A Different Kingdom Page 7

  When the meat had hardly been seared they cut off chunks of it and ate, holding the gobbets up to the tree-covered sky before swallowing them with great solemnity. They ate the entire heart, shaking out globs of coagulated blood sometimes, jerking off bites with twists of their head. And when they had finished one of them produced a bulging skin bag from his furs and drank from it, passing it round. Even from where he sat Michael could smell the spirit stink in the air, potent and flammable. They each took a long swallow, wiping their sticky faces, and then two of them went over to the corpse again and began carving it up, skinning and gralloching it as though it were a butchered calf. There was the grate of stone on bone, a sharp crack, and the hideous head rolled free on the ground, the teeth catching the flames for a second.

  'Michael! Michael!' A familiar voice carrying over the rain and the sizzle of the fire. Michael started. His grandfather's voice, coming from the fields beyond the wood. The Fox-People gave no sign that they had heard it. It was not part of their realm, Michael realized. He backed away slowly, conscious of the numbing chill that the rain had beaten into him. He was clumsy, tired, but the rain covered his blunderings. The flame light receded and then disappeared as though a switch had been thrown, and he could see the slightly lighter patch where the wood ended and the fields began, the figure there with a lantern burning, bright as the fire he had left. Pat, his grandfather, tall as a hill in the pouring night, calling for him. He plashed back across the river, left the dank woods and laboured out towards the meadow, weary as a whipped hound, his mind in a whirl.

  AUNT RACHEL KEPT out of Michael's way for days afterward, and was tight-lipped in general. He shrugged it off as one of the countless idiosyncrasies common to grown-ups. He was not yet old enough to bear grudges or to understand exactly what they were.

  He wanted to go back to the river and take another look at the site of the Fox-People's grisly feast, partly to assure himself that he had not been dreaming, and partly out of morbid curiosity. But he found that the shortening days, combined with the drudgery of school, homework and the 'wee jobs' that his grandparents set for him conspired to keep him in the immediate vicinity of the farm. Mullan, too, off-loaded his unfair share of tasks, from grooming Felix (the old man spent too much time by half currying that fancy bloody chestnut, Michael thought) to soaping rarely used tack and harness. Mullan would sit in the tack room smoking sometimes, and stare at nothing for minutes on end, explaining only when Michael asked him what he was about that he was having a last look. 'This sort of stuff'll soon only be in museums, Mike.' It made Michael scoff, but the old man would not be budged out of his fit of melancholy, until, perhaps, he had the chestnut harnessed to the light trap when something like a gleam would appear in his eyes again.

  It was over a week after his last visit, then, that Michael finally got away to the woods and the river hollow. A Saturday, the absence of school meaning he could go in the middle of the day instead of creeping along in the half-dark. He had grown less fond of the dark since he had seen the fox man transformed into an animal on the ground. A wolf. So he was a werewolf. And the realization was like a sliver of ice in Michael's gut. He should tell someone, a grown up. Mullan, maybe. Yet again he felt an ache at the memory of Rose. She would have believed him, or if she hadn't she would at least have been willing to wait in the wood with him, and watch. Maybe then she would have been convinced. Why had there been no funeral, no wake? Not even a mass to go to. Unless she were not dead after all.

  The wood was filled with a faint rushing of air, the creak of tree limbs, forlorn birdsong. A blackbird burst out chittering in front of his knees. Hysterical birds, he often thought, always pitching about in a panic. But he moved more warily after that.

  The wood changed. It happened often when he was in it, usually when he was about to see something unusual, something from what he had come to call the Other Place. The trees seemed older, though they were no larger, and there was a different feel to the air, cleaner and sharper. His nose seemed to take on a new sensitivity, twitching at the sour mould and wild garlic, the green tree smell which he found impossible to define, but which was like a vastly subtler version of new-cut grass. And he was able to note the holed hazel shells where a squirrel had had a snack, the peeled bark where a deer had feasted, the bony, crumbling pellets of an owl.

  And there, in the soft earth, the imprint of a padded paw. He straightened, but the wood was quiet, and there were hours of daylight left, even if it were only a dull, late autumn daylight. He considered breaking himself a staff from the ruler-straight hazel, then thought better of it. Before him was the river, still full, white between its banks.

  He stepped on stones this time, at leisure and unwilling to wet his toes. Then he was across, leaving the roar of the water behind, moving deeper into the wood. The river coursed in a horseshoe here, enclosing a great arc of trees. If he carried on he would find it again eventually, more sedate as it ambled into the mouth of the old bridge where he and Rose had fished.

  He stumbled across the ruins of the fire without effort, footing the ashes almost before he was aware he had found them. Bones, here, amid the black butts of sticks. Ribs, they looked like, a heap of them. Longer ones split for the marrow.

  He looked up suddenly. The wood was silent, eventhe birds quiet. But then they usually were around this place. They seemed to shun it. He thought he could hear the faint rushing of the river, but that was all. The wind had fallen. He poked with the remains of the spit and dug at the fire scar. More bones, buried in loose earth and ash, wood burned to charcoal.

  He picked up a stick of charcoal and then, half smiling, scored a thick-line across his face with it, streaking his cheeks and nose. He was a savage now. He wondered what Aunt Rachel would say if she could see him.

  Wild.

  He dug deeper, levering out earth and bones with his makeshift pick. The point jarred on something like a large stone, and he discarded it, scooping and scrabbling with his hands.

  The skull.

  He heaved it out with his fingers in the eye sockets. There were shreds of blackened gristle clinging to it, long, coarse black hairs stuck in the clay, and what might have been the withered, leathery remnant of one ear, sharp as a horn.

  The teeth fascinated him. Longer than Demon's had been, thicker at the base. The skull was huge, heavy, frightening. The fire had burned it black. He wiped ash and hide from it, staring in wonder. A werewolf's skull. Would he be believed now? Maybe they would put it in a museum like they had the sword his grandfather had found. He could be in the paper.

  But the idea faded away as he stared at it. He had a notion that it was still alive, and it would take little imagination to see it snap, the eye sockets light up like candles. He had a sudden urge to bury it again.

  But no. That was what he had come for. Evidence. Something real out of everything he had seen. He was not leaving it behind.

  There was a long, distant howl, way off in the sombre depths of the trees.

  He stood up at once. Wolves.

  The skull hung heavy from his fingers. Was there a distant swishing of feet in the wood? A pattering, an irregular rhythm? He tensed.

  The first wolf came into view two hundred yards away through the wood. It looked horribly black against the trunks of the trees, like a burnt corpse. Instants later there were six more flickering in its wake.

  Michael turned and ran.

  He was no more than sixty yards from the river, though it was invisible through the trees. He doubted if they would follow him as far as the walls of the farm.

  No distance. No distance at all.

  He heard a clatter and yowling behind him and dared a look. They had reached the fire scar and were snuffling among the bones.

  His feet flew over the fallen leaves, brambles and low branches rasping at his face, plucking his sleeve. Where was the river?

  No good. He must have come in a circle or something. He paused, gasping. There was no sound for a second except the confused s
narling behind him.

  There was no sound of the river.

  An edge of true panic entered his mind. He knew this wood in and out, winter and summer. It was impossible that he should be lost, impossible that the river should be unheard, for it was full and fast at this time of year, the noise of its rush carrying to every corner of the wood.

  A horse nickered behind him, and the wolves gave tongue like a pack of hounds. He whirled and saw something new towering through the trees. A man, black as pitch, on a black horse. His face was shrouded by a hood and he was swathed in what seemed to be ragged lengths of cloth. Even his hands were wrapped, like a leper's. He held a whip in one of them and was blurring through the tree boles at a trot, urging the wolves on.

  It's the Devil, Michael thought. And he's going to catch me.

  He ran again, following his nose and gulping frantic air into his lungs. The skull was a dead weight that ached his wrist but he refused to give it up.

  He could see dark shapes out of the corner of his right eye, and behind came the solid thump of hoofbeats.

  Tears flashed from his eyes and his back slimed with sweat. His heavy shoes weighed pounds and pounds.

  He tripped, fell headlong and rolled. The skull swung in the air and came down to crack him on the head. His sight swam for a second, then he was up again, dizzy and staggering.

  A black-mawed shape rushed up on him with a snarl. He swung the skull with all his might and heard it crack against the wolf's jaw, jarring his fingers. The animal's lip split under the impact and it yelped. He hit it again on the snout, then ran on. The whole wood seemed full of the cries of the hunting pack, the hoofbeats underlying them; and they were somehow more frightening; directed, implacable.

  The wood was alien to him, strange and unknown, vaster than was possible in his own world. He had slipped into the Other Place. He was lost. Sobs threatened to rack his chest and steal his air.

  Then he saw Rose, plain as day, standing before a clump of impenetrable hazel and bramble. She was beckoning, an urgency in her face. He almost laughed with relief.

  'I knew you'd come,' he gargled, staggering towards her.

  It was not Rose. He caught only a glimpse before she slipped into the darkness of the thicket, still beckoning to him, but he was sure it was not her. This girl was taller, darker-eyed, slimmer, and she wore a white shift that left her arms and neck bare.

  He crashed into the hazel and pushed his way through, the skull snagging on twigs.

  'Wait!'

  Behind him the wolves howled in anger and disappointment.

  He cackled madly, the breath like an ebbing tide of hot sand in his throat, scraping and scalding his lungs...

  'Where are you?'

  ...And tumbled down a steep incline, rolling, the skull banging loose from his tired hand. To splash with a shock of cold water in the river. His head went under and he thrashed around, fought it above the surface. It was deep, icy cold. He began to hyperventilate, screamed aloud, beat for the shore—and stopped. The skull was under the water somewhere.

  He dived. Swimming was something he had taught himself since Rose had disappeared. His fingers fumbled in mud, up-turning stones, one fastening on the wriggling flash of a fish. Then the hardness of the skull.

  He surfaced, whooping for air. His shoes were weighing him down. He made the far bank, hauled himself out of the water like an old, old man and lay there with the grass at his cheek and waited-for his heart to slow from a sprint.

  'God,' he croaked.

  He was on the eastern bank of the little river, and ten yards away the arch of the bridge gaped like a dark and empty gateway.

  SIX

  'MOTHER OF GOD, Michael! What in the world is that? It gave me the fright of my life!'

  He groaned, turning in bed, muzzy-eyed. His grandmother shook his shoulder. 'Where did you get it? You can't keep things like that in the house.'

  Stupid with waking, he told the truth. 'Found it near the wee river. It's just a skull.'

  'A skull! And what would you be wanting with a skull in the house, sitting on top of the wardrobe? I hope it's not old Demon's head that you've dug up, or your grandfather will be none too pleased. Graverobbing, is what it is.'

  'It's not. It's some other skull. Some other dog.' He yawned, though he was now fully awake. Outside the morning was blue and murky, and rain drummed on the window.

  'Well, you'd better shake a leg. Your grandfather's already at his breakfast and Mullan is setting up the big trap. We don't want to be late on account of one sleepyhead.' She moved towards the door. 'Skulls now it is!'

  Michael hauled himself out of bed. His body ached all over, and he felt grimy. The skull grinned at him, black bone in the corner. God, it was big.

  Sunday morning. Mass. He groaned again.

  THE RAIN WAS blinding on the way into town, the water spinning off the wheels of the trap. Sean muttered about getting a car and moving into the twentieth century, but Michael's grandparents seemed not to mind the rain. Bundled up in oilskins and hoods, they looked more like sailors than churchgoers.

  Michael and Aunt Rachel hung on grimly at the rear with the water streaming into their eyes. Michael could feel the collar of his good shirt slowly getting colder and colder with the rain. Rachel ignored him, holding down one end of her hat with a work-red hand.

  The Horseman was in the field next to the road, close to the hedge.

  Michael could have touched his horse's muzzle as the trap rattled past. No one else appeared to have seen him. He was even blacker with rain, his mount's coat flat and slick. His cloaks and wrappings clung to him like a second skin, and he was lean and wiry under them. The whip dangled from one gloved hand. His steed threw up its head and snorted against the insistent rain, but the rider might have been a corpse propped up in the saddle. Except when the hooded face turned to follow the progress of the trap down the road.

  THAT NIGHT THE sky cleared and the wind fell. It was a cold night, the promise of frost-in the air. Michael lay in bed staring at the skull on top of his wardrobe. At his feet the window opened out into blue darkness. The farm was asleep, but he could not drop off. He felt he was on the border of another country, that he had peered through a door not often opened and it had remained ajar after him. For things to come through.

  The skull stared at him, sneering in the dark. He should have left it where he had found it. He knew, now, that this thing was his alone, that no one else would ever share in it or see the things he saw. A dog's skull, he had said, and his grandfather had looked at him with disconcerting shrewdness.

  'Been a whole load of farm dogs buried on the banks of the river through the years, Michael. Our family, my father, my grandda. There's probably a dozen of them lying down there, fifty years dead. It's no bad idea to let them be. You wouldn't want somebody digging up Demon, would you?'

  And he had shaken his head dumbly.

  Old Felix whinnied in the night, the sound carrying in the starlit air.

  He threw aside his bedclothes and crawled along the bed to the window. His eyes were already accustomed to the dark of the room and the yard seemed almost bright by comparison, the farm buildings shrouded in shadow. He grabbed his alarm clock and squinted at the arms with the face close to his nose. Just after four.

  Something tall and angular moved quickly from one patch of darkness to another, disappearing behind a corner.

  He stared, eyes wide as an owl's.

  The thing came into view again, on all fours this time, with its nose close to the ground as if following ascent. It was black-furred, lean, deep-chested with a long thin muzzle and large upright ears. It stood up again, well over six feet, its forearms too long for its body. It had no tail.

  And it loped across the yard with its nose tilted up towards Michael's window.

  He drew back, sick with fear. The window was open six inches and he thought he could hear it snuffling below. Can werewolves climb? His racing mind wondered. He felt a scream creep up into his throat b
ut it lodged there, choking him into silence.

  The thing reappeared, near the stables. The halfdoors were closed and it pawed the bolts with clawed hands. Felix began whinnying in earnest, and the other horses joined him. There was a bang, loud as a gunshot, as one of them kicked the stable door. The werewolf drew back hurriedly. Michael heard voices from his grandparents' room. Then the back door slammed and Mullan limped out into the yard with a shotgun broken open in his hands. He stuffed a shell into it and clicked it shut. The werewolf had sidled round the corner of the stables. Michael could just see it, crouched down along the wall with its mouth open, panting like a dog. He banged his window to warn, but still could say nothing. Mullan spun round, eyebrows going up his forehead as he saw Michael at the window—and in that instant the beast leapt away from the stable wall, out of the yard. Mullan spun again and fired the shotgun from the hip like Audie Murphy, the recoil knocking him back a step. The shot was shockingly loud, the flash scattering Michael's sight with after-images. Mullan broke open the gun once more and limped steadily out of the yard in pursuit, fumbling in his pocket for another shell. A flood of light filled the yard as Sean and Pat came out of the back door bearing lanterns, long stock coats thrown over their pyjamas. They almost collided with Mullan as he came back into the light with the shotgun over his shoulder. Michael caught snatches of their talk.

  '—Some dog or other, big one too.'

  'Need to have a look at the sheep.'

  '—Woke the whole bloody house up.'

  '—Scared Rachel half to death.' And the three of them laughed there in the light and dark of the lanternlit yard. Sean turned and waved at Michael's window, his black hair tumbled down over his forehead.