Goldskull the wai vara c.., p.1
Goldskull (The Wai-Vara Chronicles Book 1), page 1
GOLDSKULL
THE WAI-VARA CHRONICLES
A J WEBSTER
CONTENTS
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Afterword
Glossary of Wai-Vara Terms
Acknowledgments
About the Author
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2023 by AJ Webster
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of quotations in a book review. For more information, address: info@scarabpress.com
First paperback edition August 2023
Book design by Artificial Intelligence
978-1-7392376-4-6 (paperback)
978-1-7392376-5-3 (ebook)
Published by Scarab Press
www.scarabpress.com
For Lily & Elliot
“Long is the way and hard,
that out of Hell leads up to light.”
JOHN MILTON
PROLOGUE
Every day that I spent on the ocean, was a day I could have died; not because the water itself wished me harm (though at times it did), but because the shadow of death lurked in every corner of every place I found myself.
Those days were the happiest of my life.
They were filled with everything that I miss and everything that now makes me afraid.
I grew up in a tiny house that overlooked the sea at Portsmouth and even when I was forced to move to London, I could see the river from the highest window of the children’s home.
Now I can’t stand it.
The sight of open water drowns my mind in fear. In my more rational moments, I see the tragedy of this, but fear is not rational and when I wake in the night sweating and screaming because of what I remember, sometimes I can’t even turn on a tap to wash my face for the trembling of my hand at the thought of moving water.
There is, however, some part of me that won’t let it go completely. I have an almost sadistic need to hunt out pictures of the ocean. I have travelled all over the country visiting maritime and naval exhibitions so that I can stare upon beautiful frozen moments of ships crashing through the sea. I love the safety of not needing to know what happened before or after the instant that is painted, and just for a moment, I allow myself to feel a flood of memories that keep my mind from destroying itself.
I went to the Tate Gallery in London yesterday. They had a special exhibition on called ‘Seascapes Through Time: 1500-2000’ and I couldn’t resist. As I walked around the rooms that housed the exhibit I could feel my 14-year-old self coming back to life. She was excited and scared, much like I am as I stare at these pictures.
I stop to take a longer look at one painting in particular. It is dated 1695, my favourite time. It was an enormous canvas, three times as tall and twice as wide as me. It showed a beautiful old galleon charging through a stormy sea, tiny members of its crew in the rigging and at the wheel a captain who looked almost serene in his intense concentration.
I found myself reaching out to touch the painting. A name formed at my lips and I wanted to run my fingers over this little figure who seemed so familiar. But no sound came from my mouth, because no sound has come from my mouth for a very long time. They call me an elective mute - someone who could talk if they wanted to but chooses not to do so. I have had many tests and infuriated many doctors; I don’t know if they’re right or not and frankly I don’t care.
There is no one left with whom I wish to speak.
What I do know is that as my fingertips reached the canvas, a security guard grabbed my wrist, gently but firmly. ‘I’m sorry madame,’ he said politely, ‘but you can’t touch the paintings.’
I was snapped out of my trance and realised what was happening. I looked at the man who had now let go of my arm and mouthed the words ‘I’m sorry,’ before adjusting the tattered brown leather satchel at my shoulder and walking out of the exhibit.
I hadn’t wanted to go home; it’s not much of a home anyway, just a few rooms that I inhabit. So, I walked around other parts of the gallery. Eventually I found myself in an area dedicated to early Twentieth Century British painters. Not an area that I had a particular fondness for, but at least I wouldn’t end up trying to touch anything.
I glanced around the room and found myself entranced by the most understated of pictures. It was pale, no strong colours; two off-white figures against an off-white background. One was a man standing, his arms stretched to the sky, looking mournful and desperate. The other was a woman; she sat a few feet away from him, her head against her knees and her arms wrapped around her legs, completely disconsolate and alone, despite being next to this other figure. I thought of how often during my time at sea I had occupied that very same place; how alone and weak I had been.
The picture was of Adam and Eve learning that they had been expelled from the Garden of Eden. It is a story that I both love and hate. I look at that girl, Eve, and I see my own story. I see that I was led the wrong way and I see that I made others follow me. And now I am here and I am completely alone. At least Eve got to keep Adam.
The girl that I was, drifts further from me with each passing day. I have her words and a few sketches, written in books, that remind me what I thought and felt, but sometimes it seems so alien to me that I want to cry for not taking better care of her memories. Other times I want to reach inside my head and rip them out, so that I can stop feeling this horrific, painful numbness.
I tried this once, but it didn't work.
So now I write down new words and rebuild the pictures outside of my head in the hope that this is where they will stay and that they will remain true and one day, someone will be able to tell me that the things I recall are real.
I am and am not part of your world. The story I have to tell is of my life, which took place somewhere which will sound so familiar to you in many ways, but which will surprise you in ways that my current life never does.
CHAPTER 1
Let me start from the beginning of the longest journey I ever took. My name is Eloria Gray, known for a little while, as Ellie, then as 'Girl 4392' and from there I lost track of who I was for a very long time. Now there is almost no one that needs to know my name, so it doesn’t seem to matter quite so much.
On the 24th August 1697 (Old Time) and at the age of fourteen, I found myself running through the night with blood covering my clothes and countless shards of glass wedged into my hands. I hid amongst the mail bags of a stagecoach that took me from the streets of London to the centre of Portsmouth. I burst out from the back of the coach before it stopped and ran blindly towards the docks.
This is not true.
I had always known that when I ran (which had somehow seemed inevitable for as long as I could remember) that I would head that way. I had been drawn to this place all my life and now my life depended on it.
My feet were bare, so they didn’t make much noise as I zigzagged between the warehouses and barrels of supplies that towered over me. I stopped to catch my breath when I reached the last of them and I wiped the sweat from my forehead, only to replace it with the blood from my hands, reminding me of the urgency with which I needed to find refuge. Someone would be looking for me, and I was certain that a second escape in one night was not an option.
There was only one ship moored in the docks. It was the ship I had been waiting for. It was the ship that forced me to act the way I had that evening. It was the ship that had caused my blood to be spilt and yet it offered me my only hope of salvation.
The Ark was the most impressive, forbidding, beautiful ship I had ever seen. I didn’t know what type of ship it was then, just that it was big and that the man who commanded its crew was supposed to help me.
As my mind tried to form a picture of what he would be like, suddenly there he was, standing at the ship’s railing looking directly at me. He couldn’t see me, but his gaze was towards the shadows I inhabited and I held my breath for those few seconds until he looked away to talk to one of the men that came to do his bidding.
Gabriel Farris was one of the most respected men on the One-Water. He was also what your world would call a pirate. Where I come from though, he was known as one of the Wise Masters. And more importantly he was a 2.
Everyone has a number. Whe
The numbers only range from 1 to 5. 1 is reserved for those of god-like importance; the leaders of countries and those who can ‘See.’ No one calls them 1’s though; they’re known as The Unmarked’ because they’re the only ones that don’t get branded at birth. A 2 is respected by all and answers only to an elite few, and even then, perhaps not very often. No one really knows what the criteria for being born a 2 is, but these people were often hidden from the likes of the lower numbers; they became characters in stories that every lesser number wished to be.
Most people are a 3; these people have a home and food. They’re not rich and they’re not poor, but they are content and they work hard. It’s not like class in your world though; a 3 could clean the streets or lead an army; 3 simply means that you are acceptable to the world.
I was born a 4. 4s are on the edge of society. They are part of it but will not often be spoken of or to. They are tolerated. But only just.
I had never met a 5, though I knew of their presence. They are not seen, but the contempt so often voiced about their existence was all the proof I needed to know that they were real.
A 4 cannot speak to a 2. Especially when that 4 is covered in blood, which is not entirely her own and when that 4 is not of age and is unaccompanied by an adult.
But then I didn’t plan on making his acquaintance until there was nothing but the One-Water surrounding us and he would either have to speak to me or drown me.
CHAPTER 2
I managed to get right up next to the ship. At the rear was a gangplank leading onto the main deck that had been used for loading supplies earlier in the night. I knew I couldn’t just stroll up it and onto the ship, but I thought that I could climb about halfway up and force one of the portholes open and climb in that way. Then all I would need to do is get to the bottom of the ship where no one was likely to come looking for a few days.
It was a good plan. Well, it was a good plan in theory. I got to the point of trying to force the porthole open when a large, strong hand grabbed my shoulder and pulled me backwards so hard I was sent flying through the air, landing back on the solid (and very hard) dock that I was trying to liberate myself from.
The owner of the hand followed my flight and picked me up by the scruff of my shirt. Without speaking, he pulled up my sleeve and stared at my wrist. ‘Disgusting.’ He said, spitting on my feet to emphasise his point.
He said this, because upon my wrist was my number: 4. Everyone has their number branded upon the underside of their wrist a few days after they’re born in what you call ‘Roman Numerals’. What you know as a midwife, was for us, a figura-vitae, a life-shaper: a woman who could ‘See'. She could look into your soul and know where you should be placed in the world. Once you are branded, nothing can change it. You can’t scrub it off, you can’t alter it, you can’t even scrape the skin away; somehow the branding goes deeper than that and resurfaces once the skin heals.
4s are not allowed to travel without written permission from a 3 or higher. That I was trying to board this ship was entirely illegal and could get me locked away for a long time. Not that this would be worse than where I had come from. Not that I cared. If I was caught for this, it would be better than being caught for the other things I had done.
The man, who was short, but enormously wide and powerful picked me up, suspending me in the air while he considered what to do with me.
It turned out that he was a man of few words and singular actions. He yelled ‘Master!’ in a rough, hoarse voice and threw me further back so that I landed at least twenty feet away from the ship.
I didn’t know what to do, so I stayed on the ground to see what would unfold.
A man came to the ship’s railing, but in the darkness I couldn’t see who it was, until I heard his voice. ‘What is it John Hogg?’ Asked Farris. His voice deep and flat, giving nothing away.
‘A 4, Master. Trying to board The Ark. Hogg stopped her.’
Hogg looked like a misshapen puppy, desperate for his owner to pat his head, or rub his belly. His head was cocked to the side and if he’d had a tail, I’m sure it would have been wagging expectantly.
‘Thank you John Hogg. You may leave.’
Hogg’s invisible tail floundered and his head straightened, then hung forwards. No reward for him tonight. He slunk away leaving me alone with the shadowy figure that would decide my fate.
‘Stand.’
The voice was as before, strong and commanding; it was a voice that never answered questions, only gave orders, and I was not about to disobey.
I was shaky on my feet; I hadn’t eaten since lunchtime the day before and had been thrown to the ground twice in less than a minute. I wanted to sit down and clear my head. But I stood, and I stood as tall as I could manage, though that wasn't much more than five feet.
‘Light!’ He called, but not to me. His head had turned and in an instant someone brought him an oil lantern. I saw his face clearly for the first time.
His skin was tanned like some of the girls I had met from the place I ran from. His hair was dark and long. He had a short beard that came to a point under his chin. His eyes were dark too, but piercing. Not fierce and angry like Hogg’s; there was something else about them, but I didn’t get a chance to wonder what that was, as this was when he threw the lantern at me.
Before I could react, it had smashed at my feet and I found myself facing a wall of fire. I didn’t move.
Where would I go if I had?
Into the fire - I get burnt.
Away from the fire - I get caught by Hogg, or someone worse.
I didn’t move, because there were no other options.
The light of the fire obscured my view of Farris, but as the flames began to die down they caught a flash of metal, drawn into the air from around his waist. He held his sword aloft just for a moment before it flew down at me.
It did not land safely in front of me like the lantern had.
The blade pierced the ground millimetres from my right foot. For a moment I thought I had escaped, but then my leg began to burn as I realised that the blade had cut my shin. I could feel the warm blood trickling down my leg, adding a new colour to the dusty floor of the docks.
Still, I did not move.
'Run away.' Farris called down to me.
I pulled his sword out of the ground and held it defiantly in the air. 'No.' I said, hoping my voice sounded less wobbly than it felt.
'Put it down.'
'No.' I said. Definitely not convincing.
I didn't see anything this time, I just heard the whistle of air and then something smashed against the sword I was holding, sending sparks flying, as metal hit metal and I found myself disarmed, with two matching weapons lying at my feet.
Next came the sound of heavy boots marching swiftly down the gangplank and within a few seconds there he was, right in front of me, the flames from the lantern still burning brightly enough for us to see each other clearly. It was then that I saw the raggedy bird sitting on his shoulder. Once upon a time it had probably been green, but it looked like a sad and defeated creature with eyes that restlessly surveyed everything, whilst it twitched and hopped from foot to foot. It nuzzled its head into Farris' hair, making it look like he was whispering to him.
