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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

Where was it coming from? We looked out through the trees all round the clearing, but saw nothing unusual. And then Trueheart looked up at the sky.

‘Auntie! It’s there!’

Straight away I had to cover my face because of the brightness, but not before I’d seen what it was. We knew that at once, both of us did. Just in that one short glimpse we could see that what was coming down towards us was just like the thing that sat in Veeklehouse behind that high fence. But the one at Veeklehouse was dead, and this one was still alive: a huge dark circle coming straight down towards the clearing, with white lights shining down round the edge of it, brighter than anything I’d ever seen. Michael’s names, I hadn’t known until then that light could hurt your eyes.

And now I was in the light. I could see my own hands like I’d never seen them before, the pale skin, the little chaps and scars, all picked out so sharply that it was like I was seeing them for the first time. I could see the trunks of the trees – I always thought of wood as black, but I could see now that it was a dark bluish colour – I could see the folds and twists of Trueheart’s batface, I could see each wrinkle in the buckskin wrap of that old guard, still peacefully sleeping under his redlantern tree. I could even see the hairs on it.

The whining sound the veekle made was almost as loud now as the hmmmph hmmmph hmmmph of the trees behind us. We heard men’s voices shouting out from the shelters by Longpool. Apart from the sleeping guard, me and Trueheart were still the only one in the clearing but others had seen the veekle too. We peeked upwards again. The landing veekle was right over middle of the clearing, just above the tops of the trees. In the heartbeat before I had to look away, I saw four legs come sliding out from underneath it, spindly and long, like the legs of a flutterbye. The old guard woke up with a cry as the thing reached ground, grabbing his spear and clambering to his feet, his eyes wide with fear. The veekle wobbled, just slightly, on those spindly legs as it settled over the Circle of Stones.

And then suddenly more bright lights appeared all round the side of it, shining sideways out through the trees, filling up forest with a stripy pattern of weird black shadows, sharper than any shadow I’d ever seen. I covered my face and peeped between my fingers. At the top of the veekle was that same round shape there was on the one at Veeklehouse, made of some strange kind of glass that you can see through like water, and I saw the dark forms inside of people’s heads.