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‘His name was Zavier. He was extremely good-looking with an unusual accent.’

‘He claimed he lived just outside the valley, in a cottage by the Windhaven River. He said he travelled a lot and was hardly ever home.’

Mum says, ‘He came to our house the night of the day we buried Ben, the day after he was born. We were still in shock.’

Dad jumps in. ‘It had poured with rain all day, but Zavier didn’t have a drop of water on him, not even a speck of mud on his shoes.’

Mum flicks a sharp look at Dad. ‘You’re scaring her.’

Dad leans forward and touches my knee. ‘Are you sure you want to hear this?’

‘Yes. As long as it’s the truth, I want to hear it. I
have
to.’

Dad explains, ‘Zavier carried a cane basket in his hand.’

‘A Moses basket,’ Mum throws in. ‘It had a baby in it.’

‘The infant was wrapped in a black blanket,’ Dad continues, ‘which I thought was somewhat odd.’

‘Oh, that’s the part you think is odd?’

They both give me an exasperated look. I tell Dad to keep going.

‘He didn’t show you to us at first, but you kept making little gurgling sounds and we knew a real baby was in our house.’

‘It was an amazing feeling,’ Mum interjects.

‘Zavier explained that his work kept him away from home too much to take care of a baby.’

Mum takes up the story again. ‘His sister had recently come to live with him after the situation at her home became difficult.’

I sit quietly riveted to the story of a young pregnant girl, rejected by her parents, who gave birth in her brother’s house, dying later that night from an unexpected haemorrhage.

Mum touches my arm. ‘You were three days old when he brought you to us.’

I gasp, my mouth falling open. ‘So my birth date is incorrect.’

Dad says, ‘By two days, but we had no choice. He insisted that was the birth date we give you.’

Questions hammer away at my brain. Didn’t this man Zavier have other family he could turn to for help, like a grandmother, an aunt or someone? Why did he give his sister’s baby to complete strangers to raise? Where was the baby’s father in all of this?

Mum explains, ‘You have to understand, darling, this man was … intimidating.’

I shake my head, unable to imagine my parents, especially my mother, who is strong and even outspoken at times,
being too scared to ask such fundamental questions as what happened to the father.

‘Did you even ask about the father? Weren’t you worried he might turn up one day to claim custody?’

Dad answers, ‘Zavier assured us his sister had had no further contact with the father, who was only seventeen at the time. So you see, sweetheart, your biological …
that man
… doesn’t know you exist.’

Their story keeps growing stranger. I brace myself as Dad continues, ‘Zavier said he heard of our loss and it occurred to him that, if we were willing, we could come to an arrangement for his newborn niece.’

‘He was quick to point out there were conditions,’ adds Mum, ‘and that we would have to sign a contract for the adoption.’

‘What conditions?’ My voice suddenly sounds tinny. I could do with a glass of water but don’t want to leave the room in case they stop talking.

‘He said that we must keep the name your mother had given you.’

‘
Ebony
,’ I whisper.

‘And that you must never see a doctor, but since you’re always so healthy that hasn’t been an issue. Anyway, darling,’ she says a little too casually, ‘they were more like incentives than conditions. And there was no way we could say no once we’d seen you.’ She lifts her gaze over my head and a dreamy look enters her eyes.

Dad goes on to explain what Mum doesn’t. ‘Zavier promised that as long as we raised you as our own flesh and blood we would prosper. And so that we wouldn’t stand
out in the community, consistent rain, profitable crops and good fortune would befall everyone in the valley.’

Who has the power to promise something like that?

I stare at them with scepticism and a fair measure of disgust. ‘You decided to keep me because you were promised I would be some kind of lucky charm for the valley? As if that could even be possible? What about the non-belief system by which you raised me?’

‘Don’t put it like that, Ebony,’ Mum scolds, and mutters, ‘You’re too intelligent for your own good.’

Dad explains. ‘Banks were foreclosing on properties that had been in the families of this community for generations. Everyone was suffering livestock losses and declining incomes. The longest drought in living memory ensured no one could even grow a cash crop to tide them over. Everyone’s dams and all the creeks were bone dry.’ He takes a breath. ‘Zavier promised that your birth had broken the drought. He was very convincing. He assured us rain would follow at regular intervals for as long as you …’

‘As long as I what, Dad?’

He glances at Mum as if asking her permission. With her eyes still wider than usual, and looking at me as if she’s scared I’m about to bolt for the door, she takes over: ‘As long as you never leave the valley. He insisted that on no account could we take you beyond the valley’s boundaries before your eighteenth birthday. It didn’t seem like such a big demand at the time, when you were so small.’

‘Now I’m nearing eighteen and you’re worried about something.’

Neither answers. Neither looks me in the eye.

‘I’m curious, Mum … Dad. If I didn’t stay, would the bubonic plague be unleashed across the valley?’

They’re unhappy with my sarcasm, and for a few moments we just sit and look anywhere around the room except at each other. ‘I can’t believe you two actually believed the baloney coming out of that man’s mouth.’

‘Darling, we had just buried a child – a little boy I held in my arms for less than an hour. I felt his heart beat rapidly against my chest as he struggled to live. His blue eyes looked at me as if he understood our time together would be brief. And then, just like that, his heart stopped.’ She takes a breath, her eyes swimming with tears. ‘The following day a man offered us an orphaned baby girl. And yes, it was unusual and highly suspicious. We didn’t know why he chose us. But at the time we didn’t care. And we didn’t ask questions in case it made him change his mind.’ Mum reaches across and takes my hand. ‘Darling, you were our miracle baby.’

I can see how, in their dark distress, they would willingly swallow the story the stranger told them, but something isn’t adding up. ‘What are you leaving out?’

They look uneasy and Dad says, ‘What are you talking about, love?’

‘Well, for starters, we’re atheists. We don’t believe in miracles, so how can you refer to me as your “miracle baby”?’

They glance at each other like high-school kids caught making out behind the toilet block. Mum looks away first, leaving it up to Dad to explain. ‘It’s just an expression for something difficult to explain in the logical sense.’

‘An odd expression for an atheist, Dad,’ I insist.

‘I suppose, but you did bring us good luck. We prospered,
just like everyone else has around here, from the very day you came into our lives.’

I look around at our modest home, with the same furniture that’s been here all my childhood, but decide not to ask what they did with their bounty. ‘Do you have any names other than “Zavier”? It would give me a starting point.’

‘Starting point?’

‘I promise you both it won’t change our relationship, but you know me. You raised me to accept nothing less than facts substantiated by a second source.’

Dad jumps back in his seat crying out, ‘No, Ebony, you mustn’t!’

Mum begins to wail with her hands covering her eyes. She’s actually wailing!

Stunned by their reactions, I wait until they calm down. Mum collects herself first. ‘I knew this would happen,’ she says, still sniffling. ‘I knew it!’

‘Will one of you please tell me what just happened?’

‘I think we’ve told you enough for one night,’ Dad says, his voice unusually authoritative.

Mum blows her nose on a tissue, but the tears keep coming, quietly trickling from her eyes. I hate seeing her so upset. My intention is to uncover the truth, not to hurt my parents. I go and sit on the arm of her chair and hold her. ‘Don’t cry, Mum. Nothing is going to change.’

She forces a smile, the remainder of the truth lingering unsaid between us.

Suddenly Dad offers some advice. ‘If you plan to track this man down, Ebony, you should be very careful. He emanated what I can only describe as –’

‘John!’

‘It’s all right, Mum. You don’t have to shelter me any more. I’m sure Dad’s description is spot on. After all, my “uncle” is a criminal. And whether he is or isn’t my biological uncle, Mr Zavier buys and sells babies, while palming off sob stories to infertile, grief-stricken couples. He may even kidnap the infants himself! How much did he want for me?’

By their outraged reactions, I take it I came free. But nothing in this world is free. There was a price on my head all right. Mum and Dad probably just haven’t paid it yet.

I’m on the operating table, plugged into machines beeping like the cockpit of a plane about to crash, while around me doctors and nurses are in a frenzy of activity.

Can someone please tell me what’s going on?

Stay calm, Jordan, it’s almost over
, the younger, soothing voice says close to my ear.

Meanwhile, in my other ear, the older voice says,
Ah, so you can hear us now, lad
.

You’ll understand soon
, the soothing voice says.
You’ll have many questions, Jordan, but I’m afraid we will only have time to answer a few, so please choose carefully
.

Right. Sure. Easy.

There’s just something we must do first. Ready?

Well, actually –

Now!

Suddenly two sets of strong arms wrap around me. I want to object to what feels like an invasion of privacy. Some answers first would be polite, answers the younger voice promised.

He reads my thoughts.
Trust us, Jordan, you can ask questions soon
.

‘Trust you? But who are you?’ I’m surprised to hear my own voice working.

Keep still, lad. We’re not going to harm you
.

Since we’re communicating now, maybe I’ll get my answers sooner. ‘What’s going on here?’

Hold on, Jordan. Your soul is almost free
.

‘Free? I don’t feel … Did you say my … ?’

The arms start pulling me out of my body, but a sticky film blocks my exit. My head pushes against it.

Hold still, Jordan. You’re almost through the membrane
.

The ‘membrane’ breaks, dissolving around me, and suddenly I can move and see everything really clearly, clearer than … I don’t know, but clearer than before.

What’s left of the membrane turns into a blue gas that drifts up to the ceiling, where it disintegrates into millions of bubbles. And suddenly I
am
‘free’ and it’s awesome! If not for the arms holding me, I reckon I could fly straight out of this room.

Stop squirming, lad!
the older voice snaps.
If you should slip from our grasp … This is serious, young man. You don’t
–

Now is not the time to test your new-found agility, Jordan
, the younger voice smoothly interrupts.
If you slip away from us here, we would find it difficult to return you to your body in due time
.

A chill slithers down my back. I’m not in my body? So where is my … ? I glance down and see it – my
real
,
living
,
breathing
body – lying on the operating table in the centre of the theatre, with lights blazing over it and doctors and nurses going nuts around it.

And then,
Whoahh!
My body lifts off the table as
high-voltage electricity jolts into my chest. I don’t feel anything, but it looks terrible. And that’s when I get it – my body isn’t living and breathing.

I’m not breathing!

The two sets of smooth, strong arms glide me to the other side of the room, where the three of us stand back and watch. My body is a mess, spread across the operating table with tubes to my face, and my torso completely ripped open, and at least half my guts hanging out. Blood is everywhere, sprayed across the doctors and nurses from head to foot.

I can’t watch any more.

I turn my head and see the younger of the two. The first thing I notice is his blue eyes. I have blue eyes too, but these are nothing like mine. Man, they’re so intense they’re practically blinding. Imagine a paint palette, then mix electric blue and indigo together with a touch of ice, and you still wouldn’t be close.

He lets me stare as I try to figure him out. His hair is long and yellow-blond. He wears it partly loose, partly braided, but mostly tied together at the base of his neck with a string of crimson and gold threads.

The other dude is the one with the older voice, but it’s weird because his darker skin is just as flawless and young-looking as the other one’s warm-ivory skin. Even his silver-grey eyes are similar in intensity, though not quite as potent. He has long hair too – must be the fashion wherever these two come from. This one’s hair is bright copper and tied with a white silk cord. They’re wearing similar clothes – quality suits with T-shirts underneath.

It’s clear they don’t belong here. Not in this room. Not in this time. Not in this world!

The thing is, from the moment they pulled my soul from my body I’ve been experiencing everything astronomically fast. I’m noticing details in fractions of seconds, as if my powers of observation have multiplied a thousandfold. And it’s amazing!

Listen to me, Jordan, I need you to focus
, the blond one says, turning me to face him with his hands on my shoulders, pumping waves of calmness into me.
My name is Nathaneal, but you can call me Thane if you like
. He nods at his companion.
This is Isaac
.

Isaac grins and nods.
In case you haven’t worked it out yet, lad, Nathaneal and I are angels
.

‘What? Like angels from heaven?’