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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

‘What do you mean to us all ? They’re all still there apart from me!’

‘They aren’t, you know. You can see the remains of shelters, and the stones and ashes where the main fire used to be, and some writing on a tree. But the people have all gone.’ He chuckled. ‘I can’t read myself but apparently the writing says: “We’re really here”, which is kind of funny when you think about it, seeing as there’s no one there at all, unless you count all those fatbucks lying round on the sand. That’s why I went there, in fact: to do for fatbucks and melt them down. These Veeklehouse lamps are always hungry. You wouldn’t believe the amount of buckfat that’s needed just to keep them all burning. Just as we were paddling out of the place, I remember, another bunch of guys came over to cut bark from those funny trees that bend over in middle. But apart from them, we didn’t see anyone at all. There are a few guards over there, but they have their own camp they’ve made out on the peckway edge of the water forest. My boss paddled out to them with a couple of guys just to let them know who we were, but the rest of us didn’t see them whole time we were there. Well, they’re there to watch out for Johnfolk coming across Deep Darkness, aren’t they? There wouldn’t be much point in them sitting on the sand with the fatbucks, because you can’t see anything with those big droopy trees in the water all round you. The guards have built a little grounds of their own out there out of sand and wood, my boss said, where they can look straight out towards Deep Darkness, and watch and wait. Of course, they’ve got a fast boat waiting ready all the—’

‘Where have the people gone?’

‘No one knows. I thought you’d—’

‘Do you think someone has done for them?’

‘I don’t think it’s that. The guards told my boss that they all just went, just disappeared for some reason, not telling anyone where they were going.’

Well, there was just one good thing about hearing that my home was no longer there, and that my mum and brothers and sisters and friends had all gone off somewhere where I might never find them. There was just one single good thing. At least this time I could tell Mary all about it, and not have to keep it a secret inside my head.

Mary was kind kind of course. She’d been about to put on a show, but now she told the Veeklehouse guards that it couldn’t go ahead for another waking and they should send the people away. And then she held me curled up against her while I cried and cried.