Shadow Breakers (12 page)

Mum looks very serious, peering over her half-frame glasses at Cal, and for a moment I feel a strange chill.

“I knew the history of this place,” she says quietly. “We all know the stories of the old beliefs. You can't come and do my work in somewhere so full of ancient legends and curses and not be aware of it all.” She snaps the folder shut. “It just makes my work all the more interesting.”

“Really?” says Cal casually. She catches my eye, and I blush.

“I'd love to carry on the debate, Callista,” Mum says with a smile, “but I really do have lots of work to get through.” With a swish of skirt and a jangle of bangles, she's gone.

Once she's out in the hall, I lean across the table, curious to find out what Cal was up to. “You've got to be careful!” I snap. “I can't have her finding out!”

“About our shadow chasing?” Cal asks, lifting her teacup. “Or about you seeing things?”

I fold my arms and scowl. “Both.”

Cal is like a sleek, powerful wildcat — one you want on your side, not cornering you in a forest clearing with its fangs bared and its claws unsheathed. She has a dangerous edge.

She grins. “Don't worry. We've all got secrets to keep.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Take Josh, for example. There's a story there. About him having to leave St. Xavier's and come to our school. His dad's working abroad. In financial trouble, someone told me. Lost his money in one of those banking crises.” Cal leans back, shaking her head. “But I think there's more to it. And his mum . . . well, she's just a bit odd.”

“And what about you?” I ask. I remember what Josh told me on the beach, about her mum and stepdad not having time for her.

“Me?” Cal gives me an innocent smile. “I'm fine.”

“You were the first person to talk to me at the bus stop. I don't reckon that was a coincidence. Whatever there is in me . . . you sensed it, didn't you?”

Cal leans back, looking for a moment as if she is not going to answer. “Perhaps,” she says. “Perhaps not. I'm usually good with objects, rather than people. I can often . . . read them. Where they've been, who they've been with, and so on. History.” She shrugs. “It just comes naturally.”

The computer, and the bus. She mentioned the psychic imprint of an owner on an object, I remember.

“My mum and stepdad have never known,” she goes on. “They wouldn't really be interested, anyway. Running the pub means they work seven days a week. I think they're just glad I've got hobbies to keep me busy.”

“Is that what all this is? A hobby?”

“Before Miss Bellini found me, I felt like a freak,” she says. “This doesn't help, does it? Kids say nasty things. If you're fat, or pimply, or wear glasses or braces . . . Anyway, I . . . had a bit of trouble. I went a bit . . . weird. Dad left home. I spent some time with some doctors.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

I know the kind of doctors she must mean. Not the sort who mend broken arms and dish out rash cream, but the ones who look after your head. Who take care of your mind.

“Nah, it's all fine now. I've got a purpose in life. Just like the others, you see.”

“And then there's me.”

“Yeah,” she says softly. “It's like we've been waiting for you. All this time.”

There's something a bit odd about the way she says that to me, almost menacing. It puts me on my guard. I wouldn't confide in her, the way I would in Josh.

“Anyway.” She quickly finishes her tea. “Thank your mother for me. Don't forget the team meeting tomorrow morning. And don't be late. Miss B's got something good to show us.”

“I'm supposed to be —”

Cal interrupts me, her voice hard. “You're supposed to be with us. Make something up.”

There's a moment's tense silence as we look at each other across the table.

“See you tomorrow, then,” I mutter.

Cal hoists her bag on her shoulder. “I'll see myself out,” she says, and turns away from me with a casual toss of her head.

In the living room, I slump on the sofa, flicking through TV channels, seeing the images but taking nothing in.

It's odd. I get the feeling that conversation with Cal was always on the verge of being about something else.

Something far more important.

Something she wanted to say, but couldn't.

Even after I was off school for the afternoon, they assume I'm going to be straight back in the swing of things. Before the meeting with Miss Bellini, I get a text telling me to meet Josh by the war memorial on the Millennium Estate.

Groaning, I haul myself out of bed, splashing my face. I just about feel human. In the bathroom mirror, I look pale, but not terrible. Downstairs, I grab my jacket, shout to Mum that I'm going out to meet friends, and don't even hear what she says as I hurry down the steps and head for the Millennium Estate at a brisk pace. I check my watch, guessing it will take about ten minutes. I'm right.

He barely looks at me as I arrive, but strides off down the middle of the street. “It's on the run,” he says. “That thing. It knows we're onto it, and yet it never strays far. I wonder
why
?”

My heartbeat quickens at the way he says it. So, we're hunting it now. Tracking it down. This is a change of approach.

I feel like a cowboy in a Western, walking into town for a showdown. Josh's long, dark coat flutters in the breeze. He's got something different with him this time — a piece of Miss Bellini's gear. It's like a flashlight, but with a wider end shaped like a big bagel, and with a small digital screen built into it.

We're not far from Craghollow Park and the school. Just a few streets away, in fact, from the Copper Beeches Children's Home where Jade lives. The houses all look the same — smart little semis with neat gardens and short drives. I'm reminded of a song Dad used to play to me on the CD player: “Little boxes, on the hillside . . .”

Panting, we stop, and I rest my hands on my knees and look up at Josh.

“This is the point where you say something daft like, ‘I think we should split up,' right?”

He grins. “You and I watch the same films. Listen, if you want to hunt, even chasing shadows, you have to hunt
efficiently
. Same reason we never get the police involved. Dogs, guns, radios . . . all those things cause more problems than they solve.”

I take a few deep breaths. “So what is that?” I ask, nodding at the device.

“It's an ultrasonic motion resonator,” he says.

“You just made that up.”

“Well, I didn't want to call it a magic spook-detector.”

“So what is it?”

Josh grins at me. “A magic spook-detector,” he says.

“You're kidding me. Again.”

“No, no. I swear on my mother's grave.”

“Your mother's not dead,” I point out. “As far as I know.”

“She's got a grave, though.” Josh winces and shakes his head. “Well, a headstone. She's had it made and left the year of death blank. Trust me, it's a long story. I'll tell you one day.”

I stare at him. It's hard to know sometimes when he is being serious.

“This,” he says, tapping the ultra-whatsit rezza-thingy, “records all unusual signals in the paranormal range. Including pyroelectric energy, like we detected at the Abbey.”

It's a bright and sunny day, and everything seems picked out in unnatural, cartoon colors. We can hear birds singing. There's pink and white blossoms in the trees, some of it carpeting the ground like confetti. At the end of the road, there's an old man washing his car with a soapy sponge. I can hear someone bouncing a soccer ball against a garage door. It's suburban peace.

“Too quiet,” Josh says.

“Then why is
that
thing flashing?” I ask.

“Huh?” Josh holds up the resonator and turns slightly, trying to see where the signal gets weaker and stronger.

I blink.

And then I have one of those moments.

Just like when I was going to be hit by the truck. When I knew it was coming even though I hadn't seen it or heard it. And just like when I was in the Pod with Miss Bellini, and I was able to say just by thinking, just by imagining, which of the hemispheres the white ball was under. And like in the Abbey. At the edge of my perception. A sense that hasn't been invented or given a name yet.

It's a flash of
darkness
, like a smudge on reality, but also a coldness and a screech inside my head. My eyes aren't open or closed, but I feel as if I am awake-dreaming, there in the middle of the road. I'm breathless and hot.

I am standing on the edge of a field, and behind me is a blazing forest, a huge dark finger of black smoke pointing up into the sky. A girl with dark hair is running in slow motion across a scarred, burned field. Running, running. I can hear horses, but cannot see them. There is soot and smoke around her, but she doesn't appear to be burned herself.

I gasp, and my eyes are back in Firecroft Bay.

I blink. For a second, I still feel unbearably hot, and my eyes are stinging as if from bonfire smoke.

Then I'm staring down the road toward the park.

There are pockets of shadow gathering around the play equipment. Dark, deep shadows like you expect to get at midday in the middle of summer.

“Josh,” I say cautiously.

He's still turning in a 360-degree circle, surveying the estate. “Again . . . not straying far . . .”

“Jossssh!”
I hiss.

He's angling the resonator toward Craghollow Park. The trace is fluctuating, but there is a wavering blue light when he points it in a direct line down the middle of the road, through the gate and toward —

The swings.

Beside me, Josh is still blathering on. “I was checking archive records earlier. This whole area has strong links to the past. First of all, I looked up the Abbey.”

“Uh-huh. Big gray stone place. You can't miss it.” My eyes are still fixed on the shadows by the swings.

“Very funny. You know that land was a burial ground for victims of the Black Death? Before they built the Abbey over the site, the bishop came to sprinkle the whole place with holy water first. And then here — the Crag Hollows, it was called — was a place where they used to burn witches in the time of the Plague. The area was untouched for centuries, until the park and the estate were built on top of it in the nineteen fifties.”

I glance at the resonator readout, then stare hard into the shadows of the park.

There is someone standing beside the swings.

No, there isn't —

I narrow my eyes. Yes, there is.

A long, dark shadow, not defined properly, as if not quite
tuned in
.

“Joshua!”

Finally, he stops prattling on and whirls around. I hear him catch his breath.

“Aha. All right.” He edges toward the park fence. “You chase it across. I'll head it off round the far side.” He chucks me the resonator and, surprised, I catch it.

“Okay.” I look down at it. “What the heck do I do with this?”

“Just follow the display. It's easy. And — Miranda?”

“Yes?”

“Don't take any unnecessary risks. That thing is
dangerous
.”

So this is it. We're hunting our enemy, tracking it down to its lair.

Breaking through shadows.

I'm keeping my eyes fixed on the space behind the swing, fixed on that long, dark Shape, and I've launched myself over the gate into Craghollow Park.

It's here, in the real world. In my room, in the Abbey, now here in the park. I haven't told Josh it's the same figure that haunts my dreams.

I'm aware of Josh, circling the edge of the park in the distance.

I step across the springy surface of the play area, duck under the jungle gym, and hover inside it, as if the domed steel cage is somehow going to give me protection. I have never felt more exposed in my life.

“Who are you?” I ask, my voice trembling. “What do you want?”

Cautiously I hold up the resonator. It's flashing, going wild. Scrambled numbers.

Then the digital readout goes blank.

I frown, stare at it. Something appears on the display.

Not numbers. Letters.

—
ashes
—

—
ashes
—

I'm recognizing what this is.

I duck out under the other side of the jungle gym.

Now, there is only open ground between me and the swings, and the shadows beyond them. I feel prickling on my forehead and under my arms. I can hear and feel my heart thudding through my body, and my mouth is sandpaper-dry.

—
we
—

—
all
—

I'm shaking so hard I can hardly hold the resonator. I'm trying to hold out for as long as I can. Get some readings. So that back at the Seaview we can plug this into the computer, and analyze it.

—
fall
—

For a second, a cloud passes across the sun, and the shadows around the playground change position.

I blink.

—
down
—

I feel something brush past my face. Searingly cold. Like a block of ice pressed to my flesh. I yelp and drop the resonator. I flip over on the muddy ground. I'm rolling over and over as if I'm falling down a hill, but the ground is flat.

The sky spins, fringed by trees — then I feel my hand being yanked and I am hauled to my feet to find Josh looking at me, concerned.

My breath is cold and ragged. My hair falls in front of my eyes and I shake my head. “Sorry,” I say.

I rest my hands on my knees, and I scan the whole park.

There's a man walking his dog against the far fence, and two mums with toddlers wheeling strollers up to the play equipment. They're looking at me and Josh warily. Big kids, they're probably thinking. Look a bit weird and rough. Steer clear of them. I try to smile, but they look away.

Josh scoops up the resonator from where it has fallen beside the slide, slips it into his pocket, and smiles briefly at the two mums. “It's okay,” he says to them, with his usual easy charm. “All yours.”

“It just went,” I say, hurrying after him as he strides off. “I didn't see where. And Josh . . .”

He stops, turns around. “What?”

“The rhyme — it was on the resonator.”

He nods grimly. “It's trying to tell us something. Come on. Let's make ourselves scarce.”

Slam!

Miss Bellini drops the heavy, leather-bound book open on the table, and we all stare down at it.

We're gathered around the wooden table in the Pod. My head still aches. I'm dosed up with the strongest over-the-counter medicine, but it doesn't seem to be doing any good.

Although my head is swimming, I try to focus on the book. The pages are mustard yellow, crinkly like autumn leaves, and thin as tracing paper. I remember Ollie saying Miss Bellini was going to get a book out of the British Library, but that seems ages ago.

Miss Bellini spreads her hands, smiles.

“I just wondered,” she says, “if any of you, while glued to the Internet and your mobile phones, ever considered that the answers might lie somewhere more obvious?”

“So what is this?” asks Josh languidly, pointing at the book.

Miss Bellini peers over her silver glasses, sighs. “It's a
book
. A collection of sheets of paper or parchment, printed with ink, bound together in a durable material such as leather or cloth. They were very popular from the Middle Ages until, ooh, at least about five years ago. Commonly found in
libraries
. Remember those?”

“Ooh, miss, miss!” says Josh, raising his hand mockingly. “I know, miss. The things the government wants to close in case we start reading books and asking useful questions.”

Miss Bellini smiles indulgently.

“Sarcasm's the lowest form of wit, Joshua,” Cal points out.

“But the most fun,” offers Josh with a grin.

“Hmm. Maybe,” purrs Cal.

I glower at her, still smarting a little from our uncomfortable conversation yesterday afternoon. It kept me awake. Does Cal know more about me than she is letting on? I wonder what it was she wanted to say to me but couldn't.

Miss Bellini sighs. “To answer your question more fully, Josh, this is one of the existing copies of what's known as the Constantinople Rubric.”

“Try saying
that
with a mouthful of bubble gum,” says Ollie. I smile weakly at his joke. “Sorry,” he mutters. “Didn't know I said that out loud.”

Lyssa giggles, but Miss Bellini frowns sternly.

“A very old book,” Miss Bellini goes on, “and a very
rare
book. I've had to have a special pass issued to remove it for seventy-two hours from the British Library's Dangerous Book Archives.”

“That . . . doesn't really exist,” I say.

“Oh, and you
know
that, do you, Miranda? Of course it exists. It's in a fortified titanium vault underneath St. Pancras station. Your Shadow-card grants you access, but for on-site research only. With protective gear on. Remember that. You may need it one day.”

“I've been there,” says Ollie. “It's cool. They've got the missing five Shakespeare plays, the unexpurgated King James Bible, and the scripts for the unmade
Star Wars
movies.”