SYDNEY COVE, JANUARY 1800
He was cold, then he was hot. He shivered when he was hot and sweated when he was cold and monsters lurked at the edges of the room, even when his eyes were shut.
He had to go. To death, to England, into the monsters’ jaws, it didn’t matter. All that was Andrew was going to vanish as though it had never been.
A monster growled at him; a monster with the face of one of the small green birds, a monster with a beak that clacked and chirped …
He opened his eyes, hoping the monster would vanish.
It did. He was all alone. Tears sprang to his eyes. No Mama. No Papa, no Father, no Maria or Nanberry. He was going to die; and if he lived he would be sent away.
Alone. Alone.
Tears made the room shimmer. Something moved on the windowsill.
He blinked, trying to see more clearly.
It was … fuzzy … its shape indistinct in the darkness, but sort of golden with the brightness of the moon behind it. Like a halo, he thought dazedly. But only angels have haloes.
An angel in his room.
The angel gave a tiny growl. It lifted up his bowl of stewed apples and bent its head.
The door opened. The bowl clattered onto the floor, spilling the stewed apples.