She didn’t answer at once. Tiaan was wondering if the manufactory might take her back, after this dreadful news. ‘Do you think there’s a chance for me?’ she said wistfully. ‘To work as an artisan again?’
‘I suppose it might be possible … I’ve known Gi-Had since he was a little boy. His father was my younger sister’s second husband. Would you like me to speak to him? In a roundabout sort of a way?’
She hesitated. The memories of her treatment, and the horror of the breeding factory, were strong. ‘I’m afraid. I’ll die before I go back down there.’ She shivered.
He went to the fire, made mint tea with a sprig of dried herb from a hanging bunch, sweetened it with honey, and handed it to her.
‘Thank you! Did you manage to get back my … things?’
‘I picked them up on the way back from Tiksi. All except your journal. The new crafter has it.’
‘Thank you. If you could see what I’m wearing under this.’ She held up the muddy sheets at the back, allowing heat from the fire onto her bare skin.
He laughed. ‘I’m too old for that sort of thing.’
Tiaan yawned. ‘I’m so tired. I think I’ll just curl up right here.’
THIRTEEN
Tiaan slept and did not dream, to be woken after dark by Joeyn carrying wood inside. She yawned, stretched and sat up.
‘Going to be a cold night.’ He stacked the fire. ‘Lucky you’re not sleeping out in those rags.’
‘Where did you put my clothes?’ she asked, warming herself at the blaze.
‘They’re in the pack under the bed.’
She fell on it, pulling out woollen trousers, shirts, undergarments, socks and boots, a heavy coat of waxed cloth with a fur lining, brushes for teeth and hair, a few other personal items, the copy of Nunar’s book, and at the bottom, most precious of all, her artisan’s toolkit. She unfolded the canvas with its dozens of pockets, each containing a special tool. Tiaan remembered the day she’d finished making them. It had been the day she graduated from prentice to artisan. Her fingers lingered on the tools of her trade. She might never use them again but there was no way she could leave them behind. All her self-worth was represented by that small roll of canvas.
‘Was there anything else?’ she asked.
‘Oh, yes!’ He took a leather bag from behind the door.
She loosened the drawstring and opened the mouth of the bag. Feeling inside, her fingers encountered the helm and she had an instantaneous flash of the young man on the balcony, crying, ‘Help me!’
She went still, looked up at Joeyn, began to say something then decided not to. Tiaan laid the helm on her lap, the globe beside it.
‘Beautiful work,’ said Joeyn. ‘What are they for?’
‘To sense out what was wrong with the controllers. The crystal we found the other day went in this bracket.’ Just the thought of it set off her withdrawal cravings. She had to make another pliance. She was shaking with desire for it.
‘There was no crystal in your room,’ Joeyn said.
‘Irisis would have taken it down to the workshop.’
‘I wonder she didn’t take these too.’
‘They’re made for me. She wouldn’t want them.’
‘There’s something else.’ Joeyn held a piece of cloth under her nose.
The smell made her step backwards. ‘It’s my headache balm.’
‘Where did you get it?’
‘From the apothek. The crystals gave me terrible headaches.’
‘Are you sure that’s where the headaches came from?’
‘Yes. Why?’
‘My grandmother used herbs and warned me against this one – calluna root. I could never forget the smell. It causes visions, fits, madness, and if you take enough of it, you can choke to death.’
‘But why would the apothek put calluna in my ointment?’
‘I don’t know. He wasn’t a lover of yours?’ said Joeyn with a cheeky grin.
‘I have never had a lover,’ she reminded him primly. ‘Anyway, I hardly know the man.’
‘Perhaps he loves you secretly.’
‘I doubt it. People say that he’s … incapable.’
‘Could anyone else have interfered with the balm?’
She wrinkled her brow. ‘I was too busy to wait while he made it up. Hang on! Irisis brought it down. She wanted to be rid of me.’
‘And now she has, and there’s no way to prove she had anything to do with it. No way to unseat her either.’
‘’I thought …’
‘She’s your enemy, Tiaan. She’ll never allow you to come back.’
Tears formed in her eyes. ‘I don’t know why I keep hoping. I’ll go tomorrow, though I don’t know where to go.’
‘We can talk about that later. It’s dinnertime.’ He lifted the lid of the cauldron on the hob. A delicious spicy smell wafted out. Tiaan licked her lips.
Joeyn dug caked rice from another pot, shaped it into a raised doughnut on a wooden platter then ladled a good helping of stew into the centre. He handed it to her.
‘I can’t eat that much!’
‘Of course you can. The only way to set out is with a full belly.’
‘That’s not till tomorrow.’
‘It might be a long time until you get another meal as good as this one.’
True enough. She dipped her fork. It was a thick stew of meat and vegetables: rich, spicy and hot. Tiaan ate slowly, thinking about tomorrow. She was lost; just as lost as the young man of her crystal dreams.
Had they just been hallucinations brought on by calluna? Was the young man no more than the fantasy of a drug-addled brain? She could not believe that. The dreams were the only good things left in her life. Anyway, she had first dreamed of him the night before she got the balm.
Joeyn was gazing wistfully at her.
‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘Oh, nothing really. It’s good to have someone to eat with. I haven’t, since my wife died.’
It was pleasant in his hut. Companionable. She felt at home here. ‘I usually eat alone, too. I … don’t know what to say to people, as a rule. They find me strange.’
‘People are strange. Here we are, you just starting out in life, and me at the end of mine.’
‘No!’ she cried. ‘You’re my only friend, Joe.’
‘Then you’d better make some more. Not many miners get to seventy-six. I won’t see eighty, nor want to. What are your plans, Tiaan? I know you’ve something in mind, for you keep going all dreamy and vague, and smiling to yourself as if thinking of a distant lover.’
‘I’m going to go after my dream.’ She left it at that. There was no way to explain the young man, even to Joeyn. ‘There’s only one problem …’
He scraped up the last of the stew with a rice ball and popped it in his mouth. ‘What’s that?’
‘I need another crystal, Joe.’
‘Why?’ He stopped in mid-chew.
‘The helm and the globe are useless without one. It’s … I suppose it’s like not being able to find your reading glasses. You can see the words on the page but you can’t make out what they say.’
He gave Tiaan a keen glance. ‘Well, my roof props are still there. It wouldn’t be too dangerous to get another, I suppose.’
‘Any old crystal would do.’ Tiaan was already feeling guilty. ‘It wouldn’t have to be a specially good one …’ The craving was back again – crystal, crystal, crystal! She had to have another, whatever it cost.
‘I don’t suppose so. But on the road you’ll be travelling, you’ll need the best you can get.’ He broke off abruptly. ‘I’m going for a walk. I like to settle my dinner before bed. You’ll want to change, and wash, I suppose.’
‘Thank you.’
After the door closed she washed the platters and leaned them against the fireplace to dry. Taking off her layers of rag and gown, she bathed as thoroughly as she could with a bucket of water and put on knickers and singlet. Lying beside the fire, she pulled the rags over her and was soon asleep.