The Queen of All Crows by Rod Duncan

Author:Rod Duncan [Duncan, Rod]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy, steampunk, gas-lit empire, elizabeth barnabus
ISBN: 9780857667014
Publisher: Watkins Media
Published: 2018-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

Ekua led them down the steps from the ship and along the main boardway. But before reaching the path that would have taken them back to the jetty, she took a right-hand turn between two of the shops and out behind them into an area of trees. Elizabeth caught glimpses of women here and there, but there was none of the applause that had accompanied the triumphal procession from the Iceland Queen.

The final walkway was so narrow that they were obliged to go single file. A cluster of five stilt huts lay at the end. Each was capped with a gently sloping roof, thick with vegetables. From a distance the roofs looked like small patches of farmland. But coming closer, Elizabeth saw that they were of corrugated iron construction and that the plants were growing in pots, densely packed on top.

Ekua stopped on a small deck between the houses. A woman working one of the roof gardens stood and picked her way between the plant pots to the edge. In one hand she held a trowel, in the other a quantity of dark green leaves.

Ekua shielded her eyes to look up. “I’ve brought you a guest. She’s to take the Test tomorrow.” Then, turning to Elizabeth: “You’ll be collected in the morning.” Without waiting for a response, she turned and led Fidelia back the way they’d come.

The woman on the roof clambered down a rickety ladder at the side of the house.

“Welcome,” she said.

“Thank you. My name’s Elizabeth.”

The woman didn’t take her hand. Her smile seemed more from embarrassment than warmth. “Come,” she said. “I’ll fetch water.”

Inside the hut was a single room, without windows or lamps. As Elizabeth’s eyes started to adjust, she made out a crude iron stove and two barrels. The rest of the room’s contents hung from ropes suspended across the space above their heads. Herbs, vegetables, dried fish, pans and pots, gardening implements, fishing nets and folded hammocks, all swayed with the shifting of the island.

The woman reached up and took down a wooden cup. This she dipped in one of the barrels before offering it two-handed. Elizabeth drank, cautiously at first. It was the freshest water she’d tasted in months. She drained the cup and passed it back, hoping for a refill. But the woman hooked it below the rafters again.

“What is the Test?” Elizabeth asked.

The only answer was another embarrassed smile.

“Can you tell me your name?”

A shake of the head.

“Will you be able to tell me that if I pass the Test?”

“Yes.”

“And if I fail?”

Back to the embarrassed smile. “I’m sorry,” she said. “But if you fail, you die.”

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