The Amber Legacy (38 page)

Meg filled her days with practising spells, finding casting easier now that the crystal was locked within her. Her portal experimentations were meticulous. She rehearsed the words, and although she was guessing at how the Ranu pronunciation would sound, she was buoyed by her success with the embedding spell. The problem with the portal spell was that there was no margin for error. Every book warned of the dire consequences arising from ill-prepared and badly operated portals. At best, the traveller might end up in the wrong place. Death was a more likely outcome. And she was careful to master the ability to close a portal after she had used it. It would be foolish to leave a door through the fabric of time and place open for anyone to use, she decided, after reading the warnings in the Alfyn text of how users of magic had inadvertently left portals open and had been subsequently consumed by the pursuing dragons they’d tried to escape.

When she felt confident that she knew the spell, she chose a space between two tall thin pines, and methodically broke the lower branches from the two trees to create a gap like the frame to a door. Her first eight attempts at forming a portal failed, and each failure drove her back to the texts to revise and remodel her approach. On the ninth attempt, as she completed the brief Targan incantation in place of the Ranu version, lightning crackled between the tree trunks, and settled into a shimmering blue haze. She stared in amazement at what she had conjured.

She had no idea where the portal led. She hadn’t targeted it, just concentrated on creating an entry point. According to the Ranu text, there had to be two similar poles at the target point for the spell to connect accurately. The Targan text contradicted the Ranu text, suggesting that as long as the caster had a very clear image of the destination in mind, the portal would link to that place. The Alfyn book said that portals found their own points of contact, partly guided by the caster’s intent and partly randomised because of the complex nature of the spell. Curious about her handiwork, she approached the glow, peered in, and was surprised to see the dim image of a desert-like, alien landscape. The portal’s blue light didn’t enhance the scene. She spent most of the afternoon admiring and studying her creation, wondering how long it would remain before its energy imploded, but only when she decided that she was hungry and needed to go back to her shelter did she discover that the portal was stable and permanent. In the evening, with Whisper on her lap, she sat and stared at the blue glow, knowing that she had created a means of escape from her prison. The question was, to where would she escape? And how could she guarantee that she would reach her destination?

The sight of sails in the tiny cove as she reached the peak of the hill horrified her. For all the time that she had waited, fearing Seer Truth would come after the crystal, she had expected to see the ship, but with the passing of Fuar she accepted that she was forgotten.
It may not be him
, she reasoned, as three longboats pulled away from the anchored vessel and headed for the beach.
It might be a rescue party sent by the Queen.
She watched the longboats ride the waves to shore, where the sailors climbed out to haul them onto the
sand. Soldiers disembarked—and two men in blue robes. Her heart sank. She wasn’t sure that either Seer was Truth, but who else would come to this desolate place? And who had accompanied him?

She picked up Whisper, wondering what to do. She could hide. But what was the point? If Seer Truth wanted to find her, it wouldn’t be hard on this island. They’d find her home. Then it would only be a matter of time before they tracked her down. She had hunted enough animals to know that hunting done well always turned up the quarry. What she needed to know were their intentions. So she had to stay where she was, and observe them. She might even get an opportunity to go closer and listen.

Two figures were thrust apart from the main assembly on the beach, and viciously beaten to their hands and knees by the soldiers. Shocked by the cruel scene, she crept down the hillside, keeping to the cover of the mallee and the granite rocks, until she was within thirty paces of the main group. The waves muffled the soldiers’ voices, but she could see that the two victims were naked and bruised and bleeding. One had long white hair. The other was a younger man. The soldiers surrounding them wore the Royal crest on their chest plates.

She spotted Truth, standing apart from the group. The other Seer was Light. They were discussing something calmly, and after every few words Truth gazed up towards the hills, as though he was intending to look beyond the beach. To her horror, she saw an animal on a heavy chain held by two soldiers: a goldencoated animal—a dingo. Her stomach churned. What was Seer Truth intending? But she knew the answer. Sunfire was brought to track her. He’d be so excited when he smelled her scent that he’d come looking for her and Whisper and betray them with his love. Her
shock at seeing the dingo twisted into fury. What kind of bastard was Truth to do that? Why Sunfire?

She started to rise, but a feeling formed in her mind.
No. Bad.
She smoothed Whisper’s coat as she formed the reply,
Staying here.
Her curiosity returned to the men who were being pushed and kicked and hit. The old man collapsed, face into the sand, and a soldier’s heavy boot crunched down on the nape of his neck. At that moment, the younger man launched at the soldier and wrestled with him. The soldier’s companions rushed in, but in the struggle the victim wrenched a sword from his attacker’s scabbard and wielded it menacingly. The circle expanded out of his sweeping reach, but they continued to taunt him, their weapons also drawn. Seeing the situation develop, Truth and Light approached the circle. Truth spoke to the captive. He turned his back and walked away with Light. The circle of soldiers closed in on their quarry. There was a brief and savage exchange, which sent two soldiers staggering back, clutching wounds, before the weight of numbers cut the victim to his knees. Satisfied they’d finished their sport, the circle disengaged, walking away to join their companions who were holding the dingo, leaving the fatally wounded man to die in the sand.

Meg wanted to know who had been killed—who Truth had brought on his hunting party for sport—but she also knew she was now the focus of the hunting party and she would have to escape. The men with Sunfire exchanged the restraining chain for a flexible lead, and gave the dingo his head. Sunfire sniffed along the shore for several paces. Then he began weaving back and forth, as if he was collecting important information, finding his bearings, before he headed across the sand towards the bush. He was leading the soldiers and the Seers diagonally away from where Meg
and Whisper hid, but he was taking them unerringly towards her old shelter. From there, she knew he’d connect with the path to her actual sleeping place, and within a short while he’d be tracing fresh scents to where she was.

As the party melted into the khaki bush, she estimated how long it would take Sunfire to track her and figured that, if she was quick, she could get a look at the bodies to find out who had been killed. But when she stepped onto the sand, she spotted three heads peering over the gunwales of the beached longboats and knew she’d been seen. She should have known they wouldn’t leave the boats untended. The men clambered out, yelling to their colleagues as they ran towards her. She had no choice. She clutched Whisper to her chest and bolted into the bushes.

She reached the summit of the hill in time to see her pursuers at the bottom waving frantically. The main party had returned and was skirting the edge of the bush to join the others. From where she stood, she could cut obliquely across the slope of the hill and reach her sleeping shelter before the Seers and their soldiers. And then what? She could retreat to the next hill overlooking the western side of the island. And then? The Seers trapping her was merely a matter of time.

There
was
one other choice. She slipped Whisper inside her tunic, and ran across the slope and descended into the valley, heading towards her sleeping quarters. As she neared them, she veered across the empty creek bed and clambered up through a jumble of rocks into a pine grove. She knew the pursuing men were making considerable ground because she could already hear their voices, but she sucked in her breath and weaved through the trees until she reached the glowing portal.

For a moment, she reconsidered her desperate plan. She had no idea where the portal would take her. If she had more time, she could conjure a new one and focus it on a specific destination. She thought about making a heroic and defiant stand, the kind heroes made in ballads—after all, her life had become ballad-like through a strange series of events that seemed less and less believable, except that they were
actually
happening to her. She imagined her pursuers arriving, and Seer Truth speaking menacingly, and she would make a famous reply before she defied him by stepping into the portal and escaping. Of course, Sunfire would leap through after her, just as the portal sealed and vanished, leaving Truth open-mouthed and defeated.
Romantic fantasy
, she thought and smiled grimly.
The best option is simply to vanish and close the portal in my wake.

Heavy boots crushed dry leaves, scattering pebbles and cracking twigs. Men were coming through the pine grove.
Sunfire
, she silently pleaded.
I can’t save you.
A tear gleamed at the edge of her eye. She had no other choice. Uttering three short words in the ancient Ranu tongue, she gritted her teeth and plunged into the shimmering blue. The portal vanished.

S
he was on her knees, vomiting from the rush of vertigo. When she tried to lift her head, it spun, so she stared at the soft grey dust enveloping her arms to her elbows. She waited for the world to stop moving. Eventually she sank back into the dust onto her rump. For an eternity, in every direction, the sea of grey dust spread under a cloudless sharp blue sky—a flat, bleak landscape, broken only by isolated and twisted shapes of dead white trees. She sifted the grey dust through her trembling hands.
Where am
I? she wondered.
What have I done?
Whisper emerged from her tunic, her tiny black snout sniffing and twitching nervously.
Where?
Meg felt the rat thinking.
Where indeed?
she pondered.

As she gingerly rose, her mouth dry, the strange dust fell away. She looked for residual grains, but her skin and clothes were clean. In every direction, there was nothing but grey dust and dead white trees. She’d travelled through the portal to a desert without end, and condemned herself to death—
unless I create another portal. Where?
There were no perpendicular poles and the trees were too far apart.
I could break branches from the trees to create poles. That could be the answer
, she decided.

She let Whisper climb onto her shoulder before she trudged through the deep dust towards the nearest tree. Closer to the tree, she almost fell into a rectangular hole—with steps leading down. Dust covered the first three steps. The lower steps were clean grey stone disappearing into darkness.
Who lives here?
she wondered.
Or are these old ruins of some kind?
Apart from the trees, nothing filled the landscape. She assessed her options. ‘Come on,’ she said to the rat. ‘What have we got to lose?’ and she headed down.

The steps were steep, but the stonework was very fine quality, and the walls were carved with intricate dragon motifs. As she descended into the darkness, her spine tingled and she stopped. Why was she feeling the presence of magic when she hadn’t cast a spell? As she waited, listening, Whisper slid from her shoulder and dropped to the floor.
Looking
, the rat told her, and vanished down the steps.
Come back
, Meg ordered, but Whisper didn’t respond. To go any deeper she needed to be able to see. She concentrated on forming a sphere of light, but, to her astonishment, the spell failed. She repeated the conjuration and failed again. Her instinct was to call Whisper, and run. But run where? There might be a way out of this place if she searched deeper.
Whisper?
she projected.
Come back.
She waited, but when the rat still didn’t reappear, she descended, apprehensively wondering why her light spell hadn’t worked.

The steps dropped deep into the earth, enveloping her in darkness, so she went carefully and slowly, with one hand on the smooth stone wall to guide and steady her. She also kept her mind attuned to voices, hoping to hear Whisper. Where the steps ended, she discovered a narrow tunnel lit by a very faint green glow.
Whisper?
she projected, but there was no answer. She focussed on creating light again, and this time a small sphere
materialised in her palm, leaving her to wonder why she’d failed at the spell higher up the stairway. She refined the light’s intensity, and made the sphere float ahead until she was at the edge of its radiance. Summoning her courage, she entered the tunnel, following her light.

The tunnel ended at a large circular chamber, lit by a green glowing shaft that emanated from the ceiling and flowed over a twisted mass at the chamber’s centre. Meg surveyed the space warily, and noted three dark tunnel exits, set equidistant so that, with the one in which she stood, they quartered the chamber. Apart from the central mass, the chamber was vacant.
Whisper
? she asked again.

Within a few paces of the green light shaft, she realised that the twisted mass in the centre was a naked man on a black rock sculpted in the shape of a sleeping dragon. The man’s legs were twisted agonisingly back under his body and bound by a thin strand of gold wire. His arms were spread wide across the black sculpture’s broad back, sickeningly held in place because he was pinned through his shoulders to the sculpture by two axes—one gold, one black. His body was covered with vicious, open wounds and bruises, a wretched vision that made her feel sick, but her pity was greater. As she studied the prisoner splayed across the sculpture, fascinated by his silver hair, she was overwhelmed by the intense magic emanating from the green light. It flooded her senses, making her dizzy. She reached forward inquisitively, but stopped a finger’s breadth from making contact, her instinct warning her that the light’s magical energy was probably dangerous. Instead, she searched for something to test penetrating the shaft. When she realised that there was nothing useful in the chamber, she tore a small strip from her tunic, rolled it up, and tossed it into the green light.
There was a flash of flame, a hiss, and the material vanished in smoke. She stepped back, grateful that she hadn’t touched the shaft.

Whisper ran towards her across the stone floor from a tunnel.
Run
, the rat projected, and leaped. Meg caught her and the rat repeated her urgent plea. She tucked Whisper inside her tunic and ran for the steps.
No
, Whisper projected, like a scream.
Other way.
Confused, Meg halted. Metal clanged against stone. A ghostly blue light shone in the entry tunnel. Instantly, Meg dissolved her light sphere, and bolted for the opposite exit. Several paces in, she crouched in the dark, and waited.

Enveloped in a blue aura, two armoured men marched into the chamber. Tall, solidly built, their helmets hiding their features, they walked with arrogance, spurs jangling on their boots. Both carried longswords. Morning stars dangled from their belts. The air in the tunnel grew colder, and her spine prickled with an intensity that almost made her swoon. The men paused before the green shaft, exhaling white vapour. They spoke to the prisoner, although she couldn’t hear what they said, before they separated, each heading for a tunnel in the opposite walls, each enveloped in pale blue light that faded as they disappeared.

Nothing in this place made sense. It was as if she’d walked through a magical door into a magical world and all the childhood nursery rhymes and tales her mother and father had told her were real. Or had she passed out when she stepped into her portal and this was an intense dream in her unconscious state? How could she get out of this insanity?

She moved cautiously back into the chamber, where the air was still chilly from the presence of the strangers, and stood before the green shaft of light.
How do I get out of this place?
she wondered. ‘I create
another portal,’ she told herself, and her voice echoed. She went to the tunnels that the strangers had entered and ventured a short distance along each, checking that they were not lurking in the dark. When she was certain that they were gone, she crossed to the entrance and began to create her portal spell.

When she was finished, she studied her handiwork. The blue portal shimmered in the chamber doorway that led to the steps and outside. This time, in forming the magical doorway, she focussed the target point on a place she knew well. She would close it as she left. Whatever lurked in this strange world, she couldn’t risk letting it out.
What if this is the place from where the Alfyn’s dragons had come?
she wondered. She summoned Whisper. The rat returned from her adventures along the tunnel in which they’d hidden and climbed into Meg’s hands. Meg gazed for a final time at the figure in the green light. ‘I wish I knew who you were,’ she murmured, ‘and why someone imprisoned you like this.’ His face was almost misshapen, elongated—not ugly, just very different—but it was turned half away from her and the features partly hidden. His skin was milky white, where it wasn’t battered or cut, and she had the impression that he’d only recently been impaled on the dragon statue. The magical green light also intrigued her, her spine constantly shivering in its presence.

The clang of metal startled her. An armoured man stood in a doorway to her left, shrouded in his blue aura. When she saw the red glare of his flame eyes, she stifled a scream and edged back a pace. The man’s gloved hand closed around the hilt of his sword, and he slowly drew the weapon from its scabbard. She was in real trouble. She sprinted for the portal. The distance was barely ten paces, but as she plunged into the blue haze sharp pain sliced across her back.

Her back stung. Her cheek was pressed against a cool tile. She opened her eyes, feeling nauseous. Recognising the familiar black and gold pattern of her palace chamber floor, she went to push up, but collapsed with a groan as a sharp burning pain cut through her back.
Hurt
, she heard in her head. Whisper nuzzled her cheek.
Get help
, Meg tried to convey, as she formed an image of the Queen. Then she dry-retched, winced with pain at the involuntary spasm, and fainted.

She was in a vast chamber, flooded with familiar green light. She felt something around her ankles and when she looked down, she saw grey dust rising like water. She realised without surprise that she was naked, as if she expected that, and she wasn’t perturbed by the rising dust, just curious.

Help me, she felt a presence beg, and she understood that the plea came from the stark white figure splayed across the black dragon.

Who are you? she asked.

You know who I am, the presence told her. Help me.

She felt as if she did know him, but not by name—and yet she sensed she even knew his name, if she could only remember it. She went to move towards the mass in the light, but the grey dust was already up to her waist, holding her, and at the edge of the light armoured warriors moved like shadows, heading for her, and she knew they were not her friends.

Help me, the voice pleaded.

I can’t, she wanted to say, but the images weren’t forming.

Help me, and I will help you.

‘What is your opinion?’

‘It’s not the wound, Your Majesty. That’s already healing, miraculously.’

‘So what can you do?’

‘I’ll keep applying the leeches, Your Majesty. Patience is all I can offer.’

‘And I’ll keep seeking an answer as to who would attack her in the palace, Your Majesty.’

‘You might be better served finding out how she got back here without being seen by anyone. Why is security so lax in my palace? Do something about it, Follower, or I’ll replace you.’

‘Yes, Your Majesty.’

‘And I want to know where she’s been these past three cycles.’

‘Yes, Your Majesty.’

Her senses told her that she was on her stomach in a soft bed. She felt as if she had woken from a long deep sleep, her eyelids heavy, her body light. Instead of revealing that she was awake, she kept her eyes closed and listened to the three voices, fascinated to hear people talk about her as if she wasn’t really there.

‘Is she eating or drinking yet?’

‘She hasn’t stirred, Your Majesty. If she doesn’t drink soon, I cannot help her.’

The comment made her aware of the dryness in her mouth. She swallowed and tried to lick her lips, and discovered that she was unpleasantly thirsty. She opened her eyes. ‘Your Majesty?’ she heard a man say. Then the Queen’s voice—‘Amber?’ The room was dark, except for candlelight flickering along the curtains and across the furniture. A hand gently caressed the side of her head, brushing her hair, and the Queen appeared, squatting at the bedside. ‘How do you feel?’

‘Calm,’ Meg replied, the word rasping over her dry tongue. ‘Thirsty.’

The Queen rose and returned with a goblet of water. ‘Drink slowly,’ she advised.

Meg rolled onto her side and let the Queen hold the goblet to her lips, as she sipped clumsily at the cool, refreshing liquid. She wanted to gulp down more, but the Queen withdrew the goblet, repeating, ‘Slowly.’ She was glad to see her familiar bedroom furniture, but as her eyes deliberately flicked past the bassinette by the curtains, she felt the pang of loss rush into her eyes and she burst into tears, shaking uncontrollably. The Queen wrapped a comforting arm around her shoulders, whispering, ‘It’s all right, Amber. You’re safe now. You’re safe.’

In the bath, she explored the red welts along her arms and legs and on her stomach, legacies of the doctor’s leeching. She sighed and leaned back, letting the warm water soothe her body. Queen Sunset had said that she would return to talk about what had transpired since she’d left the palace after Meg had bathed. She was glad to be left alone to collect her thoughts because her mind could not relax. Being back in her chambers in the palace where she’d given birth to Jon made her anguish worse. The hot season of Fuar was fading into the changes of Doyanah. If he was still alive, he would already be four cycles old and growing—if he was still alive—and where was he? Tears welled, and she cried for her stolen son. The image of the man pinned and tortured on the dragon statue also haunted her, as did the memory of the warrior whose brutal sword had sliced open her back. She wiped her eyes and washed her face, but the images remained, competing with her memories of Jon.

Dressed in a loose green smock and grey overgown, she nibbled at the plate of cheese and grapes in her bedroom, feeding scraps to Whisper who was preening herself on the edge of the bed.
Happy
, the rat told her.
Safe
and
warm
and
sleep
images crowded her feelings.
The rat’s contentment made her smile, but the emptiness in her heart reminded her of how she had felt after she pulled back Treasure’s visor and discovered the truth of her dreams. ‘And which one will come true next?’ she murmured, anger edging into her sadness. Someone knocked. ‘Who is it?’ she queried, her nerves on edge as she wondered how soon the news of her return would reach her enemies.

‘It’s me,’ she heard the Queen reply. The door opened to admit the Queen and two young women. Sunset’s blonde hair was down and she was wrapped in a dark blue garment that covered her from neck to toe. The accompanying women wore the Royal black dresses of servants. ‘I’m glad you’ve relaxed a little,’ Sunset said, as she took Meg’s hand. ‘I’ve assigned Ruby and Wattle to you.’ She saw Meg’s wary expression, and added, ‘They can be trusted. I hand-picked them personally.’