Twilight Hauntings by Angie Sage

Author:Angie Sage [Sage, Angie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2020-02-20T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 22

Parrot’s Cage

“PARROT’S CAGE,” SAID DANNY.

“Where?” asked Hagos, surveying the disparate group of stalls on the platform of the old Luma Station.

“Here,” said Danny, pointing to his mouth. “The bottom of a parrot’s cage, to be precise. A parrot’s cage that has not been cleaned out for weeks, if you must know. And my tongue is stuck to it.”

“All right, all right. I’ll get us a drink,” Hagos said. “But we must be up in Luma before they close the gates. I don’t want to be down here in the Hauntings tonight.”

Danny threw himself down onto the dusty platform and lay like a starfish, his eyes closed, savoring the wonderful sensation of not walking. Once the last of the Air-Weavers was safely behind them, Hagos had set such a fast pace through Lemon Valley that Danny had had to trot to keep up. Hagos had refused to stop for even a second and had walked barefoot with an ease that had made Danny, in his boots, feel clumsy.

“Orange water,” came Hagos’s voice from above, as he handed Danny a cool stone bottle and sat down beside him on the edge of the platform. Danny drank the contents down in one long gulp. He thought that he had never tasted anything quite as good.

“For the hill up to Luma,” Hagos said, handing over a waxed-paper package. “Duck and orange pie. We’re going to have to move fast. They close the gates at sunset.”

Danny looked gloomily at the hairpin bends that wound up the almost vertical face of the cliff. “We’ve got time to eat the pies first,” he said.

“You can eat your pie on the way,” Hagos told him.

Danny clarified the matter. “You can eat your pie on the way. I’m eating mine here.”

“I am leaving now for Luma,” Hagos said frostily.

“Okeydokey,” said Danny, taking a large bite of his pie.

Spluttering with annoyance, Hagos jumped down from the platform and strode away. Danny, equally annoyed, watched him go. He’d give him a few minutes, then he’d catch up with the old grump, he thought. But as Hagos reached the foot of Luma Twist, he performed a remarkably athletic leap backward, and a second later Danny saw a donkey cart emerge from the foot of the Twist at breakneck speed. It narrowly avoided Hagos and careered across the wide, dusty expanse that lay in front of the platform. But it was not the speed of the cart that took Danny’s attention, it was what followed the cart: an iron contraption about five feet high shaped like a parrot’s cage, which clattered along on four battered wheels. In the cage crouched a woman in rags, clinging to the bars, staring ahead with an expression of utter shock. In the back of the cart Danny saw a wild-eyed girl, clinging onto the cage, holding the whole bizarre train together.

“Hey!” someone on the platform yelled. “That’s cruel. Let her go!”

“Cut the rope! Poor creature!”

But another demurred. “That’s a prison cage. Looks like he’s rescuing her. Brave lad.

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