Bone Jack (8 page)

The Otherworld, Annwn. If Bone Jack really was the guardian of the boundary between life and death then that meant Mark would have to somehow get past Bone Jack to reach his father. He remembered what Mark had said that night in the woods, about killing Bone Jack’s rooks and taking his power.

And if Mark was attacking Bone Jack then maybe he would come after Mark, after all of them. Maybe it was Bone Jack who sent out the spectral hound boys to hunt, to kill.

He shook his head, laughed at himself. The whole thing was like something from a book or a movie, not something from real life.

He shut down the laptop and went to the window to close the curtains. Taped to the window pane was a scrap of paper with something scrawled on it. Frowning, he pulled it off.

‘We need to talk,’ it said. ‘My camp, tomorrow. Or I’ll find you.’

Mark. He must have sneaked up here to Ash’s room when he’d come to play mind games with Dad.

‘Get lost, Mark,’ said Ash, under his breath. He crumpled the paper into a tiny ball and tossed it into the wastepaper basket.

He switched off the light and lay on his back in the dark. He listened. The night was full of little sounds, the tap of twigs against the window, leaves stirring in the breeze, the distant fluting of an owl. Every sound made Ash’s heart race. Now he thought he heard footsteps on the gravel, coming up the drive. Someone prowling outside. The feather that had been in the living room, still somewhere in the house, oozing evil. Summoning dark forces like a curse.

Anything might be out there, coming for him through the clammy night.

Another tiny sound, inside the house this time. Then another, and another. He lay still, breathing quietly, concentrating. The sounds consolidated into actions: a door opening and closing softly, the pad of bare feet along the landing, down the stairs.

Dad, wandering around the house in the dark.

There was a long silence. Then the click of the front door shutting.

Ash rolled out of bed and went to the window. The waxing moon hung above Tolley Carn like a bent silver coin.

A shadow slipped through the darkness that edged the drive. Then it moved out into the wash of moonlight at the gate.

Dad.

Ash watched him go out through the gate, turn right along the lane, vanish into the night. Nothing up the lane except mountains and a few farms.

No one Dad would visit at this time of night.

Panic raced through Ash. Dad out in the mountains, disturbed and alone. Anything could happen to him.

He switched on the bedside lamp, pulled on his clothes. Briefly he thought about waking Mum. Then he dismissed the idea; she was worried enough already, no point making things worse. So he crept through the house, out of the front door, loped down the drive. No sign of Dad on the lane, but Ash knew which way he’d gone.

He started to run.

The hot dark prickled against his skin. He ran under a skyful of stars. The moon above the jagged skyline. Silence. Nothing moving in the hedges or fields, no breeze rustling the leaves, not even the distant drone of a car. Only the thump of his feet, his heartbeat, the rhythm of his breath.

He slowed around the bend. Dad couldn’t be far ahead. Ash didn’t want to come charging out of the night, scare him.

The lane stretched away, silvery grey in the moonlight.

No sign of Dad.

Tall hedges on either side, dry-stone wall further along the lane. No turnings. Nowhere to go except straight ahead.

But Dad wasn’t there.

Then Ash remembered that there was a little stile somewhere here, hidden away in the thick cover of dusty leaves. Dad must have gone that way. There was nowhere else.

He found the crease in the hedge where the stile was, pushed through dense foliage, felt a lash of tingling heat across the back of his hand where it brushed against a nettle.

Beyond the stile, a faint footpath slanted across a scrubby field and on the far side strode a shadowy figure, quick and purposeful.

Ash followed.

Through the mountains, black and soft grey like a charcoal sketch, intense here and smudged there. A burned world. The air thick and warm with a nip to it. Moths grazing his skin.

Silence except for his own footfalls. The shrill scolding of a bird nearby, disturbed by his presence. A thin shriek, some tiny mammal taken by owl or stoat or fox.

Sometimes he saw Dad in the distance. Sometimes he lost sight of him and panicked and hurried and had to stop himself from calling out.

They were up on Stag’s Leap now, rock veined with moonlight, and Dad was standing at the edge, the very edge.

Ash stood rooted to the spot, watching, his heart racing.

But Dad didn’t jump. He pulled something out of his pocket, held it out over the drop, let go of it. A little dart of shadow spiralling down.

The black feather.

It had to be.

Then Dad turned, came back down the slope to the path. Ash waited, then followed again, along a narrow track that hugged the shoulder of the mountain.

Ahead lay the Cullen farm, dark and silent. Dad stopped at the gate, stood there for a while. Then he turned, looked straight towards Ash. Must have known he was there all along. Ash walked along the track towards him.

‘Home now then, lad?’ said Dad. Soft-voiced, gentle.

‘Yeah.’

They walked on for a while.

‘You dropped something over the edge,’ said Ash. ‘I saw you, up on the Leap. What was it?’

Dad didn’t answer.

‘Why did you come out here, Dad?’

Dad drew a long breath, let it out slowly. ‘Tom Cullen,’ he said. ‘He was my best mate when we were boys. Like you and Mark we were. We used to go off hunting, fishing, climbing. Not so much later on though. Him with the farm, me with the army. Marriage, kids, all that. Time passes. And now he’s dead.’

‘It’s not your fault.’

‘Isn’t it? I could have been a better friend to him. I could have kept in touch, spent time with him when I was home on leave. I meant to. I just never got round to it and now it’s too late.’

‘You weren’t to know.’

‘That’s the thing though. I should have known. Him out there on his own after Ella died, two kids to raise and a farm to run. Then there was the foot-and-mouth outbreak, his stock slaughtered. I suppose he’d just used up all his strength by then. No reserves left. I should have been here. I should have done something.’

‘You were overseas,’ said Ash. ‘You were fighting a war.’

‘People keep dying around me,’ said Dad. ‘And I keep surviving.’

‘Is that what happened in the war?’

‘It’s what war is. People killing each other. People dying. You try not to be one of them. If you’re lucky, you get to come home in one piece.’

‘It was really bad, wasn’t it?’

‘Yeah, it was really bad.’

They walked on in silence for a while.

‘That thing you dropped from the Leap,’ said Ash. ‘I know what it was.’

‘You do?’

‘Yeah, I do. It was the black feather that was on the floor in the living room.’

‘Yeah.’ Sharp and hard. ‘How did you know?’

Ash shrugged. ‘Just a guess. You were staring at it, then it disappeared with you when you left the room. Where did it come from?’

‘A bird, I suppose.’

‘Ha-ha. At least you’re still making rubbish jokes anyway.’

‘All I’m good for these days.’

‘That feather though,’ said Ash. ‘Tell me about that.’

‘It reminded me of something from a long time ago. Stupid, really.’

‘Tell me, Dad.’

Dad shrugged, sighed, shut down.

‘How did it get in the house?’ said Ash. Pushing, not letting Dad retreat into another of his silences. ‘Who brought it in?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Dad. ‘There was someone else there. I saw him but I don’t know who he was. A face like a skull at the window. Hands dripping with blood.’ He stopped, ran his fingers through his hair. ‘I thought it was … someone or something that came back with me from the desert, something vengeful. Haunting me. I see them sometimes, in my dreams. The dead. Then there was that feather and … maybe I’m just …’

Breaking up, falling apart again.

‘Just what?’

‘I don’t know. Hallucinating or something.’

‘You’re not,’ said Ash. ‘It wasn’t anything to do with the war. It’s something else, something to do with the Stag Chase.’

‘I saw a feather like that once before,’ said Dad. ‘Years ago, long before you were born, I trained for the Stag Chase out here. And one day a bird flew into me, a crow or a rook or something. I don’t know why but it freaked me out. Then the next morning I woke up and there was a black feather on the pillow next to me. It must have caught in my hair when the bird flew into me, that’s all. But still.’

‘But you were OK,’ said Ash. ‘Nothing bad happened.’

Dad laughed. ‘No, but it nearly did.’

‘What?’

‘Something and nothing. It was a couple of weeks later, during the Stag Chase. I was the stag boy and I took a route along the length of Stag’s Leap. Then … well, have you ever had that feeling that your body is intent on doing something even though your mind is screaming “no”?’

‘Yeah,’ said Ash. ‘I think so, a couple of times.’

‘Well, it was that. I found myself standing at the very edge of the Leap, looking down. I don’t even know how I got there. Must have zoned out or something. And my body wanted to launch into the air, to jump. It was such a powerful urge I can even feel it now, just thinking about it. Crazy. So I was standing there, sort of frozen between wanting to jump and knowing I mustn’t, and this dread that my body might just do it without my permission. And I wasn’t alone. I thought I could see these other boys there, like shadows, only in colour. I don’t know what. They were angry, full of hate. Smashing darkness at me. Trying to force me off the edge.’

‘But you didn’t let them. You were OK.’

‘I was OK because Tom Cullen saw me standing there, all freaked out. He grabbed me, hauled me back from the edge. He saved my life. He really did. Then he just ran off and left me to finish the race. So I did. And I won. Except I didn’t win really, did I, because Tom had caught up with me and then let me go. I told the organisers but Tom denied it. He never did admit to it. Told me I’d got mountain fever or something and that I’d imagined the whole thing.’

Dad looked straight ahead, his expression hidden by the dark.

For a moment Ash considered telling him that he’d be the stag boy this year. But Dad was talking to him at last and Ash didn’t want him to stop, didn’t want to put himself at the centre of the conversation. And maybe he should take Dad’s experience as a warning anyway, a sign that there really were dark forces at work in the mountains, just like Mark said, vengeful wraiths set on killing stag boys. Mark. He remembered the note Mark had left taped to his bedroom window. Perhaps he should take everything more seriously and do what Mark wanted, pull out of the race, stay at home, stay safe.

‘Strange things happen sometimes, Dad,’ he said.

‘Yeah, I suppose they do,’ said Dad. ‘When I was out in the desert, I kept coming back to that day up on Stag’s Leap. I don’t know why. I hadn’t thought about it in years, then suddenly I couldn’t get it out of my mind. Seems like everywhere I go I’m surrounded by angry ghosts. They came for me all those years ago and now they’re coming for me again.’

‘But we’ll be OK, won’t we, Dad? We’ll get through all this.’

‘I hope so.’

Then Dad fell silent again and they crossed the fields in cold moonlight. Half-formed questions drifted through Ash’s mind but he was too tired now to ask them. His eyes half closed. Feet dragging. He yawned, longed for his bed and sleep. Dad put his arm around his shoulders and they trudged home, side by side.

FOURTEEN

It was daylight when Ash woke. He checked the alarm clock. Gone nine o’clock already. Up too late last night trailing Dad around the mountains and now he’d overslept, messed up his training schedule for the day. He rolled out of bed, pulled on his clothes, hurtled down the stairs two at a time.

He stopped in his tracks in the kitchen doorway. Dad was in there, standing by the cooker. Fully dressed, clean-shaven, making scrambled eggs and toast. A fresh bandage on his injured hand. He still looked thin and tired but otherwise he seemed almost his old self.

‘Morning,’ said Dad. ‘Do you want some breakfast?’

Ash hardly dared reply in case his words broke whatever spell had brought Dad back to life. ‘Yeah,’ he said at last. ‘Thanks, Dad.’ He glanced across the kitchen. Next to the back door stood a small rucksack and a couple of fishing rods sheathed in canvas.

Dad saw him looking and smiled as he set down two plates of eggs on the table. ‘I thought we could go out fishing today,’ he said. ‘Unless you’ve got other plans.’

Mark’s note, summoning Ash to his camp in the wood.
Or I’ll find you …

Ash hesitated for a heartbeat. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I mean, no, I haven’t got any other plans. Yes to fishing. Fishing sounds great.’ He sat down opposite Dad. ‘Where’s Mum? Isn’t she up yet?’

‘Yeah. She’s gone out. Visiting Harry, I think.’

Harry, short for Harriet. Mum’s closest friend in Thornditch, a booming woman in her sixties who lived in a tumbledown cottage at the other end of the village.

‘Harriet!’ said Ash. ‘I’m amazed she hasn’t called round since you got back.’

‘She probably has,’ said Dad. ‘I know Mr King next door came round yesterday morning. I heard his voice. Mum sent him away. I don’t think I’m allowed visitors at the moment. Probably for the best.’

‘I thought Mum would be here with you,’ said Ash. ‘Now you’re up and about.’

Dad gave a wry smile. ‘I think she’s had enough of me lately.’

They finished their breakfasts. Dad made a stack of untidy ham sandwiches, filled a Thermos flask with coffee and a plastic bottle with tap water. Ash loaded everything into the rucksack.

‘Pike Tarn all right?’ said Dad.

The other side of Tolley Carn, and where they used to go when Ash was a kid. A cold clear mountain lake, sunlight burning through mist rising off the water, the eerie calls of curlews. ‘Yeah,’ said Ash. ‘Pike Tarn would be good.’