The image of his mum in the water began to disappear, then Casper felt something land on his knee. He snatched his hand away from the river and in that split second, his mother’s face appeared in his mind – clear and bright and full of warmth. Casper looked down at his knee and was surprised to see Arlo perched there. The dragon snuggled his head against Casper’s leg and it made Casper feel less sure that the answers to his problems lay in new cars and fancy holidays. Perhaps there was something to be said for unexpected dragons – he slid a glance at Utterly – and furious girls in dungarees.
And for a wild moment, Casper found himself hoping for friendship instead of silver. Because the bruised and lonely part of his heart recognised something in Utterly, something in the way she had looked at the boys who passed her on the bridge over the moat and in the way that she had approached the girls in the courtyard. Utterly didn’t fit in either. She was an outsider, just like him, and though he wasn’t quite sure how to build a friendship with anyone, let alone a Rumblestar girl and an oversensitive reptile, he decided that it wouldn’t be entirely dreadful if one somehow ended up happening anyway.
Utterly swivelled round, raised an eyebrow at Arlo, then mumbled, ‘We need to keep our wits about us at all times. So just keep your head down and carry on paddling no matter what sort of magic is fizzing away either side of the canoe.’
The silver waters petered out and the river once again ran crystal clear beneath ordinary alders, but the branches were now so tightly interwoven that almost all of the daylight was shut out. And in that gloomy tunnel, Casper felt sure that he could hear a sound that didn’t quite fit – a slithering sound coming from the bottom of the canoe.
‘Can you hear that?’ he asked.
‘Keep paddling, Casper. Remember what I said.’
The slithering noise came again, and from what Casper could tell, it seemed to be coming from beneath the canoe. Casper listened harder, then he peered over the side of the boat to see weeds twisting up from the riverbed – long and green and trailing algae – but these slippery tendrils seemed to move quite independently from the pull of the current. Casper tried to ignore them and carry on paddling, but when one slithered up out of the water and wound itself around his paddle, he shrieked.
Utterly thumped her oar down. ‘What is it now?!’
‘The weeds are alive!’
Utterly glanced at his paddle. ‘Stop overreacting. You’ve got a tiny bit of riverweed tangled round your paddle. Nothing more.’
She turned away and Casper watched, his face plastered with horror, as more weeds wrapped themselves around his paddle and yanked it under the water.
‘They took it!’ Casper cried. ‘They took my paddle!’
Utterly turned around. ‘You mean you lost it.’
‘I didn’t lose it! They took it!’ Casper pointed to the river, but the weeds swayed with the current as if nothing had happened at all.
‘You are useless!’ Utterly rolled her eyes. ‘Now keep quiet and leave the paddling to me.’
Casper sank into his seat, all thoughts of friendship draining away. Maybe he’d imagined the weeds moving. Could he have been such a coward that even the thought of enchantments had set his mind reeling? Arlo climbed up onto Casper’s arm and patted it, and though it was only a pat, Casper saw something in Arlo’s eyes then. I believe you, he seemed to be saying. I saw it, too.
Utterly paddled on through the tunnel of trees and once again the river began to stir. The weeds shivered, even though the current was sluggish, then they twisted and turned before stretching up towards the surface and bursting over the sides of the canoe, grinding it to a halt.
And then Utterly took notice.
Her paddle clattered into the canoe and she screamed as the weeds coiled round her stomach. Arlo flapped towards her, trying unsuccessfully to puff fire. At the smoke trickling from his nostrils, a few of the weeds wilted, then snapped and fell back into the water. But then more plants poured over the sides, curling round Utterly so that she couldn’t grab her paddle and reaching out towards Casper, too. Casper flung them back, then lunged towards Utterly to do the same, but at the same time, a thicker weed reared up from the water and snatched Arlo. The dragon yelped, had one last unproductive go at blowing fire, then vanished beneath the surface of the river.
‘Arlo!’ Utterly screamed, her face white with panic.
But the weeds only tightened their grasp, winding round her feet and wrapping themselves over and over her legs.
‘Do something, Casper!’ she yelled. ‘I can’t lose Arlo, too!’
More weeds slid over the edge of the canoe towards Casper, and for a moment he was paralysed by fear. He wasn’t brave! He didn’t launch into rivers full of enchanted weeds! Then, suddenly, he found himself kicking away his doubts and standing up – despite his pounding heart and wobbling knees – and doing something very out of character. He threw off his coat and, shouting Arlo’s name, he jumped from the canoe into the river.
The water was writhing with weeds – and though they grabbed at Casper’s arms and feet and face, he pushed down through them until his hands met with something small and scaled. Arlo was thrashing against the weeds but they held him fast, and no matter how hard Casper hauled he couldn’t tear the dragon free. His lungs were aching and his heart was thundering but still he didn’t try to surface, not even when the weeds took advantage of his weakening limbs and curled around him, too. Instead, he stayed down by the riverbed – eyes wide with fear as he snatched at the weeds – until, finally, he managed to pull Arlo free. And then, clasping the dragon, he slammed his boots against the riverbed and pushed up with all the strength he could muster.
The weeds snapped and fell away and then Casper was spluttering at the surface and Utterly, who had somehow managed to saw the weeds in half against the sides of the canoe, was dragging him and Arlo into the boat. Once they were safely inside, she paddled on – fast – and then the trees opened up, the weeds trailed away and the canoe drifted out into a screen of mist. And though Casper couldn’t see a great deal ahead of him, he could see Utterly holding Arlo close as the little dragon coughed and wheezed and gasped and sobbed.
She turned around in her seat and, in a surprised voice, she said: ‘You saved him. You saved Arlo.’
Casper blinked back. He was as shocked as Utterly. And then he blushed, because there was a curious tingling in his chest all of a sudden. It felt a little like scoring full marks in a maths test, only this feeling ran deeper than that, all the way down to his soaking-wet toes.
Utterly shook her head in disbelief. ‘You were actually kind of brave rescuing Arlo like that.’ She paused. ‘I mean, not as brave as me fighting free from those weeds, obviously. But I’m uncommonly courageous—’
Arlo nipped her ear and Utterly shut up.
Casper blushed again. He was clever and rational and always on time. But he had never thought of himself as brave. And for a moment he was surprised at what courage looked like. It wasn’t big and grand and full of purpose. It was haphazard and chaotic and involved a considerable amount of sweating.
Casper squeezed the water from his jumper. ‘I wouldn’t get used to it; it was probably just a one-off.’
Utterly nodded. ‘Probably.’
And Casper couldn’t help feeling a little stung by that because he had secretly been hoping that his actions might have sparked the beginning of a friendship between him and Utterly after all. But it was clear Utterly didn’t seem to think so.
She dug her paddle into the water as Casper wrung out his dungarees. ‘I read about mudgrapple in a history book once but I thought it only grew in the streams over at Dapplemere. That’s why I didn’t believe you. But the drizzle hags must have sneaked some back here for unwanted visitors . . .’
Casper realised that this was an apology of sorts – or half of one, at least. Then Arlo slid down Utterly’s back, hopped onto Casper’s lap and folded himself into a ball there.
‘I didn’t know dragons p
urr,’ Casper said after a while.
Utterly looked at Arlo, then she glanced at Casper and said, very quietly, ‘Only when they feel safe.’
And, as Utterly turned back around, Casper wondered whether it was possible to say sorry in stages, because this felt very much like the other half of Utterly’s apology.
As they travelled, the mist around them started to thicken, and only by peering could Casper and Utterly make out the dank marshland either side of them.
‘When Arlo was snatched by the mudgrapple,’ Casper said, after a while, ‘you said you couldn’t lose him, too.’ He paused. ‘And, well, I wondered if maybe it had something to do with a name I saw on the honours boards in the castle.’ He paused again. ‘Mannerly Thankless.’
Casper left his words hanging in the air, not wanting to risk asking a question directly – he had realised by now that Utterly didn’t react well to them – but he didn’t say anything else either just in case Utterly wanted to talk.
But she kept paddling in silence, even though she had definitely heard Casper because Arlo had settled on her shoulder and was now tugging at her hair to respond. It didn’t help though. And while silence was an improvement on earlier, when Utterly had threatened to throw Casper overboard when he asked about her mum’s note, it still didn’t mean Casper understood her any better.
They sailed on through the mist, then Utterly pointed to a dark shape on the right-hand side of the river. ‘There,’ she whispered. ‘Some kind of building . . .’
She let the canoe drift closer as a house on stilts over the river came into sight. Most of the windows were broken, the thatch on the roof was rotted through and the planks of wood that formed the house had been so badly put together the entire thing seemed to slope to the left. But puffing out of a chimney was what looked to be blue smoke.
Casper read the weather-beaten sign that had been jammed, lopsided, into a pile of mud next to the house.
Welcome to the Damp Squib.
We will endeavour to make your stay as unpleasant as possible.
Casper held his breath as the canoe drifted towards the Damp Squib because on the porch jutting out from the house there were three old ladies sitting in rocking chairs – and all around them the air misted with drizzle. The women wore rags over their hunched frames, their hair was strewn with mud and their feet were webbed. Back and forth the rocking chairs creaked and the drizzle hags stared ahead with empty eyes.
‘I think they might be asleep with their eyes open,’ Casper whispered. Then he leant closer to Utterly. ‘Whatever you do, don’t wake them up before we’ve decided on a plan.’
Utterly nodded, then she fumbled for the mooring rope and chucked it round the Damp Squib sign. And it was all going well – Casper even had time to tidy the canoe a little, which it needed after the business with the mudgrapple – until Utterly yanked the rope to pull the canoe closer to the house and it bumped against the ladder leading up to the porch and the drizzle hags stopped rocking.
Utterly winced and Arlo scuttled up the sleeve of her coat as one by one the hags blinked and three sets of grey eyes fixed on the canoe.
‘Well, well, well,’ crooned the hag in the middle. She was the tallest of the three and her chin was so pointed you could have cut a piece of toast with it. She cricked her neck and Casper shuddered as the bones inside it clicked, but then something far more disturbing happened. The woman’s neck craned out from her shoulders and grew longer and longer, and though the drizzle hag remained slumped in her chair, her neck slid down the ladder like an old snake until her head was hovering before them.
‘So,’ she said, her neck curling around the children as she spoke, ‘you passed through the Silver Tears and all the mudgrapple?’ She smiled, revealing toothless gums, then glanced up at the porch. ‘Come on down, ladies. We have company. It is time to make our guests feel as unwelcome as possible.’
There were several more cricks as the bones inside the necks of the other two hags loosened and then, moments later, their weathered faces coiled around the canoe. Casper tried not to gag at the smell of their breath, a revolting mix of rotten eggs and mould.
‘Allow us to introduce ourselves,’ the tallest of the hags smirked. ‘I am Hortensia Quibble and these are my dear friends, Sylvara Buckweed and Gertie Swamp. It is our displeasure to greet you on this beautifully drizzly afternoon.’
Sylvara and Gertie gave a wheezy snigger.
‘So, how long have you two burplings been friends?’ Gertie asked.
‘We’re not friends,’ Utterly replied sternly. ‘We’re . . . work colleagues. Things are purely practical around here.’
Casper nodded nervously. At least Utterly was clear on the subject. Saving Arlo had confused things a bit, but it seemed there really was no hope whatsoever of them becoming friends. Casper comforted himself with the realisation that he could spend more time thinking about lists, timetables and staying alive instead of worrying about friendships.
Sylvara twisted her neck up to Casper’s face. ‘Come about a message you got from a magical wind, have you? Most people do . . .’
‘Y . . . yes,’ Casper stammered. ‘And if you’re able to help us, we’ll be on our way immediately so as not to bother you a moment more.’
Sylvara hissed, then Hortensia stretched her neck right up to Casper’s face so that their noses almost touched. And Casper realised that the drizzle hags did have teeth. They just weren’t in their mouths. They were dangling on a piece of string around their necks.
‘You break our enchantments,’ Hortensia spat, ‘you wake us up and then you expect us to simply send you on your way with the information you require?’
Beads of sweat prickled on Casper’s forehead.
‘Just because we have sensed dark magic in these parts of late and a handful of disgusting griffins managed to sneak past our enchantments and steal a few marvels this morning –’
Casper’s heart skipped a beat at the thought of Midnights in these parts that very morning.
‘– does not mean that we will yield our wisdom for free.’ Hortensia narrowed her eyes. ‘We are the drizzle hags and any answers we give come at a price.’
Casper thought back to the silver waters. Would finding out where this familiar face was mean losing his sight or his voice or, worse, his memories of home?
In front of him, Utterly straightened up. ‘What will it take to make sense of these words from the cometwhirl: find a familiar face to destroy the Midnights?’
Hortensia, Sylvara and Gertie slid up close to Utterly, their rotten breath pulsing against her cheeks.
‘I think you had better come inside,’ Hortensia sniffed.
Casper glanced at the ramshackle house. A Spanish phrase he’d heard of before had been painted onto the front door, only the wording wasn’t quite how he remembered it: MI CASA is not SU CASA.
Casper leant over towards Utterly. ‘Going in might mean never coming out.’
‘It might,’ Hortensia wheezed. ‘But staying out might mean never going home.’
With that, the drizzle hags wound in their necks and, with their heads in place, rocked back and forth in their chairs. Casper, Utterly and Arlo nodded to one another warily before climbing out of the canoe and making their way up the ladder and onto the porch.
The drizzle hags rose together, their joints clicking so many times it was like listening to a bunch of twigs snapping, and led the way into the Damp Squib over a doormat which bore the words HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS, except the words HEART IS had been painted over so that really the mat said HOME IS WHERE THE ARGUMENTS HAPPEN instead. They entered a gloomy sitting room in which sat two damp sofas that were stained with mud and scattered with cushions embroidered with decidedly glum messages like HOME MISERABLE HOME. And at the far end of the room, rather than a fire crackling in the hearth, there was a cauldron filled with bubbling blue liquid which rose up the chimney as tiny blue droplets and looked exactly like a stream of marbles.
Casper blinked. S
o this was where the world’s rain was conjured, and what he had seen earlier puffing out of the chimney wasn’t blue smoke but marvels – rain in its purest form, caught by Ballooners in spidersilk nets.
Sylvara and Gertie busied themselves with the cork- stoppered bottles on the shelves either side of the cauldron, tipping the contents of a small bottle labelled Ogre Tears (warning: spicy) inside, then adding a few drops from a larger bottle entitled Pitter-Patter of Sprite Feet (best before yesterday). The mixture hissed blue smoke, then more marvels floated up the chimney while Gertie poured in a bottle of Dawn Dew (keep refrigerated after opening) and Sylvara stirred.
Casper gawped as Gertie reached for yet another bottle – Waterfall Essence (handle with care) – and emptied it into the cauldron. He had no idea there were so many magical ingredients in rain . . .
Hortensia, meanwhile, slumped down onto a sofa, motioning for Casper, Utterly and Arlo to sit on the one opposite, then lay her toothy necklace on the coffee table between them.
‘Cometwhirl is often easier to understand once you get your teeth into it,’ she croaked. ‘And I will throw my teeth to give you an answer if you can solve my riddle.’
‘And if we can’t?’ Casper asked.
‘When you can’t,’ Hortensia corrected him, ‘because we at the Damp Squib are here to make your stay as unhelpful as possible, then we shall pickle you.’
‘Pickle us?’ Utterly cried.
Casper gasped. ‘I thought only onions and gherkins got pickled!’
‘And irritating children.’ Hortensia’s eyes flicked towards a collection of jars wedged into wooden pigeonholes in the far corner of the room. ‘We do so like to keep mementos of our guests.’
Casper’s toes curled as he read a few of the labels on the jars – Pickled Eyeball (troll); Pickled Tongue (nymph); Pickled Toenails (ogre); Pickled Left Elbow (anonymous) – then he tried his best to focus on why they had come. ‘What’s the riddle?’
Hortensia snapped her neck loose and it swam close to Utterly and Casper. ‘The more you take, the more you leave behind.’ She blinked two dull eyes. ‘What am I?’ She nudged a bowl of greenish-brown gloop towards them. ‘And do have a bite to eat while you mull that one over; lunch today is river slug with a side of marsh weed.’
Rumblestar Page 10
