Finder's Shore (15 page)

It takes us two days to walk from Harlan to Ronan’s farm. The spring of the island turf and the ever-present tang of the ocean remind me of Dunnett and tell, as well, of Ister’s differences.

There are signs of the power battles all across the island: buildings shattered, others that look as if a giant passed by taking bites of roofs and walls. The damage reminds me of the mortar the Paras used against us at Home Farm. Worse still are the overflowing graveyards, and the cache of armaments Malik unearthed in a bunker beyond the town. Farra proposed that we might ship them back to Vidya. If the governors want them, they’re welcome. We’ve no need of weapons in the world we want to build.

Midday yesterday we crossed the island’s spine, passing close by the ruined power plant. The fences and buildings were tumbled, the huge windmills largely stilled, or turning but unharnessed. “It might be possible to salvage something,” Farra had said. “We could bring a 
Decon team across — it would be worth a look at least.”

“Why would they have chosen to destroy it?”

“There’s always friction when resources become scarce,” he’d answered. Maybe, like me, he was thinking of Ebony Hill.

“For a while, power was a currency as valuable as food became later,” Ronan had said. He’d been quiet most of the day, detouring us around signs of the troubles when he could.

The destruction depresses me — but against it we can set signs of hope. Mika’s baby, for one: the first of Ister’s new community. Mika and Yan have opted to stay, while Jiordo and Neena both plan to travel back with
Explorer
. Neena says she’ll be back, once she’s seen her family in Vidya. She hopes some of them may even want to come with her.

However Vidya’s governors react to our proposal, it feels that the decision is already made. Mine at least. Ister is neither Dunnett nor Tay, but I’ve the islands in my blood. And there’s Ronan, besides.

On our first night in the sea-washed quiet of Ronan’s house I drift easily to sleep. The sound that wakes me pulls me from a dream where I’m a kittiwake skimming low over waves and up, up the slopes of a hill — Ebony Hill — and over, and away. Rising up out of sleep I shake the dreaming from my mind.

“Ness!” The whisper comes again. “Wake up! I want to show you something.”

“It’s still dark,” I complain. 

“Not for long. Hurry and get dressed.” Ronan’s voice from the doorway is pitched low so he won’t disturb Farra sleeping in the next room.

Quiet as I can I pull on socks and trousers, tug a jersey over my head. My boots are in the kitchen. Not knowing the house I blunder noisily across the room, till Ronan’s hand comes to guide me.

Outside, the night is just beginning to wither to grey. Ronan sets a swift pace up the hillside. The island air is crisp with wind and wild grasses, with the breath of the ocean, with belonging. Halfway up the hill I pause to catch my breath. A bird launches into its morning serenade and is soon joined by another. As they spin their elation at the new day into a waterfall of welcome, I let my heart share their song: a song of wind and sea, of this morning and tomorrow. The island’s song.

“It’s not far now.”

The top of the hill flattens into a broad knoll broken by flat mushrooms of rock. Pinks and yellows have begun to blossom in the sky, shading into palest blue as I watch. I turn a full circle. Ister lies before me: the rugged shore below Ronan’s home, the rolling cloth of farmland, rough with disuse, three higher peaks that rise to the west. Far off, beyond the wave-washed skerries in the east, a low smudge sits on the horizon.

“That’s Tay,” Ronan tells me and my eyes fly back to find it.

An arc of gold creeps above the horizon, the sun chasing its own light, sending a ribbon of radiance streaking towards us across the ocean. Two seabirds sweeping low 
over the water catch its colour on their wings.

“I could be happy be here,” I say.

Ronan reaches for my hand, banishing the morning’s slight chill from my fingers as the last of yesterday fades from the sky and the sun spills its promise onto Ister’s shore. 

Anna Mackenzie lives on a farm in Hawke’s Bay. She has two teenaged children, nineteen nieces and nephews and nowhere near enough time.
Finder’s Shore
completes the ‘Sea-wreck Stranger Trilogy’ that began with the
award-winning
novel
The Sea-wreck Stranger
and continued in
Ebony Hill
, which has been shortlisted for the New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards. It is her sixth novel.

High Tide
, 2003

Out on the Edge
, 2005

Shadow of the Mountain
, 2008

Sea-wreck Stranger Trilogy:

The Sea-wreck Stranger
, 2007

Ebony Hill
, 2010

Finder’s Shore
, 2011

THE SEA-WRECK STRANGER

The Sea-wreck Stranger
was joint winner of the Sir Julius Vogel Award for Best Novel, it won an Honour Award in the 2008 New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards, a White Raven Award from Germany, is a Children’s Notable Book and was shortlisted for the Esther Glen Award. It has also been published in Australia and France.

‘With its strong cast of characters, Anna Mackenzie’s perceptive, enigmatic novel will keep you firmly in its grip.’ —
Good Reads

‘If you like a nice subtle world creation and strong characters and a really good plot, I recommend this one.’ —
1 Girl 2 Many Books
 

EBONY HILL

Ebony Hill
has been shortlisted for the 2011 New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards and for the 2011 Sir Julius Vogel Award for Best Novel — Young Adult.

‘I lost a weekend I could have been working on my own book but could not put this down.’ — Tania Roxborogh,
Otago Daily Times

‘A riveting read for teenagers. What choices would they make in similar circumstances?’ — Jean Bennett

‘A powerful novel, exciting and thought-provoking.’ — Trevor Agnew