Lightmaker Read online

  Light flooded past him as he reached the peak. Caliper glanced behind. His home had become a screaming pillar of brilliance. Sheaves of resin paper glowed red before shredding from the tower. Blasphemy never needed half measures. Speed blurred his sails as their canvas ripped, and the windmill rocked like a trapped animal scrabbling for escape. One lantern fell and shattered while others swayed, and the tower’s left side roared and collapsed as broken timbers spewed out. The remains slumped forward. A grit-coloured growl would be the grindstone escaping, and a sail broke loose to hurtle upward before fluttering back to crash into the forest. Only a single spar stayed upright, a spur scratching the night. Church and Christina, both would see.

  The crashing faded, and his light guttered to red and black. Dense thuds slapped the earth as his windmill’s wooden bones plummeted into the trees. The windmill would have lasted centuries, but he’d killed it, along with his miller’s life, and this victory smelt of brick dust and scorched resin. Fighting himself was hard labour; he wanted to fling himself onto the ground and sleep, even though he’d not used his muscles, but Caliper shook moisture from his overalls before striding down the hillock and away from the wreckage. He’d sniff out Ferstus village in the dark. His path hummed with risk, but each step meant making his own light.

  The church would come screaming from all directions towards his windmill’s corpse, and he had to wrap himself in the night’s silence. If he didn’t escape their fists and knives his journey would end in a church cell.

  Chapter 3: dawn comes early

  Phos’s eyes snapped open as streams of silver light slid through her bedroom shutters and lapped across her wardrobe and hammock. Her framed drawings of the world glimmered in the broken night, and Phos leaped up to slap her bare feet onto the wooden floor. This light flickered with a silent pulse, and she flung her shutters open.

  Change had come. A needle of shining energy shimmered in the dawnward forest, and violet-laced rays flared across swathes of trees. Ghostly echoes drifted through the night air to hint at clanking and shattering, and Phos stared as the radiance ebbed and flowed. In a single heartbeat, the distant windmill juddered and folded; light winked out to let the velvet darkness flow back. Tart air stung her lips. Light had shocked the forest beside Stormaze Hill into a breathless silence.

  Warmth might linger under her blankets, but she’d never sleep now. Was this an accident? Flames needed guarding, but the light had shown rhythm, and its violet tinges reminded her of the lanterns paraded on holy nights. Priests said light made a rare gift, but here someone had splashed it like water. The windmill – she’d seen the windmill burst into life – she’d wandered near three years ago to watch its sails snap and billow in the wind, and the rhythm had calmed her, but there’d been no lanterns: churchmen demanded workers manage with daylight whatever their job.

  Churchmen would swarm the site and hide any secrets, but could she get there first? She imagined tiny cogwheels working inside a caterpillar as it wove itself into a butterfly. Change would teach more than questions, and Phos’s fingers traced the welts on her palm. Hadn’t her question changed Grump?

  Dad had warned her of starving gangs roving Leester’s forest at night, but some decisions made themselves. Phos had spent last evening chewing her fingernails as Mum darned socks; each pop of sparks from the hearth fire had made her jump with thoughts of priests, but no one had shown. Sometimes she worried too much; escaping marriage meant embracing risks.

  Phos fumbled in her wardrobe. She piled on layers and thick boots, and grubbed at the back for her liramic cloak. It still breathed out a faint blue-green wash, and she draped it over her shoulders.

  She’d slip through the hedge past their garden before turning right to sneak through the wood. The snagging branches might slow her, but they’d give cover. There’d be a few rushed minutes to explore the windmill, and she’d be back before dawn.

  Her bedroom door swung open, and she left it ajar. The stairs would creak, and she’d wake Dad and face endless questions, so she draped her tummy over the banister and lifted her feet to slide as faint shadows pirouetted across the plaster walls. Her boots made a soft landing on the polished hallway floor, and she faced her granddad’s portrait. Dad’s shoes rested underneath.

  Outside, and Phos ducked from the flower basket dangling above the front door as the chill wind gnawed her neck. Her cloak gave out glimmer enough to show the stones set into their garden path, and she reached the main road and glanced both ways before turning right. Her soft boots meant less noise. A hedge loomed on her left, and a hovering square of night marked where children had worn the hedge away.

  She eased herself through the gap and wrapped the cloak tighter as she climbed into the wood. Her feet tapped out a path over the snaking roots. After ten steps her eyes picked up a green tinge of tree light trickling over the soil, brighter than normal, as if the flaring windmill had woken the forest. Soft moss appeared underfoot, and she gripped a liss tree’s trunk for balance; the spongy bark yielded under her touch, and pepper and lemon scents drifted past. They’d grow rich as the night deepened, and one day she’d learn if trees talked through scents.

  Twigs snapped behind as people thrashed towards her through bracken, and Phos ducked behind a tree trunk as her trousers creaked. Two dim figures approached in ragged clothes with heads down to snuffle for food, and one scythed the ferns with a blade. Phos crouched and choked back a cough. The couple glanced her way before stumbling north.

  She’d hidden behind a young liss tree. Its bark was dim, but the moss grudged out enough pale blue-green glow to reveal her to any searching priests or guards. Phos scuttled between saplings and held her breath. A small clearing stood before her, where a long branch arched from one tree into its neighbour like a light blue ribbon riding the night. A perfect curve and an invitation to stand between trees and pretend she stood inside a tiny slice of the world. This space needed avoiding now, but she’d played here years ago. The north and south trees bowed the same way as the world walls, and the branch looked the same width as the sun’s arch, though the arch was huge. It had set hours ago, gone eveward to light other lands, a band of radiance riding over the walls and vault. Teachers called it the sun’s arch, but what sort of name was Sun?

  Belhander, with its stinking tanneries, Lostaramir and its flax fields nestling beside the northern world wall, the twin villages Drostalic and Pulgro, each saw the sun’s arch later than Leester. To dawnward, Ferstus squatted in its swamp as if cringing from the moor beyond. Ferstus had the sun’s arch before Leester, though nothing would ever dry the village out.

  Today’s arch had looked the same as yesterday’s, but one afternoon she’d traced circles in the dirt outside Dad’s greenhouse. People took two years to walk the ring, and the sun’s arch didn’t move much faster than a human, so it couldn’t ever return by dawn. Did copies of the arch chase each other, and did the spaces in between create nights? Her questions had left her friends giggling.

  A moth the size of her face trembled beside her head for a heartbeat, and ahead the trees petered out. The windmill stood alone on a hillside, so she needed caution. Phos dawdled and searched for more wandering figures as thoughts raced through her. What had turned the ancient windmill into that wonderful figure of light, the dancer in the evening sky?

  Pattering sounds drifted from leaves as slim strokes of rain brushed her cheeks, and Phos raised her hood without breaking stride. Peaty scents drowned the pepper and lemon notes, and trunks surfaced from the night, wooden ghosts wrapped in blue threads of branches. She glanced back, and her footprints glowed on the grass to make a trail for anyone to follow. Her cloak sighed out more glimmer as liramic grass crunched underfoot – her cloth remembered being woven.

  What had brought the storm of silver light? Had a rebel priest ripped open the world? She’d heard stories of ghosts, giant women built from clouds, women bringing madness. Had one struck here?

  Darkness stretched past the last trees, though th
e liramic grass carpeting the windmill’s hill doled out a dim green wash. Other eyes might see her climb, but she’d arrived before anyone else. Silence sat heavy on the hill, and a single pole shimmered in the dim light, but the windmill didn’t show, and where were the sails? Shouldn’t the grass’s light show canvas?

  A dark patch snatched her gaze leftward, where a tangle of wooden beams blocked the grass’s sheen. The windmill must have shattered into a tumble of blocks and boards before strewing itself over the hill, and the pole marked a single survivor. Rafters showed higher up the slope, and a curl of stiff paper crunched under her foot – resin paper. They nailed resin paper over plaster to fend off rain. A sail sat mangled into a spewed-out knot of wood and canvas; the cloth stayed taut in places but flapped elsewhere. No burning smells, so there’d been no fire.

  Phos lifted a spar and the wood snapped. Twisting it backwards showed bright metal spots where nails reflected light. The timber smelt fresh – three days ago this had been a tree, so someone had been busy. What could she recover before the priests blundered close? Phos edged towards a grey bulk half her height. The grindstone had burst free and rolled before toppling. Ten more steps took her to the hill’s crest, where three beams still scratched upward. The stench of scorched wood left her sneezing as her foot struck a wooden wheel with teeth surrounding the outside, and she bent to run her hands over the still-warm wood. Brick walls had collapsed to leave stumps, and a dangling metallic thread stroked her hand.

  She’d need to run in five minutes, but this place handed her a thousand questions, and maybe answers if she stayed.

  Voices below – men talking. Phos bundled her cloak under a scrap of canvas and shook raindrops from her hands. Her older footprints had faded into dim smears, and there was enough darkness to let her creep towards another wrecked sail on her left. Phos squatted beside the sodden fabric to lift the sail over her head, and damp grass soaked her backside as water dripped down her neck. The church hired anyone, even those whose minds loafed in taverns, so she’d not run. Night made men lazy, and they’d chatter about the windmill.

  Orders punched the air, and three bright lights showed through the coarse fabric – handheld lanterns. One man barked out a command.

  ‘Scour this place. I want the miller.’

  Glass crunched underfoot, and Phos shivered before holding her breath. Larger churches boasted windows, but never windmills, so what else used glass? One man’s voice boomed out.

  ‘Lanterns, Sergeant. There were ten or more strung out – there’s the light we saw.’

  ‘It’s deliberate?’

  ‘No doubt. Church lanterns too, but no idea how he got so many.’

  ‘How’d he light them? You find any batteries?’

  Phos gulped. What were batteries?

  ‘We’re looking, but I’ve seen batteries work; their light stays the same, and this changed. Bright, dim, bright, different each second. And wind gusts that way, so….’

  ‘That’s enough.’ The sergeant rasped out a cough. ‘Keep looking.’

  A late gust lifted Phos’s sail. She clenched her teeth and gripped the canvas.

  ‘Any fire?’

  ‘Not a spark. Your miller had resin paper stuck outside. All torn off now, but it’s full of small tears, like someone was working up to a bigger rip. Fire wouldn’t leave a scrap.’

  ‘Search the ground and check those sails.’

  Feet approached behind her, and Phos closed her eyes. What would happen to her parents if these men uncovered her? What words could touch these guards? Her limbs froze, but the men’s words fermented a delicious brew of knowledge, and she’d not miss one word.

  ‘What we got here?’

  Two hands grabbed her arms to wrench her backwards and upward. Hands clutched her waist. She shrieked as canvas ripped from her fingers and her feet scrabbled over grass. The guard lifted her and spun her around; leather rasped her cheek in a whirling instant of dizziness. His face was a brawl of stale beer and sweat.

  Men gathered with waiting beards and greasy tunics.

  ‘I’m sure you’ve got a great story.’ The sergeant’s voice dropped to a murmur. Phos tried staring back, but her body flinched and her gaze fell to the left. The man squatted until her feet touched ground, but his hands still belted her waist.

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Phos.’

  ‘Not old enough for your second syllable, which is more reason to stay in bed. Where d’you live when you’re not playing at ghosts?’

  Words jammed in her throat. What were their plans? What about Mum and Dad?

  ‘Who tucks you in at night? Where’s your parents?’

  ‘They’re near Leester village.’

  ‘There’s a start. Next question is, why this night-time ramble?’ Another guard pushed his lantern towards her face, and Phos screwed up her eyes. ‘What got you out of bed?’

  ‘Same thing that pushed you out of bed!’ Phos clamped her lips shut. These weren’t teachers, and they weren’t acting or pretending to be angry. Nothing made sense now, and screams boiled inside, but a smile teetered onto the sergeant’s face, and his hands slackened. Could she dish out the words they wanted and rush home before dawn? Leave learning for another night?

  ‘The windmill lit up and I couldn’t sleep,’ Phos said.

  ‘Night-time isn’t a safe time any more. How d’you squeeze through the wood?’

  The guards had wrecked their night vision, so her liramic cloak might stay hidden. ‘I’ve been here in daylight. I like woods.’

  ‘Good for playing in, aren’t they? You got here before us, Phos, so big question: what did you see?’

  ‘Not much.’ She lowered her head: the sergeant’s breath stank of rotten egg. ‘I came five minutes before you.’

  ‘See the miller? Tall guy, all beard and belly?’

  She shook her head. These guards didn’t need to hear the few words she’d shared with him months ago.

  The sergeant rubbed a finger against his eye. ‘It’s too late, Phos, and no one should be out – especially not girls your age. We’ll walk you back to your house and wake your parents.’

  ‘They won’t need waking.’

  ‘I’m sure you don’t want us to wake anyone, but—’

  A hard drumming ripped through the night, and the sergeant stood and gripped his belt. The rhythm slowed before stopping. The guards all faced downhill, so could she escape to wear the night again? Lantern light dribbled over the grassy slope. Below, an animal showed – four long legs and bigger than any dog, its long head reared back as if laughing. A single black-robed figure stood beside it and coiled ropes around his arm. She’d seen pictures of horses, but this living animal left her gasping. Spittle darted through air as the horse shook its head, and one foot pawed the ground.

  The priest whispered into the horse’s ear before turning, and his robes parted. Crimson flashed inside the top of his cloak. Phos stared as the man lumbered upward. His skin was smooth and pasty, and his full red lips made a puckered scar against the puffy bag of his face. He stared at her with his lips fixed into a half smile before glancing at the men.

  ‘Where’s your leader?’

  ‘That’s me, sir,’ the sergeant said, standing upright. ‘We were patrolling and saw lights blazing.’

  ‘You left your route without instruction?’ A young voice greased with confidence. He hauled himself uphill without trouble and crouched one foot away from Phos. His pudgy fingers stretched out to stroke a lock of her hair.

  ‘Sir, we’d never seen the like, and we wanted to catch the man what’s responsible. The miller’s gone, but there’s this girl.’

  ‘She can give me the pleasure of her company.’

  ‘We found her hiding under a sail. Didn’t touch nothing; she’s just curious.’

  ‘Curiosity? That needs attention.’ The officer’s lips parted, and he drew his hand back. Phos’s head wouldn’t move, and she couldn’t stop staring at his black eyes. Danger hurled her
onward like a leaf in a storm, but here stood a chance to visit Torzene and watch priests at work. Did this officer own books? Wasn’t Torzene almost on the road to Morzenthal?

  The sergeant coughed. ‘We planned to take her home, sir, to let her parents know she’s safe.’

  ‘Thinking again, Sergeant? We’ll have plenty to discuss back at Torzene.’ His dark robe creaked as he stood, and crimson shimmered again inside the top quarter of his cloak. ‘Return to your route. Tell nobody about this site. Discuss nothing among yourselves. She comes with me.’

  ‘Sir, she’s young, and her parents will be frantic if they—’

  ‘I will tell her parents. Discuss nothing.’

  Phos hugged her knees, but she kept staring at the priest’s wan face. His eyes and nose looked lost inside his swollen cheeks, but the guards clustered around him. His fingers brushed her cheek. She shivered: she’d tasted freedom with her night-time ramble, but now she’d become a prisoner.

  The priest grinned at her. ‘Are you cold?’

  She nodded.

  ‘I have an extra cloak. When did you last travel by horse?’

  Chapter 4: glimmers in the night

  His hand clamped Phos’s shoulder, and he guided her downward as the guards followed. She imagined Mum staring at her empty bed.

  The horse stamped its front legs, and steam billowed from the animal’s nostrils as it cocked its head to watch her. She stroked the horse’s flank, and sweat pooled around her fingers, but the priest’s hands clasped her waist to hoist her upward. Her stomach churned until she found herself perched on a leather seat covering the horse’s back – hard and slippery under her trousers.

  ‘Let’s keep you warm,’ the priest said, handing up a woollen cloak, which she draped around her shoulders. He swung up behind, and his hands wrapped around her sides as his thighs clamped hers; she winced as he arranged leather straps to surround her and link himself with the horse’s leashed head. Weren’t these called reins?