The Harvest Tide Project Read Free Page B

well that doesn’t count then,’ she sneered. ‘I can’t wait to see you explain that one. “I took it by accident , Uncle Emos.” Maybe he’ll only half kill you.’
    â€˜You can’t half kill someone. Either you’re dead or you’re not. Anyway, do you want to see if this thing works, or not?’ Lorkrin brandished the quill at her.
    Taya’s curiosity got the better of her.
    â€˜Okay,’ she sniffed, trying to look bored by the idea.
    Like all Myunan children, the pair had tried transmorphing on several occasions and had even got hold of a few chants. The fact that it was strictly banned by grown-ups was reason enough to attempt it, but the thought of changing the shape of anything the same way they could change themselves, to extend their powers beyond their own bodies, was irresistible . They had never had any success, but then they had never had a genuine transmorphing tool before either. They were hoping that it would not need a special trigger or chant, that it would just work, but they were disappointed. When Lorkrin drew the quill across one of the bricks in the pillar, no line appeared. He sighed and tried again. Still nothing.
    â€˜Try imagining that you’re sculpting yourself,’ Taya urged. ‘As if you’re using the pen like a normal amorphing tool; think of the pillar as an arm or a leg or something.’
    Lorkrin pressed the nib lightly against the brickwork again, and concentrated. When he moved the quill this time, he felt a slight give in the brick’s surface, as if he had cut it with a knife.
    â€˜I felt something! I think it’s working!’ He kept going, writing his name into the column, the pictograms appearing as if carved with a fine chisel. There was an unmistakable cutting sound, and yet it was as easy as writing with ink on vellum. Taya frowned and walked around the column to look at the other side.
    â€˜Lorkrin, stop! Stop writing!’ she gasped.
    He was about to scribble something else when the tone of her voice pulled him up short. Looking at her, he saw a frightened expression on her face. He came around to the other side and gazed at the opposite face of the pillar. His name was cut out of it in reverse. The writing had gone all the way through the brickwork, from one side to the other. The column groaned and there came a grating sound, the kind made by two hard surfaces grinding against each other.
    â€˜It’s holding up the roof,’ Taya breathed. ‘And we’ve just cut through it.’

    In the garden directly above the newly decorated pillar, Shessil Groach stood soaking in the morning light before the high wall that separated himself and his colleagues from the outside world. There were times when he wondered what life would be like outside the project, where normal people did normal things … whatever normal things were. It had been a long time since he had been able to walk down the streets of a town, to visit shops and stalls. He had been too young to visit storyhouses and taverns then, but he could do so now, if he were allowed outside, near normal people … which he wasn’t. He idly calculated the time it would take a tasherloc tree, one of the fastest-growing trees in the world, to grow high enough and strong enough for him to use it to climb over that wall. About two weeks, with regular watering , fertilisation and some violin music.
    Other, more normal people might have considered using a ladder, but then as Groach would have been the first to admit, he was a little out of the ordinary. It was just as wellthen, that he was not really looking for a means of escape. He believed that he would one day be released from the project. He was not sure when, but surely not long now, now that he had solved a problem which the staff of the project had worked on for years.
    It was only a pity that his friend, Haller Joculeb, would never see the successful completion of the