Free Shine Light by Marianne de Pierres Page A

was a listing of daily tasks. The wording seemed clumsy too, phrases in reverse or such strange wording that the sense of it became lost.
    Morn of yester odor trapped burn
    Shieves molde in spite wind
    What in Grave did those things mean?
    After a time, the words began to blur and she had to fight the desire to lie down and sleep.
    ‘This is another language,’ said Emilia suddenly.
    Charlonge leaned across to look over Emilia’s shoulder. ‘Some of the early monks came from the Far South of our world. When they died, no others came. They spoke a difficult language and not much is known about them except that they built the prayer hutches. The monks who came after them were from places much closer. They knew nothing of the Far South, only that the seas between here and there are rough.’
    That idea caught Naif’s interest, and her sleepiness abated a little. An unknown land, so far away they knew nothing of it, apart from the books left by courageous travellers. A place far away from Grave and Ixion .
    ‘Put those written in another language in a separate pile,’ said Markes. ‘I’ll look at them. Their word symbols look like music. I might be able to work out how to read some of them, if I can find a pattern.’
    Naif gave up on her current book and chose a slim, battered volume from halfway down the pile. This one, though mottled and torn, had a soft blue leather cover. The binding appeared to be a kind of resin, not the binding cord used on many of the others.
    ‘This looks more recent,’ she said.
    Inside, the writing showed spaces and some punctuation symbols, which made the reading easier.
    Brother Mahout be I, charged with the recount of the history of the Islands for His Most Holy Highness Lomakin . . .
    Naif felt a charge of energy. Brother Mahout talked about the islands. How many lay within the Golden Spiral? She began thumbing through pages for any drawings. A third of the way through, she found several maps. They showed a segment of sea sprinkled with islands of different sizes. A section of it had been shaded over lightly in an undulating shape.
    ‘The Spiral,’ she said out loud.
    Emilia shot her a questioning glance but Markes and Charlonge remained absorbed in their own reading.
    Naif thumbed back and began reading several pages before. Then she came to a page which had the corners turned down, as if to mark it. It read:
    Be told in tomes and stories from sailors that the sea be littered with remnants of God’s fury. Spits of land, cast from his mouth in anger as he tore the land of Lapith to pieces. His Holy-ness decreed new names for this land constellation . . .
    Naif scanned through the list and found Ixion at the centre.
    ‘It seems the island was larger and has not always been called Ixion,’ she said.
    ‘Yes,’ said Markes, looking up from his book. ‘In this book it’s called Lapith.’
    ‘Does it speak of the other islands?’ asked Charlonge.
    ‘Yes. Look. I have a drawing here.’ Naif placed the book in the centre of the circle so they could all see the sketch.
    ‘If this shaded section is the Spiral, it’s like a cloud surrounding them,’ said Charlonge. ‘That’s the first I’ve seen of such a map.’
    ‘You mean none of the other books have it?’
    She nodded. ‘Not the ones I’ve seen. Nor do they speak of it. I had begun to think that the Spiral was a name made up by the Ripers, and spread to other places by pirates.’
    ‘What’s that tiny mark at the bottom of Ixion?’ asked Emilia.
    Naif squinted at where she pointed. Beyond the southernmost tip, a reef was drawn in wavy lines and beyond that the dot of a tiny atoll. She examined the book’s cover for date marks but the torn hide showed no stamp or engraving. ‘Perhaps the Spiral didn’t exist until the Ripers came?’
    ‘What do you mean?’ said Markes. ‘How could it not have existed?’
    ‘The Ripers aren’t of this world. Lenoir spoke of being caught in the pull of the Tri-Suns.’
    Charlonge