A Solitary Journey (50 page)

L
uca nervously shifted his feet. ‘I’m not sure I can do this,’ he said, looking over A Ahmud Ki’s shoulder at the two Peacekeepers lounging against the wall by the lantern and just out of earshot.

‘I thought you would do anything for the right money and a little sense of adventure?’

‘But this is breaking the law.’

‘You broke it last time when you flew us out of Port River, my friend.’

‘But they don’t know that,’ Luca argued, nodding towards the Peacekeepers. ‘I’ve always had a clean reputation.’

‘And that’s why you never really have any adventure,’ said A Ahmud Ki. ‘To have adventure you have to take risks. To have a great adventure you have to take great risks.’

‘How much are you willing to pay?’

A Ahmud Ki smiled. ‘Do this for me and I will pay you with more money than you can imagine.’

Luca’s expression became sceptical. ‘How do I know you’ll do this?’

A Ahmud Ki raised a questioning eyebrow, saying, ‘When have I not paid you? You got more than you
expected to receive after Port River. And I paid you well for taking me to Bretan’s Sword. Surely my word is solid?’

Luca shrugged and apologised. ‘It’s just that this is a very great risk. The Peacekeepers never rest until they bring justice. That’s their motto.’

‘With money you can buy a whole new life elsewhere in Western Andrak. Or Targa,’ A Ahmud Ki argued. ‘The Peacekeepers won’t follow you. It’s me they will be after.’

Luca glanced past A Ahmud Ki at the guards again. ‘How will you get rid of them?’

‘I won’t,’ A Ahmud Ki replied, ‘but you will after you’ve brought them drinks. Are there apothecaries in this city?’

Luca shook his head. ‘What is an apothecary?’ After A Ahmud Ki explained, Luca chuckled and said, ‘We call them druggers. I know the places. The boss gangs run them.’

‘Then find a drugger and buy what I tell you to buy,’ said A Ahmud Ki. ‘Listen carefully to my instructions and, my friend, your best-ever adventure will begin here and now—if you have the courage.’

A warm breeze came from the east and the moon was already down. With the horses hobbled and the campfire reduced to glowing orange embers, Peacekeeper Ramon was awake on watch while his companions snored and dreamed towards the impending dawn. He could hear the soft babble of the stream thirty paces from their campsite. The prisoner was due in Lightsword by the following afternoon, but they’d made good progress and he was certain they would make the city by noon. If he was lucky he might get to see his girlfriend in the afternoon.

Meg sat with her head down in the rear of the wagon, her legs chained to a bar and her wrists in the
restrainer. Memories of her reunion with Emma and the painful farewell, and the promises she’d made and her plans whirled through her mind, making sleep impossible. Back in the city she would escape the gaol again and now that she knew exactly where the farm was she would portal there and rescue Emma. After that she would head west, into the mountains and on to Western Andrak. Perhaps the Peacekeepers would even look for her in the neighbouring state, but it wouldn’t matter. With Emma, she would keep the Peacekeepers at bay while she plotted a way to search for Treasure. Scratching broke her thoughts and warm fur brushed against her leg.
Here,
Whisper told her.
Waiting.
The rat’s presence made Meg smile and relax. She was like Whisper—resilient. The Andraks couldn’t keep her locked up—ever.

Ramon thought he heard a faint noise overhead, like a whooshing of air. He looked up and was startled to see a dull orange glow hovering above him. He struggled to his feet, grabbing his peacemaker and yelling to wake his companions—and the world around him exploded in bright flashes of flame and light. As he fired wildly at the orange glow he was engulfed by a ball of fire. Screaming and slapping at the bright flames, he ran for the creek to escape the mad confusion falling from the night sky. His companions reached for their weapons, but one young Peacekeeper fell backwards as a shot cracked from the descending orange ball of light. Two fired at the vision, but they bolted for safety as another explosion lit the campsite with eerie white light and their terrified companions followed in their wake.

As the basket touched down, A Ahmud Ki threw one more firework after the running Peacekeepers for effect before he climbed out and sprinted for the wagon. Luca fired two more rounds into the darkness
from his stolen peacemaker and prepared the dragon egg for lift-off.

The last person Meg expected to see was A Ahmud Ki and yet he appeared in the fading light. ‘Use your power!’ he yelled. ‘Break the chains!’ She focussed and the restrainer and chains fell away. He grabbed her hand to help her out of the wagon and led her to the dragon egg basket, Whisper scampering in their wake. Something whizzed past Meg’s ear as she reached the basket.

‘They’re coming back!’ Luca warned. ‘Hurry!’ He offered to help Meg into the basket, but she dropped something else in before she took his hand. ‘What was that?’ he asked.

‘Whisper,’ Meg replied, leaving Luca wondering why the woman wanted him to speak softly. As he released a burst of flame to begin the climb A Ahmud Ki scrambled in and yelled, ‘Use the peacemaker to keep them off!’ A bullet thudded into the basket and another ripped through Luca’s left arm and he yelped, releasing the burner and sinking against the basket as two more bullets punched holes in the lower section of orange fabric.

‘How does this thing work?’ A Ahmud Ki asked as he grabbed the burner handle.

‘Push down!’ Luca instructed, grimacing from his wound. A Ahmud Ki pushed on the handle and flames shot skyward, into the heart of the dragon egg fabric. ‘We’re not going to make it!’ Luca warned as he pushed painfully to his feet. Two more shots tore through the fabric.

‘Close your eyes!’ Meg screamed. ‘Now!’ Luca and Ahmud Ki closed their eyes. Her eyes also closed, she focussed and the surrounding area erupted in a flash of brilliant light. ‘Now you can open them,’ she said.

A lone voice whimpered in the dark several paces from the basket.

‘What did you do?’ Luca asked in a hushed voice.

‘We have to get going,’ said A Ahmud Ki and he fired the burner clumsily, heated air pushing upward.

‘Listen to me and do what I say,’ Luca said, and as he directed A Ahmud Ki the dragon egg slowly rose into the night.

‘Where are we going?’ Meg asked.

‘The breeze is carrying us west,’ said Luca. ‘We were lucky it brought us to you in the first place. Jon almost expected too much. I told him the breeze had to be right.’

‘What made the explosions?’ she asked.

‘Simple old-fashioned chemical magic,’ A Ahmud Ki explained. ‘The old human kings used it to frighten their enemies. The Aelendyell used it as pretend magic. These people make fireworks from it. Luca got me the ingredients.’

‘I’ve found my daughter,’ Meg announced. ‘Do you know where Ridge is?’

‘No,’ Luca answered.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said calmly. ‘I do. Put me down and I’ll get there myself.’

‘And your son?’ A Ahmud Ki asked.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I have to keep looking for him.’

‘Do you know where to look?’

‘No.’

‘Then I wouldn’t be looking for him yet—not for a while,’ A Ahmud Ki advised. ‘After this little escape you’ll have every Peacekeeper in Andrak searching for you. Better if you disappear with your daughter for a while and then, when interest in you has died down, come back for your son.’

Meg wanted to tell him that he had no idea what it would feel like to lose a son or to be a mother so close to finding him, but she knew he couldn’t possibly understand. He’d never had children. He hadn’t ever
mentioned that fact, but it was obvious in everything about him. ‘I want to go to Ridge,’ she said. ‘Put me down.’

‘We’ll fly there,’ said A Ahmud Ki. ‘Tell us which way.’

‘I can’t stop the bleeding,’ Luca complained, feeling his numbed left arm with his right hand.

‘Give me your arm,’ Meg said, moving to the injured dragoneer’s side. She gently explored the wound with her fingers and then wrapped her hands around Luca’s arm. Whisper curled against her feet.

The breeze waned as the rising sun gilded the eastern mountains so they were forced to use the cranks that drove the tiny windwheels to steer the dragon egg towards Ridge, making their progress slow and difficult, until Meg silently and discreetly conjured the breeze to strengthen out of her desperation to reach her daughter. She knew the risk. She could manipulate the weather, but she couldn’t control it once it was in motion so she hoped the breeze would not become more powerful than the dragon egg could handle. ‘That’s some luck,’ said Luca, feeling the breeze strengthen. He flexed his healed arm and stared at Meg suspiciously. ‘I still don’t understand what you did,’ he admitted.

‘Simple healing,’ she replied, scratching Whisper’s ears as she nestled in the crook of her arm.

Luca looked at the snoozing rat and shook his head. He wanted adventure, but already it was taking a shape he couldn’t have dreamed. The beautiful woman with the black rat was a fascinating enigma. He’d never had a wound from a peacemaker—in fact he’d never seen one—but his arm already felt normal, as if he’d never been shot in the first place. ‘I haven’t flown this far west,’ he said, gazing at the Great Dylan Ranges, and
he released an expertly measured burst of flame from the burner.

‘There!’ Meg cried, pointing. ‘Land there!’ She stared excitedly at the squares of grain fields, the line of trees bordering the tiny creek and the green roofs of the farm buildings, wondering if Emma knew she was coming.

Luca precisely steered his fragile craft and as they descended on a grassy patch near the farmhouse the people within—a man, a woman and two children—emerged to stare with curiosity at the unusual event of a dragon egg landing on their property. The farm dogs barked protectively as they warily backed towards their owners, startled by the oddity in the sky.

When the basket touched down, Meg climbed out and strode towards the family. Recognising her mother, Emma broke from the group and ran for her and they embraced fervently. ‘I promised you I would be back,’ Meg said in her native tongue and showered kisses on the top of her daughter’s head while she drank in the aroma of the girl’s hair. She looked up at the man and woman. ‘You know who I am,’ she said in Andrak, trying to keep her voice calm despite the turbulent emotion pounding through her spirit. ‘Thank you for giving my daughter a home. I hope you understand why I came back.’ She squeezed Emma tight. ‘One day I will return to thank you properly.’ As she shepherded Emma towards the waiting basket, the man started towards them. ‘Don’t do anything foolish,’ Meg warned.

He faltered and stopped. ‘You won’t get away,’ he threatened, but she heard impotency beneath his threat and felt sorry for him.

‘Look after the boy,’ she said. ‘If his mother is still alive in Shess she would beg you to love him.’ The man silently nodded slowly, accepting that there was nothing
he could do to stop Meg leaving with Emma, and he embraced his wife and the boy as they joined him.

Meg lifted Emma into the basket with A Ahmud Ki’s assistance and Luca fired the burner. ‘There’s a rat!’ Emma squealed.

‘Her name is Whisper,’ A Ahmud Ki explained as he lifted Whisper for Emma to touch, but he was surprised when the girl laughed and took the rat from him.

‘She grew up with Whisper,’ said Meg. A Ahmud Ki smiled and nodded as Emma hugged her childhood pet.

‘Hang on!’ Luca warned as the dragon egg lifted from the ground, the basket swaying gently. ‘I’m scared,’ Emma said, pressing against her mother and closing her eyes.

Meg encircled her daughter, her tears glistening in the sunlight. ‘Don’t be scared,’ she crooned. ‘I’m here.’

As the dragon egg gained altitude A Ahmud Ki pointed at a troop of Peacekeepers galloping out of Ridge along the road towards the farm. ‘They’re quick!’ he noted, astonished at how speedily news of what was happening had apparently reached the town.

‘Not quick enough,’ Luca replied with a cheeky grin and he fired a fresh burst of flame, lifting them towards the clouds and freedom.

The blue haze glimmered between the saplings in the dark grove. She met his gaze and asked, ‘Are you sure this is what you want?’

He smiled disarmingly. ‘I understand the secret of the amber,’ he said. ‘For so long I was seeking something that was an illusion, and yet all the time I had what I needed with me. This world is not my world. There’s no magic here any more—not
our
magic. What I need to find has to be hidden somewhere in Se’Treya and I have to find where Mareg hid it.’

‘Are you sure he’s hidden it there?’ she asked.

He shrugged. ‘I don’t know for certain. I just
feel
it.’

‘And if you do find what you’re seeking?’

He smiled grimly. ‘I don’t know. I won’t know until I find it. Things have—things have changed. I’ve seen so many different things. Not just here but in your world—in Western Shess. I don’t know.’ He looked at her as if he was pleading for her to understand.

She nodded slowly and glanced over her shoulder. Luca and Emma were outside the grove in the early morning sunlight, waiting beside the dragon egg. She took A Ahmud Ki’s hands and the tingle of energy made her shiver, but she kept hold and said, ‘I followed my dreams and feelings to come here for my children. I understand how you feel. I owe you so much for travelling with me.’

He shook his head and met her gaze with sad grey eyes. ‘I came here for my own selfish reasons, Meg. It was—’ Again he struggled for the words, and she could see that it pained him. ‘It was convenience,’ he said softly, as if he didn’t want the words to hurt her. He swallowed and added, ‘I need to feel the power in my veins again, the power I feel teasing me when I touch you like this. I could never live as a mortal, not in this world—not in
any
world. I was never meant to be ordinary.’

‘You aren’t ordinary,’ she told him, but as she stared into his eyes she saw the shimmer of red energy shifting through their depths and remembered the moment in Westport when she glimpsed what he must have been before his cruel imprisonment in Se’Treya. ‘But you
were
this Amuchki the Andraks speak about, weren’t you?’