THE POWER AND THE FURY

by James Erith

  The Power and The Fury

  Part One, Eden Chronicles

  James Erith

  EDEN CHRONICLES

  BOOK ONE

  THE POWER AND THE FURY

  By JAMES ERITH

  Foreword

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  1

  A Dream Is Given

  Archie tensed as he heard it again.

  No, it was nothing, he thought, just a gust of wind rattling a loose tile on the roof, or the strange ‘yessss!’ sounds that his twin, Daisy, shouted in her sleep. Then again, it could be Isabella sleep-talking about her science experiments. He took a deep breath. Her last sleep-talking dream was something to do with atmospheric pressure and barometers or some other weather-related thing.

  Archie smiled and rolled over; who else but his sisters could dream of such odd and opposite things – football and science.

  He rubbed his eyes and yawned. His heavy eyelids began to close but, just before they locked tight, he noticed something above Daisy’s head that forced them open.

  A shudder ran down his body.

  He closed his eyes and counted to three. Then he opened them just a bit.

  It was still there.

  Archie gasped. It couldn’t be, could it? I mean, an angel ... when had anyone seen an angel, really seen one? His brain whirred. Then it had to be a ghost. But ghosts weren’t real?

  A cold sweat broke out over his forehead. He couldn’t move a muscle – not to scream, not even to breathe. If it wasn’t an angel or a ghost, he thought, then what was it? A strange species of spider covered by a thin, opaque jellyfish? In any case, what kind of creature sprayed blue forks of electricity from its middle?

  And what was it doing hovering over Daisy?

  Archie didn’t want to stare but he couldn’t help it. He exhaled as quietly as he could, desperate not to draw attention to himself. And now that his eyes were adjusting to the light, Archie could see delicate claw-like contraptions at the end of the thing’s long slender legs, and they were moving in perfect time with Daisy’s every breath.

  As if the claws were somehow feeding her.

  Archie’s heart pounded as a flurry of questions crowded his brain:

  Does it hurt? What if it’s poison? What if it comes towards him – what then? Will it do the same to me, the same to Isabella, Old Man Wood, Mrs Pye – everyone in the house?

  A sickly feeling churned in his stomach. What if it’s an alien and hundreds more are about to drop out of the sky?

  Shouldn’t he do something?

  And then another thought struck him and, absurd as it sounded, it felt ... possible. Really possible. What if this creature – this ‘spidery-angel’ – had a connection with the strange dreams he’d been having? Maybe it was giving Daisy a dream? It felt so impossible but so right and, in a flash of clarity, it made total sense.

  As if hearing his thoughts, the spidery-angel turned its head and stared at him with deep black eyes like cavernous empty holes. Archie froze as a chill rushed into his brain and in the very next moment the creature had vanished.

  Gone. Just like that.

  Archie stared out into the dark night air as his heart thumped like a drum in his chest.

  Gradually, the iciness began to thaw but Archie remained stone-still, terrified the thing might reappear directly on top of him. After what felt like a month, he sat up, shook out the arm he’d been lying on, and wiped the sweat from his brow.

  All he could see was the fabric of the large drape, perched like a tent above him, and the outline of the thick old wooden rafters beyond. And opposite lay Daisy, fast asleep, snoring, as though nothing had happened.

  Had the spidery creature been in his head, a figment of his imagination – another dream? He pinched himself and felt a twinge of pain.

  So what was it doing to Daisy with those tiny claws on the end of its long legs? Sucking her brains out? Archie chuckled; no one in their right mind would steal those. Daisy’s feet were wonderfully gifted for football and running, but her brains? No way!

  Archie replayed the scene in his mind again and again, as though searching through a film. He remembered the way the creature waited for her inhalations and then, as she drew air into her lungs, its tiny claws spun like crazy. Each time, he returned to the same conclusion; it wasn’t taking anything from Daisy – more giving her something. And whatever it was, she had drawn it deep inside her.

  Archie flicked on the bedside lamp and a gentle yellow glow filled the attic room. From the far wall, Isabella yawned and rolled over. Archie waited until she had settled down, then slipped out from under his duvet.

  He tiptoed silently towards Daisy’s bed, a couple of wooden planks moaning in protest as he went. He knelt down and surveyed her.

  She was silent and at peace, as pretty as anything with her golden hair tumbling wildly over the pillow, her mouth parted.

  He smelt her sleepiness and leaned in until his face was just a few inches from hers.

  He inspected her nose, her chin, her lips, her cheeks and ears. But there were no odd marks or stains, no bruises, no bleeding, nothing amiss.

  Archie put his head in his hands.

  Perhaps he had imagined it – perhaps it was just another nightmare.

  He rubbed his face and readied himself to go back to bed when suddenly Daisy gasped as though she’d been stuck underwater and burst through to find air.

  She groaned and tossed her head from side to side. Then, without warning, she sat bolt upright as though a massive electric current had smashed into her – her face missing his by a whisker, her wavy hair brushing his nose.

  Archie’s eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. He could feel her breath marking his cheek. He swayed to the side and noted that her eyes were shut tight. She was still asleep!

  Now she was mumbling, but he couldn’t make out the words. He listened harder.

  What was it ... “odd”, followed by “wo-man?”

  She repeated it, this time louder. This time the word “odd” sounded more like “blood” or “flood”. And there was something else. Yes, a word like, “a-shunt” before “woman” and then a word like ... “bread”. That was it. But what did it mean? “Blood – a-shunt – woman – bread?” A car accident?

  Again Daisy said these words, again and again, growing louder and louder. And now it sounded like, “flood a shunt woman Fred”.”

  ‘Flood a-shunt woman Fred?’ Archie repeated. What was she talking about?

  In a flash, it came to him.

  Archie reeled; he knew he wasn’t mistaken. Now he said it with her. The first word was definitely “flood”, followed by, “Ancient Woman ... dead”.

  Archie felt the blood drain from his face. He stood up and stared at his twin, his mouth open. It wasn’t possible – it couldn’t be. How could she have access to his very own nightmare, the exact same dream he’d had over the past few nights; the flooding and the haggard old woman?

  Was it a twin thing? No. Twin things never happened to them.

  He noticed tears falling from Daisy’s eyes, eyes which were wide open and staring at a fixed point across the room.

  Without warning, Daisy screamed.

  Archie automatically ducked and covered his ears.

  She began to shake and her hands reached out as though clawing at an invisible figure.

  Words spilled out incoherently.

  A moment later she stopped, and, with a look of absolute dread and fear mixed upon her face, she spoke clearly, her words faint, like whispers.

  Archie leaned in but wished he hadn’t, for her next words seem
to stab him, as though a knife had been plunged deep into his heart and twisted round and round.

  ‘No, no, please Archie.’

  Louder and louder, over and over again until she was yelling, ‘DON’T DO IT, ARCHIE ... NOT HER.’

  ‘NO ... PLEASE,’ she begged.

  NO-ooo!’

  2

  The Route To School

  Archie tousled his hair with one hand and grabbed his school bag from behind the crooked door of the attic room with his other. When Archie asked why the door was angled the wrong way to its frame, Old Man Wood replied that it was due to the fact that the house had subsided over the years and was slipping ever so gradually into a hole. When Archie told this to the girls they hadn’t even questioned it, for the whole house was a little bit wonky and therefore this answer appeared entirely normal.

  The children’s attic room was shaped like a cross. At each end of the cross were four large rectangular recesses with square windows. In front of these, the children each had their own considerable area, sealed off – if they wished – from the rest of the room, with deep purple velvet curtains. These curtains hung from a black steel rail that ran around the inside and Isabella, as a fourteen years old, now kept hers drawn more often than the twins, who were nearly two years younger and hardly knew the curtains existed.

  At the other end of the cross was a communal area. Here, a worn dark green sofa littered with cushions faced a small, metal, Victorian fireplace with a matching surround. Next to this stood a large dark oak bookshelf full of books, old and new. On the other side a door opened onto the staircase that led down to the creaking corridor and the bathroom.

  Isabella’s area boasted shelves and a table that were neat and tidy. Clean white paint dominated the walls with a minimum of patterns anywhere and her desk was free from clutter, apart from a solitary fountain pen and a small notebook, in case she had to run up and make a list.

  Books in her cream bookshelves were precisely arranged in alphabetical, indexed order, as if they were on parade, and spotlights illuminated every surface with thought-through precision. Contemporary, she called it. Deathly boring, was Daisy’s interpretation.

  To prove it, Daisy’s area contained a random collection of photos of friends and family, and postcards stuck down with blu-tack or drawing pins. Next to them a huge, slightly edge-torn poster showed a scene of dappled light shining between trees in a forest – in a mysterious, almost godly way.

  On the other side, in a plastic frame, hung a signed poster of her football hero from Barcelona, with the ball at his feet, looking as if he meant action. Daisy had won it at a local fete, kicking footballs through hoops, and she loved it.

  Archie thought the poster ridiculous and hilarious in equal measure and had drawn a small curly moustache on the player, much to Daisy’s fury.

  His area, Isabella argued, was a hell of a mess, with a collection of sweaty socks and his games kit on the floor. Archie didn’t care – so long as the others didn’t complain too much.

  When Daisy started mentioning hygiene, he’d take the whole lot downstairs and stink out the boot-room until Mrs Pye couldn’t bear it any longer and threw every last item in the washing machine.

  Archie liked his books, magazines and clothes slightly jumbled up, and wasn’t in the slightest bit bothered if his drawers didn’t close properly. But the best thing in his area was a huge, old, red drape inlaid with squiggly golden patterns that he’d found in a storage box in the cellar. Once part of a travelling desert caravan – or so he’d been told – it hung from the ceiling like a tent.

  To Archie it even smelt mysterious, and it made a cosy and exotic hideaway, but Isabella thought it was the worst fashion statement of all time.

  Archie swung the bag over his shoulder. ‘I’m going the forest route,’ he announced. ‘Anyone want to come?’

  ‘Not today,’ Daisy replied while staring at her nails. ‘Saving all my energy for the big match – if I’m allowed to play. It’s the announcement in assembly.’

  ‘Oh yeah, blimey, of course, the announcement,’ Archie said dragging his fingers through his black hair. ‘Good luck ... I’m sure it’ll be fine.’

  ‘Promise me you won’t get covered in mud or torn to bits with brambles,’ Isabella yelled from behind her curtain. ‘It’ll be detention if you do. And I will make sure you do it.’

  Archie made a face.

  ‘I can tell exactly what you’re doing, Archie de Lowe,’ Isabella said. ‘Ten pounds says you’re making a face.’ Archie stuck his tongue out and waggled it towards her curtain. Daisy laughed.

  ‘Hilarious,’ Isabella said, as she popped her head out. ‘I’m on a mission to tidy you up, Archie de Lowe. Up until now you’ve ignored everyone. But it has to change, Archie.’

  Archie rolled his eyes and, with a smile where the corners of his mouth curled up mischievously, he winked at his twin, turned, sneaked out of the door and down the stairs to the landing below.

  Each tread groaned in protest under his weight. As he was reasonably tall and skinny, the noise sounded almost high-pitched. When Mrs Pye came up, the wood seemed to creak as though an buffalo was crashing about the house.

  This morning, the stairs moaned more than usual and every single floorboard Archie stepped on seemed to whine. It sank Archie to a new low. Why was he surrounded by old things that groaned and moaned all the time, like Old Man Wood and Mrs Pye ... and Isabella?

  As Archie walked, he noted a single shaded light bulb dangling rather sadly from the ceiling. In a funny sort of way, it reminded him of his experience in the night. Daisy had screamed as though possessed – loud enough to wake people in Northallerton ten miles away. And she’d slept through it all.

  Surely Isabella must have been disturbed, Archie thought. After all, every time he turned his music up she noticed. But the thing that nagged like a stubborn splinter was whether Daisy recalled any of it. Why did she scream his name and why did it feel so familiar?

  He’d ask her later – if he remembered – but not now. He didn’t have the will and, deep down, he was pretty sure she’d give him one of her dismissive looks with her big blue eyes and say, ‘Sorry, no reveally’, and he’d feel a bit of an idiot. And he hated feeling an idiot, especially when it came from Daisy.

  He toyed with the idea that instead of asking Daisy about her dream, he’d tell her what he’d seen, and then tell her that he’d had a dream that sounded, well, similar.

  He stopped as he reached the bottom step. Then again, why should he? Daisy wouldn’t be interested and anyway, he was over-reacting, right? He scrunched his eyes shut in frustration. I mean, the spidery-angel thing he’d seen was scary – and real, very real – but it was, he reminded himself, only a dream.

  If only it had felt like a dream.

  On his way out, Archie poked his head around the door of the kitchen where Old Man Wood and Mrs Pye were washing up breakfast. ‘Just off,’ he said, ‘see you later.’

  ‘You’re off early,’ Mrs Pye said. ‘Anything the matter?’

  ‘Nah, just fancy a walk, that’s all.’ He spotted Mrs Pye placing some apples in the fruit bowl. ‘Ooh. Can I have one?’ he asked.

  Mrs Pye gave him a look.

  Archie sighed. ‘Please.’

  Mrs Pye selected one and lobbed it to him. ‘Now don’t you go getting them clothes ripped again or go tripping down any holes or burrows or bigger holes like those badger ones on them slopes. I’m fed up with constantly mending your things and darning your clothes and washing, young Archie, I am.’

  Then she smiled, although to most people it would have looked like a grimace. ‘But what am I telling you that for, eh? You’re on the cusp of thirteen and quite old enough to know better.’ She grimaced – or smiled again.

  ‘Seems hardly a minute since you were a lovely little boy. Now whatever you do,’ she continued, ‘don’t go breaking any of them bones of yours. Understand? It’s your football tomorrow and you know how Daisy would be disappointed.’


  Archie smiled. He loved it when she rambled on. He grabbed his bags and opened the thick oak door of the cottage, which creaked like mad, and slipped outside. He drew in a large breath of air as he watched the first rays of light slowly creep up over the vale, smearing the base of the thick cloud in a fiery orange glow. It looked, he thought, like sunlight creeping under a door.

  At first he followed the stony path towards the ruin but, before long, he cut along a makeshift animal track that weaved through the long grass before it met the forest and the steep slopes that ran down to the river.

  For several minutes he hurdled fallen branches and jumped rabbit warrens and fox holes, untangling brambles from his clothes as he ducked through thickets and bushes. Every so often he would stop and pluck a few blackberries or scavenge for hazelnuts on the ground.

  He chewed them as he went, savouring the tastes – be it tangy and sour or over-ripe and juicy – smearing his hands and lips with red berry juice.

  In the semi-darkness beneath the forest canopy, he found long creepers dangling down and swung on them, pretending to be a pirate boarding a ship. One gave way in mid-flight and he tumbled to the ground but he picked himself up and brushed his clothes down. He fingered a tear in his blazer and another in his trousers and shrugged. Nothing he could do about it now.

  He wished Daisy was with him, she loved this kind of thing, even if she didn’t like to admit it. She only came out in the holidays – when her friends weren’t around worrying about their looks and their make-up and nails and hair, and boys.

  When Daisy was out here, she went wild; her blonde hair tangled up in brambles and grass, her face smeared by mud and berries and blood.

  She wasn’t that into all the girlie stuff. In fact she wasn’t into anything particularly, except football. His thoughts were interrupted as he swiped at a fly buzzing round his head. Daisy and her passion for football – strange that, really. A girl up here by the moors playing football with farmers’ sons and country boys; she had to be good – and tough.