The Secret Book

by Jamie Smart

  Utterly consuming him in light.

  Then everything exploded.

  17

  Boja Bear

  After what felt like a very long time, but was possibly just a few seconds, Dev unscrunched his eyes. He poked his head out from behind the crate. The only heartbeat he could hear now was his own, hammering loudly in his ears.

  He peered through the smoke. Everything he owned looked smashed or blackened, every shelf and cabinet had collapsed. The walls were thick with soot, and the roof was half destroyed, allowing a faint beam of early dawn light to shine down upon Boja Bear.

  Boja Bear!

  There he stood, in the middle of the room. His fur sparkling with bright blue lights. The handle up his nose slowly spinning to a halt.

  Flember flooded up inside his eyeballs, and Dev could see they were staring straight back at him.

  ‘B-Boja Bear?’

  Boja Bear moaned again.

  Dev stepped across the shredded cables, through the dust and the debris, unable to take his eyes off the big glowing bear in front of him. He reached a finger out towards his belly. Blue sparks span out from the fur, across his hand, and threaded up his arm.

  It felt good.

  It felt warm.

  ‘You’re full of flember,’ Dev gasped, standing on tiptoe to reach Boja Bear’s nose. He gently pulled the handle out, wiping a few drips of sparkling blue snot from his nostrils. ‘How are you feeling?’

  Boja Bear slowly lifted an arm and waggled his fingers. Then he did the same with the other, as if he were playing an imaginary piano.

  A strange, distorted giggle rose up from his throat.

  ‘Boja Bear.’ Dev stared at Boja Bear’s paws with just as much amazement. ‘That’s your name. Boja for short.’

  ‘Boh …’ Boja began. ‘Bohhhhhhhhh …’

  His mouth seemed to get stuck on the word.

  ‘I’m Dev.’ Dev gently lifted Boja’s paw, and placed it on his own head. ‘Me. I’m Dev.’

  Boja patted Dev’s head. ‘Dvvvvvv.’

  ‘That’ll do.’ Dev could feel the contented thump-thump-thump of Boja’s pulse. ‘I made you, Boja.’

  Boja’s gaze flickered over Dev’s shoulder. To the sky beyond his balcony, and the faintest glimmers of an orange sun. He reached out towards it.

  ‘It’s morning.’ Dev smiled. ‘That’s the sun!’

  ‘Snnnnn,’ Boja repeated, dragging a heavy foot forward with a loud THUD. The other foot followed, and before Dev knew what was happening, Boja was marching his huge lumbering body towards the balcony.

  ‘SNNNN!’

  ‘Boja, NO!’ Dev shouted.

  The doorway was too small for the giant bear to fit through, but his wobbly legs had already committed to this ridiculous plan, and there was no pulling out now. Under his weight the whole wall crumbled like wet cardboard, wrenching the entire back half of the workshop into the misty dawn sky.

  ‘BOJA!’ Dev screamed, the floorboards tearing away beneath the bear’s feet. Dev could only watch in horror as his creation, his amazing, magical creation, tumbled down the rock face, disappearing into great billows of dust.

  Landing on a pile of scrap far, far below.

  His eyes closed.

  His glowing body utterly motionless.

  18

  Preparations

  There was a loud hammering against the workshop door. Santoro shouted from behind it, something angry. Something muffled. Dev knew he only had a few seconds to spare. He scrambled across the room, searching through the rubble for the flember book, but it was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘What did you DO?’ Santoro yelled, barging the door open with one hefty push. He climbed over the bookcase, yanking hard on Dev’s scarf, dragging him through the house, and out onto the front lawn. Their mother was there, her helmet decorated with antlers and clumps of moss. Her eyes glistening with tears.

  ‘You’re OK.’ She winced a smile.

  ‘I was … trying to extract the saliva from … f-f-f-flutterskit moths,’ Dev stammered. ‘Very explosive, flutterskits. They only have to lean the wrong way, and … BOOM!’

  She wasn’t buying it.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Dev sighed, an uncomfortable lump rising up inside his throat. ‘I’m really, really sorry.’

  He waited for his mother to do that thing. That thing where she’d clench her jaw, scrunch up her nose and let out a long, frustrated growl. Do stop blowing things up, she’d say, and then she’d hug him.

  But nothing came. No scrunched up nose, no growl. No sigh. No hug.

  Just a blank stare.

  ‘We’ll be late for Flember Day,’ she finally said.

  Santoro’s face fell like a giant robot bear tumbling down a mountainside. ‘Dev’s not coming to Flember Day. No way!’

  The thought didn’t much appeal to Dev, either. Not while Boja Bear was lying unconscious on a pile of scrap. ‘Santoro’s right, Mum. I’ll stay here. I’ll … I’ll fix the house! I’ll rebuild the workshop. I’ll have it all perfect again by nightfall! You go!’

  ‘YOU’RE COMING WITH US,’ she snapped, making both Dev and Santoro jump. Then she took a deep breath and composed herself. ‘Flember Day is important. To me, it’s important.’ She shot a furious glance at Dev. ‘And I’ll not spend it worrying what else you’re blowing up.’

  ‘He’s not coming.’ Santoro folded his arms across his tunic. ‘The Mayor banned him. The Guild would arrest him on sight.’

  ‘The Guild won’t see him.’ She reached inside the front door and pulled a long brown cloak from the coat rack. She wrapped it around Dev’s upper half, tighter than a cocooned woodgrub, concealing all but his eyes.

  ‘There.’ She smiled, sticking twigs into the folds and hanging vines between them.

  ‘Us nffpm verr cmmfabull,’ Dev mumbled.

  ‘Well, Dev, that’s the price you pay for destroying half our house. We’re going to Flember Day, all of us, as a family, and you’ll both just have to deal with it.’

  Dev poked his nose above the cloak, breathing in the crisp air as he, Santoro and their mother followed a trail of flickering lanterns towards the marketplace. Although it was still ridiculously early in the morning, there was plenty of activity.

  Villagers pegged the marquees, laid out the tables and prepared food for the banquets. Everyone wearing and comparing their own decorated helmets – each adorned with all manner of horns and antlers, vines and leaves, mushrooms, flowers and berries. Some had smeared their clothes with moss, others had insects scuttling across their shoulders, in and out of their sleeves, up and down their trousers.

  A cry came from over the hill. ‘Out of the way! Mind! Mind out of my way!’

  Dev saw sparklers sticking out from an almighty mound of bobbleberries and cream, dolloped on stack, upon stack of giant waffles. All wobbling from side to side as Arnold the waffle maker pushed it along on a large cart.

  His pride and joy. His Flember Day Special.

  The villagers chattered excitedly.

  ‘Oh don’t encourage him,’ Nomilie, Arnold’s wife, grumbled. ‘He’s been obsessed with that awful waffle. OBSESSED! We’ve barely seen him for weeks!’

  The two children who had been clinging to her dress suddenly broke free, running over to their father. Arnold tutted and fussed, trying to keep their stumpy little fingers from dipping in the cream. Santoro stepped forwards to help, and Dev took the opportunity to slowly, slyly back away into the hustle and bustle of the crowd.

  ‘Are you in disguise?’ Commander Sam of Space Fleet bumped alongside him. His helmet was now painted with mud, decorated with little blue lights, and he wore what looked like an entire hedge as a costume. Beside him stood Reginald who, for reasons best known to himself, was dressed like a pig.

  ‘You recognised me!’ Dev grinned. ‘I should have known you would. Well, yes, actually I am in disguise. I’m … I’m on a secret mission!’

  ‘Ooh! Ooh! What’s the mission?’ Sam giggled.

  Re
ginald oinked.

  ‘Well … I left something behind … in Percy’s Scrapyard,’ Dev whispered. ‘So I need to sneak back there without anyone seeing me!’

  He shrank down inside his cloak, staring out at the crowd. ‘I need a distraction!’

  Sam thought for a moment, then pushed Reginald onto the ground. ‘REGINALD’S FARTING!’ he shrieked as Reginald rolled around, crumpling up his pig outfit, making loud oinky farting noises with his mouth.

  ‘I – FRRP! – drank some hibbicus beer! Oink!’ he moaned. ‘MY TUMMY – FRRPPP! OINK! – IT’S GOING TO EXPLODE!’

  The crowd gasped, some laughed, the sensible ones backed away. Sam winked at Dev. The mission was a go.

  The mission was not a go.

  Amy gripped Dev’s wrist just as he was about to move. ‘Don’t you dare,’ she hissed.

  ‘Amy!’ Bastor stepped out in front of them both, his weathered cheeks blushing a delicate blossom pink.

  Dev caught his eye for just a second before nestling deeper down inside his coat and shuffling behind his mother. Her hand slipped from his. The farting pig hadn’t worked as a distraction, but a flustered Bastor had.

  ‘D-did you hear the thunder this morning?’ Bastor continued. ‘Huge crack of noise it was. Rumbled right through the village.’

  ‘Oh really?’ She nervously smiled in reply. ‘I must have slept right through it.’

  Bastor chuckled uncomfortably, grinning inanely at her.

  ‘Well, it’s been nice to see you, Bastor.’

  ‘Oh!’ Bastor reached into his tunic, pulling out the silver heart. ‘I meant to show you, back in the forge. I made this. For you.’

  As Bastor stuttered and giggled, Dev was busy hiding himself behind the Flember Day Special. From here he could plan out the clearest path home.

  Fervus the goat, however, had other ideas.

  ‘Fervus!’ Dev hissed, nudging the goat away with his foot. ‘Stop chewing my cloak!’

  ‘Fervus?’ Bastor leant around the giant waffle. ‘And … DEV? You’re not allowed anywhere near Flember Day, Dev. You know that. By order of the Mayor.’

  Dev’s mouth opened and closed, until finally some words fell out.

  ‘Where’s Mum?’

  ‘Looking for you, I suspect,’ Bastor snorted.

  ‘Did she like the heart?’

  Bastor’s shoulders slumped. ‘She said it was nice,’ he sighed. ‘Just … nice. Walked off before I could give it to her.’

  ‘I mean, it is nice.’ Dev reached up and pulled one of the thinner vines from his cloak, biting it down to a more manageable length. He took the silver heart from between Bastor’s fingers, wrapped the vine three times around it and held it up as a necklace.

  ‘But now it’s useful.’

  Bastor was silent for a few moments, before tucking the necklace back inside his tunic. The smallest of smiles crept up beneath his beard. ‘If you must be here, just keep out of sight, OK?’ He scooped Fervus up and tucked him under his arm, walking away with a surprisingly light spring in his step.

  Dev thumbed a splodge of cream from the Flember Day Special into his mouth. ‘Feels good to help.’ He smiled, a moment of cheer that lasted approximately three seconds.

  ‘My ’EART!’ Zerigauld clung to his shop doorway.

  ‘Someone’s stolen me gold ’EART!’

  19

  The Parade

  The Guild huddled around Zerigauld, but they couldn’t keep him quiet, couldn’t stop him screaming about the theft of his golden heart.

  ‘I was only closed for one day! They must ’ave known! Must ’ave snuck in while I was at me sister’s! Don’t tell me to keep quiet! I’ve been thieverised! Someone ’ere thieverised me right up!’

  Dev watched, his mouth agape, his thoughts only broken when Santoro’s hand slapped down upon his shoulder.

  ‘So, what did you do with it?’ Santoro smirked.

  Dev could only squeak.

  ‘Oh come on. Zerigauld’s heart.’ Santoro nudged him in the ribs. ‘I saw you had your eye on it.’

  ‘I … I didn’t …’ Dev went a deathly pale, as if all of his blood was draining from his body. ‘Zerigauld left it for me on my balcony. To say thank you for all the cleaning I did.’

  Santoro tried to stifle a laugh until it was too much to hold in. ‘You … you thought it was from him? Zerigauld? That wrinkly old bag of bones? Dev, he hates you! He hates everyone! Why on earth would he ever give you his prized gold heart?’

  Dev mouthed a response, but even he didn’t know what he was trying to say.

  ‘I took the heart, Dev. And I left it on your balcony,’ Santoro hissed into his ear. ‘I thought that supposedly brilliant brain of yours would realise it was a joke. A set-up. Then you’d panic, and try to sneak the heart back into his shop. Probably get caught doing it.’ Santoro leant in close and winked. ‘Probably get caught by me.’

  The words didn’t quite fit together in Dev’s brain. ‘You … you stole the heart?’

  ‘Yes. I. Stole. It.’ Santoro playfully snapped a twig from Dev’s helmet with each word.

  ‘Then you planted it … on me?’ Dev growled.

  ‘Give it back to Zerigauld, if you don’t want it.’ Santoro grinned.

  Even though his brother stood a few inches taller, and was armed with a rather large sword, Dev felt a rising urge to lunge at him. To topple him down onto the ground, knocking that huge, smug smile from his face. Demanding to know why – why his own brother was always so mean to him, why he’d go this far to make Dev look bad.

  ‘Whatever you two are arguing about,’ their mother slid between them, ‘do NOT do it here. And NOT today.’

  Dev unclenched a fist he hadn’t realised he was making.

  ‘Are we here? ARE WE ALL HERE?’ The Mayor’s ridiculous, oversized helmet bobbed through the crowds. Guild members marched alongside, each holding tall flagpoles, their blue flags fluttering in the breeze.

  ‘Fifty-two minutes.’ The Mayor stared at his clock. ‘Fifty-two minutes exactly. Oh! Fifty-one! Ladies and gentlemen of Eden, I’ll make this swift, we’re already one minute behind. It looks like a beautiful morning is set to dawn, etcetera, etcetera, and so on, and so on. IN CONCLUSION, if you would all care to follow me, we will make our way up to the Eden Tree for today’s thanksgivings.’ The Mayor lolloped forwards, a procession of bizarrely dressed villagers shuffling along behind him.

  ‘SWIFTLY,’ he shouted, and they quickened their step.

  Before Dev could say another word to Santoro, he felt a push from his mother and then he too was part of the crowd, jostled and swept along like a ship on the waves. They marched from the marketplace into the hills, swapping the stone buildings of Middle Eden for the towering trees of the Old Woods. Everything had been carefully prepared to look as pleasing as possible to the Mayor’s eye. The path was swept clear of twigs, some of the shrubs manicured into a variety of animals, and the most symmetrical moss-covered rocks and boulders were rolled out to line the route.

  ‘What a beautiful village we are blessed with,’ the Mayor sighed, as a confused din of bugles and trumpets sounded from within the parade. ‘What riches nature gives us.’

  The climb steepened as they headed towards the rice fields. The path became muddier and more slippery. Mayor Bumblebuss clambered onto Bastor’s back to keep his feet dry. The rest of the Guild fell back to help lift Arnold’s waffle cart, sinking into the ground as they did. Arnold shouted and panicked and rushed around, trying to catch any stray splodges of cream.

  A small group of farmers, standing knee-deep in the perfectly still paddies of water, looked on in amusement.

  ‘We can’t carpet this bit?’ The Mayor snorted, kicking his heels into Bastor’s ribs. ‘My mayoral robes are getting filthy.’

  Dev stopped to catch his breath. He looked back over the long line of people behind them, trailing back through the Old Woods, back, even, into the marketplace. He looked towards the scrapyard, to where his great big robot bear
was lying. Or at least, he hoped it still was. Perhaps it had woken up again and wandered off. Or someone had found it. Perhaps Percy had found it. Perhaps Percy was tearing it apart for scrap right now.

  Sweat began to prickle up beneath the many layers of Dev’s cloak. To his relief, he spotted Percy in the procession, some way behind. His face scrunched up like an old lady’s elbow. His mouth puckering like a cat’s bum. Beside him walked Mina, her helmet consumed by a giant mushroom cap, her blue bunches bobbing along beneath it, a huge grin across her face as she waggled a flag in her bandaged hand.

  Dev raised his arm to wave, but his mother lowered it back down.

  ‘You’re not supposed to be here, remember?’

  They continued along the muddy path, through paddocks and cornfields, up between rocky crevices, until finally, finally, Dev stepped through the first bending willows of Shady Acres. Up here it felt like a different world. The grass was thicker, the trees taller. The air fresher. Up here grew things not seen anywhere else on the mountain, such as the dew-covered bilderdrops, lumpy, green pojoboplants and giant orange jimona flowers. Dev marvelled at the glowing algae across the ponds, at the blue and green glow-worms nesting in the tree hollows. At the hum and the warmth and the abundance of it all.

  ‘Ahh, we’re here.’ Ventillo shuffled along beside Dev, plomping herself down on the grass and blinking up into the sky. ‘Now everyone be quiet, if you don’t mind.’

  A droning noise sounded in the distance. It came from way, way down the mountain, beyond The Wall, out from the darkness of the surrounding island. A drone that grew louder, and louder. And louder. Something CLIK-CLIK-CLIKKED past Dev’s ear. Then something else. Then the drone was above them, as loud as their ears could bear. Dev looked up to see a swarm – no, a tidal wave – of insects filling the sky.