The Black North by Nigel McDowell

Author:Nigel McDowell [Nigel McDowell]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Hot Key Books
Published: 2014-05-18T16:00:00+00:00

48

‘This way now,’ said the boy of the Big House. ‘I’d advise not to make too much of a sound.’

Into upturned forest. And Oona felt such a lack, a chill of absence making the air colder: she walked among things abandoned, seeing more clearly and closely where children had once been. She saw clues: a stain on a flannel shirt, maybe a dribbled mouthful of a last meal? Muck on the leg of a torn stocking, from a last tumble? Dark spot on a sleeve – perhaps last blood. Or last struggle, last attempt at escape?

Oona kept her hands from the Loam Stone – some nightmares didn’t need knowing. The Master of the Big House muttered low, ‘Beware that black beneath your feet.’

‘We’ve heard that enough times,’ said Merrigutt.

‘Then you should listen to it,’ said the boy.

Oona looked down – she saw raised mounds, depressions that went deep.

‘Just keep moving, my girl,’ said Merrigutt.

The jackdaw was a restless thing again, into the air and circling above and around Oona, then settling somewhere, then somewhere else new, on jointed root or barren ground, but always alert.

‘Just at the top of this mound,’ said the Master of the Big House.

Before they’d left, the boy had wrapped himself in a velvet cloak, but stone fingers weren’t much use for doing up buttons. There was such a fuss to fasten them that Oona had felt time rushing away too quickly and said, ‘Here, let me help.’ She’d gotten as far as reaching when the boy had pulled away and told her, ‘I can do it myself! This was Father’s favourite and best cloak, only right that I should adorn myself with it. Don’t need another’s help.’ Then he’d spent many minutes more fumbling. The cloak dragged far behind him, and Oona had to mind not stepping on it.

They reached a sudden rise, one Oona felt had no business even being there – to Oona Kavanagh from Drumbroken, things like trees and rivers and mountains were fixed, to be worked around, not shifted. But in the North all had been changed as the King desired. And on this solitary rise was a single tree left leaning, roots raised to the sky.

‘This is our way in,’ said the boy. The upended trunk of the tree had a narrow cat’s-eye split for an opening.

Merrigutt arrived back on Oona’s shoulder.

‘You all right?’ Merrigutt asked her. ‘Been quieter since you looked out at all this from that tower. Since you touched the Stone. What did you see?’

Oona closed her eyes, and awaiting her was the same image: Morris. Same words: ‘Follow. Follow me, Oona …’

‘I’m fine,’ she said, opening her eyes again. She could’ve told Merrigutt. Could’ve confessed to the jackdaw what she’d seen the night before, what she’d heard – the voice, the blackened forest with its crimson-eyed watching and floor churning. But she didn’t. Oona had an instinct to keep these things to herself: her nightmares were her own. So she said again, ‘I’m fine.’

‘There’ll be more dispells below,’ said Merrigutt.

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