing her wrist again.

  ‘Let go, Astra. You’ve got my eyepatch. Let go.’

  She did. She was squeezing Hokma’s green and silver patch in the palm of her hand and the elastic strap was around Hokma’s neck, forcing her head down. Astra let go and Hokma released her. Astra looked up into her face.

  The skin around Hokma’s right eye socket was pink and shiny and ridged. It had also shrunk somehow, so that it tugged down her lower eyelid and the upper lid drooped over a white glistening recess where her eyeball had once been. Astra gasped and stepped back.

  Hokma straightened up. ‘Does it look scary?’ she asked. Her voice was high and tight and breathless and struck an unfamiliar note at the end. She was trying to sound calm, but she didn’t. She sounded as if she was trying not to cry.

  ‘A bit,’ Astra mumbled. The distorted socket just looked strange and unexpected, but the whiteness inside had been frightening. Something that you should be looking into and should be looking back at you was blank and moist and hidden instead, so you couldn’t tell what Hokma was feeling or thinking. That was the most frightening bit. The socket didn’t seem like part of Hokma at all.

  ‘You were very close up, weren’t you? Why don’t you look again now you can see my whole face.’

  Hokma’s voice was steadier now. Astra lifted her head.

  Hokma pushed her hair behind her ears, and smiled. ‘It’s not so bad really, is it? I was going to show you sometime anyway.’

  From this distance, the empty socket didn’t look so much like a deep-sea monster squatting on Hokma’s face. She could see how the lids and lashes, though distorted, resembled the ones she knew so well. It looked more now like a bit of Hokma’s face was melting in the sun. Astra flushed. She’d been a coward, shrinking away and acting like Hokma was ugly. A constable wouldn’t ever do that if her buddy got injured, not even if her buddy’s whole face was blistered and charred with third-degree burns. She had to say something nice to make Hokma feel better.

  ‘I think it looks like an ice cream,’ she declared. ‘Strawberry and vanilla.’

  Hokma laughed, a big belly laugh. ‘Well, I’ve never thought of it like that before! I suppose we’d better not tell Peat, had we?’ And then Astra was laughing too and Hokma was hugging her again and she was hugging Hokma too.

  They separated and Hokma tried to put the eyepatch back on, but the elastic had stretched too much. ‘I’ll have to sew it up in the house,’ she said, leaving it dangling round her neck. Astra brushed the grass and needles off her legs. Then she rubbed her wrist, which still hurt. Her cheek stung too. Hokma gently stroked her face and picked a leaf out of her hair.

  ‘I’m sorry I slapped you, Astra,’ she said, ‘but you were out of control. When you do your IMBOD Service you’ll learn that when someone gets into a state like that, you have to slap them to snap them out of it. It’s called hysteria.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really. On Boundary patrol you might save someone’s life with a slap one day.’

  ‘Oh.’ Astra wondered if in the meantime she might be able to slap Meem when she had one of her tantrums. No, probably Nimma wouldn’t understand.

  ‘I know it’s hard right now,’ Hokma went on. ‘Everything’s changing, but we’ll work it out together, okay?’

  Astra was silent. A minute ago she’d been hitting Hokma and before that she’d been screaming until her lungs were about to burst. She couldn’t tell anyone what had happened and she didn’t know what was going to happen next. It didn’t feel like everything was going to be okay at all.

  ‘But what if we can’t?’ She rubbed her elb
ow and stared down at her sneakers. ‘What if I say something wrong and IMBOD comes to get you?’

  ‘Astra.’ Hokma’s crisp tone cut through the peaty forest air. ‘I have the Security shot in the fridge. If you want to take it, any time, I’ll give it to you. I just ask that you think about it first. For a week. You need to consider everything you will be giving up. Okay?’

  Astra stared up at Hokma. ‘If you give me my shot, can I still train Silver?’

  ‘I told you before,’ Hokma said quietly, ‘you need to be very empathic to work with Owleons. I’ll still let you feed him, but you might not be able to create a bond with him. You might be too rough with him, or not reward him enough. Then even if he flies for you, he’ll give you bites and scratches.’

  Astra’s shoulders drooped. ‘But I want Silver to love me,’ she said. ‘Like Helium loves you.’

  ‘I know you do.’ Hokma put her arm around her. ‘It won’t be easy keeping our secret, but if you trust me, I can teach you to be the best scientist and Owleon trainer in all of Is-Land.’

  Her mouth was trembling and she couldn’t reply.

  ‘Astra, do you trust me?’

  She looked deep into Hokma’s warm hazel-gold eye with its lattice-work of creases, and her wild, strange eye socket that gleamed like an ice-cream moon. She nodded, once, like Hokma always did.

  ‘I love you, Astra. I never want anything bad to happen to you.’ Hokma pulled Astra close and Astra leaned against her, feeling the grit from the forest and the warmth of Hokma’s skin.

  ‘I love you too, Hokma. I’m sorry I said I hated you.’

  ‘That’s okay. I’m sure you did at that moment.’

  Astra’s arms were around Hokma’s bum. She could feel Tabby sticking out of Hokma’s belt.

  ‘Can I have Tabby back now?’ she asked.

  But Hokma reached behind her back and gently removed Astra’s hand from her belt. ‘No. Silver needs all your attention at Wise House. And we have to be very careful about Tabby. He’s only to help you with school-work, and he mustn’t see or overhear anything I teach you. That’s why I didn’t want you taking photos of the bomb crater, or Dr Blesserson’s garden. From now on I’ll keep Tabby safe while you’re here. Okay?’

  Astra didn’t want to say okay. Her hand felt empty without Tabby in it. As if Hokma guessed, she looked around in the grass and picked up the falconer’s glove Astra had hurled aside as she ran. She held it out to Astra.

  ‘Do you want to hold Helium before we go back in and feed the chicks?’

  Astra looked at the glove, then up at Hokma: at Hokma’s real face that she didn’t show anyone else. She nodded, took the glove and put it on. Then Hokma held out her ungloved hand and Astra let herself be walked back through the woods to the aviary.

  She didn’t glance back once over her shoulder, not even once.

  Part Two

  Summer 82 RE

  2.1

  ‘So.’ Klor waggled his famous eyebrows. Their grey tufts were singed turquoise and gold from the light of the Fountain and his face, like everyone’s, was gleaming with mist and sweat. ‘Who’s ready for a story?’

  A faint wind was hushing through the clearing’s curve of pine trees, and over Klor’s bony shoulders long shadows danced up the windowless mud walls of Birth House. Astra ought, she knew, to be gazing with rapt attention at her Shelter father, but from her place in the circle she stole a glance at the turf-roofed cave. It was hard to believe that just two months ago, Birth House had welcomed Elpis back to Gaia. Then the Fountain lights had been crimson and scarlet, flickering flame-tongues licking the tears from people’s faces. Now the water sprays were as bright as tropical feathers and everyone was smiling, but the entrance to the dark womb-chamber was as black as before, and the round cedar door was gaping open so Elpis could hear the story too. An invisible path ran from the doorway down to a gap in the Fountain circle: this was the Ancestors’ Place, gate-posted by Klor on one side and on the other, her bottom firmly planted on the Teller’s Trunk, Nimma.

  Long ago, when Astra was very little, Elpis herself had sat on the Teller’s Trunk, and in her wavery voice had told Kali’s famous story, which was her story too. Astra had listened to all of it, even though it was the longest story she’d ever heard. But she’d been so young then, she could hardly remember it; possibly she had fallen asleep towards the end. Last year at the spring story night, when Modem had told the story of the founding of Or, Elpis had sat beside Nimma. Elpis had listened to everything: you could tell by the way she tilted her head during the exciting, scary parts and opened her eyes wide for the happy parts. Nimma had dabbed the drool from her mouth with hankies and Meem had fed her apple juice through a straw. But now Elpis was buried in the deepest chamber of Birth House and Kali’s story had become homeless. It didn’t belong to anyone’s voice any more but floated around in Or memory like a distant murmuration of starlings, its shifting contours fading and dispersing into a bruise-blue sky. Sometimes that happened to stories, Klor said, and only stray feathers of them remained to stick into a new Teller’s cap.

  But Kali’s story was one of the most important stories there was; that was why they were hearing it again tonight. And, even though Nimma wasn’t a real Teller, she was Elpis’ Birth-Code-Shelter daughter so her place tonight was on the Teller’s Trunk.

  We are. We are. We are. Around her, the Security Generation shouted and bounced, waggling their hands in the air. Astra shifted uncomfortably. Even with the Fountain, it was a hot night. The Sec Gen section was three or four deep in places and she was squashed between Hokma’s hipbelt and a squirmy seven-year-old called Sprig. Behind her another seven-year-old, Tulsi, was sitting in her Shelter father’s lap and butting her feet into Astra’s back – kicking, actually. She reached behind and firmly pushed Tulsi’s sandals away.

  ‘Waaaah,’ Tulsi protested. She and Sprig had only just had their Security shots, so they weren’t placid yet.

  ‘Shhh.’ Her father bundled the girl closer to him.

  Hokma turned her head and frowned. ‘Astra,’ she warned.

  ‘Sor-ree.’ Astra stuck the tip of her dreadlock in her mouth and sucked. Nimma hated her doing that, but Nimma wasn’t looking.

  ‘Don’t do that either.’ Hokma reached up and tugged the dread back into place behind Astra’s ear. Frigging Gaia. Hokma was pushing it tonight. Astra scowled but kept quiet. She was already getting away with selfish behaviour, she knew, plonking herself down near the cool Fountain mist when the older Sec Gens should be sitting behind the little ones. She was on the edge of the group, though, like always, and for once Hokma hadn’t argued with her. She probably thought Astra wanted a good view of Nimma. Up beside Klor, Peat and Yoki were also close to the front, while Meem was in the back row between her Birth-Code mother’s legs – even though you weren’t supposed to stand up during a Telling, Astra knew Honey would let Meem do so if she wanted a better look. Honey spoiled Meem, Nimma said, and for once Astra agreed with her.

  Me. I am. Hear hear. Hear Her. From around the Circle adults and non-Sec Gen Or-kids chipped in with shouts and cheers. People’s faces swam like glinting fish in the supernatural Fountain light. Behind them, the pine trees bristled up into the night like a forest palisade.

  ‘Good. Very good. Now, remember … Oh … Wait a minute.’ Klor pulled a perplexed face and scratched his head. ‘What must we all remember?’ Nimma, looking watery in a silver faux-grass hipskirt and a mother-of-pearl necklace, put her hand to her ear and looked expectantly round the Circle.

  Astra winced. Her Shelter mother was tonight’s frigging Teller. Why did she have to act like an overdressed kindergarten teacher? She’d be wagging her finger and telling people off next. And sure enough, when her gaze settled on Torrent and Stream – the two older teens every Or-parent had been talking about for weeks – Nimma lifted a warning eyebrow. Astra pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her shins. As the eldest Shelter daughter of this control-freak Teller she suddenly
felt horribly exposed.

  Stream’s slender brown arms were entwined around Torrent’s pale torso. Seeing Nimma’s disapproval, the girl straightened up and as if asserting her independence, she shook her glossy chestnut mane; at the same time she tucked her right hand firmly behind Torrent’s knee. She was all over him like an army of red ants these days. Astra didn’t know why he put up with it. It must be awfully hot – and besides, didn’t he care about Congruence any more? His ex-Gaia play pal was sitting with her friends just a few metres away, staring quietly into the Fountain opposite the Ancestors’ Place.

  Watching her now, it was hard to believe that Congruence, as was whispered, had cried all day and all night after Torrent and Stream made their Gaia bond public, kissing in the back seat of the bus all the way home from school. She had done so in private, behind her Shelter family’s own doors; in public she maintained a fragile silence.

  ‘She’s too mature for Torrent,’ Astra had heard Nimma tell Luna, one of Congruence’s Shelter mothers. ‘Imagine forming an exclusive bond at his age.’

  ‘Praise Gaia we won’t have these problems with this lot,’ Luna had sighed, patting Astra’s head. She had meant the Sec Gens, which was worrying. Astra was almost afraid to ask Hokma if she might end up like Congruence one day. Traumatised, Nimma had said in her most ominous tone.

  Astra hugged her knees tighter. Thinking too hard about the older teens and their non-Sec Gen world made her feel queasy inside.

  ‘Don’t look at the Kezcams!’ All around the Circle, a chorus of voices harmonised like a morning chant-hymn before pealing into laughter. Beside Astra, the Sec Gens clapped and wriggled. Astra, as usual, was the only person not positively frothing with delight. Maybe she should have sat at the back, where she wouldn’t have to wrench her face into a different expression to match each new line in the story. Because the story was going to be dull, that was guaranteed. Nimma wasn’t a proper Teller, for Gaia’s sake. She’d been fretting about tonight for weeks, spending hours in her room practising, and not listening properly when people asked her questions. You’d think, considering how self-absorbed she’d been, she could have just ignored Astra: but no, she’d been nagging her about absolutely everything until it was all Astra could do not to scream, ‘Leave me alone’.