Season of Secrets

  “Hannaah!”

  I duck my head, screw up my eyes against the rain and stump up the lane. The wind rushes through the trees, sending the rain back to blow in my face. I stumble and almost fall. It’s the devil in the night – the devil in the storm. It’s in the trees. I stop walking. I don’t want to go to Hexham on my own. I don’t even know how to get there. In fact, the further I go, the more certain I am that Hannah’s gone the other way.

  Or maybe she’s gone back to Grandpa’s and left me here alone.

  It’s so pitchy-black and rainy, it’s hard to tell how far I’ve gone. The moon’s risen; a silver thumbnail shining through dark, rushing clouds. The lane has narrowed and the trees on the steep banks are closer. They send long, dark branch-fingers looming and roaring over my head.

  “I’m not afraid,” I say, out loud.

  Because now I can hear something coming. Someone. Feet. Feet, running towards me. My heart jumps. Who would be out on a wild night like this? Alone, without a torch? It’s the devil – I know it is. I turn and stumble-run up the bank, slipping and almost falling in the mud. I’m not going to make it. I’m going to be in the lane when he comes. My breath comes out in raggedy gasps and I think I’m almost crying. There is something so sinister about the running footsteps – dark noises alone in a black night – that stops my heart. But then there I am, almost in the hedgerow. I grab on to the branch of a hawthorn tree, thorns catching at my jumper and my fingers, and hold my breath.

  And here he is. A dark shape, bent and running. It’s a man, low and strong. He’s so close I can hear his breath catch in his throat.

  And then he’s past, off down the road to the village. But now I can hear other noises – a horn, then another horn, and another. Coming closer. Horses. Dogs, barking. Baying. That’s what dogs do, in hunts, when they smell their prey.

  The running man has heard them. He looks back. His face is white in the darkness and wet with rain. He isn’t wearing shoes, or a shirt. I can see his chest, rising and falling. I can feel how frightened he is. Who is he? Who’s chasing him?

  And then the dogs are here.

  They charge round the corner and pour on to him. They’re huge, more like wolves than dogs. He falls, lifting his arms to cover his face. And now the huntsmen are here, black shapes on tall horses. The lead huntsman stops and raises his head, and I have to clench my lips to stop myself screaming. He’s got horns growing out of his hair, great tall antlers rising up out of the sides of his head. I press myself deep into the hawthorn tree until twigs dig into my back and thorns tear at my jumper. Don’t see me. Don’t see me. Don’t see me.

  The lead huntsman sits tall on his tall horse. He raises a black hunting horn to his lips and blows, a long clear note.

  I squeeze my eyes shut tight.

  And . . .

  . . . they’re gone.

  I don’t move. I keep my eyes shut. I can still smell the horses and the huntsman, but the noises have gone. All I can hear is my heart and the quick, snuffly sound of my breath going in-and-out-and-in-and-out. And the rain. They must still be there, they must, they must—

  There’s a noise. A small one, something shifting, pebbles moving. I open my eyes. The lane is empty. The horses – the man – the dogs – they’ve gone. But something’s still there, scrabbling in the lane.

  Hawthorn trees aren’t made to be held on to. They have too many prickles and not enough big branches. I shift and slip and slide into the lane, mud all down my legs and back. I struggle and fall forward. On to something – someone warm.

  I scream. I scream and scream and hands come up and hold my shoulders, warm, living hands.

  “Hush. Shhh. Shhh.” The voice is low and strong against the rain. I scramble back, terrified, and the hands let go. “No one’s going to hurt you. Shhh.”

  It’s not the hunter. It’s the other one. The hunted man.

  All of a sudden, I start to cry, gaspy, shuddery sobs. The hunted man sits back and watches me. I can see in the darkness that he’s young, that his face is wet with sweat and rain, that his hair curls.

  “There,” he says, in his low voice. “Nobody’s hurt. Nobody’s hurting you.”

  “You’re hurt,” I say.

  He is. His legs are all torn up by the wolf-dogs. Dark blood oozes out and over the ragged cloth of his trousers, rain and cloth and blood. Sobs shudder up inside me again and I look quickly away.

  “Nobody’s hurt,” he says, again. He looks at me. “Are you far from home?” I shake my head, and, “Go home,” he says. “You shouldn’t be out at night. Didn’t your mother tell you that?”

  “My mother’s dead,” I say, and I start crying again.

  There’s a noise in the lane, bushes rustling. I tense, squeezing my stomach to keep the tears inside. The man grips my arm and lifts his nose like an animal, sniffing danger.

  There’s a rustle from the bushes and a bird rises; a crow I think, wings flapping madly and then gone. The man’s grip on my arm relaxes and I hiccup, aware suddenly of how stupid I must look, snot and tears dripping down my face, covered in mud.

  The hunted man leans forward. “Go home,” he says again, more urgently. “Do you want the wild hunt to find you?” But I’m frightened again and don’t answer. He grips my arm. “Go well,” he says. “Go safely. But go now.”

  There are only the two of us in the darkness, only the two of us in the whole world. I don’t want to leave him, but I don’t want to stay here either. I stumble back to my feet and down the lane, to home.

  Nowhere Man

  I’ve not gone far when I see a torch, and hear a voice calling.

  “Molly! Molly!”

  “Grandma!” I run straight into her.

  “Molly!” She holds me to her, then pulls me away and shakes me; not hard, but enough to shock me. “What did you want to run off like that for? Haven’t we all got enough to worry about?”

  “I didn’t—” I say, and I start crying all over again. Grandma puts her arm round me.

  “Hey, shush. Shush. None of that. Grandma’s got you.”

  But I remember.

  “Grandma! There’s a man.”

  She pulls back.

  “A man?”

  “He’s hurt.” I know exactly where he is, by the hawthorn tree. I point. “Look.”

  Grandma shines her torch where I’m pointing. There’s nothing there but lane.

  “You aren’t telling stories again are you, Moll?”

  “No! Look! I’ll show you!”

  I pull her closer.

  “Hey now, Moll, slow down. Easy does it. Where was he?”

  “Here!” I grab her hand and swing the torch around. There’s the hawthorn tree, and the muddy streak where I fell down the bank, but no man. I run forward trying to see where he’s gone.

  “Hey!” I call. “Where are you?”

  “Moll,” says Grandma. “Molly! Come back here. Come on. Tell me what’s going on.”

  I run back.

  “There was a man, a weird man, without shoes or a shirt or anything, running down the lane, and then this hunt came out of nowhere, a proper hunt, with dogs – wolves, really – and a man with horns growing out of his head and everything. And the wolves got him, and they would have got me, only I was hiding. And then they vanished, all the hunt and everyone, except him, and he talked to me and he told me to go well and go safely and go now, so I did and then—”

  “And then he vanished,” says Grandma. “Or turned into a teapot?”

  “Yes,” I say. “I mean, no. He just vanished. But he was here! Look!”

  I grab her torch hand again and point it on the patch of lane where he was lying.

  “What am I looking at?” grumbles Grandma.

  “Here!” I say. “No – here – no, wait – it’s here somewhere, I know it is.” I pull her closer. “There! Look, it’s blood! That’s where he was lying!”

  It’s hard, in the darkness, to tell where the rain and the mud and the bloodstains begin and
end. Grandma peers short-sightedly downwards.

  “Could be,” she says at last. “Could be a fox has been out, killing rabbits. Let’s go home now, Moll. I’m old and I’m wet through.”

  “But the man,” I say. “He’s hurt!”

  “If he’s not here now,” says Grandma, “he can’t be too badly hurt. If he’s got any sense he’ll have gone home too. In any case, I think we should go home and tell Grandpa and Hannah that we’ve found you.”

  So Hannah did go back. I should have known she wouldn’t really run away. I feel cheated, suddenly, of my adventure – and my moment as the sensible one. Now I’m the little one, doing the wrong thing again.

  Grandma holds out her hand and I take it.

  “You think I’m making it up, don’t you?” I say. I did used to make up stories, when I was little, but I don’t any more.

  “Me?” says Grandma. “I think I’ve got much more important things to worry about.”

  Which doesn’t exactly mean that she believes me.

  Night Thoughts

  Grandpa’s coming up the hill when we get back.

  “Molly-love—” he says. “What happened? Are—”

  “She’s fine,” says Grandma, before I can answer. “She could do with a bath, though – look at her.”

  Grandpa takes me up to the bathroom without saying anything else. He runs the bath. Afterwards he puts me to bed in my narrow little bedroom with a plate of cold sausages and hard, yellow potatoes. He sits on my bed and waits until I’m done. The curtains have been drawn against the night, but I don’t look out. I don’t like to think about what might still be out there.

  “We’ll get your things fixed soon,” says Grandpa. “Bring some of your pictures from home and put them up, eh?”

  “Mmm,” I say. Dad promised we were only here for a visit. Putting pictures up is a bit too much like staying for good.

  “Dad’s coming on Saturday,” Grandpa says. “That’ll be nice, won’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good.” He pats my hand, awkwardly. “You would tell me if something was bothering you, wouldn’t you, Molly-love? Hannah or school or . . . or anything?”

  “Mmm,” I say, again. I squirm down further into the bed. Grandpa sighs.

  “All right.” He creaks up and kisses my forehead. “Sleep tight, sweetheart.”

  After he’s gone, I lie on my back and stare at the ceiling. Above my head, the rain is pattering on the roof. I remember the hunted man, his voice in the darkness, saying, “Nobody’s hurt. Nobody’s hurting you.” I wonder where he is now. I wonder if he’s found somewhere dry to sleep. I wonder if the hunt has found him.

  I remember his hands, holding me, how gentle they were. I remember the kindness in his voice, saying, “Shhh. No one’s going to hurt you. Shhh.”

  The World According to Books

  There’s only one thing I like about this bedroom and that’s the window sill. It’s big and deep, and if you sit on it with a book and pull the curtains closed behind you, you can pretend you’re in a secret room and no one in the world can find you.

  I’ve always been a bookworm, and I’ve been reading even more since we came here and stopped having drama classes and gymnastics and piano lessons all the time. There’s a bookcase in the hall which is full of Dad and Auntie Meg’s books from when they were kids. Really old hardback ones like Peter Pan and Swallows and Amazons and books about girl guides. I know most of them already, because I always read them when we come on visits.

  I would like to live in a book. The world works better in books. If you go on picnics, the sun shines. If something gets stolen, you can solve the crime just by thinking hard. If someone’s dying, calling 999 will save them. It’s always obvious who’s good and who’s bad, and kids can camp out on moors or go to the North Pole or be world-famous detectives aged only ten.

  Everything is simpler, in books. In books, lost fathers always come back from the dead and bullies always get beaten. The sun always shines on your birthday and things always work out right in the end.

  A Face Like That

  “You made him up,” says Hannah.

  We’re coming down the hill to school.

  “You always say that,” I say. “Why do you always say that? He was real. He was there.”

  “It’s always made up,” says Hannah. “The stuff you say you’ve seen. Either that or you’ve gone crazy.” She looks at me thoughtfully. “Do you hear voices? Do they tell you to do things? Kill Grandma, Molly. Kiill heeeerrr. . .”

  “Shove off.” I hunch my bag on my shoulders. “If it wasn’t for you, I’d never have been there. What did you have to go back to Grandpa’s and leave me there for, anyway?”

  “We couldn’t have really got all the way home, you know,” says Hannah, in her older-sister voice, like it was all my idea in the first place, and she runs off down the hill before I can answer.

  I follow after.

  How do you know if something’s real? Shadows on the wall, noises in the night, scurrying shapes that might be mice or little men or merely imaginings. The man last night felt real. But then so do dreams. Are dreams real?

  “Come on!” shouts Hannah, over her shoulder.

  Our school here is tiny – a square stone building with a postage stamp of yard and a scrubby playing field over the road. There’s only one classroom and one round table that everyone sits round. There’s one class and eight people in it.

  We’re late. The others are inside. Sascha – who’s six – is standing by the empty hamster cage, crying.

  “I only wanted to stroke him!”

  Everyone else is watching Josh and Matthew, who are flat on their bellies under the Nature Table, shouting.

  “I can see him!”

  “Don’t let him get away!”

  Josh and Matthew are like Hannah. They take up a lot of space. They’re brothers. They hang around with Alexander, who’s leaning over the table, also shouting.

  “No – not like that! Try and trap him—”

  Alexander’s sort of plump. His blue school jumper is twisted up one shoulder and it’s already got orange juice spilt down it. His parents both work for the University of Northumbria. He’s the sort of boy who knows far more about Romans than is good for anybody.

  “No, look—”

  Josh and Matthew ignore him. Only Oliver, who is four and the smallest person in the school, turns and stares at him; round pink face, brown eyes and a wet red mouth chewing on his jumper cuff.

  That leaves Emily. Emily isn’t chasing hamsters. Emily has fair hair and blue eyes and sparkly silver shoes. Emily’s by the water tray, looking out of the window.

  Outside, the sky is grey.

  It’s going to rain again.

  “All right!” Mrs Angus has come in from the kitchen. “Joshua Haltwhistle, get out from under there right now! Now!”

  “I’ve got him!” Josh comes slithering out, hamster cupped in his hand, hair speckled with bits of Nature Table mushroom.

  “And just what did you think you were doing?” Mrs Angus starts into Josh, who’s indignant.

  “We were helping, miss! Sascha let the hamster out!”

  Mrs Angus ignores him. Mrs Angus is the teaching assistant, but very fierce.

  Sascha cries louder, sensing trouble.

  I feel someone’s hand on my shoulder. I look up. Miss Shelley is standing behind me in the doorway, watching.

  “I think,” she says, “it might be a good day for a trip. Don’t you?”

  I never knew there were schools as small as this. This one is way more random than my old school. We do a lot more art and a lot less numeracy. Plus, trips.

  Today, we go to the church.

  In the porch, Miss Shelley hands everyone a clipboard and tells us to draw something.

  “Find something that speaks to you and see what you can make of it.” The boys all open their mouths to argue and she waves them away. “If you can’t find anything exciting, you can do brass rubbings
. Everyone needs more purple tombstones. Go on! Shoo! The crayons are in the box.”

  Miss Shelley is proper young. She’s got yellow hair and long black skirts that make swishy sounds when she walks. She looks like a witch. A friendly witch, who makes helpful potions from flowers and trees. She’s beautiful.

  She likes things that speak to you. I don’t care. I like this church. It’s dark and close and smells of crushed dust and old stone. I wonder if my dad and Auntie Meg ever came here with their school and drew something that spoke to them.

  The boys have set off down the aisle.

  “Look! Dead man!”

  “It’s a statue!”

  That’s Josh and Matthew. Hannah shoots them a look over her shoulder.

  “Morons,” she says. They ignore her. She doesn’t start looking for something to draw, though. She hangs around by another statue, watching the boys.

  I trail down the aisle after them, running my fingers along the top of the pews. They have little doors with ivy leaves carved in the dark wood.

  Halfway down the church are two stone pillars. At the top of both is a face made of stone. A man. He’s got big eyes and a long, thick nose. There are leaves sticking out of his face and his hair. He looks bright and wild, like an old god or a goblin in a fairy tale. He doesn’t look like he ought to be allowed in a church.

  It’s the hunted man.

  I stop and stare. The man last night didn’t have leaves, but he had the same eyes, the same nose; the same round curve to his cheeks. It’s definitely him.

  “That’s my man!”

  I’m so surprised, I say it out loud. The boys stop sliding on the stonework and stare at me.

  I look for Miss Shelley.

  “That man! I saw him last night, being chased.”

  “Was he halfway up a pillar?” says Josh.

  “Did he have leaves sticking out of his nose?”