Skybound Carousel

1. The Card of the Visitor

The Card of the Visitor

My great-great grandmother has been squinting at the card in her withered hand for a full ten minutes now.

“Just show me,” I say, sighing. “It can’t be that bad.”

Old Mother insists on reading our fortunes every Provision Day. Her foresight is a talent she has from being distantly related to the Rhavnan Royal Family. It’s much more magic than my brother and I have, which – let’s be clear – is none.

Finally, she flips the card. It shows a man in robes that billow around his feet. A scarf obscures the lower half of his face, but his eyes are visible, and they’re sharp, watchful. Like they might bring with them bad tidings.

It’s not a card I’ve seen before, although new cards have been known to appear in the deck from time to time, the same way some disappear when they feel they’re no longer needed.

Beneath the image is a curling line of Old Rhavnan script.

“The Visitor. Maybe a holyman?” I guess. “Or another crew rustler?”

The tassels sway on her headscarf as she draws another card from her velvet pack.

The Card of Home.

She places both cards in my hands and I just gape at them.

“Rhavna? Someone’s coming from Rhavna?”

It’s not possible.

I’m only half-Rhavnan, on my father’s side, but it’s where I grew up.

When Hevalla declared war on Rhavna five years ago, my mother, who was the Ambassador to Hevalla to the Queen, sent my brother and I here for reasons that are still hazy to me.

From what I’ve understood, she believed being half-Hevallan put us in danger, and that Hevalla, her country, would be safer for us than the Palace, which is where we lived.

My mother even arranged for Old Mother to accompany us as our legal guardian.

So having a Rhavnan visitor won’t happen. Can’t happen. Not while the Sky War rages on above us – a war started entirely by Hevalla. I’ll never forgive this miserable country for that, or have any loyalties towards it. Even if I have to live in it.

There’s a slam as our front door swings open, and I jump so abruptly my soul just about leaves my body. Eric’s gangly frame hangs slanted in the doorway, and his tanned brow is creased.

“Ara,” he says in a breath. “Can you come outside, please? Vikemy’s here.”

Old Mother grabs the cards off me and stuffs them back into the pack. I run to follow Eric out of the house.

Our State Craftsman is standing at our rickety wooden gate inspecting our donkey, Babba. Behind him are two of his watchers. I do my best to ignore them, and their rifles, as I address him directly.

“We are preparing for Provision, Vikemy. Shall we visit you at Temple later?”

“This won’t take long,” he replies. His voice, as always, is lispy and curling.

He speaks the way I imagine a snake might, if they could.

He even looks reptilian, especially right now, standing in the dry, cracked mud of our front yard.

He is tall and long. The nostrils in his turned-up nose are narrow, like slits.

The dandruff flakes on his bald head are perfect scales.

“Then, how may we help you?” I ask, smoothing the skirt of my dress.

He tracks the movement, his small eyes roving openly over my body. I fold my arms over my chest instantly.

“We have received intelligence that military action is being planned in airspace near us,” he starts. “You will let me know if you see anything off, won’t you? Debris on the beach. Enemy soldiers on foot.”

My frown – which had never really left my face after seeing that strange card – deepens. Is Vikemy going from house to house with this information? We’ve never had a warning like this before.

“We’ll keep our eyes peeled.”

His gaze lands on Babba again.

Pointing at her, he hisses, “This animal was not here, last time I visited.”

“She was given to us a few Provisions ago.” I add, “Thank you. If that was your influence.”

He smiles, but there is no warmth in his eyes. “I can assure you, it wasn’t.”

“Then, the watchers—”

“You really do not know, do you, Ara?”

“Don’t know what?” I prompt, sensing Eric shifting beside me.

“I have many times wondered what makes luck land at your feet. Puts people in your palms. It can only be Rhavnan blood magic, and yet—”

“We have no blood magic,” I rush. “My brother and I aren’t of the royal bloodline – as you know.”

It’s not quite the truth. But it’s not an outright lie either.

Old Mother’s magic is weak – and besides, many Rhavnan people carry traces of royal blood from some distant ancestor or another.

Their talents are minor. No more than parlour tricks, or funny quirks.

I’d yet to see magic – even major magic from nobles – fix a problem common sense couldn’t.

And all of it pales in comparison to the technologies that now exist.

“You mean to tell me,” Vikemy says, “that it is only your winning personality that convinces others to make the sacrifices they do for you?”

I feel as though I’m being rocked about at sea.

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yes. And let us hope, for all of our sakes, there will never come a time when you will.” He inclines his head. “Good day.”

We always make a strange procession on a Provision Day, all of us, even children, pushing our carts or carrying our crates of provisions through the curling streets of our village, past clunky ramshackle houses of mud and wood.

My brother and I walk with Babba between us, now loaded with our baskets of dried fish.

Her tether is slick between my sweating fingers.

The blue sky is cloyingly bright, and the sun is already unforgiving. I regret not bringing my hat.

As we near the archway that opens out onto the Temple grounds, I notice Sal, my late friend Cosmer’s mother. She’s struggling to wheel her cart of freshly laundered and starched soldier’s uniforms. It’s going to flip.

Wasting no time, I bolt over and grasp the handles to pull her cart straight again.

“Shall I push it the rest of the way for you?” I offer.

She shakes her head, hard. It’s a movement that reminds me of her son. In fact, all of her reminds me of him. He had her thick, unkempt coppery hair. Her long neck. Her cheekbones.

“Thank you, Ara. I know I’m getting old. But I need to keep doing what I can, while I still can.”

I know what she means. If she’s deemed to be relying on the help of others to produce her Provision, it might be seen as less valuable. She’d then get less food and essentials from The Assembly in exchange for it.

“Oh, Ara,” she suddenly says, her lined face cracking into a smile. “You’ve become so beautiful.”

I stiffen. “Oh. Thank you.”

“To think Cosmer asked me to keep a watch on you before he left. And yet you’re the one who always seems to be keeping a watch on me.”

“Oh,” I say again, sounding rather like one of the parrots in the Palace’s aviary. “Of course. We all look out for each other.”

“I keep expecting to see him pop out from somewhere. He did that, didn’t he? Disappear. But he always came back.”

Yes. He did. Her words bring it all back.

He would disappear. He was like a fish. Fast and slippery.

People always seemed to be looking for him.

He lived in the house next door to mine, was an errand boy, but he’d end up leaving tasks unfinished or doing tasks he wasn’t supposed to be doing.

I was often sent to look for him. People knew I’d learned the places he liked to disappear to, and I had a knack for spotting flashes of his pale skin or coppery hair in a crowd or under water.

He was just full of energy, full of life, and for that I’d always thought him well-named.

Cosmer – of the Cosmos. We have that word in Rhavnan and Hevallan, but while in Rhavna it tends to mean ‘universe’, in Hevalla it tends to be the way people refer to our planet, and all of the living things in it.

He’d always been kind to my brother and I, even though he’d grown up with Sermons about my country being a lavish, greedy, corrupted place.

Over the two years I’d known him, my feelings towards him had changed – so slowly it was almost imperceptible.

I always wondered if telling him that would have been enough to make him stay.

He’d never mentioned wanting to become a soldier. When the crew rustler landed his ship outside Temple and began bellowing about the virtues of life in Hevalla’s army, he seemed unmoved – bored, even.

Something must have changed. Maybe one of the crew rustler’s speeches got to him. All I know is, the last time I saw him, he was in the air on the crew rustler’s ship.

Eric shouted the news to me while I was bringing in a haul to shore.

Cosmer’s enlisted. You have to come. Now.

Leaving my fish in the boat, I ran as fast as I could.

The ship was hovering above the ground, whirring.

Men and boys were crammed in the open doorway, waving at the crowds.

And I saw him. His hair looked like flames in the sun.

Something rippled in his fist – my ribbon. He’d asked to borrow it that morning.

I’m not sure if he saw me or not before the door closed, the ship rose, and he became a speck on the blue sea of the sky.

I shake off the memories. Try to say something to Sal, but it sticks like a fishbone in my throat. What is there to say?

I don’t blame Cosmer for enlisting as a soldier. It makes sense. He would have liked the idea of fighting for his country, and knowing his mother would receive the extra Provision she would have been entitled to from his service.

But mostly, he would have liked the thought of being part of something bigger than him. He didn’t have many other friends. And he hadn’t known his father, who was rumoured to be a travelling holyman – although Sal had never confirmed or denied that.

So, no, I don’t blame him, or even his mother, for not guessing his plans so that she could stop him.

The only person I blame, is myself.

I walk away, because if I don’t, I’ll cry.

After leading Babba over to the watchers in the Temple grounds, we join the other families already seated on their straw mats.

Temple’s shadow creeps over the flat, barren ground towards us.

It’s the tallest building in our village.

An imposing structure, a block of stone with a belltower topped by a cactus garden.

Vikemy delivers Sermon with extra monotone today.

He steps between us as he thanks us for our Provision for another week, which will sustain not only our village, but our soldiers in the sky.

He has a surprisingly loud voice when he wants to.

It carries over the tops of our heads. Gets into our skulls.

Sometimes, if I close my eyes, I can pretend I’m in the Palace gardens with my friends. Imagine it’s our tutor’s voice speaking, teaching us about world history or famous philosophers, writers, artists.

But when I open my eyes, there are too many differences for it to be a remotely similar experience.

The presence of the watchers, for a start.

The way their sharp silver masks catch the light as they observe us.

The downcast gaze of my neighbours, because it’s offensive to stare directly into the eyes of a State Craftsman.

The air, which reeks of sweat and saltwater and manure and fish and rot.

I look up distractedly, and notice several ships, black as bats and smooth as water, heading towards the sea. It’s unusual to see so many together.

What have they been sent out to do? Will we be safe?

As I lower my gaze, I catch the back of Sal’s head. It brings me back to another memory of her son. The last time we spoke.

He’d caught me that morning outside my house, hanging laundry and thinking about how hungry I was. I was thinner than ever. Our Provision was always minimal before I got better at fishing, and later, had Eric to help me. Barely enough to feed one person, let alone three of us.

I had to squint at Cosmer to look at him. His tall, lean frame was right in the middle of the sun. The sheet I was holding floated between us.

“Brought you some bread,” he said.

I dropped the sheet back into the basket to take the brown paper package he was offering me.

“Thank you.” I quirked my head at him. “Is everything all right? We haven’t seen you in a few days.”

“I can’t really think straight when I’m with you, Ara. And I had some things I really needed to think about.”

I didn’t know what he meant.

But he was reaching for me.

With one finger, he stroked the black silk ribbon I always wore in my hair to tie it over my right shoulder. It was the only possession I had from my life in the Palace.

Having him so close to my neck – my skin – gave me shivers. I tried to calm my heart.

“Can I borrow this?” he asked, quietly.

“Why?”

“I need it for something. But I promise I’ll return it to you.”

There was such a forceful look in his eyes – like he was pleading with me – that I didn’t question him further.

With steady fingers, he untied the ribbon and slid it out of my hair, which now fell loose. There wasn’t much space between us remaining.

I could have sworn his chin tilted towards mine.

But maybe it didn’t.

He was still.

He said, “Let me help you.”

We pegged up the laundry together.

He went home.

Outside Temple, Vikemy’s voice is still echoing across the open space, in a tone that suggests Sermon is almost over.

“Our soldiers have fought hard and won many battles,” he says.

Because they think they have no choice not to. They’re desperately trying to get their families fed with better Provision.

“We will defeat Rhavna and work to liberate its oppressed people, who for too long have been held under the thumb of one bloodline, simply because it may – or may not – contain magic.”

We’re happy to be a monarchy. We were never oppressed. These are lies so you can justify your pointless war against that which you don’t understand.

“The bloodline, and its magic will be eradicated. The dome will be broken. And peace, and equality, will prosper.”

We echo in unison, “The Assembly will prepare. The Assembly will protect. The Assembly Will Provide.”

Vikemy gazes at the crowd as we get to our feet. I help my brother up and notice Vikemy’s beady eyes are now pinned on me. I wonder, fleetingly, if it’s the two of us that he’s picturing eradicating. His nostrils widen, the way a predator’s might when they can scent their prey.

I hate you, I think. I hate you, and your lies, and everything you – The Assembly – stand for.

I grab Eric’s arm and pull him away.

I decide the churning in my stomach is one thing, and one thing only.

Loathing.