It was a lot brighter when Stephanie trotted up to the boundary of the town. The air had thinned considerably now, allowing
the continuum’s persistent blue-white glare to shine down with unrestrained power. Every step sent her gliding a couple of
metres above the ground. Gravity had reduced by about twenty per cent, she guessed.
Ekelund’s headquarters were prominent at the very centre of the razed town, the big tent perched atop a mound, faintly luminous.
She came out as Stephanie bounced her way up the slope, lounging against the tentpole, smiling softly.
“It’s a different body, but I’d know those thoughts anywhere. I believe we’ve had our last goodbye, Stephanie Ash.”
“You have to leave. Please. You’ll destroy Angeline Gallagher’s body and her soul if you stay here.”
“Finally! It’s not my well being you’re concerned about. A small victory for me, but I consider it significant.”
“Come back to Mortonridge. There are still some serjeant bodies available to host your soul. You can live a life again, a
real life.”
“As what? Trite little housewife and mother? Even you can’t live your old life again, Stephanie.”
“I never believe that a baby’s future is preordained. After birth, you’re on your own to make what you can from life. And
we are being born again in these serjeant bodies. Make what you can of it, Ekelund. Don’t kill yourself and Gallagher out
of misplaced pride. Look around! The air’s all but gone, the gravity’s failing. There’s nothing here anymore.”
“I am here. This island will bloom again once it’s free of your influences. We came here to this realm because it offered
us the sanctuary we needed.”
“For God’s sake, admit you are wrong. There’s no shame in it. What do you think I’m going to do, stalk you and gloat?”
“Now you get to it. Which of us was right. That’s what it’s always been between you and I.”
“There is no right. An entire army flocked to your banner. I had a lover and five mismatched friends. You win. Now, please,
come back.”
“No.”
“Why not? At least tell me that.”
Annette Ekelund’s stubborn smile flickered. “For the first time ever, I have been me. I haven’t had to defer to anybody, to
ask permission, to conform to what society expects. And I’ve lost that.” Her voice shrivelled to a hoarse whisper. “I led
them here, and not one stayed. They didn’t want to stay, and I didn’t have the strength to force them.” A tear emerged from
her left eye. “I was wrong. I got it
wrong
, God damn you!”
“You didn’t bring anybody here. You didn’t order us. We came because we desperately wanted to. I was a part of it, Annette.
When we lay there on the mud after the harpoon strike, and the serjeants were going to throw us into zerotau, I helped. I
was so frightened that I poured every drop of my power into leaving Mortonridge behind. And I was glad when we got here. We
are all to blame. All of us.”
“I organized Mortonridge’s defence. I brought about the Liberation.”
“Yes, you did, and if it hadn’t been you, it would have been someone else. It could even have been me. We’re not responsible
for the way to the beyond being opened up. Ever since that began, the outcome was inevitable. You’re not to blame for fate,
for the way the universe is put together. You’re not that important.”
Annette had to suck hard to fill her lungs with air. The sky had become very bright. “I was.”
“So was I. The day we took the children over the firebreak, I’d accomplished more than Richard Saldana ever had. That was
how I felt. I loved it, and I wanted more of it, the way my group looked up and respected me. Typical human failing. You’re
nothing special, not in that way.”
“Smug, smug, smug, God I hate you.”
Stephanie watched the dry flakes of mud lift gently from the ground, flicked up by the last wisps of air. They floated around
in a lazy cloud, rebounding off each other, slowly moving higher. There was no gravity left, the only thing keeping her feet
on the ground was sheer willpower. “Come with me.” She had to shout, the air was all but gone. “Hate me some more.”
“Would you die with me?” Annette yelled back. “Are you that fucking worthy?”
“No.”
Annette yelled again. Stephanie couldn’t hear her, the air had gone.
Choma, Tinkerbell, come and get us. Quickly please.
Annette was clawing at her throat, gulping wildly as her skin turned dark red. Her desperate motions pushed her away from
the ground. Stephanie kicked off after her and grabbed a thrashing ankle. Together they tumbled away from the top of the mound.
The universal white light had turned the mud fields a glaring silver; crinkled cliff tops ignited into magnesium splendour.
Ketton island melted away into the glaring void.
Stephanie and Annette soared ever onwards, drowning in light.
“Are they really worth it?” someone asked.
“Are we?”
Cold aquamarine light clamped around them.
______
Luca didn’t have to guide the horse; it simply followed the route he’d taken so many times before, plodding along without
hesitation. A great circle round the middle of Cricklade estate: through the upper ford in Wryde stream, around the east side
of Berrybut spinney, over Withcote ridge, taking the narrow humpback bridge below Saxby farm, the fire track through Coston
wood. It gave him a good overview of his land’s progress. On the surface it was as good as any previous year; the crops were
later by a few weeks, but there was no harm in that. Everyone had pulled together and made up for the lost weeks following
the possession.
As they bloody well ought to, by damn. I sweated blood getting Cricklade back on its feet.
And now there was enough food for everybody, the coming harvest would enable them to see the winter months out without undue
hardship. Stoke County had emerged from the transition exceptionally well. There certainly wouldn’t be any more marauders,
not since the battle of Colsterworth station. Good news, considering the reports and rumours trickling out of Boston these
days. The island’s capital hadn’t been so fast to embrace the old ways. Food there was becoming scarce; the farms immediately
round the outskirts it were being abandoned as citizens roamed across the countryside in search of supplies.
The idiots weren’t capitalising on their existing industrial infrastructure by producing goods to trade with the farming communities
for food. There was so much the city could provide, basic stuff like cloth and tools. That needed to happen again, and soon.
But the indications he’d got from Lionel and the other traders weren’t good. Some factories were up and running, but there
was no real social order in the city.
It’s actually worse than when the Democratic Land Union was out on the streets, agitating for their claptrap reforms.
Luca shook his head irritably. There were a lot of
his
thoughts roaming free these days. Some of them obvious, the ones he relied on to keep Cricklade going; others were more subtle,
the comparisons, the regrets, odd mannerisms creeping back, so comfortable he could never drive them out again. Worst was
that eternal junkie ache to see Louise and Genevieve again, just to know they were all right.
Are you such a monster, an anti-human, you would deny a father that? A single glimpse of my beloved girls.
Luca put his head back and yelled: “You never loved them!” The piebald horse came to a startled halt as his voice carried
across the verdant land. Anger was his last refuge of self, the one defence which Grant could never penetrate. “You treated
them like cattle. They weren’t even people to you, they were commodities, part of your medieval family empire, assets ready
to marry off in exchange for money and power. You bastard. You don’t deserve them.” He shivered, crumpling down into the saddle.
“Then why do I care?” he heard himself ask. “My children are the most important part of me; they carry on everything I am.
And you tried to rape them. A pair of little children. Love? Do you think you know anything about it? A degenerate parasite
like you.”
“Leave me alone,” Luca screamed out.
Shouldn’t it be me asking you that?
Luca gritted his teeth, thinking about the gas Spanton used, the way Dexter had tried to make them worship the Light Bringer.
Building up a fortress of anger, so his thoughts could be his again.
He tugged on the reins, wheeling the horse round so he faced Cricklade. There was little practical point to this inspection
tour. He knew the condition the estate was in.
Materially they were fine. Mentally… the veil of contentment furled around Norfolk was souring. He recognized the particular
strain of forlorn resentment accumulating over the mind’s horizon. Cricklade had known it first. All across Norfolk, people
were discovering what lay beneath their external perfection. The slow-maturing plague of vanity had begun to reap its victims.
Hope was withering from their lives. This winter would be more than the physical cold.
Luca crossed the boundary of giant cedars and urged the horse up over the greensward towards the manor house. Just seeing
its timeless grey stone faÇade, inset with whitepainted windows, brought a peaceful reassurance to his aching thoughts. Its
history belonged to him, and so assured his future.
The girls will carry on here, will keep our home and family alive.
He bowed his head, embittered by his deteriorating will. Anger was hard to maintain over hours, let alone days. Weary, weepy
dismay was no defence, and those emotions were his constant companion these days.
There was the usual scattering of activity around the manor. A circular brush ejecting a puff of soot as it rose out from
the central chimney stack. Stable boys leading the horses down to graze in the east meadow. Women hanging sheets out to dry
on the clothes lines. Ned Coldham—Luca couldn’t remember the name of the handyman’s possessor—painting the windows on the
west wing, making sure the wood was protected from the coming frosts. The sound of sawing drifting out through the chapel’s
empty windows. Two men (claiming to be monks, though neither Luca nor Grant had ever heard of their order) were slowly repairing
the damage Dexter had wrought inside.
There were more people bustling about in the walled kitchen garden at the side of the manor. Cook had brought a team of her
kitchen helpers out to cut the shoots of asparagus ready for freezing. It was the fifth batch they’d collected from the geneered
plant this year.
Johan was sitting beside the stone arched gateway, a blanket over his knees as he soaked up the warmth of the omnidirectional
sunlight. VÉronique was on a chair beside him, with baby Jeanette sleeping in a cradle, a parasol protecting her from the
light.
Luca dismounted and went over to see his erstwhile deputy. “How are you feeling?” he asked.
“Not so bad, thank you, sir.” Johan smiled weakly, and nodded.
“You look a lot better.” He was putting on weight again, though the loose skin around his face remained pallid.
“Soon as they gets the glass finished, I’m going to start getting some seeds set,” Johan said. “I always like a bit o’ fresh
lettuce and cucumber in me sarnies during the winter. Wouldn’t mind trying to grow some avocado as well, though it’ll be next
year before they fruit.”
“Jolly good, man. And how’s this little one, then?” Luca peered into the crib. He’d forgotten just how small newborn babies
were.
“She’s a dream,” VÉronique sighed happily. “I wish she’d sleep like this at night. Every two hours she wants feeding. You
can set your clock by her. It’s really tiring.”
“Sweet little mite,” Johan said. “Reckon she’s gonna be a proper looker when she grows up.”
VÉronique beamed with easy pride.
“I’m sure she will,” Luca said. It pained him to see the way the old man was looking at the baby; there was too much desperation
there. Butterworth wanted confirmation that life carried on as normal here in this realm. It was an attitude that was growing
among a lot of Cricklade’s residents, he’d noticed lately. The kids they were looking after had been receiving more sympathetic
attention. His own resolve to stay at the estate and ignore the urge to find the girls was becoming harder to maintain. It
was a weakness he could date back to the day Johan had collapsed, and then accelerating after the battle of Colsterworth station.
Every step he took on the sandy gravel path around the manor seemed to press blister-sized lumps deep into the flesh of his
soles, reminding him of how precarious his life had become.
Luca led his horse into the stable courtyard, guilty and glad to leave Johan behind. Carmitha was over by her caravan. She
was folding up freshly washed clothes and packing them into a big brass-bound wooden trunk. Half a dozen of her old glass
storage jars were standing on the cobbles, full of leaves and flowers, their green tint turning the contents a peculiar grey
colour.
She nodded politely at him. He watched her as he took the stallion’s saddle off; she moved with a steady determination that
discouraged interruption. Some thought had been finalized, he decided. The trunk was eventually filled, and the lid slammed
down.
“Give you a hand with that?” he offered.
“Thanks.”
They lifted the trunk in through the door at the back of the caravan. Luca whistled quietly. He’d never seen the inside so
tidy before. There was no clutter, no clothes or towels slung about, all the pans she had hanging up were polished to a bright
gleam, even the bed was made. Bottles were lined up on a high shelf, held in place by copper travelling rings.
She shoved the trunk into an alcove under the bed.
“You’re going somewhere,” he said.
“I’m ready to go somewhere.”
“Where?”
“I’ve no idea. Might try Holbeach, see if any of the others made it to the caves.”
He sat on the bed, suddenly very tired. “Why? You know how important you are to people here. God, Carmitha, you can’t leave.
Look, just tell me if someone’s said or done something against you. I’ll have their bloody nuts roasted very slowly over a
furnace.”