The Boy with One Name

by J. R. Wallis

  And then Ruby saw the tiny nub of chalk on the floor and heard a little voice in her head, telling her to grab it, without Jones seeing. So she did.

  Without her phone, Ruby wasn’t sure how to get onto the Internet so she was relieved when they found an Internet café on the main road about a ten-minute walk from Chesterford Gardens, sandwiched between a McDonald’s and a travel agency.

  ‘We’re lucky, there aren’t many of these types of places left,’ she informed Jones as they went inside.

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘Because people usually just go onto the Internet at home or on their phone if they’re out.’

  Jones watched Ruby’s fingers tapping away on the keyboard and he was in awe of her knowing what to do. She found Easton’s Bakery & Patisserie very quickly. The shop was in Hampstead on a street called South End Road. Jones was amazed when Ruby made the computer show them exactly where the shop was on a map. It gave them a bird’s eye view and it seemed that the shop backed onto part of Hampstead Heath with a mass of trees behind it.

  ‘What else can the Internet do?’ asked Jones, patting the warm plastic edge around the monitor of the computer.

  ‘All sorts of things,’ Ruby replied. ‘Ask me anything, and I’ll make it give us the answer.’

  ‘Will we kill the Witch?’

  ‘I don’t mean questions like that. It can’t tell you the future, only facts.’ He frowned at her. ‘It’s like your Pocket Book Bestiary,’ she explained. ‘That holds lots of information about monsters, right? Like their history, what weapons to use and stuff like that. But it can’t tell you the future, can it? It can’t tell you if you’ll actually kill a Wretch or an Ogre or whatever creature you’re looking up. Just how to do it.’

  ‘And the Internet’s the same?’ Jones sounded a little disappointed.

  ‘Well, no, it can do other stuff.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like entertain you for a start.’ Ruby clicked on the YouTube link and brought up a clip from an old cartoon called Tom and Jerry which she knew her grandparents had always found funny when they’d been alive and her life had been happier.

  Jones’s eyes lit up as he watched the cartoon cat chasing the cartoon mouse around the kitchen. When it was over, Ruby searched for a clip from an old black-and-white Charlie Chaplin film because she and her grandfather had roared with laughter whenever they’d watched it.

  ‘More,’ whispered Jones as the clip finished.

  But there was no time to watch anything else because it was late and the Internet café was closing, so Jones sighed and slid off the chair. After leaving, Ruby led Jones towards the McDonald’s next door, but he pulled back, afraid of the bright lights and big windows.

  ‘We can’t go in there.’

  ‘Why not? It’s where people go when they’re hungry, especially kids like us.’

  ‘I know, but . . .’ Jones tried straightening his overcoat and smoothing down his hair. ‘I ain’t never been in one.’

  ‘You’ll be fine.’ Ruby beckoned him in as she held open the door for him.

  She showed him how to choose from the big menu above the counter, answering all his questions about the differences between nuggets and burgers, and shakes and ice cream. When she made him order, pushing the boy forward, he recited nervously what they were going to have. He watched in amazement as the server, in her beige outfit, listened to him intently, tapping the order into the till. When it came to paying, he produced a small leather purse from an overcoat pocket.

  ‘Maitland gave me an emergency fund for when we were out hunting,’ he whispered as he unzipped the purse and handed over a ten-pound note.

  ‘Thank you, Jones,’ said Ruby.

  ‘Thank you, Ruby,’ he replied.

  They sat eating their burgers and drinking their milkshakes. The only thing Jones was unsure about was the slice of green gherkin in his bun. But he loved the fries, dipping them one after the other into the white frilly cup of ketchup sitting on his tray, and chomping them down to his fingertips.

  ‘Good?’ said Ruby.

  ‘Yeah.’

  Ruby toasted him with her Coke. ‘To your first ever burger.’ Jones grinned like a hamster, his cheeks stuffed full of bun and burger and fries.

  But when he noticed a man sitting in the corner, watching them, a white cup of something steaming in front of him, Jones felt goosebumps bubbling up all over his body. The man’s skin was very pale. His face was drawn, almost gaunt, and he had long, spindly fingers. Jones couldn’t help glancing at him after that.

  ‘What’re you looking at,’ whispered Ruby, leaning forward.

  ‘Nothing,’ mumbled Jones.

  Ruby balled up her paper napkin and dropped it onto the floor. ‘Oooops,’ she announced, crouching down and picking it up, giving her time to glance at the man.

  ‘What about him?’ she whispered as she sat down opposite Jones again.

  Jones started organizing the things on his tray. When Ruby touched his arm, he looked up at her. ‘All this is so nice,’ he said quietly. ‘I like burgers and fries and sitting here talking, and I never believed I’d ever do anything like it. But it’s hard to forget everything Maitland taught me, like how to tell when people ain’t people at all.’ He shifted nervously in his chair. ‘What if I can’t turn off being a Badlander? What if I kill the Witch to rescue my parents and they end up being okay, but then one day we come to a place like this and I can’t be ordinary?’

  Ruby dumped her tray on top of Jones’s and stood up. ‘Then you need to start practising being ordinary, at letting go of what you’ve been taught. Come on.’

  She walked to the nearest bin and cleared the trays and then stacked them. Then she put her arm through Jones’s and walked him out through the glass doors. As the pale man watched them leave, Jones could feel a fizzing in his chest.

  When he came out onto the street, Jones started looking for a dark alley or a deep shopfront in which he could hide and wait for the man in order to follow him. It was part of his instinct and a feeling difficult to shake.

  ‘Maitland’s not here any more,’ whispered Ruby, sensing how uncomfortable Jones was. Keeping her arm hooked into his, she started walking briskly down the street, taking him with her.

  She felt him start to relax the further they went along the pavement.

  ‘See. It’s just going to take practice. That’s all.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Jones. But then he stopped so suddenly he nearly pulled Ruby’s arm out of its socket.

  ‘What the—’

  But Jones just pointed at the bank of television screens in the shop window of the electrical store beside them. They were all tuned to the same news channel and an identical newscaster was mouthing at them from every screen. Above the right shoulders of all of them was a headshot of Ruby and a headline beside it read ‘Missing Girl’. Ruby watched the screens change to footage of her foster parents’ house. When a policeman appeared on camera, she turned away and started striding down the street, the gun parts clinking in the plastic bag she was still holding. By the time Jones had caught up with her, he was almost out of breath.

  ‘I just thought people would forget about me,’ said Ruby, looking around nervously. ‘No one’s ever really bothered about me before except my grandparents and they’re both gone. Simeon was right. Running away and becoming a Badlander is probably the most stupid idea I’ve ever had.’

  ‘No, it’s not,’ said Jones. ‘You killed a Wretch, remember? And helped me catch a Gást.’

  ‘All I own are a few clothes stuffed into a rucksack. I’ve got eighty-five pounds and seventy-three pence, saved up from pocket money and a paper round. When I ran away the other night, it felt like a million pounds.’

  ‘Maitland had money. You can have that. You won’t have to go back to being an ordinary girl if you don’t want to.’

  Without saying anything else, Jones grabbed Ruby’s hand and led her down the street until he spotted an alley where they would be out
of sight from prying eyes. He took out the bottle of black Slap Dust which Simeon had returned to him in case of any emergency now he’d agreed to be his Whelp, and poured a tiny amount into his left hand and a little into Ruby’s right hand, before putting the bottle away.

  ‘You’re already a Badlander, Ruby. You just need to keep practising.’ He winked at her. ‘So are you ready?’

  Ruby smiled and then, locking arms, they slapped their hands together, and vanished, leaving nothing but loose sheets of newspaper blowing across the alley as evidence of them ever being there.

  TWENTY

  Jones stepped back from Ruby and scrutinized her in the early morning sunshine coming through the bathroom window. He frowned. Clicked the pair of scissors he was holding in frustration.

  ‘You still look like you.’

  ‘Cut it any shorter and I’ll look like a boy.’ Ruby smoothed a hand over her head. Her hair barely reached over the tops of her fingers now. She sighed at the sight of all her black curls lying in the sink like giant commas. One of the things she most liked about herself was her rich dark hair.

  ‘You’re the one who said you spent all last night worrying about being on the television.’ Jones picked up Maitland’s old cut-throat razor and prised open the blade. ‘Let me go over your head with this and no one’ll recognize you. I know how to use it. Maitland taught me. You’ll still be the same on the inside. You’ll still be a girl, however you look.’

  Ruby stared at the sharp edge of the razor catching the sunlight, and then shook her head. ‘I’ve got a better idea. Go and look out any clothes you’ve got that’ll fit me. I’ll come and find you,’ and she walked out of the bathroom before Jones could say any more.

  When she arrived in the bedroom a few minutes later, Jones had laid out most of his clothes on the bed. Ruby had found one of Maitland’s old baseball caps and, wearing it pulled right down over her eyes, it was difficult to recognize her.

  ‘Looks all right, I suppose,’ said Jones grudgingly.

  After looking through Jones’s clothes, Ruby picked out a grey cashmere sweater, with a small hole in the neck, because it looked like the softest thing he owned. The wool smelt of boy. So did the pair of beige trousers she put on. She completed her outfit with a pair of tatty white plimsolls, and a battered brown belt with a small silver buckle. But when she stared at herself in the mirror she shook her head.

  ‘I need a coat. You wear one and so did Maitland, and Simeon and Thomas Gabriel do too. All the Badlanders I’ve met seem to have one.’

  ‘It’s cos of the pockets. They’re usually charmed to hold more than you think. You never know what you might need in a fix.’

  ‘How about that one?’ and Ruby pointed at an army camouflage jacket hanging in the wardrobe.

  ‘Go ahead. I wore it a few times, but preferred my overcoat.’

  There was a label inside with a name written on it in black marker pen that said ‘Private Owens’. Ruby tried the jacket on and plunged her hands into the deep pockets, imagining all the things she could fit in there as she admired herself in the mirror. And then something occurred to her when she saw a battered old leather backpack in the bottom of the wardrobe. ‘Since I’m not like other Badlanders,’ she said, slipping the pack onto her shoulders, ‘I think I should be different.’ She checked herself in the mirror. ‘Perfect for my scrying mirror. And no one’ll recognize me now,’ she said, nodding.

  ‘It’s not just about how you look. It’s about being confident too when you’re a Badlander. Knowing what you’re doing.’

  Ruby pulled the baseball cap back down over her eyes and spoke in a different, deeper voice. ‘Jones,’ she announced dramatically, ‘I will do my best.’

  They spent the rest of the morning in Maitland’s study looking at books about Witches. Ruby and Jones both agreed that going anywhere near a Witch meant taking every precaution possible. So they were keen to read up on how to stay safe, in preparation for a trip back to Hampstead that night to find out what they could about Mrs Easton’s Dark Bottle.

  Maitland had a whole section on the creatures and Jones worked his way through it, making notes as he skimmed through the pages of each book.

  The Pocket Book Bestiary was full of information too. It didn’t take Ruby long to realize there were different grades of Witch, and sub-grades within each one of those. Every kind of Witch was defined by a dizzying array of different characteristics ranging from things like their age, the size of their nose, the colour of their eyes, to how many warts there were on their body and even what they ate.

  The book made it very clear that although Witches could perform magic it was nothing like Badlander Magic. The book called it Wiccacraeft and there were different theories as to how Witches came by it. What the books all agreed on though was that a single bite from a Witch could poison any Badlander who’d Commenced, turning the magic inside them bad.

  ‘Jones, we’ve got magic in us. What if we get bitten by Mrs Easton? Simeon and Thomas Gabriel said Witches love munching down children. Who says Mrs Easton won’t try and take a bite if she catches a whiff of us. They’ve got noses like bloodhounds apparently, can sniff out an apprentice up to a mile away.’

  Jones turned a page in the book he was reading. ‘It says here rye drops turn Witches right off eating children. Maitland’s got a jar in the van; we can chew some before we go looking for her.’

  Ruby tapped the page she was on. ‘But this one says rye drops only work with certain types of Witches. We need to know what sort Mrs Easton is. Three-Toed. Dimple-Skinned. Blob-Warted. Bluebell Syrup works most of the time with a Flared Hair Witch but White Rose Petal powder is best with a Goggle-Eyed one.’

  Jones sighed as he looked at all the books piled around him. ‘This is hopeless. We need to know more about what sort of Witch Mrs Easton is before we can get close and spy on her safely. Can’t you use your scrying mirror?’

  Ruby shook her head. ‘It only works on people I’ve met or places I’ve been.’

  Jones slapped his book shut and stood up. ‘Come on, maybe there’s another way to find out more about her.’

  Simeon had sent over some imps that morning to fix the gun as he’d promised. And he’d sent them very early indeed. An old brass tin had appeared out of thin air in the kitchen with an alarm clock stuck on top which had gone off a minute later at exactly 6 a.m.

  Ruby and Jones had come down the stairs, rubbing their eyes, to investigate the noise and found a note fixed to the tin wishing them a ‘Good Morning’. Written beneath had been an instruction that now they were awake they should start preparing the house immediately. Neither Ruby nor Jones had felt that was a good idea at all. So it wasn’t until after breakfast that they opened the tin, and a group of tiny grey imps had popped out and lined themselves up, ready and waiting to work on the gun. After being given the plastic bag containing the weapon’s parts, they’d set to work immediately.

  When Jones and Ruby returned to the kitchen, having spent most of the morning in Maitland’s study, they discovered the gun was fully repaired, and it was very happy about it too. It was lying on sheets of newspaper on the table, shouting at the grey imps to clean it in all the right places. The creatures were using rags in their tiny, clawed hands, cooing as if they’d found a gun made of gold.

  ‘Ahhh, Jones, my boy!’ roared the revolver when it saw him. ‘I’m back. Better than ever. I gather you’re to become a Whelp according to what these good little imps have told me.’

  ‘That ain’t happening,’ replied Jones.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ve got other plans than what Simeon thinks. We’re gonna kill this Witch what’s cursed my parents as soon as we’ve found her Dark Bottle.’

  All the imps breathed in together and started chattering among themselves.

  ‘But you can’t go back on your word. Not to someone like Simeon.’

  ‘I can too. Now you need to tell us everything you know about—’

  ‘I’ll warn you now, Jo
nes, Simeon hasn’t erased Maitland’s charm completely, he’s just changed it so I can tell him things. So I still can’t tell you anything about the Witch.’ Ruby and Jones stepped back immediately in case it fired.

  ‘Bloomin’ Simeon,’ said Jones. ‘All he wants is that Witch kept secr—’ He paused as something occurred to him. ‘He only sent you back to keep an eye on us, didn’t he?’

  ‘No.’

  Jones glowered at it. ‘I’ll dig a hole for me and Ruby to put you in and forget about you,’ he threatened.

  ‘All right, all right. Yes, Simeon asked me to keep an eye on you and I agreed. I’m to send these imps back if you do anything to disobey him. Turn out your pockets, boys, we’ve been rumbled.’ All the imps sighed and threw down little grains of Slap Dust on the table, which Jones scooped away.

  ‘What’s in it for you?’ asked Ruby, picking up the gun.

  ‘I’m to be Thomas Gabriel’s gun if he Commences. My legacy will go on.’

  Ruby laughed. ‘What, with that numbskull!’ She aimed the gun at an imaginary Mrs Easton. ‘Look, me and Jones have got a Witch problem. Up for helping even if you can’t tell us anything about her?’

  ‘Work with you again? Never.’

  ‘I thought you wanted to be partners.’

  ‘You threw me at Simeon, another Badlander! I’m sorry, but I have to think of my reputation. I’ve worked with some of the best Badlanders around, including Maitland, may he sleep peacefully according to the wyrd. So I expect my new owner to be of similar calibre, not come over all hysterical and use me like a rudimentary missile. I’m not a rock. I’m a Webley Mark 1 Service Revolver from 1897 and need to be treated with respect!’

  There was a round of applause from the imps, who cheered and waved their little rags as they stood on the table.

  ‘I’m sorry about what happened,’ said Ruby, eager to convince the gun she meant it. ‘Honest. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. I just panicked. I didn’t know what else to do.’

  The gun merely sniffed and said nothing as Jones plucked two tins of baked beans from a cupboard and peeled off the lids using the ring pulls.