by Alan Skinner
Crimson gave Beatrice a small smile. ‘I’m glad you weren’t the one who was –’ she began, but Beatrice finished the sentence.
‘Helping them?’ She looked at Achillia. ‘We’ll sort that out afterwards.’
Leonardo hung his head and tried to sneak away, but Achillia grabbed his arm and pulled him back. The old engineer looked at them in shame.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean any harm. When they came to me, I believed that they really did want to make up for what Amelia had done. And they convinced me that the blue fire really could help us and that it was perfectly safe. I brought them supplies and let them know what was going on. It was me who told them who the ones were who had gone to the High Mountains. But they made me promise not to tell anyone about them. They said they were afraid that no one would believe that they just wanted to help. So I persuaded Achillia that we should get the fire stone. When those two young apprentices came up with their idea, it seemed like the perfect solution.’
Tears began to run down his cheeks. ‘I didn’t know they wanted to hurt you, Crimson. They kept asking about you. Amelia had written to them about you, told them that you were somehow special. She knew of you even before she started lighting the fires. And then when I heard Beatrice say that she could sense something, too, I told them about Beatrice. I’m sorry. I guess I’m just an old fool.’
His head bowed and his shoulders drooping, Leonardo shuffled away.
They watched him disappear among the throng of Myrmidots, then Beatrice turned to the others. ‘Achillia and I have suspected Leonardo for some time. He had begun to behave oddly. But we had no idea what was going on. He was always talking about the blue fire. It was he who first suggested we bring it to Forge, though I doubt it was his idea. And he was very convincing, and we were arrogant. We thought we were clever enough to deal with whatever would happen. I knew the people from The Place were back. I could feel them. We thought it must be connected to them but we had no idea how.’
‘Beatrice isn’t being quite truthful,’ Achillia added. ‘She was always against bringing back the blue fire, but I insisted. I was wrong. I am the one who should be blamed.’
‘It’s how you handle your mistake that will matter, Achillia,’ said Beatrice.
‘Beatrice is right,’ Crimson said. ‘You will restore Forge.’ She turned to Copper. ‘The blue fire will go out,’ she said to the engineer. ‘Touch and Cres are waiting. They know what to do when it does. But the stone will still have much of its power. It must go back to the High Mountains as soon as possible. Touch and Cres have worked out a way to contain the stone until you can return it to the cave. It won’t work for long. Will you and Dot help them return it to where it belongs?’
‘Yes, yes, of course,’ said Copper. ‘But how will you stop the fire?’
‘There’s no time to explain,’ she replied. ‘Thank you, Copper.’ Crimson hugged the small engineer. She turned to Dot and wrapped her in her arms. ‘Thank you, Dot,’ she whispered.
‘Crimson!’ Grunge’s voice held a note of panic. ‘What’s going on? What are you going to do?’
‘My job, Grunge,’ said Crimson. She buttoned her coat and checked to make sure her large red fire hat was firmly on her head.
‘Your job?’ said Grunge. ‘Crimson, that’s crazy. You can’t put out that fire. You don’t even have your fire cart.’
Crimson took his hand and held it. ‘Grunge, did you ever wonder why Muddlemarsh has a fire officer when there’s never been a fire in Muddlemarsh? And why the fire officer is the only Muddle who isn’t really good at anything else? There’s a reason, Grunge, and I didn’t see it until last night. There’ll always be a fire officer in Muddlemarsh.’ She pointed to the fire. ‘In case this happens.’
Crimson squeezed Grunge’s hand and let it go. ‘Now, I have to go to work.’
She turned to go but was pulled back by a sharp tug. She looked back and saw Miniver with the bottom of her jacket in her teeth. Crimson gently pulled it away from the bear’s jaws.
‘I don’t like this,’ Miniver growled. ‘I won’t let you. Not you, Crimson.’
Crimson kissed the tip of her nose. ‘I am the Meddle, Miniver,’ she said softly and she turned and walked away, Miniver’s deep, dark eyes following her.
‘What’s going on?’ yelped Calamity. ‘If she’s going to put out the fire, I have to go with her. She’s the fire officer. I’m the fire pup. It’s my job, too.’
She started after Crimson but Flyte stepped in front of her.
‘No, Calamity,’ growled the wolf. ‘Crimson said she knows what she’s doing. How many times have you heard a Muddle say that? She’s right. This is her job. You’re the station pup. You’ll be needed again.’
‘Grunge, have yer got somethin’ to play-like?’ asked Patch quietly, watching Crimson walk towards the blue fire.
For a moment Grunge didn’t answer. He stared after his friend. Then he nodded and pulled a battered tin whistle from his pocket.
Crimson unlocked the door in her head. Freed, the voice of the fire filled her head. Her own name echoed inside her, then faded to a whisper. The sound of a tin whistle came from behind her and for a second she was puzzled, then she smiled. It was a real tune, a gentle tune, solemn but not mournful. It was rich and melodious and, best of all, she knew it would never be played again. It came from a place inside Grunge that he would never revisit.
Over the tune she heard the names of her friends roll through her head: Grunge and Calamity; Miniver and Reach; Patch, Sparkle, Leaf, Bright, Sky, Flyte, Wave and Slight. The name of every Muddle tumbled through her head, as if the Land was reminding her. She knew that they defined her as much as what she did now.
She could feel the immense power of the beacon of blue flames. It rose higher and higher, until sky and fire were one. The power drew her to the flames. They raged and danced, beckoning her to join them. As she approached, she realised that the closer she came to them, the less she felt their heat.
Crimson reached the edge of the charred and crumbling hole. She looked down, and far below she could see the stone glowing. The heart of the stone was a gleaming midnight blue and the flames that burst from it were of every shade of blue she could have imagined. She watched the stone drink the water that washed over it and each drop of water became another shooting flame.
Left unchecked, there would be no end to the fire; the power of the stone, which served the Land in the High Mountains, would destroy the Land here. But Crimson knew that the Land had provided the balance to the stone.
Her eyes fixed on the stone’s heart, Crimson stepped from the edge of the crater into the fire.
There was no sense of falling. The fire held Crimson and she floated slowly into the flames. They had no heat, only anger and violence. She felt them struggle against her; she felt the panic and desperation in the blue fire as she went deeper and deeper into its heart. Far above her, she could seee the sky through the black hole in the roof.
Slowly but surely, the flames diminished. The pillar of fire became a ribbon, and the ribbon became a plume, and the plume became a wisp. And then she felt the stone itself beneath her and the wisp of fire quivered, and was gone.
She knew it wasn’t dead. She could feel the heart of it, still warm. But it had given up its struggle.
She lay on the stone, staring up at clouds drifting across the face of the hole. She heard the door of the furnace room scrape as it was pushed open and she heard Touch and Cres enter. Crimson rolled off the stone. She was tired, so deeply tired. She dragged herself to the wall, and sat with her back against the warm concrete.
Chapter 16
Roasting Day
Twelve metres and seventy-three cen-tee-metres! Weese has a new record!’
Patch held up the coffee bean for all to see and everyone cheered. Wave held up the small tube he had used to blow the bean, and everyone cheered again.
‘So who has record?’ asked Brian. ‘Wave, Cape or Reach?’
Patch removed his jaunty pirate hat and scratched his head. Brian wondered if the pirate head being scratched and the astronaut’s hand doing the scratching felt exactly the same thing. Then he decided that that was far too difficult a question to ask oneself, especially at a celebration.
‘All three, I reckons,’ decided Patch.
‘Right,’ said Kevin. ‘So we’ll put all three names in the record book.’
‘What record book would that be, then?’ Patch asked.
‘If you don’t have a record book, how do you remember who has the record and what it is?’ said Brian.
‘Ain’t hard,’ the pirate declared. ‘Weese has a new record every year.’
The Land had smiled on Muddlemarsh. It was late autumn but summer had returned for an encore and the day was warm and sunny. The Muddles couldn’t have asked for better weather for the best day of the year, Roasting Day.
On Roasting Day the Muddles celebrate the end of the coffee harvest. The festivities begin early, when everyone gathers to fire up the oldest kiln in Home. The kiln is far older than any Muddle, but they swear it is the best roasting kiln in Muddlemarsh. It is only used on Roasting Day, when the finest beans of the year’s harvest are roasted to perfection. The rich smell of roasting coffee is at the very heart of Roasting Day.
After a breakfast of coffee and muffins there is music and dancing and games. The entertainment lasts far into the night, when story-telling takes place. Not even the youngest Muddle has ever fallen asleep before the last ‘The End’ has been said and the last camp fire has gone out.
On this particular Roasting Day, the Muddles had taken special pains to invite some of their neighbours. For on this Roasting Day, the Muddles had decided they had something else beside the harvest to celebrate.
When dawn came that morning, the Muddles had greeted the Beadles’ red bus. Bligh, Brian, Megan, Kevin and Aunt Mag had been met with cheerful hellos and heartfelt hugs. A few minutes later, Shift had arrived with the guests from Forge: Achillia, Beatrice, Copper, Dot, Touch and Cres. There had been more hellos and many, many more hugs.
With breakfast over, the games had begun. Wave had just put his shooter to his mouth when a small bird-shaped cloud had drifted across the sky. The air had been filled with a hazy shimmer as the Mix came over the Muddles.
So Wave had won the Bean Shoot, though Copper did point out that Cape competed twice, or at least, one-and-a-third times.
The Bean Run was next and a horde of Muddle children persuaded Achillia to compete. Contestants had to run from the kiln to the coffee plantation and back again with a coffee bean balanced on their nose. Young Kite was expert at the Bean Run and was favourite to win. And win he did, though he was hard-pressed to hold off a determined challenge from Forge’s Lord Mayor, who discovered that a slight bend in her nose was the perfect size for a coffee bean.
After the race, Achillia found a place under a tree, where she sat to catch her breath and watch. Nearby, she saw Dot with Leaf, Reach and Miniver, receiving her first make-over. She smiled to see Beatrice sitting in the middle of a circle of Muddles, playing Grunge’s clarinet while the Muddles sang. She watched Patch throwing a ball for Clash and Strike to chase. They had taken a liking to Muddlemarsh’s pirate and now everywhere Patch went, the spoorhounds trotted beside him.
In a clearing at the end of the plantation, she saw Touch and Cres surrounded by a group of young Muddles. The Muddles were urging the apprentices to tell them how they had made a prison to hold the stone of blue fire.
‘It was nothing,’ said Touch. ‘Really, we didn’t do much.’
‘Please,’ urged the young Muddles, who thought Touch and Cres were pretty cool. ‘Tell us how you helped captured the blue fire.’
‘OK,’ said Touch, ‘but first, I have to tell you that it was Cres’s idea.’
‘Ooooh,’ said one of the Muddles, who seemed to be a very small blacksmith. ‘I wonder where I can find an idea just for me?’
‘Well,’ said Touch, ‘everyone knows that the blue fire burns most when it has air. And when it has water and air, it burns so that there’s no stopping it. So Cres said we should make sure it can’t get any air.’
‘But there’s air everywhere,’ said a Muddle. ‘Everywhere.’
Touch winked at him. ‘That’s perfectly correct. That’s why Cres said we should make a place where there isn’t any air. So, we took a metal box –’
‘Metal’s the only thing that takes ages for the blue fire to burn,’ explained the little blacksmith, in case any of his friends didn’t know that already.
‘. . . and we made sure that no air could get in.’
‘But it already had air in it,’ said one of the youngsters.
‘That’s right, and that’s where Cres’s brilliant idea came in. She worked out how to get the air out of the box.’ Touch leaned into the circle of Muddles. ‘She took a pair of bellows and fixed them so that instead of blowing air when you squeezed the handles, they sucked air. And we put a small hole in the metal box, just big enough for the tip of the bellows, and when the blue stone was in the box, we squeezed the handles and sucked all the air out of the box. And the stone couldn’t breathe.’
‘Did it die?’ asked one of the Muddles, sounding a bit sad.
‘No, it didn’t die. It just went to sleep so we could take it back where it belonged,’ said Touch.
‘But how did you get it into the box?’
Touch leaned back. ‘I’ll let Cres tell you that part,’ he said.
‘When the great tower of blue fire disappeared, we pulled the wagon carrying the box into the furnace,’ Cres began. ‘It was terrible down there. The room was sooo hot, and the walls and floor were charred and cracked from the heat of the fire. But there, in the middle of the room, was the fire stone.
‘It had been in a thick metal furnace, thicker than any metal ever made, but had burned right through the bottom and was burrowing into the Land itself. But that didn’t stop Touch. He grabbed a long metal bar and pushed it under the stone. And he rested the bar on a broken piece of the furnace and pushed down with all his might. But the stone wouldn’t budge.
‘We were frightened because we knew that at any moment the stone could come to life again. We both pushed on the bar, as hard as we could. Then the stone began to glow very, very faintly and we knew we didn’t have much time. But we also knew we would never get it into the box.’
All the Muddle youngsters sat silent and wide-eyed as Cres went on with her story.
‘We were just about to give up, when a huge paw pushed us gently out of the way, and there was Miniver. She leaned on the bar with all her strength, and suddenly, the stone popped out of its hole. It soared through the air and landed right in the middle of the box.’
‘Like a tiddly-wink!’ cried one of the Muddles.
‘Like a tiddly-wink,’ Cres agreed. ‘After that, it was easy. We closed the box and sealed it; then we squeezed the handles of the bellows until all the air was sucked out. And the blue fire stone was our prisoner.’
The young Muddles cheered and yelled. They cheered Touch and they cheered Cres and they cheered Miniver.
But there was one thing that Cres hadn’t told them, because she and Touch weren’t really sure it had happened. When Miniver had first moved Touch and Cres aside, she had looked at them and growled.
‘Is she here?’ the bear had asked. Touch and Cres pointed to Crimson asleep against the wall.
‘Thank you,’ Miniver had said to them.
Touch and Cres had understood each word Miniver had
growled . . .
From her spot under the tree, Achillia listened to the cheers. She leaned against the trunk, feeling happy for the first time in weeks. She smiled and closed her eyes.
‘Getting refreshed for the next event?’
She opened her eyes. Grunge and Copper grinned at her and sat down.
‘I think I shall retire from sports as undefeated runner-up,’ said Achillia. ‘Thank you for in
viting us Grunge.’
The musician smiled. ‘Copper just told me the news of his election,’ he said. ‘Chief Engineer.’
‘He was the right choice after Leonardo had the good sense to resign,’ Achillia replied.
‘He meant well,’ said Copper. ‘He thought Hazlitt and Edith wanted to make up for what Amelia had done.’
‘Do you think Hazlitt has gone back to The Place?’ asked Grunge.
Copper nodded. ‘There’s no sign of him anywhere. When we took the stone back, we looked, but I’m sure he’s gone.’
A group of Muddles called to them to come and join their game of crickle. They looked over. Young Kite chased the crickle ball. He scooped it into his hand, then turned and threw it back to the batter.
Crimson watched the ball coming to her. She swung the bat and watched the ball sail straight past her into the hoop behind her.
‘Another point for me!’ yelled Kite.
Crimson laughed. ‘I think I throw better than I bat!’ she said.
And so the afternoon was spent playing games, eating, drinking bubble water and talking to friends.
When night came and the lanterns shed a golden glow and the light of the campfires danced on their faces, the Muddles gathered to tell their stories.
‘Who will tell the first tale?’ asked Grunge.
At once all the Muddles called out, ‘Patch! Patch can tell the first tale!’
As he did every year, Patch settled himself on a big log in front of the biggest campfire and cleared his throat.
‘OK, me shipmates. What story shall I tells yer?’ he asked.
But Patch knew there was only one tale they wanted that night. And under the pale, grey moon, Patch told the story of how a Muddle called Crimson brought the Meddle River to Forge.
Table of Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Imprint
