Читать книгу The 1,000-year-old Boy - Ross Welford, Ross Welford - Страница 16

As I got to my hands and knees, Roxy grabbed my collar, and pulled me back down really hard, and, for someone so small, she had plenty of strength.

‘Stop it!’ I whispered, and struggled from her grasp and, as I did so, I pushed her. She rolled down the bank, scrabbling for my hand or for grass, or for anything to stop her tumbling into the yard, which was where she was headed.

For a split second, her eyes locked on mine, pure terror etched onto her face, and then she was over the edge of the slope and out of sight.

There was a loud thump as she hit the ground, but no shout, no scream. I had drawn breath to shout her name, and to check she was OK, but the shout stilled in my throat as I saw the back door of the cottage burst open and the witch come running out.

‘Ay, ay, ay!’ she cried. And then something else, something I couldn’t make out, because it was in a language I’d never heard before.

It wasn’t French. I know what French sounds like (third from top in my class, en fait). And it wasn’t Italian, because I’ve heard Spatch talking with his dad at home.

It was like nothing I had ever heard before: a throaty, musical language. The witch – or ‘witch’, I suppose – hurried to where Roxy had fallen right below me. Then, in her language, she called out again, as if shouting for someone.

That’s when I saw him.

He stood in the doorway: a pale, skinny blond boy. A pair of sunglasses hung on a loop round his neck and he put them on before scuttling out into the sunshine of the yard to where Roxy lay.

Was she dead? I was terrified, but I didn’t think it was likely, even though it was quite a long drop. Then I heard her moan. Thank God for that.

Should I stand up? Reveal myself? I was caught in a terrified dither of simply not knowing what to do when the boy picked up Roxy and carried her little body easily into the house, a dripping trail of blood coming from her head.

Both halves of the door clattered shut and I realised I hadn’t breathed since Roxy had fallen.