FREE
Watcher's Web:
Return of the Aghyrians Book 1
Return of the Aghyrians Book 1
by Patty
Jansen
Description
Her name is Jessica, but most people in the Australian country town where
she lives call her "freak". She casts webs of power, reading the
feelings of animals and telling them what to do. Nobody knows what causes it,
least of all her.
One fateful day, her "web" connects with a stranger, and stray
power causes the plane in which she's travelling to crash in an alien world. An
accident? The more she discovers about herself and the world in which she has
landed, the more she doubts it. She finds out that she is a survivor from an
ancient race that once travelled the stars. Her ancestors were powerful and
dangerous, and it seems at least two people want her: the man at the other end
of her "web", and the man who's desperate to help her get back home.
Both claim they love her, and want only the best for her, but knowing
nothing of the alien world, how does she know who to believe?
Excerpt
Wherever Jessica
went, people watched her.
Like those two
teenage boys leaning on the fence, akubra hats pulled down to shade their eyes.
One of them dangled a cigarette in careless fingers, the other swigged beer
from a stubby. Neither was watching her now, but she hadn’t missed their
gawking, nor their low voices barely elevated over the noise of bellowing
cattle, shouts and truck engines.
Wow! See that really tall one?
Bloody hell, yeah.
How’d you reckon she kisses a guy? On her knees?
They laughed, and
when she came closer, faced the yard to watch the cattle as if they had said
nothing.
Jessica walked past
them to the gate, glaring at their straw-covered backs. Well, I bloody heard you. She was used to it, anyway.
It hadn’t been the
worst thing people said about her. They hadn’t said the words ugly, or creepy,
or freak, but she had become used to
hearing those words, too.
They went into a
little hard spot inside her where she scrunched up the hurt, forgot it, and
remembered that she might look like a freak, but when she helped John
Braithwaite and his mates from the Rivervale Stud Farm at a cattle show and
Angus went into one of his fits, they still needed her to get him into the
truck without spooking him. No one else could do that. No one knew how she did
it, and no one should ever know. Because no one was crazy enough to get into a
pen with a stroppy bull, right?
Well, we’ll see about that.
She grasped the top
of the gate with both hands, stepped onto the middle bar and swung her foot
over. Jumped. Landed in sun-baked mud churned with cloven hoof prints, and cow
pats.
At least when Angus
looked at her, he didn’t hide his dislike. A beady eye rolled, a gust of
hay-scented air blew from his nostrils. He stiffened, all fifteen hundred-odd
kilograms of Brahman bull-flesh of him. Then lowered his head, horns poised.
Someone yelled,
‘Watch it!’
No, he wasn’t going
to charge. He’d charge at the boys, he’d even charge at his well-heeled owner,
but never at her. Call her arrogant, but she knew that, and how she knew it
would remain a secret, too, thank you very much.
She stopped a few
paces inside the pen and crossed her arms over her chest. Well, bugger that.
She had a bloody audience. About twenty people, mostly men, sitting on the
fence, with cynical hey-look-at-this-mate expressions plastered on their faces.
Beef cattle farmers,
their lackeys and other hangers-on, those clowns who had partied in the
pavilion last night, those who owned the bulls that had occupied the pens next
to Angus’. All their animals were already in the trucks, ready to be taken home
from the Pymberton show. None of them with a ‘best of show’ ribbon, like Angus,
and none with a diva mentality.
It looked like the boys had been trying to get Angus to move for a while. The gate on the opposite side of the pen was open, the ramp in place. Brendan held the door to the truck, ready to slam it. Everything about his expression said, rather you than me. The coward.
It looked like the boys had been trying to get Angus to move for a while. The gate on the opposite side of the pen was open, the ramp in place. Brendan held the door to the truck, ready to slam it. Everything about his expression said, rather you than me. The coward.
Come on, Angus, in
you go.’
Men sniggered,
including the two teenage boys. The one with the cigarette flicked ash into the
pen and said something about a whip.
Now who was more
stupid? Them or the bull? You did not
frighten such a prize animal if you could help it. He might bolt and injure
himself. An unsightly gash would take him off the show circuit for months.
Sheesh!
Jessica reached
through the fence into the bucket she had dumped there. Her hand came away
black and sticky with molasses. Angus loved it.
She inched closer,
holding out her hand. Come on, look me in
the eye, if you dare.
Angus blew out
another snort, as if he knew what was coming. Backed into the fence. Met her
eyes.
Jessica exhaled. Her
breath seeped from her in tendrils of sparkle-filled mist, which sought out
Angus’ fur and crept over his grey-mottled back, a bit like glitter-glue, but alive.
Jessica lunged for
the rope that dangled from Angus’ collar. She couldn’t quite reach it, and
while Angus backed further away from her, scraping along the fence, he planted
his hoof on the end of the rope, squashing it neatly in a fresh pile of dung.
Just her luck.
A bit closer.
She pulled the mist
tighter around him, so his coat sparkled and glittered with lights. His outline
became fuzzy. She didn’t know what to call it, and had learned not to talk
about it to anyone. It wasn’t that she could communicate with him, but she
could tell him what to do. Sort of. In a weird way she couldn’t explain in
words. The mist soaked up emotions, as far as bulls have emotions, and dampened
them, and she could override them with her own. If it worked.
Her audience had
stopped talking. Anyone who watched always did that, even though they couldn’t
see the mist and didn’t realise it influenced them. That was just as well,
because she was making an idiot of herself. Angus was being bloody stubborn,
his head still lowered, trampling the rope further into the shit. Something
must have spooked him badly. Maybe it was the yapping from the dog pavilion.
Well, she and Angus seemed to have something in common – she didn’t like lap
dogs either.
But he was going to
get into that bloody truck, preferably before she missed her flight back to
Sydney. All kinds of hell would break loose if she wasn’t at the school
basketball team meeting that night.
Jessica focused on
Angus’ beady eye and let out another deep breath. More sparkling vapour flowed.
Pinpricks of light soaked into Angus’ mottled fur. Angus relaxed, stuck out his
head to nuzzle her molasses-covered hand.
But then ...
The threads
solidified and the mist spun into tightly-coiled cords, which wove into a
formation like a spider’s web.
What the hell ...?
She froze, staring
at the writhing construction. It looked like someone had cast a living net over
the bull, made of sparkling mist that yanked and stretched of its own volition,
or ... as if something pulled at the other end. There were shadows in a
nebulous space over Angus’ back, and male voices, just outside the edge of
hearing. The web vibrated and strained.
A tug of war between
herself and ... Who was pulling the other end?
In her panic, she
broke loose from the construction. The shadows at the other end of the web
faded. The strands dissolved into mist once more.
A wet nose touched her
palm and Angus’ rasping tongue curled around her wrist. The molasses was clean
licked-off, but he probably liked the salt of her sweat, because her arms
glistened with it. She hoped no one noticed.
Her legs still
trembling, Jessica pulled the rope and inched towards the gate. Angus followed
her meekly, up the ramp, into the truck, where one of the boys was ready to tie
him up.
The onlookers
applauded.
Jessica leaned
against the truck, forcing herself to grin at her audience.
‘Can anyone give me
a lift to the airport?’
Review
By Puna J
I really enjoyed Watcher's Web. This is a great story idea well executed by the author. I hope
there will be a sequel or two to continue the story of Jessica/Anmi. Space
opera at its finest ... kid from nowhere, through a series of inescapable
incidents, saves an entire planet from exploitation and ruin. If you enjoy
space operas you'll want to give this one a try.
About the Author
Patty Jansen lives in Sydney, Australia, where she spends most of her
time writing Science Fiction and Fantasy. Her story "This Peaceful State
of War" placed first in the second quarter of the Writers of the Future contest and
was published in their 27th
anthology. She has also sold fiction to genre magazines such as Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Redstone Science Fiction, and
Aurealis.
Her novels include Watcher's Web (soft SF), The Far Horizon (middle grade SF), Charlotte's Army (military SF), and Fire & Ice, Dust & Rain, and Blood & Tears (Icefire Trilogy)
(dark fantasy). Her novel Ambassador
was published by Ticonderoga Publications in 2013.
Patty is a member of SFWA and the
cooperative that makes up Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine,
and she has also written nonfiction.
Links
