The Sleeping Giant

“Out here, even the rocks feel like they’re holding on to stories.” — Jasmine Dallow

The Australian Outback unfurled endlessly before them, a canvas of red earth and pale sky stretching as far as the eye could see. Eucalyptus trees towered in uneven lines, their silver trunks twisting upwards, their leaves shimmering in the late afternoon light. The air was warm and dry, carrying the faint scent of dust and gum leaves, every breath steeped in the landscape’s ancient quiet.

Violet and Jasmine moved together along the track, their trainers scuffing up little clouds of ochre that drifted behind them like ghostly footprints. The land seemed to hum with its own rhythm: cicadas droning, the occasional call of a crow, the rustle of branches shifting in the cool breeze. It was a rugged beauty, raw and untamed, and for Violet it was both sanctuary and reminder.

The Outback had always made her feel small, in the best possible way—swallowed by something older, vaster, unbothered by the concerns of people. But today, it pressed differently against her, its silence magnifying the storm still raging in her head.

She led the way, her eyes darting ahead to the track that wound between clusters of scrub, but her mind remained tangled in the shadows of the Silver Queen. The groan, the flicker of a man’s silhouette, the journal’s frantic final words—they clung to her, whispering in the back of her thoughts no matter how fiercely she tried to bury them beneath the red earth.

Sally Harlow’s neat observations, her sudden urgency, her spiralling fear—it was all too alive in Violet’s hands, too vivid to belong to a young woman gone missing. And then there was the map, its inked crosses like little marks of fate, each one daring Violet to follow.

Jasmine’s light steps quickened behind her, the scuff of her shoes pulling Violet momentarily back into the present. She glanced sideways and caught sight of her sister’s face: flushed with exertion, strands of hair sticking to her forehead, but her eyes bright, unburdened.

The contrast between them was so sharp it hurt.

“Vi, wait up!” Jasmine called. “You’re walking so fast, I can barely keep up!”

Violet slowed, the crunch of gravel softening beneath her feet as she turned. Jasmine was a few paces back, picking her way carefully across a rocky patch, her arms spread slightly for balance. She looked so light, so sure-footed despite the uneven ground, her plaits swinging as she moved. The sight drew an ache from Violet’s chest—her sister, vibrant and carefree, while she herself felt like she was dragging shadows in her wake.

“Sorry, Jaz,” Violet said, a small smile tugging at her lips. “Guess I got lost in my thoughts again.”

Jasmine reached her side, her cheeks flushed pink from exertion, but her grin wide and easy. She gave Violet a playful nudge with her shoulder as they fell back into step. “What were you thinking about? You’ve been so quiet lately.”

Violet hesitated, the words she wanted to say pressing hot against her throat—the letter, the journal, the map, the flicker of a man’s shadow in the mine. But she swallowed them down, tucking them deep where they couldn’t harm Jasmine. “Oh, just school stuff,” she said lightly, with a dismissive shrug. “You know how it is.”

Jasmine tilted her head, studying her. Though her grin lingered, there was a flicker of something sharper in her gaze. She was a teenager now—no longer the little girl content to take everything at face value. She noticed things, even when Violet wished she wouldn’t.

“Mm,” Jasmine said at last, her tone noncommittal, though her eyes still searched Violet’s face. “If you say so.”

The two sisters walked on, side by side, their trainers scuffing up little spirals of red dust that hung briefly in the late light before settling back to the earth. The sun was lowering now, painting the horizon with copper and gold, and for Violet the scene should have been calming—an echo of childhood walks, of days when worries were no bigger than scraped knees or forgotten homework. Jasmine’s presence was still a balm, innocent and unbroken, but Violet could feel the weight of her secrets pressing harder, like storm clouds gathering just out of sight.

“Is it about Sally Harlow?” Jasmine asked softly.

Violet faltered mid-step, her foot snagging on a loose stone. She stumbled, catching herself just in time, her breath sharp in her throat. She turned quickly, eyes narrowing in surprise. “What makes you say that?”

Jasmine gave a small shrug, though her gaze stayed fixed on the path ahead. Her voice was matter-of-fact, but quieter than usual, as if sharing something half-forbidden. “I heard you talking to your friends the other day. And I saw the newspaper clipping in your room.” She hesitated, her expression tightening as she kicked at the dust. “It’s scary, isn’t it? Thinking about what might have happened to her.”

Violet’s stomach knotted. She had tried—carefully, deliberately—to keep Jasmine outside of the darker parts of her search. To protect her. To keep her in the bright, easy world of laughter and homework and daydreams. But her sister’s eyes, sharp and knowing, told her she had noticed more than Violet had ever intended.

“It is scary,” Violet admitted at last, her voice low, almost carried off by the dry breeze. She forced herself to keep walking, though every step felt heavier. “But that’s why it’s important to find out the truth. People deserve answers.”

Her throat ached as she said it, because she wasn’t just speaking of Sally anymore—she was speaking of all of them, of the silence stretching back through decades, of Emily Sullivan’s name whispered in history lessons, of shadows in abandoned buildings. And of Jasmine herself, too young to be burdened, yet already reaching into the dark with her questions.

As they pressed further along the trail, Jasmine’s wide-eyed fascination with the smallest things tugged at Violet’s focus, drawing her—if only for a moment—out of the storm in her head. Jasmine crouched now and then to study an unusual stone, or darted forward to follow the quick shadow of a bird as it skimmed over the scrub. Her delight was effortless, unguarded, the kind of joy Violet remembered but could no longer grasp so easily.

“Look, Vi!” Jasmine cried suddenly, pointing ahead. “That rock looks like a sleeping giant!”

Violet followed her gaze to where a massive boulder lay half-hidden in the brush. Its curved bulk did, in the late afternoon light, resemble the shape of a body at rest—shoulders hunched, a head tilted as though in slumber. The features were softened by centuries of wind and weather, a patient sculpture carved by the Outback itself.

Violet smiled despite herself. “It does, Jaz. It really does. Imagine the stories it could tell if it could speak.”

Jasmine’s eyes widened, her voice taking on a conspiratorial lilt. “Maybe it can. Maybe that’s why you’re so good at solving mysteries—you can hear the stories the rocks are telling.”

Her words were offered lightly, but they struck deeper than Jasmine could know. Violet felt something stir inside her, a shiver not quite of fear, not quite of pride. Was that what this was? Was it her bond with this land—the red earth, the stones, the whispering eucalyptus—that drove her to chase after the truths buried in it? Perhaps that was why Sally’s words had clung to her so fiercely, why Emily Sullivan’s ghost seemed closer with every step she took.

Violet reached down and brushed her fingers across the dusty ground, warm still from the day’s sun. For a moment she almost believed Jasmine was right—that the earth itself remembered, that it wanted her to listen.

But if the rocks told stories, she thought with a chill, they were not always kind ones.

As they scrambled up the rocky outcrop, the ground rough beneath their palms, the world seemed to widen with each step. At the summit the view unfurled in every direction—the vast, unbroken sweep of the Outback, red and ochre stretching towards the horizon, where the land met the deep blue of the late-day sky. Sparse clusters of hardy shrubs dotted the expanse, their stubborn roots gripping at the soil, while the faint shimmer of warmth lifted off the earth like a veil.

Violet stood still for a moment, breathing it in. The enormity of it all mirrored the weight she carried inside her—the complexity, the secrets buried in layers, the questions that seemed to stretch without end. Yet here, high above the town, away from the prying eyes and closed doors, she felt something rare: freedom, and a flicker of perspective.

They found a flat slab of rock, its surface warm from the sun, and settled side by side. The silence wrapped around them, not empty but alive. A magpie’s liquid call carried from somewhere in the distance, answered faintly by another, while the breeze threaded through the leaves of the nearest eucalypt with a gentle hiss. Jasmine swung her legs idly, the dust on her shoes flaking away in small puffs.

“Do you think there are still treasures hidden in the mines?” Jasmine asked suddenly, breaking the stillness. Her eyes gleamed with excitement as she bent to pick up a small stone that caught the light, its flecks glittering faintly. She turned it over in her hands, holding it as though it might reveal some secret if she stared long enough.

“Maybe,” Violet said, her voice thoughtful. She watched the stone glint in her sister’s hand, but her mind was elsewhere—on journals and maps and shadows that moved when they shouldn’t. “But sometimes the real treasures aren’t things you can hold. Sometimes they’re answers—the truths that have been buried too long.”

Jasmine studied her for a moment, then gave a slow nod, seemingly content with this answer. She leaned back on her palms, her face tilted towards the sky, her features softening into serenity. “It’s so beautiful out here,” she murmured. “It’s hard to believe anything bad could happen in a place like this.”

Violet’s gaze travelled over the horizon, where the endless red earth fused into the heavens without seam. The sight was stunning, yes, but she knew its beauty could be cruel. People had been lost out here—by accident, by design—and never found again. She let the words escape quietly, almost to herself.

“Beautiful things can be dangerous too, Jaz,” she said softly. “That’s why we have to be careful. Why we have to look out for each other.”

Her sister turned, puzzled for a heartbeat by the weight in Violet’s tone, then gave her a small smile. Violet managed one in return, though inside, her unease only deepened.

As Violet sat with the journal’s words echoing in her mind, a strange urgency throbbed through her veins. Every page of Sally’s handwriting had sketched a picture darker and more intricate than the town’s whispers allowed: a web of secrets, of old wounds buried beneath Broken Hill’s dust. The thought of Sally’s last days—alone, hunted, afraid—made Violet’s chest ache as though the girl’s fear had seeped into her own bones.

“Jaz,” she said at last, her voice barely above the sigh of the wind through the scrub. “Do you ever think about what happened to Sally Harlow? About why she came here in the first place?”

Jasmine turned her head, her usual brightness dimming. Her brow furrowed in thought, the weight of the question pulling her into a seriousness Violet rarely saw. “Sometimes,” she admitted. “It’s scary to think about. But I know you’ll figure it out, Vi. You always do. You’re like a real-life Nancy Drew.”

The words tugged at Violet, swelling her heart with pride even as they stung with sadness. Jasmine’s faith was unwavering, almost childlike in its absoluteness, and yet Violet felt the heaviness of it press harder on her shoulders. She wasn’t Nancy Drew. This wasn’t a library mystery solved in tidy chapters. This was Sally, missing. This was Emily Sullivan, vanished. This was shadows that groaned and moved when they shouldn’t.

“I hope you’re right,” Violet murmured, forcing a small smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “But this is bigger than anything I’ve ever dealt with before. Sometimes I wonder if I’m in over my head.”

“Maybe,” Jasmine said gently, reaching out to nudge her shoulder with her own. “But you’re not alone. You’ve got your friends. And you’ve got me. We’ll help you, no matter what.”

Her sister’s certainty should have lightened Violet’s heart, but instead it wrapped around her like both comfort and warning. Jasmine believed in her completely—but belief could not shield them from what lurked in the shadows of Broken Hill.

The Outback stretched around them, vast and unyielding, its silence filling the spaces between their words. The scattered eucalyptus trees stood like sentinels, their branches whispering secrets in the late breeze, their roots gripping stubbornly at the parched earth. Violet let her gaze sweep across the horizon, and for a fleeting moment she felt its strength seep into her—unyielding, enduring, watchful. She wanted to be as steady as the land itself.

But even the Outback had its dangers hidden beneath its beauty. And Violet could not shake the fear that this mystery might devour more than just its secrets.

As the afternoon stretched on, the sisters settled into an easy rhythm of silence. The cicadas sang their endless chorus, a low, buzzing drone that seemed to rise and fall in waves. Their footsteps scuffed against the dusty path, and the occasional cry of a magpie rang out across the scrub. It was a silence that didn’t need filling, a companionable pause where both could drift into their own thoughts.

“We should start heading back,” Violet said at last, rising from the sun-warmed rock. Her legs tingled faintly, stiff from sitting. “Mum will worry if we’re not home before dark.”

Jasmine jumped to her feet, brushing the red dust from her shorts with brisk slaps. Her cheeks glowed from the afternoon air, her grin easy. “Can we come back here again soon? I love it out here.”

“Of course,” Violet said, smiling at her sister’s eagerness. “Next time we’ll pack a picnic. Make a whole day of it.”

They began their descent, the path that had seemed daunting on the climb now easier, more familiar. They moved in companionable silence, their steps in rhythm, broken only by Jasmine’s bursts of observation, her voice carrying bright and unburdened into the dusk.

“Look, Vi! A kangaroo!”

Violet followed her sister’s pointing hand. On the far side of the scrub a lone kangaroo bounded gracefully across the open ground, its shadow elongated against the earth. It paused briefly, ears twitching, head lifting as though it had sensed their eyes on it. Then, with a powerful leap, it vanished into the distance.

Violet smiled, her chest easing for the first time in days. “I see it, Jaz. It’s beautiful, isn’t it? This whole place is like something out of a dream.”

She let the words settle, though in the back of her mind she couldn’t help but wonder: dreams had beauty, yes—but they also had shadows. And sometimes, you only noticed the darkness once you woke.

As they turned into their street, the landscape shifted from the wide, open sweep of the Outback to the familiar edges of home. Verandahs cast long shadows across neat front yards, and the faint strains of a radio drifted from somewhere nearby—an old pop song softened by distance.

Violet felt the echoes of the Outback still clinging to her, as though the red dust had lodged beneath her skin, carrying its silence and its warnings with her. Each step towards home was steady, but her thoughts tugged elsewhere, back to maps, journals, and shadows.

“Vi,” Jasmine said suddenly, her voice small in the cooling air.

Violet turned. Her sister’s face was solemn, her eyes wide with something she hadn’t expected—fear. “Whatever you’re mixed up in,” Jasmine went on, “whatever’s going on with Sally Harlow and all that… just be careful, okay? I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

Violet stopped dead, her breath catching. For all Jasmine’s chatter and youthful bravado, in that moment she looked very young indeed—her cheeks softened by the light, her plaits loose, her shoulders slumped as if the weight of her own worry had finally caught up.

“I promise I’ll be careful,” Violet said quietly. She reached out and pulled Jasmine close, holding her tightly, fiercely, as though she could shield her from everything the world might yet demand. She pressed her cheek to her sister’s hair, breathing in the faint smell of eucalyptus and dust. “And I promise I’ll always come back, no matter what.”

Jasmine clung to her for a moment longer before pulling away with a half-smile, though her eyes lingered on Violet’s as if searching for reassurance.

Inside, the house welcomed them with the familiar warmth of family. The scent of their mother’s cooking drifted from the kitchen—onions frying, something simmering slow on the stove—wrapping around Violet like a tether to normality. The rattle of cutlery, the hum of domestic life, stood in stark contrast to the shadows she had walked through that morning.

Yet even as she stepped across the threshold, Violet knew: the calm of home could only hold her for so long. The truth was still out there, buried deep in the earth and history of Broken Hill, and it wouldn’t stop calling to her.