The Disappearance of Ember Crow by Ambelin Kwaymullina

Author:Ambelin Kwaymullina [Kwaymullina, Ambelin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781922244284
Publisher: Walker Books Australia
Published: 2013-09-02T04:00:00+00:00

THE CITY

The next few days were a blur of preparations. I left most of the details of organising the trip to Connor, while I – well, talked. First to Georgie and Daniel, explaining what I’d discovered and putting them in charge of the Tribe while I was gone. Then to Jaz, explaining it all again. He promised the saurs would keep up their patrols and make sure no one was caught unawares by anything to do with the Adjustment. After that I tried to contact Grandpa, only he still wouldn’t come out. So my last conversation was with the wolves. Pack Leader was unimpressed that I’d stopped off to say goodbye. He obviously thought it was a waste of time when I had a Pack member missing. It was a bittersweet reminder that I was now a girl who was part-wolf, rather than the other way around. Wolves weren’t sentimental. Humans were.

Spinifex City lay in the desert on the far side of the Firstwood. Connor, Jules and I hiked part of the way, then took to the skies once we neared the homelands of the sabers who populated the edge of the forest. The big cats were aggressive and insanely territorial; it would have been next to impossible to walk through their lands without being eaten.

I wasn’t prepared for what was beyond the western side of the Firstwood. I’d imagined sand, and little else. I was wrong. There was sand – bright red sand – but there was so much more. The desert was a place of contrast and colour. Yellow spinifex grass, bleached white by the sun. Taffa vines, trailing their bulging purple pods and lime-green leaves across the earth. Chunky formations of orangey-brown rock. Tall pines and the strange bottle-like shapes of grey boab trees. And everywhere, thin streams of water that pulsed through the landscape like veins. It was beautiful, even though it wasn’t my forest.

By the time we finally neared Spinifex City, ten days had passed. There was a high composite wall surrounding it, the same as all the other cities, only the one here was stained red by the desert dust that seemed to get into everything. The closer we got to the wall the more nervous I felt. We’ll be fine. We look as if we belong. The three of us were wearing clothes of mixed colours and carrying heavy backpacks, befitting our supposed identities as traders. I had a Citizenship tattoo on my wrist as well, inked there by Connor using leftover dye we’d found in Ember’s lab.

I rubbed anxiously at my wrist.

“Will you quit fretting?” Jules said. “I told you, no one will check the tattoo properly. Not when you’re with me.” He waved at the distant wall. “This is my city!”

“You’re originally from Gull City,” Connor pointed out.

“Spinifex City isn’t only a place. It’s a way of life.”

I rolled my eyes. Then I frowned, staring at Jules. The journey here seemed to have taken a lot out of him.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I told you before, I’m fine.

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