by Julie Hunt
The Swoon! I saw my opportunity and seized it.
‘It was a sleeping sickness! The disease spread from Peat to the Siltman’s dogs.’
‘No,’ the Siltman breathed. ‘That’s not true.’
‘One by one they sickened and died, and without the dogs, the Siltman was lost.’
I didn’t know what had made me say that. Maybe it was the uncertain look on the Siltman’s face. He moved his head from side to side and whispered a command to the dog that stood beside him. It gave a little sigh and fell down, almost knocking the Siltman over. He reached around him, feeling for his other dogs, and in that moment I realised he was blind.
‘He wasn’t lost,’ the Siltman muttered. ‘He had the boy to lead him.’
Siltboy was still twisting the stranger’s thread between his fingers. He looked terrified.
‘Siltboy wouldn’t help him,’ I cried, hoping it was true.
‘Boy,’ the Siltman ordered. ‘Come!’
Siltboy took a step towards the Siltman. He looked at me and stopped. I could see that he wanted to obey his master.
‘Boy!’ said the Siltman. ‘Where are you?’
‘Brave yourself, Siltboy,’ I whispered. ‘Courage is the warrior’s way.’
Siltboy stayed where he was.
‘Stop,’ cried the Siltman. ‘Stop the story!’
‘I can’t finish the story until it reaches the end,’ I said. ‘It’s one of the rules.
‘The Siltman had made a bargain, and the bargain was complete. The Siltgirl was his. She would stay in his country forever. The only way he could get rid of her,’ I said, ‘was to reverse the bargain.’
The Siltman nodded like a person in a trance.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Reverse the bargain. You’re trouble, Siltgirl. You’re wilful and bad. Go back to where you come from.’
‘Where are you keeping Eadie’s spirit?’ I asked. ‘If the bargain is to be reversed I must take it back to her.’
‘I put it in a plant . . . a flower.’ The Siltman staggered and lowered himself to the ground.
The perfume was starting to work on him the way it had worked on the animals. Lily must have perfected it – or perhaps it was the creature in him that was responding. I stepped back and hoped the wind wouldn’t blow the scent in my direction. The Siltman leaned against one of the sleeping dogs with his face turned to the sky.
‘Which flower?’ I yelled. ‘Where?’
But he didn’t answer. His breath wheezed in and out and his rags flapped around him. The Siltman was asleep.
I backed away.
‘Call Shadow,’ I said to Siltboy. ‘We have to find the flower and go quickly. I don’t know how long the Swoon will hold.’
SEARCHING
Coral bells and sea pinks grew in the sand dunes behind the Siltman’s hut. Wild poppies, shell-bells and happy wanderer covered the ground near the riverbank. Now that I was looking, there were flowers everywhere, and Eadie’s spirit could have been hidden in any one of them.
Shadow took us over the dunes and across some grassy hills, stopping and starting whenever we saw a patch of colour.
‘We’d be better off on foot,’ I told Siltboy.
‘Halt, Shadow,’ he cried, and we slipped to the ground.
Dandelions and red-clover flowers were coming up through the grass, along with forget-me-nots and wild thyme.
‘There are so many flowers, I don’t know where to start,’ I said.
‘How about battle stars or snapdragons?’ Siltboy suggested. ‘Or thistles or them heads of spear grass?’
‘No. Eadie’s spirit wouldn’t be in those.’
‘If Shadow knows the scent he can help,’ Siltboy said. ‘How is muck auntie smelling? What is her whiff?’
‘Eadie smells of fish and smoke,’ I said. ‘But no flower smells like that.’
I got down on my hands and knees and parted the grass, finding clusters of tiny white flowers with yellow centres. The more I looked, the more flowers I saw.
‘It’s going to be impossible,’ I said. ‘We’re fighting a losing battle.’
I felt something brush against me, and when I closed my eyes I saw Shadow was moving restlessly behind us. His head was down, and the lights in him were moving up his neck. I put my hands over my face and saw the lights gathering in his nose, until the tip of it was so bright with them it almost hurt me to look.
‘He wants to go,’ Siltboy said. ‘Maybe he has knowledge.’
We climbed back on and Shadow sped across the countryside.
‘Too fast!’ I yelled. ‘We can’t even see what flowers we’re passing.’
He took us beyond the hills to a stretch of open country, where boulders were scattered about like a giant’s marbles and flat slabs of stone towered above us, standing upright on their ends. Shadow weaved back and forth across the ground.
‘He looks,’ Siltboy told me. ‘He’s getting scent.’
‘Of Eadie?’
At that moment Shadow took off in the direction of one of the flat stones, heading straight towards it. It crossed my mind that he could probably pass straight through the rock but Siltboy and I would hit it. At this speed, if we crashed, we would be killed.
‘Stop!’ I cried. ‘Make him stop!’
Shadow swerved and Siltboy and I were flung into a patch of fireweed at the base of the stone.
‘Ow!’ Siltboy cried. ‘Like nettle. Like fire. Bad dog!’
I said nothing, because I found myself staring into the wild eyes of the sleek. He must have been hiding there. He looked past me and fixed his gaze on Siltboy.
‘Your sleek!’ Siltboy cried.
The sleek made an angry chattering sound, and his tail flared.
‘Shh. Don’t speak. Don’t move,’ I cried. ‘Or he’ll attack.’
‘He says I should never have called him.’ As soon as Siltboy spoke, the sleek leapt. He swiped Siltboy’s face and sunk his teeth into his ear.
‘No, Sleek. No!’ I cried. ‘Siltboy is my friend!’
I thought the sleek was going to pounce again, but before he had the chance, the ground began to shake and a low growling filled the air. It was the same sound I’d heard at the fort.
The sleek bristled with fright and looked right and left, trying to work out where the threat was coming from. He arched his back and let out a long wailing cry, because he saw Shadow’s collar moving towards him. I thought the sleek would flee, but he leapt at the buckle, locking his teeth on it. I watched him hang upside down; then he was swung from side to side. I didn’t need to close my eyes to know what was happening – Shadow was shaking his head, trying to fling the creature off. When the sleek let go and dashed behind the rock, the collar followed him. The growling grew louder, and the ground under our feet shook violently. There was hissing and snarling and the fight ended with an ear-splitting yelp.
‘Look out!’ cried Siltboy, pointing up. ‘The standing stone – it falls!’
He pulled me to the side as the great stone crashed forward.
The sleek had been behind it. He glanced at Siltboy and began washing himself. Shadow’s collar was near the ground, and it wasn’t moving.
‘Who won?’ I asked. ‘Is Shadow all right?’
I didn’t dare shut my eyes. I imagined Shadow lying on the ground, his outline fading and all the sparkling lights inside him going out until he was nothing but darkness. Siltboy, too, didn’t look. He kept his eyes wide open and stared at the sleek. Blood was dripping from Siltboy’s ear, and an extra scratch had been added to his face. He made angry clicking sounds in the back of his throat, and the sleek replied with the same sound.
‘Truce,’ Siltboy replied. ‘No winner. No loser.’
I sighed in relief. The sleek chittered, staring at Siltboy.
‘Sleek very mad,’ Siltboy told me. ‘He says I make him come so far and bring what I ask, and when Siltman’s dogs chase him he drop it.’
‘Drop what?’
‘The luck.’ Siltboy gave a
low whistle. ‘Now we must find it.’
He reached towards his hound.
‘Come, Peat.’
I was surprised when the sleek jumped onto my shoulder. I supposed he didn’t want to be left behind. When we took off he dug in his claws and I gritted my teeth.
‘Siltboy, where are we going?’
‘To mouth of river.’
‘No, Siltboy! What if the Siltman wakes up?’
‘We is never finding flower without luck,’ Siltboy replied, as we moved across the country, heading back the way we had come.
When Shadow reached the dunes behind the Siltman’s hut, he paused. I looked down and saw that the Siltman and his dogs had not moved.
Siltboy put his finger to his lips.
‘Them hounds is swooned, Peat,’ he whispered. ‘We is safe.’
He chittered to the sleek, who spat at him in reply but then slipped from my shoulder onto the ground and began creeping down the slope.
Oh, Sleek! I held my breath.
‘What if the dogs get wind of him?’
‘Worry not. Their sniffers is full of ant stink.’
As Siltboy spoke, one of the dogs stirred and tried to raise its head. The sleek stopped in his tracks, and his fur stood on end. The dog groaned. When it was still again, the sleek continued. He crept right past the hut; then, with his nose to the ground, he ran towards the wet sand at the river’s edge, where he began digging furiously.
The wind lifted the Siltman’s hair and I saw his rags flapping around him. His arm was draped over a dog.
‘Sleek has found!’ Siltboy cried.
The sleek dashed towards us with something in his mouth. As he passed the hut, I thought I saw the Siltman raise his hand, but it might have been the wind. The sleek scrambled up the dune and flung something in my direction.
‘The cow charm! Sleek, thank you!’ I put it around my neck, and we were moving again, quickly, over the dunes. We passed the lagoon with the tree where Siltboy stored his drinking horn and headed inland away from the coast. As the boom of the waves grew fainter, I thought I heard a voice on the wind – the Siltman’s voice – very slow and slurred, with long gaps between the words – You . . . won’t . . . get . . . away . . . with . . . this . . . Siltgirl . . .
THE FLOWER
‘Please help us, Sleek,’ I cried. ‘You must know what sort of flower we are looking for. Ask him, Siltboy.’
We were on Shadow’s back in the open plains, and there were as many flowers here as anywhere else in the Siltman’s country.
Siltboy did as I’d requested but the sleek ignored him, and when he asked a second time the sleek glowered and turned his back.
‘Then who will help?’ I cried. ‘It’s hopeless!’
‘Yeak, yeak!’
The sleek flinched at the sight of Siltboy’s eagle hovering above us; then he cowered, ran up my trouser leg and hid under my dress.
‘Stop it, Sleek. You’re meant to be helping.’
‘Best he hide,’ Siltboy said. ‘Battlebird will snatch him.’
The bird circled overhead, riding the air currents.
‘She is wide-seeing,’ Siltboy said. ‘If you give her the look she will find.’
‘How can I give her the look when I have no idea what I’m looking for?’
‘When I speak to creatures, I blank my mind so I can hear,’ said Siltboy. ‘Maybe you try that. Blank your mind and your mind’s eye.’
I closed my eyes and tried to make my mind empty, but no flowers came into it. Instead I saw Eadie. She was splashing through the dark towards me as I hung upside down in the snare. Then I saw her paddling towards her hut. She climbed the rickety ladder. In my mind, I pulled aside the bag that hung over the door, and I looked around her cluttered hut. And then I saw them – the flowers in a jar on the table.
‘Everlasting daisies!’ I cried. ‘Could they be the ones?’
‘Tell them to me,’ said Siltboy.
I tried to describe the flowers I had seen on Eadie’s table – their dried petals, their bright colours, the size and shape of them. Siltboy looked up and translated everything I said. ‘Yeak. Yeak. Yeak.’
The bird circled higher and higher. When she tipped one wing and swooped towards the west, Shadow followed. I had never travelled so fast before – not even in the tunnel with the Siltman and his dogs. In a few seconds I found myself in a field of everlasting daisies. There were hundreds of them – white ones, orange ones, pink ones and red ones. Where to start?
I looked up. The battlebird was a tiny dot in the sky.
‘She is watchbird,’ Siltboy said. ‘Tarry not, Peat.’
The sleek let go of my leg and slid to the ground, where he began pacing up and down, making anxious yipping sounds.
I walked among the everlasting daisies. Their dry petals rustled in the breeze. So many of them looked exactly the same. How would I find the right one? How would I know it was the right one?
The sun was high in the sky. I searched all through the afternoon, and when the sun set I was still searching. One by one, the flowers were closing up for the night.
‘Sleek, can you help? Please can you help?’
He laid back his ears, then he turned and groomed his tail, picking grass seeds out of it. I supposed he thought he had already done enough by bringing the cow charm – and perhaps he had, because as I spoke I noticed the everlasting daisy right in front of me. It was large and reddish in colour, and it was still wide open. The centre was gold and the petals had white tips, like the sleek’s tail.
‘Siltboy, look! This must be the one. I’ve found it!’
I carefully dug up the plant, cupping it in soil, then I tore a piece off the bottom of my dress and wrapped it around the roots. ‘Your plan is brilliant, Siltboy! Now we can take back the deed that was done!’
He didn’t answer. His eyes were closed and his face had gone very white.
‘What is it, Siltboy?’
‘The Siltman calls,’ he said. ‘Sleep-like, his voice . . .’
I grabbed Siltboy’s hand and the sleek leapt onto my shoulder.
‘Don’t listen,’ I cried. ‘Tell Shadow to get us to the river!’
I had to make Siltboy climb onto his dog, pushing and shoving him, but once he was there he did as I asked. He whistled softly and we were moving again.
‘We’ll cross the Silver River and find the tunnel,’ I yelled, hanging on with one hand and holding the flower in the other. ‘We can go back!’
‘I is fraid, Peat,’ Siltboy whimpered. ‘Fraid and afeared. I is fraid of behind and fraid of ahead.’
‘What do you mean?’
He replied with something I couldn’t hear. The wind was howling in my ears.
When Shadow reached the riverbank, Siltboy raised his hand and called out, ‘Halt!’ We stopped so quickly that the sleek went flying from my shoulder into the water and landed with a splash. I could still hear the howling.
‘Let’s go,’ I cried. ‘What are we waiting for? Let’s get away!’
Siltboy turned to me with huge, frightened eyes.
‘Siltman says if you cross the Silver River you die.’
‘It’s true,’ I told him. ‘But first you have a life. Have courage, Siltboy.’
‘All my life for nine hundred years, I live in the land of the Siltman,’ he said. ‘Where to can we go?’
‘To Hub,’ I said. ‘If you want to go anywhere, you must go to Hub first.’
‘But Shadow knows not the way . . .’
Siltboy looked very young just then. He was trembling, and I thought he might burst into tears.
‘Siltboy, you are the son of a warrior giant, you are the proud owner of a noble hound, and you are my true friend – the friend of my life,’ I cried. ‘Brave yourself!’
At that moment there was a cry far above us.
‘Watchbird gives warning,’ Siltboy whispered.
The howling grew louder.
‘The Siltman’s dogs!’ I yelled.
&nbs
p; Siltboy seemed to be frozen to the spot. Suddenly the sleek leapt from the water, impatient with the delay. He hissed at Shadow and nipped Siltboy’s ankle before scrambling up onto my neck and biting me hard on the earlobe.
‘Make Shadow go!’ I shouted.
Siltboy gave an uncertain whistle and Shadow took off over the water. He didn’t touch it, he skimmed just above the surface, and when I closed my eyes I saw the sleek sitting between Shadow’s ears, talking to him in clicking sounds. The lights in the ghost hound’s head swirled for a moment like confused thoughts, then they settled into a pattern that looked a bit like the map Siltboy had drawn in the sand at the river mouth.
‘Look, Siltboy,’ I cried. ‘The sleek knows the way!’
The shore disappeared behind us as we glided out over the water, into darkness. When the moon came up I saw mountains looming in the distance and I thought the sleek would lead us towards them, but he continued to steer Shadow straight out over the river. I couldn’t see the other side.
‘No, Sleek. You’re going the wrong way. You must find the tunnel,’ I cried. ‘Tell him, Siltboy.’
Siltboy had stopped shaking. He stared straight ahead and the wind blew through his hair.
‘I dare not,’ he said. ‘Sleek comes by his own way. He is fierce and trusty guide.’
I clutched Marlie’s cow charm and hoped he was right.
‘How far?’ Siltboy asked.
‘I don’t know. It didn’t seem far when I came with the Siltman, but the tide was out then.’
‘This is tide of time,’ Siltboy said. ‘Long way and long journey.’
The moon moved over the sky as we travelled across the Silver River. From time to time I thought I could still hear howling. I hoped it was just the wind. The water was choppy beneath us, and as the night wore on the wind picked up and small waves broke against us, splashing my feet. I pulled up my legs.
‘Make Shadow ride higher, Siltboy,’ I said. ‘I’m getting wet.’
Siltboy whistled, but Shadow kept gliding just above the waves, moving steadily forward.
As we journeyed on he sank lower, until half of him was in the water. Now my legs were really wet. Soon I was shivering with the cold.
