Changeling's Island: Chapter Nine

    During the next few weeks, as school trundled on its slow way towards the summer holidays, Tim gradually learned more about the bounds of his prison and how to use what it had. He could go online at the library. His Facebook reminded him of what a quiet desert his life was. He didn’t want to update his status, in case anyone back in Melbourne asked him why he was here. He looked to see how Matthew, the guy from junior school he’d been best buds with, before, well, before they’d moved, before Dad had gone to Oman. Before St. Dominic’s. But he didn’t comment, because he didn’t want anyone to know where he was. Or in case someone from the island friended him or something. It was like a lingering toothache that sneaked up on him when he’d almost forgotten about it.

    He found the more he knew of the island kids and adults, the less they were like the zombie horde. They didn’t know anything, of course, not about real stuff in the city, but some of them were actually pretty decent. A couple of the kids said he must come fishing sometime, or on a quad-bike trail. It hadn’t actually happened yet, but they had offered. He hadn’t ever wanted them to know why he’d come here. Now he really, really didn’t.

    Things people had said made him realize they thought he was here because his parents had divorced, or were getting divorced.

    That story suited Tim just fine. It had a bit of truth to it.

    While online, he also looked up the prices of flights. That suited him a lot less well. He’d set quite a high bar for himself, he thought, sitting on the ground, weeding. At Gran’s, there was always weeding to do. And digging his fingers in the dirt…it left him feeling stronger for some crazy reason. Well, “stronger” in “the more able to cope with all of this” sense of “strong,” not in the “picking up stupid sheep and putting them over the wonky fence” sense. That, he still struggled with. There was just such a lot of heave and carry and lift about the farm. Even the carrots he’d taken as just orange things at the supermarket took a lot of pulling out of the ground.

    He’d found a shortcut across the fields, and he could walk fast and catch the bus in twelve minutes now. And he’d found his way down to sea. The day after a storm, when they’d had enough rain to make it a dripping-wet walk back through the bush from the school bus, Gran had taken them down there in the ute from the shed. The ute was a very old Ford pickup with a tub-tray, growing cobwebs. He hadn’t even known it was there for the first few weeks. Gran’s method of driving seemed to be to get into the wheel-ruts and look at the paddocks. She drove completely in first gear, so it was only mildly terrifying. She yelled out the window for directions, which was a lot worse.

    “What are you doing?” he asked, clinging on to the dashboard.

    “Don’t backseat drive!” she snapped, peering sideways.

    “There isn’t a backseat. Mind that tree!”

    She swung away from the fallen ti-tree and they scraped past several other trees and then back to the track. “Yer drive on the way back,” she said.

    “But I can’t drive!”

    “Yer better learn then,” she said.

    “But I am not allowed to drive. I’m too young.”

    “Not on the road. On the farm.”

    She turned the ute at the last dune just before the sea, and faced it more or less back down the track.

    Tim rapidly discovered this hadn’t merely been a scenic trip, or just to get his knuckles white clinging onto the window frame.

    “The storm washed the weed up, and the rain’s washed the salt off. It’s good for the garden.”

    She looked at the sea. Shook her fist at it. “And yer be off. Don’t yer be coming anywhere near here, or I’ll stick a pitchfork in you.”

    “Who? Who are you talking to?” asked Tim looking at the gray angry water.

    “The seal-woman. She’s nothing but trouble.” She pulled a face. “Have you got a knife?”

    “No.” Knives had caused one of the boys at St. Dominic’s to get expelled only the term before. Pupils were not allowed to carry them, and while it had been tempting…It had to be something cool, not like a kitchen knife or something. Tim had never had the spare money, or really been…well, bad enough to get one. He’d wanted…sort of, to be bad, to get a bit of respect and to make up for being small and really not much good at ball sports. Now his life was too full of people who thought he was bad, and trouble, and who still didn’t give him any of that respect, back in Melbourne anyway. Did his gran think he was a mugger and a shoplifter? Why did she think he had a knife?

    “Yer need one. Yer never to go near the sea without steel. I’m a fool. I didn’t even think of that,” muttered his grandmother. “Well, she’ll not come near while I’m here.”

    They gathered armfuls and then carried loads of stinking seaweed up to the ute. Crabs scuttled away. Little bugs ran out of it. March flies bit at them if they stopped…

    And then, when the ute tray was full, piled high, his grandmother said: “I hope yer can move the seat. It hasn’t bin moved since yer father was a boy.”

    Tim noticed she never mentioned his father’s name. Hardly ever even talked about him. If she did talk about anyone, it was “my John,” and even that didn’t happen too often.

    They wrestled with the seat and got it to move slightly. Then it stuck. “Can yer push the pedals all the way down?”

    Tim tried. The ute lurched forward. “Foot off the clutch, on the brake,” said his grandmother.

    He got the part about taking his foot off the pedal. “Which is the brake?” he asked in a panic.

    It was rather a long trip back with the seaweed. Tim was exhausted, but quite pleased with himself. He’d found the concentration of driving a strain. He’d stared hard ahead so much that he imagined he saw all sorts of things out of the corner of his eye that just weren’t there when he looked properly: Potholes, logs, a small hairy manikin in a hat clinging to the outside mirror. That, which nearly sent them off the road and into the bog, was on second glance a bunch of weeds.

    When they got home his grandmother said, “I need a pot of tea. And they deserve some beer. I don’t think we’re ready to try taking the ute into the shed yet. Just stop.”

    Tim had gotten used to his grandmother’s ways by now, or at least the beer for the fairies idea. He set out the bowls. There were two of them to be put out, one in the barn, and one in the corner of the kitchen, each with a half-centimeter of beer in them. A bottle lasted a couple of weeks or more. He figured the mice or something must love it.

    Only this time, he was tired enough to just sit there in the kitchen, and he happened to be looking at the bowl. The flat beer was a limpid brown pool in the bowl…and then it began to ripple, as if something was lapping at it. And then, all by itself, the bowl tipped a little. Tim blinked. Rubbed his eyes.

    Looked. Rubbed them again.

    The bowl was empty. Drained of the last drop.

    It must have been a mouse he couldn’t see at this angle…or something. It was enough to creep him out. But Gran decided they’d sat about idle for long enough, so she said, “Come. We’ve got a ute to offload.” She hesitated for a second, went to the drawer of the kitchen dresser, and rummaged about. “Here,” she said, holding a flat, yellowed object out to him. “It was yer great-granddad’s penknife. Useful on the farm. I thought yer must have one.”

    It was a solid, heavy piece of steel, with the outside casing made of a yellow, scratched…something.

    “It’s supposed to be walrus tooth. Sailor’s knife, been in my family a long time. Must have come from Scotland, somewhere. We don’t have walrus here.”

    Tim opened the knife warily. It had obviously been sharpened many times. Once it must have been quite a broad blade. Now it was narrow. He tested it against his finger, and cut himself. “Ouch. It’s sharp,” he said, looking at it.

    “Yer keep it that way,” said his grandmother. “What use is a blunt knife? It’s not this new stainless steel, boy. It’ll rust. Yer oil it, clean it after yer use it, and keep it sharp.” She took a deep breath. “And yer keep it with yer all the time. Especially at the sea, or near it. That seal-woman doesn’t like iron. I didn’t know she was still around. Yer don’t ever go into the sea without a knife. You wash it in fresh water and oil it after, as soon as you can.”

    “But…it’s dangerous. I…I’m not allowed to have a knife.” He could just imagine his mother finding it. Or someone at St. Dominic’s. Or the store where he’d been caught.

    His grandmother snorted. “Townie nonsense. They got nothing they need a knife for, except to try and pretend they’re tough, and cut each other. It’s different here, Tim, working on the farm. A knife ain’t dangerous, any more than a spade. It’s laid there in that drawer for forty years and not hurt anyone. It’s what you do with it that’s dangerous, if you’re a fool or a little child. It’s a tool, not a toy. Don’t play with it. And never test it on yer thumb.”

    Tim felt quite peculiar about the old knife. He wanted it. But he was scared about being in trouble because of it. “They won’t let me have it at school.”

    His grandmother rubbed her chin, a sign, Tim had learned, that she was considering something. “Fair enough. It’s far from the sea. But the minute you get back here it goes in yer pocket. No going near the water without it.”

    That was rather different from the warnings his mother had given him.

    Áed saw the knife and, because he was a creature of air and darkness, saw those aspects to the piece of steel too. It had the marks of blood on it. Fae or half-Fae blood, which left stains that did not wash away. The marks were old and fading, but it was ironic that this knife would come to the child-of-the-child-of-the-child-of-the-child…many times of the changeling blood spilled on it. In the distant past…it had killed Finvarra’s half-human child, here. It was appropriate, a repayment of a kind, that it should now be the defense against Finvarra’s sendling. It would be effective on the selkie too, and quite possibly kill her, if the master had the sense to have it with him, and to use it.

    Áed made a point to tell the selkie about it that night, while the young master slept, exhausted by his labors. “An iron tooth he carries. It’s had the lifeblood of one of the Aos Sí gush over it,” said Áed. He relished that part. “He keeps it next to his skin, seal-woman. Neither your art nor all the water in the sea will save you, if he wields it against you in fear.

    The selkie smiled, showing her tricuspid teeth. “It’s first that I’ll bargain for what I want, little one. I always bargain first…after frightening them a bit. Forewarned is also forearmed, though, if bargaining fails.”

    Áed knew he’d at least made her wary. He was not sure that was a good thing.

    Tim found the December holidays had sneaked up on him. To the other kids, school might drag, but although he would rather have died than admit it, he quite liked going there. One was supposed to hate school, and long for the holidays. However, the holidays were a big uncertain area, and Tim knew it would be majorly uncool to admit it too, but tiny classes and fairly flexible work suited him better than the “you are just a number to pay the fees” attitude at St. Dominic’s. There, money, and how you dressed, and how good you were at ball sports counted. He didn’t drip money, couldn’t get his mother to buy the right clothes for him, and was never going to be any good at ball games. He’d been left out. Here…well, it was difficult to avoid being involved. Besides, he’d found he was good at swimming, at least by local standards. The school pool was a place where he felt a bit of a champion, and where swimming lessons back in Melbourne paid off. There was nothing like winning a race to make you feel like taking part in the other things, Tim found.

    Term ended. Tim waited for the call saying he was heading back to Melbourne for the holidays.

    So, plainly, did his grandmother. “Yer better call yer mother,” she said, on the second night of the holidays. It hadn’t been much of a holiday, so far. They’d been fixing the troughs and fetching in the hay. Tim was a much better driver by now, but the hay was hard work. He hurt and itched and sweated and sneezed. And Gran just kept going. “Yer’ve come on, boy,” she said at the end of it all. “Yer couldn’t have picked up a bale when yer come here.”

    It was still heavy enough, like the telephone in his hand. He dialed. It rang. He tried to think of what he’d do, back in Melbourne. Who he’d go and see. Who he’d hang out with, and…and…

    The phone went on ringing. Eventually the answering machine cut in, with his mother’s lilting voice. “I’m sorry, I’m not home. Please leave your name and number and I’ll get back to you.”

    He hadn’t thought of what to say.

    “Uh, Mum. It’s me. Tim. I was just wondering, um, about the holidays…” He realized he had no idea what the phone number was here. His grandmother hadn’t been about to give him any privacy for this. She was standing right there. He put his hand in front of the mouthpiece. “What’s our number? I’m leaving a message.”

    “Our number…” Nan told him, and he had to put the phone down. He wondered where his mum was? If she was all right…What if she was dead, or in a hospital or something? Would he spend the rest of his life here? He felt the little bag hanging around his neck. Not a chance. He was 17.4 percent of the way to Melbourne already.

    “Out gadding,” said his grandmother, disapprovingly. “Looking for another man, probably. We’ll try in the morning. Bet she will be in her bed when the cow is being milked.”

    Tim had gotten more or less used to that by now. That would be something he could do in Melbourne. Not get up and milk the cow. The cow would just have to cope with Nan.

    “I didn’t think. I could call her mobile.”

    “It costs extra.”

    “Please…I want to know,” he asked, worried now. “She might have had an accident or something.”

    His grandmother rubbed her chin, then nodded. “Tell her to call you back on the landline.”

    He dialed the number. He had to think to remember it…It had been a while. Hailey’s number, he had down pat still. Not that he would call it after the Island Show! His mother’s phone rang twice, and she answered. There was laughter and music in the background. “Tim? Is something wrong?”

    “No. I just wanted…”

    “I’ll call you in the morning, dear. I got your report. You have done well, but I can’t talk now. Bye-ee.”

    “Well, at least you were quick,” said his grandmother. “Is she calling back?”

    “Tomorrow. She’s out somewhere. She says she got my report.”

    His grandmother gave him that sideways stare of hers. “And?”

    “She says I did well,” said Tim, feeling a little defensive about it.

    “An’ so yer should. Yer can do computers and things. I reckon yer teacher should have sent it to me, not her,” said his grandmother. “Now, we’ve got nearly no wind, the tide will be full about an hour after dark. Yer eyes are good enough, and the water will have warmed up. We’ll go spearing flounder. Get yer shorts on.”

    She fetched out an old inner tube that had a cut-off twenty-five-liter tin jammed into the middle of it, and a barb-pointed fork on a pole, and a spare car battery from the shed, and a light on a pole. Minutes later Tim drove them, bumping down the track to the beach. The sea was mirror-calm, still and, in the shallows, not too cold.

    The light was waterproof and pushed underwater. Shoals of tiny silver fish schooled to it, and then, in sudden alarm, darted away. “I can’t see well enough, Tim,” she said, as they waded in the knee-deep water. “You’ll have to look for the fish. They’re diamond shaped an’ you’ll see their eyes. They hide in the sand. You’ll see squid and flathead sometimes too.”

    Tim looked. He saw the tiny silver fish, and a curious slim long-beaked garfish, skipping away…and nothing else, until he stood on a flounder. He screamed and fell over as it swam off.

    “What happened?”

    “I stood on something that squirmed under my foot and swam off.”

    “Quick,” she said eagerly. “Up you get, see if you can follow the dust to where it settles.”

    All Tim wanted to do right then was run for the shore, but she was so urgent, he stood up and looked around. And sure enough, there was a trail in the still water of the silt that the fish had stirred up. He walked closer…and nearly stood on it again before he saw it. It camouflaged well, and the edges of the fish were blurred into the sand. “I can see it. What do I do now?” he asked, looking down at it in wonderment, seeing the two small eyes looking up.

    “Walk really slowly and quietly until it is less than an arm’s length from yer feet. Take yer time. Then lower the spearpoint into the water, until it is maybe a hand-width above it. Then yer push it down, hard, fast.

    Tim did as he’d been told. He couldn’t believe the fish wouldn’t swim off, but it didn’t. It just lay there as the spear point got closer. He couldn’t breathe and it felt like the weight of the whole universe was pressing on him. Why should he care, a part of him demanded? But he did. He had to. He was sure he was going to miss…

    He thrust the spear down into the water as hard as he could, and felt the sudden quiver and thrash as he lifted the fish. “I got it! I got it! I got it!!!” he yelled.

    It was really weird. It sounded like a thousand people were yelling with him too, drumming their feet on the hard sand. Shouting in triumph, not in English, but he understood them anyway. And just then he felt like he was one of them. Like part of some huge family, generations of them, looking at him, and yelling in delight. The fish was beautiful and he was enormously grateful for it, that it had been there to be speared. To be food. That feeling was strange as an idea in itself, but right, somehow. He rocked on his heels in the sand, giddy with the adrenalin rush, as he stood there, holding the speared fish up to the star-patterned night.

    “Well done!” said his gran, her voice full of pleasure too. “Hold him over the box, Tim.”

    Tim did, and his grandmother worked the fish over the prongs with her knife. “Yer first fish. You done good, young man,” she said.

    She’d always called him “boy” before. “That was just like…amazing!” He meant the way it had stayed still, and that really odd feeling he’d had when he’d thrust the spear through it. He was still shaking from it all.

    And for once his grandmother seemed to understand without him trying to explain. She put a hand on his shoulder. “It’s in yer blood, Tim. My people have always done this. Always and always. This is our place. This is what we do, this is what we are. Without it, we’re just leaves in the wind. I’m glad yer here to carry it on.” Then she shook herself, and said gruffly. “Well, don’t just stand there. Get on with it. We need another one for our tea.”

    Tim was thoroughly wet, and the air was cool, but absolutely nothing could have stopped him from getting on with it. And now that he knew what he was looking for, he saw the next fish, about twenty meters away. And then, a little farther on, two more close together.

    “That’s enough for us. We can’t keep ’em,” said his gran.

    Tim was still too fired up to want to stop. “But…”

    She shook her head. “Yer don’t kill what yer don’t need. Other people will want a fish too.”

    She sounded a bit like McKay about the flathead, thought Tim, as they walked towards the shore. And there, lying against a trail of weed, was an enormous flathead in his grandmother’s light. Tim didn’t care if they didn’t need it. He wanted that fish. He stalked forward, spear ready. Only this fish did not stay still, but swam off into the dark deep. He turned to follow.

    “What is it?” asked his grandmother.

    “Flathead! A really, really big one.”

    “Yer won’t get it once they start swimming away. Yer came up in front of it, didn’t yer?”

    “Yes. But I was careful. Slow.”

    “Come up from behind next time. And don’t try to follow it. They’ll lead you out. I thought I saw that dratted seal-woman out there. She means no good to yer. Drowned a few of your ancestors and left their widows to raise the child on their own.”

    “I don’t have any children.”

    “Then maybe she won’t drown yer, yet.”

    His grandmother was weird. Couldn’t see the fish, but thought she could see imaginary seal-women.

    By the time they got to the beach Tim realized just how cold and wet he was. But he was still full of the hunt. He felt…right. His ears seemed still full of drumming, and his body was tired, but oddly full of energy.

    He had strange dreams that night. Strange, but good. Full of smoke and drumming of heels on hard sand, and people dancing in the firelight, and he was there with them, dancing too, passing through the smoke.

    Áed saw the spirits of the old ones weave and stamp their dance through the smokes of their spirit fires. They were a hunting people, and a young man’s first blooding was a very important matter to them. They had lived far more as part of the land, and the hunt, and the prey, had their love and respect. To hunt was what a man did. He brought food from the land — and the water — for his family with his spear and throwing sticks.

    The seal-woman had been out there too, farther off to sea and hidden in the dark of the water. Her guile would have to be greater now. His master belonged to this land and it to him. They were part of each other, rock, sand, water, bush and blood. It would give him strength, if he learned to use it.

    Tim was rather surprised to find, the next day, that he’d actually forgotten that his mother had promised to call. It was just as well, because he would have had to be patient, instead of being busy with the jobs on the farm, and thinking about the flounder-spearing. It was just so…more than cool.

    When the phone rang he had a faintly guilty start. Melbourne, yeah. It would be good…Except it was Jon McKay and not his mother. “Yes,” said his grandmother. “He’s here. But I don’t know yet for how long.”

    She put her hand over the mouthpiece. “He’s asking if yer want a job. His deckie is away for a couple of weeks.”

    “Oh, wow!”

    His grandmother gave one of her rare smiles. “We’ll talk to his mother, ‘n’ get back to you.”

    McKay obviously said something.

    His grandmother nodded. “Right, then. Later.”

    She put the phone down. “He says it’ll be hard yakka. Yer can go along with them tomorrow and see if yer want to do it, and he can see if yer up to it. Are yer?”

    “I’ll try. No. I won’t just try. I will be!”

    “Then we better call yer mother. Yer probably won’t be able to.”

    Great. I’ve spent months wanting to get out of here, and just when I’ve finally got something here I really want to do, I am going to leave.

    Tim called his mother. “Oh, Tim dear,” she said, before he got a word in edgeways. “I am sorry. I’ve sent your father three texts. And an e-mail. He’s supposed to pay for these things. I really can’t afford it.”

    “Well, um, would you mind if I…only came a bit later? It’s just I’ve been offered a job I really want to take…if I can.”

    He was surprised at the relief in her reply. “Oh, that would be fine. You’d just be sitting around in the flat here. I had been thinking of taking some time off. I really could use a holiday, and Mar…Mary-Lou invited me to go to Queensland.” There was an awkward pause, and then then his mother continued hastily. “Um. She’s found a great package deal, only a thousand five hundred for the week, but it is sharing a room.”

    That would have paid his flights a few times, thought Tim crossly, before a thought about going to sea with McKay pushed it away instead. He was thinking about that, as Mum rattled on about manicures and stuff. It might as well be in Latin for how much of it Tim understood, but then she said, “Oh. I met that girl from the island, Hailey, when I was having a pedicure. She said she had to go over there for a week or ten days before they fly to Switzerland for some skiing.”

    Tim didn’t actually know quite what to say. Or quite what to feel.

    Then his grandmother took the telephone from his hands. “I want ta see his report,” she said curtly. Tim hadn’t realized how much Nan really didn’t like his mum until he heard her speak. “I’m looking after him. If anything needs to be done, I’m going to need to see to it.”

    “I’ll post it,” Tim heard his mother say. “But he’s done fine. Better than at St. Dominic’s in fact.”

    “Yer do that. Goodbye.”

    She put the phone down. “I guess you can work for McKay tomorrow. But yer to promise me yer keep that knife by you. All the time. That seal-woman is scared of it.”

    Tim nodded, even if the “seal-woman” stuff was more of Gran’s craziness.

    “What’s she up to?” asked his grandmother, in the tone that she reserved for Tim’s mother.

    “She says she’s going to Queensland with…with a friend.”

    “New boyfriend,” said his grandmother with a scowl.

    Tim had to wonder if she wasn’t right. Something about the “Mary-Lou” had seemed a bit odd. For a few minutes he felt abandoned. Pushed out. But then Nan had him go out to the shed to try on some old oilskins that might do for wearing at sea if it rained, and got to talking about sailing herself, as a little girl. It was something she’d not done before, and it was different enough to distract him. She plainly knew a lot about it, he realized, fitting his little experience into what she said.

    The weeks leading to Christmas were something of a blur for Tim, looking back. He’d never been so tired in all his life. He just wasn’t quite strong enough for a lot of what he had to do, so he made up for it with extra effort. He had to haul bags of abalone onto the boat, knock all the smaller shellfish and seaweed off the shells and at the same time move the boat after the man diving, making sure the air-hose was never dragging. He wasn’t too sure what he was doing, so made up for it with extra concentration. And Jon McKay kept expecting him to learn new stuff. He started asking Tim tides, currents, and about where a good drift would be, from about the third day. Tim learned to spot the littlest things that could give him clues. He wanted to get it right. And it was really satisfying when he did.

    By the time he got back to the farm every night it was all he could do to eat and wash before he fell asleep. Nan’s ABC radio was something he heard for ten seconds before sleep. He’d thought quite a lot about Hailey the day his mum had told him she was coming, but, like his report card, after starting work with Mckay, he forgot about her, and it.

    He loved every moment of being out at sea, loved the boat, loved the way it responded to the sea, loved the sounds and smell and feel of it. He didn’t really know why, but…it just felt good. But he was still glad for the two days when the weather was too bad, and work was merely three hours of boat maintenance and cleaning. He was so tired those were like a holiday.

    Two days before Christmas, McKay stopped shipping, and Tim got paid. It added a lot to the neck pouch. “I guess you’ll be able to buy a few more presents,” said Jon, with a grin. “Speaking of which, I have one for you. With my talent for wrapping stuff up, it’s still in the box they sent it in. You can pop it under the Christmas tree. Don’t get overexcited. I don’t have much experience of buying presents. I always buy Rob and my dad a bottle of Scotch, and my mother chocolates. And Louise I make a mess of.” Louise was Jon’s on-again-off-again girlfriend. She was an artist who spent most of her time in Hobart. She’d just come over for the Christmas break, and so far Tim had decided he really didn’t like her. She was beautiful, he supposed. But she wore loads of tinkling jewelry and talked about opera, or ballet, or art, and not about fish and the sea.

    “I really feel bad now. I haven’t got you anything,” said Tim awkwardly.

    Jon just laughed. “Didn’t expect you to. Rob’s back after New Year, but he’s prone to taking Monday off sick, and sometimes Friday too, so I might give you a call. And Mally is coming over again at the end of January. He’ll want to go fishing again.”

    “I’d be keen!” said Tim, grinning. “We can teach him a thing or two.”

    “Heh. I know you would. You’ll have to fish off the beach in the meanwhile.”

    Tim was thinking about this, about what he could possibly get McKay for Christmas, walking down the track to the farmhouse, when he realized there was a vehicle behind him.

    It was a police ute.