Dawn of Wonder (The Wakening Book 1) (4 page)

Emroy’s jaw clamped and he moved towards Aedan, but
he couldn’t demonstrate his “proof” here, and he had already been accused once
of preparing for a kiss, so he turned and stamped away, shoving an
inconsiderate path through the crowd.

When he was gone, Aedan wondered aloud if the
slavers would take requests. Kalry smacked him over his scruffy head and Thomas
pulled a wry grin.

“We intended to make you a pearlnut pie,” Aedan
said to him. “It was all this business about slavers that disrupted our plan.”

“Was that going to be your way of saying sorry?”
Thomas asked.

“It was meant to be congratulations. We are still
impressed that you got as far as you did. Nobody else ever stood on the wall
and swung their arms before.”

Thomas smiled. There was no anger left there. He
was never much good at being angry – his soft features looked uncomfortable and
drawn out of shape by hard expressions. Even when something did rouse his ire,
he lacked the stamina for holding resentments.

“Pity,” he said, “I could have done with some
pearlnut pie. As long as Kalry was going to make it and not you.”

Aedan laughed. “I feel exactly the same.”

As he glanced around he noticed the Lieutenant in
the far corner. Something irked him about the way the man’s eyes were moving over
the people in the room. Kalry was right about one thing – he certainly considered
these people beneath him.

Finding the hall stifling, they climbed the stairs to
Kalry’s room. It was colder on the upper floor, but there was a fire going in
the hearth. It revealed a spacious and relatively messy room – cushions and books
and sketchpads and flowers collected from the fields were scattered liberally.

“Where’s Dara?” Kalry asked.

“I’m sure she’s tucked herself away in the
quietest corner,” Thomas said. “Think like a mouse and you’ll find her.”

Kalry disappeared and returned a short while later
with the mouse-mannered, doe-eyed girl in tow. She was the youngest of them,
only nine, but her small frame and timid appearance made her look six. It was
deceptive though. She was not as timid as she looked. Aedan braced himself when
he noticed that there was still something smouldering there. She fixed her eyes
on him and stood stiffly against the doorpost. In the way of anger and
resentment, she was Thomas’s perfect opposite.

Thomas looked up at her. “I forgave them,” he
said. “They wanted to make me a pie to apologise, but they did a good job of
chasing Emroy away instead.”

“Ooh, I hate that boy!” she said, and then blushed
at the fierceness of her outburst.

“Come sit,” said Kalry, as she settled on the
large rug before the fireplace that was humming with bright flame. The rug was
where they always sat. As Aedan had put it, chairs made them feel like they
were still half standing. Dara dropped down beside her friend and began braiding
the rug’s long woollen tufts, while the boys took turns with a pair of fire
irons, balancing chestnuts over the coals for roasting.

A sound drifted through the window from the dimness
of a wet and early dusk. It was the song of a rainbird, clear against the
silence of all the other forest birds that would be tucking themselves into
their feathers and hunching up under dripping leaves. Aedan listened and heard
the soft pattering of rain. One thing he shared with the singing bird was a
love of rain and especially of storms. He always felt a deep thrill of awe when
the pale sapphire cloaks of sky were flung aside and dark raging heavens roared
and plunged and cast fire and water and ice upon the earth.

Something landed on Kalry’s shoulder and nuzzled
against her neck.

“Hello Skrill,” Dara called. She reached for the
young forest squirrel, plucked it from its roost and nestled it in her arms
where the fluffy creature settled and began to clean itself. Dara made a little
tent over it with her long brown hair. “I hope you’ve learned some manners,”
she said. “If you poop on my frock again I’m going to shave your tail.”

Aedan grinned. He had found the little animal,
weak and abandoned, after a violent storm. Since he was already looking after a
fledgling woodpecker at the time, Kalry had kept the squirrel.

The fire was the only light in the room and it threw
out a dancing radiance charged with the magic of stories beautiful and terrifying.
Appropriately, Thomas had found Kalry’s book of original stories on the rug and
was struggling his way through the letters now.

“Is that a new story?” Dara asked him.

“Yes. I think you’ll like this one.”

“Oh, please read it aloud.”

Thomas handed it to Kalry. If he were to read, it
would be one laborious word at a time.

Aedan had half wanted to air his concerns again –
at least they would make for an exciting discussion. But he wasn’t so sure
about them now, and William’s warnings were never given idly. What finally made
him drop the idea was his co-author’s pride when his eyes fell on the book.
Dara shifted a little closer to the fire as Kalry placed the book in the warm
light.

“It’s just the first bit,” Kalry said. “We decided
to turn our old quest for the silver dwarf’s hideouts into a proper story, so
we made a start on it yesterday. This is how it begins …

In the most secretish and
magical places, the silver dwarf makes his home. But he never stays there for
long and that’s because he is always looking for the one he lost long, long
years ago. It all began many hundreds of years before.

He was only a little dwarf boy when he accidently cornered
a young moon-scaled river maiden. She was terrified that he would drive her to
the shore and knock out her teeth (because everybody knows that the teeth of
these river maidens are the most perfect pearls) but the dwarf stepped aside
instead. She was so surprised at his kindness that she stayed and talked with
him. They soon became very good friends and met whenever pure starlight fell on
the shivering crystal waters of the Brockle.

But one day a vile and ugly serpent slid through
the river behind her while they talked. The dwarf saw it but he didn’t have
time to warn her so he leapt towards her with his knife raised so he could
strike the serpent but she never saw the serpent and both of them (the river
maiden and the serpent) dived away and vanished into the darkness of the water
never to be seen again.

From then and forever onwards he spent his days
searching for her so he could explain what really happened, and also to avenge
himself on the serpent by challenging him to mortal combat and hacking him into
tiny little bits and feeding them to the crows.

Aedan glowed with pleasure at his relatively obvious
contribution. Still, he thought, there wasn’t nearly enough blood and glory
there. He would have to put in a lot more monsters and battles as they
continued with the tale. That was what any decent story needed.

“Where is the silver dwarf now?” Dara asked.

“The last signs we found,” said Kalry, “were on
the west bank of the Brockle under a hidden patch of shady ferns where the
light is dim and mystical.”

Dara’s eyes grew large. “Will you take me there
tomorrow?”

“Of course.”

“It’s going to be so much fun. I can hardly – Oh Skrill!
Not again! Yuck. Here Kalry, you take him.”

When the little crisis was over, the girls
continued discussing plans for the expedition and the pursuit of the little
magical being.

Aedan and Kalry had invented the legend of the
silver dwarf when they were five and six. Over the years, they had explored
every corner of Badgerfields and all the shadowy valleys, wind-buffeted hills,
dreamy woodlands and secret forests they could reach, hunting for enchanted
places marked with tiny boot prints and dwarf-sized shelters.

Aedan had never felt embarrassed about his imagination.
Without it there was no magic. Whether or not they actually found the silver
dwarf wasn’t important. The magic was in searching their whole world, lost in
the wonder of it all. Without imagination, things were only as they appeared –
and that was blindness. Things were more than they appeared, so much more. When
he considered an oak tree, it was not just a tree. To someone small, like an
ant, it was a whole landscape of rugged barky cliffs and big green leaf-plains
that quaked when the sky was restless, a place of many strange creatures where
fearsome winged beasts could pluck and devour someone in a blink.

And it wasn’t just about magic. Without
imagination, one could not think very far into things, like that Lieutenant. Without
imagination, he was no more than he said he was. But there was more to him …

It brought Aedan back and he decided, warning or
not, he was going to pour out his doubts. Before he could begin, though, Thomas
asked if they had played their origins game.

“We did,” said Kalry.

“And?”

“He says he’s from Rinwold.”

“So who won?”

“She did,” said Aedan. “Again.”

Kalry frowned. “I’m not convinced I did. Aedan said
some things about him that kept me thinking all day. Thomas, have you noticed
anything odd about him?”

“He’s very impressive, almost frightening. But
he’s a strange kind of man, that’s for sure. And not one with a lot of sense neither.
I saw him take his coat off as soon as he was done with talking, even though the
wind blew winter back for the day. Said he didn’t feel the cold, but there was
gooseflesh running all over his neck and arms.”

The silence lasted only a few heartbeats before Aedan
gasped and leapt to his feet.

“Kalry! Kalry, we need to speak to your father. Now!”

The chill wind that had been rising through the early
evening had brought a thick, soupy mist. Aedan slipped back past the lone
sentry into the house, teeth chattering.

“He’s not in the courtyard. Could he be in his
study?”

“If he is, it would definitely be a bad idea to go
looking for him,” said Kalry. “He doesn’t like to be disturbed when he’s there.”

“Can we afford to wait?”

Kalry bit a fingernail. Aedan had told her in a
torrent of thoughts what he feared, and the dread was clearly growing in her mind.
“No, I don’t think we should. But this might not go well.”

They had to step carefully now as they passed back
through the hall, over and around makeshift beds on which some of the children
had already fallen asleep. The passage leading to the study was dark, but they
felt their way easily enough with a hand brushing each wall – though Aedan
could not quite reach both at the same time. There was a section of the passage
where the floorboards were loose; they clattered like falling tiles under even
the stealthiest tread. Light poured out from beneath the closed door at the far
end of the passage. Dresbourn would be within. Aedan felt his stomach shrink
and the blood begin to rush in his ears. He hated these meetings.

Kalry knocked.

“Who is it?” The voice was terse.

“It’s me, Father,” Kalry replied.

“Come in.”

She opened the door into a large room, richly
carpeted and lit with several lamps. The walls were lined with shelves that held
more bronze and silver bookends than books. As in the hall, expensive paintings
and large sculptures stood proudly, displaying their owner’s financial success
and social status. There was a large teak desk on the far side of the room
where Dresbourn, swollen even larger than normal in a rich fur coat, sat
opposite Lieutenant Quin.

Not for the first time, Aedan wondered how such a
man with his puffy cheeks flanking a self-important little chin, haughty brow,
and turned-back arrogant nose could be Kalry’s father. Her mother must have
been a princess. Not wanting to stare, lest his thoughts be revealed, he dropped
his eyes and noticed a long scroll that lay unrolled between the two men. He
had a feeling he was trespassing there and he looked up again, uncertain, from Dresbourn
to Quin. There was no welcome in either face. Dresbourn’s raised eyebrows had
grown distinctly colder on noticing Aedan.

“This is the same boy I saw with your daughter
earlier,” said Quin. “Is he noble too?”

“Aedan?” Dresbourn said, with a short humourless
laugh. He regarded the scruffy boy as he would a porker on display at the
farmer’s market. “Not as we understand it. He’s a notch above the local
commoners thanks to his mother’s line and the education she’s given him, but
his father more or less nullifies that.”

Aedan stood silent, too intimidated to be
offended.

“Well, Kalry,” her father continued. “What do you
want?”

She cleared her voice and tried to clear the look
of distress from her face as she pulled her eyes away from Aedan. “We wondered if
we could speak to you,” she said. “It’s really important.”

“Make it quick.”

Kalry looked at the lieutenant and then at Aedan,
unsure.

“Actually,” stammered Aedan, “we need to talk to
you alone.”

“Children,” said Dresbourn, standing so suddenly
that the desk lurched and a quill toppled from the ink jar, “I do not have time
for your games now, and I am embarrassed that you would insult a guest, a man
of rank and breeding. Kalry, I have raised you better than this.”

“It’s perfectly alright,” the lieutenant
interjected. “We can resume the discussion later. It so happens that this would
be a good time to check on a few things.” He left, closing the door behind him.
Dresbourn did not sit immediately. When he did, he leaned back in his chair and
levelled his gaze at Aedan. It was that heavy, withering look that demanded an
explanation while making it clear that anything said would be considered an
impertinence; it was a look that, if cast about the farm, would cause young
shoots to turn around and dive back into the earth.

Whenever Aedan explained his thoughts to Kalry,
her unfeigned enthusiasm was like summer’s rain and shine – his ideas burst
into life, growing surer with the telling. But her father’s wintry intolerance
never failed to shrivel the words on Aedan’s tongue. Dresbourn’s look did more
than expect disappointment, it demanded disappointment, and reaped it every
time.

Aedan tried to swallow but his mouth was too dry. Eventually
he found his voice hiding somewhere back in his throat and hoped, as a hundred
times before, that he might sound convincing.

“We think he’s lying,” he said. It came out like
an apology. He saw Dresbourn’s jaw clench, but decided to press ahead while he still
could. “His jacket doesn’t fit him, that’s what gave him away. It’s why he
didn’t wear it even though it was cold. Probably pinches under his arms. It’s
not his jacket. I think he stole it from the real Lieutenant Quin on the way
here. If what he says is true – about slavers being in the area – then I think
he’s one of them.”

The room fell silent.

The awful words hung in the air.

Dresbourn tilted his head back and released a
tired breath, disinterested eyes looking down at Aedan. He said nothing. Aedan
knew that tilt all too well; it had always made him feel like a liar even when
telling the truth. He would not be endured much longer. He tried again, his
voice sounding thinner,

“The lieutenant’s plan doesn’t make sense. He’s only
one man. It took him almost the whole day to prepare us, but there are forty farmsteads
that he has to get to, so it would take him a month to reach everyone. I think
he has a band in the forest. It’s really easy to hide lots of people in there.
I think he’s leading them from one farm to the next, gathering us like
chickens. I’ll bet he’s planning to take sentry duty at midnight and open the
door wide.”

“Is that it?” Dresbourn said, shaking his head
with exaggerated slowness. “Because his jacket doesn’t fit, you think he’s a spy?
He came to this farm first because he deemed it to be the first at risk. He
will coordinate matters from the village tomorrow. We have just been discussing
it. Do you honestly think I would not have discovered by now if he were false?”

“There’s more than the jacket,” Aedan said,
snatching the chance to get in a few more words. “There were things in his
story that didn’t make sense. He said that the slavers were well armed, but he
also said that nobody saw them except at a distance, even when they raided the
previous village. So how does he know that they are well armed? He said they
only attacked people who got isolated, but when Thomas’s father suggested
moving as a big group, he said they would attack us. Then earlier this evening
he said that they would not attack us in the house and stopped us putting lots
of sentries on duty. I think he’s just making things up so we’ll do what he
wants and we’ll be easy for slavers to catch.”

Dresbourn’s eyes were hard. “Kalry, are you part
of this nonsense?”

“We aren’t looking for trouble, Father. It started
when we tried to guess his origin, but there was so much that didn’t make sense.
He said he’s from Rinwold, but lots of his words sounded like a sailor’s talk. I
think Quin has been acting since he galloped in. Apart from his coat and that
letter that could both have been stolen, how do we know he is who he says? Aedan
and I think he’s a Lekran who has prepared himself for this act.”

Aedan had been thinking. Something bothered him
and suddenly he realised what it was. He had not heard the floorboards. The lieutenant,
or whatever he was, had not left.

“I can prove it!” he said, and ran to the door,
yanking it open. The light of the lamps fell on the man’s surprised face.

“See. He’s been listening the whole time!”

“Not at all, my young friend,” said the tall man,
stepping inside and putting his hand on Aedan’s shoulder. The grip tightened
like a horse’s bite, but nothing was betrayed in the man’s face or the smooth voice
in which he continued. “I returned from my rounds and decided to wait until you
were done talking. I simply wanted to avoid interrupting.”

“But the floorboards –” Aedan began.

“Aedan, that is enough!” Dresbourn’s voice struck
like a bullwhip. “You have insulted my guest along with my judgement. I forbid
you to spread these disrespectful ideas any further. Due to the present crisis
I will tolerate your presence here tonight, but at first light I want you out
of my house. Now leave!”

After beating a miserable retreat through the hall
and back to the upstairs room, Aedan closed the door behind him and dropped
onto the floor. He nursed the shoulder Quin had gripped, while Kalry recounted
the ordeal to the others.

“Maybe he’s right,” said Thomas after they had sat
in silence awhile. “How could children have spotted what everyone else couldn’t?”

“Because we haven’t killed off our imaginations,” Aedan
mumbled behind a wrapping of arms and knees.

“I don’t think you are wrong just because you are
young,” said Dara. “Anyway, Dorothy always says you and Kalry are too clever by
half. What’s the word she always uses?

“Prodigies,” Kalry mumbled, “but I’m sure it’s
more Aedan she means.”

“Maybe your dad just got embarrassed ’cos you two
thought out something he didn’t.”

Aedan finished off for her, “And I made him hate
me forever.”

“Not if we are right about this,” said Kalry.

“If we are right,” Aedan retorted, “then we will be
marching in a line with ropes around our necks by morning. How is that better?”

“Isn’t there something we can do?” asked Dara. Her
voice was small.

“Don’t be frightened.” Kalry put an arm around
her. “Maybe we are wrong.”

“I don’t like him!” the little girl said with characteristic
fire. “I saw him looking at Tulia like he wanted to eat her. Tulia had her back
to him and when he saw me walk into the kitchen he smiled in a way that made me
want to run. I don’t think he is a good person at all.”

Everyone was quiet. They had all climbed onto Aedan’s
roof now, his vantage on the situation, and what they saw terrified them.

“Kalry,” Aedan finally said, “do you still have
that rope?”

She pulled it out from under the bed and tossed it
to him. “What are you planning?”

“Something that will either save everyone or put
us in enough trouble to last a year. You don’t have to join me if you don’t
want. I’m going to the town for help.” He stood up.

“But it’s too far,” said Thomas. “In this mist it
would take all night. By the time you get back with help, that’s if anyone believes
you enough to come out, it will be morning. If there really are slavers around,
that might be too late.”

Aedan sat down again with a dejected thud. He
plucked at the coarse fibres in the coils of rope and let his eyes drift upward
and across the thatch for a while.

“We’re going to have to split up,” he said. “Two
will need to stay here and watch, but without being seen, and two will need to
go for help. The two who stay will need to count how many slavers and say which
way they went, because rain might spoil the tracks. The ones who go will need
to take horses, so I think that means Kalry and me.”

Everyone nodded.

“But how will we watch without being seen?” Thomas
asked.

“At the front there is the timber-shed roof – it’s
flat and one of you could lie there and not get spotted. At the back there’s
the treehouse. Just remember to pull up the rope ladder. We don’t know which way
they’ll come, so you should split up.”

Aedan looked at Dara. Her chin was trembling. This
was asking a lot of anyone, but for a nine-year-old girl, waiting alone in the
dark for a band of thugs to abduct everyone she cared about was too much. He
realised this could not work.

Kalry had seen it too. “Shouldn’t we at least try
to tell some of the adults? At least warn them?” she asked.

“Even after we were told not to?” Aedan put his
ear to the door. “Your father is down there now. He’ll be watching and he’ll put
a stop to anything we start. Anyway, I don’t think a single adult will believe
us.”

“Then who do you think will believe us in the
town?”

“Nulty.”

Kalry nodded. “Yes, I suppose he would. But can he
help?”

“I don’t know, but it’s the best I can think of.”

“Aedan,” she said, looking at the little girl
beside her, “we can’t ask Dara to wait alone outside. She’ll be terrified.”

“I know. I was thinking that maybe you should stay
with her and I’ll go alone.”

“I’m the better rider,” she replied. “And I know the
horse trails better. If one of us goes it should be me.”

“You can’t go alone. You hardly know Nulty. If I
let you go and your father finds out, he’ll hang me.”