Alfie’s rings cut into the rope, bit by bit, a soft scuffing amid the rain-filled night.
‘It isn’t working, Raven,’ Alfie groaned, his voice cracked with pain.
But just at that moment, when he felt the last of his strength seep from his body, the rope fell away and Alfie slumped forward. He twisted his neck towards Raven who neighed softly and pawed the ground.
‘Shhhhh, boy.’
Alfie made to get up, but his legs buckled beneath him and he collapsed. Raven turned his back to Alfie.
Alfie winced. ‘Don’t – don’t turn away, boy,’ he whispered. ‘I’m sorry. It’s just – I don’t have the strength . . .’
Raven yanked his neck to one side and then there was a crack as the tethering rope, which had been fastened from a ground peg to his halter, snapped off. Raven stepped gingerly towards Alfie, then lowered his neck and nuzzled the boy’s head. His warmth surged through Alfie and he lifted a shaking hand to his cob’s mane.
‘My boy,’ he whispered, closing his eyes. ‘My boy.’
He sank his head into Raven’s mane and then watched, his mouth wide in disbelief, as Raven lowered himself to his knees.
Alfie shot a look at the clearing, but Skull and his gang were still deep in conversation. Summoning all his strength, Alfie clung to Raven’s mane. ‘That’s it, boy, that’s it! There’s a chance now . . .’
Flinching in pain with every movement, Alfie hauled himself up on to Raven’s back. His own leg was bloodied and limp, but he felt the power of Raven’s legs as the cob thrust his body upwards to a standing position.
Alfie was silent for a few seconds, then he let his head fall down on Raven’s mane. ‘I don’t know, Raven. I don’t know where to go.’
Rain poured down on to Alfie’s face making his teeth chatter, but Raven didn’t hang around. He picked his way away from the clearing into the heart of the Deepwood. As soon as the camp was out of earshot, Raven quickened his pace. Trotting. Through the deadened glade. Then faster. Cantering. Through the crowd of beech trees. Until, at last, they were racing away from Skull, through the sodden forest.
Alfie clung on. ‘Don’t let me fall, Raven. I can’t go back to Skull. Don’t let me fall . . .’
His body slumped on Raven’s back and waves of pain washed over him, dragging him back into unconsciousness. The trees around him fell away, and with it the raw aching in his leg. Still the black cob raced on.
Alfie’s eyes fluttered open as they slowed by the river. But the pain was rolling over him again and, lulled by the pattering of the rain, he felt himself falling away once more into nothingness. He was numb to everything around him: numb to the splash of water as he fell from Raven into the river; numb even to the strong, firm hands that hauled him to the bank.
Moll sat on the end of her box bed. It had been raining for days and this morning it clobbered down on her wagon roof like thousands of marbles dropping on to a tin tray. Gryff was nestled within the folds of crumpled clothes on Moll’s floor. Before Moll’s kidnap by Gobbler and Alfie, the closest the wildcat had been to the camp was when he’d occasionally crept beneath her wagon at night to sleep. But since their escape on the heath he hadn’t left Moll’s side, not even to hunt, and Oak’s boys brought him rabbits, voles and mice. During the day he followed her like a reflection and at night he watched over her, a friend amid the forces of the Dream Snatch.
Moll looked at the figure in her bed. ‘Should I poke him?’
Gryff opened one yellow-green eye and growled.
‘Stop staring,’ Moll hissed. ‘You’re meant to be sleeping.’
Gryff made a short pppttt noise through his teeth, then closed his eye.
‘Maybe a little poke,’ Siddy whispered, ‘to check he’s still alive.’
Moll and Siddy had got their poking fingers ready when the wagon door creaked open and Mooshie stuck a bedraggled head in.
‘You two – OFF!’ she hissed. Raindrops dripped off her dimpled chin and her headscarf was soaked through. Behind her, children whispered in anxious, excited voices. Mooshie shooed them away. ‘I’m sure Moll will tell you everything soon.’ She closed the door. ‘Won’t you, Moll?’
‘Mmmmmmn.’
Siddy gave Moll a thwack. ‘Come on, admit you missed everyone when you were in Skull’s clearing.’
Moll sighed. ‘There was a lot going on, Sid. Not much time for missing people, I’m afraid.’ But she had missed them. Not just Siddy, whom Jinx had led Oak to after Moll’s kidnap, but even Florence, and that was worrying on a whole new level. Moll stared across at the body in her bed.
‘If you carry on staring at him like that,’ Mooshie said curtly, ‘he might never wake up. I know I wouldn’t bother coming round if the first thing I had to look at was your scowling mug.’ She unhooked a copper pan and turned to the stove. Lighting it, she boiled down the pig fat she’d brought in, then reached inside her pinafore. ‘Blossom gathered in a thunderstorm – carries extra healing properties.’ She scattered the petals into the simmering pot, then strained the mixture. ‘For his bruises – and I’ve lavender oil and woundwort to soothe the wound.’ She brought out a small tin. ‘It’s mixed with mashed potato, see – the best dressing you’ll find.’
Moll made a silent decision never to have another cut or bruise.
Mooshie shooed Moll and Siddy off the bed. ‘Can’t you busy yourselves elsewhere?’
Siddy threw his hands into the air. ‘We’ve been busying ourselves for ages!’ He pointed to the mounds of moss, birds’ eggs and feathers he’d collected with Moll. ‘Any more busying around and we’ll have half the blinking forest in here!’
Moll nodded. ‘He had all of yesterday and the day before to come round. And we’ve got so much to do: understand why the Shadowmasks have no shadows; figure out how they killed my parents; find the well with the amulets inside . . . And he needs to help, instead of lying there covered in mashed potato!’
Mooshie shook her head. ‘You saw those hounds, Moll. You saw what they managed to do to Wisdom and Jesse – and they were on cobs.’
Moll looked down. Even after Mooshie had held her close and tucked her into bed the night of their escape, she couldn’t untangle herself from what she’d seen. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw the hounds. They chased her into her nightmare that night and it was only when the familiar click of her wagon latch sounded that she had been rescued from their snarling jaws. Oak was carrying a small body in his arms. That had been two days ago and still Alfie hadn’t sat up or spoken a word.
He lay before her, breathing shakily. His eyes, swollen and bruised, were closed, and the scratches on his face were still raw and red.
Moll sat forward. ‘Alfie?’ she whispered. ‘Alfie, Alfie, Alfie, Alfie, Alfie, Alfie, Alfie, Alfie—’
Gryff buried his head under Moll’s discarded clothes and Mooshie glowered at her, picking up two mud-stained skirts from the floor and folding them over her plump arms. ‘Hush, Moll, you’re being a pest. Leave the boy to sleep, will you?’
Then, quite unexpectedly, Alfie’s eyelids fluttered and one eye opened.
Moll beamed at Mooshie. ‘Ha!’
‘Stay with him, both of you,’ Mooshie said, ‘and I’ll get Oak.’ But her eyes were sparkling and as she left the wagon there was a spring in her step.
Alfie’s other eye opened and his gaze fell upon Moll. He looked at her for several seconds, his face completely blank, then his eyes travelled over her wagon and its belongings. Seconds later, he looked back at Moll with empty blue eyes.
She stuck out her leg and nudged Gryff with her foot.
Gryff yawned, his whiskers twitching either side of his nose. He dipped his head towards Alfie. ‘Brrroooooo.’
‘That’s his greeting call,’ Moll said.
Alfie didn’t respond, but he tensed as he took in Siddy.
‘That’s Siddy,’ Moll explained. ‘He pinched the bone reading from Cinderella Bull’s wagon – and he races earthworms in his spare time.’
‘You know he’s Alfie,’ Moll hissed.
Siddy grinned. ‘I had a pet worm called Alfie once. Before Porridge.’ He lifted the earthworm from his pocket. ‘Now I’ve got Porridge the Second and I’m training him up to be a racing worm.’
Porridge the Second shot Alfie a look of resigned boredom, then sank back into Siddy’s pocket.
Alfie swallowed and looked at Moll. ‘Is this your wagon?’ His voice was scratched, like a broken instrument.
Moll nodded. ‘Yup.’ She drew herself up nice and tall. ‘We’ve been looking after you, even though you thieved me from Oak’s camp—’
‘You catapulted me in the head! And you – you left me for dead on the heath!’
Moll blew through her teeth as she tried to remember Mooshie’s advice again. Think then get angry. Or was it get angry then think? Or maybe it was don’t get angry and don’t think. She tried that: ‘I wanted to come back for you; I tried to make them. But Skull – he . . .’ She trailed off. ‘Anyway, you can borrow the wagon for a while if you want.’
Alfie raised his eyebrows. Moll scowled back. So here she was, making peace with the enemy again. And yet Alfie had tricked Skull with the blacksmith note and he’d got them out of the cage. And there was her dress. Somehow she didn’t want to snap a promise to him any more. It felt like the right thing to do.
‘Is Raven safe?’ Alfie asked, biting his lip.
Siddy nodded. ‘Tied up with our cobs just beyond the clearing. Oak’s boys have been looking after him.’
Alfie breathed a sigh of relief. Pushing the quilt back, he eased himself up so that he was sitting against the wagon wall. Moll pretended not to notice the way he winced every time he moved.
‘What – what happened to me?’ he asked. ‘And why do I have mashed potato on my ankle?’
Moll sat cross-legged, planning her words as carefully as possible.
Sensing the disaster Moll was capable of being in situations like this, Siddy intervened. ‘See those raw marks on your fingers? Oak thinks you used your rings to cut through the rope Skull tied you up with.’
Alfie held up his hands and then his mouth fell open. ‘I – I remember,’ he stammered. ‘It was Raven who helped me. He broke free from his tether and knelt down so as I could mount him. Then—’ Alfie struggled on, ‘—then I don’t remember. Last thing I knew I was riding through the Deepwood.’
‘Oak found you,’ Moll said.
‘Oak?’ Alfie mumbled. ‘But – but I stole you from his camp. Oak must hate me.’
Moll waved her hand in the air. ‘Course he doesn’t. Not after I told him you didn’t have a rotten brain like Skull’s – that you were against all of his gang’s dark magic. Isn’t that right, Gryff?’
Gryff leapt up on to the bed and settled himself between Moll’s legs. Siddy’s eyes widened as he glimpsed Gryff’s claws, but the wildcat just stared across at Alfie for several seconds, unblinking. Then he dipped his head.
Alfie looked from Gryff to Moll. ‘You’ve got the same eyes as Gryff, Moll.’
Gryff curled his tail round Moll’s toes. Alfie had used her real name for the very first time. He’d kept it safe until they’d reached the Ancientwood, just like he promised he would. She squinted at him. Even if he was lying about who he really was, he’d kept her name safe. And somehow that counted for more than losing it to Skull.
Alfie shook himself. ‘I’ve got to fly from here – your camp aren’t going to want me.’
Siddy raised his eyebrows. ‘Where to?’
Alfie was silent.
‘Raven brought you to the river,’ Moll said, ‘and Oak carried you to our camp. You’re here for a reason, Alfie. Oak and the others aren’t going to give you up. They’re not like that.’
Siddy nodded. ‘Moll does terrible stuff the whole time and they’ve never chucked her out.’
Alfie looked down. ‘But Oak doesn’t know who I am . . . Not properly.’
‘Who are you then?’ Moll asked.
Alfie sighed.
Moll shrugged. ‘Well, you’re against Skull and his dark magic; that’s enough for Oak. Didn’t Mellantha say something about help coming from unsuspecting people? Or maybe it was about us all being birds and not really human at all. Can’t remember. Point is: Oak will look out for you while you’re here.’ She leant in closer; there was something she wanted to ask. ‘It was your scent the hounds had, only I could’ve sworn it was my dress you ripped a bit off.’
A rumble of thunder filled the wagon and the ground beneath them seemed to shake. Moll ran a hand over Gryff’s back.
Alfie considered. ‘May’ve looked like I was giving away a scrap of your dress, but when I was up close to you I ripped a corner off my shirt and gave that to Brunt instead – same colour as your dress, see.’
Gryff lifted his head from beneath Moll’s arm.
‘I figured we had one chance to get out of the Deepwood alive and if the hounds had my scent we’d get further since I can outrun you. Only it didn’t work out that way as I never expected Oak to show up like he did.’
Moll held his eyes for a moment, then looked away. ‘You’re strange.’
Alfie shrugged. ‘It’d be a dull old world if everyone was the same.’
The corners of Moll’s mouth rose as she recognised the echo of her own words.
Gryff prowled over the bed sheets until he was centimetres away from Alfie. The boy held his breath, but Gryff just looked at him for several seconds and then he dipped his head down low.
And, although no one said anything, Alfie understood.
Thank you.
The wildcat slunk off the bed and stalked to the other end of the wagon, where he tucked himself beneath a chair and closed his eyes.
Alfie looked down at his leg and flinched. And, in a moment of rare forward thinking, Moll got up and poured a glass of water from the jug Mooshie had left. She handed it to Alfie and he drank it down.
‘We still need to find the amulets,’ he said. ‘The well Mellantha talked about, we have to find it before Skull gets a hold of you and Gryff.’
‘Mellantha said the well was in the heart of the forest,’ Moll said. ‘Oak and the Council of Elders have been meeting to try and work out what that means. The Rings of Sacred Oaks around our camp is the heart of the forest as far as we know it, and there isn’t a well here, that’s for sure.’
Siddy nodded. ‘Cinderella Bull – that’s Oak’s mother – she thinks the heart of the forest might mean trees so deep into the forest that no one’s been under them. Once we figure it out, we’re going to find the well.’ He paused. ‘You should come.’
Alfie fiddled with the quilt, then he looked Moll square in the eye. ‘I was going to cut and run with the amulets when we found them.’
Moll held his gaze. ‘Well, I was planning to steal them off you. And I had a pretty nasty plan too. Was going to involve a very big spade.’
They all grinned, but Moll knew she’d been right about Alfie. He wanted those amulets for a reason of his own – and it had nothing to do with money.
‘Why do you want the amulets so badly?’
Alfie ran a hand over the pine wall, then looked at Moll for several seconds, saying nothing. Eventually he shook his head. ‘It was an idea I had – to – to fix something that happened a long time ago.’ He looked down. ‘But it was a stupid idea. It would never have worked. And, besides, I’ve discovered a better reason for finding the amulets now.’
Moll smiled. ‘You’ve started believing in the old magic in the Bone Murmur, haven’t you?’
Alfie blew out through his lips, then he smiled. ‘Why else d’you think I gave Brunt the scrap from my shirt?’
Moll looked from Alfie to Gryff to Siddy and at last she remembered Mellantha’s exact words: Sometimes it’s the people we don’t expect who wind up looking out for us.
The wagon door swung open. Gryff’s head shot up but, seeing
Oak stride in, he turned away and settled back to sleep. Oak hung a dripping hat on the door hook and smiled at Alfie. ‘How’re you feeling?’
Out of the corner of her eye, Moll could see that Alfie’s body was tensed. ‘Bit better,’ he said stiffly. He looked down at his chafed hands, then mumbled, ‘Thank you.’
Oak smiled. ‘It’s that cob of yours you’ve got to thank.’
‘You’ll want me gone from here. I understand—’
‘We’d like you to stay with us, Alfie – until you’re better. After that, you can go as you choose.’ Oak nodded towards the window. ‘You’ll be safe in the camp and there’s food and water for you here which you’ll be hard pushed to get any place else without money.’
Alfie reddened. ‘But you’re never going to trust me. None of your camp are.’
Oak shook his head. ‘Your past with Skull isn’t important. It’s the present that counts and what you decide to do with it. And, from what Moll tells me, you can run, you can ride, you can pick locks – and you can be trusted.’
Alfie shifted under the covers. ‘But I’m not even a real gypsy . . .’ He fiddled with his jay feather earring and Moll and Siddy listened with bated breath. ‘Skull told me no one knew who my father was, but my mother worked up at Tipplebury Farm, looking after the cobs: feeding and watering them, grooming them, breaking them in . . .’ He looked towards the window. ‘Apparently she died giving birth to me and Skull said that, when he was passing the farm to buy supplies not long afterwards, he offered to take me in and raise me if I looked after his cobs when I was older.’ Alfie sighed. ‘I suppose the farm didn’t want to waste time raising an orphan like me so they just agreed.’
Oak shook his head. ‘I don’t believe the farm would have handed over a baby to someone like Skull.’
The Dreamsnatcher Page 13
