Innlechild

Chapter 1

The darkness bloomed into dawn, flooding the valley with light and illuminating the lush gardens and rolling hills of Eden. It was the only place I had ever known. I loved it, truly I did, but I always had this hankering feeling that there was something more, something I was missing.

Today that would change. Today was my eighteenth birthday. Today I was leaving, though I hadn't told my parents yet. Today I would go beyond Eden, and find what I couldn't reconcile here.

Standing from my position on the rocky ledge, I turned back toward the gleaming building which stood atop the hill. It had once housed the cryopods of hundreds of sleeping beasts, preserving them for centuries, but that had all been freed before I was born. My parents and Sentinel, as well as Gahltha and Maruman, had freed them, and now the beasts roamed the surrounding hills.

Maruman had disappeared when I was five, and he was a distant memory, though my mother often spoke of him as if he were dead. Though he was ageing, Gahltha still resided in the fields around Eden. My mother seldom rode him now for fear of hurting him.

I stepped into the house and headed for my room. Petro was waiting for me on the end of my bed, wings folded, beak scratching at his feathers impatiently.

"Innlechild has been gone long," the little owl observed.

"You are lazy," I teased. "Mam told you to watch me, but you were dozing when I left. Aren't you supposed to be nocturnal?"

Petro shook his feathers. "Petro has changed his ways for Innlechild. Innlechild should be grateful," he sent.

I laughed and flung open the window. My father had cut it out of the wall; sleeping beasts didn't need windows. This room had once contained the cryopods of fifty birds, but they had been replaced by my bed, a modified empty cryopod which had once belonged to a monkey. Shoving the bedclothes aside, I pulled out a linen bag my mother made me for a previous birthday and stuffed it with another set of clothes, my journal, a map Sentinel had created, a water-skin, a thin sleeping bag and a bag of dried fruit I had picked from the orchard. Deciding I had best see my parents before I left, I made my way toward the kitchen.

My mother was already there preparing breakfast, her eyes ringed with black. She must have had one of her nightmares again. At least, that was what she called them. Sometimes they came true. I reached out and hugged her, making her mouth curve slightly.

"Morning Mam," I greeted her.

She buried her face in my hair. "Good morning, Cassy. Happy birthday."

I took the bowl from her and set about making breakfast myself. "Sit down and tell me what you saw."

She shook her head. "I don't want to burden you on your birthday."

"I can handle it."

My mother sighed and ran a hand through her raven hair. There was one streak of grey which had appeared a year ago.

"I dreamed that Dragon miscarried again. The look on Matthew's face when she told him was heart-breaking. So much depends on having an heir; it must be terrible for them."

"You miss them."

She nodded. "More than you could know. They were like siblings to me, and I felt so responsible for them. Then I up and left."

"To come here," I added. "Why don't you go back?"

"Futuretellers say I never will, so I suppose I have never tried."

A soft clunk echoed down the hallway, followed by an annoyed grunt. Soon my father appeared, bleary-eyed but grinning.

"Happy birthday." He seized me in a bear hug. "How is my adventurer?"

"I'm great, Da. But Mam is not so much."

He took my mother's hand and squeezed it, releasing me. They shared a look full of love and support, but also etched with remembered pain. I would never understand the depth of their bond.

Not everyone could say their mother had saved the world, but I could with a proud smile. It was hard to believe sometimes, watching her sew or work on the farm, but she carried herself with a strength I could never possess.

The three of us sat about the table and ate breakfast in companionable silence. Petro fluttered in and perched on my head, digging his claws into my mane of hair. I shoved him off and he complained noisily, settling for sitting in the middle of the table. That made my mother laugh, which warmed my heart. She had become increasingly withdrawn lately, and seemed to have recurring nightmares, or perhaps she was dreaming of her friends and worrying about them.

"Can I go exploring today?" I asked, laying aside my empty bowl. "I want to go up past the hills, out of the valley."

"That could take more than a day," my father warned. "It's dangerous out there, Cass. There is a reason none of us have left the valley since we arrived."

"Gahltha has," I retorted.

My mother shook her head. "Gahltha is a wild horse. He can do as he pleases. You are my tame daughter. You don't know how to look after yourself out there."

"I am eighteen, Ma. Under Land laws, that makes me an adult. When am I going to start learning how to take care of myself if I don't take some risks?"

The conversation was interrupted by a loud knocking sound. My parents glanced at each other and then at me.

"I didn't do anything."

"I will see what's happening," my father decided, rising from the table and moving toward the front door. I got up and hurried after him, wiping my mouth on my sleeve, Petro squawking behind me.

My father opened the door, and there stood a young man dressed in a loose shirt and trews with dark skin and long hair. My father gasped. "Swallow?"

The young man bowed his head. "I am not my father, I am afraid. Though I never met him, I am often told of my resemblance to him. I am Sebastien, son of Analivia and Swallow."

"How the blazes did you find us?" my father asked.

"My mother knew you had found Eden, for she dreamed of you. Ines in the Land produced a map, which led me to you."

"Come in," my father urged, beckoning for Sebastien to come inside. He did so, seeming to notice me for the first time and bobbing his head in acknowledgement, though his eyes widened. His mother mustn't have dreamed of me.

"Elspeth, you will never guess who just walked in," my father called.

My mother stood as we entered the kitchen and put a hand over her mouth. "Sebastien!" she exclaimed. "I have dreamed of you and Ana. But why are you here?"

Sebastien smiled what my father might have described as a gypsy smile. "I am here because the Red Land needs help. The Gadfians are rumoured to be mustering their fleet and trying to take back Redport. Matthew, the Red Queen's husband, thinks that you must return to the Red Land and help the Queen."

"Me?" my mother asked. "I can't go back. Sentinel said I would never –"

"Sentinel is a computer machine who figures probabilities using algorithms. Sentinel did not foresee that I would come here without passing through the treacherous lands you trekked on your journey. I came here by glide, and that is how we will leave here."

"Mam doesn't have to leave," I interjected. "I could go. I can beastspeak, farseek, coerce and heal."

"No, Cassy." My father put a hand on my shoulder, infuriatingly paternal and protective. "You stay here."

I shook him off me. "If Sebastien came here in a glide, it would be perfectly safe for me to leave here in a glide. Much better than trying to walk all that way. How long did it take you?"

My father refused to answer, which only made me more determined.

"You can't stop me. I have a bag packed already."

My mother sighed. "Rushton, if Cassy will go, so must I."

"And I will follow," my father replied.

"We must pack." My mother squeezed my shoulder and left the kitchen, my father on her heels. Only Sebastien and I remained, and Petro flapping uselessly above my head.

The gypsy grinned, which annoyed me. Despite the fact he had just provided me with the perfect opportunity to leave Eden, I didn't trust him yet. We had only just met. My parents seemed to take him seriously because they knew his parents, but I was less sure.

"You are Cassy?" he asked, looking pleased with himself.

"I am," I confirmed, raising an eyebrow. "And you are Sebastien. Is this significant?"

The gypsy shrugged. "My mother often speaks of your parents. Elspeth Gordie, guildmistress of the farseekers, who disabled the weaponmachines that caused the Great White, and Rushton Seraphim, formerly the Master of Obernewtyn."

"I know who my parents are. And I know of yours." I eyed him curiously. "But neither of us are our parents. Tell me of you. Who is Sebastien? And why has he travelled all this way to Eden when he should be living happily in the Land?"

"I left the Land a few years ago," he told me. "Against my mother's wishes, I wanted to see the Red Land, see the place where my father died. I travelled there in one of the glides my mother had helped scavenge. When I arrived, I was straight away summoned to an audience with the Red Queen. She was exceedingly curious to meet me, but she seemed preoccupied. She was expecting a child, while also expecting the arrival of a new emissary from the Empire of the White Face Lords. I was allowed to visit the crypt of the first Red Queen's brother, where my father was murdered on the orders of the much-loathed Ariel." The gypsy's face curled in anger.

"While I was in Redport, the emissary arrived with tidings of a mustering of the Gadfian fleet. I was again summoned to the Red Queen, who was there with her husband Matthew. She appeared to be in increasing pain, so he spoke to me of your parents' journey to Eden, and bade me locate Elspeth and bring her to Redport, for the Queen badly needed her. So I took the glide which had transported me from the Land and retraced your parents' steps as best I could with my limited knowledge of the area."

Nodding, I realised the breakfast dishes still sat on the kitchen table and absent-mindedly moved to clear them. "Sentinel?"

"Yes, User Cassy," the computermachine replied.

"Water please."

The tap in the kitchen sink spurted water and I shoved the dishes into it, scalding my hand. "A little colder, please Sentinel."

"Affirmative, User Cassy."

Sebastien seemed unfazed by the computermachine's constant, irremovable presence, though if he was indeed Ana's son, that was no surprise. My mother often talked of Ana's skill with machines. Machine empathy, she called it, and she had sometimes told me I might possess a similar ability.

"Tell me of Cassy," the gypsy insisted suddenly.

I shrugged. "There is little to tell. I have lived in Eden all my life, though I long to explore beyond the hills. My parents forbid it. They fear for me." Petro fluttered over and landed on my shoulder, nibbling at my hair.

My parents re-entered the kitchen, now fully dressed and carrying bags full of supplies. They were deep in conversation.

"You will have to tell Gahltha," my father said.

My mother nodded. "He cannot come with us. He is too old." She pursed her lips. "If we leave, we may not see him again. He may not last while we are gone."

My father patted her arm. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

She bit her lip and nodded. "Dragon needs me. That is all that matters."

"I will fetch my bag," I announced, drying my hands and exiting the kitchen. Petro followed me, dropping feathers as he flew.

"Where Innlechild goes, Petro will follow," he sent.

"I expected nothing less," I told him.

I returned to the kitchen with my bag over my shoulder. "Ready?"

My mother sighed and my father took her hand. "I suppose we are. I beastspoke Gahltha and he is not happy, but the Daywatcher cannot watch me all my life."

We left then, the only home I had ever known. Gahltha was waiting for us as we left the gleaming building, left Sentinel. He snorted in frustration as my mother bid him a tearful farewell.

Then Sebastien was leading us from the valley, toward the shiny glide. And I was entering the Beforetime machine for the first time and buckling into a seat as the glide took off, Sebastien at the helm. And I watched through a window in the floor as Eden slipped away beneath me, perhaps forever.