But Bando didn’t make a sound. He cringed away, like a bullied child, avoiding Robert’s eyes and shrinking back against the wall.
Robert felt sick. Revolted. He wanted to slide off the ledge and race out of the cave. To escape from everything. He let himself imagine what it would be like to burst out of the tunnel and run and run, across the short, green grass to the other side of the park.
Lorn dropped her plaiting and came flying across to Bando. Squatting down beside him, she put an arm around his huge shoulders and stretched up to whisper in his ear. Bando shook his head sulkily for a moment or two, but she went on whispering.
Nate was talking to Perdew. He stopped in mid-sentence and came back to the scattered woodpile. Without looking at Bando and Lorn, he picked up a log and brought it up the ramp.
"There you are," he said, squatting down by Robert’s feet. "Shove that on to keep the fire going until Bando calms down. Lorn will get him settled in a minute."
Robert glared at the log, not taking it. "Why does everyone keep treating me as though nothing’s happened? Didn’t you hear what I said last night? I’m leaving."
"I know you’re leaving," Nate said steadily. "But you’re here now. And the fire needs stoking."
"And that’s the most important thing in the world?" Robert looked up angrily. "Don’t you remember a different life? Without all this endless work?"
Nate met his eyes without wavering. "We don’t remember. We look forward."
He said it firmly, but his voice was dead. As if he were reciting something. Robert thought of the look they’d exchanged the night before.
"You do remember though, don’t you?" he said softly. "When I said I was going back—you knew how I felt."
There was no reaction. Nate’s face was fixed like a mask.
Robert pushed a bit harder. "You want to go back, too, don’t you?" he murmured. "But you’re scared."
There was a tense silence. Then Nate nodded at the fire and held out the log again. Robert took it impatiently and rolled over toward the brazier. He thrust the log into the flames, ramming it in so hard that sparks went shooting up to the roof.
When he rolled back, Nate was staring at him. Robert sat up and leaned forward.
"Why don’t you come with me?" he said softly.
"I—"
Nate was struggling. Robert understood that he had asked something forbidden, but he knew it was the right question. He said it again, leaning closer so that their heads were almost touching.
"Come with me, Nate. We’ll do better if we go together. And you want to come, don’t you?"
For a moment, Nate was completely still. Then, very faintly, he nodded. Robert grinned and held out his hand, and Nate took it, gripping it hard. Then he turned and went down the ramp to fetch another log.
Robert closed his eyes and took a long, slow breath. My friend, he thought. He’s my friend and he’s coming with me.
When he opened his eyes again, Nate was back, holding out the next log.
"What’s your name?" Robert said. Speaking so low that no one else would hear. "What’s your real name?"
Immediately he knew that he’d made a mistake. Nate flinched and drew back, shaking his head. There was no time to repair the damage. Before Robert could say another word, there was a loud gurgle of laughter from below and Bando shouted up at them, "Get down, Nate! You’re in the way. I’m doing the woodpile—and I’m racing Lorn. I have to get it straight before she brings the breakfast!"
He came charging over to the logs and began to stack them, lifting them as easily as matchsticks. Nate shook his head at Robert and grinned, holding out the log. "Better take this quickly, before Bando throws me off the ledge."
The moment for questions had gone. Robert took the log, smiling ruefully.
Nate ran off down the ramp, hurrying to catch up with Lorn as she went to fetch the breakfast. Following with his eyes, Robert saw a still figure beyond them, in the shadows. It was Cam. Watching everything.
CAM KEPT ROBERT AND BANDO STOKING NEARLY ALL DAY. LORN brought them water and food, but no one came to take over. By the evening, Robert was furious and tired and dehydrated.
That was the moment Cam chose to let him talk. As Shang and Lorn began to lay out the food for everyone, she nodded quickly at Dess and Ab, signaling them to take over. Dess came across to the ledge and grinned up at Robert.
"I bet you thought she was going to keep you there all night, too."
"I thought she was going to keep me there for the rest of my life," Robert muttered sourly.
He was so stiff he could hardly climb off the ledge. Letting himself down cautiously, he limped across to the circle that was forming around the food.
He knew, at once, that they were going to discuss what he had said. He could tell by the way people looked at him and murmured to each other. By the way Perdew stopped to examine his wounded arm and leg. By the feeling of tension and suppressed excitement that filled the whole cave.
But he knew, without even thinking about it, that he mustn’t start the discussion himself. That wasn’t how things were done in the cavern. It was Cam who fixed the times and gave the signals. If he began on his own, unasked, he would break the rhythm of things and lose the argument immediately.
He settled down and took his share of the food in silence, not listening to the muted chatter going on all around him. He was saving all his energy and concentration for a great speech.
Are you really content to live in this hole for the rest of your lives? . . . Don’t you want to understand what’s happened to you? . . . Don’t you want to get back to where you should be . . . to your real size . . . your real selves?
The phrases rang in his mind. As he ate he hunted for words to trigger people’s emotions. Maybe he could persuade some of them to come along on the journey with him.
He was wasting his time. When the moment came, there was no chance to make a speech. Cam waited until the eating had almost stopped. Then, as Bando began to chew at the last roasted grain, she leaned forward, into the firelight.
"Robert," she said. "You’ve been up the tree with the night bird. You’ve seen the whole view. Where are we? What are you planning?"
Her voice was sharp. Once Robert would have mistaken that for hostility, but he had been in the cave for long enough to know better now. The sharpness meant she was focused. Whatever he had to say, she would give it her full attention.
Everyone was listening. Zak and Lorn and Perdew. Ab and Dess by the brazier. Nate. They were all waiting for his answer. Even Bando was listening as he sat on the edge of the light, playing with a handful of stones.
Robert closed his eyes and tried to visualize what he’d seen in that long, bleak time in the tree. He knew that Where are we? had no simple answer.
"We’re sitting in a hedge," he said carefully. Taking his memory of what lay outside the cavern and weaving it together with other, different memories to make a new kind of sense. "This is a hole under the hedge. If you come out of the hole, you’re facing into a bit of scrubby woodland. You know that as well as I do."
Cam glanced at Lorn. Leaning forward, Lorn drew one finger along the dry, dusty floor of the cave, making a line.
"This is the long wood," she said. "And the cavern is here, under the wood." She marked a circle halfway along the line, and then used all her ringers to rough up the earth on one side of it. "When we come out of the cavern, through the tunnel, we’re looking across at the great trees. But there’s a ravine between us and them."
It’s not a ravine, Robert thought stubbornly. It’s a ditch. But he wasn’t going to be distracted. He reached over the roughened earth and touched the ground on the other side of Lorn’s line.
"If we go the other way," he said, "through the hedge, we’ll come out onto the grass. In the park." Stretching as far as he could, he drew the shape of the park. Long and roughly rectangular, tapering slightly as it approached the road. "That’s what I saw from up in the tree. At the end of the park i
s the road. And across the road is the house where I live. We’re not in a jungle. We’re not anywhere strange. We’re in the place where I’ve spent my whole life."
"You think you can get there?" Cam said. There was an odd lightness in her voice that was almost like flippancy. "Just because it’s familiar?"
"I know it won’t be easy," Robert said doggedly. "I’m not a fool. It’ll probably take several days to get to the far end of the park, and it’s sure to be tough going. But I have to do it. My family must be going crazy, wondering where I am."
He knew he was leaving out the biggest thing of all, but he didn’t care. Lifting his head, he looked around the circle, challenging everyone. What about your families? Are they as near as mine? Don’t you want to go home, too? But no one would meet his eyes, except Nate—and even he stayed silent.
Zak studied the lines Robert and Lorn had scrawled in the dust. He moved his hand over Robert’s untidy oblong.
"When you look at this," he murmured, "what do you see?"
Robert didn’t reply. It wasn’t a real question. Zak let it hang for a few moments and then he answered it himself.
"When I look at it, I see death. It’s easy to find a quick death in a big, open space. There’s always a gull flying over, looking for something small and tasty."
"At least a gull would save him from having to fight the weasels," Shang said flippantly.
"And the rats." Annet sat back on her heels and preened imaginary whiskers with clawed hands.
Perdew grinned. "Not to mention the stoats—" He wiggled his arm sinuously.
The others began to join in.
"—and the owls—"
"—thrushes—"
"—starlings—"
"—kestrels—"
Bando had forgotten his stones now. He was looking from one face to another, and his eyes were wide and nervous. People were beginning to add gestures to the words, darting their hands into Robert’s face, tugging at his hair, flicking his nose with their fingers. Robert tried to brush the hands away, and Zak gave a low, tolerant laugh.
"That’s right. Don’t pay any attention to them. They’re just fearmongering. I can’t see you having to worry about stoats and kestrels. You’ll have much more urgent problems."
He glanced across the circle, and Nate nodded slowly. "It’s very dry out in the grassland," he muttered.
"And there’s nothing to eat," murmured Lorn, clutching at her stomach and making a face.
"C-c-cold, too," Tina said, chattering her teeth.
Robert wanted to argue. But before he could speak, Cam leaned forward and rapped him on the mouth.
"Be quiet! You had your chance to tell us about the ground. We listened to your map—now listen to ours. We’ve only told you about the grassland so far. What comes next, Zak?"
Zak opened his eyes, wide and innocent. "Why don’t we ask the one who’s been up the tree?" He nodded at Robert. "Go on. Tell us. What’s on the other side of the recreation ground?"
"You know perfectly well," Robert said irritably. "It’s my house."
Zak’s smile was lopsided and scornful, crinkling up one side of his face. Slowly he shook his head. "You’re not there yet. After the grassland there’s—"
"Another long wood." Lorn drew it in along the far side of Robert’s rectangle. "Then the wires. And after those it’s the grass where people take their dogs. That stinks."
Tosher’s Jack Russell. The spaniel next door. The big red setter from up the road. She was right, of course. Robert had seen them hundreds of times. But no one ever complained—not as long as they stayed on the strip of grass outside the park.
"They’re only dogs," he said defensively.
"That’s right." Cam smiled benignly. "Dogs are OK, aren’t they? Not half as bad as cats."
There was a sudden scuffle in the dust. Bando scrabbled back toward the wall, pulling himself into the shadows.
"Stupid!" muttered Lorn, with a fierce look at Cam. She went after Bando and squatted down beside him, putting an arm around his shoulders.
And Robert laughed. It was involuntary, surprised out of him by the sight of Bando’s fear. By the idea of Bando trying to squeeze his great, muscular body into the shadows to avoid an ordinary house cat.
The moment the sound was out, he wanted to call it back, but it was too late. The others drew away from him, sliding out of the light. He was left on his own with Zak, in the center of the cavern.
"Come on." Zak caught hold of his arm and pulled him onto his feet. "Let’s take a look at the world outside."
Robert wanted to make the others discuss his plans. He wanted to see if Nate would speak up on his side. But his silly laugh had ruined all that. He let himself be led to the tunnel and crawled through meekly, ahead of Zak.
They came out into the cold darkness. Zak set off immediately, walking briskly over the rough earth under the trees. Robert had forgotten what it was like. He hadn’t been more than a few steps outside the cavern, in all the time he was there, and his memory of the tangled, dark wood had faded. He had come to think of it as something like the hedge he’d always known. A little bigger, maybe, but still the familiar mixture of hawthorn and beech and holly.
It was a shock to find himself following Zak over difficult, broken ground, through a great mass of tall, interwoven trees. The little area around the cavern was relatively clear, worn smooth by constant comings and goings. But once they were beyond that, nothing was level. They were traveling over heavy clods and boulders, with cracks opening up between them. Every step was a separate effort.
The darkness was full of whistling, pulsing noises. Zak moved through it easily, looking backward and forward and all around, as though he could see things that were invisible to Robert. Robert struggled after him, tripping and stumbling.
They walked through the trees for ten or fifteen minutes. Then Zak turned right sharply, and they came out into an area of tall, slender plants. Their stalks were no thicker than Robert’s leg, but they rose high into the air, twenty or thirty times as tall as he was. Way above him, in the moonlight, great, seeded heads drooped heavily.
Long grass in an angle of the hedge. Where the mower misses it.
Robert remembered hunting for lost tennis balls in patches of grass like that. Stooping and parting the stems to look down at the damp earth. Now the grass towered over him, and the ground under his feet was thick with creeping stems snaking under and over each other.
Zak stepped through the jointed stalks, careful not to catch his feet. Robert followed, clutching at them to save himself from falling.
There’s only a small patch of long grass. Just a few steps. Once we’re out into the short grass there won’t be any problem.
But it took them well over half an hour to get to the shorter grass. By that time Robert was cold and tired, and his leg was aching. He thought longingly of his two fur blankets, back in the warm cavern, but he kept moving, following Zak as he pushed his way between the pale stalks.
As they neared the end of them, Robert felt the air grow fresher, stirring around him. Zak looked back and beckoned, and Robert stepped forward eagerly, longing to stride out at last. Expecting open space and short, cropped grass.
The reality was quite different. He came out of the high grass into a field of stiff, shoulder-high leaves, like growing corn. But corn would at least have left the ground bare between individual plants. Here there was no bare ground. No distinction between separate plants. The stiff leaves rose out of a mat of tangled roots, denser than anything they’d come through so far.
Robert was determined not to be beaten. He could see Zak looking at him, watching for some sign of dismay, but he didn’t waver. Stumbling past Zak, he peered over the cropped tops of the grass blades, looking down toward the end of the park. Toward his house. It was still a long way off, but he was hoping to see the lights on the first floor. Surely they should be visible above the hedge at the far end of the park?
There was nothing. Only darkness
.
It took him a moment or two to realize that the ground in front of him was sloping upward. It was only a very slight slope, too shallow for him to have noticed when he—in the old days. But now it was enough to block out everything beyond.
He turned around quickly, to say something casual before Zak could guess his disappointment. But Zak had disappeared.
He was standing all alone in the dark, open grassland.
His first reaction was anger—and then a stubborn determination to carry on with what he had been doing. He began to battle his way forward over the roots, toiling up the slope to reach a place where he might get a better view.
But he had taken only twenty or thirty steps when a wave of fear swept over him. Away to his left, the grass rustled suddenly and he spun around, terrified. It can’t be anything serious. I’m only in the park. But that was as unreal as a fairy tale. The reality was being alone, in the dark, in country where he couldn’t move fast or see far. And all around him—circling in the sky, hidden in the grass—were hungry predators with eyes that could see in the dark. He began to run—
And immediately Zak was there, gripping him by the arm and spinning him around.
"You want to get lost?" he said lightly. "There’s nothing in that direction. Only grass and more grass."
"Why did you leave me then?" Robert was so angry that he could hardly speak.
"You’ve got to know what it’s like." Zak let go of his arm and took a step back. "You have to be prepared if you’re really determined to go on that journey."
"Of course I’m still going!" Robert snapped. "I told you."
He began to struggle the other way, thinking he was heading back toward the long grass. But after a few seconds Zak called to him from way over on the left.
"It’s better here!"
Robert turned, feeling foolish and furious. He could hear Zak whistling softly, to guide him in the right direction—and he imagined a smug smile accompanying the whistle. He clenched his fists, longing to strike out at something. Why is he so sure he’s right?
The Dark Ground Page 9