by Lee Monroe
www.hodderchildrens.co.uk
Copyright © 2010 Lee Monroe
First published in Great Britain in 2010
by Hodder Children’s Books
This ebook edition published in 2011
The right of Lee Monroe to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form, or by any means with prior permission in writing from the publishers or in the case of reprographic production in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency and may not be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 444 90489 5
Typeset in Berkeley Book by Avon DataSet Ltd,
Bidford on Avon, Warwickshire
Hodder Children’s Books
a division of Hachette Children’s Books
338 Euston Road, London NW1 3BH
An Hachette UK company
www.hachette.co.uk
For Molly R.
Branches whipped my face as I ran and my cheek stung where it had been lashed. I pushed forward, warm blood on my lips, my heart thudding faster in my chest. Above me, the night clouds slid uneasily over the pale moon. Beyond me I heard the crunch of boots on snow and glimpsed the dark figure winding through the dense trees. I was so close I could cry, but he slipped quickly out of sight. I should have called out. But the unknown kept me silent.
As I reached the clearing, a spot I knew well at the base of the hill, I heard the sound of a truck groaning slightly along the mountain road. I came to a halt and then stood, panting, to see nothing but the black curving tarmac and the half-moon in the sky.
Whoever he was, he had disappeared.
Suddenly the energy, the force that had kept me running through the woods evaporated. I stood, freezing and defeated, and tilted my head back to look up at the sky. Midnight blue. No clouds now. Just a bitter, unforgiving night.
A sound behind me – the snap of a twig – made me jerk. But as I turned to look, something heavy gripped my shoulder and I stopped. My face was still but my eyes darted down to see long pale fingers resting on my collarbone.
‘Don’t move,’ someone whispered. ‘And don’t be frightened.’ The owner of the hand gently turned me to look at him. Large eyes, wide mouth, short brown hair. I knew him. I knew this boy.
But we had never met.
‘Jane,’ said the boy, his hand, surprisingly warm, holding mine. ‘Please. I would never hurt you.’
‘Who are you?’ As I spoke my breath clouded in the cold. ‘What am I doing here?’ I had no recollection of why I had come into these woods.
‘You followed me. You have been dreaming about me for a long time and now you know I’m real … Well,’ he gave a dry laugh, ‘almost real.’
‘Please,’ I said weakly, as though I had not been in pursuit of him. ‘Just let me go home.’
‘Jane. You are home.’ He let go of my hand and put both of his around my face, drawing it closer to him.
Green eyes, and skin like a child’s, but the bones in his cheeks belonged to a man. His face was gentle, though in his pupils there was something alert and wild. I was so cold I couldn’t move, except for my hands shaking and my heart thumping.
Watching my confusion, he stroked my cheeks with his fingertips, and my head lolled, soothed all of a sudden. Then gradually I felt aware of the rest of my body, my legs, my hips, my breasts.
‘This is where your story begins,’ he whispered. ‘With me, in this place.’
And as I listened I knew that here, in this moment, it was true.
Today was my sixteenth birthday, and my story had begun.
CHAPTER ONE
‘Jane?’
Something was shaking me.
‘Jane. Wake up!’
I jerked awake. Opening my eyes, I saw golden plaits and gingham pyjamas.
‘Dot,’ I said grumpily, ‘what day is it?’
My nine-year-old sister tilted her head, her large, blue eyes regarding me seriously. She wrinkled her nose. ‘Saturday, stupid. Your birthday!’ She put both hands on my bed and levered herself up to perch next to me. ‘They’re talking about you downstairs.’
‘Already?’ I said, still sleepy. ‘What are they saying today?’
Dot sighed a little melodramatically. ‘Mum is worried about you getting up in the night, opening windows and doors.’ She nestled in close to me. ‘Last night you left footprints on the carpet in the hall.’
‘Oh.’ I rested my head back. ‘I sleepwalked.’
Dot nodded happily. ‘I think it’s cool.’ She fiddled with the silver chain on my wrist. ‘Where do you go, Jane? Aren’t you scared?’
‘I don’t know and I don’t know,’ I said, pressing my cheek against her blonde head. ‘I’m kind of asleep … you know?’
Dot giggled. ‘Well, I think you’re brave,’ she said. ‘Don’t listen to them.’
‘What else does Mum say?’ I asked casually.
‘That maybe you should go to boarding school,’ Dot replied sadly. ‘Because you’re too insolar.’
‘What?’ I prodded Dot’s arm. ‘Insolar?’
‘You don’t have enough friends.’ Dot turned to face me. She slid her arms around my waist and kissed my cheek. ‘But I told her you’ve got me.’
‘Right.’ I smiled. ‘I think the word is insular.’
‘Like I said.’ Dot buried her face in my chest. ‘Insolar.’
‘I’m sixteen. I don’t have to go to school any more. Not if I don’t want to.’
‘You’re lucky.’ Dot scrambled to sit up. She examined my face. ‘What’s that?’ She pointed at my cheek, pushing my hair to the side. ‘You’ve got a scratch. It wasn’t there yesterday.’
I stared at her and put my hand up to my face, feeling the rough, puckered skin.
‘I must have done it in my sleep,’ I said cautiously, remembering the trees and intense cold and then … warmth like I’d never felt before. And someone—
‘You’d better cover it up.’ Dot broke my thoughts, pulling my dark, curly hair over my face, covering the wound. ‘Or Mum will start locking your bedroom door at night.’
‘She fusses too much.’ I said, half wishing that I could be locked away. For the few weeks leading up to my birthday I’d been having these dreams. At first I’d had no real memory of what happened in them, but lately … lately I had been remembering more, waking exhausted and sometimes finding inexplicable bruises and scratches.
‘I’m hungry.’ Dot slithered off the bed. ‘Breakfast time!’
Downstairs it was a typically unceremonious Jonas birthday breakfast. My mother doesn’t believe in spoiling. She and Dad were buying me a car for my seventeenth, so this year was some money in a bank account. Dot, bless her, had bought me a book token and Dad had kissed me on the cheek and got back to tapping out numbers on his calculator. Hot topic of the day I was not. The mood this morning was sober.
‘Happy birthday to me,’ I muttered, pushing rabbit food around in a bowl.
‘Old Murray’s cancelled his commission,’ said my father, to no one in particular.
‘Oh God.’ My mother sighed, pushing away her unfinished yoghurt and banana. ‘Not another one.’
Dad nodded, brushing his beard with a napkin. ‘B
ut we’ll be fine, Anna. I have Mrs Benjamin’s kitchen table and Pete’s staircase. We won’t starve.’
Mum picked up her bowl and pushed her chair back, shooing our Irish wolfhound, Bobby, out of the way. She walked into the kitchen. ‘But it’s drying up, Jack,’ she called back. ‘No one’s got any money, and they’re not coming up this far.’ She started putting on rubber gloves. ‘Mrs Caffrey in the post office says everyone thinks this little mountain is cursed.’
My dad winked at my sister and me. ‘I’m a carpenter,’ he said. ‘I’ll always get work.’
My mother, who never fails to look on the dark side of life, grunted and began wrestling with the bin liner. ‘We need to prepare ourselves for the worst, is all I’m saying.’
‘What’s a curse?’ asked Dot, plunging a soldier into her boiled egg. I watched queasily as the yolk trickled on to the shell.
‘It’s made up, is what it is,’ I told her. ‘There are no such things as curses.’
‘Like what they say about magic?’ Dot stared, interested.
‘That doesn’t exist either,’ I said, rolling my eyes. ‘It’s what Grandma Jonas used to call claptrap.’ I looked up and met my mother’s eyes as she stood, one hand clutching a bag full of rubbish, in the doorway.
‘We need to talk about your education for the next few years, Jane,’ she said abruptly. ‘I can’t go on teaching you at home. I need to get a job.’
‘Fine. I’ll go to college.’ I drank the rest of my tea. ‘There’s one in Hassock. And it’s only five miles away.’ I smiled at Dot. ‘I can go by bike.’
‘No,’ said Mum quickly. ‘Not here.’
‘Boarding school.’ Dot poked my arm. ‘I told you, Jane.’
‘I’m too old,’ I said. ‘It’s ridiculous.’
Mum put down the rubbish. ‘Not boarding school. God knows we can’t afford that. But somewhere you can mix with girls your own age. It’s not healthy for you to be stuck up here all day.’ She sighed. ‘A fresh start. Right, Jack?’
My dad rubbed his forehead awkwardly. ‘I don’t know, Anna … is it really necessary?’ He looked over at me. ‘Your mother just wants you to be happy – after what those girls … I mean, a new school might help you forget.’
Mum tried smiling at me. ‘It’ll be good for you, Jane. You’ll make proper friends.’
I winced. ‘I don’t need to make friends. It’s my birthday and you’re spoiling it. I’m fine as I am.’
My parents exchanged a look that said We’ll see.
You won’t, I thought defiantly.
‘I’m going out for a bike ride,’ I said, scraping back my chair and walking to the back door. As I pulled my hair into an untidy ponytail my hand knocked against the scratch on my face.
‘Ow.’ I grabbed at the door handle, flustered.
‘Jane?’ called my mother.
‘I’m fine.’ I snapped. ‘Stop fussing.’
‘Wrap up warm, sweetheart,’ she said limply.
I ignored her and pulled my hood up.
‘Be back by twelve,’ she said. ‘We need to do Maths today.’
I stepped outside without answering, immediately regretting not taking a coat.
I don’t need change, I thought angrily as I wheeled my bike out of the shed. I don’t need friends. I closed my eyes, thinking of a year ago, when I had walked out of school for the last time. I’d had no friends, Sarah had seen to that. Queen Bee, Sarah Emerson, she who ruled the school and cast a poisonous spell over everyone in it.
‘You’re a freak, Jonas,’ she told me, over and over again. ‘You look like a boy. You dress like a tramp.’ For Sarah, who never wore the same thing twice, who learned the word ‘materialistic’ before ‘mama’, I was incomprehensible.
I took the rugged hill path down towards the town. It seemed right that my journey was uncomfortable, jolting over the stones as I curved down our piece of the mountain. After days of grey sky that had sealed us in, this morning it was a beautiful bright day. A day of escape. The crispness of the air pecked satisfyingly at my cheeks as I rode and I began to warm up as I pushed hard on the pedals. To my left was the wood, pines with a frosting of snow. It was dense and eerie, not somewhere you’d want to be at night.
I was there last night.
I shook my head, suddenly anxious, and found myself braking. I put one foot down on the ground and thought I heard someone call my name. Something in the trees. I swallowed and dropped my bike where it was. As the wheel spun behind me I trod through the gorse to take a closer look. I reached the outskirts of the wood and saw nothing. No one. I had turned away when I heard it again, a soft sound that could almost have been the wind. ‘Jane.’
‘Jane!’
I dropped my hand and jerked round. My sister was crouched down by my bike, spinning the wheel with one hand as she looked over at me.
‘You ran all this way?’ I asked her.
‘I want to come too,’ she said in a wheedling voice. ‘Mum and Dad are arguing again.’
‘Fine. But I’m taking the painful route,’ I told her.
Dot nodded furiously. ‘I don’t mind the stones,’ she said brightly. ‘It’s fun.’
‘Strange child.’ But I smiled at her all the same. As she struggled with getting the bike upright again I turned back to take one more look at the dense trees, listening.
Nothing.
‘What are you doing?’ Dot called, jigging from foot to foot. ‘Let’s go.’
I did a final examination of the trees before walking back to the path. Disappointed.
CHAPTER TWO
Our nearest town, Bale, was only a mile from the house, but Dot moaning in front of me meant it took forever. When we finally got on to the main street – what my mother called ‘civilisation’ – Dot’s bottom was aching.
‘Told you it was the painful route.’ I grinned at her. ‘Was that fun for you?’
Dot screwed up her nose and stuck her tongue out. ‘We need a milkshake,’ she said, looking hopefully down the street.
Bale was a bit like one of those towns you see in old Wild West films starring Clint Eastwood. Just one wide road, flanked by mismatched buildings. No supermarket. No fancy shops. Just the essentials. A local grocer’s, selling everything from needle and thread to caviar; a cobbler’s, a tiny junk shop – optimistically known as the Town Antiques Emporium – a tiny post office and a café: Fabio’s. It used to belong to an Italian family, who’d disappeared before I was born, but Eileen and her husband Greg had kept the name. It was a friendly, old-fashioned place, laid out like a diner. I’d been coming to Fabio’s since I was able to pronounce ‘vanilla chocolate’. I’d outgrown the milkshake now, but it was Dot’s favourite place in the world.
She rushed along the pavement towards it, leaving me locking up the bike by the defunct petrol station. As I straightened up again, a figure crossing the road caught my eye. Tall, checked shirt and long legs in dark blue jeans. He was about my age, maybe a little older, with a tanned face and sun-streaked, short, messy hair. Even from this distance I could see he was one of those intimidating, good-looking, alpha-male types, and we didn’t get many of those round here. I saw him glance my way and I sniffed, indifferently, and moved to follow Dot into the café.
I watched as the boy reached the entrance of Fabio’s at the same time as my sister and performed a comical bow, holding the door open for her. I heard her shriek, delighted, and slowed right down. Suddenly I wished I’d worn something less androgynous than my shabby old grey hoodie and ancient dungarees that were too short for me.
‘Do you have to dress like a ragamuffin, Jane?’ was my mother’s familiar refrain. ‘You’re a young woman, not a car mechanic.’
Just for today I conceded, she had a point.
I quickly unzipped my hoodie and tied it round my waist. As I passed the windows to get to the door and glimpsed my reflection I realised this was not an improvement. Irritated, I untied it and bunched it under one arm.
As I walked into the café
I saw that Dot was already perched on a stool by the counter. The boy was sitting next to her, still making her laugh. I dug my purse out of my front pocket and stood at the other end of the counter.
Eileen sashayed over, beaming at me. ‘She’s already got her order in,’ she said, cocking her head in Dot’s direction. ‘And she’s got an admirer.’
‘Who is that boy?’ I asked casually, emptying my change on to the counter. ‘Never seen him before.’
‘Evan?’ She shrugged, then leaned closer to me. ‘He’s got family around here apparently – step-family, I think.’ She pursed her lips in concentration. ‘He was the one in the paper … you know. The boy who went missing in Australia – turned up on his dad’s doorstep. I can’t for the life of me think of his surname.’
‘I don’t remember that.’ I frowned.
Eileen shook her head. ‘You must walk round with a blindfold on and earplugs in,’ she said, with a smile. ‘That boy was the talk of the town a few weeks ago.’
‘Interesting,’ I said, sneaking a look over at him.
‘Very interesting,’ she said with a wink. ‘And a looker too.’
‘Hmm.’ I wrinkled my nose and pushed over seven pounds in coins. ‘Guess I’d better rescue him from Dot. She’s the clingy type.’
Eileen chuckled. ‘She’s adorable and you know it,’ she said, waving away the money. ‘Which is why you girls get your milkshakes on the house.’
‘Thanks, Eileen,’ I said gruffly. ‘I think I’ll have a coffee today.’
Even though I hate coffee.
‘Okey-dokey.’ Eileen winked at me. ‘Much more sophisticated.’
I blushed what must have been crimson pink and shuffled over to Dot and Evan.
‘This is Evan,’ announced Dot, as I approached. ‘He’s looking for some company. Evan, this is Jane.’
Evan turned, smiling. His eyes were incredibly blue. And though they were bright and friendly, there was something else there too. Something sharp, clever.
‘Hi Jane.’ His voice was deep, but quiet.
I nodded rudely, looking away quickly. Up close he was unnervingly beautiful. Every feature moulded to perfection. Practically inhuman.