Читать книгу The Cradle of All Worlds - Jeremy Lachlan - Страница 15

WORST-CASE SCENARIOS

My tunic gets clammy in the stifling heat. The sun creeps towards the horizon, beaming dusty shafts of light through the gaps in the boat shed walls. A mishmash of tribal drums drifts down from Outset Square, mingled with the faraway sounds of laughter.

The Manor Lament has begun. Hours must’ve passed since Winifred left.

Worst-case scenarios claw at my mind. The mayor and his goon squad crashing through the doors, pitchforks raised and ready to skewer. Mr and Mrs Hollow wandering in with a tub of popcorn, ready to enjoy the show. Peg throwing me back into the water. The fact that none of them have happened yet can only mean Atlas is planning something bad. Really bad. The man knows my weak spot, after all. He knows what would hurt me most.

He could go after Dad.

I haven’t left him alone this long in years. Atlas could burst into the basement, drag him from his bed and throw him out onto the street, and I wouldn’t be there to stop him. Peg could throw him into the water. Dad would sink faster than I did. Wouldn’t stand a chance.

The thought alone makes my hands tremble.

I just want to get back to the basement and make sure he’s okay. Rustle up some grub, settle him in for the night, maybe even tell him a story or sing him a song. Dad loves my songs. I can tell. I’m not one to blow my own horn, but I’m pretty sure I’m a great singer.

I should sing a bit now to pass the time, but I’m not in the mood. Instead, I fumble through my undies and throw the fish corpse across the room. No easy task with two bound hands. I tap my feet. I sweat. I try the ropes again, and sweat some more. Stare at the photo till my eyes ache and blur, then try to find a hidden clue in Winifred’s message, a secret meaning behind the symbol. Strange, but I can’t help feeling I’ve seen it somewhere before.

Also, I kinda need to pee. I’m seriously considering taking a squat in the corner when there’s a flurry of tapping somewhere behind me. I drop the photo. Violet’s waving down at me through a window high on the back wall, face painted in stripes of black, orange and white. She’s supposed to be a tiger, but she couldn’t look less fearsome if she tried. She’s wielding a toffee-apple half the size of her head. I’ve never been happier to see her in my life.

‘Go round the front,’ I shout. ‘I don’t think the door’s locked, so you don’t need to break the –’ Violet shatters the pane of glass with her toffee-apple. ‘Never mind.’

‘Jane whatever-your-middle-name-is Doe.’ Violet ditches her treat and clambers in, dropping down onto a stack of crates. ‘I leave you for one second and – whoa. That sucker on your forehead’s the size of a chestnut! Does it hurt? It looks gross. Like, really, really –’

‘I’m hideous. I get it. How did you know I was here, Violet?’

‘Eric Junior. Heard him bragging to Meredith Platt at the festival. She was getting her face painted same time as me. Got a butterfly on her cheek. Can you believe that?’

‘Focus, Violet. What did he say, exactly?’

‘Eric Junior? He said you tried to drown all the fisherfolk and Winifred Robin caught you. And he said it’s a secret. I don’t think many people know yet. Cool cage, by the way.’

‘Yeah, I love it. Almost want to stay here forever.’

‘Yeah.’ She cocks her head. ‘Wait, really?’

‘No! Of course not. Thanks for coming, kid. Look through that junk down there for something to cut this damn rope. We’ve gotta get out of here, pronto.’

Violet leaps down from the crates and searches through the junk scattered around the shed. ‘By the way, I waited, like, half an hour for you. Even after the little quake happened. Then I went home, just like you said, and I waited and waited –’

‘Did you check on my dad? Is he okay?’

‘He’s fine. I told you he’d be fine. I sat with him for a while, but then I got really, really bored, and thought maybe Atlas might’ve taken you to check out the festival, so I headed back to Outset and – well, then I got distracted.’ She rummages through a tackle box. ‘You should’ve told me you were gonna wreck half the cove.’

‘It was an accident, Violet. And it wasn’t half the cove, it was one jetty.’

‘Still. Would’ve been cool to see.’ She pulls a small fishing knife from the tackle box and skips towards the cage. ‘I could’ve helped you teach ’em a lesson.’

Bless her little boots. She hacks away at the rope around my hands, chewing on her tongue. She always chews on her tongue when she concentrates. Her parents hate it. Actually, they seem to hate everything about her. Maybe they love her deep down, but they never show it. Truth is, they’ve resented her ever since she became friends with the girl in the basement.

They tried to stop it happening. For the first two years of Violet’s life, Mr and Mrs Hollow made sure we were never in the same room together. Before I was let upstairs to clean the house, she’d be locked in her room. Before she was brought down to the kitchen, I’d be locked in mine. I’d hear her crying and giggling, blowing raspberries upstairs, but I never saw her. After a while, I heard her little baby footsteps. I’d hold my ear to the basement door and listen to the tales Mrs Hollow would tell her over breakfast. Scary stories of bad things lurking under houses and demons posing as amber-eyed girls. But the Hollows didn’t know who they were dealing with. Even as a toddler, Violet was enthralled. I began to hear her shuffling around outside the door. One day I looked through the keyhole and saw her eyeball staring right back. Mrs Hollow dragged her away and told her she could burst into flames just by looking at me, which only made the little pyro want to see me even more. She sneaked outside a few hours later and made her way round to the basement window. I’ll never forget that moment. Me, standing at the base of Dad’s bed, looking up. Violet fogging up the glass with her breath, smiling down.

The rest, as they say, is history.

‘So,’ Violet says now, ‘what was she like?’

‘What was who like?’

‘Winifred Robin.’ Violet tuts at me. ‘Come on, you could act a little more excited. She’s only the most amazing adventurer Bluehaven’s ever seen. She’s been into the Manor more times than anyone. I’ve read all her books. Kids at school say she went batty after the Manor shut up shop, like most of the old folks round here, I s’pose. She lives under the museum. Never talks to anyone. She’s pretty much a hermit, but, like, a cool one. And you actually got to meet her.’

‘Lucky me.’ Violet cuts through the last few strands of rope and it unravels to the cage floor. I rub the red-raw marks around my wrists and take the knife. ‘Thanks.’

I saw away at the rope around my feet.

‘Why didn’t you just untie that with your hands?’ Violet asks.

‘I tried, but the woman ties knots like a pirate. As for what she was like?’ Actually, I have no idea how to describe Winifred. On one hand, yeah, she smacked me in the head with a shotgun and stuffed me in a cage. On the other, she saved my life. Even offered me a refreshing, poison-free beverage. I cut through the rope and kick it away, stand and stretch. ‘She was the one who slipped the photo through my window this morning, not Atlas. She wrote the message. She’s messing with me, but,’ I hand Violet my baby photo, ‘look.’

Violet gasps. ‘Is that you? Aw, you’re so little!’

‘All those books. It’s the Great Library, right? Under the museum?’

‘Yep,’ Violet says. ‘And we thought you’d never been inside it, huh?’ She shakes her head in wonder, flips the photo. ‘Everything happens for a reason? Weird. What does the drawing mean?’

‘I dunno.’ I check the padlock and chain wrapped around the little cage door. Useless. Pace around the cage and give each wooden bar a shake instead, rub the shotgun lump on my forehead. ‘She said Atlas is gonna do something. She said something bad’s gonna happen, but it’s necessary, and I’m the only person who can help everyone. Maybe at dusk.’

‘You’re the only person who can help everyone? We’re in big trouble then.’

‘Look, this knife isn’t gonna do jack on these bars. We’ll have to break through them. Have a look around for a hammer or something.’

‘Sure thing.’ Violet hands back the photo and hurries over to the pile of junk, has a dig around. She holds up a rusty screwdriver. ‘How about this?’

‘Bigger.’

‘That?’ She points to an enormous anchor.

‘Smaller.’

‘This?’ She twirls a crowbar through the air.

‘Perfect.’

She runs back to the cage, grinning. ‘So what do we do once you’re free?’

‘Sneak out of here,’ I stuff the photo in my pocket, wedge the crowbar between two bars and pull, ‘head back to the house, make sure my dad’s okay, track down Winifred again – and get – some – answers.’ One of the bars cracks. I smile and re-position the crowbar. ‘Atlas is gonna go mental when he finds an empty cage. Did Eric Junior mention what he –’

A hot breath of wind blows through the gaps in the boat shed walls, carrying with it the sound of the drums again. The drums and a distant chuckle. We freeze.

A voice. The slow clippity-clop of a horse. Footsteps getting louder.

‘Go,’ I whisper, tossing the crowbar from the cage. ‘Out the window.’

‘No way, Jane. If they’re taking you somewhere, I’m going too.’

‘Look, I appreciate that but we don’t have time to – what are you doing? ’ She’s crawling under the wagon, that’s what. ‘No, Violet. Get out of here.’

But it’s too late. The horse’s clippities have stopped clopping. The door rattles.

‘Run first chance you get, kid,’ I mutter. ‘If they catch you –’

‘I’ll kick ’em in the nuts,’ Violet whispers. ‘Suckers won’t even see it coming.’

The doors burst open. Golden light fills the shed with a swirl of dust. Four silhouettes stand in the doorway. Atlas, Peg, Eric Junior and a horse.

My worst-case scenario is about to begin.