The Sign of One

‘You’re wrong,’ I say. ‘I know what it looks like, but I don’t feel any different inside. I’m the same as ever, I just heal faster. I’m not evil, Jude, not even bad!’

I try to smile and reach for her hand, but she snatches it away.

‘Don’t touch me!’

I curse and she flinches, like she thinks I’m going to rip her head off or something. Next thing, she’s on her feet and backing away. I scramble after her, sensing she’s about to run. And I can’t help it, I’m angry now.

‘Look, this isn’t my fault!’

She trips over something in the muck and straw.

I swear I only grab her so she doesn’t fall backwards, but she gasps loudly and I’m sure she’ll scream. Without thinking, I clamp my hand over her mouth. She flails against me, tries to push me away, but I’m too strong. Her eyes bulge.

I pull my hand away, brace myself.

‘You said you wouldn’t hurt me,’ she sobs.

I shake my head and try to get a grip on my temper. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. But you mustn’t scream. If your father finds us here, sees me like this, then it’s like you said – I’m dead. And so is Rona. You don’t want that, do you?’

She stares at me, but says nothing. Which says it all.

‘You won’t tell, will you?’

Jude shakes her head, but I see her little finger trace the Sign of One. I’m so stunned, I let go of her. She gives this huge gulp and darts to the side door. Beyond the spill of light, I hear her fumbling at the latch and her ragged breathing.

The door creaks open, then bangs shut behind her.

The drizzle eases as I make it home. The nearly full bigmoon finds a gap in the clouds and paints our shack silver, nestled in our herb and vegetable gardens. I’m wondering if this is the last time I’ll ever see it like this, when I notice the sliver of light sneaking out from under the door. Oh great, that’s all I need. Rona’s back already, probably waiting behind the door with a hatchet.

I bang inside, slam the door behind me, determined to make no excuses.

‘Look, I don’t care. You can’t keep me –’

Rona looks up from stuffing something into my backpack. Her glare could stop a charging fourhorn.

‘Where the hell have you been, Kyle?’ she growls.

And that’s when I see we have a visitor.

She’s sitting, her legs stretched out, in the chair by the stove. Those leathers, the long white dreads, the teardrop tattoo, her dark green eyes. . .

My mouth drops open. So does hers.

‘You!’ we both say.

Windjammer girl launches herself to her feet.

‘No way. I’m not flying this scumbag anywhere,’ she says to Rona.

Rona looks from me to the girl and her eyes go wide.

‘What? You know each other?’

8

I SAY SOME TERRIBLE THINGS

I shrug. The windjammer girl stands there all twitching and snarling. I wonder if she has that nasty little flamer on her. What did that bald bloke call her? Oh yeah, Sky. A stupid, made-up kind of name if you ask me.

She grabs her rain jacket off the back of the chair.

‘No way. I’m out of here.’

She steps around me, but hasn’t reckoned on Rona, who puts her back to the door to block it. I’ve never seen my mother look more fierce.

And that’s saying something.

‘Where do you think you’re going?’ she snaps.

The girl hesitates. She scowls, looks me up and down. ‘Not him,’ she says, spitting the words. ‘You don’t understand.’

Rona groans. She runs her hands through her hair in obvious frustration. ‘Show her,’ she says to me.

‘Show her what?’ I say, confused.

‘Your dressings, Kyle, take them off. Show Sky your healing.’

My collar is still turned up against the rain, so Rona can’t see they’re gone already. ‘Are you out of your mind?’

‘Just do as I say!’

I throw my hands up. If Rona asked me to sing ‘Oh, My Saviour’, all twenty verses, I couldn’t be more gobsmacked. Show this stranger my twist healing? Yeah, sure. Why not? For the second time this evening, I unbutton my shirt.

Rona twitches, seeing my already bare neck and chest.

The girl’s eyes narrow as they flicker over what’s left of my wounds. She purses her mouth as if choking poison down. I expect her to scream or make a run for it like Jude. Instead, she just frowns, as if she’s seen this before.

‘Blaster burns, that what you said?’

‘A week ago, low power maybe, but point-blank range,’ says Rona, all healer matter-of-fact now. ‘He was in a terrible state, but now look at him.’

Sky darts one last venomous look at me, then throws Rona a little nod.

‘O-kay then,’ she says, sounding half-strangled.

‘Okay,’ echoes Rona. ‘Good.’

Whatever they’ve agreed, it looks like it’s on again.

‘Will somebody please tell me what the hell is going on?’ I say.

Rona ignores me. She marches over to the table and starts stuffing my backpack again. She’s got her back to me, but I can tell from how stiff it is and the way she’s punching the gear in, she’s furious.

Well, I don’t care. I’m angry too. At her – at Jude – at the whole world.

‘Off you go,’ she says to me, handing me my pack with a grunt. ‘Follow Sky; she knows the way. I’ll join you later, soon as I’m done here.’

‘No.’ I sling the pack back on to the table.

‘Oh, don’t you start,’ Rona says, her voice rising.

‘This is crazy! I’m not going anywhere,’ I say. My voice wobbles. I see the windjammer girl out of the corner of my eye, sneering. ‘I’ve had it with not knowing what’s going on. I’m staying right here until you tell me everything.’

Rona twitches. ‘We haven’t got time for this, Kyle.’

I shake my head and stare at the floor until I hear my mother’s sigh.

‘Sky,’ she says, ‘maybe you could give us a minute?’

I look up now. The girl stares at Rona, then at me. I see the hostility, but something else too. Curiosity? Maybe, but a blink and it’s gone. She shrugs her jacket on over her thin shoulders. ‘Whatever, but remember we ain’t got all night.’

The door bangs shut behind her.

Silence. My heart thrashing, my head thumping. Neither of us able to look the other in the eye. I feel numb and empty inside.

‘Sit down,’ Rona says at last. ‘And button your shirt.’

I do as she says. She sits opposite me and sighs again. My heart tries to batter through my ribs, but I stay quiet. I don’t want sighs – I want answers.

‘Please tell me you didn’t go see Jude.’ she says.

I roll my eyes. She curses, making me jump, but then takes my hand.

‘Listen, I’ve sorted us a trip out of here on that girl’s windjammer, no questions asked, to somewhere safe. I can’t imagine how you know each other, but she can be trusted. You must do as she says though. Promise me that.’

‘Fine,’ I say through gritted teeth.

‘Good. That’s good,’ says Rona.

She glances at the closed door, as if she can see through the wood to Sky waiting impatiently outside.

I pull my hand away. ‘Why is this happening to me?’

‘It’s too long a story,’ she says, with a tired shake of her head. ‘Try and be sensible, Kyle. I’ll tell you everything later, I promise you I will.’

Try and be sensible?

Oh sure. Turns out I’m the bane of Wrath.

A monster so awful that I make my girlfriend’s skin crawl.

I smash my fist on to the table, sending stuff flying. I jump up, sweep my backpack to the floor, kick my chair across the room. ‘This is all your fragging fault! You should have told me. You should’ve stopped this happening. You –’

And I say some terrible things.

Rona doesn’t flinch, just watches me as I rage and stamp about. When I stop, panting and helpless, she’s there to gather me in her arms. She pulls me close. I sense then how she’s trying to be strong for both of us.

‘I’m sorry,’ I whisper, ashamed.

‘So am I,’ she says. She pulls back and does her best to smile, but her eyes are shiny with sadness. ‘More sorry than you can ever know.’ She dabs at her eyes with a rag.

I feel a stab of guilt. I’ve seen her bleak before, but never cry.

‘When you were little,’ she says, ‘I told myself the less you knew about your past, the better it would be. Life’s tough enough, I thought.’ She clicks her tongue. ‘When you got older, I think I’d just got into the habit of keeping secrets.’

She takes my hands again. This time I don’t pull away.

‘Right or wrong, everything I did, I did for you. You must know that.’

A tear escapes down her face, drips off her chin onto my wrist.

‘I didn’t mean those things I said,’ I tell her.

‘I know,’ she says. ‘Kyle, you’re frightened and you’re confused. With everything that’s happened to you, I can’t blame you for being angry. And we all say things we regret when we’re angry. It’s only . . . human.’

‘You’re sure I’m not a monster?’

‘Kyle, you’re no monster,’ she says, looking me in the eye. ‘Believe me.’

I think about that caged creature I saw at the Peace Fair.

‘But what am I then?’

She gives her head a little shake. ‘Just a boy who heals quickly. And maybe you’re stronger and faster than other boys. Different – that’s all. No twisted blood. Not evil. On any other world, it wouldn’t be a curse, it’d be a blessing.’

I’m shocked. ‘Isn’t that heresy?’

‘Heresy? Hah, that’s what they’d like you to think.’

She leads me back to the table and puts her hands to her cheeks, which drags her skin down so taut she looks a hundred years old. ‘You must understand, this whole rotten world is built on lies. Our so-called Saviour is the biggest liar of all. Nothing is what it seems, not even me. But the biggest lie of all is that kids like you will grow up to be monsters. Whatever happens, never believe that.’ She sighs. ‘Just listen to me, droning on all self-righteous about lies. I may not have lied to you, Kyle, but I’ve hidden the truth and that’s just as wicked. I’ve been a fool.’

I reach over and cover her cold fingers with my warm ones.

‘So tell me the truth.’

Rona shifts uneasily, looks past me, at something that isn’t in the room.

‘The truth? The truth is that you’re in great danger now, Kyle. And not only because of what you are, but because of who you are.’

‘Huh?’ I say, not sure I heard this right.

But Rona doesn’t explain. Instead she throws her head back and stares up at the ceiling. I look too. For one mad second, I half expect to see her secrets carved into the rough-hewn rafters, but all I see are bugwebs and shadows.

‘Okay,’ I say, fighting to keep frustration out of my voice, ‘when I asked if you knew about me being different, you said you weren’t sure. You said something else like there was always a chance it was me. What did you mean by that?’

I squeeze her hand, until she looks at me.

‘Even as a healer I couldn’t tell,’ she says, her voice a whisper. ‘After you shrugged off the swamp pox, I thought it likely. But I wasn’t sure until a few days ago. You see, Kyle –’ She hesitates, a vein squirming at her temple. ‘I suppose deep down I’d always hoped that it wasn’t you, that it was your brother.’

My next heartbeat is a long time coming. ‘My brother?’

More tears wriggle down her face. ‘Your identical twin. Colm.’

I stand up so fast, my vision goes all blurry.

‘What? I have a brother ?’

Rona reaches for me, but I recoil.

‘Kyle,’ she pleads.

The door bangs open. Sky sticks her head inside, looking real tense.

‘We’ve got company!’

Somehow, Rona beats me to the door. I’m trying to peer past her when her whole body stiffens. I hear her sudden intake of breath. When she turns round, I see she’s bitten her lip so hard it’s bleeding. I squeeze past and look outside. In the distance, I see a column of flaming torches, slowly winding its way towards us.

No three ways about it – it’s a lynch mob.

‘Oh, Jude,’ I groan. ‘What the hell have you done?’

‘Time to go,’ hisses Sky.

Rona runs, grabs my parka and my daypack and hurls them at me.

‘Don’t stand there!’ she yells. ‘Get out by the back window.’

She rips open a cupboard and grabs a plastic container. Stunned, I watch as she tears the cap off and starts sloshing liquid over walls and floor.

I know that stink – it’s surgical spirit.

‘I’m not leaving you,’ I shout.

Rona throws the empty container down. ‘I’ll catch up with you at the old landing ground. Now please, Kyle, do as I say for once. And hurry!’

What old landing ground?

The girl starts hauling me away, but I shrug her off.

‘Don’t be an idiot,’ she says.

Next thing I know, Rona is shaking me.

‘Kyle, there’s a gun in your pack. Don’t be scared to use it if you have to. We do still have friends out there, more than you know. Sky will take us to them; we’ll be safe there. I love you. Now, get moving! I’ll follow as soon as I can.’

She crushes her lips to my cheek, then shoves me away.

I want to say, ‘I love you too.’

But a sudden gust of wind rattles the shutters, bringing with it the sound of men’s voices, baying for twist blood. And they’re shouting my name.

It’s like I feel rope around my neck already.

I throw myself out of the window after the girl. I run and run and don’t look back until a whoosh sound overtakes me. I stop then, bent over and panting after the steep climb. Way below me a red and orange fireball leaps high into the night sky. The torches of the lynch mob scatter. I hear angry cries. I think maybe I see a figure flit from the back of the blazing shack and dodge through leaping shadows. Only I can’t see anything but flames now as Sky appears beside me, gasping.

‘Rona knows what she’s doing,’ I tell her. Tell myself.

‘Good,’ she says, sounding disgusted. ‘But you don’t. Where do you think you’re going? The landing ground’s up this way.’

She stomps away off to my left and the darkness swallows her.

PART TWO

9

WAITING

When the sun finally drags itself up in the west, bathing the world in watery dayshine, I reckon I’ve done enough running. I’ve never come this way on any of my hunting trips, so have only the vaguest idea where we are – someplace high in the mountains north of Freshwater. Half an hour ago, in pitch-darkness, the trail crossed over a ridge. We’ve been descending ever since.

Sky’s ahead of me, limping along and not looking back.

It’s been a hell of a night getting up here, cold and hard and scary. How we weren’t stalked and gobbled by gibbercats or nightrunners, I’ll never know.

With a curse, I ease the pack from my aching shoulders. My stomach rumbles, so I find a rock to sit on, take a drink from my canteen and open the pack. Knowing Rona, she’ll have packed food. Sure enough, first thing I find is a bag of nuts and berries. I start munching. Below me, the trail switchbacks down to a plateau and what looks like an abandoned landing ground. The grass runway is overgrown. There’s a barn with a water tower leaning against it, and some fallen-down shacks. At one end of the runway, I see what must be the steam winch, with its boiler, smokestack and cable drums. But what I don’t see is any windjammer. I have another dig in the pack then, looking for the gun Rona said was in there.

It’s at the bottom, still wrapped in its oily rag.

‘No way,’ I say, when I unwrap it.

I’d hoped for a blaster or a flamer, something lethal. But no, this is some ancient slug-thrower from the Long Ago on Earth. A quick fiddle and I get the cylinder thing in the middle to fall open. More disappointment. Three rusty bullets, three empty chambers. It’s not even fully loaded. Just great. The whole world wants me dead and Rona gives me a weapon that will probably blow up in my face if I shoot it. I try aiming it, but it’s so heavy it wobbles all over the place.

Sky turns and slogs back up the trail to me.

Quickly, I stuff the old gun back into my pack. If I’m tired, Sky looks destroyed. Despite it still being chilly enough up here for me to be glad of the parka Rona made me take, sweat is running down the girl’s face. Those painted bars under her eyes are all smudged, dripping down into her hollow cheeks.

‘What the frag are you doing?’ she says, looking mad as hell.

‘Oh, we’re talking now?’ I say.

The whole night, she’s pretty much ignored me. A few times, I asked her where we were going – the most I ever got back was a grunted ‘up’.

I fake-smile. ‘Want some nuts?’

Her dark eyes blaze. For a second, I think she’ll knock them from my hand.

‘Stuff your face later,’ she snaps. ‘We need to keep moving.’

I shake my head. ‘This is as far as I go.’

‘Don’t be stupid.’

‘I’m waiting here for Rona.’

Sky surprises me. I expect her to bite my head off, but she doesn’t. ‘You’ll be waiting a long time,’ she says softly.

I shrug. Sure, I know what she’s thinking – I’ve thought it too. My head is thumping from thinking it. Maybe Rona’s dead, or captured.

‘I’ll take that chance,’ I say.

Her scowl comes back. ‘I don’t think so. You promised your mother you’d do what I tell you. And I’m telling you to move.’

I stand up so quick that she takes a step back.

‘Yeah?’ I say. ‘So tell me how come I don’t see a windjammer? If you’re leading me into some sort of trap, I’ll kill you.’

‘See that?’ she says, sneering and pointing. ‘That’s camouflage.’

There’s a weird cross-shaped mound covered in scrub at the other end of the runway from the winch. Now that I know where to look, I see the windjammer.

‘Okay,’ I say, feeling stupid. ‘But what about Rona?’

‘What about her? She knows where this place is and how to get here. We’ve got loads to do to get ready for take-off. If you help, it’ll get done faster.’

‘And you won’t go without her?’

‘We’ll wait as long as we can.’ With that, she sets off down the trail again.

After a quick think, I hoist my pack and chase after her.

‘Hey, what do you mean, loads to do?’

‘Look at the state of everything,’ she says, over her shoulder. ‘We took a hell of a risk landing here. If we can’t get the winch going, then –’

She shrugs, but I get it. No winch, no flight, and we’re stuck here.

‘I never knew about this place,’ I say.

She spits. ‘You don’t seem to know much about anything.’

I’m fishing for a comeback when a loud bang sends birds screeching and flapping into the air. I duck, sure we’re being shot at, only to see smoke billow from the chimney of the winch. A man leaps from the cab and staggers away, beating at his windjammer leathers. I’m a long way away, but he looks familiar.

We reach the plateau and the path comes out behind the old barn we saw from the ridge. Sky hurries round it, towards the still-smoking winch.

‘Wait here,’ she says.

Fine by me. This is close enough.

Thought so – the man covered in soot and scorch marks is that massive bald guy who pulled Sky off me at the Fair, a lifetime ago. Even from here, I see he’s very red in the face. Sky marches straight up to him and starts shouting. She waves her arms and then points at me. Not good. I wonder if I should run.

He glances at me, but doesn’t seem interested.

Next thing I know, Sky’s on her way back, pinch-lipped and angry.

‘Not going to introduce us?’ I say as she stalks past.

She stops, and definitely thinks about punching me. ‘His name’s Chane. And I’d stay out of his way if I were you. You’d better come with me.’

I follow her the length of the runway.

‘Help me clear this,’ she says.

Coarse netting is draped over the windjammer’s hull and wings, foliage woven in to break up its outline. We pull the greenery clear, then haul the netting off. I help her to fold it. While she’s stowing it, I stare nervously.

‘You’re sure this thing flies?’

Sky gives a short laugh. ‘How do you think we got here?’

I look more closely and wish I hadn’t.

The windjammer looks like an enormous metal bug. Where I expected sleek, the body of the machine is fat and round. The hull is a patchwork of battered metal panels, many stained orange-brown with rust. The wings are thick and stubby.

My heart sinks. ‘Who sold you this scrap? You should get your money back.’

‘Ha ha.’ Sky reaches up and strokes the hull. ‘She may be ancient, but she’s still the finest jammer on Wrath. We call her Rockpolisher.’

I open my mouth, then shut it again. Don’t want to know.

‘Could Chane use any help?’ I say later, after another winch explosion.

‘Don’t make me laugh,’ says Sky.

Annoyed, I wander off to the barn. Inside I find an old cable-retrieve tractor rusting away, roughly the same as the ones we plough with back in Freshwater. The barn’s roof has kept the worst of the weather off it. There are even some mouldy old lumps of coal left in its hopper. Getting my hands dirty working on it is a relief and it takes my mind off Rona and Jude. All it needs is a patch for a leaking high-pressure line and a fill of water, before I light the firebox. Pressure builds nicely. She rattles like a box of nails when I crash her into gear, but goes okay.

Who’s laughing now?

They both come running, gobs open, as I drive her out of the barn.

‘How’d you fix that?’ bellows Chane.

‘It’s what I do,’ I shout back.

See, Rona heals people – I heal stuff. That’s how we put food on the table. Or how we used to, I mean. I peer up through the smoke and steam at the hillside trail we came along, but nothing moves. What the hell’s keeping her?

‘Why didn’t you say you’re a tech?’ demands Sky.

How badly I want to say she didn’t ask me. I don’t though.

An hour later, Chane and me get the winch going. It’s a punch-the-air moment, but scary too. Even at idle, the winch’s boiler runs at far higher pressure than the tractor, but it’s much rustier. Some of the vortex-multiplier pipes look so knackered I swear I could crush them with my bare hands. We both step back as it starts. It coughs and splutters, but keeps chug-chugging away.

‘She won’t last long at full revs,’ I say.

‘No problem,’ says Chane. He slaps my back, nearly knocks me over. ‘She only has to last a few seconds – that’ll get us off the ground.’

I can’t decide if he’s joking or mad. Or both.

We use the tractor to pull the cable out from the winch to the windjammer. I watch, fascinated, as Chane unhooks the looped end of the cable and attaches it to a quick-release hook set into the jammer’s belly. We’re all set now. I know roughly how this works, even if I’ve never actually seen it. It’s like flying a kite – the winch winds the cable in at full power and hauls us into the air.

I think that’s how it goes anyway.

When I look up, I see Sky standing at the edge of the plateau. She’s holding a small device above her head and staring at it. I wander over. One boot-length behind her is the cliff edge, a drop that makes my palms go all sweaty.

‘What you doing?’ I ask.

‘Checking the wind speed,’ she says, chewing her lip.

And that’s when I notice how calm it is, no breath of wind on my cheek.

In the wind-scoured Barrenlands, that’s weird.

Chane joins us. For such a big man, he moves quietly.

‘No wind, no ridge lift,’ he says. ‘Our lift-cells give buoyancy, but to soar we need updraughts from wind hitting the cliff. Launch now and it’s a one-way trip down to the valley floor.’ He grins, showing me teeth green and rotten from chewing shadeweed. ‘Don’t worry. Wind’ll be back, soon as the day warms up.’ He stomps off then and starts checking all the windjammer’s control surfaces.