The Silver Child

by Cliff McNish

  Dad said, ‘Look at me, Helen.’ I glanced up, not quite able to meet his eyes. ‘You didn’t leave the boy alone,’ he said. ‘Walter’s back there with him. And not only Walter. The twins and Thomas —’

  ‘I still deserted him, Dad.’

  ‘Stop blaming yourself for everything,’ he said, angry now. ‘You didn’t ask for any of this! That boy! How dare he! You didn’t make any conscious decision to abandon Milo, or anything like it. You were … you were just scared out of your wits, that’s all! For goodness sake, Helen, that’s all that happened!’

  ‘He was … he looked so terrible!’ I yelled, suddenly bursting into tears again. ‘I couldn’t stand it, all that pain pouring out of him! I couldn’t!’

  Dad held me tightly. ‘No one could have. Whatever he’s becoming, it’s frightening. What do we really know about Milo? Didn’t you say Thomas was afraid as well, the moment he saw him? Maybe he had a good reason to be!’ Dad paused, then said slowly, ‘Do you know something, Helen, I don’t think you abandoned Milo at all. I’m being completely truthful with you now. It seems to me that you stayed longer than most people would ever have done. You stayed until you started to burn. How can you ask more of yourself than that?’

  I let Dad go on, finding myself clinging desperately to his reassurances. ‘The boy misled you,’ Dad murmured, stroking my hair. ‘At the very least, he did that. He gave you no warning about what he would look like, or how much he was suffering.’

  Misled me? Had Milo really done that?

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Milo didn’t hide his pain from me. The truth is, in my mind I had a picture of a golden boy. When I ran through the storm to be with him I’d hoped for …’

  I knew what I’d hoped for. Despite Milo’s pain, I’d still expected a smile, some hint of affection. I’d expected him to walk up to me on two normal legs, take my hand and show me a kind of miracle.

  ‘I abandoned him,’ I said.

  ‘You left Milo with other children who will do their best for him!’

  ‘If they hadn’t been there, I’d still have run. Even when Walter gave me a second chance to help, I didn’t take it. I ran from that as well.’

  Dad stared at me. ‘I’m glad you did!’ he said fiercely. ‘Otherwise, you might not be here now.’

  I said nothing to that. For a while we simply sat there, wrestling with our emotions. But there was one more thing Dad had to know. ‘Unless he gets help,’ I said, ‘I think … Milo’s going to die.’

  ‘Oh, Helen …’

  The thought of any child suffering tore Dad apart, but his overriding concern was still to protect me. He’d already considered getting the police involved, but what kind of report would they believe? A bald-headed boy, sir, with golden skin, and there might be a couple of insectivore girls and a giant hanging about nearby? Yes, sir, naturally we’ll commit all our forces …

  ‘Dad,’ I said, ‘Milo is not going to survive unless we do something for him.’

  Dad gazed at me. What he wanted to do was lock me in, bolt every window and door in the house and stand guard outside. But he also suspected that I’d find a way to slip away. He didn’t want that to happen. I felt the struggle inside. Then he came to a decision.

  ‘We’ll go together to find him.’

  I hadn’t expected this, and clutched him, suddenly realizing how much I’d wanted Dad to say it.

  ‘I’ve got a condition,’ he said. ‘You get some sleep first.’ He stopped my objections. ‘If you’re going to be any use to this boy of yours, you need it. Just a few hours.’ He was right. Now that I was safely home, I could hardly keep my eyes open. ‘Come on,’ Dad said. He helped me to my room and closed the curtains. After I got into bed, he pulled the quilt around my shoulders and smoothed it out. ‘I’ll be in the guest room again,’ he said. ‘If you need anything, just shout.’ I love you.

  ‘I love you too, Dad.’

  A look of surprise creased his face, then he smiled broadly. ‘We’re going to get through this, Helen,’ he said. ‘And we’ll do the right thing for Milo, too. I promise.’

  Dad locked my door. He felt awful about it, but that didn’t stop him – he still didn’t completely trust me. I thought I’d never sleep, but I was so exhausted that I think only a new scream from Milo could have woken me. No scream came. In the late afternoon, when my eyes finally opened, I lay there perversely wishing for that scream, anything to prove that Milo was still alive.

  Half the food in the house seemed to be on the table when I came downstairs. ‘I’ve eaten,’ Dad said. ‘This lot’s for you; take your pick. I’ve packed other food, and got our walking gear ready. Whatever else happens, Helen, we’ll be prepared for any conditions Coldharbour has to throw at us.’

  We left the house shortly afterwards. Dad drove the car to the southern edge of the town. From there we would have to make our way on foot – any usable roads into Coldharbour had long disappeared. I stopped for a moment to peer beyond the bridge linking us with the mud flats. All I could see was mile after mile of steel girders and derelict huts that looked alike. Only the refuse tips, standing out like peaks against Coldharbour’s flatness, offered something to aim for.

  We crossed the river, and as we did I wondered what I was doing. Even with Dad beside me, I didn’t feel ready to confront Milo again. Hadn’t he terrified me before? If he was still transforming, his pain might be worse. Wouldn’t I run again? Probably, I thought. But at least I’m going to find you. Even without your screams, I’ll find you, Milo.

  The sun was already low in the sky by the time Dad and I set off into Coldharbour. Only Milo was capable of sending his thoughts from long distances, but one gang boy, walking home, was close enough for me to dip into his mind. The boy did not know where Milo was, but he’d heard of a giant, and had once seen Emily streaking across the landscape.

  I let his mind lead me to that place.

  In the fading light, surrounded by rats competing with seagulls for the choicest of the leftovers, we arrived at the heart of the northern tip. Dad and I climbed up the lower slopes of rubbish. From the summit, out of breath, we screened our eyes from the wind.

  ‘There’s still a long way to go,’ I said.

  ‘Do you know which direction, Helen?’

  ‘Yes – come on.’ Helping each other, we picked our way across the tip. By the time we were off, the seagulls were screeching and wheeling in the sky, preparing to return to their roosting nests further up the coast.

  Above their screeches, dominating everything else, was another sound. I’d grown used to it. Endlessly there, eternally gnawing away, it was the sound I had come to hate and dread – the sound of the roar. Only this time it was different. This time the roar seemed to break free and suddenly burst over me.

  It came loudly from all directions, like a mouth next to my face.

  ‘What is it?’ Dad asked, holding me up. ‘Helen!’

  But I hardly heard his words. The world seemed to tilt and fall away as my gift reached out. It reached out like it had done for Milo, but this time it went much further, raced beyond the tips, beyond Coldharbour, beyond all adults and children, beyond our world entirely, until at last it located something. It found the source of the roar.

  It glimpsed the roarer.

  Not human, not animal. Vaster. There was nothing on our world to compare the roarer with because it was larger than our world. Its stomach alone was larger – and it was starving. I sensed its long thick body moving through space, feeding on the particles of matter there, and needing more. That was why it screamed. It was hunger that made it roar.

  My mind drew back, unable to stand even this brief contact. But I did not withdraw soon enough. The roarer stopped. Just for a moment it paused, sensing me. Perhaps it smelled me, even across the immense distances of space. Then it moved on again between the stars, surer than it had been of its destination. It dragged its famished body towards us more urgently.

  Dad was shouting at me, trying to bring me back. I felt hi
s hands on me, shaking me, and at last I let out a scream of my own.

  ‘Helen, what’s happening? Tell me what to do! Tell me …’

  I looked at Dad, and though I could see his lips forming words they were being drowned out. The only sound I could hear in the world was the roar. Barely able to speak, I pressed Dad to move on. I clutched his hand, and together we ran towards Milo and the setting sun.

  Fifteen

  the river

  THOMAS

  Throughout the day I’d been sweating inside a fever. While it gripped me, I was clearly aware of only one thing – the roar. The sinister quality of it never left us now. Even my dreams were filled with the nightmare of it. And the slow-beating wing – the one note of hope we all clung to – had faded almost to nothingness.

  I slept most of the day. While I did so the twins worked tirelessly to hold Milo together. In those brief times I knew what was happening around me, their busy hands were always doing something for him. And he seemed to appreciate it. At least, when the twins offered him a bite to eat or put a cup to his lips, he smiled as if he really understood their kindness. Once I woke to see him smiling up at Freda as if she was a saint.

  ‘If I’d more to give,’ she murmured softly to him, ‘I’d give it.’

  ‘If I’d more to give,’ Emily said, ‘I’d love ’im with it.’

  The twins took care of me, too, though I wondered if Walter needed their help more. He’d always taken on too much responsibility, our Walter, it was just part of his nature, but it was awful to see him looking so miserable. All those muscles, but what could he do for Milo? What could any of them do?

  Only my beauty was keeping Milo alive. There was precious little left of it. Perhaps I should have been more nervous about that, but what Milo had said to me earlier had changed my mind about many things. I trusted him more. The purpose of my beauty seemed clearer to me now: to lessen Milo’s suffering while he finished his transformation. I couldn’t be sure, but more and more the power lifting out of me and into him felt like a natural thing.

  Most of the time, though, I was too wrapped up in my own pain to notice anything going on around me. Whatever had struck me down, I felt worse than ever. My throat ached; my eyes burned; the smallest gulps of air were difficult. Milo would moan, and usually I’d follow him up straight away with a haggard breath of my own – nearly as long and loud – with the twins anxiously flitting between us all the while. I’d never realized you could have pain in so many places at once! Every part of my body was racked by some dull or stabbing grief.

  When I did wake up, it was the stench I noticed. Milo absolutely stank of decay. I could smell him all over me, an odour so bad I couldn’t even identify it.

  Shortly before sunset, I woke to whisperings in the shack. When I heard my name mentioned, I kept my eyes half-shut.

  ‘… all wasting away, Toms is,’ Emily was saying. ‘Oh, it ain’t right not to say! We got to!’

  ‘But ee’ll go berserk!’ Freda replied. ‘Oo knows what ee’ll do?’ She sounded like a lost soul. ‘Oh, no, what am I saying? Course we ’ave to tell ’im. Course we do, Emms!’

  I remained as still as I could, waiting for more.

  ‘Walts, what do you think?’ Freda asked.

  All this time Walter had been glancing agonizingly between me and Milo – as if he didn’t know who needed his help most. Now he shuffled his feet, and said in an undertone, ‘He’s l-looking the s-same, isn’t he? Like Milo did when we f-first saw him. Don’t t-tell Tommy y-yet. I’m go-going to get h-help.’

  ‘Oo’s help?’

  ‘Helen. She m-might understand. She knows th-things about Milo we d-don’t.’

  ‘Helen was scared stiff of ’im, more like!’ Freda said. ‘She’ll never come here unless you make her.’

  ‘I won’t n-need to m-make her,’ Walter said. ‘She’ll c-come if I ask her.’ He looked at the twins, obviously trying to convince himself. He started to rise, then changed him mind. ‘Nah, nah,’ he said. ‘C-can’t leave you on your own. Too m-much happening.’

  ‘No, Walts,’ Freda told him. ‘If you think Helen might be able to help, you go. Toms has been asleep ages. I doubt ee’ll wake.’

  Walter hesitated a moment more. ‘W-w-won’t be long, then,’ he said, putting on his patchwork jacket, and giving Freda his smile.

  ‘Good,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t be.’

  I shut my eyes tight as Walter hovered briefly next to me. Then he left the shack. As soon as I could no longer hear his footsteps, I fully opened my eyes. Emily gazed back at me, trying to work out how long I might have been listening.

  ‘You all right, are yer, Toms?’ she said, as casually as she could. ‘Feeling a bit better, eh?’

  ‘Never mind that,’ I answered. ‘What exactly did Walter mean just now when he said I looked like Milo?’ With an effort I propped myself up. ‘Why wasn’t I told anything? Well?’

  The twins stared at me fearfully, tears suddenly starting in their eyes. ‘It’s all right,’ I said, mistaking the meaning of their expressions. ‘I won’t go berserk, whatever it is. Come on – just tell me what Walter meant.’

  There was a shuffling movement, and I turned to see Milo.

  He sat comfortably on my old mattress, sipping water. He was able to hold the cup himself now; he didn’t need assistance from the twins. His arms were still hard against his chest, but his skin had altered. Beneath the golden skin hanging in tatters there were several points of silver. They lit up the shack like stars.

  ‘Milo …’ I said, finding a smile from somewhere. ‘You look … far better … you …’

  I trailed off when I noticed that he was wearing one of my shirts. I don’t know why that unnerved me, but it did. He stared at me strangely. He stared at me just like the twins, and just like them there were tears in his eyes.

  Suddenly I realized – all their tears were for me.

  ‘I’m all right,’ I said automatically. ‘Aren’t I?’

  I looked at my hand. All the flesh was pasty white. I lifted it to my nose and the reek of rotting flesh shuddered through me. All along, I’d been smelling my own decay!

  ‘What?’ I screamed, trying to get up. My left leg wouldn’t move properly. I threw the blankets off, and when I prodded my knee the flesh felt dead.

  Emily screamed. She actually screamed. Freda held her hands over her mouth.

  I got up – and it took every bit of energy I had. Emily rushed over to help, holding me upright. I stood there tottering like a baby, seeing how much pressure I could put on the left leg. Not much. My one good leg and Emily were the only things keeping me from collapsing. I hadn’t looked at the rest of my body yet; I didn’t want to. ‘What … what do I look like?’ I asked.

  The girls wouldn’t answer, either because they were so upset or because it was too hard to describe.

  ‘Sit down, Tommy,’ Freda was saying. ‘We’re … we’re gonna w-work this out.’

  ‘Walts will be back soon,’ Emily added.

  ‘What’s he going to do?’ I demanded. ‘Bring crutches? You think that’ll make everything better?’

  ‘You stay calm,’ Emily implored me.

  I tried. I still hadn’t examined the rest of my body. They were all doing enough of that for me! No, I had to look, stop panicking, face it. How bad could it be?

  ‘Just relax, Toms,’ Emily was saying. ‘Sit yerself down on the sheet there.’

  ‘Will you just shut up!’ I screamed. ‘Shut up!’ I was trembling, trembling. ‘Get me a mirror!’ I ordered Freda.

  ‘You don’t want to see, Toms,’ she said.

  ‘Yes, I do. Get the mirror!’

  ‘We ain’t got one.’

  ‘In your bag!’ I shouted. ‘I know you’ve got one. Get it or I swear I’ll … I don’t know what I’ll do!’

  Emily glanced at Freda, then went to the back of the shack. Inside the pocket of a bag there was a small rectangular mirror, smudged with the girls’ fingerprints.

  F
reda begged me to sit. I took the mirror and lifted it – not to my face, though, not yet; I looked down, angling it to show off my body first. I should have known what I’d see in that mirror. My symptoms were hardly new. Milo. I looked like Milo – but not the new version of him. No, I looked exactly like the old one, the hot-skinned one with all the bits of flesh hanging off. Only the gold was missing. I raised the mirror to my face. I touched my left eyelid and it slid away painlessly. I moistened my lips and they hissed ever so softly. My bald head almost shone. My hair lay all over the bedclothes.

  ‘What … what have you done to me?’ I croaked at Milo. He said nothing. I looked at Emily and Freda, and they looked back at me, tears and love in their eyes.

  ‘You did this!’ I screamed at Milo.

  I wanted to smash him. But more than that I wanted to know … why? Hadn’t he blessed me for what I’d done for him? Hadn’t he given me thanks for the kindness of my beauty? ‘How … could you do this?’ I said. ‘How could you?’

  He sat up on my mattress, gazing at me with an expression I couldn’t understand at all.

  The twins gazed in horror at the state of me. ‘You – you weren’t anywhere near this bad before,’ Emily murmured. ‘Oh, Toms …’

  Milo hadn’t taken his eyes off me. ‘Good-looking, aren’t I!’ I shouted. Suddenly I felt a stomach pain – and realized my beauty was in its last spasm. Yet even now, with it gasping out of me, Milo took what was left, siphoning the final dregs for himself. Then he flinched – and his heart boomed out like a cannon. With reckless movements of his bloodied fingers, he started tearing at the shreds of his skin. What was underneath flashed silver. One flash. Another. Another. Each one nearly blinded us, and with every one of them my stomach howled with pain.

  ‘That’s enough! Get in the back! To the back of the shack!’ I screamed at the twins. I dragged my body towards Milo.