The Harpy's Song Page 2

  He struggled to his feet and looked down at himself in annoyance—he was filthy. ‘Damn it! My new trainers!’

  He crouched down and started to wipe the mud off with his already filthy hands, but all he did was make it worse. He looked around for a rag or something else he could use to clean them and was surprised to see that the rickety old shed was something of a treasure trove. There were pieces of old furniture, paintings, clocks, jars, tins and many things that he couldn’t identify. How could someone leave all of this stuff here? he thought as he made a bee-line for a grandfather clock covered in a skin of silver dust. He wiped its glass with his hand to reveal a pristine porcelain face.

  His heart began to pound. His mind whirled with the images of forgotten treasures. He had seen those programs on television where people bring in things they have found in their attics or cellars and they turn out to be worth a fortune. He scanned around, looking for anything that might be valuable in amongst the precariously stacked piles of dusty objects. .

  To the back of the shed stood a huge chest, the type a Victorian gentleman might have taken on a long trip. Trevor walked slowly towards it, his eyes flitting from side to side looking for anything of interest. The smell of age mixed with damp decay and creosote tickled the back of his throat, making him cough but only adding to his excitement.

  He shook the lid of the chest but it was locked, so he lowered himself onto his knees to examine the small metal clasp. Looking from side to side, his eyes found an assortment of gardening tools protruding from a well-tarnished copper bucket. He reached out and grasped the handle of a rusty old trowel which, despite its age, felt heavy and solid. He used it to pry at the lock, but, unable to find a decent purchase, he took to just hitting at it until, finally, with a dull metallic thud, it sprang open.

  Trevor lifted the lid and his heart sank. He didn’t know what he had expected to find, but the sight of old photos and newspaper clippings was more than disappointing. He was about to let the lid fall shut when an article from the front page of a national newspaper caught his eye. The photo showed his new house, the farmhouse, with a middle-aged man and woman standing in front of it. The headline read ‘Missing Teen Vanished Before His Parents' Eyes,’ and was dated June 1973.

  He put the clipping down and pulled out another about the same thing. A boy of Trevor’s age, called Wayne, had lived in the house nearly forty years ago and had mysteriously disappeared from this very shed. There were articles from many different papers that covered the story for almost a year. The last clipping, dated April 1974 read, ‘Wayne’s Bankrupt Parents Vow to Search On.’ A photo of the farmhouse with a ‘for sale’ sign in the garden accompanied it. Trevor closed the chest lid gently, as if it were a coffin. He pondered for a moment before his search for lost treasures restarted in earnest.

  Outside, the rain had all but stopped and the summer sun, slowly awakening from behind the thinning cloud, sent shards of light to the darkest corners of the shed. Trevor spotted a curious looking wheel, sticking out from underneath an old green tarpaulin. ‘A motorbike!’ he said out loud. But in his hurry to reach it, he did not see the freshly spun web that cut across his path. Its sticky tendrils clung to his face and sent him dancing across the floor in a frantic attempt to free himself. Things fell from all around him, clattering and breaking. A makeshift shelf gave way and jars filled with screws and nails tumbled beneath his feet. Clumsily, he stepped on one and slipped, sending his gangling form flailing into the air.

  But his body never hit the ground.

  2

  The Falling Boy

  THE MONOCHROME HAZE of dawn cast a metallic veil across the Southern Forest, shrouding the secret world of the night for those last precious moments before the light of the early morning sun beckoned in the day. Burtlùs would be one of the few who would witness the transition. He had walked to the meadow in the woods to watch the sunrise every morning for as long as he could remember, and today was to be no different.

  After gulping down the last of his hot, sweet-scented láven, he perched on the edge of his chair next to the fireplace and pulled on his boots. He took one last, deep draw of the amber-leaf filled pipe, sending plumes of thick orange smoke drifting like pillows above his head, before taking the walking stick from the stand next to the door and heading out into the sobering early morning air.

  The narrow, rugged path led from the little cottage into the hills beyond, slicing through the woodland like a jagged scar. The going was tough on the uneven terrain, but Burtlùs made light of it, speeding through the gloom of the dense overhanging trees, not needing to watch his footfall as he knew the way so well.

  The sun was just breaking the horizon when he arrived, spilling its golden fire across the gently sloping meadow and vanishing into the trees all around. Burtlùs ambled along the tree line at the northern end of the meadow, stepping carefully, as he always did, so as not to tread on the many wild spring flowers that were scattered like rainbow drops in amongst the grass. But as he approached his favorite sitting place he noticed something different, something that was not meant to be there. On the ground, partially hidden by shadow, lay the heaped form of a man. He cautiously approached the filth-encrusted tangle of limbs to examine it. He prodded it meaningfully with his stick, sure that this poor soul had passed on. But slowly it began to rouse, untangling itself with a woeful groan. Burtlùs stepped back with alarm.

  Trevor's eyes half opened. The blurred outline of a short, portly figure stood at his feet, pointing at him with the end of a stick. Trevor could make no sense of what was happening, or indeed of what had happened.

  Penny-sized droplets of rain suddenly came hurtling towards the ground, one hitting Trevor square on the forehead, then a second and a third. A dark shape covered the rising sun, and for a moment turned day back into night. More droplets of rain fell, hitting Trevor's face and leaving skin-colored pockmarks. One caught the corners of his gasping mouth. It tasted salty.

  He raised his head a little. His heart jumped straight into his mouth as, directly above the meadow, skimming the tops of the trees, a wooden galleon drifted casually through the air, dripping seawater from its hull. To Trevor’s eye, it appeared to be the sort of vessel that Christopher Columbus would have had when he discovered America. A huge fire-red sail billowed from its single mast as it passed overhead.

  Trevor sat up as the man came to his side and began to speak, but a blast of shouting from above drew their attention. Both Trevor and the strange man looked up to see two very big and apparently very angry men dangling a smaller figure over the side of the slowly moving vessel. They let go. The body fell through the air and crashed into the top branches of the tree closest to where Trevor sat.

  Crunch.

  A shower of leaves and twigs came hailing down. For a moment there was silence.

  Crunch. Crash.

  The branches that had saved this person now gave way, sending him crashing down. Branch after branch cracked and splintered under his weight until finally, with a thud, a boy came to rest on the ground beside Trevor, narrowly missing him. However, the large branch that followed, unfortunately, did not. It hit Trevor with a glancing blow, knocking him clean out.

  Trevor woke with a sharp inward breath, confused and in pain, not recognizing his surroundings. He let out a hollow yelp. ‘Mum!’ A cold sweat poured over his body. His head spun dizzily as he managed to sit up, pressing the heel of each hand over his eyes in an attempt to quell the nausea.

  He was in a darkened room, yet the floral drapes, which hung either side of a checkerboard of glass, were tied back. He wondered how long he had been unconscious. He swung himself round to sit on the edge of the bed, making his head spin even more with a dizzy sickness that could only be calmed by shutting his eyes.

  Finally, when the sickness had passed, he allowed his eyes to open. He looked at his unfamiliar surroundings. It looked like his grandma’s house, but the bed seemed oddly small. Then he noticed that everything else in the room was unu
sually small as well. How did I get here? he thought. Images of the shed…newspaper clippings…a motorbike…a spider’s web flitted through his mind like fragments of a dream. He felt too dazed and weak to try to rationalize it, so decided to find someone who could explain it to him.

  Shakily, he stood up from the bed, sending a flurry of dried dirt to the floor in a shower of brown snowflakes. He noticed his trainers had been placed at the foot of the bed and he slipped his feet into them, cracking their shells of mud.

  He staggered to the door. It was slightly ajar so, with a filthy hand, he pulled it open cautiously and stooped slightly to peer through. He could hear voices but the only person that he could see in the narrow, smoke-filled room was a boy who sat at a long table at the far end. He vaguely recognized him, but for a moment he couldn’t quite place him. ‘The falling boy,’ he whispered under his breath as he remembered.

  He turned around, paced back over to the bed and sat with his elbows on his knees, covering his face to try and block out this strange reality. This can’t be happening, he thought. He wished he could wake up from this nightmare. Slowly, he took his hands away from his face and opened his eyes, hoping against all hope to see the silhouette of his mother sitting on the bed beside him. But he was still alone. A part of him wanted to hide away, to climb under the covers but the other part knew that he needed to get out of here and find his way home.

  After a moment he had gathered his thoughts enough to creep back over to the door and peer through the gap. The boy was still there. He was examining a small silver-colored box and seemed to be trying to prize it open with a butter knife. He was having no luck though and was getting angry with it. Finally, he stopped, muttered something and threw the box across the tabletop. Then, as quickly as he had discarded it, he rushed to retrieve it. He dropped the knife and scooped the box up with both hands like it was something very precious. Then he turned it over to inspect it, buffed it on his tunic and slipped it carefully into a worn leather pouch that he wore across his chest.

  What could he have done wrong, Trevor wondered, to be thrown out of that flying ship?

  He studied the boy with curiosity. His bright cornflower-blue eyes seemed almost out of place beneath his mop of dirty-brown hair. He was a pale and scrawny boy with a slender build and looked about Trevor’s age, or maybe a bit younger. Yet there was something about him that Trevor couldn’t quite work out…

  The sound of voices was getting louder and drew Trevor’s attention away. They seemed to be approaching the house from outside. He opened the door a little more to look round, but it creaked on its hinges and startled the boy, who jumped up, knocking back his chair, grabbed the butter knife from the table and held it out in front of him.

  ‘What you doing? Spying on me?’ The boy stood with the knife ready in one hand and the other pressing the leather pouch firmly against his chest.

  ‘I…I was just…err…’ said Trevor from between trembling lips.

  ‘What on Ëlamár is going on here?’ The short portly man stood at the now open door, shaking his long, bone-like stick. ‘You put that knife down this instant. We’ll have none of that in here.’

  The boy stepped backward, tripping over his fallen chair, the knife spilling onto the floor. Trevor slammed the bedroom door shut and sat down quickly with his back up against it.

  After a moment, the room behind him fell silent. Then a gentle knock came, followed by a soft, woman’s voice. ‘It’s alright. There’s nothing to fear here.’

  Trevor didn’t know what to think or whom to trust. At this point, he didn’t even trust himself, let alone these odd-looking people. ‘Who are you? And where am I?’ his voice wobbled.

  ‘I’m Freya and you met Burtlùs, my husband, this morning— ’

  ‘I told you this pair was going to be trouble. Should have left them where I found them,’ Trevor heard Burtlùs say.

  ‘Shh. That kind of talk’s not going to help anyone.’

  Trevor pushed himself up onto his feet and slowly opened the door. The woman, Freya, looked up at him, soothing him with her sympathetic eyes. She was no taller than Ruth but, from the lines on her face, Trevor could tell that she was around his mother’s age.

  ‘Come on out my dear. Let me take a look at that head of yours. You took a nasty bump to it,’ she said kindly.

  ‘Lucky to still be here, that’s what he is,’ Burtlùs said. ‘What were you thinking of, out in the open like that? Anything could have happened to you.’

  This time the tone of Freya's voice matched the sideways look she gave her husband. ‘That’s enough, I said!’

  Trevor stooped under the low door fame as Freya took him by the hand and led him to a worn-out chair next to a roaring fire. She gently unwound a bandage from his head, which she must have applied earlier while he was asleep.

  ‘Could have got himself killed, that’s all I’m saying. Dangerous place to be, these woods, especially at night,’ Burtlùs said, pacing up and down impatiently as Freya tended to Trevor’s wound.

  ‘Let me finish up here and we’ll get some hot food into him. Then maybe the poor love will tell us how he came to be in the meadow.’

  Trevor hadn’t realized how hungry he was until Freya took a steaming pot out of the range and removed the lid. The smell was divine. His mouth filled with saliva and his stomach churned, letting out an almighty groan.

  ‘We’ve all eaten so have as much as you like,’ Freya said. ‘You must be starving—you’ve had nothing to eat all day.’

  Trevor was shocked. ’How long have I been here?’

  ‘This whole day. It will be dark soon.’ Freya ladled some stew into a bowl and handed it to him.

  He finished a first and then a second helping of the delicious stew and when Freya offered a third he almost accepted but remembered his manners and politely refused.

  ‘Well?’ said a shrill voice from the corner of the room.

  ‘Well, what?’ asked Freya indignantly.

  ‘Well, isn’t he going to tell everyone what he was doing sleeping in the woods?’ The boy looked Trevor up and down as though he were some kind of circus freak.

  ‘You haven’t said much about how you ended up here yourself,’ said Freya. ‘So I think you’re the last person to be making demands, don’t you?’

  The boy slumped back into his chair, folded his arms and muttered under his breath.

  ‘Now, you don’t have to tell us anything you don’t want to,’ Freya continued, trying to reassure Trevor. ‘But we might be able to help.’

  ‘Well, I’d like to know where he’s come from. He’s staying under my roof. He could be anybody,’ Burtlùs complained.

  ‘Yeah. And where’d you get those stupid clothes?’ the boy mocked.

  Look at what you’re wearing! Trevor thought, glancing at the boy’s strange attire. ‘Well, I’m not sure where to start really,’ he began out loud.

  ‘How about at the beginning?’ jibed the boy.

  Trevor had known this wraith for less than an hour and already he disliked him more than anyone he had ever met.

  Burtlùs made himself comfortable in his chair next to the fire, where he stoked an arm-length pipe with orange leaves from a stone jar beside the fireplace. He lit the bowl with an odd little device that appeared from the chest pocket of his shirt. It sent a cascade of sparks showering down, igniting the leaves. Puffs of smoke bobbled up into the air. He nodded towards Trevor to continue.

  ‘Okay,’ Trevor said, still seething at the boy’s comments.

  ‘What’s your name my lovely? Before you start, we should at least know your name,’ said Freya.

  Trevor shuffled around in his chair then began to tell the strangers what had happened, as best he could. ‘My name’s Trevor and I…I come from London, well…uhh…Devon now. And I was in the shed…and now…well…now I’m lost.’ A puzzled look swept across his face.

  ‘Well, how did you get here, a passage on a merchant vessel, or what?’ asked Burtlùs. ‘You must know t
hat. I’m sure you could find a vessel going back the same way, and we could afford you the fare if that’s what’s needed. You’ll be home in no time.’ He paused to take a long draw from his pipe. ‘Unless you fell out of thin air, that is.’ The funny little man gave a soft chuckle.

  ‘That’s just it. I don’t know how I got here. One minute I was in the shed, the next thing I’m lying in a field, on my back, watching a huge sailboat flying through the sky. I have no idea where this crazy place is, nor how I got here!’

  Silence fell over the room. Burtlùs stared at Trevor through narrowed eyes. Freya looked at him sympathetically, as though he were quite mad. A feeling of sheer terror pierced Trevor's body, as he realized no-one believed him. How could he convince these people that he was telling them the truth when he wasn’t exactly convinced himself?

  The boy broke the silence. ‘That bang on the head must have been worse than we thought, Trevor, previously from Lon-don, now of De-von.’ He laughed uncontrollably until Freya thumped her fist down hard on the tabletop. Then he continued with his criticism. ‘You don’t believe this rubbish, do you? There are no such places, you must know that. My parents were relickers; we traveled all over, and I’ve never heard of any such places.’

  Burtlùs rose from his chair, the long pipe hanging from the corner of his tightly pursed lips. He paced the floor for a moment or two. ‘I hate to admit it, but the boy’s right. I may not be a worldly man, but I’ve known many who were. I’ve heard the most amazing stories of far-off lands over a tankard or two of mead. But not in all my days have I heard of these places.’ Burtlùs also seemed to be skeptical of the story.

  Freya put a hand on Trevor’s shoulder. ‘He may not be telling the truth, but look at him—he’s no more than a boy, confused maybe, but a boy nonetheless.’