by Nina Milton
I chose a sixty-minute recording of double drumming. I let it start before I settled myself on the lounger and pulled a scarf over my face. The Slamblaster lay on my solar plexus, triple-wrapped in its forensic packaging.
It was nighttime at my spirit portal, which didn’t surprise me. I stood quietly, gripping Josh’s toy in my hand. A smell of riverweed was in the air, and I heard a slurping splash from the stream. Trendle scrambled onto the bank. His sleek body shone in the light of a waning moon; water droplets sparkled as he shook his coat dry.
“Good evening, Sabbie.”
I thought he sounded a little formal, as if there was something wrong—some way I’d offended him that I’d forgotten but he had not. “I need to find the place that Aidan is hidden. Can you help me, Trendle?”
“This is always my one endeavour, to help you.”
“I think Josh was there before him, that’s why I’ve brought his toy.” I held up the Slamblaster and gawped at it. It was now the length of my arm. I dropped it in horror.
“Sabbie.” Trendle’s voice was urgent. “I am here to counsel you.”
“I need counselling,” I agreed.
“This thing you have brought is not a spirit. It’s only a memory of a boy’s love for his toy.”
I began to understand what was wrong. Trendle did not agree with my reasons for the journey. He considered this his first job—a sort of triage service, where he sniffs out bogus motives and methods.
“Untrustworthy,” he said, his voice low, as if he didn’t want to be overheard.
I gathered my arguments, keen to persuade him, but something rammed against my left shoulder before I could speak. I sprawled down, my face hitting a stone that jutted from the grass. I stared at it in horror. Things often appear suddenly in my portal, but not things of danger. I got to my knees and saw blood dripping onto the stones. I’d bashed my nose. That shouldn’t happen. I looked up.
The Slamblaster was now as tall as a young boy—as tall as his owner might have been. He stared at me with glowing red pupils. His mouth struggled to speak, but the plastic lips were permanently sealed and no sound came from him. Of course. The toy saw me as a threat—after Josh’s experiences, he must consider every new adult a threat.
“Please! I mean Josh’s spirit no harm.” I scrabbled to my feet. “I must visit the place where Josh was kept, so that we can find the poor child who is held there now. Is this possible?” I didn’t think I needed to add that it was important.
The Slamblaster nodded creakily, as if nodding was as alien to his muscles as pushups would have been to mine. He was growing all the time; now he was as tall as me. His purple-gloved hand closed over my arm. His grip was tight enough to make my fingers tingle. He turned on his jointed body and crashed through the trees that lined the brook, pulling me with him. We were in a dense forest of oak and beech. There was very little light and the ground was deep in bracken, but the Slamblaster was so tall now that my feet didn’t reach the ground as he yanked me along.
Trendle leaped onto my shoulder. “Tell that thing to let you go.”
I shook my head, impatient at his reproach. “This might actually give us some answers for once.”
“Get out of its grip and let me deal with it.”
But I didn’t want that. Rey had asked me to do this, and I was determined to provide him with a result.
I felt a great tug on my arm as my dress caught in the tree roots that twined over the forest floor. I fell onto my stomach, squashing Trendle’s long, soft body beneath me. He gave a squeal of pain. The gigantic toy dragged me up, and Trendle turned tail and fled through the trees. That brought me to my senses.
“Stop!” I yelled. “Stop, stop! Let go my arm!” Finally, the Slamblaster seemed to register my distress. He turned to me. His red eyes were as large as spotlights. He grasped my thigh and arm and slung me over his shoulder. A long trail of a scream came from me like vapour from an exhaust as I sailed into the air and landed, breathless, on the toy’s plastic jacket. I dug my knees and fists into it, but the Slamblaster didn’t even react. He just stomped through the forest, each stride taking us ten or more metres, as he continued to swell and grow—soon he was so tall that I had to cover my head with my hands to stop the topmost branches of the trees whipping against me as we stormed on.
Suddenly the Slamblaster came to a juddering halt. His hold on me faltered, and I yelled in terror as I felt myself slip. I gripped at the plastic bolts sticking out from his ludicrous helmet. We were no longer in the forest of trees. We were on the edge of a ravine that seemed to slope down and down into a chasm.
I had to take charge of my journey. I let myself float from the creature’s shoulder. My feet landed just as the Slamblaster began to storm down the ravine. I tried to follow as best I could under my own steam. The floor was littered with small rocks and larger boulders, but the massive figure had no trouble with them. He powered stones out of his way with a kick from his boot and lifted larger rocks in both his purple-gloved hands, sending them crashing down the path ahead. I slipped and slid behind him.
The bottom of the gorge was filled with potholes and pitfalls, its air thick with sun-baked dust. Not a bush or tree afforded shade or the promise of fruit. There was nothing but the road ahead, bordered on both sides by a gorge so steep and so high that the sky above was no more than a channel of unnatural blue. It was hard to look up, anyway, for the sun bore down on us with blinding intensity. I could feel it burn the back of my neck. My armpits prickled with heat, but I didn’t dare take off my black dress in this fierce sun. Every muscle in my body ached—the back of my calves especially. Tiny round balls of gravel cut into my bare soles.
“Trendle,” I gasped. “Don’t desert me.” I was truly sorry that I hadn’t taken his advice. That was what my spirit guide was for, after all—to guide me safely through otherworlds.
Suddenly my otter was back, trotting beside me. We picked our way forward through the stones. I was trying not to twist an ankle or take the skin off one, but Trendle’s legs were so short that his stomach was scraped over the rocky ground. I couldn’t bear to think of his paws all ripped and bleeding as my own feet were. I picked him up and cradled him.
“I lost my senses. I didn’t start this journey for the right reasons. I was puffed up with the idea Rey Buckley had asked for my help.”
Trendle looked up from his position along my arm. His eyes were black and molten and full of love.
“We could float like hovercrafts,” I said to him.
“That would be cheating,” said Trendle.
Trendle was right. A little five-year-old boy walked a far more difficult path than this. If we didn’t experience this journey in its full intensity, we would never be able to face Josh’s spirit.
I understood well enough where we were headed. This was Josh’s last road—the path to his death.
“You are a most honourable otter,” I whispered.
Trendle put out his tongue and licked the back of my hand, where I’d scratched it climbing in the window to Brokeltuft.
When the sun dipped behind the rock, I knew something new would happen. The Slamblaster had reached the end of the gorge, which was blocked by its own high sides. A tiny sliver of light filtered through a narrow crack. The Slamblaster was far too big to squeeze through it. He beat his plastic fists on the rock and his sealed mouth writhed with frustration. We had to be very close, now, to Josh’s spirit.
Without a backwards glance at my robotic companion, Trendle pushed through the slender breach. I followed, crawling on all fours.
We found ourselves in a busy street. Traffic roared past me, hooting as I almost fell into the road. The rocks melted away, and behind me was a house, a stone-built structure three stories high. It looked strangely familiar, but I couldn’t think why. My eye was drawn to the dormer window at the top. Was this where Josh had spent the last days of hi
s life? My stomach clamped as I looked up. I was not sure I wanted to meet Josh Sutton or hear his story.
A gate was set into the wrought-iron railings around the house. I clicked it open, and it dissolved in my hand, leaving me clutching air. The scene was becoming distorted, as if someone was bending a photograph and snipping at it with scissors. The roof was chopped smaller and smaller until I could no longer see the attic window. I kept my eyes focused on the front door, wide and glossy with bottle-green paint with its number placed centrally just above my eye level—73—in polished brass ironware.
I took a fast step forward. Snip by snip, the house was shrinking. Its roof, its garden, its windows were all disappearing until all I could only see the front door. A feeling of dread overwhelmed me.
“A door,” I said to Trendle. “Is this the symbol I’m to bring back? I brought a door back for Cliff, and that was the start of everything.”
I ran the length of the path and lifted my finger to press the bell. The door faded before my eyes, the last of the photograph snipped away.
As if the entire journey with the Slamblaster had been some sort of dream, I was back with Trendle at the brook. He slid into the water and floated on his back. Unlike me, he no longer seemed disconcerted by the terrible journey we’d taken. I thought about apologising, but it didn’t feel it was the right thing to do.
“Why do things always end up with doors?” I asked, but I saw the answer myself. “Because they are portals.”
A change in the sound of the drumming came clearly into my ears, calling me back. An hour had passed since I lay down on the lounger in my therapy room. My body had been there all the time. My nose wasn’t broken, my feet were not bleeding, and my black dress wasn’t coated with dust. But my heart thundered along, singing in my ears like the beat of the drum. I pulled off my scarf and stopped the CD, then reached for paper to record my journey.
“That’s all I saw. I didn’t get the name of the street. I could try again, but I’d like to give it twenty-four hours before I do. Can I keep the Slamblaster that long?”
“Sorry.”
Rey leaned forward and put the package in his document bag. Barely half an hour had gone by since I’d pulled the scarf from my eyes, but here he was, sitting on the wicker chair in my therapy room. He’d achieved a personality remake since the morning. I no longer recognised him as the bloke I’d shared eggs and hugs with. I managed a wonky smile, trying to even up the feelings that were swilling around the room. At that moment he had all the command and conviction, and I had all the insecurity and trepidation.
As I’d described my journey to him, his eyes had developed this gauzy film. I realized that he didn’t want to hear about a giant Slamblaster. I pushed a notebook into his chest. “See for yourself.”
A full-half minute passed before he opened the notebook and read my account. “Feels like your imagination to me,” he said, without looking up.
I didn’t respond directly. “It was a hard journey. Protracted … exhausting. But I didn’t get any feelings of dreadful pain.” I glanced up, sensing the heat of tears in the corners of my eyes. “I’m glad to say.”
“I’d told you how the child died.” The words felt dragged out of him. “You already knew it was painless.”
“Rey, I’m simply relating what took place—”
“Look at the house you’ve described … well-kept, attic window, posh suburb. Don’t you realize what this is?”
I went to stand next to him, pretending I needed to read. But standing close to a seething Rey didn’t have quite the affect I’d anticipated. My heart was thumping blood around my body, turning my skin a tender pink. I noticed something as I read my words. “I’ve left out the number I saw on the door.” I reached across to take the notebook and correct the omission.
With a swift movement, Rey’s hand flicked out like the tongue of a reptile, pinning my wrist. The book slid from his knees onto the floor. Sometimes lovers cannot wait another instant to caress each other, but this was no lover’s touch. It felt about as tender as steel, although he wasn’t hurting me.
“Seventy-three,” he said.
Thoughts spun through my head. They’d made an arrest at number seventy-three. Aidan Rodderick was safe. Cliff was free. “You’ve found the house. You’ve found him!”
“No, Sabbie. This house isn’t where Aidan is, if he’s anywhere at all.”
I realized I was leaning backward, pulling away from the grip around my wrist, breathing fast through my mouth, in and out. I straightened my back and snatched my arm away, circling it with my other hand, as if nursing it back to health. “Stop playing games with me, Rey.”
“I have a feeling that the team would say you were playing games with me. If they had any idea you were doing this, which they don’t, thank God.”
Finally my confusion found form in anger. I scooped the book up from the floor and threw it at him. It hit his chest like a kite. He caught it and smoothed out the pages.
“You’re perfectly right, Sabbie. This is number seventy-three, Edward Villas, Clifton, Bristol. You might’ve seen it on the telly dozens of times. In fact, I’m sure you did see it. You remember now, don’t you?” He appraised my open mouth, his own gaze impassive. “This is where Josh Sutton lived with his family before he was snatched and put to death. They stood TV reporters outside it, they had cameras waiting for the family to emerge.” His mouth screwed in distaste. “Vultures.”
My legs buckled. I sank down onto the edge of the sun lounger. I knew he was right—it was all too easy for a journey to get confused with what is already in the deeper recesses of the memory. But it was pointless trying to defend myself. I had failed Rey … I had failed Aidan.
Rey stood as I faltered and sagged. “I didn’t hold out much hope, Sabbie. In fact, I’m pleased with this result. It’s proved conclusively that the things you get from this … spirit place … are not consistent. Or reliable.”
I looked up at the hard line of his jaw and the glitter of his eyes. “I’ve only tried to be of help.”
“I’m going to ask you politely. Keep out of my investigation. Allow the professionals do their job. We’re about to have a major breakthrough and I can almost promise you that it won’t be long before we find Aidan.”
I could feel my pupils expand with shock. “Breakthrough?” I echoed.
“Houghton has agreed to be interviewed by a psychological profiler. A few nights in the remand wing has helped him see sense. I’m confident he’ll give us all he knows.” The line of his mouth lifted into a smile of triumph. “He’s about to confess to murder.”
TWENTY
The soft chink of Christmas sleigh bells drew closer. It was Caroline Houghton’s tea trolley. I was back in the dustless gleam of her lounge. Across from me, taking up quite a slice of sofa, was a lady in her late fifties, a dumpy woman in a tartan kilt—a garment that did nothing at all for her figure—teamed with a twinset in a sort of apricot colour. The chink of china stopped as the door swung open and Caroline drove her contraption into the room.
“I hope you two have been getting acquainted,” she said.
The tartan lady nodded both chins vigorously. “Oh, we have. It’s been so interesting. I’ve never met a shaman before.”
Last night, after Rey had left, taking the triple-coated Slamblaster with him, I felt about as worthless as the garden spade I’d had to chuck out after it lost its handle. A spade with no handle … a shaman who didn’t listen to her animal guide. Throw them both in the bin, I’d whined.
It was lucky I had an evening free of clients, because all I had wanted to do was curl up on the sofa and eat chocolate. But first I had rung Caroline—I’d needed to give her a selected version of my visit to the prison, and I felt sure that her matter-of-fact tones would calm me down and focus my attention. She’d certainly sounded more upbeat than I did, remembering that her son had been loc
ked up for a week. Over the phone, she had told me that a member of the family liaison team had arrived in time to forewarn her about the news of the Wetland Murderers’ bodies before she was confronted by it on the telly. I hoped that it was Rey who’d set up the visit. I hoped that because I really needed corroboration, right then, that he had any sort of soul.
“Did you have a hand in finding those evil people, dear?” she’d asked.
My cheeks had pricked with heat. “That information wasn’t supposed to be released.”
“It wasn’t. It’s just my hunch.”
I’d heard my breath whoosh down the line as it crackled between us. “I only wish I could help in any way to locate Aidan, but my attempts so far have been useless. Worse than useless, really,” I’d added, as I recalled the gunshot sound of Rey slamming my front door behind him.
“Sabbie, dear. Are you free for coffee tomorrow? There’s someone I’d like you to meet.” Her voice was so composed I wondered if she was trying to enroll me in her Women’s Institute. “It’s Nora Rodderick,” she’d continued. “You came up in conversation, you see.”
“Aidan’s grandmother?” My antenna shot up above my head, waggling like cobras summoned by a flute. “Are you absolutely sure she wants to meet me?”
“Yes, dear,” Caroline had said. “She really does.”
I didn’t bother with breakfast before I left for Caroline’s; I already knew her morning coffees were served promptly at ten with rich pastries.
And true to form, Caroline was building her little towers of tables, place mats, saucers, doilies, and finally the green and gold cups before pouring the steaming liquid, adding the right amount of sugar and milk to each one from memory.
“I wondered if I’d have to shoulder my way through newshounds again,” I said, watching her with awe. “But there’s only one bloke left now.” I’d been momentarily tempted to feel sorry for him, huddled inside his dog-eared sheepskin coat against the cold.
