Syren (31 page)

“She’s gone,” whispered Jenna, shaking her head in disbelief. Septimus watched her turn the pages, searching for Syrah’s neat, friendly writing. But there was no more. Nothing but cold, precise copperplate detailing complex signs and symbols that none of them could begin to understand. Jenna closed the book and silently handed it to Septimus.

“I feel like we have watched someone being murdered,” she whispered.

“We have,” agreed Septimus. “Well, we have watched someone become Possessed, which is much the same thing.
Now
do you believe me?”

Jenna and Beetle nodded.

“Beetle,” said Septimus, “I’ll take the first Watch and you can do the second. I’ll wake you in two hours. Jen, you need to get some sleep. Okay?”

Jenna and Beetle nodded once again. Neither said another word.

Septimus chose a place a few yards from the hideout, in the dip between two dunes, which gave him a good view of the beach but provided him with cover. Despite the unknowns of the night, he felt alive and excited. Now he had the support of his friends, and whatever was going to happen they were in it
together. Septimus hated to think how Syrah must have felt, alone with just her little blue book for company.

Septimus sat stone-still, breathing in the cool air, hearing the distant sound of the waves as the tide retreated. Slowly he moved his head from side to side, watching the tops of the grasses for signs of movement, scanning the empty beach before him, Listening. All was quiet.

Hours passed. The air grew cold, but Septimus stayed still and watchful, almost part of the sand dune himself. The unearthly glow from the Sphere of Light lit the sky to his left, and as the moon began to rise and as the tide drew ever farther out, Septimus watched the glistening white shape of a sandbar appear. The sounds of the waves quieted as the water receded, and in the silent space Septimus heard something: the distant cry of a gull—and the deliberate step of bare feet on wet sand.

S
ilently, like a snake through
the grass, Septimus wriggled down the sandy dip between the dunes, pulling himself forward with his elbows. In the dim light of the rising moon his hair was the color of sand and his cloak the dull green of the grass above—but his movement had not gone unnoticed.

In the sandy darkness of the hideout, Beetle was suddenly awake, listening hard—something was wrong.
Beetle edged out from under his HeatCloak, got to his feet and automatically ran his hand through his hair. He immediately wished he hadn’t—his hand was now covered in a sticky mixture of hair oil and sand. Stooping awkwardly, for the hideout was not quite high enough for him to stand up, Beetle looked out through the narrow slit of the entrance. To his concern he saw Septimus slowly edging down the slope toward the beach. Beetle squeezed out of the hideout, dislodging some sand, which just missed Jenna’s head.

Inside, Jenna slept on, dreaming of Nicko on his ship.

More like a turtle than a snake, Beetle set off down the slope toward Septimus, who had now stopped at the foot of the dip and was peering onto the beach. Beetle joined him in a shower of sand. Septimus turned and put a finger to his lips.

“Shh…”

“What’s up?” Beetle whispered.

Septimus pointed to the left, along the beach. Silhouetted in the glow from the Light, Beetle saw two figures walking, boots in hand, along the line of the outgoing tide. They looked, Septimus thought somewhat enviously, as though they did not have a care in the world. As the figures drew nearer,
it became clear that one was a boy and one was a girl. And as they drew nearer still, Septimus had the oddest feeling that
he knew who they were
.

“It can’t be,” he muttered under his breath.

“What can’t be?” whispered Beetle.

“It
looks
like 409 and Lucy Gringe.”

“409?”

“You
know
. Wolf Boy.”

Beetle didn’t actually know Wolf Boy, but he did know Lucy Gringe—and he figured Septimus was right.

“But…how could they possibly have gotten
here
?” Beetle whispered.

“They
haven’t
,” whispered Septimus. “It’s a Projection. The Syren is trying to lure me out.”

Beetle was skeptical. “Hey, wait a minute—how does this Syren thing know about Lucy and Wolf Boy?”

“I was so
stupid
,” Septimus said. “I thought about them when I was doing my MindScreen.”

Beetle and Septimus watched the Lucy and Wolf Boy figures draw nearer. They stopped by the edge of the water and stood looking out to sea.

“They’re very realistic,” said Beetle doubtfully. “I thought
people were hard to Project?”

“Not for the Syren,” said Septimus with a shudder, remembering the Beetle Projection begging him to wait. “Beetle,
get down
.”

Septimus pushed Beetle down. The two figures had turned and begun to walk up the beach, heading toward the very place from where Beetle and Septimus were now rapidly retreating.

“Get back in the hideout,” Septimus hissed.

A few seconds later, Jenna was covered in an avalanche of sand.

“Wha…”
spluttered Jenna, suddenly awake.

“Shh…”
hissed Septimus. He pointed outside. Scared, Jenna got to her feet and looked out.

Although the hideout’s entrance was only large enough for one person to get through at a time, it was just about possible for three people to look out. And soon there were three pairs of eyes—one violet, one brown, and one brilliant green—watching the figures of Wolf Boy and Lucy Gringe climb wearily up the sandy slope between the dunes and head straight for the invisible—Septimus hoped—hideout.

The figures sat down in the sand no more than a couple of feet away from the entrance. A gasp of amazement escaped Jenna.

“Shh…”
Septimus hissed, though he told himself that it didn’t matter—Projections couldn’t hear.

“What are
they
doing here?” mouthed Jenna.

“They’re a Projection,” Septimus mouthed back.

“A
what
?”

“A Projection.”

But they’re
real, mouthed Jenna.

It was true, thought Septimus, that they did look very real. In fact, they looked so lifelike that he felt that if he reached out, the real 409 would actually be there, matted hair, sandy cloak and all. Septimus very nearly did reach out. He stopped just in time by telling himself that this was another of the Syren’s tricks—as soon as he showed himself, the Syren would be there, waiting for him. She had sent out her Projections like terriers down a rabbit hole to flush out her quarry, and there was no way he was going to venture out of the rabbit hole until they had gone.

Suddenly one of the Projections spoke.

“Did you hear something just now?” it said, fiddling with its braids.

“They’re
talking
,” whispered Beetle. “Projections don’t do that.”

“The Syren’s do,” whispered Septimus. “I
told
you.”

Outside the hideout the Projection-with-braids was getting twitchy. “That noise. There it was
again
.”

“It’s okay,” said the Projection-with-matted-hair. “Probably sand snakes or something.”

Beetle gulped.
Sand snakes
—he hadn’t thought of that.

The Projection-with-braids leaped to its feet. “Snakes?” it screamed. “Snakes—
aargh
!” It began leaping around, frantically shaking its tunic. Showers of sand cascaded into the hideout.

“Sep, that is Lucy Gringe—for
sure
,” Beetle hissed, rubbing the sand out of his eyes.

“No, it’s
not
.” Septimus was adamant.

“Ugh!” yelled the Projection-with-braids. “I hate snakes. I hate them!”

“Don’t be silly, Sep. Of course it is,” said Jenna. “No one else screams like
that
.”

The Projection-with-matted-hair now also leaped up. “
Shh,
Lucy.
Shh!
Someone might hear us.”

“Someone
has
heard you.” Jenna’s disembodied voice came from the hideout.

The Projections grabbed hold of each other. “What did you say?” the Projection-with-braids asked the Projection-with-matted-hair.

“Me?”
The Projection-with-matted-hair sounded offended. “I didn’t say anything. That was a
girl
. In fact, it sounded like…well, it sounded to me a lot like Jenna Heap.”

“Princess Jenna? Don’t be
stupid
,” snapped the Projection-with-braids. “It can’t be.”

“Yes, it can,” said Jenna, emerging—apparently—from the inside of a sand dune.

The Projection-with-braids uttered a pathetic squeak.

Jenna shook the sand from the folds of her tunic. “Hello, Wolf Boy, Lucy. Fancy seeing you here,” she said as calmly as though she and Lucy had just met at a party.

Lucy Gringe opened her mouth. “Lucy, please don’t scream again,” said Jenna. Lucy Gringe closed her mouth and sat down, for once lost for words.

For Septimus’s benefit, Jenna said, “You
are
real, aren’t you?”

“Of
course
I am,” Lucy replied indignantly. “In fact, I could ask
you
the same thing.”

“Yes, I’m real too,” said Jenna. She looked at Wolf Boy. “And so are you, I suppose.” She grinned.

Wolf Boy did not look too sure. “This is so weird….” he muttered. He nodded his head toward what he now recognized as a standard Young Army hideout. “412 in there as well?” he asked.

“Of course,” said Jenna. “And Beetle—Beetle’s in there too.”

“Yeah, well…there’re a lot of them in the sand. They bite.”

“No, it’s
Beetle
. Oh, Sep, do come out now.”

Septimus emerged looking embarrassed and somewhat annoyed. “What’re
you
doing here, 409?” he asked.

“Could ask
you
the same thing,” Wolf Boy replied, watching a sand-caked Beetle emerge from the hideout. “How many you got down there, 412—a whole army?”

Beetle, Septimus and Wolf Boy sized one another up warily, as if each had encroached on the other’s territory.

Jenna took charge. “Come on. Let’s go down to the beach and light a fire. We can roast some Banana Bears.”

Lucy looked amazed. “You’ve got
Banana Bears
in the middle of nowhere?” she asked.

“Yep,” said Jenna. “Would you like some?”

“Anything that doesn’t taste of fish is fine by me,” said Lucy.

Septimus began to object, but Jenna stopped him. “Look, Sep, this Young Army stuff has gone on for
long enough
. There’s five of us now. We’ll be fine.”

Septimus did not know what to say. He felt mortified after all the fuss he had made about the Projections.

“There’s some driftwood on the beach,” said Beetle. “Coming, Sep? And, um, 419?”

“Four-
oh
-nine,” Wolf Boy corrected him with a smile. “But you can call me Wolf Boy—everyone else does.”

“And you can call me Beetle,” said Beetle. He grinned. “And I don’t bite.”

Half an hour later they were gathered around a spluttering fire on the sand, roasting Banana Bears, unaware that not far away, Jakey Fry was watching them longingly.

Jakey was perched on top of the highest point of Star Island—the star-shaped island just off the tip of the main island. He was cold and hungry and, he realized as he watched the group gathered around the fire, lonely too. He chewed the
head of a small dried fish that he had found in his pocket and shivered; it was getting cold, but he did not dare go back to the
Marauder
for a blanket.

Dutifully Jakey scanned the horizon. He had been sent to watch the sea, not the land, but every now and then he could not resist a glance at the group on the beach. They looked tantalizingly close, and Jakey saw that the retreating tide was leaving behind a sandbar, which connected Star Island to their beach. A desire to run across the sandbar and join the group almost overwhelmed Jakey, but he did not budge. It wasn’t the thought of his father and the murderous Crowe twins a stone’s throw away on the
Marauder
that scared him—it was the old ghost that had been waiting for them on the wall of the old Star Island harbor when they had arrived. There was something about the ghost in his ancient dark blue robes and his staring, goatlike eyes that had terrified Jakey. It hadn’t escaped his notice that even his father seemed scared of the ghost—and Jakey had never seen his father scared of anything. As soon as night had fallen, the ghost that had told Jakey to “Be off and watch for the ship, boy. I don’t want to see your peaky face again until that ship is
wrecked
. And when it is, I want you right back
here the
very moment
it hits those rocks—got that?” Jakey had indeed got that.

Oblivious to their envious spectator, the group on the beach settled down by the fire, and Wolf Boy and Lucy began to tell their story. Jenna and Beetle listened, enthralled, but Septimus could not shake off the feeling of threat. He sat a little way apart from the group. To preserve his night vision he did not look at the fire or the Light shining from the top of the Pinnacle.

“Relax, Sep,” said Jenna, catching sight of another one of Septimus’s anxious glances. “It’s fine. This is such
fun
.”

Septimus said nothing. He wished he felt it was fun, but he didn’t. All he could think about was Syrah lying facedown at the foot of the steps. What fun had
she
had?

Lucy and Wolf Boy’s story unfolded, but Septimus only half-listened. Still thinking about Syrah, he chewed a couple of Banana Bears and drank Jenna’s offered hot chocolate, but the memories of the afternoon had settled over him like a damp blanket, and he watched the group around the fire as if, like Jakey, he was on another island. The fire began to die down and the air grew colder. Septimus huddled inside his cloak and, trying to ignore Lucy Gringe’s
cat noises, stared out to sea.

Septimus could not believe it. No sooner had Beetle and Jenna—at last—understood that something really bad was happening on the island, then Lucy and Wolf Boy had appeared and turned the whole thing into a beach party. The more he thought about it, the angrier he felt. Instead of laughing at Lucy’s stupid cat impressions, they should be discussing why the crew of the
Marauder
had taken the Light and put it on the Pinnacle; they should be trying to work out what Syrah had meant by a threat to the Castle; wondering what the
Marauder
’s crew were doing right now. Septimus was sure that all these things were connected, but it was difficult to figure it out on his own. He needed to talk about it, to find out what Lucy and Wolf Boy knew. But every time he had tried to steer the conversation, he had gotten nowhere. They were, thought Septimus, fooling around as though they were on a day trip to the Portside dunes.

While Lucy regaled the others with a description of chocolate fish heads, Septimus continued to look out into the darkness. It was then, to the background of a chorus of “eeeeeew,” that he saw on the horizon the shape of a ship in full sail.