The Crowmaster
Barry Hutchison
After Kyle's ordeal at school, his mother packs him off to the safety of the countryside, where there will be no temptation to use his powers, and he can forget the bad things - like the fact that his dad is a monster determined to destroy the world.But here's the thing about the countryside: it's full of nature, and nature sometimes has claws.Followed by a spindly figure in the woods and attacked by crows, Kyle is about to discover that NOWHERE is safe from the invisible fiends…
BARRY HUTCHISON
INVISIBLE
FIENDS
THE CROWMASTER
For my big sis, Carol Anne.
Sorry for turning your Bucks Fizz record into a clock.
But it was 18 years ago.
Let it go.
Contents
Cover (#u28de8f0e-7076-598f-b9d4-33674492d2e7)
Title Page (#u13c43f47-556c-58df-8372-a07920d81179)
Prologue
NINETEEN DAYS EARLIER...
Chapter One - BROUGHT TO LIFE
Chapter Two - OF MONSTERS PAST
Chapter Three - A GOODBYE
Chapter Four - JOSEPH
Chapter Five - MEETING MARION
Chapter Six - LOST
Chapter Seven - UNDER ATTACK
Chapter Eight - DRESSING UP
Chapter Nine - RUDE AWAKENING
Chapter Ten - SHEDDING SKIN
Chapter Eleven - THROUGH THE SQUARE WINDOW
Chapter Twelve - GUARDIAN ANGELS
Chapter Thirteen - CAUGHT BY THE CROWS
Chapter Fourteen - A FALL TO RUINS
Chapter Fifteen - INTO THE BIRDHOUSE
Chapter Sixteen - FLAMING CLOSE
Chapter Seventeen - DEMON IN DISGUISE
Chapter Eighteen - SNEAK ATTACK
Chapter Nineteen - THE MAST
Chapter Twenty - THE MONSTER WITHIN
Also available in the INVISIBLE FIENDS series
Copyright
About the Publisher
PROLOGUE
What had I expected to see? I wasn’t sure. An empty street. One or two late-night wanderers, maybe.
But not this. Never this.
There were hundreds of them. Thousands. They scuttled and scurried through the darkness, swarming over the village like an infection; relentless and unstoppable.
I leaned closer to the window and looked down at the front of the hospital. One of the larger creatures was tearing through the fence, its claws slicing through the wrought-iron bars as if they were cardboard. My breath fogged the glass and the monster vanished behind a cloud of condensation. By the time the pane cleared the thing would be inside the hospital. It would be up the stairs in moments. Everyone in here was as good as dead.
The distant thunder of gunfire ricocheted from somewhere near the village centre. A scream followed – short and sharp, then suddenly silenced. There were no more gunshots after that, just the triumphant roar of something sickening and grotesque.
I heard Ameena take a step closer behind me. I didn’t need to look at her reflection in the window to know how terrified she was. The crack in her voice said it all.
‘It’s the same everywhere,’ she whispered.
I nodded, slowly. ‘The town as well?’
She hesitated long enough for me to realise what she meant. I turned away from the devastation outside. ‘Wait… You really mean everywhere, don’t you?’
Her only reply was a single nod of her head.
‘Liar!’ I snapped. It couldn’t be true. This couldn’t be happening. She stooped and picked up the TV remote from the day-room coffee table. It shook in her hand as she held it out to me.
‘See for yourself.’
Hesitantly, I took the remote. ‘What channel?’
She glanced at the ceiling, steadying her voice. ‘Any of them.’
The old television set gave a faint clunk as I switched it on. In a few seconds, an all-too-familiar scene appeared.
Hundreds of the creatures. Cars and buildings ablaze. People screaming. People running. People dying.
Hell on Earth.
‘That’s New York,’ she said.
Click. Another channel, but the footage was almost identical.
‘London.’
Click.
‘I’m… I’m not sure. Somewhere in Japan. Tokyo, maybe?’
It could have been Tokyo, but then again it could have been anywhere. I clicked through half a dozen more channels, but the images were always the same.
‘It happened,’ I gasped. ‘It actually happened.’
I turned back to the window and gazed out. The clouds above the next town were tinged with orange and red. It was already burning. They were destroying everything, just like he’d told me they would.
This was it.
The world was ending.
Armageddon.
And it was all my fault.
NINETEEN DAYS
EARLIER...
Chapter One BROUGHT TO LIFE
The house was quieter than I ever remembered it being. The stairs didn’t creak as I tiptoed barefoot down them. The kitchen door didn’t make a sound when I edged it open. Even the fridge, which usually gives a strange gurgle when anyone so much as touches it, stayed silent as I pulled back the door and blinked in the faint orange glow of the light.
The floor was cold beneath my feet. I curled my toes in and tried to balance on my heels, minimising contact between my skin and the chill of the lino. I’d been given slippers at Christmas, but in all the… excitement of the day, they’d got lost.
The shelves of the fridge were almost bare. Tomorrow was shopping day – well, technically, since it was after midnight, today was shopping day, but since I hadn’t been to sleep yet I was still classing it as ‘tomorrow’. Pity. There was never anything decent in the fridge on the day before shopping day.
The milk carton felt light when I picked it up and carried it across to the table. If I drank some there probably wouldn’t be enough left for cereal in the morning. I grabbed a glass from the draining board and half filled it anyway. Nan always said milky drinks were good for helping you get to sleep, and drinks don’t come much milkier than milk.
On the wall above the microwave the plastic hands of the clock crept past 3 a.m. There were no ticks, no tocks, just the same flat silence that seemed to have fallen like a blanket across the world.
I put the carton with its dribble of milk back in the fridge and closed the door. It gave a gurgle, but it was short and faint, and nowhere near its usual high standard.
With glass in hand I wandered through to the living room, where the carpet slowly warmed the soles of my feet. The lamp post outside spilled light through a gap in the curtains – not much, but enough to help me avoid most of the room’s major obstacles.
Lifting the remote control from the top of the TV I made for the couch. I wasn’t sure what television stations filled their night-time slots with, but it had to be more interesting than lying on my back staring at the ceiling until morning.
Sipping my milk, I sat on the couch and curled my legs up beneath me. The TV came on at the first press of the remote, and the silence was suddenly shattered by a loud, nasal laugh. The sound made me jump, and a splosh of milk slid up the side of the glass and spilled down the sleeve of my pyjamas. The thumb of my other hand frantically searched for the mute switch.
At last I found the button. The laughter was immediately cut short. I sat there with the remote still pointed at the television, breath held, listening for any sign that I’d woken anyone up.
Not a bedspring groaned. Not a floorboard creaked. Gradually, my muscles began to relax and I leaned back against the cushions. The milk had trickled down past my elbow, but was now being absorbed into my PJs, so at least I didn’t have to worry about cleaning it up.
On the TV, the laughing man was still guffawing away, only now I couldn’t hear him. I recognised him as a chef from one of the cookery programmes that Mum watches. He and another man were in a room filled with big wooden barrels and racks of wine bottles. Every so often they’d fill a glass, take a sip, spit it back out into a bucket, then start laughing again like a couple of maniacs. I’d tasted wine on Mum’s birthday a few months ago. It tasted like vinegar and left a horrible film on my tongue. No wonder the men on the telly were gobbing the stuff out rather than drinking it. I’d been tempted to do the same thing myself.
In the bottom-right corner of the screen, a little woman was making a series of frantic hand gestures. I knew she was signing for the deaf, but I didn’t understand why whenever the men on screen laughed, she pretended to laugh too.
What was the point in that? Surely deaf people could see the men were laughing? They didn’t need her shaking her belly and contorting her face into a big Santa-Claus-style chortle, did they?
I flicked over to another channel. A skeleton-faced man with a long white beard was looking at an even longer mathematical equation on a whiteboard. I quickly hit a button on the remote and moved on.
The next programme I found was about Egypt. The pyramids were a dead giveaway. Someone was signing for the deaf on this channel too. This time the person doing the sign language was a man. He looked very excited about being on telly. His face moved as if it was made of living Plasticine, and his hand gestures were so wild and frantic he looked in danger of slapping himself unconscious. Every movement and gesture he made was ridiculously exaggerated. I wondered if that was how deaf people shouted at each other.
I watched the strange animated little man until I’d finished the rest of my milk. He was far more interesting than the actual programme and I could have kept watching him all night, but I was yawning now and it felt like sleep might be at least a vague possibility.
I hit the red button on the remote and the picture on screen turned into a thin line of colour, then disappeared completely. Pushing with my legs I bounced up off the couch and took a few steps towards the kitchen.
Something hidden by the gloom on the floor snagged my foot. I barely had time to realise it was one of Ameena’s boots before I stumbled, staggered, then started to fall.
I managed to catch the edge of the coffee table, but still came down hard on my knees. The jolt of my abrupt stop shuddered through me, and I felt the wet glass slip from my fingers.
Crash. The milky tumbler smashed against the wooden tabletop, showering it and the carpet in a hundred sharp crystalline slivers. The shattering sound shook me to the core, and not because I was worried about getting into trouble. It was because the sound had reminded me of something – something I’d been trying hard to forget.
The last time I’d heard glass break had been here in this very room. That time it hadn’t been a drinking glass smashing, though. It had been the window, as my childhood imaginary friend, Mr Mumbles, came crashing through.
Kneeling there on the floor I could remember it all so clearly. The panic as the window came in. The shock as Mr Mumbles fixed me with his beady glare. The sight of him. The smell of him. The feeling of his rough hands around my neck.
My throat tightened as I pushed myself up on trembling legs. I could hear the faint murmurings of movement upstairs now. Someone had heard the glass breaking. A feeling of relief washed over me, easing the knot in my stomach. The memory of my all-too-real imaginary friend had disturbed me, and right at that moment I really didn’t feel like being alone.
And then I realised.
I wasn’t alone.
He was standing there in front of the curtains, just as he had been last time. His wide-brimmed hat curved down, hiding his face in a mask of shadow. His heavy overcoat swished softly back and forth on a breeze I couldn’t feel or hear. His stench hit my nostrils; the familiar stink of filth and decay and of things long dead. It caught way back in my throat and made me gag.
He tilted his head and the light from outside pulled the dark veil from his face. There was the cracked, papery skin. There were the narrowed eyes; the hooked nose, through which his foul breath came whistling in and out.
And there, stretched into a humourless smile, were the lips – thick and bloated, and criss-crossed by a series of short grubby stitches that sealed his mouth tight shut.
My head shook all by itself, trying to deny what my eyes were seeing. But there was no avoiding it. There was no other way of explaining away what I was looking at. I didn’t know he’d done it, but he had. Somehow he’d come back.
Mr Mumbles was back.
Again.
‘Kyle?’ I heard Mum’s voice at the same time the living-room light came on.
‘Mum, move, get out!’ I cried, spinning quickly to face her. She was standing at the bottom of the stairs, dressing gown wrapped around her, a finger still on the light switch.
‘What?’ she frowned. ‘Why? What’s wrong?’
‘It’s him,’ I spluttered, turning back to the window. ‘It’s… Wait. Where did he go?’
‘Where did who go?’
‘Mr Mumbles,’ I yelped. ‘He was there. By the window!’
‘What? Are… are you sure?’
‘Of course I’m sure,’ I told her as I began to search the room. ‘He was right there when you switched the light on.’
‘I didn’t see anyone. It was dark, are you sure—?’
‘He was there, OK?’
Mum stood in silence, watching me check behind the curtains, the couch – anywhere Mr Mumbles might be hiding.
‘What’s all the ruckus?’ asked Ameena, who had now appeared behind Mum. She was wearing the pyjamas Mum had bought for her, and an old dressing gown of Nan’s. This was the fourth night Ameena had slept here, but I still hadn’t got used to seeing her. The sight of her knocked my train of thought, and Mum replied before I could.
‘He thinks he saw Mr Mumbles,’ she explained.
‘I don’t think I saw him, I did see him!’ I dropped to my knees and looked under the coffee table. It was a long shot, but I checked just in case.
‘Well unless he’s eight centimetres tall I doubt he’s under there,’ Ameena said.
‘What, you think this is funny?’ I demanded. ‘Have you forgotten what he did to me? To all of us?’
‘No, I haven’t forgotten,’ she said defensively, ‘but—’
‘But what? But what?’
‘Look, chill out,’ she told me. ‘If he was here then he’s not here now.’
‘Ameena’s right,’ said Mum before I could reply. ‘Let’s just all go back to bed and we can talk about it in the morning.’
I looked at them both in turn, barely able to believe what I was hearing.
‘Are you nuts?’ I cried. ‘I’m telling you I just saw Mr Mumbles and you think it can wait till morning?’
‘I know that’s what you think you saw,’ Mum continued, ‘but I was standing right here and I couldn’t see anyone.’
‘He was here!’ I insisted. ‘He was right here! What, was I imagining him or something, is that what you’re saying?’
Mum didn’t speak, but her face said it all.
‘I dunno,’ Ameena shrugged. ‘I saw what happened to him up on the roof, and I don’t think that’s something you come back from. Even if you are an imaginary evil monster guy.’
I glanced between them, still amazed at what I was hearing, but fully aware I wasn’t going to win this argument. Not against both of them.
‘Fine,’ I scowled, ‘let’s all go back to bed. But if you both get murdered in your sleep, don’t come crying to me in the morning.’
* * *
I’m not sure how long I lay there on my bed, propped up against my pillows. An hour? Two? The world outside was still wrapped in darkness and morning felt like a long way away.
I hadn’t been able to relax since returning to my room. I was certain I’d seen Mr Mumbles, but the more time passed the more unbelievable that seemed. Mr Mumbles was dead. Very dead. You couldn’t get much deader. But I’d seen him.
Hadn’t I?
What if he hadn’t been there? Could it have been that I’d been dreaming somehow? Or hallucinating? The lack of sleep and the flashback of the breaking glass could have sent my imagination into overdrive. It was possible, I supposed. And Mum must’ve been there for at least a few seconds before she switched the light on, yet she hadn’t seen anyone in the room besides me.
I felt the muscles in my back relax a little. The headache that had been pulsing behind my eyes since I’d come back to bed eased off a few notches. Maybe Mum and Ameena were right. Maybe I was worrying about nothing. Nothing that a few hours of sleep wouldn’t fix, anyway.
A glance at my bedside clock told me it was barely after four. School had been closed for the past few days while investigators tried to work out how every pupil and teacher had managed to develop temporary amnesia at exactly the same time; so I could sleep on for as long as I wanted.
I closed my eyes and allowed myself a smile. I could still remember the looks of panicked confusion on the faces of the teachers and students as they ‘awoke’ to find themselves standing in my front garden. The police and the school inspectors and anyone else who fancied could investigate all they liked. There was no way they’d figure out the truth. It was just too weird. There was no way they’d ever find out about—
The soft giggle from the end of my bed seemed deafening in the silence. My childhood instincts screamed at me to pull the covers over my head and hide, while my more grown-up ones ordered me to sit up and face whatever was with me in my room.
In the end I came up with a compromise. I kicked off the covers and rolled out of bed, pushing myself into the corner of the room and as far from the source of the sound as possible.
A small, frail figure stood watching me from the gloom. Her flowing white dress was caked thick with dried blood. In her hands she clutched a dirty porcelain-faced rag doll. Raggy Maggie’s single eye bored into me as the girl waved one of the doll’s stubby arms up and down.
‘Peek-a-boo,’ sang Caddie. ‘I see you!’
Chapter Two OF MONSTERS PAST
Silence filled the room like a void. Caddie was still standing at the foot of my bed, still making the doll wave at me. Her dark eyes watched me, unblinking, but she made no attempt to move closer.
A thousand thoughts crashed together in my head. I reached out and plucked one at random.
‘How did you get here?’
She didn’t answer.
‘What are you doing here?’ I demanded – more loudly, but not loud enough to wake anyone up.
‘She doesn’t want to play with us any more,’ the girl spoke softly.
I hesitated, trying to figure out the meaning behind her words, if there even was one.
Caddie looked just like she’d done four days ago. The smear of lipstick was still a red blur across her lips. Her face was still a rainbow of badly applied eyeshadow and blusher and whatever other names they give to make-up. Beneath it all her skin was still as pale as bone, and her lifeless stare still gave me the willies.
‘Who doesn’t—’
‘Oh, you remembered,’ she said. Her face broke into a wide smile.
Again I paused. ‘Remembered what?’
‘She won’t play any more,’ Caddie said, apparently fighting back tears. ‘We were having so much fun, but then she just wouldn’t play.’
Confusion had taken over from terror now. I had no idea what the girl was talking about, although there was something about her words that seemed familiar.
‘S’not fair,’ she muttered. ‘Every time I find a new friend to play with they get broken.’
Broken. A circuit connected in my brain and I realised why I felt like I’d heard this before. I had heard it before. Caddie was repeating everything she’d said to me in the school canteen – the first time I’d seen her here in the real world. I remembered Mrs Milton, my head teacher, lying on the floor. Sobbing and babbling. And broken.
I ran back over the meeting in my head. If I could remember what she said next then I could prove to myself I was right. What was it she’d said? What had I said? Something about Billy.
‘Not telling,’ she spoke.
Of course, that was it.
‘I told you, silly, I’m not telling,’ I blurted out, as quickly as I could. She started to speak before I was half finished.
‘I told you, silly,’ she giggled. ‘I’m not telling!’
It was as if I was looking at a recording. Every word, every inflection of her voice was exactly like it had been in the school. Any second now she’d ask me if I wanted—
‘Tea?’ she enquired.
And now I thought about it I realised it wasn’t just Caddie. When Mr Mumbles appeared on Christmas Day I’d first seen him in front of the living-room window. He’d stood there, hat pulled down, coat swishing in the breeze, beady eyes boring holes in mine.
He’d looked exactly the same when I saw him again tonight. The same stance in the same position in the same room. It was as if my encounters with both him and Caddie were being somehow replayed or re-enacted.
I detached myself from the corner of the room and cautiously moved towards the bed. Caddie’s eyes followed me, but she made no other movement. She was still talking – telling me I’d get a cake if I was extra good – but I was no longer really listening.
The bedsprings squeaked when I stepped up on top of the mattress. It was impossible to walk around the bed without having to go through Caddie and her doll, but I could go over it and reach the door without having to pass too close to them.
I thudded down on to the other side of the bed. The closed bedroom door was just a few steps away now. My eyes remained locked with Caddie’s as I backed towards it, my hand searching for the handle.
‘Raggy Maggie likes sugar, don’t you, Raggy Maggie?’ was all she said as I slipped out on to the upstairs landing.
The door to Ameena’s room was directly across from mine. It used to be where Nan slept when she lived with us, but – apart from Christmas Day – it had been empty ever since she’d gone into the old folks’ home a few years back.
The door wasn’t fully shut. I nudged it open and took a backwards step inside. My eyes were still on Caddie. I didn’t want to let her out of my sight for a second, in case she pulled a vanishing act like Mr Mumbles had.
I could hear Ameena’s breathing, soft and slow. She was asleep. Not for long.
‘Ameena,’ I hissed into the gloom. ‘Ameena, wake up.’
I heard her gasp quietly. The bed gave a sharp creak as she sat quickly upright. ‘What?’ she said, more loudly than I’d have liked. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Come here, quick.’
‘What is it?’
‘Just come and look!’ I hissed, giving her an imploring look. She muttered faintly beneath her breath as she threw off her covers and came to join me by the door.
She needn’t have bothered. The spot where Caddie had been standing was empty. I cursed myself for glancing away.
‘Gone,’ I said. ‘She’s gone.’
‘Who’s gone?’
‘Caddie.’
‘Yeah, four days ago,’ Ameena said.
I shook my head. ‘No, not four days ago. Now. A second ago.’
I marched across the landing and into my room. Empty. Ameena sauntered in behind me.
‘You were probably just dreaming.’
‘I’m telling you she was here,’ I said, pointing to the foot of my bed. ‘Standing right there.’
Ameena opened my wardrobe door and peeked inside. ‘Not in there,’ she said, closing it again with a click. ‘You sure you weren’t dreaming, kiddo?’
I flopped down into a sitting position on my bed. First Mr Mumbles and then Caddie. What was happening to me?
‘I saw her,’ I said, my voice coming out as a quiet croak. ‘I saw her as clearly as I’m seeing you.’
‘Maybe you just imagined—’
‘No,’ I snapped, ‘she was here.’
‘You didn’t let me finish. I’m not saying she wasn’t here, I’m saying maybe you imagined it.’
I looked up at her and blinked, even more confused than I had been. ‘How do you mean?’
‘Remember in the garage?’ she said. ‘When we fought Mr Mumbles. You told me you thought about a light coming on, and what happened?’
‘A light came on,’ I frowned, ‘but—’
‘And you thought how handy it would be to have a weapon, didn’t you? And then…’
‘I found the axe.’
‘Exactly,’ she nodded. ‘So what happened downstairs? Just before you saw Mr Mumbles.’
‘I dropped a glass,’ I told her.
‘And?’
I hesitated, having already realised the road this conversation was taking me down. ‘And I remembered him coming through the window.’
‘And I’ll bet just before your other guest turned up you’d been thinking about her too.’
I looked from Ameena to the spot where Caddie had been standing. Though I didn’t realise it, I must’ve nodded.
‘Thought so,’ Ameena said. She looked pleased with herself. I felt like she’d just kicked me in the stomach.
‘So, what,’ I began, ‘every time I remember them they’re going to come back, is that it? Every time I think about what happened they’re going to come leaping out of the shadows?’
‘There’s a simple solution.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Don’t think about them.’
Easy for you to say, I thought, but I didn’t say it out loud. I looked down at the floor. Was this it? Was I doomed to a life of running from ghosts of monsters past? I had to know. One way or another I had to find out for sure.
‘You might be right,’ I nodded, standing up.
‘Of course I’m right. I’m always right.’
‘But let’s do a test,’ I suggested.
Ameena’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. ‘What kind of test?’
‘I’ll think about one of them and see if I can make them appear.’
Ameena didn’t say anything for a moment. I saw her look over at my bedside alarm. The LED display told her it was well before five. She sighed as she realised she wouldn’t be getting back to bed any time soon. ‘OK,’ she nodded. ‘Let’s give it a try.’
‘Close the door,’ I instructed. I bounced up and down on the spot a few times, taking four or five big, deep breaths.
‘Ready?’ Ameena asked.
I stopped bouncing and nodded. ‘Ready.’
We stood there for a long time, neither one of us saying anything, until Ameena eventually broke the silence.
‘You started yet?’
I winced. ‘I don’t know which one to think about.’
‘Good grief,’ she muttered, shaking her head. ‘Think about whatever one scared you the least. I don’t want you freaking out on me if you do make them appear.’
‘Right,’ I said. ‘Good idea.’
I closed my eyes. It was a close-run thing, but I found Mr Mumbles marginally less scary than Caddie, even though it probably should have been the other way around. There was a vague familiarity to Mr Mumbles that Caddie didn’t have, and I think that’s why he didn’t terrify me quite as much as the girl with the doll did.
Lost in the blackness behind my eyes, I tried to picture my old imaginary friend. It wasn’t hard. He had a face that wasn’t easy to forget, and I’d seen it up close so many times it was burned into my memory for ever.
Almost straight away, Mr Mumbles stumbled from the fog inside my head, arms outstretched, hands clawing at thin air. Instinctively I opened my eyes and pulled away, although there was nothing to pull away from. Only Ameena and I were there in the room.
‘What happened?’ she asked.
‘I thought about him,’ I said. ‘I could picture him coming at me.’
‘And what about now?’ she asked, casting her eyes around the room. ‘Can you see him now?’
I shook my head. ‘Maybe I should try again.’
‘If you like,’ Ameena nodded, before she gave a yawn so big it threatened to swallow her own head.
‘Let’s try in the morning,’ I suggested, taking the hint. ‘It’s late. Or early, depending on how you look at it.’
‘Good call. You be OK?’
‘Course,’ I said with a smile, as I guided her towards the door. ‘I’ll be absolutely… Wait. Did you hear something?’
We stood listening to the silence.
‘Nope.’
I hesitated, then reached for the door. For a moment there I’d thought I heard…
‘Footsteps,’ I whispered. ‘Listen.’
We leaned closer to the door. Ameena stared down towards the end of her nose, the way she always did when she was listening hard.
Thup. The sound of the footstep on the hallway carpet was almost too soft for us to hear. Almost.
Ameena’s eyes met mine. She gave a brief nod and we both stepped back from the door.
Thup.
‘Now do you believe me?’ I whispered as I looked around for something to use as a weapon. The only thing close to hand was a pillow, and I couldn’t see that being a lot of help.
Thup. The footsteps stopped right outside the bedroom door. Ameena and I both took another step away.
I narrowed my eyes and gave the power sleeping inside me a nudge. At once I felt the familiar tingling sensation creep across my scalp; saw the flashes of blue and white sparks across my vision. When Mr Mumbles stepped through the doorway he’d be stepping straight into a world of pain.
Standing shoulder to shoulder, I felt Ameena tense as the handle of the door slowly began to turn. The dull metal gave the faintest of creaks as it was pushed all the way down.
The electricity buzzed through my skull. I raised my hands, not yet sure what I was going to do to Mr Mumbles, but certain it was going to be something nasty.
The door edged open and a head appeared through the gap. Mum looked half asleep. She also looked angry.
‘What’s going on?’ she demanded, pushing the door the rest of the way open. ‘It’s the middle of the night.’
‘Mum,’ I breathed, feeling the tingling in my head subside. ‘It’s only you. We thought it was—’
He stepped out behind her without a sound, raising the axe before I could grasp what was happening. Everything seemed to lurch into jerky slow motion as Mr Mumbles swung his arm round in a wide arc. I heard Ameena give a yelp, and watched, helpless, as the blade of the axe sliced through the air.
And straight towards Mum’s neck.
Chapter Three A GOODBYE
I have no memory of moving. I don’t remember hurling myself at Mr Mumbles, or how I managed to reach him before the axe could find its target.
All I remember is my shoulder hitting him hard in the chest and the sound of the air leaving his body in one short sharp breath.
We tumbled, a flailing ball of arms and legs, through the door into Ameena’s room. He was laughing before we hit the floor, that low, sickening cackle I’d heard too many times before.
My fist glanced off his chin. He didn’t flinch. Kept on laughing. I brought the sparks rushing across my head. Pictured my muscles bulging. Faster. Stronger.
Bam. The next punch twisted his head around. That shut him up, but I hit him again anyway, across his crooked nose this time. It split with a crack, spraying thick black blood on to the carpet.
This time I was getting rid of him for good. There would be no coming back from what I was about to do to him.
How many times did he try to strangle me at Christmas? Four? Five? I’d lost count of how often I’d felt his hands around my throat. Now it was my turn. My fingers wrapped around his windpipe and I pushed down with all my weight. His eyes bulged and his grey skin took on a purple hue as I choked whatever passed for life out of him.
I heard a sound on the carpet right behind me. Caddie, I thought, releasing my grip and twisting at the waist. The lightning zapped through my brain before I knew what was happening. Mum was lifted off her feet and driven backwards into the wall. It shook as she slammed against it, hard enough to send some of Nan’s old ornaments toppling from their shelves on the other side of the room.
I was on my feet at once, Mr Mumbles forgotten. Ameena was at Mum’s side before I was, kneeling down, checking she was OK. Mum groaned and edged herself into a seated position against the wall. Her face was contorted in pain, but there was something else there in her eyes when she looked at me. Something I’d never seen before.
Fear.
‘Mum, are you all right? I’m sorry,’ I spluttered. ‘I didn’t know it was you. I thought…’ My words wilted under her gaze. ‘You saw him, right? You saw him?’
She nodded, but her eyes didn’t leave mine, and the expression behind them didn’t change.
‘He’s gone,’ Ameena said, standing up and searching the room. ‘Where did he go?’
We were right by the door. There was no way he could have got out that way, but Ameena ventured on to the landing to check anyway. She returned a second later and gave a shrug.
‘Disappeared,’ I said. ‘Like before.’
‘You were going to kill him,’ Mum breathed.
‘I had to,’ I told her. ‘He was going to kill you.’
Mum’s eyes searched my face, as if seeing it for the first time. ‘But the way you flew at him. The way you were hitting him…’ Her eyes went moist and she looked down at my hands. Mr Mumbles’ blood still stained my knuckles.
‘You were going mental,’ Ameena said. I shot her a glare, but she fired it straight back. ‘We were shouting at you to stop. Didn’t you hear us?’
I nodded unconvincingly. I hadn’t heard a thing.
Mum winced as she tried to stand. Ameena and I both held out a hand to help her up. She looked briefly at mine, then took Ameena’s.
‘What’s the problem?’ I asked, more aggressively than I meant to. ‘I had to do it. I had to stop him. Don’t you get that?’
‘Downstairs,’ Mum said, placing her hands on her lower back and giving her spine a stretch. ‘You and I need a little talk.’
‘But, Mum—’
‘Downstairs, Kyle,’ Mum said, not angry but sad, which was worse. ‘It wasn’t a request.’
I sat in the kitchen, listening to the cheeping of the birds outside, and the distant rumblings of the first of the early-morning traffic. Mum’s ‘little talk’ had become a long discussion, and although it was still mostly dark outside, the clock on the wall told me it was almost seven.
The hot chocolate Mum had made an hour ago had gone cold. It sat in a mug on the table in front of me, untouched. I was too stunned to drink any of it. Too shocked by what Mum was suggesting to do anything but fight back the tears that were building behind my eyes.
‘It’s for the best,’ Mum said. My gaze was lowered to the table. I could see her hand resting on top of mine, but I couldn’t feel it.
It’s for the best. She’d said those words nine times during our two-hour conversation. Only It won’t be for long challenged it for the coveted title of Most Overused Phrase. They had been neck and neck almost the whole way through, but this last instance had pushed It’s for the best into a nine-eight lead. It was nail-biting stuff, and concentrating on the game was probably the only thing that was stopping me from crying.
‘I’m sorry, Mum, it was an accident,’ I said croakily, raising my eyes to meet hers. ‘Don’t do this, please.’
‘I promise, sweetheart, it won’t be for long,’ smiled Mum weakly.
Nine all.
‘It won’t happen again, I swear.’ ‘It’s not that you hurt me. That’s not what I’m worried about,’ she said. ‘I’m worried about you. And Ameena. And… and everyone. If you’ve started making those… those things come back, then no one’s safe. No one.’
Part of me knew she was right. If I was somehow making the enemies I’d faced return, it would be dangerous for anyone to be around me.
Another part of me was even more worried, though. Mr Mumbles was dead. Caddie was dead. There shouldn’t have been anything left of them to come back.
Could it be that by picturing them so vividly I was somehow creating them? Was my imagination bringing them to life? It sounded impossible, but everything I’d been through in the past few weeks had made me take a long hard look at my definition of “impossible”.
Despite all this, despite everything I knew and everything I suspected, there was one thing keeping me from agreeing with Mum’s plan.
‘But… I don’t want to.’
She squeezed my hand and glanced towards the window. Before she turned away I saw the softness in her eyes. A butterfly of excitement fluttered in my belly as I realised she wasn’t going to go through with it. She couldn’t.
When she turned back, though, her expression had changed. The softness was still there, but a wall of determination had been built in front of it.
‘I’m sorry, Kyle,’ she said in a voice that told me the debate was now over. ‘But you’re going to have to leave.’ She gave my hand another squeeze, before adding: ‘It’s for the best.’
Ding ding, I thought, as the first of the tears broke through my defences and trickled down my cheek. We have a winner.
Four hours later I was on a train, wedged in tight against the window by one of the fattest men I’d ever seen in my life. The carriages were all pretty busy, and I had considered myself lucky to find a seat at all. Now, jammed there with my arms pinned to my sides and my face almost touching the glass, I wasn’t so sure.
He’d joined the train at the stop after mine. From the second he squeezed himself into the carriage I knew he’d end up next to me. There were two or three other seats free, but I knew my luck wasn’t good enough for him to choose one of those. Sure enough, he heaved himself along the aisle until he was level with my seat, then plopped down next to me with a heavy grunt. No matter which way you looked at it, this really wasn’t shaping up to be a good day.
The track clattered by beneath us; a regular rhythm of clackety-clack, clackety-clack. The train shifted left and right on its wheels. Every time it swung left I found myself squashed further by the bulk of the behemoth beside me.
It was an hour or so to Glasgow, where I would have to get off this train, go to another station, and get on a second train. Then it was nearly three hours until my stop, where I would be met by Mum’s cousin, Marion. From there it was a ten-mile drive to Marion’s house, where I would be living for at least the next month.
Mum had shown me the place on the map. It was a remote little house located slap bang in the middle of nowhere. Apart from the train station there seemed to be nothing within twenty miles in any direction. Mum had described it as ‘perfect’. I guessed ‘painfully dull’ would probably be much more accurate.
I still didn’t want to go, but Mum’s reasoning for sending me to Marion’s did make sense, I had to admit.
It was our house, she said. Huge chunks of the horrors I’d experienced in the past few weeks had taken place in the house, and Mum believed just being there was what was making the bad memories so vivid. Vivid bad memories, it seemed, led to very bad things happening.
She reckoned being around her and Ameena could also be contributing. It was just after she said this that she dropped the bombshell about going to live with Marion. She hoped the change of scene would help me to stop conjuring up anything that might try to kill me. I’d probably just die of boredom instead.
Marion didn’t have any children, which was another reason for sending me there. Mr Mumbles had been my imaginary friend, and Caddie had been Billy Gibb’s – a boy from my class in school. If they only came back when the child who imagined them was around, then taking me away from children should keep me safe from any more homicidal visitors. At least, that was the theory.
‘Nice view.’
The huge man in the seat next to me was leaning into my space, admiring the scenery as it whizzed by the window. His face was red and sweaty, as if he’d just completed a marathon. He was completely bald, and as he breathed I could detect a definite whiff of milk. Stick him in a giant nappy and you could have passed him off as the world’s largest baby.
I quickly pushed the thought away. The last thing I needed was for that mental picture to become a reality too.
‘Yeah, it’s nice,’ I replied, looking out at the fields.
‘See the little birdies?’ he asked, jabbing a podgy finger against the window. ‘Pretty.’
Ignoring the urge to point out to him that he wasn’t talking to a three-year-old, I followed his finger. A large flock of black birds was flying parallel to the train, about thirty or so metres away. They moved as one, all soaring in perfect time together, as if taking part in some carefully orchestrated dance.
‘How are they keeping up?’ I mumbled, not really expecting an answer. ‘We must be doing eighty miles an hour.’
‘They’re crows,’ he said, as if that somehow explained things.
‘Are crows that fast?’
He made a sound like air escaping from a balloon. SSSS-SS-SS. It took me a moment to recognise the sound as laughter. ‘Them ones are.’
I kept watching the crows. I doubted they could keep up this pace for long. Any second I expected them to fall back and be left behind by the train, but they remained level for several minutes. If anything, they seemed to be pulling ahead a little, although I couldn’t be certain of that.
‘Where you off to?’ The man-baby’s voice was close by my ear and I gave a little jump of fright. We were so close he must have felt my sudden jerk, but he didn’t let on if he did.
‘Glasgow,’ I said, not wanting to give away too much information.
‘Big city,’ he said. Every word he spoke seemed to make him more and more breathless. I realised that was why he used as few of them as possible. If a sentence had more than four words in it he had to stop for air halfway through. ‘Shopping?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Young lad. On his own. Big city,’ the man wheezed. ‘Dangerous.’
‘I’ll be meeting friends,’ I lied. I was keeping my gaze pointed out of the window, hoping he’d take the hint.
‘Yes. You will be.’
I turned to face him, struggling against the bulk of his arms. ‘Sorry? What did you say?’
‘I’m sure you will be,’ he panted. ‘Meeting friends, I mean.’ His mouth folded into a gummy smile and I realised for the first time that he had no teeth. Maybe he really was the world’s biggest baby.
‘Tickets, please.’
I was glad the ticket collector chose that moment to appear. Anything to save me from having to talk to the weirdo next to me.
I felt like a circus contortionist as I tried to squeeze my hand down between the man and me so I could reach into my pocket. He must have realised what I was trying to do, but he made no attempt to make things easier. Bad baby. I thought, and I couldn’t help but smile.
My ticket was a little crumpled when I finally managed to haul it from my pocket. I straightened it out as best I could before holding it up for the ticket collector.
‘Sorry,’ I said, ‘it got a bit squashed.’
‘No problem,’ the collector said. He clipped a hole in the ticket, then handed it back to me. As I reached out to take it I almost yelped with surprise. The ticket collector turned and moved along the aisle, but not before I caught sight of his face and realised who he was.
I’d seen him three times before. Once in the police station when I’d been chased by Mr Mumbles, then twice at the school when I’d faced Caddie and Raggy Maggie. I had no idea who he was, but as I watched him move along the train I knew one thing for certain.
I was going to find out.
Chapter Four JOSEPH
‘Excuse me, can I get past?’
The mega-baby scowled at the question. ‘Why?’ ‘I need to see the ticket collector,’ I said with some urgency in my voice. The man-of-mystery didn’t seem to be bothering with anyone else’s tickets, and was instead walking casually along the train to where a sliding door led through to the next carriage.
With a sigh of annoyance and a grunt of effort, the obese man shifted his immense weight in the seat. His breath became laboured as he caught hold of the headrest in front of him and began to ease himself upright. Huge flaps of blubber wobbled below his arms like fleshy wings. His face contorted in effort as he pulled himself into a standing position.
I moved to pursue the ticket collector, but the bulk of my fellow passenger still blocked the aisle.
‘I’m up,’ he grunted. ‘Might as well go to the bog.’
I pushed my fist into my mouth to stop myself shouting in frustration. The toilets were in the same direction as I was trying to go, and there was no way of squeezing past the waddling beast of a man. I had no choice but to follow behind as he plodded his way along the train, his massive girth brushing against the seats on either side of the aisle.
He was too big even to see past. I hopped into the air a couple of times, but his height and the sheer expanse of his back stopped me seeing if the ticket collector was still in the carriage.
After what felt like a decade we arrived at the end of the compartment, where the aisle widened a little. I squeezed my way past the man and hit the control for the door. It slid open with a shhht and I hurried through. Behind me, the mega-baby forced his bulk through the door and stopped by the toilets.
‘If you’re not back,’ he managed to wheeze, though he sounded like the effort might kill him, ‘window seat’s mine.’
I nodded without looking back. My luggage was in a rack at the end of the train and I had left nothing in my seat. Now that I was free, I had no intention of going back to sit there.
I heard the toilet door close and lock, and tried hard not to imagine the horrors about to be unleashed inside that unsuspecting little room.
A glass door led into the next carriage. I could see right along that aisle and the next one, where the train ended. There was no sign of the ticket collector anywhere.
My hand was halfway to the button that would swish open the door when a voice to my right stopped me.
‘Looking for someone?’
I hadn’t noticed anyone standing in the little alcove where the exit door was, and my shock must’ve been visible on my face when I whipped round. The ticket collector gave a self-satisfied smirk, as if he’d been deliberately trying to surprise me.
‘You, actually,’ I said, recovering quickly.
He nodded and pushed back his hat, revealing a head that was almost – but not quite – as bald as the man-baby’s. ‘Well, you found me.’
The ticket collector was short and a little on the podgy side. He looked to be around sixty, but stood with the type of slouch usually reserved for teenagers. It rumpled his uniform and made it look two sizes too big. He smoothed the edges of his thick, bushy moustache while he waited for my reply.
‘Who are you?’ I asked, unable to come up with a less obvious question.
‘Ticket collector,’ he said with a smile. ‘Tickets, please. See?’
‘Who are you really?’
‘I told you, I’m a ticket collector,’ he insisted. ‘Always have been.’ I opened my mouth to argue, but he kept talking. ‘Just like I’m a policeman and always have been. And just like I will for ever be standing behind the curtain in your school canteen, waiting to untie you.’
I blinked slowly. ‘Nope,’ I said. ‘You’ve lost me.’
‘It’s OK,’ he chuckled, ‘it’s not easy to understand. It’ll be years before you figure it out. Forty-four, to be exact.’
My brow was knotted into a frown. I’d come looking for answers, but all I was getting was gobbledegook. ‘Right,’ I stumbled. ‘So… who are you?’
‘The ticket—’
‘What’s your name?’ I sighed, growing tired of this. The man across from me, on the other hand, seemed to be enjoying every second.
‘I’ve got lots of names.’
I glared at him. ‘Pick one.’
He thought for a moment. ‘Kyle Alexander.’
‘That’s my name,’ I said.
‘Oh yes,’ he said with a wink. ‘So it is. How about… Joseph?’
‘Joseph. Joseph what?’
‘Just Joseph will do for now,’ he smiled.
The door next to me slid open and a woman came through. She was about my mum’s age, and looked almost as strung-out as Mum had looked as she’d waved me goodbye. A boy of around three was in the woman’s arms. He fiddled with her long hair, not paying us the slightest bit of attention.
The woman gave us a faintly embarrassed smile as she made for the toilet door.
‘Out of order, love,’ Joseph announced. ‘Sorry. The one further along’s fine, though.’
A flicker of irritation flashed on the woman’s face, but she thanked him and carried on along the train.
‘Why did you tell her it’s out of order?’ I asked.
‘Because it will be in a minute,’ Joseph answered. I assumed he was anticipating a big clean-up job when the mega-baby finally emerged. ‘Now I need to get back to work,’ he told me. ‘Lots of tickets needing to be collected today. Was there anything else?’
I had too many questions to ask. They buzzed like a swarm of bees inside my head – one big collective noise that was almost impossible to break down into its component parts.
I fumbled for words. ‘Just… just… everything. What’s happening to me? What’s going on?’
‘Wow, straight for the biggies then,’ Joseph said, sucking in his cheeks. ‘What do you think is happening?’
‘I don’t know!’ I cried, launching into a full-scale rant. ‘That’s why I’m asking you. First my imaginary friend comes back and tries to kill me, then someone else’s appears and tries to do pretty much the exact same thing. I find out my dad’s actually my mum’s imaginary friend, and, I mean, I don’t even want to begin to think about how that’s even biologically possible. I’ve suddenly got these… these… powers, and now it’s like either they’re going crazy or I am, because everywhere I look I’m seeing Mr Mumbles or Caddie or… or…’
‘Or me?’
‘Right,’ I said, my tirade running out of steam. ‘Exactly. Or you.’
Joseph nodded thoughtfully, his eyes studying the smooth lines of the train’s ceiling. He gave a final nod and turned back to me.
‘Yep,’ he said.
I waited expectantly for him to continue. ‘Yep what?’
‘Yep,’ Joseph said, ‘that’s pretty much what’s happening to you. Couldn’t have put it better myself. You hit the nail right on the head.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me—’
‘What, that’s it?’ I spat. ‘You’re not going to tell me anything else?’
‘I think you’ll do a fine job of figuring it out all by yourself.’
He tipped his hat towards me and made for the door that led to the next carriage. I watched him, dumbstruck.
‘I thought you could help me,’ I told him. ‘I thought that was why you were here.’
He paused at the door. For a long moment there was no sound but the clackety-clack of the train on the track. When Joseph finally spoke, the lightness was gone from his voice.
‘I am helping you, Kyle,’ he said. ‘I’m doing everything I can.’
‘Not from where I’m standing.’
He turned round and straightened from his slouch. There was an intensity to his expression that seemed to change the entire shape of his face.
‘You think so?’ he asked, his voice flat and emotionless. He nodded towards the door to the toilet cubicle. ‘Look in there.’
‘What?’ I gasped. ‘No way! There’s someone in there.’
‘You sure?’
‘Yes! I saw him go in. Couldn’t exactly miss him.’
‘There’s a window,’ Joseph said.
I snorted. ‘What, are you saying he’s climbed out? That guy?’
One of Joseph’s eyebrows raised so high it almost disappeared beneath the brim of his hat. ‘I’m not saying he went anywhere.’
Joseph took a pace forward and swiped a credit-card sized piece of plastic across the face of the door control button. The light around the switch blinked from an occupied red to a vacant green. ‘Go on,’ he urged, stepping away. ‘Open it.’
I looked from the door to Joseph and back again, my mouth flapping open and closed like a fish out of water. ‘You can’t be serious!’
‘You say I’m not helping you. That I’m doing nothing. I’ll show you,’ Joseph said. There was an authority to his voice I’d never heard before, even when he’d been dressed as the policeman. The bumbling oaf persona had slipped away, revealing a much more commanding presence lurking behind it. ‘Open the door,’ he said. ‘Open the door and see how I help you.’
‘By showing me fat people on the toilet?’ I muttered, but I was already staring at the circle of green. Already knowing I was going to do it. Already reaching for the button.
The door clicked off the catch as my finger brushed over the switch. The toilet door didn’t slide sideways like the others and I had to give it a push to start it swinging inwards.
The smell that rushed out to meet me stung my eyes and caught in my throat. My gag reflex kicked in and I had to pull my jumper up over my nose and mouth to stop myself throwing up.
As the door swung all the way open I felt my whole body go rigid. The sight I had expected to see when I opened the toilet door had been bad enough. The sight that did greet me was worse. Beyond worse.
Way, way beyond.
What was left of the mega-baby lay twisted on the floor, the vast flapping limbs contorted into impossible positions, the head bent awkwardly sideways, as if his neck was made of rubber.
He was slumped on the lino like a big wobbly blob. There was no rigidity to him. Nothing solid. It was as if something had crawled inside him and devoured every one of his bones. All that remained was a mound of blubbery skin. It swayed hypnotically with the movement of the train.
The man’s mouth was wide open, but his eyes were wider. They looked beyond me, devoid of life, but pleading for… I don’t know. Mercy or dignity or something.
There wasn’t a spot of blood anywhere on the floor or the walls. A broken window was the only sign of a struggle. The hole in the glass would have been too small even for me to fit through, so I didn’t know how it fitted in with the rest of the grisly scene.
My eyes met with his again, and I suddenly felt very ashamed for thinking so badly of the poor guy. I stood there, transfixed by the man’s mushy remains, until Joseph reached forward and swung the door closed.
I blinked, the spell broken. ‘He’s… he’s… dead,’ I whispered.
Joseph swiped his card across the door control button and the lock blinked red. ‘Well spotted,’ he said. ‘What gave it away?’
‘What did you do to him?’ I asked, missing the sarcasm completely.
‘Me? Nothing. I’ve been standing here with you. Nothing to do with me.’
‘Then what happened?’
‘Long story,’ Joseph said. ‘And one you’re probably best not knowing for the moment. I’ll clean it up. I’ll take care of it. That’s what I do. That’s how I help you, Kyle. I tidy things away. I tie up the loose ends.’
I nodded, my eyes still fixed on the door. I couldn’t get the sight of the man’s remains out of my head. I think I muttered ‘OK’, but I couldn’t say for certain.
‘Go back to your seat,’ Joseph told me. ‘Try to act natural. You’ll be in Glasgow before you know it.’
I nodded again, too numb to do much else. The door to my left slid open and Joseph gave me a nudge to start me moving along the aisle.
Just before I started to walk, he put a hand on my shoulder. He may have been a small man, but his grip was like steel. ‘One thing you should ask yourself,’ he said, his voice quiet so no one else would hear. ‘Did that man die after he went into the toilet, or before?’
The hand withdrew from my shoulder and I stood in the mouth of the aisle, waiting for the sentence to filter properly through to my brain.
‘After,’ I frowned, turning on the spot. ‘I saw him walk…’
I left the rest of the sentence hanging in the air. The area around me was empty. Joseph had pulled his usual disappearing trick.
I skulked along the aisle back to my seat. I kept my gaze on the floor, avoiding all eye contact for fear of somehow giving away what I’d just seen. As I walked, all I could hear was Joseph’s final question, repeating over and over again in my head like the steady clattering rhythm of the train on the tracks.
Of course he’d died after going into the toilet. I’d watched him walk in. But the way Joseph asked the question, and the fact he’d even asked it at all, made me wonder if he knew something about the man-baby that I didn’t.
Chapter Five MEETING MARION
The change at Glasgow had gone smoothly enough, once I’d managed to find the other train station. It was hidden down a side street, and I’d arrived just as the dozen or so passengers were boarding the train.
The carriage I was in was virtually empty, and I’d found a seat with no problems. We pulled out of the station just a minute or so after I sat down. I gazed out through the grimy window, watching grey concrete tower blocks trundle slowly by. After the fifteenth or sixteenth identical block had passed, I settled back in my seat and closed my eyes.
Immediately I was confronted by the pleading stare of the mega-baby. Lost in the darkness behind my eyelids, all I could see was his wide face, wobbling atop his mushy remains like melted ice cream. His rubbery lips flapped open and shut, but no sound came out, just the choking stench of sour milk.
I opened my eyes again, and knew at once that I’d been dreaming. The housing estates had been replaced by rolling expanses of greens and browns. They stretched off in all directions, becoming trees and hills and lochs in the distance. The scenery where I live is pretty impressive, but the sights I saw through the train window were picture-postcard beautiful.
I’d sat there, admiring the view and slowly waking up, for something like ten or fifteen minutes. Eventually, a robotic-sounding female voice had announced we would soon be arriving at my stop.
As I heaved my bag down from the overhead luggage rack, I felt an uneasiness in the pit of my stomach. I may have left some dangers behind when I’d boarded the first train that morning, but who knew what waited for me up ahead?
* * *
Nothing. That was what waited for me. Nothing and no one.
The station was almost exactly how I imagined it would be – an old stone hut with a flimsy plastic shelter attached to one crumbling wall. There was also a clock mounted on the wall, but its hands were stopped at eleven fifteen. Moss grew around the clock’s face, so I’d be surprised if the hands had stopped at eleven fifteen any day recently. It had probably been frozen like that for months, if not years.
I listened to the clattering of the train growing fainter, and wondered what I should do next. Marion was supposed to be at the station to meet me, but besides the building itself, there was nothing but hills and trees for miles around.
I thought about phoning Mum. She’d given me the mobile phone she’d been keeping for my birthday, and topped it up with some credit so I could get in touch whenever I wanted. I think she was trying to reassure me she wasn’t just sending me away and cutting all contact.
And then I remembered that the phone hadn’t been charged up yet. The battery was completely flat, so calling anyone wasn’t an option. It didn’t matter. Marion was probably just held up somewhere. Stuck in a traffic jam or something.
My eyes wandered along the dusty, single-track road that led away from the station. Traffic jam, I thought. Yeah, right.
My bag almost knocked me off balance as I swung it up on to my shoulder. I immediately swung it back down again, realising I may as well leave it beneath the plastic shelter while I went for a look around. It wasn’t like it had anything worth stealing in it, and even if it had, there was nobody around to steal it.
The steps leading down from the platform were little more than cleverly arranged boulders. I picked my way down them, holding on to the rough stone wall of the station building for support.
There was no path at the bottom, but a track had been worn through the tangle of grass and heather that surrounded the building. A soft wind swished through the foliage, and I realised its whispers were the only sound I could hear.
I was completely alone – further away from any other human being than I had ever been in my life. There was nothing but me, the landscape and the flock of birds circling far, far above my head. It was strangely relaxing.
The track curved around the back of the station building. I followed it, almost skipping along, until I realised I wasn’t actually alone at all.
A battered old Morris Minor estate car stood in the small car park behind the station. The building shielded the four-space parking zone, making it impossible to see from the platform.
The car was dark blue, with occasional spots of brown rust. Its entire rear end was clad with panels of varnished wood, giving the impression it was half car, half walk-in wardrobe.
I knew right away it had to be Marion’s. I couldn’t remember much about Mum’s cousin, but I remembered enough to know this was exactly the type of thing she was likely to drive.
The front door swung open and my suspicions were confirmed. Marion’s prematurely grey head popped up on the other side of the roof. One of the few things I could remember about her was the colour of her eyes. They were a striking shade of bright blue. They almost shone as she fixed me with a glare, gave me a curt nod, then stared down at my empty hands.
‘No luggage?’
‘What? Oh. Um, hi, Marion,’ I smiled. ‘I left my bag up there. I didn’t think…’
She nodded again and climbed back into the car. The door closed behind her with a thunk.
‘I’ll just go and get it, shall I?’ I muttered. I waited for a moment to see if she’d pop back up. She didn’t, so I turned and backtracked up to the platform.
When I got there I found another surprise waiting for me. An oily-black crow sat perched on top of my bag. Its wings were folded in against its back, and its head was tilted slightly to one side. The bird’s dark, beady eyes stared at me as I scurried up the stone steps and stopped.
‘Shoo,’ I said, stamping my foot hard on the ground. The bird didn’t flinch. I took a few steps closer and stamped my foot again, harder this time. The crow tilted its head further to the side, but otherwise did nothing.
We watched each other for almost a minute, while I tried to figure out what to do next. I’m not keen on birds, not since the budgie we had when I was three got its claws tangled in my hair. My memory of the thing flapping and pecking at my head as it tried to get free is hazy, but even now, when I get up close to anything with feathers, I can feel myself getting nervous.
And the monster perched on top of my bag was no budgie. For a start it must’ve been about fifty centimetres in length. Its beak was long and curved, with short feathery tufts covering the top. Its legs were long and spindly, tapering at the bottom into sharp-looking claws.
The feathers, the legs, the beak; no part of the bird was any other shade but black. It didn’t just look like a crow, it was a perfect example of crowness. Like something from a creepy fairy tale. Or – I realised with a shudder – a horror story.
‘Right, come on, shift,’ I urged, clapping my hands loudly and shuffling towards my bag. The bird gave a faint caw, then hopped into the air. It appeared to beat its wings only once, but that was enough to carry it up to the roof of the station building. It perched there, watching with its dark eyes, as I picked up my bag and made my way back to Marion’s car.
‘You got it then,’ Marion said, as I clambered into the passenger seat. The inside of her car was as neat and tidy as it was chilly. I slipped my seatbelt on and pulled my jacket tightly around me. Somehow it felt colder inside the car than it did outside.
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