“It’s magic.”
“I got other things I find here too.”
“Like what?”
She get down from my shoulders. I show her the little comb that been made of bone and the bracelet made of stone beads. I got them placed up on a ledge.
“See, we aint the first people been here.”
Mary look proper frightened.
“There aint no one here now, Mary.”
“How d’you know that?” she say, scared.
“I been here on my own enough time, and I know there aint nothing here gonna get you except the things in your head. The people who been here gone a long time ago. This place filled with spirits of animals and the mountain that’s all. They aint gonna hurt you, not if you treat them good and say your words proper. See. Just got to say your words proper.”
And kneeling there with our cold hands together brings a feeling that wash over me like a warm wind. I forgot I been hungry and tired and alone with this pesky girl.
I reckon that feeling gonna stay written on my heart forever, I really do.
16
“Let me come wi’ you.”
The girl Mary crying.
It’s a shame cos she been a good kid really. After I show her my place, we come back down to the fire and eat a bit of food—we sit about pretty happy til we fall asleep. I reckon it been the first night she gone to sleep without crying.
But like every day, the morning come around like clockwork. I tell you, aint nothing stay the same for long.
Today I got to head on east, where the sun comes up, leave the heavy stuff in the cave for now.
I take the dog skull and put it up high on a ledge. He aint gonna want to go down to the road. I’m gonna come back for him and get all my stuff later.
I got to get to Geraint’s farm but not with this girl. I know she want to stay with me and I got to like her enough. But I aint got no choice. I’m pretty near washed out and aint got much food left.
I mean, it aint like I’m planning to leave her out on the hillside for the dogs and ravens to pick over. No way. Just leave her under the power lines, down by the road. She can get a truck ride—make it back to the city. It been her home after all.
Right now though she’s sitting on the ground crying cos she keep saying she aint going down there, and you can’t make me. She really been a pesky kid at heart, and I aint never had to stand by someone blubbing as much as she do and not stick it to them.
“You’re right,” I tell her. “I can’t make you, but you aint so stupid to stay here on your own for the dogs to fight over.”
“You’re going to leave me because you think I’m a stealer, don’t you?” She look at me hard with that question.
“Number One that aint the reason but I do reckon you been a stealer cos you come up here from the city and steal stuff, and like a scared dog with its tail between its legs, stealers run off back home when it gets too cold,” I say.
“But we didn’t run off.”
No, but it been better if you did, I think—but I don’t need to say that cos I know she’s thinking on her dead brother and her dad gone and maybe the woman, and her eyes gonna swell up and I aint got too many more soft words to tell her about it all. I mean it aint her fault cos she been a kid. But her dad’s just a stealer who got too big in his boots to admit he got to run back home, I reckon. I mean aint he never heard the story about the ant and the grasshopper? Everyone know how the ant work hard all summer getting food for the winter while that lazy grasshopper just singing all day til he die of hunger when the snow start to fall.
“Me da weren’t a stealer,” say Mary.
“Well it look that way to me cos if you aint been stealers then what are you?”
“I don’t know. But me da weren’t a stealer. He was a ponyman.”
“I aint gonna fight over it. Really, I aint. Don’t matter to me what you been. I come back to get you, aint I? I been sorry about Tommy and your dad I really am—”
“But you’re going to take me down to the road?” She point down in the valley, over the lake where the lines run east. “You’re going to leave me there, aren’t you?”
I reckon I am, Mary. The snow aint getting thinner nor the wind aint getting softer yet. Got dogs and ravens and storms and I got somewhere I got to be. Don’t know if I’m gonna make it. Aint gonna be no journey for a thin little girl.
But all I say is, “I thought you want to go back.”
“I don’t want you to leave me, that’s all. Maybe Da’s going to come back?”
“He aint coming back, Mary, and where I got to go aint no place for a kid like you,” I say—which remind me I’m Number One again.
“I’m not scared,” she say. But she’s nearly begging she’s so scared—I hear it in her voice.
“I’m not scared. Please don’t leave me down there.”
“It aint no point to talk on it.”
“I don’t want you to leave me on the road.”
“I don’t care. I aint no good with kids, and I got things to do.”
“I don’t want to go back to the city.”
“It aint so bad. City aint gonna be worse than a pack of gruesome dogs on your tail, is it?” I say it as soft as I can but her eyes so wet it make me want to turn away. “It aint far. Big trucks come down the road every day.”
But all the patience in me been draining out like I’m an upturned bottle and I got a pretty strong feeling I just got to kick her up off the ground or maybe just leave her after all. She aint the only one got no dad. Or no mum. I aint got no one either. Aint got no clue where they all gone. And I’m tired and hungry like I aint never been before.
“You aint the only one been lost.” I shout it at her. “And if you sit there I’m gonna just leave you for the dogs.”
I really mean it too.
She hear that in my voice I reckon and get up without a word.
We shoulder our packs and set off at last. But it aint a good feeling, not like when we been in the cave last night.
Outside a hard, cold wind cut across the hillside. The sky been fighting a battle with black clouds scudding across from the north and it aint gonna be so easy getting down in the valley with the wind picking up again. I can feel it now. Bad weather about to jump down on us. It been that time of year.
A whirlwind of snow dance up in front of me right then—like a sign to be wary. I can still see the lake and wide-open plain below and far off the great metal pylons marching across the snow from Wylfa in the west. A gust of freezing wind catch my mouth—it take away my breath for a second. I pull my hood over.
“Keep close,” I shout.
She stumble forward. Trip in the snow. I got to pick her up. I look into her face and I see she been begging me in her eyes. She been so thin and hungry and tired, and I don’t know if she’s gonna make it down to the valley if the weather get bad this quick.
“Don’t try to go too fast.”
The wind roar about us all of a sudden, whipping up her hair, lashing it about her face. I got to lean in close so she can hear me.
“Keep close. Storm’s coming up quick. But it’s better down there.”
I point down below the bluff, the hillside gray in the snowmist and morning light. I think about climbing back up into the cave. Out of the wind. But we got to keep going. We aint got food enough for stopping.
Mary nod. Wipe the hair from her mouth. Aint no use in talking now the blizzard come in, just got to get off the hillside. If we make it off the Farngod, we can get under cover in the conifer plantation right alongside the lake. The wind aint gonna fight its way inside the trees so easy.
I tell you, I aint got too much strength in me after so many cold nights and bad food and worrying about the girl just sinking down in the drifts.
“Keep near,” I shout as we bend against the wind in the flailing snow. It’s all I can say.
Like I told you, the weather gonna swoop down on you like an eagle up here. We half fall, floundering down
the icy slope on the north side of the Farngod. Plantation’s gonna be the only way. I don’t like it but aint no choice if this weather keep up. Maybe trap a hare in there. That’s one good thing maybe. Thinking that make me proper hungry and forget worrying about that ragged sulking girl for a bit.
I aint been down to the plantation for a long while. It been close to the power lines and stealer camps. The trees so tall and dark and green in the plantation. Don’t see much green up on the hills in winter. There been something shadowy though when you get right inside. I been a stranger down in the valley and I aint used to it and don’t like it cos I can’t see what been around and about. Just those dark trees—there’s something dead under those always green trees. Like poison in the ground.
The snow got so mean and the wind so strong, it been hard to see even a few paces in front of me. And even though it give me a bad feeling, it don’t take long before that sheltering forest of fir trees far off down by the lake guiding every thought in my head.
17
“Keep away from the edge,” I tell her. “The ice get thin there.”
Mary struggle to keep up along the edge of the frozen lake. We been close to the forest. The trail through the rushes lead up into the scrubby trees. The low birches brush against us and clumps of snow fall down from their spindly bare branches. I see a fox track heading toward the plantation. It’s a good sign. If there been foxes then there’s gonna be hares for sure.
“Can’t we rest for a while?” say Mary. She sit down on a stump under the low trees and I put a little snow in her mouth.
“We got to get deeper inside the forest,” I say. “Gonna be stiller there and we can rest good and proper, get a fire going, get something warm inside. Hares get inside the trees in the winter to eat the fir needles—I’ll lay a snare.”
“I’m so tired.”
She pull herself off the ground. I take her pack for a bit.
Soon we get to the edge of the plantation. The fir trees stand up like a dark wall in front of us. I can hear myself thinking at last without that wind on the hillside torturing every move I make.
“Is it safe?” she say.
“Well it don’t look too bright but it’s sheltered enough and like I say, we’ll get a hare maybe. Get to the pylons easier out of the weather. They cut right through the trees somewhere.”
She hang her head but don’t start spouting on like before.
We push into the green boughs hanging low like hands reaching out of the gloom. Into the shadows of the fir trees. You hear some pretty bad things about the forest when the kids been telling stories to scare each other at the Barmuth Meet. Some of those stories coming right back to me now, but I don’t say nothing to the girl cos she looking around like she heard the stories too.
On through the close rows of trees. Stubby low branches catching our coats. The snow aint too thick under the flat green boughs above, but here and there where a tree blown over the snow fallen through the canopy in deep piles.
“I don’t like it, Willo,” she whisper.
“You aint alone.”
We been deep inside. Tree trunks standing up like soldiers all about.
“Shh.”
I stop cos I reckon I hear something. Maybe I just smell something instead.
“What?”
“Come on, but quiet.”
In my head I been trying to think what that funny smell is. I got a bad feeling—like we aint alone, like eyes been on us. But I can’t see nothing, everywhere just been trees stretching out in the gloom—far as the eye can see. Just thoughts in my head. I got myself proper spooked. Mary sure is keeping close and quiet. Every now and then I turn around. Glance about behind us.
“Please can we rest?” she say.
“Not yet. Let’s get deeper inside.”
“Where are we going?”
“The road cuts through somewhere further north.”
“I want to rest.”
“It aint far now, Mary, aint far to the pylons, just can’t see them til you been right underneath almost.”
But she’s falling behind.
I stop near a fallen bough.
“Sit here then. Have an oatcake if you want.”
“Where are you going?”
“Look for hare runs.”
“Please don’t go.”
“I’m just gonna have a look about. Lay a snare.”
“Don’t leave me. I’m scared.”
“I aint going far, just keep your eyes open and shout if you want me.”
She sit down on the fallen branch.
The snow’s pretty deep here, the trees bigger. Away in front of us I seen a fallen trunk. I reckon there’s gonna be a few hare runs right under the branches. Where they been feeding. It aint gonna take me long to set a snare.
Coming in among trees always make me think of Robin Hood, cos he live in a great big forest. I pretty near learn to read on that book about Robin Hood that Magda got, so I know the story roundside about. It been a proper old-time story, and the book been so ratty Magda got to sew it all back together about twenty times. All the kids like it. Robin Hood and the Silver Arrow, it’s called—I reckon I’m gonna remember the words in that book til I die. But Robin Hood aint been that easy to trick, Sheriff of Nottingham, cos he got a green coat and won a silver arrow. But mostly he been stealing from the greedy and giving to the poor and getting away with it.
I always want to know if Robin Hood been an ant or a grasshopper. My dad say it aint so simple, Willo. The poor had nothing cos the greedy got it all. And I say, you mean like the ant—he got it all cos he work hard like us. But Dad say no, not exactly like the ant, and he say he’s gonna explain when I get older—but he never do. He just say, You remember that story. Reckon these days Robin Hood gonna have a gun instead of a silver arrow though.
The fir tree been pretty big when I get up to it. There been fresh hare runs sure enough. I got my pack off to get the trap wire and then I see up ahead there must be a new planting cos there been a thick low wall of green. Young trees with their branches almost touching the ground.
That gonna be the best place for hares for certain. Good cover and plenty to eat. Sure enough there been a good set of tracks where a hare been lolloping through here.
I sling my pack over my shoulder and crawl toward the bushy trees. Just gonna take me a few minutes and I’m gonna be able to set a snare right in the trees. Reckon it aint gonna be a long wait before I get one.
I push my way under the low branches. It been black as night here and the ground pretty bare from snow. Just sharp fir needles like a carpet under my knees, and then I lose the tracks. It look like there been a bit of a gap in the trees up ahead. If I get in there I can look about.
I check behind me but the tall trees been hidden by the young branches weighed down with snow above me. Can’t see Mary.
I creep along on my front toward the light. Creep forward right to the edge of the low cover.
I wonder why there been a planting of young trees right in the middle of the forest? Maybe we come right through to the other side already. But we aint come to the road under the pylons, so I can’t work it out. Maybe we been going around in circles.
I edge up careful on my elbows. I push the branches apart to see what been inside the clearing.
But it aint no clearing.
I near fall over the edge when I crawl through the tree line.
My guts come right up inside me.
A great big pit. Stretching out in front of me.
Deep pit dug right in the middle of the forest.
And the pit been full up. Full up like a gruesome nightmare. Pit full of arms and legs. Dead bodies. Limbs sticking up like twisted frozen branches out the snow.
A pit full of dead people.
My heart thump hard. My head trying to work it all out.
And drifting across from the thick trees on the other side is the smell.
The smell I picked up further back in the plantation.
That smell just hanging under the trees.
It been a smell of smoke.
All the stories, the bad stories flooding through my head. Stories graybeards tell to stop you coming down in the plantation. About the dead from the cities. About hungry stealers left on the mountain in winter.
And over on the other side, an icy path slide into the pit from a gap in the trees. An icy track where something been scrabbling in and out of that pit of dead bodies.
Something that been feeding in there.
Then I see it. Dark shape moving under the trees. My heart pounding. Bang bang bang.
I slip back inside the low trees. Bang bang bang. The smell of burning fat and smoke in the air. I got to get back to Mary. But I can’t see nothing. Just low branches all around. And the panic get me. Hands reaching out in the darkness pulling at my legs. Pulling me down into that pit. Into that grave of frozen bodies.
Got to listen to the dog in me. Dog aint gonna panic.
Quiet as a mouse, Willo.
Every move I make sound like a storm. I slide out of the young fir on my belly. Back away from the pit. Away from where men been feeding on men. My hands are shaking. All I see is the tall trunks marching off in every direction.
Panic pounding behind my eyes.
I see Mary now, far off between the rows of trees. Hunched over her pack.
And she aint alone.
Flitting in the flat green shadows. Something moving.
Between the rows of trees. Just a quick flash to the left and another off to her right.
She look up.
A man step out of the trees behind her.
“Mary!” I shout it out from the bottom of my heart. “Mary!”
He come out from behind the trees far behind her. I see him good and proper now. Thin and raggy like a starving beast. Face cracked in a grin. Moving his hands. Saying something I can’t hear.
Mary turn her head cos I been shouting and pointing. And then her mouth get like a hole. That stealer got a stick in his hand. More figures come out of the trees either side of him, under the trees like shadows. Like wolves. They just stand up out of nowhere somehow.
My dad always tell me, Hungry stealers in the winter aint men, and you just got to run if you see them.
After the Snow Page 8
