The Way to Impossible Island

by Sophie Kirtley

  ‘I not need my spear, Mothgirl,’ said Voleboy, and he waggled his bone whistle at her.

  Mothgirl blinked; she did not understand.

  ‘Wolfsong; bearsong; lynxsong; boarsong,’ he said. ‘I have spear because …’ He shrugged. ‘Because man have spear, it is simply the way. But, Mothgirl, I not need my spear to hunt. I not need my spear to make safe. I need my bone whistle.’

  Voleboy offered her his spear again, and this time Mothgirl took it. ‘I give thanks, Voleboy,’ she said. ‘I give big big thanks.’

  Voleboy rubbed between ByMySide’s ears, in the place the wolf loved best. ‘I give thanks you, Mothgirl.’ He smiled, wide and warm-hearted. ‘One day, I will give that promise stone big big thanks!’

  She smiled back at him, then she turned and, spear in hand, Mothgirl and her wolf disappeared into the night forest.

  Dara lifted his tear-blotched face from his pillow. To his surprise it was still day outside. The rain had stopped, and long low beams of sunshine reached into his room like golden fingers on an outstretched hand.

  He sighed a shaky sigh and knelt on his bed, his elbows on his window sill. Out at sea Lathrin Island glowed gorse-yellow and impossible, mocking him almost with its brightness. The sea had changed colour now as well; it was like another sea entirely – placid and pale as a painting. A small white fishing boat crossed the strait; Dara watched it shrink and shrink as it ploughed straight through the water between the buoys that marked the safe route from the big harbour on the mainland to the small harbour out on Lathrin. By the time the boat had reached the island it was small as a bath toy. Dara watched it change course at Owl Rock before skirting the island’s tip and disappearing out into the wild open ocean beyond. Owl Rock was named for a story about the owl who waited for so long on the headland she turned to actual stone; with a bitter little laugh he imagined himself as Dara-shaped rock; waiting, waiting, waiting …

  He sighed again. He’d always loved all those legends about Lathrin Island; Charlie had read them to him so many times when he was little that Dara had known the stories pretty much off by heart even before he learned to read them for himself. Dara lifted the book from his window sill, its cover worn soft and its corners all raggedy; he ran his fingers over the once sparkly stars and the worn-out swirls of silver writing on the cover: The True Legends of Lathrin Island. He shivered, remembering that funny tingly dreamy feeling he’d always had when he was a little boy that one day he’d be part of these stories too; that he’d go to Lathrin and do something brave and heroic and legendary. Dara bit his lip.

  Sinking back into his pillow, Dara opened the book for about the millionth time and he read.

  The Golden Hare

  Once, long long ago, when all our world was new, a hare was born. The other hares didn’t quite know what to make of her because this hare wasn’t at all like they were: she wasn’t brown or grey or black. The new hare was different; she had fur of pure gold and eyes of blue.

  ‘She’s surely bewitched,’ whispered the other hares. ‘She’ll bring us ill luck.’

  The golden hare’s mother and the golden hare’s father paid them no heed. ‘A hare is a hare,’ they said, and they raised her just the same as all their other young leverets.

  But as the golden hare grew long-eared and tall, she found it harder and harder to ignore the sharp looks and whispers as she passed. Each morning she wished she would wake at dusk with brown eyes and brown fur, invisible like that, one of many. But alas it was not to be, for the golden hare grew more golden by the day, and also more lonely.

  One terrible winter a sickness came amongst the hares. One by one their ears drooped and their eyes closed, never to reopen.

  ‘We told you that golden hare would bring ill luck,’ said the other hares. ‘She must leave before her witching sickness catches every last one of us.’

  So one full-moon night they drove the golden hare out across the frozen fields all the way to the sea. ‘Go!’ they cried, forcing her into the icy water. ‘Swim away from us and never return!’

  And the golden hare swam through the dark water all night long. As dawn broke, she saw land looming upon the horizon. Weary and heartsore, she swam towards it. Finally she crawled exhausted on to the sand and she fell into the deepest of sleeps.

  When the golden hare awoke she saw another hare, whose fur was white as ice and who was sitting upon the sand by her side, watching her with the kindest purple eyes.

  ‘What is this place?’ asked the golden hare.

  ‘This is Lathrin Island,’ the other hare replied. ‘All are welcome here, golden hare.’

  And, filling the fresh island air, came the voices of hares – bronze and gold and silver; blue-eyed and black-eyed and green-eyed. ‘You are welcome, golden hare. You are welcome,’ they sang.

  So the golden hare stayed and made a home of it.

  Some say that she lives there still, and that if you catch a glimpse of that golden hare you’ll have good luck through all your waking days.

  Dara rested the book on his lap and looked back out at the sea; he tried to imagine a hare, a golden hare, swimming all that way. But how would a hare know the safe way to cross? How would an animal know the way to avoid the invisible currents of the Swathe that dragged even boats out to sea? Or how would a hare know to avoid the Needle Rocks that lurked underwater, unseen, all around the island’s shore? Dara felt a sudden flash of rage searing through him.

  It was stupid. It was stupid and impossible. He’d always believed in these stories when he was little. He’d believed in the ridiculous Golden Hare and the giant owl who got turned to stone and the old lady who was a secret smuggler. He snapped the book shut. ‘The True Legends of Lathrin Island,’ he spat. Even the stupid title didn’t make sense. True stuff was true. And legends were made up. That was just a fact. He’d been a fool, a great big baby, to believe in it. Any of it. A stupid hare and a stupid happy ending. It was time he grew up and stopped believing in ridiculous, untrue, impossible things.

  Suddenly he hated The True Legends of Lathrin Island. He flipped open the stupid, beautiful book again and stared furiously at Charlie’s ‘Happy 7th Birthday, Dara!’ writing on the title page.

  With a little gasp, Dara ripped the title page clean out.

  Then he tore out the next page.

  And the next and the next and the next, letting each page fall on to his bed one after another after another, until he’d torn out the whole of ‘The Secret Smuggler’.

  Dara could hear the far-away laughter of children playing on the beach, splashing in the sea, running in the dunes.

  Page by page by page Dara ripped the stories from his book – ‘The Porpoise Road’. ‘The Swan Children’. ‘The Banshee Moon’. ‘The Owl Rock’. Until only ‘The Golden Hare’ remained, looking little and lost in the fatness of the empty binding. Dara sat marooned in a sea of paper. In his hands flapped the almost-empty cover of The True Legends of Lathrin Island, still glinting with stars.

  Dara looked at what he’d done and he didn’t cry. He felt cold. And heavy, like he had been transformed into basalt; igneous rock like Lathrin Island; red-hot lava turned hard with time. Lathrin Island. Dara blinked. The plan he’d had since forever played itself for the millionth time in his mind, clear and unchanged. Calm settled upon him. In a way nothing had changed. He still knew exactly what he wanted to do.

  Ripping ‘The Golden Hare’ out of the cover in one chunk, Dara shoved it under his pillow, then he got up and reached under the bed for his backpack.

  Dara unzipped his bag and packed his water bottle. His binoculars. His phone. His spare puffer. His raincoat. A change of socks. A change of pants. His waterproof torch (he checked it first – circle of light under the bed – it worked). His wallet, with a five-pound note in it. His penknife.

  He felt so level-headed and primed and steady he imagined himself almost like an army commando or like a spy or …

  No. Dara shut down the imaginings. He was done with stupid, mad
e-up stuff. He unzipped the pocket where he kept his puffer and his lucky brass hare. The stupid pointless hare peeped dully up at Dara. He shoved the packet of pink pills on top of it and zipped the pocket back up again. There was no such thing as luck. And legends weren’t true. He was fed up with waiting and hoping and dreaming.

  He opened the door and went to the bathroom; he could hear the TV on downstairs. He brushed his teeth, brought his toothbrush back to his room, packed it. Dara checked his oxygen level. It was good. He dressed, put his warmest red hoody on, slung his backpack over his shoulder, went to the door.

  Dara looked around his room at the mess of paper. No – he couldn’t leave it like this; when Mum and Dad came in to check on him they’d know immediately something was up.

  When Mum and Dad came in to check on him.

  Dara thought for a moment. Then he snatched a blank endpaper page from the floor and wrote on it: DO NOT DISTURB. He stuck it to his door.

  But just to be sure, he gathered up all the other pages and scrunkled them each into a ball and shoved each ball under his duvet, sculpting the shape of a sleeping Dara.

  A different Dara, a Dara he should’ve been, could’ve been, would’ve been …

  But wasn’t.

  Real Dara looked out of the window at the golden evening sky and narrowed his eyes at Lathrin Island. He glanced down at the scrunkled page in his hand – it was the stupid little map from the front of the book; Dara shoved it in his pocket.

  Silently he opened his door and crept out on to the landing. He tiptoed down the stairs, past the triangle of light and the TV voices that spilt from the open living-room door. In the kitchen Dara took two bananas from the fruit bowl and the box of matches from the shelf by the cooker. Dara swallowed. Wishing. Hoping. Waiting. He’d had enough.

  Dara slid his feet into his embarrassing yellow wellies and slipped out of the back door of Carn Cottage, closing it behind him with the quietest little click. He walked away through the dunes; the wind tumbled his hair and the long grass whispered.

  He was going to Lathrin Island.

  The wind made whisperings in Mothgirl’s ears as she trudged onwards, up and up the slope of Carn Hill, pushing her way through the girl-high grass. Foot-worn and weary, her whole body ached. Her spirit ached too as thoughts of Pa and Vulture and Hart panged her, spear-sharp.

  Hanging her head, Mothgirl blinked again through the truth of her own rememberings; for the whole of her long journey from home to here, she had seen no trace of Hart at all: no sign of his waymarker, no footprints in the mud; no strand of his hair snagged on a twig; no spat-out fruit pips or left-over nutshells. Nothing. She sighed. The sighing winds breathed around her.

  ByMySide’s sudden-sharp bark cut through the air. For a small moment, Mothgirl paused; her wolf barked again. But it was not his bark of warning, ByMySide had made his ‘Come! Look This!’ bark and Mothgirl’s heart lifted; with the last of her energy she ran through the grasses until finally she stood, next to her wolf, upon the summit of Carn Hill.

  Spreading her arms like eagle-wings, Mothgirl let the wind cool her hot skin. She looked back beyond the grasses, over the long way they had journeyed, all through the night then all through the day: the glint of river marked her path as it twisted and turned, appearing and disappearing, through the great forest. Far off, she could just see the outline of her very own Spirit Stone on her very own hill; it seemed a tiny pebble from here. ‘Home,’ she murmured and even the word was smaller now too.

  Mothgirl turned and looked out beyond Carn Hill to where the river spread, broad and slow and gleaming, across the Great Plain. The wind flapped at her deerskins and tugged at her hair and Mothgirl sighed – this place was so wide and vast and strange; was Hart here at all? Surely Vulture had not spoken truth. Surely Hart was not truly gone.

  The sinking sun lit the dusty flatlands red as embers so even shadows were dim, and suddenly Mothgirl remembered a game she and Hart used to play in the forest, back when she was a small small girl. ‘Make light,’ breathed Mothgirl, making the echo of her brother’s long-ago voice in her own. ‘If you are lost, my sister, make light and I will find you.’ And Mothgirl’s mind filled then with the rememberings of how she would run in the darkness, leaving a trail of glowing moonmoss amongst the trees for her brother to find her by.

  And he always did find her.

  Mothgirl smiled at the remembering of how she would hide in the ferns, and listen to her brother’s footsteps drawing closer as Hart followed her trail of light through the darkness. Her giggle-squeal of joy when he found her. The sleepish comfort as he carried her home to their hut upon his back; she was as small then as Eelgirl was now. So long ago.

  Mothgirl’s heart ached for her brother – if only she had a pouch full of moonmoss now! If only Hart would see her light and find her and they could return home together to send Vulture running. If only all would be as it was before.

  ‘Where you, Hart?’ whispered Mothgirl as she squinted right out to the furthest fringes of the Great Plain where Lathrin Mountain loomed. She shuddered. No. Vulture must have been filling their ears with untruths when he said that he had seen Hart’s waymarker out there at Lathrin Mountain. Why would Hart ever think to go to that dark place where restless spirits roamed? Hart was brave but he was not foolish.

  And she was not foolish either. She tightened her jaw and gazed out at the jagged craggy shape of Lathrin Mountain, looming dark and dreadful, right where the river melted and was swallowed completely by the Big Water. The sky beyond was streaked blood-red, bruise-dark and amber – the colours reflected in the far waves like a warning.

  ‘Ha!’ said Mothgirl aloud as suddenly she realised. She knelt by her wolf and whispered her new thought in his flicking ear. ‘It is a trap, ByMySide. A trap! Vulture wants us to go to Lathrin Mountain to get snatched by spirits. But we will not trip into his trap, my wolf.’

  But ByMySide only answered with a ‘HHHRRFF’ and a toss of his head; he did not care for spirits and warning colours. He cared for meat. Ears high, he eyed the shadowy grasses and bracken on the hilltop for signs of small life.

  His nose twitched and Mothgirl saw the gleam in his eyes which showed that, even though his pack was two-legged and hairless, he was wild-wolf still. He licked his lips. A meal was near.

  ‘What creature you smell, ByMySide?’ breathed Mothgirl, peering hard into the dim shadows of the rustling grasses. ‘Juicy boar? Tender deer?’ Her empty belly rumbled.

  ByMySide shrank low to the ground, nostrils wide, eyes aglow and trained on a bramble clump. Mothgirl followed his gaze, spear raised.

  The whisper of leaf on leaf. The tiny crackle of small paw on dry ground. And from beneath the clump of brambles snuffled a cautious, listening rabbit. She nibbled grass, fast as fast, and even in the dim of the evening shadows, Mothgirl could see her fear in the nervous way she peered about her, like she always half waited for an attack to spring.

  And the wolf sprang.

  He was arrow fast, all fur and teeth and claws, but this rabbit was quick and ready! She leaped away from ByMySide and as she bounded into the light Mothgirl saw that she was not a rabbit at all; she was a hare; long-legged, tall-eared and with fur of a colour that Mothgirl had never seen before in all her days in the forest – not nut-brown like other hares, but pale as honey. And the hare was foolish as well as strange for she did not flee back to the safety of her twisted-bramble shelter; no, she leaped down the dusty slope of Carn Hill, with ByMySide bounding behind her.

  A fine long hare would make good good eating; Mothgirl tightened her grip on Voleboy’s spear and joined the chase. She charged, tumbling over her feet and righting herself again; the hare a bright shadow, her wolf a grey blur, Mothgirl ran fast as fast, and as she reached the flatlands she ran quicker still and she yawped then too! High and wild!

  ByMySide howled in answer to his girl and together they ran out on to the vastness of the Great Plain, dry dust rising in red puffs from the thuddings of their fast
fast feet.

  But the hare was faster.

  Mothgirl dug her heels into the earth and skidded to a halt. Panting, she fixed the running hare with her eyes and raised her spear. Aiming near the yellow-thorn bush where the hare would be in the next moment’s time, she shaped her throw in the empty air and she was just about to hurl her spear when the honey-pale hare stopped.

  Ears tall and alert, the hare turned and faced Mothgirl. And Mothgirl gasped. Her spear arm wobbled. ByMySide stopped running too. For the hare’s eyes were blue.

  Blue as lightning. Bright as stars.

  ‘Spirit hare!’ breathed Mothgirl. Awestruck and fearful, she shaped the make-safe circle sign with her fingers, for protection. She had heard tell of spirit creatures in Pa’s firestories but she had never seen one in true flesh. And still the spirit hare stared with watchful star-blue eyes.

  Suddenly Mothgirl realised: the spirit hare was not staring at her; she was staring beyond her. Then Mothgirl’s ears heard what the hare had heard first.

  Heartbeat deep and deeper. A rumbling beneath her feet and in the air all around. She turned from the spirit hare. And Mothgirl’s breath caught in her throat as she saw what made the thunder-dark distant din.

  Behind them on the Great Plain rose a huge cloud of sunset-red dust, big as a mountain. Mothgirl squinted at it, and within its billows and swirls she spied the dim shadows of horns and tails and hooves and heads, thrust from the dust and gone again in an instant.

  ‘Aurochs!’ she gasped, breathless with awestruck fear.

  Aurochs! A whole herd of huge long-horned aurochs were stampeding across the Great Plain! Mothgirl could feel the pounding of their hooves in the ground, like the rumblings of riverfalls after big rain, but louder, louder, louder!

  And she cried out in terror and she turned and she ran. For the cloud of thundering aurochs was coming closer, unstoppable and mighty. The herd was charging towards Carn Hill! Towards her!