As she drove, Bella tried to recall Darren in her memory. All she could remember was that he had been a high school rugby player with a disarming grin and an easy smile, tucking Agnes under his arm as easily as if she had been a rugby ball. What she recalled most was Agnes’ insistence: “I love Darren and we want to be together and we don’t care what anybody else says.” They had been so young, so awfully young.
One night, Bella and Hoki were woken up by Agnes. “Sshhhh,” she said. “I don’t want to wake Mum and Dad up. Darren is waiting in the car. We’re running away together.” Agnes’ face was lit with love, so much love that it seemed to be giving her pain. “Isn’t that romantic? I’m sorry you won’t be able to be bridesmaids. Will you forgive me? I’ve come to say goodbye. I love you both. Don’t worry, though. One day I’ll be back.’
The next day, Dad had set out after the runaways. He found them in Christchurch, but Agnes refused to come back with him. The months drifted by. Rumours came back to Tuapa that Agnes was “in the family way”, then that Darren had taken off before the baby was born, and then that the baby had died at birth. “Come back to Tuapa, Agnes,” Mum had pleaded. But Agnes had said, “No.” Maybe she had been ashamed to come back. Or perhaps she had grown used to Christchurch. But whenever she spoke on the telephone to Bella and Hoki she would always say, “One day, my sisters, one day I’ll be back.”
It never happened. A year later, lovely, smiling Agnes had been killed in a car accident.
“Oh Agnes,” Bella said to herself. “If only you were home now. We really need you.”
In Tuapa, Bella bought two cases of ammunition from Harry Summers at the farming supplies store.
“Planning a war?” Harry quipped.
Bella looked at her watch. She was running late, but a promise was a promise. She swerved into the carpark, parked in a “Doctors Only” space and hurried into the hospital. When she reached Cora’s room she was surprised to find Lucas sitting by the bed, holding Cora’s hand. He looked up as Bella arrived.
“Do you think she’ll wake up?”
Bella didn’t know what to say. Cora was lying as still as death. Her face was waxen. She had an oxygen mask over her nose and mouth, and tubes coming out of the sleeve of her left arm.
“Of course she will,” Bella answered finally. She didn’t know why Lucas cared so much — or what his girlfriend Melissa would think. But that was really none of her business.
“Ah well,” Lucas said. “I’d better go. I’m on my lunch break. You wouldn’t happen to know where Arnie is, would you? He’s done a runner on me.”
“He didn’t tell you?” Bella answered. “He’s had to go up north. On family business.”
“Oh, so he’ll be coming back? Good.”
Lucas went out the door, Bella sat down in a chair and stroked Cora’s face. Cora’s skin was so cold, so alabaster. The only perceptive movements were the slight rise and fall of her chest as she breathed and, every now and then, the flicker of her eyelids as if she was dreaming. If she was, she was trapped there, searching for a door, a way out.
“Cora?” Bella began. “I know you can’t hear me, but don’t be afraid, dear. You must be patient and hold on. You have a lovely daughter in Skylark. She’s doing the best she can.”
It was time to go. Quickly, Bella stood up and kissed Cora on the forehead. On the way out she happened to glance at Cora’s chart at the foot of the bed: Cora Agnes Edwards nee Wipani Born Christchurch 1960
Bella closed the door behind her.
She left the hospital and headed back to Manu Valley at speed.
“I’ve stayed away too long,” she said to herself. The forest blurred around her, the sunlight slashing at the windscreen like a whip. She pushed the accelerator to the floor. In no time flat she reached the homestead, stepped out of the station-wagon and slammed the door. The silence became physical and hit her in the stomach.
Bella looked up to the clifftop. She couldn’t hear Hoki’s shotgun. She couldn’t see Hoki at all. Instead, at the summit, a cloud of seabirds was swooping and diving, raining like arrows through the rip in the sky.
“Oh no.”
Bella pulled the ammunition out of the wagon and yanked the top off one of the cases. She grabbed some boxes of shells and stuffed them in her jacket. Then she was on the run into the homestead to get her shotgun. Along the verandah she hurried, banging the door open with her shoulder.
She was surrounded with the sound of hissing.
Bella stepped back. Her blood ran cold with fear. The room was filled with black sea shags. They had smashed their way in through the windows. They were perched everywhere. On the sofas. On the table and chairs and the sideboard. The remains of Lucas’s doll, shredded, punctured, totally savaged, were scattered throughout the room. Standing on the doll’s head, claws dug deeply into its face was the black shag, Kawanatanga. The sight of him brought Bella to her senses and she pointed a finger at him.
“You are trespassing here,” Bella called. “The land to the landbirds, the sea to the seabirds. How dare you transgress my personal domain and soil my undefended nest. Go or face the wrath of the Lord Tane.”
Kawanatanga’s wings unfolded like a nightmare. He filled the room with his mocking sibilants:
The Lord Tane is on our side now. He has granted us dispensation to change the order of things if we can. Once we have the power, old hen, it will be only by our leave that you will live here.
Bella picked up a jug and threw it at Kawanatanga. It smashed, raining him with jagged pieces. His eyes widened and he stretched out his neck.
The threatening movement did not frighten Bella. “That may be,” she said, “but it has not yet come to pass. Until then the old order stands. Now get out, and take your dark minions from Hell with you.”
Kawanatanga stabbed at the air with his beak. There was a flurry of black wings as the seashags hopped up onto the window sills and out. The sun gleamed on their feathers as they ascended the currents.
Kawanatanga remained behind:
Enjoy your freedom while you have it.
Kawanatanga lifted and, as he beat past Bella, she felt his wingtips like sinister fingers caressing her face. She ran to the verandah to watch the squad of seashags, fifty in all, that were heading north.
“They know about Skylark,” Bella realised.
She heard Hoki’s scream curling down from the clifftop. Bella grabbed her shotgun and was on the run again. As she climbed the cliff path she was already loading and firing the weapon at random into the air. Bang. Reload. Bang. Reload. Bang. “Hoki, Sister, I’m coming —”
Hoki was lying on the grass. Seabirds were diving at her. She was fending them off with her walking sticks.
“Get away from her,” Bella yelled. She reloaded her shotgun. Bang. The seabirds scattered, turning away from the ripped sky. Just to make sure that they knew the boss had returned, Bella let off another shot. Bang. The sound reverberated across the sky like distant thunder.
“I’m sorry, Sister,” Hoki said. “The shotgun stopped working. I didn’t know what to do. I tried to fix it myself.” Her face was streaming with sweat.
“That doesn’t matter. At least you’re alive.”
Quickly, Bella picked up the shotgun. She inspected it, worked the bolt a couple of times and ejected the shellcase that had jammed inside the barrel. It was just a simple jam, easy to fix; she had shown Hoki hundreds of times. Hoki saw her sister’s look of frustration. “I’m sorry, Sister,” she wept. “I can’t even shoot straight. The sweat pours into my eyes, I can’t see anything and —”