Читать книгу Freax and Rejex - Robin Jarvis - Страница 10

JANGLER HAD WATCHED the crowd hurrying from the camp, chasing after that bothersome American reporter, with only the mildest of interest. There was still much to do on his timetable and this would be the perfect opportunity to show the newly arrived children their accommodation.

With his clipboard under his arm and the iron hoops at his belt clinking and rattling with large keys, he marched over to both groups. The winkle-picker shoes he wore, to go with his medieval gaoler’s outfit, were new and he hadn’t had time to break them in. They pinched his toes and chafed his heels. It was spoiling his enjoyment of the day.

“Now then, if I could have your attention,” he began, in his usual officious manner. “While His Highness, the Holy Enchanter, is otherwise engaged, I will show you where you are to be billeted.”

The children were looking anywhere but at him. The older ones were pulling their bags from the luggage holds in the coaches while the youngest were gazing around the camp, unsure and afraid. They eyed one another shyly. Trust had been ripped from their lives, but they were desperate for friendship and company. They were damaged and wary, but soon the first hesitant smiles were exchanged.

It was more difficult for the teens.

“That’s my case there, that pink one – and that one!” Charm’s voice shouted. “Careful – they’re genuine Louis Vuitton repros!”

A sandy-haired lad, with a guitar slung over his shoulder, shrugged in bemusement. “You planning on stoppin’ here permanent?” he asked dryly. “How many frocks can a body wear in one weekend?”

“These is just me basic essentials,” she replied, pulling up the handles and trawling the cases back to where her mother was waiting.

Another boy, in a pale blue Hackett polo shirt with the collar turned up, stared after her, inclining his head to one side.

“Now that’s tasty,” he said appreciatively.

“I dinnae eat plastic,” the other lad commented.

“Afford to be fussy, can you? Even now? You’re wrong though, matey. That there would have been top trophy totty even before DJ ruined everything.”

“You reckon? Did you no hear her and her mother yakking on the coach all the way here? I can do without that earache.”

“Trick is not to listen to them, amigo. Just nod when they look at you and flirt a bit with their mums. Works a dream.”

“Dinnae call me amigo.”

“What then? I’m Marcus. Do you play that guitar?”

“Aye, you look like a Marcus. And no, I just carry this with me to use as a paddle in case I get washed overboard my luxury yacht.”

“No need for the attitude. We’re in this cack together.”

The Scottish boy considered him a moment. He had seen Marcus get on the bus at Manchester. He was about fifteen, the same as himself, but a type he would normally never associate with, in school or out. He was far too cocky, sporty and wore casual clothes that had never been chucked on the bedroom floor after use. He probably folded them before putting them in the laundry basket and ironed his socks and underwear. He certainly spent way too long in front of the mirror and too much money on self-grooming products, if his painstakingly arranged hair, moisturised skin, pungent shower gel and aftershave were anything to go by. Before that book had taken over and changed all the rules, he must have been a swaggering fish in his own little north-west pond. But, despite those unappealing traits, this Marcus was undoubtedly right. Aberrants such as themselves faced enough battles out there without picking quarrels among their own kind.

“Alasdair,” the Scottish boy muttered, extending his hand. “Just dinnae call me Al, Ally – and if I hear a Jock or a Jimmy, at any time over the next few days, I will have to kill you.”

Marcus grasped the hand and shook it, too heartily in Alasdair’s opinion. He was like a teenage estate agent or used car dealer.

“Nice to talk to another normal person for a bloody change!” Marcus said.

“Whatever normal is, aye.”

“Not being a raving Jax-head, that’s what I call normal.”

“I wouldnae know any more. It’s been so long.”

“It’s mental. I still don’t get it. Soon as that ruddy book came out, every girl I know… knew, cracking pieces they were, no rubbish, dumped me and chased after some scrawny loser just because he had a ten of clubs on his Primark anorak. I was like, what?”

Alasdair glanced at the branding on Marcus’s shirt and smiled to himself. In Scotland the word ‘hacket’ meant ugly.

“Aye, well,” he said. “If your own parents can kick you out as mine did, there’s no many surprises left.”

If he had expected Marcus to sympathise or ask him about it, he would have been disappointed. He wasn’t.

“So,” Marcus continued, reverting to his favourite topic, “if you don’t fancy that hotness, it’s a shame to let it go begging. I’ll have a crack at her. I am having one hell of a dry spell. Before they brainwash me this weekend and do my head in good and proper, I’m going to cop off with a fit bird one last time.”

Alasdair seriously began to wonder if this boy’s brain actually was located in his underwear.

“Did you check out that other coach?” Marcus continued. “No talent at all in that. Just more kids and a definite ‘Avoid’ in a manky green cardy. The blonde bit is the only thing worth chasing.”

“You’re wasting your time,” Alasdair told him. “Yon plastic dolly’ll no be interested in you. Fancies herself way too much that one.”

Marcus pushed the short sleeves a little higher up his biceps and picked up his case.

“No skirt in its right mind can resist the Marcus magnetism,” he boasted as he sauntered after Charm. “When I shift into fifth gear pulling mode, I’m the Stig’s knackers.”

Behind him, Alasdair winced.

“Total tool,” he muttered.

Jangler was irritated and his feet were throbbing. No one was taking the least bit of notice of him. He cleared his throat and clapped his hands. Eventually he called one of the minstrels over and banged crossly on his drum.

The children’s heads turned his way. The teenagers dug their hands deep into their pockets or folded their arms. Charm stood to attention and waited politely, posing her head this way and that, as cute and as coy as she knew how, all the while wondering where the cameras had disappeared to. Marcus positioned himself behind her and admired the view. Jody sunk her chin into her chest and huddled into her cardigan. Alasdair looked at the pompous little man, staring over his spectacles at them, and hummed the theme to Dad’s Army to himself. For all his medieval costume, the Lockpick reminded him of Captain Mainwaring and in spite of everything, the Scottish lad couldn’t stop smiling. At the back, Nike boy hissed through his teeth and kept his earphones in.

“As there are thirty-one of you,” Jangler addressed them, “eighteen girls and thirteen boys, I’m going to call out your names in groups and assign each group a cabin. Make your way to it, unpack and freshen up, and we will foregather here again in one and one half hours to commence the weekend’s revels – won’t that be nice? Now females first…”

He began to read from his clipboard. The younger children looked confused. Their parents had trailed after the Ismus, but help was at hand in the form of women, dressed as serving maids, who found their bags and cases and ushered them to the right cabins.

The camp had only been open a couple of years so these dormitories were modern, comfortable and pretty spacious inside, considering. Usually they slept five, but extra frames and mattresses had been fitted into them for this special weekend. The girls were allocated three cabins. The boys were crammed into two.

Shaking her wet hands, Jody Barnes emerged from the toilet and returned to the bed where she had dumped her holdall. She looked around her. The place was clean, if spartan. She assumed the prints of painted Mooncaster landscapes had been hung on the walls for their benefit, but there was also a TV and a games console.

Each cabin was laid out the same. This ground floor housed four beds and there were two more on the small, partly enclosed mezzanine area up the stairs. Jody should have raced straight up there and bagged one of those bunks for herself, but her bladder had decreed otherwise. Two of the younger girls from the other coach had claimed them instead. Still, she didn’t mind; this wasn’t so bad. After so many months being the only person in Bristol shut out from the world of Dancing Jax, it was going to be a breeze sharing this place with other rejects, even if they were mainly kids.

The only downer was that Charm creature. She’d been put in here as well. Her mother was still fussing around her and Jody felt a pang of jealousy. Her own parents were outside with the Ismus somewhere. They only came today so they could meet him. They took no interest in her any more. They were bored of having to be her mum and dad in this world. Five months on, the pain of that rejection was still there and induced tears if she picked at it, so she never did. Jody turned away and her attention rested on the child sitting uneasily on the corner of the bed next to her own.

It was little Christina Carter. Her dress was still covered in cold sick.

“Where did the nice TV lady go?” the seven-year-old asked when she saw Jody looking at her.

“As far away as she can if she’s got any sense, which isn’t very likely,” Jody replied.

“She said she was going to take us with her,” the little girl said, staring down at her feet. “I don’t like it here.”

Jody pitied her. This new life must be so much worse for the very young ones. If she couldn’t understand what was going on, how could they?

“Open your bag,” she said. “Let’s get you some fresh togs out. Then come with me to the bathroom and we’ll clean you up. How does that sound?”

Christina’s answering grin was the widest she’d ever seen and they made a game of searching through the little girl’s bag to see what had been packed for her.

“We should have them two beds upstairs,” Charm interrupted them, addressing Jody, hands on hips. “We’re like the oldest in here, innit? I’m gonna kick them kids out. What do you say?”

“You’re orange,” Christina told her.

Jody’s nostrils widened as she suppressed a laugh. “I’m fine where I am,” she replied. “It’s only for two nights. Let those girls enjoy themselves for a change. They must have a miserable time of it back home.”

“I want to sleep up there,” Charm insisted. “And I’m gonna. Them kids’ve gotta shift. If you won’t help then I’ll do it on me own, makes no difference. But don’t expect to kip up there when I’ve sorted it.”

Jody squared up to her. Although she was a year younger than this painted gargoyle, she knew she was stronger and wasn’t afraid to smack the lipgloss clear off her face.

“You leave them alone,” she said forcefully. “They got there first, so the penthouse is theirs. If you try to evict them, I’ll drag you down the stairs by your extensions so fast, you’ll slide out of your tan like a snake sloughing its skin. You got that?”

Charm glowered at her. Jody half expected her to throw a tantrum.

“Come away, child,” Mrs Benedict interjected, shooting Jody a scolding glance and drawing her daughter back to where the pink suitcases were waiting. “Don’t you mingle with the likes of that common sort. Naught but a lowly two at the most, I’ll wager, if she ever makes it to the castle, which I doubt. What a surly face. I’ve seen prettier sights round the backs of cows and what comes out of them. We don’t want her kind in Mooncaster. A proper dirty aberrant and no mistake.”

Jody snorted. That was the most fun she’d had in months and she promised herself a weekend of Barbie baiting.

“I know what her flavour is,” Charm told her mother in a deliberately loud voice. “Old cabbage and sprouts!”

Christina stuck her tongue out at her. Then the seven-year-old’s attention was arrested by a strange circular object, fixed high on the wall. She pointed to it and asked Jody, “What’s that?”

In the boys’ cabin that had been fitted with seven beds, Marcus was looking at an identical device and wondering the very same thing. It resembled an old-fashioned radio from the 1930s, being made of brown Bakelite, with a central dial and a brass grill. But it was too large and didn’t match the rest of the interior decor. He dragged a chair over from the TV corner and stood on it for a closer inspection.

“It’s bust,” he announced to anyone listening. “These knobs down the side don’t do anything and the needle doesn’t go round the dial. It’s just for show. It’s junk.”

A slightly younger boy gazed up at it. “Maybe it’s just a speaker?” he suggested. “To wake us up in the morning and tell us when to go for breakfast and make announcements.”

Marcus looked down at him. The boy wore what he could only describe as “geek goggles” and was going through the first flush of puberty, if his crop of zits was anything to go by.

Back in the pre-Jax days, Marcus wouldn’t have even noticed the likes of him. His posse consisted only of the cool kids, at the top of the school food chain. It was a pity that Alasdair dude hadn’t been put in this cabin as well. He didn’t seem so bad. If he was here, they both could have avoided talking to dweebs like this.

“There’s no wires connecting it to anything,” he said, jumping off the chair. “And why the phoney dial?”

“Was only an idea.”

“So who’re you, know-all?”

The boy hesitated. He’d got out of the habit of speaking to people who weren’t possessed by the book and was now always on his guard.

“Er… Spencer,” he said with some awkwardness.

“Herr Spencer?” Marcus scoffed. “You German?”

“No, just Spencer.”

Marcus punched him playfully on the shoulder.

“OK, Herr Spenzer,” he laughed. “You zee any pretty Fräuleins, you zend them to Marcus, ja?”

“I’m not German,” Spencer reiterated, rubbing his shoulder. “I’m from Southport.”

“Just teasing ya!” he said, flicking the boy’s spectacles so they sat at an angle on his face. “Take a joke.”

Spencer backed away, adjusting his glasses, and returned to his bed. He sat there protecting his bag, in case Marcus thought it would be funny to run off with it.

The older boy groaned. What a useless bunch of kids he’d been lumbered with. Every one of them could win a misery guts contest in ugly town.

“Oh, lighten up, the lot of you!” he called out. “This has got to be better than what you left behind at home, hasn’t it?”

Five sullen faces stared back at him. He rolled his eyes and knocked his knuckles on his temple.

“Hopeless!” he uttered. “Bloody hopeless. Right, I’m going to grab a shower. I’ve a feeling I’m going to get lucky, not that any of you can possibly understand what that means. If you need a wazz, go now while I get my towel. Just a wazz though; if you want to drop a log, tough – you’ll have to wait till I’m done.”

He went up the stairs to the mezzanine. At least he’d had the sense to be first up here and take ownership of one of those beds. He wouldn’t have to sleep down there, which would be an airless pit of sweaty socks, bad breath and BO by tomorrow morning. Herr Spenzer’s zits probably glowed in the dark too.

At the top of the stairs Marcus stopped. The other bed up here had been taken by the black lad from the other coach. He was reclining on the covers with his earphones in, puffing away on a cigarette. The grey smoke had gathered in a ghostly canopy overhead.

Marcus scowled. “Hey, dude,” he said. “You wanna take that outside? I don’t want me or my stuff to stink.”

Nike boy’s eyes opened and appraised him slowly, up and down. Marcus folded his arms so he could push the biceps out a bit more. He wasn’t going to be intimidated. Still, that lad was stocky, not gym-toned but naturally brick-wall solid.

“You just call me ‘dude’?”

“Take your cancer sticks outside, man,” Marcus told him.

“You don’t get to tell me what to do, white boy.”

“Oi, don’t start that!”

The lad rose from the bed and Marcus saw he was a good bit taller than himself. He stood his ground as the other approached, the cigarette hanging on his lip.

“I will start what the hell I want,” he said as he came closer. “Who is you to lay down rules in here? Lab rats don’t get to say what’s what. You’re in the same experiment as the rest of us. If you don’t like my nicotine then you better go find somewhere else to lay your head this weekend cos I will be lighting up in bed, I will be blowing smoke in your face while you sleep and I will be burning holes in your AussieBum panties. You better pray to baby Jesus that’s all I’ll do, cos I got me a blade and your pussy face could do with a few lines of interest. You hear what I’m saying?”

Marcus blinked nervously. The boy leaned into him and exhaled a dense fume of smoke. Marcus spluttered and backed away, clenching his fists in readiness.

Suddenly the other boy broke into a laugh.

“Just teasin’ ya!” he roared, throwing his words back at him. “Take a joke!”

Marcus glared fiercely for a moment. Then he pushed past to collect his toiletries bag and a towel from his case. In stony silence he stomped downstairs to the shower. On the way he heard Spencer chuckling. He’d remember that.

On the mezzanine the smoker returned to his bed and stretched out on it luxuriously. “Lee Jules Sherlon Charles,” he congratulated himself. “You is the last of your kind.”

It wasn’t too long before the drum was beaten again outside and everyone was summoned from the cabins.

Alasdair emerged feeling hungry and was glad to see serving maids weaving through the crowd, bearing trays of food from the stalls. He grabbed a large slice of ham and chicken pie and a ceramic goblet of ale and made short work of both. At least the food was good here and one thing he did admire about the world of Dancing Jax was the quantity of booze the characters got through. They drank ale in place of tea, coffee or soft drinks and the nobles were always quaffing wine. If that’s what life was really like in the olden days, they must have been perpetually off their faces.

“Is there a vegetarian option?” Jody asked one of the wenches. “That’s just a lump of death wrapped in a murder parcel that is.”

At her side, now washed and in clean, dry clothes, little Christina absorbed her words and shrank away from the proffered tray.

“There is cheese and bread, Mistress,” the serving maid told them helpfully.

“I like cheese,” Christina declared brightly. Her very empty tummy was growling.

“It’ll have been made with the chopped-up insides of a baby cow’s stomach,” Jody informed her.

Christina wrinkled her nose and shook her head with disgust.

“We’ll just have the bread,” Jody said. “Though that’ll be packed full of additives and made with chlorine-bleached flour.”

She took several slices of a rustic-looking loaf and sniffed them. “You wouldn’t believe what they put in this rubbish,” she grumbled. “There’s a list of E-numbers long as your arm, trans-fats, preservatives, traces of pesticide.”

Christina was too busy devouring her second slice to comment.

“Don’t suppose you’ve got a banana?” Jody called after the departing serving maid.

A snigger sounded behind them. Jody turned to see Marcus shaking his head in disbelief at her.

“Don’t you worry,” he laughed. “They’re going to roast a wild tofu for you veggies later.”

Chuckling, he continued on his way. He was carrying two goblets of ale and was on a mission. Jody watched him push to the front. She recognised his type, and marked him down as not worth talking to.

The Ismus had returned with the Jacks and they were sitting in places of honour around a raised stage area. Cameras were snapping away and Jody saw that American TV reporter among the other news crews.

“So much for Julie bloody Andrews,” the girl muttered. “Didn’t take her long to get Von Trapped.”

Charm and her mother had stationed themselves right by the stage. Charm had changed into a short skirt and scraped her hair into a ponytail. They were waiting for the performance to commence, or for a lens to stray in their direction. A large pair of Gucci sunglasses shielded her eyes from the afternoon sun, but she would have worn them whatever the weather.

“This has got to be the glam corner!” Marcus declared, blinking in feigned surprise as he came bowling up to them. “No one told me there was going to be a Mooncaster’s Next Top Model contest going on here today. Would either of you two lovely ladies like a drink? It’s not bubbly, but it’s the best they’re offering; the mead smells like a wino’s emptied himself in it, so we’ll have to make do with this. Now rev up your fun glands, the party starts here!”

Mrs Benedict pursed her lips and viewed him suspiciously as she took one of the goblets.

“I don’t like your manner, young man,” she said. “It’s overly familiar and flippant and we don’t know you.”

“Call me Marcus!”

“Why? What’s your real name?”

“That is my real name. I’m just being friendly. I saw you two beautiful damsels over here, on your lonesome, and thought I have got to go over and say hello.”

He held out the other drink. Charm regarded him and the ale through her shades.

“There’s more’n four hundred calories in a pint of that stuff,” she said.

Marcus looked shocked. “You don’t need to think about things like that!” he cried. “Not a stunner like you.”

“She’s been on some sort of faddy diet ever since she was nine,” her mother informed him. “She won’t allow so much as a Jaffa cake in the house. She’ll be so much happier in the castle – there’s none of that silliness there. You don’t need to count calories when you’re laced into a good strong bodice with a panel of wood tucked down the front.”

“Well, whatever made her beautiful, I’m glad of it,” Marcus said, raising the goblet and drinking a toast to them. “You’re the hottest babes here.”

Mrs Benedict tutted, but she was always ready to praise her daughter.

“She is most fair, isn’t she?” she said proudly. “Two years ago that was the face of Lancashire Pickles. You couldn’t eat an onion in a Bootle chippy without seeing her smile on the jar. ‘Only our vinegar is sour’ the slogan said.”

Marcus smacked his forehead. “I knew you had to be a model!” he exclaimed. “I said so, didn’t I?”

The girl’s mother nodded. “Oh, yes, she’s a true professional. Been doing it since she was ten, haven’t you, child? This was going to be a big year for her. We had The Plan all worked out, didn’t we? Still, what a prize she’ll be when she finally awakens to the real world.”

“Maybe we’ll know each other there!” Marcus suggested hopefully. “That would rock, knowing you here and there as well. So what is your name, beautiful?”

“Charm,” she answered in a voice of lead.

“It couldn’t be anything else!” he said with a grin. “I’m charmed to meet you.”

The girl said nothing and those sunglasses made it impossible for him to read her expression. He tried one of his trademark winks. They had a pretty good success rate. The girl turned back to the stage and he thought he caught what sounded like a bored sigh.

It was time for the performance to begin. First there was a display of courtly dancing, in which the Jacks and Jills took part. Then there was a re-enactment of an episode from the book, when the Jill of Hearts was kidnapped by a Punchinello Guard, who carried her off to a cave under one of the thirteen hills. The short, hideous creature was realised by a dwarf actor wearing an ingenious costume with built-up shoulders and a large, false head jutting from his chest. The head was suitably repulsive, with swivelling eyes and, when it menaced the captured girl, the younger children in the audience covered their own. But the Jack of Clubs came to the rescue just in time. He sliced his sword straight through the creature’s neck and the head went rolling across the stage.

“Oh, them fings is well vile,” Charm said to her mother. “I fink I’d scream if I saw ’em.”

“When you see them,” Mrs Benedict corrected. “But don’t you worry, child. The Punchinellos are usually kept in strict order by their captain, Captain Swazzle, who reports to the Ismus direct. It’s the fiends that go creeping outside the White Castle and in the woods and fields that are to be feared, but you’ll never have to worry about the likes of them, being of such obvious high-born quality.”

“I dunno… I still wouldn’t like to see them every day. Snow White always used to freak me out. When she woke up an’ all them tiny old bald blokes were pervin’ at her. That was well dodgy, know what I mean?”

Marcus remained silent. He heard Mrs Benedict speaking about Mooncaster as though it was a real place, in exactly the same way everyone else he knew spoke about it. He could not understand how or why anyone could believe such infantile rubbish. When this madness had first started, he had wondered if it was a massive con and they didn’t actually believe in it at all, but why they would pretend to do so was an even bigger mystery. What were they getting out of it?

In his darkest moments, and there had been many of those in recent months, when he felt utterly alone and filled with despair, he had questioned his own reason. But his ego was indefatigable and pulled him through every time. He almost wanted this weekend to successfully change him into a believer, just to see what the fuss was about, but he really couldn’t see it happening. How could it? It was only a stupid book.

Elsewhere in the crowd, Christina turned to Jody and whispered in a frightened voice that she hadn’t liked ‘Mr Big Nose’ and was glad he’d been ‘deheaded’.

Jody put her arm round her. “There’s no such things as Punchinellos,” she assured the seven-year-old. “They’re only monsters in a story; they don’t exist.”

“But the Jacks and Jills are in the book too,” Christina said. “They’re real.”

“Just kids playing dress-up. There aren’t any witches or fairy godmothers, no Mauger beast at the gate, no werewolf and no castle.”

“My mummy and daddy say there are,” the little girl uttered unhappily.

Jody glanced over to where Christina’s parents were standing. Mr and Mrs Carter had forgotten about their young daughter and were transfixed by what was happening on the stage. Jody looked away in disgust. She didn’t even wonder where her own mother and father had got to.

“People are the only real monsters,” she said.

It was time for the reading. A distinguished actor, who had appeared in countless movies and voiced umpteen CGI characters, stepped on to the stage to appreciative applause. The serving maids made sure every child had a copy of Dancing Jax and the recital commenced. The actor’s voice rang out, with that dry, clipped, resonant gravitas only the best Shakespearean thespians possessed.

“Dora, poor Dora the blacksmith’s daughter, was a lumpen girl, built like bricks and mortar. When she was ten, she was as tall as her father, at sixteen even he could not have fought her. She could wrestle the burliest farmhand and punch out a horse’s molar. The villagers of Mooncot were justly proud of her prowess, but none of them would court her. Dora, plain Dora despaired how nature had wrought her, so one bright morn she set forth – with ham and cheese and a flagon of well-drawn water. Every young maid knew of magick Malinda, so off she went and sought her. A pretty face and voice of silver was all that she was after. But Dora, dim Dora lost her way, forgetting what her father taught her. ‘Don’t go down the dingling track, where the toadstools grow much taller!’ Down the dingling track she tramped and heard strange voices call her – to Nimbelsewskin’s forest house where soon began the slaughter.”

Through force of habit, Jody followed the words on the pages. She had learned very early on that rejects who showed willing were persecuted far less than those who rebelled. Marcus was doing the same. He pretended to read along with the rest, but all the while his eyes were flicking left and right.

The face of every adult was transfigured with rapture as they found their way back into the Realm of the Dawn Prince and resumed their vivid lives there. Soon they were rocking back and forth, their eyes rolling up into their heads. Only the children who arrived that day remained motionless – they and the Ismus.

The Holy Enchanter gazed out over the sea of bobbing heads. His questioning stare fixed upon each and every one of those youngsters. Which of them? he asked himself. Which of them?

He saw Charm concentrating, desperately wishing for the power of the book to swallow her up. She even tried nodding her head, but only succeeded in catapulting her sunglasses on to the stage. She let out a squeal of frustration. The Ismus looked further back, to where Lee Charles was moving his head from side to side, in time to the music blaring in his eardrums. He hadn’t been paying the slightest attention to anything and wasn’t even holding a copy of the book. Then the Ismus regarded Spencer. He was fidgeting nervously while trying to be as inconspicuous as possible.

A twelve-year-old boy next to him caused the Ismus to narrow his eyes. There was something unusual and furtive in the way Jim Parker was gently patting his shirt, as if he was hiding something beneath it. Nearby, Tommy Williams was still peering around like a baby bird. He and the other small boys had been put in the same cabin as Alasdair and they were now gathered about him. The Ismus considered the Scottish lad and discovered he was staring straight back. Such deep hatred blazed in those young eyes. Could he be the one?

When the reading ended, the crowd uttered wretched groans and gasped miserable breaths as they were torn from the blissful existence in Mooncaster and found themselves back here.

It was time for the parents to depart in the coaches. The Ismus thanked them for bringing their children on this journey. He was confident the next time they met they would have found their rightful places in the world of Dancing Jax.

Kate Kryzewski and Sam filmed the farewells eagerly. In spite of the neglect and unhappy home life, many of the smaller children cried when they saw their parents board the vehicles without them. Rupesh Karim tried to jump on after his father and had to be dragged clear. Jody disappeared into her cabin long before her parents thought to look for her.

There was only one sad parting.

“Now don’t you worry,” Mrs Benedict told her daughter. “When this weekend’s over, you’ll be a real-life princess – I know it.”

Charm tilted her head back and fanned her eyes to stop the tears.

“I wish you wasn’t going, Ma,” she said. “I’m gonna miss you so much.”

“S’only two days,” her mother consoled her. “I’ll be here first thing Monday morning to pick you up and take you back home. Don’t you fret none.”

“You promise?”

“I vow it, if you’re not too grand for me by then. And don’t you forget, when you finally wake up in the castle, come find Widow Tallowax in the wash house and spare her a silver penny or two so she can buy ointment for her poor chapped hands.”

“It’ll be the first thing I do!” Charm swore. “I’ll buy you everyfink the Queen of Hearts has got.”

Her mother smiled and stroked the girl’s face tenderly.

“You’re a good child,” she said softly. “Your real mum will be so proud. Blessed be.”

Charm wanted to tell her how much she loved her, but the lump in her throat made further speech impossible. Instead she threw her arms round her mother’s neck and sobbed.

“Don’t you worry,” Marcus declared, imposing on this intimate moment. “I’ll take care of her.”

Neither took any notice of him. Mrs Benedict stepped on to the coach and Charm mouthed the words she hadn’t been able to say. Her mother found a seat and waved.

When the coaches pulled away and drove up the long forest road, Charm covered her eyes with the sunglasses once more.

“If you want a great big cry,” Marcus invited, holding out his arms, “my shoulders are damp-proofed and I give good hug.”

Charm flicked her ponytail back and walked briskly away.

“You’re a cucumber, you are,” she said over her shoulder.

Marcus wasn’t sure what she meant, but he called after her, “In every way except the colour, gorgeous!”

“I hate cucumber,” she clarified. “It’s wet and borin’, pointless, tastes rubbish, keeps repeatin’ an’ you can’t get rid.”

Marcus was too busy ogling her bottom in that short skirt to be offended or discouraged. It was only early evening Friday – still plenty of time.

Jody had emerged to watch the coaches leave. Leaning against the cabin wall, she saw them turn off at the junction and disappear behind the trees in the distance.

“On my own now then,” she murmured. “No change there.”

A small hand slipped into hers. “No, you’re not,” Christina said. “You’ve got me.”

The unexpected human contact and the simple, loving statement took her totally by surprise. Jody looked down at the seven-year-old, but the grateful smile froze on her lips. What was she doing? She wanted to tell her they would be like sisters this weekend and that she would protect her. But what about afterwards? What if Christina did get snatched away by the power of that book like everyone else in her life? She couldn’t endure the pain of losing another person she cherished. She couldn’t put either of them through that.

Jody shook her hand free. “Go make friends with kids your own age,” she said coldly. “I don’t want you hanging round me all the time. I’m not here to nanny nobody.”

Christina flinched as if she had been slapped. Then she ran around the cabin, out of sight.

“You’re a spiteful mare, you are,” Charm said as she walked past to go inside. “That’s just cruel.”

Jody didn’t answer, but she despised Charm more than ever for being right.

Over by the stage, the Ismus surveyed the remaining crowd. The entertainers and stallholders were milling around, enthusing about their other existence, while the younger children were either crying or staring in crushed silence at the empty forest road.

“Now the weekend can really begin,” Jangler’s enthusiastic voice broke into the Ismus’s solemn contemplation. “Won’t be long before dusk and then, in the night…”

The Holy Enchanter considered the old man gravely. He came to a decision.

“Walk with me,” he said brusquely.

“It’s almost time for dinner,” Jangler reminded him, consulting his watch and schedule. “There is a feast prepared in the main block…”

“That can wait!” the Ismus snapped. He signalled to his bodyguards to remain and strode away.

Jangler nodded meekly; he had been looking forward to soaking his feet while the feast was going on. With delicate, hobbling steps, he followed the Holy Enchanter through the compound. What was on his Lord’s mind? He seemed so preoccupied and troubled of late. In silence they crossed the grassy area behind the cabins, and passed into the trees beyond. The new leaves were rustling lightly overhead, stirred by the gentlest evening breeze.

“Is it something I have done, my Lord?” Jangler asked. “Have I displeased you? Has the day not gone in accordance to your plan?”

“It could not have passed more smoothly,” the Ismus said. “Miss Kryzewski will send an enthusiastic report back to America and, while her government puzzles and dithers over it, the delay will be enough for the book to take a firm hold there. Within four months the home of the brave shall fall – to my most intelligent design.”

“Then what disturbs you? That’s splendid, is it not?”

The Ismus looked back at the compound. A blanket of soft purple shadow had stolen over it. The sun was low. Its amber light caught only the tops of the surrounding trees. None of that was reflected in the darkness of his eyes.

“Those children disturb me,” he whispered.

“The aberrants?” Jangler asked in surprise. “No, no, no. They present no problem. I’ve never seen a more thoroughly subdued and timid lot. They’ll be no trouble. They’re utterly cowed and defeated, just as it should be. They’re nothing, just insignificant wastage.”

“You think so, do you?”

“I know it, my Lord. I’ve encountered disruptive elements before now; there’s none in that dismal collection. They went to their chalets as compliant and docile as rabbits to hutches. Submissive and harmless dregs, that’s all they are. The gullible clods truly believe they’re only staying here for the weekend! They don’t know what your true intent is, or what the bridging devices are for. Not the vaguest idea, I’m sure.”

The Ismus shook his head. “You are mistaken, Jangler,” he uttered. “One of those docile rabbits could be the greatest threat to the world of Mooncaster imaginable.”

“You’re having a jest with me! Nothing can endanger the blessed Kingdom, nothing!”

“One of those children back there… is the Castle Creeper.”

The old man caught his breath and slowly removed his spectacles. “Are you sure?” he asked in a shocked, dismayed whisper.

“Oh, most definitely.”

“But Mr Fellows doubted such a personage could exist. Theoretically it’s possible, but…”

“Yes, I doubted! There was a chance! Incalculably remote, but a chance nevertheless.”

“But to have been found so soon, in this country… and a child?”

The Ismus closed his eyes. The shadows of evening deepened in the hollows of his gaunt face. Beneath the enclosing trees it grew chill.

“I have sensed the incursions,” he said with a slight shudder. “Felt every trespass, as keenly as a cold scalpel razoring through my skin. One of those children, one of those ‘harmless dregs’, has the ability to enter the Dawn Prince’s Kingdom, to insinuate him or herself into my wondrous creation, yet not become a part of it. Somehow they do not assume one of the prescribed roles. They appear in Mooncaster as they are here, whilst retaining a footing in this world and, with each fresh visit, their presence gains in strength.”

“Then we must kill every child in the camp at once!” Jangler insisted – appalled by what he was hearing. “Massacre them! We can set up another bridging centre in the next country that falls. The Castle Creeper is a threat to the Realm – a deadly menace!”

“Only if he, or she, strives against us. Have you forgotten what the Creeper is capable of? Must I remind you of what only they can do? What even I, even His Majesty the Dawn Prince, cannot?”

Jangler blinked and groped through his memory for the relevant passage. Then, in a voice wavering with excitement and wonder, he quoted the hallowed text.

“And who can hinder the Bad Shepherd’s wild, destructive dance? None but the unnamed shape; the thing that creeps through the castle and the night.”

“Yes!” the Ismus declared. “Now do you see?”

Jangler exhaled. His eyes were sparkling. “We must discover which of them is this Castle Creeper!” he said urgently. “There must be no delay!”

“It is too soon!” the Ismus warned. “That would be the ruin of this one incredible chance. We must wait, we must watch, keep those aberrants close and under scrutiny. When the Creeper is grown in strength and conceit, they will betray themselves. Then we shall know.”

“What are my Lord’s wishes?”

“Live up to your name,” the Ismus instructed with a foul grin. “Be the gaoler of that place. When this weekend is done, you will remain. Keep the children under lock and key.”

“It shall be just as you command and I shall report to you every day.”

“No need,” the Ismus said with a low chuckle. “I will monitor everything, know everything, before you do, Jangler.”

“My Lord?”

The Ismus took three steps back and threw open his long arms.

“Dancing Jax must go out into the world and do its glorious work,” he exulted. “There is much to be done and I, Austerly Fellows, must oversee the domination of every country. But I shall spare a part of me – leave a splinter of my essence – here. To observe and do what must be done.”

As he spoke, dark blemishes broke out across his skin until his face was peppered with ink like spots of black mould. They bloomed and spread, foaming over his features until his head was a pulsating mass. Only his mouth was visible – a cave within a festering cloud. Mycelia branched through his hair, writhing and sprouting fresh growths. Then he arched his back and a flood of black strands and spores went shooting upward – into the leaves above. The putrid stench of decay and corruption rained down.

Jangler watched, enthralled, and he fell on his knees to worship the true form of Austerly Fellows.

The mould blossomed overhead, swelling and crackling softly, forming a thick, clotted web in the trees. And then, from within its dark heart, a malignant, bubbling voice spoke.

“Rise, Jangler. Rise, grandson of Edgar Hankinson. For three generations your family have proven their worth and loyalty to me.”

Jangler got to his feet and stared adoringly up at the frothing horror clogging the shadows.

“It has been an honour to serve,” the old man answered, raising his hands in adulation. “You are the Abbot of the Angles, founder of the candle faith, author of the sacred text. When I was a small boy, I dedicated my whole being to your great glory and grandeur. All my life I have venerated you.”

“This shall prove your greatest labour,” the voice told him. “I entrust to your safe keeping the smooth running of the camp. Fortify it. Make it a stronghold from which there can be no escape.”

“Alone? Will you not guide me?”

“You will not be alone. Help shall be sent, extraordinary help. It will support and assist you.”

“But the splinter of yourself? May I not come here, to this place, and consult with it?”

The mould cluster quivered as a gurgling laugh issued out. The sound filled the gathering gloom beneath the trees and the strands connecting the Ismus to the thing overhead vibrated wildly. Then they snapped apart. The hideous growths covering the Holy Enchanter’s face retreated back, disappearing into his pale skin. The disembodied laughter ceased, and was immediately taken up by him. He put his arm round the old man and pointed to the repulsive, throbbing mass above. It crawled higher up the tree and hid itself among the leaves.

“I don’t understand,” Jangler said.

“You won’t be able to consult with that fragment of myself,” the Ismus told him. “Because you won’t know where it is. One night this weekend, that little part of me up there is going hunting.”

“Hunting? What will it hunt?”

“One of those young aberrants. That fragment of me is going to wait, out of sight, and you, dear Lockpick, will drive them in here tomorrow evening. Make a game of it. Employ whatever ruse or method seems best to you. Just see that they are all roaming this woodland when darkness falls. I shall make my selection then.”

“Ho! What an amusing scheme. And what will you do with the filthy scum, once caught?”

The crooked smile appeared. “I shall hide within its body, possess it as I did the man Jezza – the previous owner of this host flesh.”

“But what if your choice is the Castle Creeper? The child will be dead and its skill with it.”

“One life out of thirty-one,” the Ismus said. “That is a gamble I am prepared to take. Have I ever baulked at risk?”

“No, my Lord. And after you have taken possession, how shall I know which of them you are? You must make yourself known to me in a manner that will not arouse the suspicions of the others. Young people are so distrustful.”

“Certainly not! I don’t want you treating that host any differently to the rest. The other aberrants will know for certain if you bow and scrape every time it walks by. Your devotion would give the game away in the first five minutes. Just forget I’m there. As soon as it becomes clear who the Creeper is, I’ll step forward and take command.”

“Whatever you say, my Lord.”

“But remember, it is only a splinter of myself which I shall view and operate remotely. I can channel no power through it. It will be no stronger than the body it animates. Do not think to call on it for help if you fail here. It is merely a direct link to me, nothing more.”

“I will not fail,” came the confident reply. “And I shall not even try to guess in which of them you are concealed.”

The Ismus clapped him on the back. “Then let us return to our unwary little rabbits and their hutches!” he announced. “My Black Face Dames will be getting anxious. For such burly bruisers, they really are the most terrible worrywarts.”

He led Jangler back towards the compound. At the edge of the wood he paused and glanced over his shoulder. High in the trees a patch of foliage rustled against the breeze. The breathing darkness within was trembling with anticipation. The hungry wait had begun.