Glass Swallow

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© Julia Golding 2010

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First published 2010

First published in this eBook edition 2011.

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ISBN: 978-0-19-275754-8

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For Lucy

C
aught out in the storm, Rain ran for home, fleeing the barrage of droplets hammering rings in the dirty puddles. Her normal route down Smith Alley had become a quagmire.

‘Blast all weather-sayers,’ she muttered, hovering on the edge of the muddy walkway, wondering if she could make it across. If she did, it would be at the expense of her new stockings and leather boots. She should have taken no notice of the local weather-woman who had promised a fine day.

Thunder crackled, urging caution. Deciding to wait out the worst under an overhanging roof, Rain retreated to huddle against the wall, sheltering her basket from the downpour. Shivering a little in the chill breeze, she pulled her shawl around her head and closed her eyes, listening to the raindrops hitting the roof above.

A cart rumbled past, the owner huddled under an improvised cloak of canvas, his grizzled face staring determinedly out from under the peak of his hood.

‘Want a lift, little mistress?’ the old man called.

‘No, thank you,’ Rain answered, giving him a smile. ‘I’ll wait it out here in the dry.’

‘Suit yourself. Spearthrower weather this,’ he grumbled as he clicked the horse into movement again.

‘Yes, it’s cruel enough.’

‘Good day to you.’

‘Good day.’

The cart jolted away, dousing the walls of the alley with dirty water, the backwash slopping on Rain’s skirt, wetting the navy-blue swallows she had embroidered on the hem. She grimaced, cursing herself softly for not jumping out of the way in time. The wagon turned the corner and she was alone again. From the look of the skies, it seemed likely she might be trapped here for a while yet. Rain seized the chance to dream, letting her thoughts trickle back to the past like the water running away down the gutter.

According to her father, she had begun life in such a storm. Born on the first day of March in the third year of the reign of King Ramil and Queen Taoshira, she emerged into the grey morning of the world. As the midwife cut the cord, the heavens opened, rain pouring from the eaves over the bedroom window like a waterfall. The flowering vine that clambered up the brickwork and peeked into the room stirred and twitched under the onslaught, orange trumpet petals bobbing a fanfare. Flushed red with outrage, the newborn mewed and protested as she took her first unwilling breath, fists waving blindly. Her mother, roused by the cry, lifted her head from the pillow and reached out to take the child.

‘Little Rain,’ Sunbeam murmured, snuggling the baby to her breast, choosing a name suiting the moment of birth, as was the custom in the families belonging to the glassmakers’ guild.

Torrent took his wife’s hand in his scarred fist, smoothing his fingers over her palm. He caressed her with the same light touch he used for his finished masterpieces as they cooled after exposure to the furnace. Torrent and Sunbeam had waited so long for their family and he could hardly believe it had finally happened.

‘She’s a miracle, Sunbeam,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Perfect. And she’ll be the first of many, you’ll see. She’ll have brothers and sisters to play with. She’ll never be alone.’

But he was wrong. There were to be no more children. Before the year was out, fever swept the land and Sunbeam Glassmaker was among those who died, leaving Torrent with a baby to tend and a business to manage.

‘You must marry again, for the child’s sake,’ his neighbours advised the silent man as he toiled over his workbench, rolling, spinning, and blowing the molten gather, twisting it with pincers into anguished shapes.

Rain’s father merely shook his head and returned to creating droplet-shaped bubbles, the only tears he allowed himself to shed. As he finished each one, he suspended it over his daughter’s cradle. He carried on until the ceiling in her bedroom was covered with them. When the setting sun shone obliquely through the window, the teardrops caught the light, scattering rainbows across her room. Finally, his grieving at the furnace done, he sat beside Rain’s cot and admired the effect.

‘I’ll fetch you the moon and stars, Rain,’ he crooned to the baby. ‘But for now, here’s your mother’s sunbeams. You and I must carry on.’

As she had grown, the teardrop bedroom had stayed with Rain, a sanctuary in her busy home. It had become the place where she dreamed and made her plans. Now she had reached fifteen, and her father had risen to the head of his craft, his workshop on the outskirts of Tigral a place of pilgrimage for those who wished to collect the finest glassware. There was rarely a quiet moment. Young men fought to become his apprentices; he could have filled his house three times over with pupils had the guild rules allowed. Rain thought the five who lodged there at the moment were more than enough, their voices loud in the kitchen, boots clattering on the stairs at all hours.

And feeding them required many trips to and fro from the market, even when the weather was like this. Rain wriggled her toes in her damp boots, amused by her ability to blame the apprentices for everything.

The clouds were beginning to break up, the intensity of the storm fading. Despite the damp, cold conditions, Rain felt strangely content, set apart by the weather which was keeping others indoors. She so rarely got any peace at home. Orders for her father’s products had flooded in ever since Torrent developed an expertise in the making of stained-glass windows; all acknowledged him as the leading exponent of the art. To walk into a room lit by a Torrent window was to step inside a miracle, they said, and Rain agreed. Little wonder that the Queen herself had chosen him to make the stained glass for the temple being built in the palace complex.