Esau poked his head back into the lift when I failed to follow him out. “Like it?” he asked.
“It’s great.”
“One of my designs. Pulleys are the key,” he explained. “You won’t find many in the Zaltana homestead. The others are slow to change, but I’ve sold a ton at the market.”
“Does Perl sell her perfumes at the market, as well?” I asked as I stepped onto the landing.
“Yep. Most of the Zaltanas either sell or exchange goods at the Illiais Market. It’s open all year. My inventions and Perl’s perfumes have provided us with a plentiful source of income.” Esau talked as we walked down the hallway. “A group of Zaltanas will make a trip to the market when enough items have been made or when a special order’s due. We aren’t the only ones who sell there either, so if we want something, we’ll go and buy. Unfortunately, not everything we need can be found in the jungle. Like your mother’s glass bottles and the hardware for my chairs.”
“You designed the rope furniture, too?”
“Yep. Except they’re not ropes. They’re lianas.” When understanding failed to brighten my face, he explained, “Vines from the jungle.”
“Oh.”
“The lianas are a constant source of trouble. Probably why they’re our family name.” Esau grinned. “They grow everywhere, and they can pull trees over. We have to keep them trimmed or cut them down.
One day, instead of burning them, I took a bunch home and tried working with them.” Esau pulled back a cotton curtain that covered an entrance on the right side of the hallway. He gestured for me to precede him into a room.
“The vines become very strong when dried. While they’re pliable, they can be woven into almost anything.”
At first, I thought we had entered a storeroom. The air held a slight musty odor, and rows and rows of shelves holding glass containers of every size obscured the walls. The bottles were filled with various tinted substances. Only when I pulled my gaze away from the colorful collection did I see a small bed made from lianas and a wooden bureau.
Esau ducked his head. He ran a green-stained hand through his hair. “Sorry. I’ve been using this room to store my samples. But I cleaned off the bed and desk this morning.” He pointed to a Blackwood desk tucked into a corner.
“It’s fine,” I said, trying to mask my disappointment. I had been hoping that this room would help me remember something, anything of my life before Brazell’s orphanage.
Laying my backpack on the bed, I asked, “What other rooms are up here?”
“Our bedroom and my workroom. Come on, I’ll show you.”
We continued down the hall. There was another curtained doorway on the left, which led to a big bedroom. This room had a large bed with a purple flowered quilt, two end tables and shelves filled with books instead of containers.
Esau pointed to the ceiling, which was made of leather hides stretched over branches. “I coated it with oil so the rain runs off,” he explained. “No water drips in here, but it does get hot.”
Hanging from the middle of the ceiling was a large flower-shaped fixture made of wood planks. Ropes wrapped around the base, crossed the ceiling and trailed down the walls. “What’s that?” I asked.
He smiled. “Another invention. Pulleys again and some weights make the flower spin, cooling the room.”
We went out into the hallway. Across from Esau’s bedroom was another bedroom. A plain single bed, dresser and nightstand were neatly arranged inside. No decorations, inventions or other signs of its occupant were evident.
“Leif lives at the Magician’s Keep most of the year,” Esau said. “So I added his room to my work area.”
We continued down the hall, which ended in a spacious room. I grinned as I looked around. Esau’s workroom was stuffed full with plants, containers, piles of leaves and tools. Shelves groaned under the weight of many jars filled with strange items and various liquids. Walking into the room without bumping a shin seemed impossible. The clutter reminded me of Valek’s office and apartment. While Valek had books, papers and rocks piled everywhere, Esau had invited the jungle to reside with him.
I stood in the doorway for a moment.
“Come in, come in.” He walked past me. “I want to show you something.”
Taking my time, I threaded my way toward him. “What do you do here?”
“This and that,” he said as he searched through a pile of papers on a table. “I like to collect samples from the jungle and see what I can cook up. Found some medicines. Found some foods. Flowers for your mother. Aha!” He held up a white notebook. “Here.”
I took the book, but my attention was on the room as I searched for something familiar. The words “my mother” had triggered the feeling of doubt that had plagued me since my arrival at the Zaltana homestead. Finally, I asked Esau the same question I had asked Perl. “How do you know I’m your daughter? You seem so certain.”
Esau smiled. “Look in that book.”
I opened the cover. On the first page was a charcoal drawing of a baby.
“Keep turning.”
The next page had a drawing of a small child. As I turned the pages, the girl grew from a child to an adolescent into someone I recognized. Me. A hard knot gripped my throat as tears threatened to gush from my eyes. My father had loved me even when I was gone and I couldn’t even remember anything from my time here. The pictures showed my childhood as it should have been, living here with Esau and Perl.
“It’s really fun to flip through the book fast. Watch yourself grow twenty years in a few seconds.” Esau took the sketchbook from my hands, and held it open. “See? This is how I know you’re mine. I drew your picture every year after your birth, and even after you disappeared.” He turned to the last page and studied the portrait there. “I wasn’t too far off. It’s not perfect, but now that I’ve seen you I can make corrections.”
He tapped the book on his chest. “When you first disappeared, your mother carried this book with her, looking through the pictures all day long. Eventually she stopped, but after a couple years, she saw me drawing another picture, and she asked me to destroy it.” Esau handed the book to me. “I told her she would never see it again. As far as I know, she hasn’t. So let’s keep it between us for now. Okay?”
“Sure.” I gave each page my full attention. “This is wonderful.”
All doubts of my lineage vanished as I took note of the details that my father had put into these pictures. In that moment I knew I was part of the Zaltana clan. A feeling of relief washed through me. I vowed to try harder to make a connection with my parents. Leif, though, was another story.
“You should show your sketchbook to Leif,” I said, giving the book back to Esau. “Maybe then he would believe I’m his sister.”
“Don’t worry about Leif. He doesn’t need to see a picture. He knows who you are. It’s the shock of your arrival that’s thrown him off balance. He had a difficult time with your disappearance.”
“Oh, yes. I forgot; I’ve had it so easy in the north.”
Esau grimaced, and I regretted my sarcasm.
“Leif was with you the day you were taken from us,” he said in a quiet voice. “You had begged him to take you down to play on the jungle floor. He was eight, which may sound young, but Zaltana children are taught to survive in the jungle as soon as they can walk. Nutty was climbing trees before she took her first steps; it drove my sister crazy.”
Esau sat in one of his vine chairs and weariness seemed to settle on him like a coating of dust. “When Leif came home without you, our concern was minimal. A lost child had always been found within an hour or two. After all, the Illiais Jungle isn’t that big. Predators are not as active during the daytime, and at night we have a few tricks to keep them from our homestead. But we grew more frantic as the day wore on and we still hadn’t located you. You had disappeared so completely that everyone thought you had been caught by a necklace snake or a tree leopard.”
“Necklace snake?”
He grinned, and an appreciative glint flashed in his eyes. “A green-and-brown predator that lives in the trees. Sometimes fifty feet long, it loops its body over the branches, blending in with the jungle. When its prey comes close, it wraps itself around the victim’s neck and squeezes.” Esau demonstrated with his hands. “Then it swallows the body whole and feeds on the carcass for weeks.”
