II
Adlartok
Chapter One

herself over the precipice, slipping and scrambling downwards. Her elbows knocked against stones, heart hammering, hands flailing in an attempted to slow her decent. She fell helplessly, plummeting for a couple of body lengths at least. A plume of dust rose up behind her, the cliff face grazing her back as she slid to a jarring halt. Relived to have found the bottom, she climbed to her feet, heaved herself over a final mound of boulders, and jumped to the sand.

          ‘Okay,’ she said, smiling, wiping strands of matted blonde hair from her eyes, ‘that’s better.’

          The beach curled around its ocean, water thrashing, dark and rattling with ice. Far out to sea however, illuminated by the morning sunlight, the child admired an arch of freestanding rock, stubborn and lonely within the white-wash of distant waves. She had been following a star, and up until this moment, her mind had given little thought to where it might be leading her. It was only now, on squinting against the rising sun, that she began to wonder.

          Stalking a path around the cove, the child buried her hands into the sleeves of her jumper. It was a blue jumper, blue as the sky, as that sea. She listened to the scuff of her trousers as she walked, let herself imagine the sand scampering beneath her feet. She could sense sunlight warming her skin. It was a pleasant sensation and yet, alone as she was, she shuddered at the prospect of those rays reaching for her bones. A stone lay huddled within the sand. She reached down, cradling it, feeling out its contours, running her fingers over its surface as she walked.

          ‘You’re okay,’ she whispered, ushering the stone into her pocket.

          About halfway along the beach, the child saw a cave, its dark mouth widening as she drew closer. The child paused. Something was moving. The cave’s shadow lay across the sand in front of her, and though she couldn’t be sure, it seemed to be camouflaging a creature within. She peered harder, crouching low, hairs rising on the back of her neck. It was a woman. The child tensed, bristling as the figure stepped out into the light.

          ‘Hello?’ said the child, tentatively.

          The woman walked away. She skirted the foot of the cliff before perching herself on a rock. The child followed, staying as close as she dared, before trying again.

          ‘Hello?’ As the word fell from the child’s mouth, images of a hillside flashed behind her eyes; a hillside where fractures riddled the mossy grey earth, a hillside strewn with boulders and haunted by a ceaseless wind. She squirmed and rubbed her brow. Somehow, deep within her, she sensed a mountain erupting. She blinked. Water exploded from the ground. She blinked again. Each time a different image: glaring-white icecaps, tearing fissures and slow, grinding glaciers. The child screwed up her face. Just as quickly as they had appeared, the images were gone. She crossed her arms, cradling her stomach, for a distant longing had begun pulling her insides out, and she felt sick with the sensation. ‘Hello?’ said the child, scurrying a little closer to the woman on the rock, rolling on her heels, ‘hello?’

          The woman seemed indifferent. Of all things, she had begun reading a book.

          ‘Hello…’ called the child, ‘hello?’ and neck outstretched, she began to raise an impatient finger, toes curling in the sand.

          The woman’s head snapped towards her, revealing a hooded head of yellow hair. The child stumbled backwards.

          ‘I am Heiðrún,’ said the woman.

          It was the briefest of sentences, though it seemed to the child as if that voice had somehow been whispered from behind her, those words whipping her ears before coiling back into Heiðrún’s lips.

          ‘Wha—’ but before the child could reply, Heiðrún spoke again.

           ‘And so, at last, here you are,’ she hummed, peeling away her hood.

          ‘Yes,’ the child said.

          With her hood removed, Heiðrún’s eyes blazed beneath the sunlight, each iris licked with fire, her lips forming a greedy arc.

          The child backed away further, but Heiðrún called after her. ‘Who else have you seen, little gosling?’

          ‘What?’

          ‘Answer me, who else have you seen?’

          ‘I’ve been walking, every night,’ said the child, ‘and some days. No one, there is no one else.’ A peculiar tingle descended her thumbs, danced across her palms. ‘I’m alone.’ She shook out her hands, cheeks flushing with heat.

          Ever so slowly, Heiðrún rolled her eyes. ‘…Look.’

          The child heard that word quiet and distant.

          ‘Look…’ It grew louder, exploding within her eardrums. ‘…Look,’ trailing off into the distance. ‘…look, …look, …look…’

          Heiðrún raised her head, and as she did so her hair flushed red, ‘look,’ she said, pointing her ringed little finger towards the sky.

          Following Heiðrún’s finger, the child stifled a gasp, for the horizon, once a bright morning blue, was somehow shrinking and bowing; as if its corners were being pulled to the ground, it formed a transparent dome above their heads. In its place only the dark remained, a billion stars twinkling in unison. Who was this woman? A tremor of apprehension stole the child’s breath. What was she?

          ‘What do you see?’ asked Heiðrún.

          The child pointed as best she could, determined to disguise her anxiety. ‘There, that one. The star next to… the cut, or whatever it is, up there, in the sky.’

          ‘The Crack?’ asked Heiðrún.

          The child crossed her arms, feet anchored to the spot. ‘Yes,’ she croaked, ‘The Crack? The star next to The Crack. I’ve been following it here.’

          She retrieved the stone from her pocket, cradling it, holding it to her chest. Her bones rattled with cold, stomach squirming with hunger. She couldn’t stay here.

          ‘They’re not stars,’ said Heiðrún, ‘not as you might know them. Despite my years, I’ve seen few of these within the night sky. That crack, it marks the death of a solar system. Those orbs you see, they were cast from the explosion. Traveling between solar systems, galaxies, universes even, their movement follows no pattern. They’re very rare. You’re fortunate to have seen one.’

          The child felt little more than a patch of skin, a smudge upon the morning, her thoughts adrift within such vast expanse.

          ‘Sadly,’ said Heiðrún, ‘even the largest of them are not big enough to hold position, to offer an orbit, to harbour life. They’ve remained bright long after the others have dimmed, and yet, it’s not enough.’

          The child tilted her head to look at Heiðrún, unsure, returning the stone to her pocket.

          ‘It does seem,’ said Heiðrún, ‘that they’ve brought you to me. Maybe their efforts of survival were not so wasted after all?’

          ‘That star?’ said the child, clearing her throat, ‘it’ll lead me home?’

          A curious expression swept across Heiðrún’s face. ‘We are on an island called Adlartok. That there, that’s an ocean. We are on the highest point of the deepest of all the frozen worlds. It may be warm now, but for nine months of the year the secrets of this planet, along with its few creatures, are buried beneath ice.’

          The child turned from Heiðrún’s gaze, once again scanning the stars.

           ‘You,’ said Heiðrún, ‘you were born to endure this kind of weather.’

          The child listened uneasily, fingers curling ever tighter.

          ‘Below this beach, within that bluest of seas, are the deepest of truths about you and me…’ Heiðrún’s words lingered, ‘and everybody else who lives and has ever died. Do not dive too deep, beneath the surface the sea is ruthless in its revelations; many creatures have never returned after leaving this beach.’

           ‘I’m going home,’ said the child, glancing at her new companion.

          Heiðrún let slip a grin. ‘So then, gosling child, bring your constellation of freckles and follow me, for I alone know the way.’

          The child snorted, her eyes fixed once more on the sky. There was a lot to consider, so many questions, and yet she knew this was what she wanted. More than anything, she’d been hoping for someone else. She should say something, ask something, thank this woman, and yet for some reason she was struggling to find the words. Gosling child? Her tongue felt heavy. She swallowed hard and lowered her gaze, at last forcing herself to speak.

          ‘I…’  she stammered.

          But on looking again for Heiðrún, she realised the beach now lay deserted. 

          She turned on the spot. ‘Where—’

          But it was too late. Heiðrún had gone. There was nothing to say. Nobody to say it to.

          ‘Heiðrún,’ she called, ‘Heiðrún?’

          After a few minutes the child fell quiet. She stood, swaying with the breeze, nesting the stone in her pocket, stroking its familiar spirals. She surveyed the ocean. Only the vague silhouette of a creature far out to sea seemed to be moving, rising and falling with the swell of the water. By now, the sun had cleared the horizon. Blue sky and chalky wisps of cloud. Ice glistened upon the surrounding cliff face, some of the higher rocks frosted completely white. She felt the wind brush her ankles, hair flapping across her face, mesmerised as clouds of sand swirled down the beach and raced along the shoreline. Who was she and what was she doing here, all alone? Her stomach gurgled as at last that creature dived, in its wake a silent expanse of water. Those clifftops, this beach, that ocean, the entire world span behind her eyes. It was a dizzying sensation, the disappointment almost unbearable. She covered her face, time and tears lacing her cheeks — all hope of Heiðrún’s return, eventually fading from her mind.