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Chapter 3
Tongue Tied
A week passed, but there were no more hunting trips. In fact, Iggy’s dad had forbidden him to go to the forest or even to cross the river. When Iggy asked why his dad just said, ‘Because I say’ and quickly changed the subject. With no hunting, there was rarely any meat at suppertime. Mum said they’d just have to make do with what there was – which was mostly a stew of bitter roots and the odd gristly bone.
Iggy soon grew tired of hanging around the cave, especially since his grumma had started coming round a lot lately, usually at mealtimes. Iggy’s grumma was a sour old woman with a bush of grey hair and a face like a wrinkled prune. She had a way of looking at Iggy as if she knew he was up to something.
He decided to go down to the river. If they couldn’t hunt, there was always fish, though catching them was a problem.
‘Where are you off to?’ demanded his mum.
‘Nowhere,’ said Iggy. ‘Just the river.’
Mum grunted. ‘Unh. Well, mind you don’t go no further.’
A thin complaining voice wailed from inside the cave.
‘Wait a minute, Grumma!’ sighed Mum.
‘Anyway, I’ll be with Hubba,’ said Iggy, turning to go.
‘I don’t care who you’re with – keep out that forest!’ Mum yelled after him.
Iggy walked down the hill, trying not to think about how empty his stomach felt (breakfast that morning had been lizard tails). As he approached the river, he saw someone on the bank. It wasn’t Hubba as he’d expected; it was Umily. Iggy hadn’t seen her since the day of the boulderball tournament, when he hadn’t exactly covered himself in glory. She was kneeling on the muddy bank with her back to him, staring intently at something in the water. He wondered if he should go back or risk trying to speak to her. While he was trying to decide, he spotted a patch of dandelions growing under a tree. Maybe he should pick some for Umily as a present? At least he’d have a reason to speak to her. He gathered a large bunch. They were rather droopy, but that couldn’t be helped.
‘Hello!’ he said, trying to sound as if he’d only just noticed her. Umily didn’t even turn round. She kept staring at the river. Iggy saw now that she had one arm in the water.
Iggy tapped her lightly on the shoulder. ‘Umily?’
She gave a yelp and sort of jumped – which is difficult when you’re kneeling down and dangerous if you’re on a riverbank. Before Iggy could grab her she overbalanced and toppled in head first. She came up spluttering and coughing. Iggy thought she looked a bit cross, not to mention pretty wet.
‘You . . . you clumsy bonehead!’ she spluttered.
Iggy stared. Him clumsy? She was the one who had just fallen in a river!
‘What’re you doing, creeping up on me? I’m soaked!’
‘You look . . . nice,’ said Iggy. ‘Just a bit, well, drippy.’
‘Drippy?’
He seemed to be making things worse. Umily waded to the bank and Iggy reached out a hand to help her. She ignored him and scrambled out by herself.
‘What are they?’ She was pointing at the dandelions, which he’d completely forgotten.
‘Oh, they’re, um . . . flowers.’ His voice had gone croaky. He sounded like a frog. He held out the bunch of droopy dandelions.
Umily stared as if he was offering her a plate of slugs.
‘They’re dead,’ she said.
‘Are they?’ Iggy hadn’t even realised flowers could be dead. In any case, what had given him the idea that Umily might want some? She was a chief’s daughter; she could skin a rabbit without fainting.
‘Look,’ he said. ‘They’re magic. Watch this.’
He took a deep breath and blew. Dandelion seeds filled the air like tiny feathers dancing on the wind. Not all of them were dancing though, because lots were caught in Umily’s hair or stuck to her wet face. She looked as if she’d stepped in a snowdrift.
‘Sorry!’ He tried to brush the bits out of her hair, but she pushed him off. The feathery seeds were still floating around in a blizzard. Iggy caught one in his hand and examined it.
‘If you had thousands of these, you could fly,’ he said.
‘What?’
‘I was just thinking. You could jump off a cliff and fly. Like a bird.’
‘That I’d like to see,’ she said.
‘Me flying?’
‘You jumping off a cliff.’
Umily was shivering and brushing at her hair to get rid of all the seeds. Iggy noticed her looking past his shoulder, up the hill. He turned to see Snark coming their way, carrying a spear.
Snark leapt the last few yards, landing beside them. ‘You’re wet,’ he said, staring at Umily.
‘Yes. Somebody pushed me in.’
Snark turned on Iggy. ‘What you gawping at, face-ache?’
‘Nothing,’ said Iggy.
Snark glared, perhaps considering whether to throw him in the river. He evidently decided it wasn’t worth the effort.
‘Ready?’ he said to Umily. ‘It’s further up. Best spot on the river.’
‘Best for what?’ asked Iggy.
‘Catching fish. What d’you think?’ said Umily.
Iggy flushed. So that was why Umily had been staring at the water so intently! She had been fishing. Catching fish by hand required patience, skill and total silence, which he’d shattered by scaring off every fish within a mile. No wonder Umily had looked cross!
‘See you around then, boulder boy,’ said Snark, as he and Umily set off upstream. Iggy watched them go. He sighed heavily and began to trudge back up the hill. If Umily wanted to go fishing with a blathermouth like Snark, that was her business. What do I care? he thought, kicking a stone aside. He tossed away the droopy dandelion stalks. Despite his gloom, his thoughts turned back to flying. Wouldn’t it be amazing to soar like a bird, gliding and swooping through the sky? He imagined jumping off a high cliff clutching a bunch of a thousand dandelions while a crowd watched from below.
It would never work.
x
Back at the cave, there didn’t seem to be anyone around. His mum had left a deerskin hanging out to dry. It was stretched on a frame between two poles, flapping like a bird in the wind. Iggy stared at it thoughtfully for a while. Maybe dandelions weren’t the only way . . .
A minute later he stood on a rock holding the deerskin by two corners. He waited for a strong gust of wind and let the skin go, tossing it as high as he could.
FLUMP! The skin ballooned out like a ship’s sail, then floated gently back to earth.
‘Your ma’s gonna be pleased,’ said a voice behind him. Iggy turned to find Grumma watching him from the mouth of the cave. She made a habit of creeping up on people like this.
‘Oh, Grumma, I was just . . .’
‘Throwing skins around.’ Grumma nodded.
‘. . . Just borrowing it.’ He picked up the deerskin and hung it back over the frame. There was a dirty brown stain in the middle. He rubbed at it with his hand, which only managed to make it bigger.
Grumma squatted by the fire, watching him all the while like a beady-eyed toad. She had dark hairs on her top lip. If she got much older, Iggy thought she could probably grow a full beard.
‘Been to the forest?’ she asked.
‘No, Grumma. You know I’m not allowed.’
Grumma grunted. ‘I know what I hear.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Iggy.
‘Never you mind.’ She gave him a sly, calculating look. ‘I hear ’em talking when they think I’m asleep.’
‘Who?’
‘Who d’you think?’
‘Mum and Dad? What were they talking about?’
Grumma smiled, crinkling her eyes into dark slits. �
��Never you mind. Caves have ears.’
‘Please, Grumma! I won’t tell anyone.’
She beckoned him over to sit beside the fire. For a while she was silent, picking at her pointed yellow teeth.
‘That day in the forest – you seen it, didn’t you?’ she said.
‘We saw tracks,’ replied Iggy. ‘And poo. And the bones of something. But I don’t know what killed it.’
Grumma nodded. ‘Sticky bones, was they? Slimy, like the innards of an egg?’
‘How did you know?’
She gave him a look. ‘Ah. Just as I thought. It’s come back.’
‘What has?’
‘The creature. The beast.’
‘You know about it? Is it a mammoth?’
‘No, boy. A hundred times worse ’n that.’
‘Then what?’
Grumma looked around to check that no one was within earshot. She dropped her voice.
‘Ever hear of a slimosaur?’
Iggy shook his head. He had heard of snaggle-toothed tigers and woolly rhinos with savage horns, but his parents had never said anything about a slimosaur.
‘What’s it like?’ he asked.
Grumma laughed, showing her pink gums. ‘You think I’d be here talking to you if I ever seen it? I know this – it come before. Long ago, when I were a girl.’
‘It came here?’ said Iggy, astonished. ‘To the valley?’
‘To the forest. Eight . . . nine of our tribe was took – most of ’em young’uns. Not one were seen again. Not one.’
Iggy shivered, hugging his knees. ‘You think they were eaten?’
‘All we found was their bones. Bones and nasty slime.’ She sat back and warmed her blue-veined hands at the fire.
‘Still, not to worry,’ she added cheerfully. ‘Keep out of the forest, and maybe you’ll live. Now where’s that mother of yours? I’m hungry as a crow.’
Iggy looked away, staring across the valley at the mist rising off the Forest of Urk. Somewhere out there he imagined an ugly great beast, fast asleep and dreaming of tasty Urk children.
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Chapter 4
‘If You Go Down to the Woods’’
Breakfast next morning was leftover bone stew – though not much was left over. Afterwards Iggy and Hubba set out in search of something more filling to eat. Finding nothing, they stopped under some trees for a rest. Iggy turned over a large stone, uncovering a sea of wriggling earthworms.
Hubba scooped up a handful and held them in the palm of his hand. ‘Have some,’ he said.
Iggy shook his head. ‘No, thanks. You go ahead.’
‘Tasty, worms is. You got to swallow ’em in one, mind.’
Hubba crammed the worms into his mouth. A pink tail dangled from one corner of his lips and he sucked it up like a piece of spaghetti.
Iggy’s stomach heaved. He was just as starving as Hubba, but he had never been able to face eating worms. Grubs and maggots were the same. His mum said he was a mealy-mouthed fusspot. What he would give now for a leg of roast boar! It had been almost two weeks since he’d tasted meat of any kind, and he was sure his ribs were beginning to stick out. Even the best hunters in the tribe, like his dad, were too scared to venture into the forest. Families were living on grubs, roots and bones. Occasionally someone caught a lizard, which they cooked on a stick for supper, dividing it between four or five people.
‘Yumberries!’ said Hubba, licking his lips. ‘I know where there’s heaps of yumberries.’
Iggy stared at him. ‘Why didn’t you say so before?’
‘Know that bank along by the stream? Yumberries grows there like weeds. More ’n you can eat.’
‘Which stream?’ asked Iggy. ‘Not the one in the forest?’
Hubba nodded.
Iggy let out a long sigh like a balloon going down. For a moment his hopes had been raised. He’d imagined cramming fistfuls of ripe yumberries into his mouth, the purple juice running down his chin. He lay back on the grass and groaned.
‘Hubba, we’re not allowed in the forest. You know that!’
‘But yumberries, Iggy, think of it.’
‘My mum would never let us. Yours neither. They’d go mad if we even asked.’
Hubba propped himself up on one elbow. ‘Then maybe we don’t. We slip out when they’re asleep.’
‘At night?’ said Iggy. ‘You want to go to the forest at night?’
‘Why not?’
‘What if we bump into the . . . thing? You heard what my grumma said – it eats children!’
Hubba snorted. ‘Your grumma’s barmy. She told me her hair’s falling out.’
‘It is.’
‘Oh. Anyway, it’s all hogslop. Has anyone ever seen the beast?’
‘We saw those tracks,’ said Iggy.
Hubba shrugged. ‘Could’ve been anything. It’s not like we’d be going far. Only to the stream.’
Iggy still looked doubtful. He didn’t like the idea of going to the forest. Certainly not at night when it would be dark and creepy, not to mention dangerous. All the same, he didn’t want Hubba thinking he was scared – and he was hungry. Unbearably hungry.
‘Yumberries . . .’ Hubba sighed. ‘Fat, juicy yumberries, big as your thumb.’
‘Stop it!’
‘Hanging in plumptious bunches . . .’
‘All right!’ groaned Iggy. ‘We’ll go. But only as far as the stream. We pick what we can carry and come straight back, all right?’
Hubba grinned. He wondered how many berries he could actually carry. Maybe he’d take a sack.
x
Late that night, Iggy pushed back the furs that he slept under. He’d been listening for some time to make sure his parents were asleep. He could hear his mum’s heavy snoring and knew she would be splayed on her back like a starfish. It would take an invasion of clog-dancing mammoths to wake her. He crept from the cave, stepping carefully over his dad’s legs.
Outside, the moon had painted the hillside a ghostly grey. Iggy peered into the darkness, hoping Hubba might have forgotten the plan and he wouldn’t have to go through with it.
‘Iggy? That you?’ hissed a voice.
Ten minutes later they were wading across the ice-cold river. Iggy had brought a flaming torch dipped in animal fat, something his dad had taught him. It should burn for hours.
Hubba led the way as they hurried through the trees. At night the forest was an altogether different place, full of strange shapes and unfamiliar sounds. An owl hooted in the darkness and something scurried into the undergrowth, perhaps a badger or maybe a wolf going to fetch his friends.
‘You said it wasn’t far,’ whispered Iggy.
‘It’s not. Just a bit further,’ said Hubba.
‘We ought to go back.’
‘Yumberries . . .’ said Hubba. ‘Keep thinking of yumberries.’
x
At last, just as Iggy was beginning to think they were lost, they stumbled upon the stream. A tangle of thorny bushes grew nearby and, as Hubba had predicted, berries hung in huge clusters, laced with dewy cobwebs. Before long Iggy had forgotten that he had wanted to go back. He was busy plucking the largest berries and filling his empty stomach. They held a contest to see which of them could cram most yumberries into his mouth at once. Hubba held the record with seventeen. Iggy was about to try to go one better when he heard a sound like a tree falling.
THUD!
His heart stopped beating. ‘What was that?’ he whispered.
Hubba wiped his purple mouth. ‘A squirrel?’
THUD! THUD! The ground shook and a shower of leaves fell.
‘Um . . . two squirrels?’
A wave of panic swept over Iggy. He suddenly saw the utter foolishness of enterin
g a deep dark forest when you know flesh-eating monsters are on the prowl. It was the kind of thing only Hubba could have suggested, but Iggy’s judgement had been clouded by hunger and the promise of yumberries.
They stood very still and listened, not knowing which direction it was coming from.
CRASHHHH!
They both dived to the ground. Iggy almost dropped the torch.
‘Keep still,’ he hissed. ‘Maybe it won’t see us.’
‘GROOARGHHHHHHHH!’
The roar echoed through the forest, sending rabbits diving into their holes and bears hiding under their beds. Hubba’s nerve snapped and he broke from the bushes.
‘Hubba! No!’ cried Iggy.
Suddenly a shadow loomed out of the sky. Looking up, he saw the thing lumber past on two powerful legs. Green scales glinted in the moonlight, and through the treetops he glimpsed an enormous head and one yellow eye. A moment later it was gone from sight, crashing off through the forest like an armour-plated tank.
‘IGGY!’ wailed Hubba, his voice rising in terror.
Iggy ran towards the sound, his heart pounding, fearing that he was already too late.
x
Chapter 5
Sticky!
Iggy burst through the trees into a clearing and came upon the sight he’d dreaded. The slimosaur was crouched over a glistening heap on the ground. The heap wasn’t moving, but from the dirty feet Iggy could tell it was Hubba.
The sheer size of the creature took his breath away. It was like a green lizard that had swallowed a magic growing potion. It stood on two powerful legs as thick as tree trunks, with a long neck, gleaming yellow eyes and a head crowned with ugly lumps like stumpy horns. Iggy had only seconds to take any of this in as the creature turned its great head towards him and let out a savage roar.
He knew he had two choices – to stay and fight, or run for his life. The beast had shifted round to face him. Gobbets of sticky drool dripped from its mouth. Suddenly it lumbered forward. Iggy thrust the torch flame in its face, yelling something like:
Arrrrgh! Slimosaur! Page 2
