‘What’s the matter?’ said Mandy.
‘Nothing …’ He pressed his fingers into his temples, trying to make the buzzing noise stop, but it wouldn’t go away, and it was then that they heard a terrible shout. Fraser, the Duchess and Lady Anne all stopped, and looked around.
It was a sound that should not be heard at a cocktail party in the English countryside. It was a scream, long and painful. Edward didn’t care now whether anyone saw him. Everyone was looking in the direction of the noise. Something was moving towards the party, something that was bubbling with rage.
It was Mr Bartlett. He was stumbling along, shouting incoherently, babbling a stream of rubbish, full of sound and fury. His tie was askew, hair at angles, he was clutching a bottle. He was splashing wine everywhere. He wandered up to the party, not noticing the commotion that he was causing. He was laughing.
Murmurs of worry were running through the crowd.
Edward watched Bartlett approaching, grateful that his appearance had deflected Lady Anne away from him.
‘What is he doing?’ asked Mandy.
The buzzing noise had risen to a shriek in Edward’s head, and he was finding it difficult to balance. He held on to the wall for support, though it felt as if the force within him was so strong he could break down the Manor and bring all of its secrets crashing with it.
‘Are you all right?’ said Mandy. She was watching Edward, concerned, her attention diverted from the scene below. But Edward did not reply.
He saw that Imp had taken an interest in Mr Bartlett and was sniffing and snuffling around his shiny brown brogues. He watched Bartlett swatting at the beast. ‘Bloody irritating bloody little dog,’ he said.
‘Come on, Geoffrey. It’s time we went home, friend. Come on.’ Edward heard that O’Brien was speaking in the tone of voice he used when he spoke to Imp.
The dog was yapping and whimpering around Bartlett’s legs. Bartlett was becoming increasingly annoyed. He swatted and Imp growled, showing his terrible teeth.
‘Calm down, Geoffrey. Here, Imp. Come here. Imperative!’ said O’Brien desperately.
Mr Bartlett wrenched free of O’Brien’s grasping arm, and to Edward and Mandy’s horror and disgust started to kick the dog, hard. Edward felt each kick as if it were aimed at his ribs, and doubled up, coughing. Mandy tried to comfort him, but he brushed her off.
‘I have to watch this.’
Bartlett grabbed hold of Imp. A circle widened out around them. Edward saw Bartlett grappling with Imp. His hands were around Imp’s throat. The dog was writhing, frantic; there was squealing and yipping and Mr O’Brien was shouting too and then, suddenly, there was nothing. Mr Bartlett held the dog aloft, triumphant, like a seer who has read the entrails and seen destruction, and Edward realised, along with Mandy and the rest of the crowd, as the noise in his head rose to an unbearable pitch, he realised, with a sickening, final crunch in his stomach, that Imp was dead.
Edward saw the crowd of people widen around O’Brien, and saw O’Brien being sick on the grass, globules of spit sprayed from his mouth. The science master wiped the back of his hand across his lips and a long string of mucous joined his jaw and his hand, like a spider’s silk.
It was as if someone had turned off a switch and sucked all the noise out of the party. People held their glasses halfway to their lips, unsure how to react. Edward noticed that only Lady Anne ate her olives, slowly and deliberately, holding a glass of sea-dark wine.
O’Brien held his hands to his eyes, bent over and vomited on to the grass again, heaving and shuddering. Mrs Ferrers ran to him, alarmed. Mr Bartlett let out a scream like a frenzied warrior. He tried to get to O’Brien, who stood, bent over, waving away any help, coughing up a stream of clear bile. He held Imp aloft, and ran into the centre of the courtyard, whooping and yelling, and, as if it were the climax of an ancient ritual, he placed the body of the dog Imp where the pillar had been. He turned round and yelled, as if he were expecting applause, or praise, or for them all to join in his exultation.
And then he started weeping. Edward and Mandy could not bear to watch him. It was bad enough when one of the boys cried. But Bartlett was in a position of authority, and he was now just a mass of wobbling phlegm and flesh. Then a change came over him; he stopped sobbing, and stood up, looking around at the world as if he had not noticed it before.
‘Geoffrey?’ said Fraser. ‘Come with me.’ Bartlett went with him like a foal, shaky and trusting. Noise slowly started seeping back into the party, and it soon rose to a roar, and as if in opposition, that in Edward’s mind abated.
‘What happened there?’ said Mandy.
‘I … I don’t know,’ said Edward. ‘But listen to me. You’ve got to keep watching Phipps and Lady Anne. I don’t know what they’re up to. But they’re dangerous. Listen to what they say to each other. You’ve got to help me. You can listen in on them when they’re not paying attention. OK?’
Mandy nodded. Edward escaped back up to the dorms, his heart racing and his mouth dry. He leapt on to his bed. His dorm-mates turned to look at him, interested. ‘You’d never believe,’ he said. Then he stopped. They were all standing by the window. They had all heard the fracas below, but couldn’t make out exactly what was going on. Their view was obscured by the shifting branches of a tree.
‘What?’ said someone.
‘Nothing …’ he said. Because he could feel under his pillow the presence of something and he put his hand under it to find the book. It had come back, externalised itself.
What he had seen when he’d opened the book came back to him. That impulse he had felt then for Mr Bartlett’s destruction, for Imp’s death, had somehow come true. That awful creature that he had seen in the book, that had asked him what he wanted before the knight had rescued him, had drawn it out of him and made it real.
Edward could hardly sleep. All that night he felt the presence of the book. It radiated a gloating, glutted complacence. All night he dreamt of destroying it, to stop its powers. But he did not think that he would be able to. Though somewhere, in the back of his mind, which he hardly dared to admit, he felt a grim sense of satisfaction at Mr Bartlett’s humiliation.
Seven
Owls made their eerie cries outside the dormitory window; Edward thought he heard the thundering of hooves in the courtyard, but when he looked out of the window there was nothing there. He looked at his watch in the moonlight–it was three o’clock in the morning. He hadn’t been able to sleep. The book was sitting under his mattress. He felt a bending of reality, as if a weight had been pressed down upon a thin sheet of plastic. He had read about the invisible dark matter that makes up the universe, and he wondered if that was what the book was made of.
Impatient, weary, strained, he decided to take it out again. As quietly as he could, he got out of bed to reach under his mattress for the book, and leapt on to the window seat.
He gripped it firmly and, ignoring the pulse of pain that throbbed up his arms, opened the book. The drawing of the man and the woman confronted him again. But this time he was prepared for the nightmarish results. The picture started to move. A great rushing noise filled his ears. He found himself speaking to the book, asking it for help. And, as if it were some great, wild intelligence, it seemed to answer him.
Something was different now. He felt detached from his body. Something was grabbing hold of him, and pulling him–his consciousness–out. With a creeping sense of horror he realised that he had somehow been yanked free, and for a second he saw his body lying on its back. How calm I look, he thought, terrified, and he was sucked into the blackness of the book.
He was falling, fast, and before he knew it he’d hit the ground, hard. He rolled over. Raising himself up on an elbow gingerly, he looked around. He was in a thicket. There was a low sun just visible through the trees, making little shards of beams. He felt the warm dampness of grass beneath him. A smell of late summer, the richness of fennel. He was dressed, incongruously, in his pyjamas. Slightly bruised fr
om the fall, he got up, dusting off twigs and leaves.
‘You are lucky, child,’ said a voice, gentle, low, and Edward spun round to find himself staring at a knight.
‘What do you want?’ said Edward, on his guard. The knight’s helm was off. His sprightly horse was tethered nearby, munching on long grasses.
‘Edward, do not fear me. There are many worse things than I. You must listen to me. There is great danger. I have chosen you as the one to aid me in fighting it. You are the carrier, Edward. It is a difficult task, and you have many enemies already.’
Me? thought Edward. You have chosen me? Confusion and fear spread through him, but he tried to stay strong. How was he to know that it wasn’t another trick, like the ice monster?
‘How do I know that I can trust you?’ he said, as forcefully as he could.
The knight looked solemn. ‘You must trust me, child. You have a task, and it must be performed, or else your world will be overcome by those who seek what you have.’
Edward was still not sure what to think. The knight noticed his discomfort. He unsheathed his sword, the metallic noise sounding loud in the quiet of the forest. Edward stepped back.
‘Wait, child.’ The knight knelt down. ‘Here.’ He held out the sword to Edward, its pommel towards the boy. ‘Take it.’ The knight’s neck was bare.
Edward held the sword above the knight’s head. The low sun was warm, he heard the horse snorting, whinnying to itself. He had never held a sword before. It was heavy. For a moment he wondered what it would be like just to draw back the blade and let it fall on to the knight’s neck. He shifted his weight, considering how much strength it would take to make a clean break. Would he be able to hack through in one go? The thought made him shudder and he lowered the sword.
‘It’s OK,’ he said. ‘Please, get up.’
Slowly, assuredly, the knight raised himself. Edward held out the brand to him. ‘Thank you,’ he said. Sunlight flashed off the knight’s armour.
‘Where are we?’ said Edward.
‘In a world created for you by the book–the Other Book. When you first opened it, you lost yourself to its dark power and allowed another to control you. This time you have shown you can control it. You are not strong enough to use its full powers.
‘Too long has the Book been absent, too long have I fought against the creatures of the Other World. I am weakening and it is time for the prophecy to be fulfilled. You must restore the Other Book. You have seen what it can do. And I must tell you, when you use it next, if you do not put up defences then she will hear you and manipulate you again. At all costs you must keep it from her.’ The knight’s face was set, stern.
‘Defences? What do you mean?’
‘Strengthen your mind.’
‘But how … how will I be able to do that?’
‘Just think of what you love most. Think of your family, your friends, those people with whom you feel strong.’ The knight looked sad for a moment. ‘At the due time, you will also have to make a sacrifice.’
‘What? What sort of sacrifice?’ Edward felt a sense of purpose fill him. He looked at the knight’s kind, handsome face. It seemed to Edward that this was the moment he had been looking for, all of his life. He wanted to do what the knight asked of him. It was a quest, something in which he could prove himself. ‘I’ll do whatever it takes,’ he said quietly.
The knight nodded. ‘Excellent, child,’ he said. ‘Now it is meet that I instruct you –’ He stopped. ‘Hold fast!’
The sun was dimming. Where before it had been a pleasant, orange glow, it was fading; before Edward’s eyes it began to descend, rapidly. The onset of cold was sudden; Edward shivered in his thin pyjamas.
‘She hears us!’ The knight drew his sword. ‘Be wary! Lord knows what she has sent …’
The forest was becoming darker. Edward watched the bright green leaves of the welcoming trees begin to wither and fall off, shrivelling up until the warm bark turned black. The grass too browned as if it had been scorched.
He sensed that many creatures were concealed around him, their eyes all bent on him, and Edward had a dizzying impression of standing on the edge of a vast, howling abyss, buffetted by strong winds.
The knight shouted at him, ‘You must go. Now! Beware those who seek it for their own gain … the line of the wizard and witch is strong …’ The knight’s horse whinnied in fear, and he went to it. ‘Calm, Beaumont,’ he said. He hoisted himself up on it.
Creatures began to come out of the woods, creatures that Edward had seen when he had opened the Book for the first time. ‘Go! Go now!’
‘How?’ shouted Edward.
‘Think yourself back into your body!’ The knight settled himself into the saddle. Bloodthirsty and lordly he looked, his blade shining as he swirled it around his head.
‘I don’t understand! I don’t understand!’ said Edward helplessly; as the creatures began to snake out of the trees, he thought as hard as he could of his bed and his body: he felt himself swirling, whirling, he felt the force of a terrible wind; there was a shattering noise.
He was breathless, choking. Shivering. He did not dare to open his eyes. Slowly, blinking, he crumpled them open.
He was safe. He was on the window seat. He fell into bed, ashen-faced.
The Other Book … that was what it was called. So strange, and terrible, and it was his. He put it back under his mattress, not daring to keep it near his skin, and drifted into fitful, dream-haunted sleep.
Eight
The next day when the bell for assembly rang, everyone was in a sombre mood. Masters rushed here and there, hurried and harassed, answering questions sharply. There was absolutely no question of a cover-up. All the boys with dorms that faced on to the courtyard had heard the disturbance. Some had seen what had happened. It was fast becoming a myth. Bartlett the Puppy Slayer.
The walls of Great Hall were lined with masters. They were all grave, in various pensive poses. The boys were all murmuring quietly as they lined up, which was odd, because usually they would be running around, playing games, until they were quietened down by the master in charge. Will came up to Edward.
‘Nice bags,’ he said.
‘Huh?’
‘Under your eyes.’
‘Oh yeah. I couldn’t sleep last night.’ He didn’t want to say anything else, and Will didn’t push him.
Edward wasn’t really paying attention to what was going on. He thought about the raven, the prophecy, Mr Bartlett and the knight, and how they were connected. He wondered whether the raven had been a sign, who had written the prophecy. The knight had said, ‘You have seen what it can do.’ Could it be possible that he, through the Other Book, had caused Bartlett’s breakdown? And the awesomeness of the task which had been set him: restore the Other Book … but to whom?
Fraser was looking strained. ‘Sit down,’ he said, very quietly, but everyone heard him. Fraser glanced gloomily around the room. ‘Last night you may have heard, or seen, many things. I’d like to set the matter straight. Mr Bartlett has been taken ill. He has gone on an extended sabbatical and we hope that he will return when he is better.’
This blatant lie caused murmurings from the boys. They all knew that Mr Bartlett had done something horrific.
‘Silence,’ said Fraser, and there was silence for a moment, but then the huge doors of Great Hall opened. Everybody swivelled to look at the latecomer.
Lady Anne de la Zouche shimmered in, followed by Mrs Phipps. Lady Anne settled into a chair by the door, but Phipps remained standing. She began to shuffle, slowly, around the back of the room, her malign gaze grazing over every head in the room. Edward’s skin was crawling. She had stopped, deliberately, at the end of his row. He could feel her looking at him. It felt as if she could see deep into his brain, into its coiling, gleaming folds, and tear out the thoughts. Edward tried to make his mind blank, and focused on the comforting figure of Mr Fraser, though all he could think about was the Other Book. It hadn’t disappeared. He ha
d locked it into his overnight case, and stashed it under some papers and boxes under his bed. He hoped it was safe there. The knight had said he could now control it. Maybe it only disappeared when it needed to make his thoughts real.
‘I have another announcement to make. We’re very lucky–we won’t have to look far for a replacement English teacher. One of our governors has kindly agreed to step in. Lady Anne de la Zouche,’ said Mr Fraser, and motioned to her to come up. She walked slowly, elegantly, up the middle of Great Hall. Edward stopped breathing, and elbowed Will in the gut.
She walked like a model up a catwalk–poised, confident. When she stopped by Mr Fraser, he looked wan and tired by comparison with her brightness.
The headmaster shook her warmly by the hand. ‘Lady Anne was at Magdalen with me. She read English literature.’ He glanced at her, and she nodded warmly. ‘Lady Anne is intimately connected to the school. Her family, the de la Zouches, were the owners of Oldstone Manor until the 1970s. It is an old, old title–and the only one that passes directly through the female line as well as the male. There are many de la Zouche tombstones in the churchyard, and indeed many portraits dotted around Oldstone. There are two or three in here.’ He pointed to the enormous portrait of the vicious-looking man above the huge fireplace.
Edward remembered that the tombstone he had put the raven on had been a de la Zouche grave … maybe that had something to do with Lady Anne. Was it possible that she could control people? Who was it that had made Imp leave the raven? Edward shuddered, imagining her as a mad puppet-master, swinging little figures from her hands.
‘Lady Anne will continue to stay in the guest house, which is, as you all know, strictly out of bounds. Now, boys. Let’s all give Lady Anne a Rousing School Welcome!’
This was the cue for the boys to clap and stamp their feet, which they did, very loudly. At Mr Fraser’s signal they gave three cheers. Edward thought that they were all deeply affected by Lady Anne. It was as if a magnet had been put down on a sheet of paper scattered with iron filings that grouped around it. He wondered if anyone would be able to resist her.
The Other Book Page 8