So we agreed we’d creep out at midnight, collect the eggs, and head to the Boarding School with them.
Perfect.
I was already in a good mood when we set out too, as we’d listened to the Raffia–Takejby rugby game after dinner. Most of us kids support the Kingdom of Raffia even though it never wins the cup, and we’d all crowded around the wireless. Lili-Daisy is the most passionate supporter as she grew up in Raffia—she’s the reason we got behind the team in the first place—and she always puts on her Raffia scarf and woollen hat to listen. So there we were in our pyjamas, drinking our cocoa, waving our arms around and spilling our cocoa, because they won! Against Takejby! Five-time cup holders!
Close match, too. 28–24.
Right as the game finished, the announcer said, ‘We interrupt this programme for a Special Announcement from Waratah Teevsky.’
That had us shaking our heads at the near-disaster. Imagine if Waratah Teevsky had interrupted the game!
‘It doesn’t bear thinking about,’ Lili-Daisy told us darkly.
Waratah Teevsky is the Director of the K&E Alliance, in case you don’t know that. The K&E Alliance is an organisation that represents all the Kingdoms and Empires. They get together to try to stop wars and to sort out issues like how fast ships can go without smashing into each other, and things like that.
Listen, look it up in a book if you need to know more. I’m not that into politics or, you know, events.
‘I am speaking to you all today,’ Waratah Teevsky blared on the wireless, ‘about the children who have gone missing all over the Kingdoms and Empires.’
‘HUSH UP, EVERYONE,’ Lili-Daisy cried, grabbing the wireless and turning up the volume. ‘WE NEED TO KNOW WHAT SHE SAYS!’
Waratah Teevsky took a deep breath. It was loud coming through the wireless, and Lili-Daisy adjusted the volume back down a bit. ‘The K&E Alliance vows to do all in its power to track down the culprits and return the children!’
‘Blahdy blah,’ Glim put in. ‘All talk but nothing gets done.’
Lili-Daisy nodded grimly at Glim. We all looked at the empty beds where Amie, Connor and Bing should be, and up at the top of the wardrobe. Where was little Jaskafar?
‘My proposal,’ Waratah Teevsky carried on, ‘is that we transfer a huge chunk of the diamond regions in several different Kingdoms and Empires to the Whispering Kingdom. They already have their own diamond mines, of course, but they would appreciate more. In return, they have promised to listen out for Whispers from the future that might help locate the children. The paperwork will be drawn up within the next two days. Thank you and goodnight.’
Lil-Daisy switched off the wireless.
We were all silent for a bit, probably thinking about huge chunks of diamonds.
‘Strange,’ I put in eventually. ‘Why would the Whispering Kingdom need diamonds to hear Whispers about the missing children? Wouldn’t they want to help just for the sake of helping?’
‘It’s always about money,’ Taya said darkly.
Glim and I told everyone how Snatty-Ra-Ra had heard a Whisper from tomorrow that Jaskafar was not in Spindrift anymore.
‘See?’ we said. ‘He didn’t even need a single copper coin to tell us that.’
‘So Jaskafar is not in Spindrift anymore?’ Lili-Daisy asked sadly.
‘He won’t be tomorrow, anyhow,’ we said.
Lili-Daisy sighed, unwound her scarf and pulled off her hat. ‘We’d better call off the search, then,’ she said. ‘You’d all better start lessons again.’
That part was a shame. But we’d known lessons would have to resume at some point anyway.
At midnight, like I said, we headed to Brathelthwaite. The twins and I did our egg-tossing in a fairly random way, but Glim has beautiful aim and she hurled hers straight at the Boarding School’s welcome sign.
Most letters in the sign got hidden by egg splatters. The only ones left, I’ve highlighted here:
If you like, you can write down the highlighted letters and see what Brathelthwaite was now announcing about itself.
I like Glim.
The next day, we were back doing lessons, sleepy but happy.
The schoolroom in the Orphanage gets hot and stuffy, so we open all the windows. But then it gets noisy because we look straight onto the Town Square. So we close the windows.
Then we get too hot and open them.
And noisy, and we close them.
And so on.
Our teacher, Anita, laughs so hard she falls over sometimes. She’s tiny, with dark-gold skin, ears a bit too big for her face, and long eyelashes that curl around—you notice these when she blinks like mad, which she does when she’s cross about losing a game. She’s eighteen years old but she still joins in games with us kids sometimes—usually wins, but is very irritated when she loses. We tease her for that.
Anita grew up in the Orphanage herself. When she was seven, her family’s farmhouse burned down and her parents died in the fire. So she walked from the countryside into Spindrift carrying her baby brother. But the baby was sick. ‘And if I’d been a doctor,’ she says sometimes, blinking her angry eyelashes, ‘I might have been able to make him well…’
For this reason, Anita is studying to be a doctor at night. During the day, she teaches us.
Sad story, I know. But most of us orphans have sad stories. You get used to it. Don’t let it get you down.
‘If a cornfield has turned blue,’ Anita said, starting off today’s lesson, ‘it could be common corn mould. How would you treat that?’
Anita likes to teach us about farming, as it reminds her of her childhood. The Yellow Jewel, her family’s farmhouse was called, because her dad once spilled a tin of yellow paint on the roof, after which the house had glowed like a jewel in the sunlight. She tells us that often, sort of dreamily.
‘Common corn mould?’ Eli replied, not looking up from the newspaper on his desk. ‘Spray it with the tears of antelopes from the Underling Cross Islands. They cry all the time, those antelopes. Very sensitive. I read that in an article on animal mood swings.’
Anita allows the twins to read in class because they remember every word—handy—and because they can multitask. They can read a newspaper, recite multiplication tables, and throw shot-put balls, all at the same time.
She doesn’t let them throw shot-put balls in class though.
‘Exactly!’ she said now. ‘The tears of the antelope! Well done, Eli. And does anybody know where the Underling Cross Islands are?’
‘To the east of the Empire of Ricochet,’ Taya replied, turning a page of her newspaper. ‘But Anita, maybe your cornfield is blue because you’ve accidentally planted blue elouisas? Have you thought about that?’
‘As I’ve never heard of blue elouisas,’ Anita replied, ‘no, I have not thought of that.’
‘It’s a flower. Only grows in the Kingdom of Kate-Bazaar,’ Eli put in. ‘Read that in an article about a horticulture fair.’
‘Only Faery children are allowed to pick blue elouisas,’ Taya added. ‘Read that in a piece about rules once.’ She twitched her nose. The twins are not fans of rules.
Somewhere outside, a Siren shrieked with laughter. ‘Noisy,’ said Anita. ‘Could someone close the windows, please?’
I hopped up and closed them.
‘And why else,’ Anita continued, ‘might a cornfield turn blue?’
‘Maybe a colony of Blue-Hatted Elves has moved in?’ Leesa suggested shyly.
‘Excellent!’ Anita gets very excited when timid kids speak up. ‘So, kids, if you ever have a farm and your cornfield turns blue? Do not rush outside to spray it with antelope tears! Or what might happen?’
‘Elves could drown!’ everyone shouted.
‘Right! Check for elves before you use the tears. If no elves? The tears. Moving on. If your face turns blue, what could that mean?’
‘That you’re choking?’ someone asked.
‘Exactly! Well done! Or else?’
‘That a S
terling Silver Fox has stolen your laughter?’
‘Brilliant! What a class I have! What kids you are!’ Anita smiled happily for so long that we began to chat amongst ourselves. ‘And if your elbows turn blue?’ she cried suddenly. ‘What could that mean? Oh brother, it’s hot in here! We need some air!’
I hopped up again to open the windows.
Outside in the Town Square, locals were buying loaves of bread from Baker Joe, or choosing fruit and vegetables. Some were tossing back beers, or playing chess, or getting their boots repaired. All of this they were doing as noisily as they could. A pair of Siren sisters was sitting out there having coffee and accidentally screaming—they forget themselves when they gossip.
Tourists wandered amongst the locals, getting their fortunes told, buying chocolates, staring at Shadow Mages, and blocking their ears against the Sirens’ screams.
Across the square, alongside the drinking fountain, I could see a girl and a boy around my own age. I didn’t recognise either of them. They were standing perfectly still, looking over towards the Orphanage. Both had shiny dark hair, and both wore fancy coats and hats. The girl wore a blue coat, the boy a dark grey.
‘Boarding School kids,’ I muttered.
For the first time, it occurred to me that the Brathelthwaite kids might try to get revenge for our rotten egg attack.
Surely not.
Surely they’d see that they deserved the rotten eggs?
But these were Brathelthwaite kids. They’re so daft that every time it rains, they probably go, ‘I say, whatever is all that stuff falling out of the sky? Looks like water! But that usually stays in the ocean, doesn’t it? Golly, has the ocean lost its mind then?’
Slow on the uptake, is what I mean. Heads muddled by cream puffs.
Meanwhile, those two kids were out there staring.
Spies.
They were Boarding School spies.
They were calculating our weaknesses. Planning their counter-attack.
When I turned back to the room, ready to beckon Glim and the twins over to check out the spies, Glim and the twins were on the floor. All the kids were on the floor. They were pulling off their shoes and studying their toenails. The twins’ newspapers were spread around their feet so they could carry on reading as they did this.
‘If your toenails turn blue,’ Anita was explaining, ‘and then turn back to normal? It means you are a Spellbinder and can train in the art of Spellbinding. Oh brother, it’s so loud out there, I can’t hear myself think! Finlay?’
I was still by the windows, so I swung around ready to shut them again.
Not possible.
The windows were streaming with rats. Big rats, grey rats, brown rats, whiskery rats, twitching rats, sharp-clawed rats, hundreds of rats, and all of them tumbling over each other in their rush to pour into the room.
Honey Bee
I heard about the rat attack while I was at the Spindrift Town Meeting that night. How frightful it sounded!
Orphanage children innocently learning away and then KERPOW! An influx of stampeding rodents! It really would put you off your geometry.
Poor little rats were confused and terrified, of course, so their claws were out, teeth primed to tear flesh. As if rats running all over the floor and desks, with fur brushing bare skin wasn’t enough, many children were scratched or bitten.
For some reason, the children weren’t wearing any shoes—Oh, but I know the reason. Now that I’ve read Finlay’s chapter, I know. The children were checking their toenails to see if they were Spellbinders. Fair enough.
But such rotten timing! It meant rats running across bare feet!
At the time, of course, we couldn’t understand their shoeless state.
‘They really are too poor for words,’ Rosalind Whitehall muttered, screwing up her nose. ‘No shoes! I mean to say, be poor in the privacy of your own home if you must, but the rest of us do not need to see that poorness! Erk!’
‘They were in their own home,’ I whispered. ‘They were in the Orphanage.’
Rosalind rolled her eyes as if I’d said something terribly daft. She turned back to Victor.
‘Where did you get the rats from anyway?’ she asked.
‘Picked them up super cheap,’ Hamish replied. ‘Fire sale at the Sterling Silver depot. Jolly good deal they were, glossy coats on the lot of them. They came in boxes about yea big, although some of the boxes were more yea big—’
‘SHUSH!’ cried Mayor Franny and hammered her gavel. This conversation, as I mentioned, was taking place at the Spindrift Town Meeting. Why was I at the Town Meeting, you may wonder?
Students of Brathelthwaite are future leaders, Sir Brathelthwaite says, and will one day rule Kingdoms and Empires, laying claim to most of the money and all the biggest houses. Therefore we must practise bossing people about.
So five Brathelthwaite students attend the Town Meeting each week. We sit in the front row and we are supposed to call out, ‘Objection!’ whenever the town council says anything ‘foolish or disagreeable’. Then we must make a ‘rousing speech that will show the simple townsfolk the errors of their ways’. I don’t believe any student has ever done any such thing, though, as Mayor Franny would tear us to shreds—much like the rats tore the orphans to shreds.
This week, it was Victor, Hamish, Rosalind, Carlos and I. Victor had just whispered excitedly about how he and Hamish had attacked the Orphanage with rats. Rosalind was shiny-eyed to hear the story, but Carlos was frowning. Usually, my friend Carlos follows up his frowns with words—he is kind-hearted and would not generally like the idea of children being attacked by rats—but he was very unwell with bronchitis by now and wheezing too heavily to speak.
Anyhow— ‘SHUSH!’ cried Mayor Franny. Up on the stage, she and the other town councillors were proposing a ‘buddy-system’ for children so we’d never wander the streets alone, as well as extra training for constables.
Two local constables leaned against the wall, ‘keeping an eye on things’, and I noticed them raising their eyebrows at each other when ‘extra constable training’ was mentioned. Behind us, about twenty townsfolk were scattered amongst the wooden benches listening. Every now and then, they contributed thoughts.
‘When I trained my puppy,’ Baker Joe called, ‘I found it helpful to say good boy! to him. In a voice like this—’ and he put on a passionate, loving voice: ‘—Good boy!! GOOD BOY!!’
‘Now,’ he continued, ‘what say we use this approach in training local constables? Good boy. Or, for female constables, good GIRL.’
I glanced at the constables to see how they would respond to this, but their faces were carefully blank.
My thoughts drifted. I agreed with Carlos’s frown, and did not think the rat attack fair. Certainly, the Orphanage had attacked our school by hurling eggs, and that had led to another week of punishment. But the eggs hadn’t hurt us, and the orphans couldn’t have known that Sir Brathelthwaite would punish us for—
BOOM!
BOOM!
BOOM!
A sudden pounding on the Town Hall door!
We all swung around. The door flew open. (It’s never locked so there was no need for pounding. I think they just wanted a dramatic entrance.)
A Royal Guard in a dashing red uniform burst forth.
‘All rise,’ he boomed, ‘for Her Majesty, the Queen of the Kingdom of Gusts, Gales, Squalls and Violent Storms!’
A gale seemed to blow across the room now, but that was just gasping and excited jiggling as everyone shoved each other aside, craning to see.
In came the Queen.
There were three guards ahead of her and three behind, but she looked just like an ordinary, pleasant lady, hurrying to do her shopping.
Mayor Franny took the carrot out of her mouth and grinned. ‘Ahoy there!’ she said. ‘Come on up, Majesty! Glad to have you!’
‘This will be the Royal Prerogative,’ Victor told us in his languid way.
‘Eh?’ Hamish blinked.
‘Royal visitors are entitled to attend any town meeting and have the final say on any issue,’ Victor said. ‘There must be something she’s wanting final say on.’
Up on the platform, the Queen got busy discussing dull issues like bylaws with Mayor Franny and the other councillors. Clipboards and papers passed between them. The Queen’s guards gathered around her, their hands clasped behind their backs. I suppose that holding your hands like that gives you good posture. Try it.
‘Any other attacks planned for the Orphanage?’ Rosalind Whitehall asked in a low voice.
‘Steady on,’ I whispered back. ‘Surely the rat attack was enough?’
Carlos wheezed to show his agreement. Hamish turned to Victor, uncertain. ‘What do you say, old chap? We’ve done enough now, no?’
But we were distracted then, as the voices on stage had grown louder. There were also mutters amongst the townsfolk. The voices settled down quickly, and we shrugged and turned back to each other.
‘Hamish and I have formed the Anti-Orphanage League,’ Victor murmured.
‘Have we?’ Hamish said, pleased. ‘I had no idea. But delighted. Absolutely honoured. By the by, what is it?’
Victor ignored the question. ‘First meeting tonight, green common room—’
‘Your Majesty,’ several voices said at once.
Again, we looked up.
‘What’s going on?’ Rosalind whispered.
None of us knew.
‘Indeed!’ The Queen’s voice rose above the clamour. ‘Indeed we shall! The town of Spindrift will be transferred to the Whispering Kingdom.’ She held up a paper. ‘It’s all here in print.’
‘I say,’ Hamish gasped. ‘Is that quite the thing?’
‘Has she lost her mind?’ Victor asked, his eyes shining. Oddly, he seemed delighted by the idea of a queen losing her mind. He’s often bored, you see, and likes a good plot twist.
Now some of the townsfolk were shouting.
‘No offence, Your Majesty, but this is a cartload of crabapple!’
‘You can’t be giving our town away!’
‘Why? I don’t understand why?’
‘Yes!’ many others yelled. ‘WHY?’
The Slightly Alarming Tale of the Whispering Wars Page 6