“Read the book. Then I’ll let you go.”
I turned around and stared at The Nothing. She was perched on the armrest of the easy chair, digging her fingerfeet into the fabric to stay upright. Her eyes looked completely vacant.
“What book?” I asked, to be quite sure about the voice.
“The Nothing knows,” Chimera’s voice said, but it was coming out of The Nothing’s mouth. “Find it and read it. But hurry up. The sisters are getting hungry.”
“Chimera,” Aunt Isa said with an icy rage that instinctively made me duck. “Release that poor creature and speak for yourself.”
The Nothing blinked.
“What…?” she said and sneezed violently. “I’b so bery, bery sorry…” she mumbled and went cross-eyed for a moment, then she fell off the armrest and landed on the floor with a feathery bump, all floppy and unconscious.
The Nothing was lying on her back on the rug with her fingerfeet up in the air and her eyes closed. Oscar peered at her suspiciously.
“What is that thing?” he asked. “And why did its voice suddenly change?”
“She’s some sort of failed experiment,” I said and surprised myself at how angry I sounded. “A chimera who didn’t turn out quite the way Chimera wanted. Chimera put her in a cage and abandoned her because she got fed up with The Nothing following her.”
“The Nothing?”
“It’s what she calls it.” I corrected myself. “Her. She’s a her, not an it. A person, not a thing. Or a nothing, for that matter.”
“But Chimera can talk through her,” Aunt Isa said pensively. “That must mean she used some part of herself when she created her.”
“Excuse me,” Shanaia interjected, “but shouldn’t we be more interested in what she said, rather than how she said it?”
“And you’re not suggesting that Chimera is going to let us all walk out of here if we just read some book aloud to her, are you?” Oscar said.
“Books can be important to a wildwitch,” Aunt Isa replied. “And possibly even more to someone who is now a… different kind of witch. Like Chimera.”
“You may be right, but surely she can do her own reading and writing?”
“Yes.”
“Then why make such a fuss about a book that’s been sitting on a shelf here – for years possibly?” Oscar looked sceptical.
“There has to be more to it,” Aunt Isa conceded. “Shanaia, are there any… special books in this house?”
“Grimoires, black books and necronomicons? Isa, you should know better. You know us.” Shanaia’s facial expression changed abruptly. “Or you used to know us. I’m the only one left now. But with the exception of my great-grandfather Shaemas, who was a bit of an oddball, we’ve never dabbled in that kind of thing: the dark arts, blood magic and all that. We’re wildwitches, pure and simple. Or rather, we were.”
There was something terribly lost and lonely about Shanaia. I remember being a bit scared the first time I met her – her dyed hair, the ink-black make-up around her eyes, the studs, and not least Elfrida, who hadn’t exactly been the cutest and cuddliest of wildfriends. But maybe the point of all that wildness and the Goth attitude was to help Shanaia convince herself that she was tough, that she didn’t need anyone. Right now she looked neither wild nor dangerous, just very, very alone.
“What really happened to your parents?” I asked.
“They died,” was all she said.
It was obvious that she would rather not talk about it. But what if it had something to do with all of this – Westmark, Chimera, that mysterious book she was so keen to get her claws on?
“They were going to a Walpurgis Night gathering at Raven Kettle,” Aunt Isa said. “Shanaia was only four years old, too young to go with them. In fact, I was her babysitter myself that night. We don’t know exactly what happened, only that… somehow they must have got lost on the wildways. It took us five days to find them and by then it was too late.” She looked at me, her eyes filled with shadows. “If you lose your way, it’s not only hunger and thirst that can kill you. The wildways fog itself will consume a little of your life force with every passing hour, especially if you don’t know where you’re going. Eventually… you just lie down and die. At least Shanaia’s parents had each other. They lay down together, embraced each other, and that was how they died.”
“So it wasn’t because… someone killed them?”
“No.”
“I thought perhaps… perhaps Chimera had done it…”
“No,” Aunt Isa said. “There’s nothing to suggest that. Chimera didn’t appear until later.”
“Chimera didn’t appear until she saw a chance to steal Westmark,” Shanaia said darkly.
“How did she do that?” Oscar asked.
“When my parents died, my Aunt Abbie looked after me. Or… she wasn’t my aunt, but rather my mum’s. So I guess that makes her a great-aunt or something, but I never called her anything other than Aunt Abbie. She was quite old and eccentric, and lots of people said she wasn’t a suitable person to bring up a child, but… but I loved her. She was my mum and my dad and my best friend. She wasn’t exactly the domestic type, and people used to gossip about the house being messy… but then again we spent most of our days outside and we ate things that we found, and lit fires in the garden and on the beach, and boiled mussels, and… she taught me everything. Everything about Westmark. And when we came home in the evening, she always gave me a bath. The house might have been a bit dirty, but I wasn’t. And she would read to me, and we would draw pictures of the things we’d seen that day, and… and… I thought it would last forever. Of course I knew that she was old, but she was as strong as an ox and almost as quick on her feet as I was. I mean, the woman climbed trees, for Pete’s sake. She and I would sit in the cherry tree, eating cherries, spitting out the stones and…” Shanaia’s face contorted. “How was I to know that one day she would suddenly sit down in a chair and die? But she did. Without warning me, without saying anything, just like that… bang.” She stared at us defiantly. “I miss her more than I miss my parents. She looked after me for ten years. She would never have sold Westmark without first discussing it with me. She would never have sold Westmark at all.”
“But… is that what she did?” I said.
“No, I keep telling you. It was a trick.”
“Chimera produced a sales contract, which Abigael had signed,” Aunt Isa said. “Or at least so it appeared. It became effective on Abigael’s death, and there was a lot of waffle about ‘providing for the child’s education and offering her financial security’ and blah blah. Enough so that it could be argued that Abigael had simply wanted to do what was best for Shanaia the day she was no longer around to care for her herself.”
“But Aunt Abbie would never have agreed that leaving Westmark was ‘in my best interest’,” Shanaia said. “She would never have sent me to that ridiculously expensive boarding school. How could anyone think so?”
“The Raven Mothers thought so,” Aunt Isa said. “They decided that the sale was valid, and that Shanaia would leave Westmark and start at Oakhurst Academy. An exclusive boarding school favoured by some wildwitch families.”
“It’s a horrible place,” Shanaia said. “You’re trapped inside a classroom most of the day, and I wasn’t allowed to have Elfrida with me during term. I ran away after three weeks…”
“And the school kept the money…”Aunt Isa said. “They said it wasn’t their fault that Shanaia ‘refused to let herself be taught’.”
“… and then you had no aunt and no home and no money,” Oscar said. “That’s messed up.”
“All I had was Elfrida,” Shanaia said, and at this point her eyes looked practically extinguished. Because now she had lost Elfrida too.
The whole story was so sad I could hardly bear it.
“We have to do something,” I said. “We can’t just sit here feeling glum. Is there really no way past those shark birds?”
“I’m not risking it
again,” Oscar said, picking at one of his cuts.
“But…” I thought about the seagulls and the wild dogs. “… What if they don’t hurt me?”
“Why wouldn’t they hurt you?” Oscar said. “I don’t think they’re fussy. They’ll eat anything.”
“Yes, but…” I started explaining what had happened with the wild dogs. Or rather, what hadn’t happened. “It felt as if they didn’t want to… draw blood.”
Aunt Isa scrutinized me.
“There has to be something about you,” she said at length. “Given the lengths Chimera went to to bring you here. If it’s at all possible – then make your escape. Get out of here. Seek out the Raven Mothers and tell them that we’re here, and that… that they have to do something. Chimera is more than just a wildwitch who has crossed the line. When I see what she has done here, soul-stripping animals and creating chimeras and…” She looked down at the still unconscious Nothing. “We have to stop her. Otherwise it won’t only be Westmark that’s in danger, but all of the wildworld. Tell them that!”
“And hurry up,” Oscar said a tad nervously. “Don’t forget she said something about the shark birds getting hungry…”
CHAPTER 18
Guard Dog
“Are you quite sure?” Aunt Isa asked. “It goes without saying that we’ll help you if you’re wrong, and they attack you. But it could be dangerous.”
“We’re already in danger,” I said. “Waiting here in the drawing room might feel less dangerous, but it really isn’t.” How I wished that Cat were here, then I would feel a lot less scared. Cat was always so good at making me feel brave.
Aunt Isa smiled to me in a very Aunt Isa way. She cupped my face in her hands and gave me a quick peck on my forehead.
“You’re growing, Clara,” she said. “It’s good to see.”
Oscar, too, looked a little surprised at my volunteering, but for once he kept his mouth shut.
I took a deep breath. I felt as if I should be running on the spot or doing some push-ups. I mean, that’s what you do before a major sports challenge isn’t it, warm up? And this was much more difficult.
I opened the door to the landing. It was quiet outside, just as before, but possibly a little darker. Perhaps it had clouded over outside. Or maybe it was all in my mind. I could sense the sisters more than I could see them. This still, motionless waiting that wasn’t sleep.
You walked past them less than an hour ago, I reminded myself. They didn’t even twitch. You can walk past them now. Remember the seagulls. Remember the wild dogs – especially Lop-Ear. For whatever reason they will leave you alone, or… at least they won’t bite you.
I started walking. I could have run, but I decided against it – if you’re tiptoeing past a guard dog, it’s a really bad idea to start running because it’ll chase you just by instinct. So I walked, one step, two steps towards the stairs.
I thought I heard a flutter. I looked up. A few of the nearest sisters stretched their wings and, for the first time, I could see their heads.
Perhaps it was just as well that I hadn’t seen them earlier because I’m not sure I would have dared venture outside. They had no beaks – to that extent they bore a slight resemblance to The Nothing. But instead of a lost little girl’s face, there was… practically nothing but a huge mouth. The eyes were reduced to shiny pinheads in the feathers, and just like Oscar had said, they had shark jaws bursting with sharp, triangular teeth, not just one row, but two or three.
I stopped in my tracks. I didn’t mean to. I really didn’t mean to.
Come on, I told myself. Onwards. OK, so they’re looking at you. That won’t kill you. Keep moving…
I took a few more steps, but I couldn’t help make them a little faster. I’d almost reached the stairs now. I wouldn’t say I was running, but neither was I out for a leisurely stroll.
The minute I put my foot on the first step, I heard a huge whoosh. I looked up. The whole stairwell had come alive. A swarm of sisters had taken to their wings as if controlled by a single will.
Now I ran. I made a dash for the bottom, but I still only managed a few steps before they were on me.
“Go away!” I screamed at the top of my wildwitch voice. “GO AWAY!”
I flailed my arms about as I ran, and I did hit some of them, but there were just so many of them. Thud. Thud. Thud. They hit my back and my head, my shoulders and my chest, my arms and my legs like feathery rubber bullets.
It was horrible, but I quickly realized that they weren’t actually sinking their teeth into me. In that way they did act just like the wild dogs and the seagulls. As long as I could keep going long enough to reach the front door, as long as I could make it outside…
I forced myself to carry on. I stopped lashing out at them, except when they aimed themselves directly at my face. But the strikes continued and they began attaching themselves to me with their claws. My body grew heavier and heavier, and my foot caught on the edge of a step because I failed to raise it high enough. Losing my balance, I made a desperate grab for the banister, but my arms weighed much more than they usually did. I was half turned around by the weight on my back and I fell, tumbling and landing not on the hard stairs, but on top of hundreds of soft bodies. Some of them were squashed; I heard the sound of delicate, light bones snapping like twigs and felt a wet warmth against my hip. It didn’t hurt. It wasn’t my blood. But the weight on top of me doubled abruptly.
I’m going to suffocate, I thought, and started bashing them again with my heavy arms, kicking them with my heavy legs, twisting my heavy body. I made it halfway to my feet, but fell back again, fighting to keep from being submerged in a flood of feathered bodies…
“Clara!” It was Oscar calling out to me, I thought, but he sounded much further away than he really was.
“Turn back!” Aunt Isa’s voice cut through the whirr of wings. “Clara, you can’t do it. Come back here!” Then a shrill, ear-piercing note rang out, a wildsong, but a form of wildsong I’d never heard before – a war cry that was an attack in itself. It seemed to pierce the mass of feathered bodies, and the weight on me eased a little. I managed to scramble to my feet and reach the banister. Clinging to it for dear life, I hauled myself up a step or two, when suddenly a hand grabbed mine. I batted a sister wing away from my face and could see that the hand belonged to Shanaia. She was dragging me back up the stairs while her wildsong keening grew louder and louder, and I couldn’t believe how all that sound could come out of just one girl. Aunt Isa had started singing too, and I could see both her and Oscar beating off the sisters, not with their bare hands, but with heavy books they used almost as if they were baseball bats and the sister birds were balls. With Shanaia’s help I made it back onto the landing, and when Aunt Isa got hold of my other arm, I was able to stagger the last few paces back into the drawing room.
Hoot-Hoot only just made it inside before Oscar slammed the door shut. Hoot-Hoot had fought too, I could see. He had blood on his beak and on one wing. Shanaia grabbed a book and slammed it down on the head of one of the sister birds that had chased after us; Aunt Isa brutally tore a couple more out of my hair and off my back, and wrung their necks as if they were chickens for the dinner plate.
Aunt Isa, Oscar and Shanaia were all bleeding from fresh injuries. Shanaia’s were the worst, one shoulder looked like someone had tried to push it through a shredder. Her leather jacket was in tatters, and her naked, bloody shoulder stuck out through the lining. There was hardly any skin left. In one place, something blue and sinewy could be glimpsed in the depths of the raw redness of the gash. Shanaia hadn’t guarded herself at all, she had fought simply to save me.
I was the only person without a scratch and I felt weirdly guilty about it. I had been congratulating myself for trying to save them, but instead they’d ended up coming to my rescue and paid for it with cuts and blood and pain.
“I’m sorry,” I said, although strictly speaking I hadn’t done anything wrong.
“It was worth a try,” wa
s all Aunt Isa said, and placed her hands on Shanaia’s shoulders. The wildsong returned, this time the calm, humming singsong so much more familiar to me than Shanaia’s wild battle cry, and it looked as if it was stemming the bleeding a little. Shanaia was deathly pale, and her black-rimmed eyes looked like cinders in her white face.
“It’s no good,” Oscar panted, sucking his wrist, which had acquired yet another shark bird bite. “We can’t get out that way.”
“Can’t we use the wildways?” I asked.
Aunt Isa shook her head. “Few wildwitches can find the wildways indoors,” she said. “Most of us need the sky above our heads and grass, soil or rock under our feet.”
Cat could do it, I thought. But then again, he needed only a hole in the fog big enough for him to slip through – a kind of sophisticated cat flap. Besides, I was starting to realize that Cat didn’t really think most of the laws of the universe applied to him.
Aunt Isa sang another wildsong for Shanaia’s shoulder. And another one.
“We haven’t even got water,” she said. “Oscar, check the drinks cabinet to see if there’s anything other than mediocre sherry. Vodka or schnapps would be the best.”
“Aunt Abbie preferred brandy,” Shanaia said in a croaky voice. “I don’t think she was much of a vodka drinker.”
“Why is that so important?” I asked.
“The wound is quite deep,” Aunt Isa explained. “Even with wildsong… it would be good to get it cleaned up. And vodka is almost pure alcohol.”
“There’s nothing like that,” said Oscar, who had opened a rather large mahogany cabinet that was clearly not, after all, the innocent bookshelf it had first appeared to be. “But there is some whisky. Will that do?”
“I guess it’s better than nothing,” Aunt Isa said.
Oscar brought the bottle, and Aunt Isa carefully tipped a little of the whisky into Shanaia’s cut.
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