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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

We had no young men with us: they were all in the guards. But we had young women. I thought of young Flame with her little baby. I thought of Trueheart. You might think an ugly batface like hers would give some protection, but I knew it didn’t always work that way. There were plenty of men who saw batfaces as being so damaged already that they might as well be damaged some more.

‘There are two three good glass knives in that bag on our buck,’ I hissed to Trueheart. ‘If they come for us, run over and grab them for us. We may not have metal but we can give these blokes a fight.’

One of the bucks came forward, a second following straight after. Their riders wore coloured longwraps, rather than the plain ones that the other ringmen wore, so we could see they were the high men in charge. The first one’s wrap was blue, the second one’s white but sewn with big writing. They stopped side by side and the first man reached up to his mask. It seemed to be fixed to his metal hat, for when he pushed at it, it folded upwards and forwards, so we could see his face underneath. He was a young young guy, no more than twenty, I’d say, with long black hair. His wore his beard tied in little bows, and though he had a proud face like high people often have, he smiled. And it wasn’t a cruel smile, but a smile like he wanted to reassure us.

‘My name is Luke Johnson,’ he said. ‘My father, Dixon, is the Headman of New Earth.’

A little shiver ran down my spine. I knew Dixon. Dixon had been with Greenstone when me and Starlight first met him in Veeklehouse. He’d been Chief Dixon then, a tall, cold, proud man with thick grey hair, who’d done his best to stop Greenstone from taking Starlight with him across the water. I remembered how he wouldn’t so much as look at me, not just because I was a low person, but because I was a batface. And I could see Dixon’s face now in this young guy who was talking to us. Luke Johnson was a younger version of that tall grey man. But, if it wasn’t just my wishful thinking, he also seemed kinder, and friendlier, and less proud.