The Midnight Carnival (16 page)

‘Right,’ said Grace when they finally reached her, ‘what do you want to do first?’

‘What have you got?’ said Jenny.

‘You can crawl into the brain of an animal and look around, but not control it or anything,’ Una replied, ‘or you can punch people without touching them.’

Jenny grinned.

‘I’ll take punching, please.’

‘I could have guessed,’ Grace sighed. ‘Okay, it starts in the lower back.’

She explained the spell as best she could, trying not to leave out anything that Mrs Quinlan had said.

‘And you have to start small, if we’re trying it on each
other. No knocking anybody out because if we have to call an ambulance up here, Ms Lemon and Mrs Quinlan are bound to find out.’

‘Don’t worry, I’ll take it easy on you.’

‘You haven’t tried it yet,’ Grace said, irritated by Jenny’s cockiness already, ‘so maybe you should wait before you brag.’

‘Take a look at these muscles.’ Jenny flexed her biceps. ‘This spell is made for me.’

‘It’s not about physical strength, it’s–’

The blow was enough to knock Grace off her feet.

‘Pow!’ Jenny cried. ‘First try and it’s a knockout.’

Una helped Grace to her feet, brushing stray bits of grass from her jumper.

‘I said start small,’ Grace snapped. ‘I’m not Mrs Quinlan, so cut it out.’

Grace was expecting an apology, but didn’t get one. Instead, Jenny shrugged.

‘That wasn’t intentional,’ she said, ‘but I guess I’m just
that
good.’

Grace tilted her head.

‘Really?’

It wasn’t much harder than Jenny’s push, but it sent the tall girl rolling. Stopping on her stomach, Jenny snarled.

‘I was going easy on you, but maybe we should take this up a notch.’

‘Oi, stop,’ Una said, ‘it’s all getting a bit agro here. Anybody
wanna listen to some Heart?’

Grace was knocked off her feet and hit the slope at the edge of the field. This one would leave a bruise, she could feel it. Without a moment’s thought, she pushed back and Jenny sailed several metres into the air, landing with a thud. When the girl got to her feet, her face was puce.

‘Stop it,’ Una cried, stepping between them. ‘Seriously, stop it. ’Cos one of you is going to get killed and I know I wouldn’t handle that very well. I mean it, no more pushing. Shake hands.’

Grace and Jenny both looked at her like she was being ridiculous.

‘I don’t care if it’s lame,’ Una said, ‘shake hands so I know you’re still friends. And that you’re not going to kill each other.’

It was impossible not to be amused when Una took things seriously, and Grace could see the shadow of a smile on Jenny’s face. She reached out her hand…

Grace awoke several seconds later at the far end of the pitch. It felt like there was a flock of tweeting birds trying to escape from her skull. She sat up, rubbing her temple, and could hear Una shrieking in the distance. She staggered to her feet with every intention of screaming at Jenny, but she could see the tall girl lay at the opposite end of the field, motionless.

Despite the pain in her head, and her weak knees, Grace
ran to the other end of the pitch. It felt like running in slow motion.

Una was frantic. She was pacing around Jenny with her hands to her head, taking out her phone, then putting it back in her pocket.

‘I can’t wake her!’

Jenny lay absolutely still, her arms and legs splayed at strange angles.

‘What happened?’ Grace asked.

‘What happened?’ Una said. ‘You both went mental, that’s what. Why did you do it? All you had to do was shake hands.’

‘That’s all I did.’

‘Fudgeballs!’ Una said, pointing a finger accusingly at Grace. ‘You pushed her, and she pushed you. You both did it and you both went flying.’

I did push her
, Grace thought, playing the moment back in her mind,
but I didn’t mean to.

Jenny stirred and moaned and Una fell to her knees in relief. She gently took Jenny’s head onto her lap, stroking her hair.

‘I thought you were dead. Can you talk? What year is it? Count to fifty.’

‘I’m alright, Una,’ Jenny groaned, sitting up on the grass. ‘What…’ She glared at Grace. ‘You pushed me.’

‘I know,’ said Grace, ‘but I didn’t mean to. You pushed me too. Was that on purpose?’

‘I… no, no it wasn’t. I
felt
something just before it happened.’

‘Like you sucked energy out of my hand.’

‘Yeah,’ said Jenny, rubbing her eye as she looked up.

‘I felt the same thing. I somehow took energy from you and it made the push much stronger. You must have done the same.’

‘But how? Why?’

‘I was really angry,’ Grace replied. ‘I think that must have been it.’

‘Jeez,’ said Jenny. ‘Did Mrs Quinlan say anything about not getting angry during a push?’

‘No, but she did give us a lecture on controlling our emotions in general. I guess they were linked. Sorry I left that bit out.’

‘No worries. You okay?’

‘I’m grand,’ said Grace. ‘You pack a mean punch though.’

Jenny smiled.

‘You too, Brennan.’

‘I love you guys,’ Una said, pulling her mp3 player from her pocket. ‘And I’ve got the perfect song for this moment.’

It was pouring rain. Adie’s curly hair hung in long, straight tails down her back, and she was soaked to the skin.

The downpour hid her tears, and the noise of the wind
hid her sobs. It didn’t matter that much. There was nobody about in Wilton Place so late at night, the street was empty. Sneaking out of her house this time had terrified her to her very core. The hours she spent, locked in her room, waiting for her family to switch off the lights and go to bed, dragged on like an eternity. The fear that her weird-eyed mother might come into her room kept her curled up against the wall in one corner of her bed. Her legs had cramped but she hadn’t moved for hours. No-one had knocked on her door.

She was overzealous throwing pebbles at Delilah’s window, and cracked one of the glass panes. The small girl seemed alarmed when she appeared, waving her arms to tell Adie to stop.

‘There’s something in my house!’ Adie cried when Delilah opened the back door.

‘Shh! You’ll wake Vera.’ Delilah stepped outside and shut the door, pulling her coat over her head. ‘What do you mean? What’s in your house?’

‘I don’t know,’ Adie sobbed. ‘Whatever we conjured. It’s in my house. It’s in my
mum
.’

Delilah stared and then shook her head.

‘Yes!’ Adie said, hiccupping with the cries that wouldn’t stop. ‘There was a black wormy thing in her eyes. And it kept moving. It moved into my brothers, into my dad. What is it, Delilah? What did we do? You said it was an object, or a spell. This isn’t a spell. It’s alive. Whatever it is, it’s alive and
it’s inside my mum.’

When it came to magic, this was the first time Adie had seen Delilah look completely lost.

‘I’m sorry,’ the small girl breathed.

‘I don’t care about sorry,’ Adie wailed. ‘What do we do?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You
have
to! We have to do something. Kill it, get rid of it. You have to think of something!’

Delilah stared at nothing and then shook her head.

‘We should go to Bob.’

15

Rodents in the Lunchroom

The paths into the woods had all become mud in the storm. Adie and Delilah picked their way through, as if they were walking through treacle.

A thin string of smoke twisted its way from the remains of Bob’s fire. He sat next to it, repairing his fishing rod in the rain.

Doesn’t he ever sleep?
Adie thought.

The two girls sat down awkwardly, sharing the only other stool outside the stone hut. Adie hoped Bob would invite them inside, out of the bad weather, but he spoke without looking up.

‘What have you done?’

Adie’s chest tightened as she figured out what to say, but Delilah beat her to it.

‘I did a recovery spell–’

‘
We
did the spell,’ Adie interrupted.

‘–to pull out an aspect of the creature. We’d seen it in a magnesia stone. It was a clear line wrapped around all these other ones. The creature is not a faery.’

‘I know that,’ Bob grunted.

‘But it’s not a single entity even.’

‘I know that too.’

Delilah seemed stumped for a moment, and Adie wished she had trusted Bob from the beginning. He had figured out as much as they had, and he had done it without conjuring up any weird black worm.

‘What did you recover?’ he asked, still working on his fishing line.

‘We don’t know,’ Delilah replied. ‘I thought it would be an object, a talisman or something. But whatever it is, it’s alive. And… and it’s inside Adie’s mum.’

Bob looked at the girls for a moment and then nodded his head at the trees to his left.

‘And I take it
that
is your mother?’

A figure lurked in the shadows. It chuckled softly and stepped into the clearing. Adie’s heart broke when she saw that perfect smile on her mother’s face.

‘Hello, my sweet.’

Delilah grasped Adie’s arm and whispered,

‘What is it?’

‘That’s a witch,’ Bob said, finally tying off the line.

‘No,’ Adie said, ‘it’s my mum. My mum’s not a witch. There’s something inside her.’

‘That’s a witch.’

Adie saw her mother’s eyes brighten at something in Bob’s hand. It was the jewelled fishing fly. His fingers closed around the purple and silver feathers.

‘No,’ Adie gasped, lurching forward. ‘Don’t hurt my mum!’

But she was blown backwards by a powerful blast that singed her arms and pounded her head against the woodland floor. Crawling to her knees, untangling her limbs from Delilah’s, she saw her mother hunkered down with one hand on the ground and a look of sheer delight on her face. Bob sat against the wall of the hut, panting, his clenched fist held out against her. Several stones from the hut had come loose or broken. He had hit the wall hard.

‘You don’t know,’ the woman said in a voice that wasn’t Adie’s mother’s, ‘how long I have waited to be back in a young body. Look at these arms.’ She stretched her arms out like they were spectacular. ‘So strong and able. This body is a gift.’ She smiled at Bob like he was an old friend. ‘And this will be so enjoyable. Let’s meet again soon.’

With that, she sprang into the trees with the agility of a cat and disappeared.

Adie and Delilah had to help Bob to his feet. He looked worryingly frail, but shook off their concerns.

‘You know what it is,’ Adie whispered.

Bob shrugged.

‘If the creature is a pet,’ he said, ‘then that’s the owner.’

Adie walked home. Where else could she go?

Delilah had tried to insist she stay at hers, but Adie’s family was back in her own house. And that thing was there with them. If it wanted to kill her, there would be nothing she could do about it, no matter where she was. Better she be with her mum, dad and brothers.

The thing hadn’t gone home quietly. At the entrance of the woods several trees had been ripped clean out of the ground. Two Garda cars were parked next to a hole in the tarmac off North Street. It looked like the road had buckled under some huge weight, and discoloured water spewed out like a fountain. And as Adie approached her own street she saw a lamppost bent over, like an old man, its light flickering and buzzing.

Her heart thumped as she turned the key in the front door. The hall light was off but she could see straight through to the kitchen. Her mother stood at the counter, staring out the window. For a few moments Adie dared to hope that the thing had abandoned her mother’s body, that it had found
someone else, someone she didn’t know.

‘So you followed me…’ it said, still staring into the night.

‘Where else could I go?’

Adie wanted to switch on the kitchen light but she was too afraid. The thing chuckled.

‘Not you.’

Adie looked past her mother, through the window, to the treehouse at the end of the garden. The twig-haired creature sat there, its long fingers curled around a branch. It looked serene.

‘It got out,’ her mother said. ‘Clever thing.’

‘It was me,’ Adie’s eyes were stinging with tears. ‘I brought it here.’

‘Goodness, my sweet.’ The thing that was her mother turned and gently put one finger under Adie’s chin and stared into her eyes. ‘You do like trouble.’

It swept past her and went upstairs. In the dark, Adie continued to watch the creature in the treehouse, as tears rolled silently down her face.

Adie sat in the corner of the lunchroom, chewing on her cheese sandwich. She was so distracted she didn’t even notice her brother plop down in the chair beside her.

‘Tell me more,’ he said, making her jump, ‘of this witch in the woods.’

Pained, she turned to Niall just in time to catch the black flick over the whites of his eyes. The thing had followed her to school.

‘Leave me alone. Please.’

Niall propped his chin on his thumb, in a way Niall would never do.

‘I assume he lives there, in that little shack.
Quel mystère
, when he could crush you all like ants. I wonder what makes him tick.’

Niall looked to her as if expecting an answer. Adie tried to react as little as possible.

‘I don’t know.’

‘He permits you and your friend to sit with him, share his space. He has affection for you?’

‘Not really. I don’t think so.’

‘Then what does he care for?’

‘I couldn’t tell you.’

Niall’s wide, flickering eyes bored into her. He was so close she felt like she was suffocating.

‘No matter,’ he said finally. ‘I can always kill
you
. Perhaps that will provoke him.’

He said it so casually, Adie felt physically sick.

‘Hey, Adie, where ya been?’ Una marched into the room and flung her bag on the desk in front of them. ‘’Sup Niall? You don’t usually eat in here. Did they kick you out of your own lunchroom?’

Niall made no answer and, luckily, Grace and Rachel showed up to break the silence.

‘You weren’t in Irish this morning, Adie,’ Grace said, concerned. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I was in the toilets.’ The words came out of Adie’s throat with a croak. ‘I wasn’t feeling well.’

‘Aw, you poor thing,’ said Una. ‘You should tell a teacher and go home. Sit on the sofa and watch bad telly.’

‘I’m alright now.’

‘Hey, Niall,’ said Rachel. ‘How’s your first year going?’

‘Have you got any bullies yet?’ Una asked. ‘’Cos if you do, point them out and we’ll take care of them.’

She punched her hand and grimaced like a boxer.

‘Unless it’s Tracy Murphy,’ said Rachel. ‘Then we’ll just run away, and you should too.’

‘I can handle the Beast,’ Una growled, punching her hand again.

‘She’s behind you.’

Una jumped and spun around on the desk. There was no-one there.

‘Oh, you’re hilarious, Rach. You should be on stage.’ She suddenly poked Niall in the arm. ‘So come on, tell us how it’s going? Have you made lots of friends?’

Niall stood up to leave.

‘Are you leaving already? Ah, come on,’ Una playfully punched him in the ribs, ‘tell us all about it.’

Water suddenly spurted from Grace’s bottle, hitting her in the face. At the same moment, a dozen mice erupted from the table and scattered in all directions, sending the girls screeching and leaping onto chairs in fright.

‘Adie!’ Grace cried, as Niall slunk out through the door. ‘What the hell?’

Adie shook her head helplessly. She wanted to scream,
it wasn’t me!
but the words wouldn’t come out. She felt dizzy. Grabbing her bag, she ran for the door leaving the others staring after her.

‘But
why
would Adie spray water at you? That’s not like her,’ Una said as Grace checked through her bag for mice.

‘Water’s her thing. Who else could have done it? Was it you?’

‘No, I’m not that good.’

‘Wasn’t me either,’ said Rachel, ‘in case you were wondering.’

‘If it was Adie,’ said Una, ‘she’s getting really good at origination. That was a whole load of mice at once. I can only do one. Could you do a whole load at once, Grace?’

Grace shrugged, still digging in her bag. She didn’t know what was worse, that one of her best friends might have attacked her with water and rodents, or that she felt a stab of jealousy at the thought of Adie bettering her at origination.

‘She’s keeping secrets,’ said Grace. ‘And she’s visiting Bob.’

‘What? When?’ said Rachel.

‘The other night, when she bunked off mind-hopping class. I saw her walking away from his camp when I was mind-hopping on that fox.’

‘You didn’t mention it on the way home.’

‘I was too busy trying not to throw up. Then I thought… well, I thought maybe it was none of my business. But why did she lie?’

‘Do you think she’s getting extra magic lessons from him?’ asked Una.

‘I don’t know. But it looked like she was walking off in a huff that night.’

‘Maybe she asked him to teach her magic, and he told her to get lost.’

‘Maybe.’

‘That doesn’t make sense,’ said Rachel. ‘Jenny’s the one who got kicked out of magic class, not Adie. Now, if it had been Jenny storming off, then I’d be ready to believe it.’

‘Me too,’ said Una. ‘Jenny could storm off for Ireland. She’s got that temper.’

‘Whatever the reason,’ said Grace, ‘whatever she’s talking to Bob about, I don’t think we should tell her about helping Justine. If she tells Bob, we might get in trouble.’