‘Oh my!’ Mrs Barson cried and brought her hands to her heart. Em giggled; Takeru and I watched, embarrassed, intrigued. ‘Why, her eyes, they’re near white! Her skin is pale, pale and feeling so cold. Her hair is flat and has no lustre, no sheen. She looks emptied.
‘“That trickster!” she cries, but her voice has no power, no charge. What is she going to do? He has taken her dreams and her life and gone, fled away, with nothing to give back.’
Mrs Barson lowered her head to stare us right in the eyes.
‘The girl searches for him, and tries to find help in others, but none will believe her – her words always sound so false, so fluttering and wispy, smoke caught on a breeze, butterflies flapping on windows, nothing to stir people to move. She wanders in the woods, looking for light, looking for Full Lot, but of course he is not there. She has sold her dreams for nothing but hot air and tricks. A lost cause.’
Em clapped suddenly, making us jump. ‘You see, you should respect the woods! Don’t ever sell your dreams, eh?’
‘Indeed, Emma. Full Lot’s a clever one. He knows where each of us is weakest,’ said Mrs Barson.
‘And that’s a local thing, is it?’ asked Takeru.
Mrs Barson smiled. ‘All recorded here, dear,’ she said, picking up a book from a nearby shelf. Tales and Hauntings of Morey, cheap, faded and thin.
‘Thank you,’ I said, ‘that was really interesting.’
‘Oh, the stories with soul in them always are. Give me a mystery from a wood of my own over aliens and gunfire any day.’
We thanked her again and started for the front door. The house’s silence seemed heavy. We shuffled out, none of us talking. When I was in the doorway, I felt a hand rest lightly on my shoulder. I turned around.
‘Take care, dear,’ said Mrs Barson.
‘Um,’ I said. ‘Sure.’ Em and Takeru were already outside, waiting.
‘If you ever need to chat … I know it’s not easy being new in town,’ she said. ‘And things are hard, I’m sure.’
I frowned. ‘Sorry?’
She blinked, and nodded without saying anything. ‘Not my place,’ she said. ‘You run along.’
She lowered her gold glasses again and let them fall loose on the chain, standing in the doorway as I walked back out to the street. Em cocked her head. I shrugged. ‘Just saying goodbye,’ I said.
* * *
We headed home. The sun was high and we were hungry.
‘She’s pretty cool, right?’ asked Em. Takeru and I nodded. ‘We can go back there another time. Give the society something to do.’
‘Give her something to do, you mean!’
‘Same thing,’ said Em.
I said goodbye to them outside Takeru’s house and walked around to Uncle Rob’s. I had to go back to the loft. I had to.
I had to see Eren.
ELEVEN
‘We are the dreamers of dreams,’ he says. ‘Magic. Wow. Magic. What a lady. I should so like to get to know her.’
‘Mrs Barson?’
‘You paint a fine picture of her, my boy. A fine, fine picture. A book keeper! Gods of the word, they are. Finest of the brave. You know, it’s them that keep books,’ he says, ‘that know things, in the end.’
He turns away from me and stares into blackness and shadows. ‘No greater fear or happiness,’ he whispers, ‘than for those who keep the books alive.’
I SNUCK IN the house, making sure no one saw me. Mum was in the kitchen, arguing on the phone. I stopped for a second to listen for Dad’s name, but whoever she was shouting at, it didn’t seem like someone I knew. The sound of rustling bags and clinking plates followed me upstairs. The loft ladder pulled down easier than before – it was getting less stuck every time. I paused, breathing heavily for just a second, watching the pale leaves outside my window. I put my foot on the bottom rung and climbed. As my head bobbed into the gloom I saw a shape move in the shadows near the window.
‘You again,’ he said in a hoarse whisper. He groaned and coughed. ‘Twice in a day, I’m a lucky one, eh? Come to finish the story?’
‘Eren,’ I said. It was the most powerful word I could think of. It meant everything.
He bowed and hobbled over and grinned like a devil. ‘Three pigs,’ he said, ‘and only two houses gone. It’s time for me pudding. Away we go!’
That was what he wanted, before anything else? It seemed like so little.
‘The third house was made of bricks,’ I said, and he nodded along with his eyes closed, swaying his head, a monster in prayer. ‘The wolf came, and he huffed, and puffed, but the bricks were strong, the cement was dry and solid, and no matter how hard he blew, nothing happened.’
‘He should try harder,’ said Eren. ‘Everyone falls in the end. He should blow into their weak spot.’
‘Uh … he does, he blows harder, but you can’t blow over a house made of bricks.’
‘You can’t blow over a house made of bricks, you mean.’ He licks his lips and pats his rough furred belly.
‘The wolf stops, and thinks. The door is locked, the windows tight closed – how can he get in? He’s hungry, after so much huffing and puffing.’
‘And effin’ and blindin’, I’m sure,’ said Eren. He opened his eyes and smiled at me. ‘Go on, then, go on, let me hear it all!’
‘The wolf climbed the house! He had seen, on the roof…’ I paused for a moment, ‘… a chimney!’
‘Oh, heavens! Oh, vengeance!’
I’d started to enjoy telling the story, I realised. I was enjoying ‘The Three Little Pigs’. Eren leaned towards me, desperate to hear what I said next. I had the power of the storyteller. I felt slightly odd. His breath – Eren’s breath – touched the hairs on my head and moved them slightly. He moved back and I stared at him. ‘The pigs aren’t stupid, though – not the third one, anyway. He sees the wolf’s plan, he knows what will happen if the beast gets inside.’
‘Never let the beast in, that’s for sure.’
‘“Quick, quick!” he tells his brothers. “He’ll come down the chimney, but why don’t we let him? Let him come all the way … to the pot! We can boil him, smash him, get rid of him for good!” They all agree, and the trap is set. The fire is lit, the water is heating, the pot is hot iron, hissing and steaming away. On the roof they hear the scratches of beasty claws.’
In my mind I heard the tapping of nail on slate, felt my skin prickle as the wolf’s howl echoed, watched the steam rise and spit in the boiling iron pot. Eren was moving closer again, hanging on my words. I had the power here.
‘Then, with a crash, the house is shaking. The chimney fills with dust as the wolf tears down it, ready to get three pork rolls in his belly. Splash! The pot rattles and chimes, the wolf howls, thrashes around, the pigs fall back in terror, squealing and snorting, sparks fly, iron sings out as the wolf bites down, and then … and then…!’
I was throwing my arms around, lost in the moment. I felt dizzy, spun out of control; the story was spilling over, bubbling around its mould, becoming wild and dangerous and raw. As I moved recklessly around, crying out the words, I caught sight of Eren. He was laughing as he watched me, mouthing along to my story. I stumbled, fell over, and the silence in the attic was so heavy I thought it might drown me. Time held its breath.
‘He dies,’ said Eren in a tiny, far-off whisper. ‘The wolf has lost, and the pigs, the victors, shall always be remembered. Thank you, Oli.’
I was sweating, panting, my eyes were stinging. Eren moved away to stare out of the window, turning his back to me and holding his hands together.
‘I—’ I said, but he shushed me without turning around.
‘You are special,’ he said. ‘That’s all. You have a flair for this kind of thing. You will be fine. I’m tired now, but thankful. Maybe you’d best be off, eh?’
‘What are you?’ I asked again. Had I really seen his lips moving with mine? Had I imagined it?
‘That sounds an easy question,’ he said, ‘but that’s only ’cause
of what you are. Be happy, for now, knowing that I’m here, knowing what I ain’t. I ain’t many things.’
‘Tell me more. About you,’ I said. I felt like the first man to meet an alien, an angel, a dinosaur. How could I not ask for more?
He snorted at my question and waved his hand around the room. ‘Look at this! Dust and shadows and forgotten things. Nothing to live on here. But I waited, didn’t I?’
‘What for?’
‘Someone up to the task.’
‘Me?’
‘You’re proving an ingenious little bugger, aye.’
‘Tell me more, Eren!’
‘Oh, that name,’ he said, holding his head, chuckling low and dark. Like a bear, I thought. ‘I’ll tell you more,’ he said. ‘Hell’s words, I’ll show you more, mark it. You in for more, Oli?’
What was he offering? I thought of Mum, Bekah, Uncle Rob and Dad.
‘Yes. Show me,’ I said.
In the dust a fly buzzed and jerked through the air, lost and drunk and dying. Eren moved slowly, in shuffles and steps that creaked, tattered wings rustling behind him with a sound like dry leaves and fire. As he stepped nearer, the light from the window behind him threw his shadow against my face and I felt the cold rising.
‘I will touch you between your eyes,’ he said. A single digit stretched towards me and I held my breath. His eyes, black and deep, shone even then. His touch was dry and faint and weak, like the touch of a silk scarf lightly tapping my skin. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘let’s go back.’
Deep in my stomach something lurched, and I felt myself spinning out of the loft.
* * *
Me and him, me and Eren, were crouching low behind rocks, staring out at the patchy grass. The sky was baking in the high sun, and an entire plain spread out before us – light-yellow grasses, boulders and rocks jutting harshly through, a river winding lazily to the horizon.
‘My memories,’ said Eren. He looked like a moulting vulture, or a crow, black and hazy but jagged, too. ‘My youth.’
I heard voices from behind a high stone and moved around to see. ‘They can’t see you,’ said Eren. ‘This all happened a long time ago. Years and years, like you couldn’t imagine.’
‘What year is it?’
‘No years. Not invented yet. No countries yet. Nothing but man and the things he knows.’
Three men were sitting on the ground, cooking meat over a fire. Their hair was tangled and long, they all had thick beards, and clothes made from animal fur and nothing more. The meat hung on a stick, juicy and spitting and sweet. ‘Who are they?’ I asked.
‘They’re no one special. Nothing much to do. But they’re some of the first.’
‘First?’
‘Hell, I remember all of this. So long ago, a time you can’t imagine.’
The men sat in silence, chewing on gristle, staring off at the open world, or watching the sun cross the sky. Then, suddenly, one of them spoke. He spoke in a strange, choking way, harsh but soft. He kept stopping, letting his words hang in the air before starting up again. The two other men watched him, or listened – I couldn’t tell.
‘He is telling them about a beast he has heard of,’ said Eren. ‘A beast he has seen.’
‘Seen?’
‘Heard of.’
‘Which?’ I asked, staring at the man again. His dark eyes squinted in the sun as he spoke.
‘Both. Neither. It’s not the same as it will be, later. They don’t really mark the difference.’
The man was moving his hands in time to his words, showing sizes, mimicking animals, and once or twice he hooted and chuckled. His friends watched and waited.
‘He’s telling them about the beast, about its size, its ferocity, its anger. No one could ever kill it. It will kill everything else, he says. Watch, watch what he does now…’
The man continued speaking and leaned forward to turn the meat. It hissed and the fat dripped into the flames. Eren sighed. ‘He is imagining, out loud, where the beast might live, and is wondering, to himself, what kind of man would tame it.’
‘He’s imagining?’
‘He is creating, boy. Creating a story that will later be told to others by both these men, listening now, as if it were theirs. When they tell it the hunter will kill the beast, or the beast will kill the hunter and devour him piece by piece. Different versions, spreading over the grass and the dust. He,’ says Eren, pointing, ‘he is the first teller, though.’
I moved closer. The men didn’t see me, didn’t move at all. The storyteller’s audience were ensorcelled. Their eyes, dark and deep-set, opened wide in amazement as the man continued talking, and when he stopped, they both gazed deep into the fire, and stretched their necks back to stare at the sky.
‘These men, their families, their language, their tales, their memories will die out long before a person ever even holds a pen. This world will pass into nothing before your people even know what metal is.’
I stared at the sun, high and yellow, righter and whiter than I had seen it. It was something ancient. I felt its power. Eren sighed and turned to me, his black shape filling my mind. ‘And from this I came, like the fire that bursts from the green trees, the wave that bubbles from the oceans. Stories were told, and they had power, and I was born, always hungry, always thirsty, seeking more, keeping the balance. That’s all you can know,’ he said. ‘I am something that came after, and I was fed well.’
‘You’re old,’ I said, not meaning it as a question, not wanting him to agree with me. He touched me, once, between my eyes, and the old, lost world faded into sand and wind, and I felt the attic floor beneath my feet. He shuffled away and said, over one shoulder, ‘Next … next time – when I am stronger again – you will share your own story with me. Just a slice, what do you say? A nice, juicy bit of Oli’s life, for a poor old thing like me.’
‘What?’
‘I showed you a part of me, and now I want a part of you. Three pigs is good – it’s a snack – but it’s not your tale, is it? Fair’s fair, little warrior. I want to hear about you. You’re so interesting. You’re so special. Next time, eh?’
I nodded and climbed down the ladder, feeling small and tired. The sound of Mum in the kitchen surprised me with its blandness. The ring of dead wind still rumbled and echoed in my ears.
TWELVE
Eren gives me a strange look, an unreadable mixture of loss and something else.
‘You won’t have understood all that,’ he says. I agree, sitting before him. I’m only just beginning to understand. Little pieces, bit by bit, drips and drops. He sighs and laughs.
‘You’re here now, so you can begin to see. There are things beyond the places you have been.’
‘It was … ancient,’ I say. The word is right, the only word I can think of that approaches that place.
‘It was a beginning,’ he says. ‘Do you know the ending?’
Is this a test, then? Maybe I can survive him. It’s a warm thought.
‘There is no end,’ I say, and the sound of him clapping explodes through my mind.
‘Bravo! “There is no end,” he says.’ He swoops down and his wings darken my sky. ‘No end, Oli. Tales go on and on. They come from before you were born, and they echo on after you leave.’
‘HEY, THERE you are!’ said Mum. She looked annoyed. ‘Oli, come on, help unpack the shopping.’ She pulled a loaf of bread out of a bag and thumped it down heavily on the table.
I felt tired and empty. My stomach hurt. ‘What’s up?’ I asked. The wrinkles around her eyes were more obvious than normal. She held herself stooped over the sink, looking like a frightened child.
‘I’m fine, Oli, just busy, and I’d appreciate the help.’
‘Sure. Sorry, Mum.’
I took cans and fruit out of plastic bags and did my best to find where they could go. Mum stayed at the sink, her hands gripping the edge, breathing deeply and staring into nothing.
‘Bad news about your dad, Oli,’ she said suddenly. My stomach turned
cold and I turned to look at her. She had her eyes closed as if she were remembering a song. ‘He’s going to stay in London for a bit.’
‘I thought he was coming soon?’
‘No. No, he’s staying down.’
‘Why?’
‘There are … problems at work. You know your dad has a very important job.’
‘He works for the government,’ I said.
‘Yes,’ said Mum slowly. ‘Yes, he does. And there are some hard times at the moment, so he’s … staying, to try to work things out.’
‘He’s not coming here, then?’
‘No. No, he can’t.’
‘For how long?’
‘I don’t know, Oli!’ she shouted. She gasped and stopped herself. ‘Oh, darling, I’m sorry. It’s just difficult. It’s … a big, big problem. But nothing he can’t handle, I’m sure. You know your father—’
‘It’s OK, Mum, really. I don’t mind it here. I really don’t. We can stay for the summer. It’s OK.’
‘Yes, I think we should,’ she said. ‘We should have come here long ago.’
‘Uncle Rob said he’s been to London before.’
She gave a tiny laugh. ‘Oh, yes. But it’s been years, now. Ages. Your father and Rob don’t really see eye to eye on a lot of things, which made it hard.’
I put away the cheese she’d bought, and the ham and the juice.
‘Rob was a proper trouble maker, back in the day,’ said Mum. ‘He always meant to be, too. Gave your dad some headaches back when we still lived here, when he was working on more local projects. Just planning approval, things like that, but…’ She stopped and looked up out of the window. ‘Before we moved to London, all this. Before your dad climbed the ranks,’ she said.
‘So you moved.’
‘And Rob stayed, yes.’
‘Why would they argue?’ I asked.
‘Ha!’ she said bitterly. ‘They’re both a bit proud. Your uncle just doesn’t really agree with a lot of what your dad does. They’re … very different men, Oli. Both like to have their own way. But they’re both good in their hearts. You know Rob once chained himself to a tree?’ she said, starting to laugh.
Tell the Story to Its End Page 7