Sea Change

by Francis Rowan

  "Uncle Davey, come on, a little longer?" Sal sounded cross, John thought.

  "Because of the first rule," Davey said. "You remember the first rule, don't you Sally?"

  She reluctantly stepped back from the wheel, letting Davey take over. "Yes, Uncle Davey, I know it." She sounded as if she had answered that question a hundred times before. John saw Simon grinning.

  "And what is it, my love?"

  John got the feeling that this was a game that they had all played out many times before.

  Sal pursed her lips and then muttered something.

  "What was that, sis, couldn't hear you back here?" Simon said. Sal swivelled her head and glared at him in a way that made John think of a bird of prey. Simon just shrugged. "Must be the engine noise and all that. What did you say?"

  Davey made a noise that could have started off as a laugh but ended up as a cough when Sal's hawk gaze swivelled in his direction.

  "The first rule," she said, through gritted teeth. "The first rule of going out on the boat is that after a minute you always want to throw your idiot brother overboard. The second rule, is that it's Uncle Davey's boat and he's the captain and we're the crew and the crew always do what the captain says, when he says it, and without question."

  "Aye, that's pretty much it," Davey said. "Good to see you can remember it. It's the first rule though, always the first rule. Throwing your brother overboard can be the second rule if you like though, seems sensible enough for me. Anyway, north or south, John? You're the guest, it's your decision.”

  "Let's go south," Sal said. "We went north up the coast last time we were out."

  "That was ages ago," Simon said. "North's cool."

  "Hey, hey the pair of you, enough," Davey said wearily. "Every time I take the pair of you out, it adds years to my life, bloody years. Let John decide. I'm past caring. Although if he has any sense, what he'll be deciding is that coming out on this boat with the pair of you was the biggest mistake he's ever made in his life."

  "South, then," John said.

  "There's a surprise," Simon muttered, being very careful not to look in Sal's direction.

  John felt his cheeks colour, and looked out to sea. These are good people, John thought, really good people, and I'm happy that I am here with them.

  "Hob's Hole," Sal said, and gestured towards the cliffs. John peered out, shading his eyes from the sun, and saw the cave dark black against the ochre of the rock. The sea broke up around the foot of the cliffs, waves slapping at the base, white spray arcing up into the air, falling down in a million sparkles.

  "See what you mean about the tides coming in," John said. "If you got cut off there..."

  "You'd be all right," Davey said. "Long as you sat it out in the Hole, anyway. Might be cold and frightened, but you'd be all right in there. Long as you didn't fall down it."

  "Wouldn't fancy that much," John said, "But I suppose it beats—" he was going to say drowning, but he thought of Sal and Simon's dad and he caught the words, just in time. "Beats staying on the beach."

  "It's not so bad,” Davey said. "Least, not in hindsight. But then that's true of most things, as you young 'uns will learn."

  "You've stopped there?" Simon said. "In the Hole?"

  "Aye, long time back mind," Davey said, rubbing at his chin with his thumb.

  "Back before electricity had been invented?" Simon asked.

  "Aye, and dinosaurs walked them cliffs," Davey said, and John got the impression that it was something that Davey and Simon had said to each other many times before. "Was summat all the local lads used to do. Soon as they turned thirteen. You went up to the Hole before the tide came in, and there you sat. If you didn't fall down the hole or get washed away by the waves, you were picked up in the morning, and you were one of the lads from then on, grown up. Won't happen now, old customs like that all done away with for the telly and computers. Not many fish out of Saltcliff now anyhow. Look: see that line where the waves are breaking."

  John stared out, saw nothing at first because of the dazzle of the sun on water, and then saw a line stretching out from the beach where the sea turned white. "I see it, I see it," he said.

  "Line of rocks, stretches out, barely gets covered at high tide. If you're careful, you can get a boat up real close, step down from it and walk along the rocks like a causeway, only get wet up to your knees if you didn't fall in or the sea wasn't up too much. So what they used to do, the older ones, is wait until it was high tide, in the night, and then bring a boat in, real quiet like. One of 'em would go over and onto the rocks, and sneak along 'til they got up to the shore. Then they'd moan and make terrible noises, scare the lad sitting in the Hole half to death."

  "That's awful," Sal said, and Simon hooted with laughter.

  "That's class that."

  "Not for the lads who were sitting in that cave, the night and their imaginations all around 'em. You try anything like that, and you'll be answering to me, you hear?”

  John and Sal desperately avoided looking at each other or at Simon.

  "I mean it. No messing around near the water."

  They all went quiet for a moment, and John thought that they were probably thinking the same thing. One lost to the sea was enough.

  "So were you frightened then, Uncle Davey?" Simon said. "When you had to stop in the Hole?"

  "Not half as much as I would have been if I hadn't heard Billy Dawkins swearing his head off as he slipped off the rocks on the way in to scare me."

  They all laughed, and Simon said, "Did any of you really believe in it though? The Hob? I mean, were you all scared of that like, or just of falling down the hole?"

  "Plenty would have told you they didn't. But in the night...."

  "It's important to keep stories like that alive," Sal said suddenly, with real passion. "It's our story, of our place. Don't you think, John?"

  "Uh—yeah, yeah. Important," John said, although he hadn't been really listening, as he had been thinking of things that he knew came out of the dark that were scarier than falling down a hole. But whatever Sal said was fine with him.

  "Ignore her," Simon said. "She's just trying to impress you John. What with you being up from the city and all that. She's all star struck."

  "Shut up Simon," Sal said, and there was heat in her words and colour in her face, and John felt a dozen things all at once.

  "You hot, or ill or something, mate?" Simon said, innocently. "You just look a bit flushed."

  "You've got a point there Sally," Davey said quickly. "It's tradition, like. Worth keeping what's left alive, because there's precious little of it. Makes where we live what it is, it's as much part of Saltcliff as the cliffs themselves."

  "Yeah, but it's just a story," Simon said. "Not like it's real history, is it? Can see why real history's worth keeping, because it's what happened. But this sort of thing, it's just made up."

  "You know that, do you?" Sal said.

  "Aw, come on, Sal. The Hob? You're not telling me you really believe..."

  "Maybe not like in the story," she said. "But the story comes from somewhere. From something."

  "Time we headed back," Davey said. "Shame, because it's a lovely day out here, but if I don't get that van engine someone else will, and if it's one bit what he says it is, it's a bargain."

  The boat turned in a slow and lazy circle, and John went out onto the deck behind the cabin and watched the coast, ignoring the breeze that tore the tops off the waves and threw salt water in his face. He thought about what Sal had said, and then he thought about the old man. Something dark, something dangerous. Stories that were not just stories, but which told of something that really existed in the shadows, a nightmare from the past that had never gone away.

  When the harbour walls showed dark against the sea, Simon came out and sat next to John.

  "You okay?" he said.

  "Yeah," John said. "Just thinking."

  "You don't want to do that, it's dangerous, you'll end up like Sal." There was silence fo
r a moment between them. "Was worried you weren't having fun, like, that you were bored or something. He's a funny 'un, Uncle Davey, but he does go on at times."

  "Bored? No way, I wouldn't want you to think—Simon, this is great, I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed myself. This is all just what I needed. There were things back home that—well, they weren't good, not good at all. Not at home, with mum and dad, just...stuff back there."

  Simon nodded. "It's all right. You don't have to talk about it. I know what you mean, with...you know. Dad and that."

  "I know," John said, and they were silent for a moment. "Doing stuff like this, it just stops me thinking about things back home. So...thanks. It's just what I needed. What's that up there, by the way?"

  John pointed up at the cliff top, where he had seen the orange tape on his walk up the cliffs.

  "Heavy rains a few weeks back, and then a landslip, massive chunk of the cliff fell into the sea. Happens, from time to time. Don't go thinking of building your holiday home on the cliff tops. Anyway, council go in to tape it all up so no-one goes too close and falls into the sea with it. Saw this programme a few weeks ago, about these men who were the best at diving in the world, and they were diving from off this cliff that was the highest in the world or something..."

  Si was still talking about it when they got off the boat, and Davey had driven off in an old van that belched almost as much smoke as his boat.

  "So, what you doing this afternoon?" John said, when he got a moment's chance to interrupt.

  Simon pulled a face. "Sorry mate, not around, though I wish I was. We'll be eating soggy biscuits and trying not to smell the wee."

  "He means mum is taking us to go and visit her Aunty Flo," Sal said. "Old folks’ home down near Scarborough. Won't be back 'til late, we usually stop somewhere for tea. Maybe tomorrow though?"

  "I'd like that," John said. And thought: very much.

  "Come with us today, if you want," Simon said. "But it stinks worse than Davey's boat."

  "I think I'll pass, ta," John said. "I'll have some lunch, maybe take a wander up on to the cliff and check out that barrow. See you tomorrow though, yeah?"

  "If we survive the gassing of boiled cabbage and wee," Simon said, already walking away, a look of despair on his face.

  "Yeah, tomorrow," Sal said. And she looked at John sideways again and smiled. "I'd like that." Then she turned and ran after Simon, and John stood there, thinking about how many days he had left before he would have to leave for home, and thinking that leaving would be even harder than he had first thought.

  Chapter Nine

  After lunch John walked up to the cliff and over the fields to the orange tape and the council signs that warned of land slide and danger. There was a ragged brown scar along the edge of the cliff, as if a giant had just taken a huge bite from it. Just behind the land slip, the ground rose up in a low hummock, but the front of that hummock was gone, dropped down into the sea and leaving nothing but raw wet earth.

  John heard the sea boom as it hit the bottom of the cliff, and he thought he felt the ground shiver under his feet, just a little bit. You're imagining it, he thought. But then stones rattled from the cliff edge, and a little bit more of the land was lost to the sea.

  Clouds had crept in, taking what little warmth there had been from the air. John shivered, pulled his jacket a little closer around him, and walked away from the cliff top, back down towards the village. It felt as if there was a storm coming. The air had gone very still, very quiet, and the world pressed in close around him.

  He came to a junction between two alleys and paused, trying to remember which one to take.

  "John," a voice said behind him, "John," and John stopped where he was, frozen in fear by the rustling sound of old paper, and the smell that reminded John of underground places, of cellars and caves where everything smelt of damp and the decay.

  "Leave me alone," he said. “Please.”

  "I asked you to help me, and you abandoned me. I told you that I needed you and you ignored me. What kind of way is that for a boy to treat a poor old man?" The voice was wheedling, full of sugar, and it made John feel sick.

  "I don't care," John said. "I don't want to help you."

  "What you want—child—is not at issue here." The voice was hard now, sharper, as if it could cut. "You have a gift, John, and I need you to use that gift to get me what I want. If you do—" again the voice lapsed into cloying sweetness—"My name is Elias, John. I can be your friend. Your defender. I will give you everything you could want. Respect. Power over those that hurt you. Wouldn't you like that, John? Power to make those that punch you stop, and hold their heads in agony. Power to make those that make fun of you instead run screaming from you. Wouldn't you like that? The power to make sure that you do not become another Alex.”

  "Don't say his name." John didn’t turn around. He didn’t want to see the old man, because he remembered from the first time how wrong he looked, how his thin limbs twitched and skittered like an insect.

  “Do not try and command me, child. Do not argue with me. Do not tell me that you will not do what you want, because then you will end up just like him John, and I'll be there, all the time, behind you, whispering in your ear, telling you that you are just as worthless as him whispering to you jump, jump, look down on the water and think of how it would feel to be this scared, this miserable, this alone for another sixty worthless painful years, jump, John, jump." John felt dizzy, as if he was very high up. The voice seemed closer, whispering in his ear. "But imagine what you could do if I just gave you a little of my power, John. Revenge on those who hurt you. The power never to be hurt again. Don't you want that John? Don't you want that?"

  John did want that, very much. The word ‘no’ hovered in his mind, but it was blurred, and the cold that rose like a tide froze it out before it could form. I could make Parker feel like this, John thought, I could make all of them feel like this. I could pay them back for all that they did to me, I could pay them back for Alex. He opened his mouth to say yes to Elias, but then John thought: and I will be just like them, just like him, they are the same as him. As he thought that, the cold pulled back from him, a rapid and violent thaw that left John shaking but in control of himself, the thick confusion lifted from his head. Nothing controlled his limbs, nothing deadened his thoughts, there was nothing but the sick feeling of fear and the pounding of his heart, but John clung to those because they were real, they were his own. He took one step forwards, one step away from Elias, one step towards the old familiar world.

  "What are you doing, boy? Don't you dare!" John stood there, caught between two worlds. "Do not walk away from me. I knew you had power, that is why I chose you, but you surprise even me. Do not make the mistake, though, of thinking that it means that you can defy me, because if you do I will show you what power really is, and then you will be sorry. Briefly.”

  Do I want to be like him? John thought. This is what having what he promises would do to me. It would eat away at my heart and make me just like him.

  He took another step, and was surprised that he could. I have more power than he realises, John thought. So use it. He walked away.

  "Don't walk away from me!" All the sweetness had gone from the old man's voice now. It was harsh like pebbles dragged along the beach, dry like the bones of time, rotten like the crumbling fungus of a woodland floor. "I will not let you walk away from me!"

  "You are nothing," John said as he walked away. "You are nothing you are nothing you are nothing."

  "One last time," the voice behind him shrieked. "One last chance. Use your gift to serve me. I command you, John, I command you. Serve me now, or be dragged into a darkness from which you will never return.”

  John did not trust his voice not to wobble and break if he replied, so he just stuck two fingers up over his shoulder as he walked away. He expected more shouting and shrieking, but there was none, just silence. He kept on walking, and then Elias spoke again, quietly, but his voice ca
rried as if he were standing right next to John, whispering in his ear.

  "So be it," he said, and then he spoke more, but John could not understand what the words were. He could hear the rhythm of them though, non-stop, again and again, like the sound of the waves on the shore. He had turned a corner but the sound was still with him, so much so that he looked back over his shoulder to see if the old man had followed him, but there was no-one there, nothing behind him except for the darkness and the words, quiet and terrible.

  The world began to slow down. The air itself curdled, becoming thick and heavy, and tugging at his legs as he tried to walk. The light changed too, as if everything was taking place underwater. The air thickened more around him and all colour faded from the world.

  John kept on walking. His throat was dry and his hands wanted to shake so badly that he clenched them into fists and dug the nails into the palms of his hands, but he kept on walking.

  "Now find out what real power is," the voice whispered, as if it was next to John's ear. He looked back and saw the old man standing not far behind him, moving his hands over and around one another, making shapes in the air. A cloud formed between his hands, as if something were burning and giving off streams of thick black smoke. The cloud curled and twisted out lazy fingers. They groped around aimlessly for a moment, and then started to make a steady progress towards John.

  John could see darker shapes within the cloud, as if it contained something that was writhing, moving. He stood, spellbound. Then he saw movement out of the corner of his eye, and he turned his head with an effort and saw the black dog. It stood at the far end of the alley, as if it were waiting for him.

  John ran.

  He ran towards the dog, and it leapt into motion ahead of him. Every few paces he snatched a quick glance over his shoulder. The mist rolled and surged behind him, but he was just ahead of it. For how long, he did not know.

  He rounded another corner and the dog was not there, but when he looked behind him he could not see the mist either. John came stumbling to a halt, leaning his back against the wall, his chest heaving, a painful burning with every ragged breath. His legs were shaking, every muscle trembling. He felt sick, but fought it back. In his mad flight, he hadn't seen a single person. Where was everybody? The village was deserted.