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Back Daughter of Eden
Chapters (68)
  1. Title page
  2. Dedication
  3. Part I
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Three
  7. Four
  8. Five
  9. Six
  10. Seven
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Sixteen
  20. Seventeen
  21. Eighteen
  22. Nineteen
  23. Twenty
  24. Twenty-one
  25. Twenty-two
  26. Twenty-three
  27. Twenty-four
  28. Twenty-five
  29. GAIA YOUNG. SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSIONS.MISSION DAY 20. 20:25 MT.
  30. Part II
  31. Twenty-six
  32. Twenty-seven
  33. Twenty-eight
  34. Twenty-nine
  35. Thirty
  36. Thirty-one
  37. Thirty-two
  38. Thirty-three
  39. Thirty-four
  40. Thirty-five
  41. Thirty-six
  42. Thirty-seven
  43. GAIA YOUNG. SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSIONS.MISSION DAY 22. 20:05 MT.
  44. Thirty-eight
  45. Thirty-nine
  46. Forty
  47. Forty-one
  48. GAIA YOUNG. SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSIONS.MISSION DAY 25. 15:30 MT.
  49. Forty-two
  50. Forty-three
  51. Forty-four
  52. Forty-five
  53. Forty-six
  54. Forty-seven
  55. Forty-eight
  56. Forty-nine
  57. Fifty
  58. Fifty-one
  59. Fifty-two
  60. Fifty-three
  61. Fifty-four
  62. Part III
  63. Fifty-five
  64. Fifty-six
  65. Fifty-seven
  66. Fifty-eight
  67. Also by Chris Beckett
  68. Copyright page

‘Mother,’ I whispered. ‘My mum and my brothers and my sisters. Are they alive? Are they well?’

I waited and listened. I listened for a long time, but there was no answer. All I could hear was the pulsing trees, and the sounds of people out there somewhere in the fug.

But I’m listening to the wrong kind of thing, I said to myself, wiping the sweat from my face. Gela’s voice wasn’t going to be a sound out there like the hmmmph hmmmph hmmmphing of the trees, it was going to be inside my own head, like a voice in a dream. So I tried to shut out all the sounds that came from the world beyond my skin, and concentrate on the sounds inside me. But all I could hear was the racing of my thoughts, and my own blood pounding in my ears, like there was another tiny forest inside my head: a tiny forest, hot and fuggy like forest outside, but with no one living in it but me.

I could still see Mary out there, or at least I could still see the blurred shape in the fug that I knew was Mary, patiently waiting for me to hear what she could already hear herself. ‘I so look forward to when we’re both shadowspeakers together,’ she often said, ‘and can talk between ourselves about our Mother and what she wants for us. It’s lonely doing this on your own, it really is. Everyone is a bit scared of us shadowspeakers. No one wants to come close, and no one really understands what it’s like for us.’

I’m going to let her down, I thought. After all her patience and all she’s done for me, I’m going to let her down!

But then I told myself firmly to stop all this. It was just worry and fretfulness, and Mary had particularly said there was no point in that, and that it would only get in the way. So I pushed thoughts of Mary and whether I was good enough out of my mind and tried again to hear our Mother. Still nothing came. Still there was nothing at all beyond my own thoughts, my own pulse, and the sounds coming in from outside.

I wondered if my question was too selfish? After all, Mother Gela didn’t speak to shadowspeakers for their own benefit, she spoke to them so they could pass on her messages to all her children. I must try again with another question that wasn’t about me.

‘Mother,’ I began again, ‘what should I do so as to be able to help your daughter Mary as best as I possibly can?’

Tell her everything, of course, came the thought straight away. Don’t hold things back from her. Tell her everything and accept whatever it is she has to say. Why even ask the question, when you already know what to do?