Once (32 page)

AN ACT OF EXTREME VALOUR

MAKING HIMSELF as tall as he could so that his . legs were able to take longer strides, Rigwit raced through the forest, crashing through shrubbery and scrambling over fallen trees, his little heart pounding, his arms pumping air.

He had left the Council of Elves without explanation, jumping to his feet so that the other eleven members rocked backwards in surprise. Although he had not heard his voice, Rigwit was suddenly aware that Thom was in terrible, perhaps even mortal, danger, for the subliminal cries for help were like stab wounds to the elf’s heart. Important though the council meeting was - sinister and evil doings were astir and gatherings between the faery clans were taking place throughout the woodland that night to discuss where the threat might lie and what its nature might be - Rigwit could not ignore Thom’s desperate pleas. Something dreadful was taking place at Little Bracken and it was Rigwit’s duty to defend and protect not just the property itself, but also the

dweller within. Nocturnal prowlers raised their heads in alarm as he sped by, while other night-creatures scurried off and hid in the undergrowth at his approach.

‘BebraveThombebrave!’ he called out on the run ‘Bedare-soon, soonbedare!’

He might have worn wings on his ankles, so swift was his stride, and before long he had the moonlit clearing in view, the light in Little Bracken’s kitchen shining like a beacon. From outside and that distance, there seemed to be nothing amiss, but Rigwit’s pace did not slacken, for it was his instinct for the ominous that spurred him on.

Scarcely checking his speed, the elf plunged into a burrow screened by thick foliage, moving along on all fours, scraping past the odd tree root along the way, dislodging loose earth from the tunnel’s roof and walls in his haste. Although the secret passage, whose dimensions were big and wide enough to accommodate the biggest of badgers, twisted and turned to avoid occasional obstacles such as rocks and the more substantial tree root, its general direction was true enough, although it did become more and more narrow the closer it got to the foundations of the cottage, for this section was elf-extended. This was no problem for the elf: he merely allowed himself to become smaller and smaller so that eventually he was no bigger that the average dormouse.

In less than a minute since entering the burrow, he was climbing vertically and coming up through a hole in the cottage’s bathroom floor, one that was beneath the raised bath itself.

Thom thought he might easily pass out. His left arm and leg were lead weights, hindering his progress up the spiral staircase, a burden he had to drag along. He had tried to flee up the stairs earlier, would have taken them two at a time, but the moment he turned away from the mass of spiders

filling the ground-floor landing, seeping through the cracks around and beneath the door like black oil, the clicks and rustling of their movement like a language known only to their own species, he had all but collapsed against the curved wall.

His left leg had given way and when he had tried to reach the newel post for support, he found he could only lift his arm a few inches. Like a hammer blow, pain had struck his head, almost paralysing him, and even as he fell he had time to fear the worst.

Not now, he had begged. Dear God, not now!

This was how he had felt when the stroke had cut him down the first time, although the headache had raged for at least twenty-four hours prior to the collapse at the wheel of his car. Lying against the wall, he had sobbed when he felt the light prickling sensation of tiny needle-thin legs on the flesh of his right leg, the only leg that had some feeling. Almost in spasm, he drew it up and beat at it frantically with his right hand, mashing the spiders against his skin, killing those on the outside of his jeans as well as those that had found their way inside.

‘Bastards!’ he had yelled. ‘Bastards!’

But in the moonlight he saw there were more on his other leg, some of them way beyond his knee. They were pouring over the lip of the first step, dark liquid, thousands of them - millions, it seemed - with nothing to stop them, an army whose size was interminable and whose movement was perpetual. They flowed forward, covering everything in their path, easily surmounting any obstacle.

He kicked out and although his left leg was clumsy, it still had some strength in it. He pushed himself upwards, using his hands on each step to lift his buttocks, like a toddler negotiating a stairway that was too steep. Black spots were arriving on his lap and sweatshirt, leaping spiders eager to get at him. Something landed on his face and he quickly brushed it off, afraid to even glance at the wall above him.

The blinding pain in his head eased - or at least, adrenaline overrode it - and some power was returning to the debilitated limbs on his left side. Thom half-rose and, belly up, climbed more swiftly in awkward parody of the creatures that chased him.

Now the spiders covered every inch of floor space, with hundreds more on the curving wall and the newel post opposite, a thick advancing flood of long legs and tiny bodies that bristled and teemed, clicked and rustled, and in his despair Thom felt thousands upon thousands of minute greedy eyes on him, watching his every movement, impatient to engulf him, ready to defy nature and turn man-eater.

His shoulders were almost against the top step to the landing outside his bedroom door when the heel of his foot slipped off the edge of a lower stair and he slid down towards the oncoming tide. Thom gave out a short screech, fearing he would slide all the way down, right into their midst, but somehow he managed to stop himself. Nevertheless, they swarmed over his legs, crawling over each other’s backs to get at him, and as much as he slapped them away, so more took their place.

In mere moments, they were up to his waist.

Thom’s chest was heaving with the exertion of breathing and his hands were slick with gore and pap. He tried to turn over on to his side, tried to push himself upright, but the stairs were slimy with the spiders’ juices, and he slipped again, slithering down even more stairs than before, one hand - his left hand, the weaker one - slapping against a higher step to halt his descent. He could only lie there for a second or two, trying to recover his strength and equilibrium, for his head was in a daze, the shock of his predicament making him dizzy, making him feel faint again.

Over the sound of his own fitful breathing and uncontrollable groaning, the combined quiet but feverish scratching of the spiders (nightmare muzak for the very afraid), there

came the creaking of a door being opened, and even in his excitable state he knew it couldn’t be the kitchen door, for that one and the front door were smooth on their hinges, almost noiseless when opened and closed. He couldn’t see much because of the bend in the stairs, but the sound had to be caused by someone or something opening the cupboard or bathroom door. Oh dear God, what now? What fresh horror was on its way?

He heard light footsteps, soft scrunching of brittle-shelled bodies, like boots on snow, or faint squelching, bare feet crushing grapes, the sounds mixed inside his head and amplified because of the acoustics of the circular stairway and curving wall. Someone, something, was approaching.

A small shape appeared, one that seemed to grow in height, but not because it was mounting the stairs. It was becoming taller.

Thom knew it was Rigwit even before the elf spoke to him and even though the spiders and millipedes, earwigs, centipedes, countless others, climbed his diminutive body to cloak him with their mass, so that he was just a blackened shape in the moonlight shining through the high window.

‘DonbeafraidThom.’

The elf’s voice was calm, reassuring, but the words a gabble.

‘Don’t be afraid, Thom,’ Rigwit said again, continuing to climb.

Spiders entered Rigwit’s mouth and he turned his head to spit them out, casually, as if they were no more than apple seeds.

Thom tried to move away from him, for Rigwit was bringing more of the spiders with him, a troop-carrier for the enemy.

‘Stay, Thom. Don’t try to escape them. They really can’t hurt you. At least, they can’t hurt your body.’

‘Are you crazy?’ Thom pushed himself upwards, kicking out, feeling the prickle of their legs on the skin of his

stomach, his chest, his arms, his clothing dark with them from the hips down. He slipped again, jarring his elbow. ‘Help me!’ he pleaded.

‘I will, Thom, I promise you, I will.’ The camouflaged elf was just below him. ‘But you must listen, you must hear me…’

‘Make them go!’

‘… you must obey me.’

Thom slumped, a paralysis that had naught to do with his illness taking over. He was rigid with revulsion and shock, like a rabbit frozen in a car’s headlights, a gazelle shocked into stillness by a stalking lioness. He lay there helpless.

But Rigwit had climbed high enough to lean close to Thom’s ear.

‘You have to be brave,’ the elf told him firmly without the slightest trace of excitement in his voice. Which did not exclude a grim urgency.

‘Rigwit, make them go away! Use your magic!’ Thom had turned his face to the stairs, an arm raised to protect his eyes.

The elf shook him by the shoulder. ‘Only you can do that. They were sent to you, only you. Quickly, tell me how they arrived here. Were they in a sealed container?’

Rigwit persisted in shaking his shoulder, but more vigorously now.

Thom felt things running up his spine and he shuddered violently. In desperation, he looked at the elf.

‘Oh Jesus. ..’ he gasped.

Barely an inch of the elf could be seen, for his entire body including his head and shoulders seemed to quiver with a dark scabrous bustling.

Thom buried his head in both arms, but Rigwit would not let him be. Using two hands, disturbed spiders dropping from them, he wrenched Thom round, and before he could turn away again the elf wiped his own face, clearing most of the teeming layer.

Looking a little more like himself once more, if only for a few moments, he said sternly: ‘You’re the only one that can make them leave this place. The spell was meant for you and only you can break it. Can you feel them nip you, Thom? Can you feel their bites and stings?’

Before Thom could reply - and he was about to say ‘Yes’

- Rigwit jumped in. ‘You can’t. You can’t feel a thing. Be

honest with yourself. Now, can you feel anything other than

their presence?’

Thom hesitated. He wanted to scream, wanted to tell the elf that, yes, of course he bloody well could feel them eating him, but he couldn’t. He could feel their sickening bodies and legs brushing against his flesh, but there was no pain, no sharp stabs, nothing to cause him real harm. Surprised, unsure, he looked down at himself.

Which was a mistake.

For the moon outside provided enough light for him to see that webs were being spun over half his body, the silken strands creating a fine mesh over which the spiders continued to work, some of them spitting tiny jets of gooey substance - presumably a glue of some kind - to bind him. If he allowed it to happen, it would not take long for them to encase him in a tight cocoon of silver strands. And if he froze with the trauma, then they would spin their webs over his face and head, bind his eyes, seal his mouth and nostrils; they would stop his heart with the sheer horror of it all.

Thom, Thom, you’re thinking too much,’ Rigwit insisted, a slight rise in his voice now, as if he was afraid he might be losing the battle. ‘Lookit, lookit, see that they’re nothing.’

He picked off a particularly large spider from Thom’s neck and crushed it in his tiny fist. ‘See? They can’t hurt you. Let go of the fear and fight back.’

In fact, it was maintaining the fear that galvanized Thom

- the fear of slowly being suffocated by these insidious

thriving creatures. He kicked out, his left leg not nearly as

agile as the right, but easily breaking the threads. He beat his body with hands and fists, slapping and punching, then brushing, long sweeping movements, ridding himself of the spiders and their clinging companions, sitting up on a step to make it easier for himself.

‘Good lad!’ encouraged Rigwit. ‘Ysee how they’re nothing. It’s only their features that stop you from loving ‘em.’

Even if he heard, Thom did not appreciate the humour. He was too busy shedding the rising cocoon, shaking, beating, flattening all that he could reach. He spasmed again when he felt them in his hair, then quickly swept his head with his right hand, his left too difficult to raise. Close to exhaustion, his actions became slower, more clumsy. He wanted to crawl further up the stairs, make it to the bedroom, seal the bottom of the door with bedsheets, only dimly aware that they would follow and enter anyway through other cracks and holes, relentless in their pursuit. As he turned, rising to one knee, Rigwit caught hold of him.

‘It’s no good running.’

Thom tried to pull away, but the elf’s grip was surprisingly strong.

There’s only one way to defeat them, Thom, so you have to tell me - how did they get here? Was it in a box?’

Thom glanced fretfully over his shoulder before looking at Rigwit. ‘In a jar!’ he blurted out. ‘They were in a jar!’

‘Ah! And where is the jar now, lad?’

‘I don’t… the kitchen! It’s in the kitchen.’

Then you have to go down there.’

‘Are you fucking insane?’

‘Just a bit. But you already asked me that.’ His light tone had no calming affect on Thom whatsoever. He smiled, thinking it might help, but a bug shot into his mouth. As before, Rigwit coolly spat it out and continued his conversation with Thom. We’ll go together, but it’s you that has to pick up the jar and throw it out.’

‘I can’t go down there!’ Thom heard his own hysteria and wasn’t proud. He started moving up again.

Rigwit caught him by his sweater, then hopped up two steps to get closer to Thom’s face.

“Will you please listen. They cannot harm you unless you let them. Pretty soon you will start feeling their bites and stings, but it will only be because your own mind is allowing it to happen, and that’s because it’s what you expect. You have to fight your own thoughts as well as them. Come now, Thom, come with me. I’ll be with you all the way.’