Author's Note: There's not going to be a new chapter for a while, because I'm going to head off to the U.S. on Wednesday. A friend and I are going on a trip up the West Coast from L.A. to Salem, which is going to be a lot of fun, I hope. I'll keep writing on the plane flights, though, and I'll get back on the 20th of August. Thank you for your patience, and I'm really sorry about the time you'll have to wait!

Chapter Nine

„…so you just decided that, without even talking to me!" Tess sat up in bed rapidly, pushing her hair back. She was angry and disappointed, as he could tell from the lines on her forehead and the way she pressed her lips together.

"Shh, everyone's asleep" Nick tried to soothe her. "And I'm telling you now. I didn't want to wait until tomorrow."

"But you talked to Alex before."

"He's my brother!"

"And I'm your wife! How come you never talk to me about those things in advance? You…argh…" She lay back down abruptly, turned away and pulled the cover up to her chin, making it clear that the subject was closed for her.

Nick walked across the room to their bed and stopped, looking down at her convolved body helplessly. "I-"

"I'm tired" she muttered quietly.

"I'm sorry, Tess." He hesitated for a moment before deciding to sit down, and put a hand on her shoulder tentatively. "I didn't even know if Alex was gonna sell and I didn't want to say anything before that part was settled…because that would have made it so…real."

Tess didn't respond to his words. Nick figured that she really was too exhausted, and maybe too mad at him to answer, and lay down next to her, his front almost touching her back. "I'm sorry", he whispered again, closer to her ear.

As her breathing slowed down, so did his. He fell into an uneasy sleep, full of indefinable, angst-ridden dreams he wouldn't remember the next morning.

Tess stayed awake, gazing at the stars outside.

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"Do not fear!" Charlotte exclaimed in a ceremonial, "manly" voice. "Black-Eye-Joe is dead, you'll- I mean you shall be safe from now on!"

"Oh, thank you!" Emily had her playmobil gypsy (who did not even belong to the pirate set) fly around the pirate's neck. She made kissing noises. "I love you!"

"No, Em." The older girl lowered her arm and shook her head in all seriousness. "They can't be in love."

"But then how are they gonna get married and have babies?"

"They won't! But Queenie Leliza can be a pirate, too, if you want to."

"Nooo" Emily whined. "Why can't they have babies?"

"Cos they're pirates! Pirates don't have babies, they rob other ships!"

"But- but they could rob ships and still have babies."

Charlotte looked at her, confused by such a proposition. "No…real pirates don't do that."

"Aunty Meg, can pirates have babies?"

Meg smiled, amused by the two girls' discussion. "Uh, I don't know, honey. I don't think they did in real life, but since it's your play, I guess they can do anything you want them to."

Emily turned back to her cousin, a triumphant look on her face. "Queenie wants babies."

"But Bill doesn't."

"Pirates are stupid." She dropped the plastic gypsy in disappointment, about to sulk, when a different idea crossed her mind. "Let's play outside! Maybe the little sheeps are still there!"

"Emily, you know the rules" Meg warned her in a strict tone. "No playing with the stock."

The little girl rolled her eyes. "…or big animals..."

"That's what I meant."

"But can we go outside?" Charlotte asked hopefully.

"Sure, as long as you stay close by the house. Don't touch the machines, and if you see a snake-"

The girls were already halfway out the door, since they knew Meg's speech by now. "Hey, don't you think you forgot something? I want you to clean up your toys first."

Both children threw an annoyed glance at her and strolled back slowly. For a moment, their facial expressions looked strikingly alike; it seemed impossible to overlook the fact that they were related. They could have been sisters, Meg noticed with a smile. Seeing them like this instantly caused her to remember Claire and Tess when they had been that age. It didn't seem so long ago. How quickly time passed…

Having put the pirate ship and the plastic figures back into a big, wooden box, the children left quickly, before their babysitter could think of something else. At the door, they almost bumped into Jodi, who had just returned from Jack's Folly. "Whoops, watch out!"

"Sorry!"

"And don't stay in the blazing sun for too long!" Meg called after them. She doubted that they had heard it.

Jodi approached the cupboard, grabbed a glass and filled it with water from the tap. "Holy cow, I'm melting!"

"You're not the only one."

"Mum, I've just been kneeling in the dirt for three hours-"

"-it hasn't been three hours-"

"Who cares, my clothes are sticking to my body, it looks like I peed my pants; can't you please let me complain?"

"Would you stop if I told you to?" Meg asked with a subtle smirk.

"Well, no, but…that's beside the point." She tugged at her pink shirt, fanning it in order to get some air to her skin.

Meg's gaze fell on one last remaining pirate lying in front of her feet. She sighed and picked it up, putting it into the box to the others.

Jodi grinned. "Looks like you've become the unofficial nanny for another generation of McLeod's."

"I don't mind."

"Hm. Where is everyone?"

"Tess and Stevie are gone to check on the sheep because Neil Thomson claims he saw a boar the other day-"

"Again? Didn't he just 'see' a dingo? What's it next time, a tiger?"

Meg ignored the comment. "…Chloe's cleaning the troughs out on the pastures, Nick's fixing the roof of the shed."

"How exciting."

"Stevie said it's your turn to do the joint tax return this year, so you better get started."

"I will, in a minute."

Jodi stood by the window and emptied her second glass of water, watching the kids run around outside. It stirred up memories inside her, pictures of herself getting refreshment from the hose on a hot day, although she hadn't been supposed to do so, because it was a "waste of water". Somehow, she had always lived under the illusion that the adults wouldn't notice the moist ends of her hair and the wet spots on her clothes. She remembered Jack smirking down at her a few times, but he had never said anything.

The girls had long since disappeared from her view, when Jodi caught herself still staring at the same spot. She turned around to her mother, who had gone back to hooking up the new toaster. "Mum, do you ever wonder what it would've been like, if Claire hadn't…"

Meg looked up, gazing at her daughter thoughtfully. The question surprised her, it appeared to come out of the blue. "Of course. All of us do."

"You know, I sometimes picture it…Charlotte would have stayed and Alex would live here now –weird thought- and him and Claire would probably be married with a bunch of more kids."

Meg smiled at Jodi affectionately. "I know."

For a few seconds, mother and daughter were brought together by a moment of silent remembrance. It was Meg who broke the eye contact, turning back to the plug with an abrupt motion. "But you're romanticizing things a bit…it's no use. Life doesn't go that way."

"Yeah, but do you think Peter would have come back, I mean, hypothetically speaking? With Alex and all?"

"I have no idea, Jodi. Does it matter?"

"…cos I honestly don't think he would have, he didn't seem to care too much that he had a kid."

Meg spun around with a furious expression on her face. "Don't ever say that again! He's Charlotte's father, for God's sake, and-" Suddenly, they heard loud rattling in the hall, and footsteps of someone running away.

Jodi bit her lip, a terrible suspicion crossing her mind. "Oh no…"

They hurried out of the kitchen and almost fell over the broom and bucket, which had been knocked over. "Charlotte?" Meg called anxiously.

The front door stood wide open, which made the conclusion they had drawn immediately more plausible. "Charlotte!"

"Charlotte!" Jodi joined in, full of concern about her niece. This was all her fault…how could she have been so stupid? "Come on, Charlie…"

In the gritted yard, they found Emily, who was looking around in confusion. "Have you seen Charlotte?" Meg asked from a distance.

The little girl mumbled something indefinable. Jodi, who reached her first, crouched down in front of her. "What?"

"She cut herself on the fence and…and then she went inside to get a pegado, but she ran back outta the house and didn't talk to me. Why-"

"Where did she go?"

"Over there." Emily pointed into the rough direction of the shed with the leaking roof.

"Thanks! Stay there, don't go away!"

The child was about to ask more questions, but the two women were already running off into the same direction as Charlotte. At the shed, they met Nick, who was standing on an old ladder. "What's wrong?" he asked, noticing their agitation.

"Have you seen Charlotte?"

"No, why?"

Jodi fidgeted nervously. "She, um, she ran away after I said some stuff to mum –things that she wasn't supposed to hear-"

Nick climbed down from the ladder right away. "Where is she?"

"We don't know!" Meg exclaimed, with less composure than usual. "We need to split up- Jodi, check the stables, all of them! I'll look through the house again and the chicken house, and Nick-"

"I'll check outside" he affirmed quickly.

"Meg!" They were about to depart, when they saw Chloe racing towards them. She clasped her hat in her right hand; loose strands of hair were hanging down from her bun and she looked utterly drained, but right now, the addressed one couldn't have cared less. "Mistral's gone!"

"Gone? What do you mean, gone!"

"She –I only…left her for a minute- she was…tied to…the pole" Chloe panted. "Firmly tied…only left her for a moment…"

"Was she saddled?" The young woman nodded, still out of breath.

"Why did you leave a saddled horse by a pole? Didn't you realize that someone might take off on her!" Nick snapped in a wrathful tone. His concern was getting the better of him.

"I was going to come back…I had to go to the bathroom quickly" she stammered, completely intimidated.

Jodi rolled her eyes. "Chloe, if you've got to pee, you go behind the next bush!"

Meg interrupted them. "This isn't the right time to discuss such things! We need to find Charlotte-"

Chloe gasped. "You think she took Mistral? But…could she mount her by herself?"

"There are stools, fences…" Nick murmured gravely. "We're not enough people to start a search, I'll go get Tess and Stevie. Get the horses ready."

With these words, he hurried off to the car. Tess would be devastated, he knew that much, and he was deeply worried himself, too. What if they couldn't find the girl? This horse might be hard to handle, especially for a seven-year-old kid, who didn't know her way around Drover's. She could get lost or worse! All of the potential dangers flashed through his mind- a riding accident, wild animals –that rumour about a boar could turn out to be true- dehydration, a sunstroke…he forced himself to push them aside, concentrating on the upcoming search.

This was a big property, Charlotte could be anywhere.