‘I hope you drown,’ she spat. The glass in the window rattled as she slammed it shut.
‘Seth,’ I said. He turned, but whatever he might have said was interrupted by an almighty splash as one of the drinkers fell over a submerged mooring ring, cannoning into Seth.
‘Sorry, mate. Christ, it effing stinks,’ the man grumbled.
It was true. The water smelled. Not the fresh, clean smell of the sea, but a foetid stench of rotting fish. It was was dark with weed and silt, and there were creatures in it, deep-sea creatures: white, sightless fish, coiling eels and sucking, tentacled things that I couldn’t name. And it was rising all the time. The benches, which had been dry when we first came down to the quay, were half submerged.
I looked round for Maya – and realized with a shock that she was no longer behind me, that there was nothing there but a dark expanse of choppy water. Seth, Emmaline, Abe and Sienna were all with me, so were Abe’s biker friends Bill and Carl. But Simon and Maya were on the other side of the quay with the rest of the group. We’d been edging away from each other, forced apart by the rising water – and now we were cut off by the swirling black mass that was now the quay. We were trapped, and the only way out led up to the castle, to the Ealdwitan.
‘Ma!’ Sienna yelled.
‘Don’t worry,’ Maya yelled back, ‘we’ll find a way round. Just – just stay out of the water … Oh God!’ She recoiled sharply as a thrashing thing darted out of the dark waters. It snapped at her hand, then fell back with a splash. ‘Stay away from the water, do you hear me?’ She was backing away from the rising tide, up the high street. ‘We’ll get the others from the flat and come to find you.’ Her voice was now almost too faint to hear above the rising wind and the tolling bells. ‘We’ll find you!’
And then they were gone, forced round the corner and out of sight by the rising sea.
‘Well,’ Abe said, flatly. He looked at Bill and Carl, and then shrugged.
‘What do we do now?’ Sienna asked.
‘Move up the hill, I suggest,’ Emmaline said distastefully, watching the murky ooze rise closer.
We all jumped as there was an enormous crash and the small hut where the fishermen sold whelks off the harbour arm swept suddenly into the sea. We watched as the sea battered it into shreds of broken planks – then it disappeared beneath the waves. Emmaline looked shaken.
‘Thank goodness we live up the hill, is all I can say.’
‘Grandad,’ Seth muttered.
‘Sorry, what did you say?’ Sienna asked, cupping ske awayher ear against the wind.
‘My grandad. He lives on the Spit.’ He pointed out to sea. Abe, Sienna and Emmaline all looked at each other, and then Sienna turned back to Seth.
‘I’m very sorry.’
Just then Emmaline gave a gasp and staggered, putting a hand to a gash on her cheek.
‘You’re bleeding!’ Abe shouted, over the roar of the wind.
‘I was hit,’ Emmaline said in wonderment, ‘by something hard.’
She looked down at her feet. There was a huge green barnacled crab scuttling away.
‘Time to go, I think.’ Abe jerked his head towards the road. We nodded and began to climb.
It was the route I walked home from school, but the familiar path looked very different in the moonlight, slashed with fallen branches and driftwood. As we walked, straining into the wind, Seth’s eyes kept drifting out to sea, and I knew he was thinking of his grandfather, trapped out there with the rising waters. My heart tore for him – and suddenly my mind was made up.
‘We have to do something,’ I said. ‘We can’t let them destroy Winter like this. The town’s cut off – we’re the only people who can reach the castle now. It’s up to us.’
‘We have to wait for Ma,’ Sienna said. I shook my head,
‘There’s no time. It’ll take them hours to get round the headland to find us. The whole village could be under by that time.’
‘But there’s only six of us,’ Abe said. ‘Seven, if you count the useless one.’ He jerked his thumb at Seth. ‘Emmaline, how many did you see up at the castle?’
‘I only caught a glimpse,’ she said, ‘but at least twenty – more perhaps. I don’t know.’
‘Considerably more,’ said a dry voice and, turning, we saw Mr Brereton in our path. His hair was plastered to his forehead and his glasses were misted with salt, but he was standing upright, in spite of the tearing gale.
‘Mr Brereton!’ I cried, stupidly.
‘I take it, my dear, that you haven’t come to tell us of your change of heart?’ he asked. I shook my head vehemently. ‘Then I’m sorry, my dear, you leave me with no choice.’
Somehow, although his voice was as calm and quiet as ever, he had no trouble in making himself heard above the storm.
‘I command you to stop.’ He held out his hand and suddenly mynd 00000">‘ feet were rooted to the ground. ‘All of you, stop.’
I couldn’t move. I literally couldn’t lift a foot. It was the strangest feeling. I tried pulling cautiously, then harder, and finally I wrenched with all my strength, but it was like my shoes had been glued to the tarmac. My skin might have been part of the road, for all the good straining did. Turning, I could see by the expressions of the others that they’d suffered the same.
‘Mr Brereton,’ screamed Emmaline, ‘let go now!’
She flung out an arm, palm outstretched towards him. Mr Brereton staggered; for a moment my feet grew lighter and I almost stumbled forwards – but then he seemed to recover.
‘Ah, Emmaline Peller, if I’m not mistaken,’ he said smoothly. ‘You always were a most unpleasant child. Little girls should be seen and not heard.’
He pointed towards her and she opened her mouth to retort – or tried to. As I watched, her eyes bulged and her face contorted in distress, but she seemed completely unable to open her mouth. Only muted sounds of horror came from her sealed lips as she tore at her face with her hands.
‘You bastard!’ Abe bellowed. He raised his hand and a bolt of lightning struck Mr Brereton squarely on the forehead. He was flung into the air, back towards the edge of the cliff, and before he could rise Abe hit him again with another crack of lightning.
Just as he was about to try a third, Mr Brereton scrambled to his knees and howled, ‘Terrethum!’ Abe tumbled, like a felled tree, and lay on the ground as if stunned.
‘Kveykva!’ Bill drew back his hand and flung a ball of white light. Mr Brereton cowered to the ground, but it passed overhead harmlessly. Then, stumbling to his feet yet again, Mr Brereton drew himself up to his full height and drew a circle in the air. A rope seemed to shimmer there, and he caught both ends in his fist, drawing them tighter, and tighter.
A band of steel closed around my chest. My lungs were being crushed, and I looked around me in panic, but had no breath to call for help, and no one to help me anyway. Beside me Seth was doubled in agony, tiny shallow breaths hissing between his teeth. Emmaline had her arms wrapped around herself and a look of mute terror in her eyes. It was like being held in a vice; with every breath I exhaled the band drew tighter around my ribs until there was no air left at all. Finally I could only heave uselessly, my ribs straining with the effort, but totally unable to get any oxygen to my lungs. There were stars in front of my eyes, and a dull hissing in my ears. My vision grew black, began to fracture. Through the black mist I saw Seth fall to the ground beside me.
As my head spun, I tried to recall the surge of power I’d had before, the surge of rage and love which had let me dive to Seth’s rescue without needing oxygen, without needing anything except magic. I’d done it then, I could do it now.
I summoned all my powers – and took a breath.
It was like silver light gushing through my lungs – a breath so wonderful, so glorious, I felt I’d never take life or lungs for granted ever again.
‘Get off them!’ I screamed at Mr Brereton. He looked round at me, startled. It was almost as if he’d forgotten I was there. Sudde
nly I could move my feet and beside me Seth, Emmaline and the others were moving too, stumbling forward with choking gasps, inhaling air as if it was the first breath they had ever taken.
‘Get away!’ I thrust my hands out and Mr Brereton staggered back, towards the cliff. ‘You hateful, hateful man!’ He stumbled from my searing rage, shielding his eyes, doubled up against the fury of my attack. ‘Leave them alone!’
One last time he quailed, and one last time he stepped back – into nothing. We heard a scream, and a hideous, dull cracking: the sound of a body ricocheting off rocks. And then nothing.
‘Are you OK?’ Emmaline was sobbing. ‘Oh Anna! Are you OK?’ She flung her arms around me, her face wet with tears and sea spray.
‘I’m fine,’ I was shaking. ‘But – but – Mr Brereton!’
‘Gone,’ Abe said succinctly. ‘And good riddance. C’mon. Let’s get up to the castle and get stuck into the rest of them.’
‘Oh God.’ The horror of it suddenly struck me and I sank to my knees. ‘I’ve killed him; I’ve killed a man.’
‘A man!’ Bill spat on the ground disgustedly. ‘He’s not what I call a man – barely human. I’d sooner spare a rat’s life. He would have killed us, Anna. All seven of us. It was one life or seven.’
I knew he was right, but it didn’t stop me turning with a backward glance to look at that spot on the cliff edge where I’d seen him last, as we started our walk up the road, towards the castle.
I’d taken only a few steps though, when I realized Seth wasn’t beside me. I looked back and he was standing, staring out to sea, still where Mr Brereton had rooted him.
I ran back and plucked at his arm.
‘Are you OK?’
‘No,’ he shouted back above the gale. ‘I can’t come, Anna.’
‘Your feet!’ I turned to call to the others, to tell them to stop, to come back, help me release Seth. ‘Don’t worry, Seth, I’ll get the others. We’ll get you free.’
‘It’s not that.’ He put a hand on my arm to stop me. ‘I have to go back; I have to get Grandad.’ He nodded towards the Spit, almost invisible behind the lashing rain and enormous waves.
‘What!’ I was horrified. ‘Seth, you’re mad. Look out there …’ I swept a hand towards the churning black sea, filled with who-knew-what kinds of nameless, snapping creatures. ‘Look at the sea – you’ll never survive!’
He shook his head.
‘Grandad needs me – he’s an old man, Anna. I can’t just abandon him.’
‘Seth, please, please no. If there was any chance, I’d tell you to go, but there’s no way any boat could survive out there, let alone land on the Spit. You’ll die. You know it.’
He nodded, but his face was set and I could see my words had had no effect on his resolve.
‘There’s a chance of that, I admit.’
‘A chance!’ I felt a sob rise in my throat, ‘A chance? A certainty you mean.’
‘No, it’s not a certainty; boats have weathered as bad, or worse. I wouldn’t go if I thought it was suicide.’
‘Seth,’ I said desperately, ‘please don’t go. Please, please, I’m begging you. It would break my heart to lose you. I love you – I always have loved you. I should have told you that long ago.’
Seth only stood very quietly in the pouring rain, water streaming over his skull and down the bridge of his nose. Then he smiled so that my heart lifted and twisted and ached all at once.
‘I know,’ he said very softly, so quietly I had to strain to read his lips. His words should have sounded arrogant, but they didn’t, and his face was full of a fierce sadness and joy. ‘I know you do. But Anna, you know there’s a chance that you won’t come back from the castle. Would you turn back from there, if I asked you?’
‘Yes!’ I sobbed, knowing I was lying but not caring.
‘OK then.’ He put his arms around me, and they were warm, strong and infinitely comforting. I put my head on his shoulder and it felt like coming home. He held me close, so that I could hear his voice, softly, through his chest, in spite of the waves and the wind. ‘Come back with me. Inland. I won’t go to the Spit if you turn back from the castle. We’ll run, away from all this.’
I pulled away. I buried my face in my hands, unable to answer.
‘Well?’ Seth said, his voice almost lost under the shrieking wind, ‘Will you do it? Will you turn back?’
Wretchedly, I shook my head. Not even for Seth could I abandon Winter to its fate. If there was even a small chance that I could help save the town I had to lend my strength to the fight. And of course Seth had known that all along. He smiled and stroked a lock of wind-whipped hair behind my ear.
‘Come on, Anna, we both know there’s no chance of you running now. I know what you have to do, and I’m not going to try to persuade you out of it. Let me go.’
I could not find words, so I only hugged him, winding my arms so tight around his neck that he almost choked. Then he laughed, an incongruously joyous sound in the bitter, shrieking storm, and wrapped his arms around me, lifting my feet off the ground.
‘Come back safe,’ I choked in his ear.
‘I’ll try. I love you, Anna.’
‘I love you too.’ I buried my face in his shoulder. His skin smelled of salt and sweat and soap. ‘I love you, Seth. If you die,’ my heart clenched cold with the effort of even uttering the words, ‘if you die I’ll – I’ll – I’ll never forgive you. Do you hear me? Come back, come back safe, do you promise?’
‘I promise,’ he said, and there was something in his voice that made my tears spring afresh. Then from up the hill I heard a bellow.
‘Anna, Seth, what’s going on? Are we going or not?’
‘I’m not,’ Seth shouted back, his words ripped and twisted by the winds. ‘I’ve got something else to do.’
He kissed me again, quick and fierce, then he was gone, running down the slope towards the harbour, into the dark.
I turned back to the others, wiping the tears from my face with my sleeve.
‘OK, let’s go.’
As we climbed, shapes began to resolve themselves out of the murk. First was the dark hump of the castle headland, then the gap-toothed, tumbledown towers of the castle itself.
‘My God,’ Abe muttered under his breath, ‘they’ve made it into a bloody fortress.’
And then I realized what they had done, and why the Ealdwitan had chosen this place for their stand. Not only was the castle the highest point in Winter, protecting them from the rising waters, but it was still, in spite of its age, an impressive fortification. The Ealdwitan had gathered on one of the farther battlements, where they could see both the sea and the town of Winter.
It was the perfect place to co-ordinate their attack. They were shielded from outwith eyes, invisible behind the castle walls as they lashed the town with wind and waves. But just as importantly, they were shielded from attack; shielded by the castle’s imposing moats, battlements and towers, and by its ancient magic. They’d twined their spells about the castle walls like a fantastic mesh of magical barbed wire and before we could even touch them, we’d have to penetrate a dark web of spell and counter-spell.
A wave of despair wa of
Beside me I could see from their devastated faces that Emmaline, Abe and Bill were having the same thoughts.
‘We’re lambs to the slaughter,’ Emmaline said bleakly. ‘Is it even worth trying?’
‘Of course it’s worth trying!’ Sienna snapped. ‘What’s wrong with you all? Have we come this far to give up now?’
‘It’s a spell, you fools.’ Carl grabbed Emmaline’s shoulder and turned her to look at him. ‘Emmaline!’ He shook her. ‘Emmaline, Anna, resist it, do you hear me? This feeling – it’s just a spell, they’re messing with your minds.’
I shook my thick head and felt the despair lift a little, then settle again.
‘Come on,’ Sienna urged. She shook Bill’s shoulder. ‘Bill, listen to Carl, he’s right. This is not hopeless, do you hear me
? Abe, Anna, snap out of it – you’re falling into their trap.’
The effort of resistance was like wading through treacle. Every cell of my mind wanted to give in to the black washing despair and just lie down and weep, but Sienna and Carl’s nagging voices kept telling me to keep pushing, keep resisting, keep the black tide back. And gradually it began to ebb … I saw Emmaline surface with a gasp, shaking her head like someone with water in their ears. Then I pushed out of the thick goo of the spell, breathing hard, as if I’d been swimming against the tide.
‘For goodness’ sake,’ Sienna said, and her voice was grim, ‘that was just the first line of defence. You’ll have to be a bit tougher than that if we’re going to get anywhere.’
‘It was so real,’ Emmaline said, still slightly dazed.
‘Anna’s got an excuse, she’s never encountered this kind of thing, but you,’ she stabbed a finger at Emmaline, ‘and above all you, Abe, should be ashamed of yourselves. Now pull yourselves together.’
‘What a kids’ trick to fall for,’ Abe said disgustedly, as we began to walk. ‘I deserve everything I get after that.’
‘Look.’ Sienna put a hand on his shoulder. ‘It was the right spell at the right time. Which, as the saying goes, is half the work done.’
‘What do you mean?’ I said, confused. ‘What saying?’
‘One of ours, not one you’d know. “The right time and tide does half the work, the wrong makes half again”. What it means is that magic works best when it works with the tide, not against it. We were already despondent and depressed – coming on top of that, the spell worked far better than it should have done.’
We trudged on up the gedl workhill, the castle glowering over our heads, and when we reached the top I looked back. The sight that lay below was both beautiful and terrifying. Where the small harbour had been, cosily surrounded by cottages and dotted with small boats, there was now a great spreading mass of black water which had overflowed the harbour confines, flooding the quay and the gardens of all the cottages round about. Thread-like tentacles of sea were spreading across the rest of the village, penetrating the streets of Winter with probing oily fingers, until the whole town was enmeshed in a dark, glittering web of water, spreading and growing with every passing minute. Soon only the roofs of the harbour cottages would be visible. Then, not even the roofs. The river would break its banks and rise through Wicker Wood to taint our house with all its muck and murk. Its waters would merge with the sea and together climb the high street, flowing into every living room, gushing under the doors, overflowing windows – welling unstoppably out of the plugholes and toilets as even the sewers became overwhelmed.
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