The Bone Quill

by Barrowman, John

  After a beat, he leaned towards Matt and offered him his hand.

  Matt stared at Solon’s outstretched palm, his face blood-streaked and wet with tears.

  ‘If you’re going to find your father and stop this rebellion,’ said Solon, ‘then you’re going to need our help.’

  ‘How do you know we’re talking about my father?’ Matt whispered.

  ‘Because you said that the stranger who has come to our island is a Guardian,’ explained Solon, ‘and you hesitated before telling us that your father is a Guardian, too. We may be peasants, but we’re not stupid.’

  Matt nodded, accepting Solon’s hand unsteadily. ‘I’m sorry I hurt you,’ he mumbled. ‘And thanks for the offer. But I think I need to do this on my own. After all, my dad is the only family I have left.’

  SIXTY-NINE

  Auchinmurn Isle

  Middle Ages

  The Night Before

  Sandie had lost her footing while scrambling to Em’s defence against the slobbering hellhound, and was tumbling head over heels back down the hillside. Even her dress snagging on bramble bushes was doing nothing to stop her freefall.

  ‘Em!’ she screamed.

  In one ungainly roll through a thorny briar, Sandie slowed enough to see a woman in a modern orange safety vest running into the smoking blaze. Before disappearing behind the curtain of smoke, the woman turned and smiled at Sandie.

  Sandie couldn’t believe what she was seeing. How was that possible?

  But then she was off again, slipping out of the briar, her head bouncing off a tree root. She lunged and caught the end of the root just as the rest of her body swung off the edge of the overhang.

  Her hands were bleeding, and she had cuts across her arms and legs. Her dress was torn and filthy. Scrambling to get a better grip on the overhang, her legs bicycled against the rocks. It was a long drop to the beach. Sandie dolphin-kicked furiously, trying to heave herself up on to solid ground, but the tree root was not having it. As if in slow motion, it lifted from the soil. Her arms flailing in the air, Sandie dropped off the edge.

  The woman in the safety vest marched into the smouldering haze in time to see a monk in an ornate purple cassock crouching down to lift a sleeping Em into his arms.

  ‘Stop right there and leave the wean alone,’ Jeannie demanded, her hands on her ample hips, ‘before we both do something we might regret.’

  Malcolm froze at the sight of the Abbey’s housekeeper standing amid the ash and debris of Em’s fears. He had spent his entire life listening to Jeannie. She’d been like a mother to him, and he wished he was confronting anyone but her.

  Taking a step back, he dropped his hood to reveal the grotesque skeletal shell of his face.

  Jeannie didn’t flinch. Her stance remained resolute, her grey hair recently shampooed and set, her short leather boots tight on her thick ankles and her best wool coat peeping out from underneath the safety vest. It was as if she’d left the house to go to church, instead of travelling through time to meet a monster.

  ‘You don’t scare me, Malcolm Calder,’ she said. ‘I’m taking the lass and we’re going home. All I ask is ye think about what you’re doing here, and let us bring you home, too. This isn’t right and you know it. You’ll fracture history and change everything.’

  Malcolm burst out laughing. The old lady was making demands on him? On Malcolm Calder, who was destined to be so much more than a Guardian and a father? He flipped the cowl of his robe back up over his head, concealing his ruined face beneath its folds again.

  ‘You always did see the best in all of us, didn’t you, Jeannie?’

  ‘It’s still in there, son,’ she said, her voice and her stance softening. ‘Come home, why don’t you? For the sake of your weans and your poor dad.’

  ‘One day, Jeannie, you’ll realize there’s a demon in all of us,’ said Malcolm. ‘I’m simply choosing to let mine free.’

  He turned back towards his daughter. But before he could reach down and pick her up, the peryton crashed through the tops of the trees and swooped down. With a toss of its head, it flung Em up from the leaves and on to its back and flew out over the blackened treetops, down to the beach – and out of sight.

  Malcolm howled in rage. ‘You cannot stop me, Jeannie! No one can! I am unbound! I found the bone quill and took it and I hold it here, against my heart.’ He struck at a leather pouch around his neck. ‘My own son released me from the purgatory into which my father and my wife had bound me.’ He took a step towards Jeannie. ‘I have killed, controlled, ruled the superstitious fools on this island and when I find The Book of Beasts, Hollow Earth, the world and the future will all be mine!’

  Faster than Jeannie could have believed possible, he vanished into the smouldering woods, the firelight glinting on the embroidered black peryton of his robes.

  Jeannie did not give chase. Instead, she kneeled down and began to brush away the layer of ash covering the ground, before scrabbling at the soil with her fingers, burrowing her hands deep into the earth.

  Then she closed her eyes and imagined.

  SEVENTY

  Sandie had landed in Simon’s waiting arms with a thump.

  ‘I’ve got you,’ said Simon, steadying himself with a wince. ‘Though to be honest, I need to put you down right now.’ He set her on her feet and rubbed at his injured shoulder.

  ‘Simon!’ Sandie gasped. She spun around and stared up at the cliff. ‘I thought I saw ...’

  ‘Jeannie?’ said Simon. ‘You did.’

  ‘How did I never realize she was an Animare?’

  Simon smiled. ‘None of us did. It was the way that she wanted it. Renard’s her Guardian, and she made him swear an oath years ago to keep her secret. Her connection to these islands runs even deeper than ours.’

  The peryton suddenly swooped down and landed on the sand with a snort. Em lay draped across its back.

  ‘Oh, Em!’ Sandie rushed to her stirring, groaning daughter and lifted her from the peryton’s back, covering her with kisses.

  The peryton flicked its brilliant white head and leaped into the sky in a trail of shimmering light.

  ‘Is Jeannie the one who animated the peryton?’ Sandie asked, still trying to adjust to all that was happening.

  ‘Yes.’

  Sandie used the torn hem of her skirt to wipe soot from Em’s forehead. ‘She looks so young ... they are both still so young.’ She glanced around. ‘Did Matt get home safely?’

  Simon was silent for a second. ‘Matt returned to find you and Em. He’s somewhere on the island, but we don’t know where.’

  Sandie’s hands flew to her face. ‘We need to find him!’

  Simon knew he’d never get Sandie to return with him if he told her that Matt had come to the Middle Ages with Malcolm. They needed to return to Renard and the Abbey. ‘Matt may have already gone home,’ he said, not really believing his own words. ‘We can’t risk staying here any longer.’

  Sandie dropped to her knees on the sand, tears streaming down her face. ‘He’s only a boy ... This is all my fault ... all of it.’

  The peryton’s trail was still visible, but it had vanished, directly above Era Mina.

  Simon kneeled next to Sandie. ‘The peryton will watch out for him. Jeannie says that it’s bound to the islands and forever tied to the descendants of the person who first released it. Turns out Jeannie is descended from the first person to animate the peryton. The island is a kind of organic canvas to those descendants.’

  ‘How will that help Matt if he’s lost here?’ Sandie got to her feet.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Simon, ‘but we’re not helping Em by staying here any longer. Matt is a resourceful kid. He’ll be fine. I’m sure of it.’

  There was a sudden change in the wind. The mist surrounding Era Mina thickened, then went from pink to green to blue and finally to poppy red. A high white beam of light burst up from the centre of the smaller island like a great, dazzling spotlight.

  Clouds of mist stre
tched into long, thin slivers of colour and wrapped around the beam of light like fingers moulding clay, until suddenly the great light flew towards them in a long, white line stretching from Era Mina to Auchinmurn. Vibrating like a violin string above the water, it created a force of energy that in seconds was churning up a treacherous tidal wave.

  As they watched in astonishment, the tsunami suddenly changed its shape, forming a row of silver swords on its crest. The spray was already drenching them. The line of light rose higher, pulling the tide up with it, the blades of the swords stabbing the sky.

  ‘We need to get out of here,’ said Simon. ‘Now!’

  ‘Not without Matt and Jeannie,’ said Sandie. She thrust Em into Simon’s arms and began running across the sand.

  Simon threw Em over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold, chasing Sandie down the beach.

  ‘Jeannie made two copies of the woodcut that brought us here,’ he yelled over the roar of the churning sea. ‘I’ve got one and she has the other. Matt came here by some other means. They’ll both be able to come home on their own. We have to leave.’

  The great wave looked as if it were standing to attention beneath the brightly fluctuating ribbon of light.

  ‘We’re not going to survive when this wall comes crashing down,’ Simon warned.

  ‘Matt! Jeannie!’ Sandie wept. ‘I can draw something ...’

  ‘Don’t you get it, Sandie? Jeannie’s trying to protect the island. She’s trying to flood it, wash away the sacred relics, destroy the bone quill and The Book of Beasts and ...’

  Simon wasn’t prepared to share the news of Malcolm’s unbinding with Sandie just yet. She was shocked enough about Matt.

  ‘Jeannie’s doing everything that she can to secure our futures,’ Simon concluded, his voice heavy with emotion. He shifted Em to a more comfortable place on his shoulder. ‘If these relics are destroyed, Hollow Earth can’t be opened. Ever. Matt will have to look after himself for a while.’

  The roar of the wave was becoming deafening. The sea now stood as high as the monastery’s towers.

  ‘But what if Jeannie’s wrong, Simon? What if nothing changes?’ Sandie implored. ‘Or worse, everything does?’

  Simon unfurled Jeannie’s second copy of the ancient woodcut of the monastery and reached for Sandie’s hand. ‘It’s a risk we have to take. By tearing up your picture, you and Em will have to return home via 1848, but you told us there’s a picture you can use in Duncan’s studio to get back to the present, right?’

  Sandie slowly pulled her picture from her dress and stared at it. But what if Matt and Jeannie don’t survive the flood?

  The water furled over and into itself until the colossal wave looked like a giant glass locomotive roaring out of the sea towards them.

  ‘I have to find my son!’

  Simon thrust Em into Sandie’s arms, grabbed Sandie’s drawing of the monastery tapestry and tore it up alongside the woodcut Jeannie had made for him. The deluge rushed over the spot where they had stood, slamming into the island a second after they had gone.

  High up on the hillside, Jeannie pulled her hands from the cold earth, sat back on her heels and watched her death approaching.

  SEVENTY-ONE

  The Abbey

  Present Day

  Em slept fitfully on and off for three long days. When she learned what Matt had done and how Jeannie had followed him to repair the damage, she was inconsolable. She wouldn’t eat, she wouldn’t read, she stayed in her bed. Her brother was gone, and Jeannie may have drowned. Even Zach was unable to relieve Em’s sadness or draw a single smile from her, and it wasn’t for lack of trying.

  The mood in the Abbey was as sombre as the weather, which had been overcast since their return to the twenty-first century. Simon, Renard and Zach spent their days poring over the maps and tunnel plans that Matt had discovered in the library, determined to find a way back. But it seemed impossible. The tapestry had been destroyed, Jeannie had the original woodcut of the Abbey, and Duncan Fox’s medieval watercolour was with Matt. Somehow they had to return to the Middle Ages and undo the damage that their time travel had caused. They had to recover the bone quill and find the rest of The Book of Beasts before Malcolm and his monks wrought destruction.

  Neither Em nor her mother knew the part that Malcolm had played. The others had decided to keep this information to themselves. How much grief could they ask Sandie and Em to endure?

  And so they waited, watching the still-life and all the prints they had found on Matt’s desk, hoping that at any moment, Matt would appear, crashing to the floor in a burst of bright colours and even more colourful language. But days passed and Matt never came home.

  One morning, later in the week, Sandie marched into her daughter’s bedroom, carrying a plate of warm currant scones. Em lay huddled on her bed in the semi-darkness, no handsome knights or pale vampires projecting from her dreams.

  ‘Em,’ Sandie said softly, perching on Em’s bed. ‘Your brother is both resourceful and knowledgeable, and he has Jeannie there with him. They will find a way to return. Okay?’

  Em sat up against her pillows. ‘But what if something happens before then? What if Hollow Earth is opened and—’

  ‘It won’t be.’

  Sandie set the scones on the bedside table, slipped off her shoes and climbed on the bed with her daughter, pulling Em’s duvet over her shoulders. They lay quietly together. In her mother’s arms, Em sensed hope and she felt better.

  ‘If anyone can get out of this, Matt can,’ Em finally said, allowing herself to feel optimistic for the first time in days. ‘If he was stuck forever, lost or dead ... I would feel it. You know?’

  ‘Of course you would,’ said Sandie, climbing from the bed. At the window, she pulled back the curtains. Light flooded into the bedroom.

  ‘I think he’ll be fine,’ Em said, pushing back the duvet and examining the plate of scones. ‘No – I know he’ll be fine. You came back to me, and so will he.’

  She picked up a scone and bit into its warm crumbling centre. ‘Who made these?’ she said as she went to join her mother at the window. ‘They’re delicious.’

  I did.

  Em turned. Zach was standing by the door.

  I’ve been watching Jeannie in the kitchen my whole life. Figured I’d have a go.

  With a smile, Sandie kissed her daughter, grabbed a scone and left the room.

  Zach joined Em at the window, slipping his hand into hers. Together they looked out over the lawns to the bay, and beyond that to the small island, where the sun spilled from a break in the clouds, cloaking the tower of Era Mina in shimmering gold.

  GLOSSARY

  The Abbey

  The Abbey on Auchinmurn Isle started its life as a fortress, then a monastery housing a community of monks in the early Middle Ages, developing into a modern home and place of learning in the twenty-first century. Through time, wars and strife, the buildings and their continuous line of owners have held the islands of Auchinmurn and Era Mina together and kept their secrets safe.

  Animare

  A person who can animate – bring pictures to life by drawing. The fact of their existence is known only to a few, but there are those who wish to use the powers of Animare for their own evil gain. For this reason, Animare live by the Five Rules:

  1. They mustn’t animate in public.

  2. They must always be in control of their imaginations.

  3. If they endanger the secret of their existence, they can be ‘bound’ (see below).

  4. They are forbidden from having children with Guardians (see below), as this can result in dangerous hybrids with an unpredictable mix of powers.

  5. Children cannot be bound.

  Guardian

  A Guardian helps to keep an Animare’s powers and emotions under control. Each Animare is allocated a specific Guardian at the age of sixteen. A Guardian’s ability to influence an Animare’s way of thinking is known as ‘inspiriting’. Guardians can use this power on other people
as well.

  Council of Guardians

  A body of Guardians who enforce the Five Rules for Animare. Council members do not always agree about how Animare should be guided. When hybrid children are created, for example, some Guardians believe that their talents should be nurtured, while others believe that binding (see below) is the only safe course of action.

  Binding

  Binding is a kind of suspended animation. Animare are bound into a work of art as a last resort when they lose control of their powers or endanger the secret of their existence. Binding an Animare can only be authorized by the Council of Guardians, and can only take place when both a Guardian and a second Animare are present.

  There are five secure vaults all over the world containing bound paintings. One lies at the Abbey on Auchinmurn Isle.

  Hollow Earth

  The supernatural place where all monsters, demons, devils and creatures from the dangerous, magical past have been trapped by the medieval monks of the Order of Era Mina (see below).

  The Hollow Earth Society

  Founded by Duncan Fox in 1848, the original Hollow Earth Society was designed to prevent the world from knowing about the monsters and imagined creatures locked away in Hollow Earth. The reformed Hollow Earth Society has a very different outlook: to retrieve the monsters, control them and unleash them on the world.

  The Order of Era Mina

  The monks in medieval Auchinmurn belonged to the Order of Era Mina, which had a particular mission: locking away the monsters of the superstitious past by drawing them into a bestiary called The Book of Beasts, thereby reinventing the world as a modern place of enlightenment and learning.