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‘What? Where?’
The page was a rather gory one about whalers – men in sailing ships who had slaughtered whales by their thousands in generations past. Dead centre on the page was a faded black-and-white photo of a tiny coastal town, featuring two ships moored at the mouth of a narrow harbour, with a huge whale carcass being winched up a kind of broad boat ramp, and a crowd of people standing around in awkward poses
‘There, see?’ said Jaide, pointing to the very right-hand edge of the photo. ‘That’s Mermaid Point.’
Jack squinted. ‘It is! But there’s no lighthouse or iron bridge. This must have been taken years ago!’
‘And there’s a clock tower, look. Isn’t that where Main Street runs now?’
‘I think you’re right.’ Jack peered even closer at the photo, straining to make out details from the ancient greys. ‘But how did they take this? I mean, it’s like an aerial photograph, but way before there were planes . . .’
He looked at Jaide. The same thought occurred to them.
‘A Warden took it,’ they said together. ‘A flying Warden!’
‘Must have been a better flier than me,’ added Jaide with a sigh.
Jack didn’t answer for a moment. He tapped a barely legible line of writing at the bottom right of the photograph.
‘Or not one at all. It says here, “The town from above. Third balloon ascent, 1872.”’
‘Oh,’ said Jaide. As so many times before, there was an ordinary explanation. Perhaps this meant that there was one for Martin McAndrew’s EVIL sign too. ‘Why’s it in the Compendium then?’
‘Look at the men around the whale. Check out their eyes.’
The figures around the whale were tiny, the photograph having been taken from at least a few hundred yards away from them, and perhaps fifty yards up. But when Jaide looked as close as she could without them turning into tiny, blurred splotches, she saw that every single one had strangely large eyes.
Eyes that were entirely white, without pupil or iris.
‘Their eyes are white,’ she said. ‘They must have worked for The Evil.’
‘No, they were The Evil. There’s no working for The Evil when it’s taken you over. You’re just part of it. Forever.’
Jack’s voice was hard and flat, and it was Jaide’s turn to shiver. All of a sudden he felt like a stranger to her, a distant, grown-up Jack very different to the four-minutes-younger brother she knew better than anyone. He often went like this when reminded of the times he had come face to face with The Evil in the stormwater drains below the town, particularly those times when she hadn’t been there to help him. She knew there were details he hadn’t told her. A large part of her never wanted to know what they were.
Jack, for his part, was remembering a cold voice echoing through dank tunnels: Come to us, Jackaran Kresimir Shield. Be with us. Be one of us . . .
‘Do you think there were any Wardens back then?’ Jaide asked.
‘Of course, or none of us would be alive today. Besides, it must have been a Warden who took this photograph. Even from a balloon.’
The Compendium suddenly shivered, then slammed shut. Before the twins could react, it slid across the floor and under Jaide’s bed, like an insect that had suddenly been exposed to the light.
Their bedroom door opened. Both twins were gaping at the empty floor, but their heads whipped round as their mother entered the room.
‘What are you two up to?’ asked Susan with a smile.
‘Uh, yoga,’ said Jaide quickly. ‘We learned it at school. Mr Carver is very keen on yoga.’
‘I used to do yoga with your dad,’ said Susan. ‘We went to a class every Tuesday night for quite a few years. Hey, we can do some together –’
‘Oh, I’m pretty tired,’ said Jaide hurriedly. Inwardly she was cursing herself. Mr Carver was indeed very keen on yoga, and led a class at lunchtimes for students and staff. Now she’d have to go to one to learn a few moves.
‘I’m tired too,’ said Jack, feigning a yawn.
‘All right. Tomorrow then.’ Susan patted them each on the head and said, ‘’Jamas and teeth.’
‘What about dessert?’ asked Jack hopefully as Jaide hurried off to the bathroom. Dinner already seemed like hours ago, and his stomach was feeling hollow.
‘Well, there’s that cobbler. You can have a bit before you go to bed, if you like.’
‘Oh, no, thanks, Mum,’ he said.
She tilted her head to one side and smiled at him. ‘It’s OK if you don’t like it. You don’t, do you?’
‘Um, no. Not really. Sorry.’
‘That’s OK, Jack. I’m not offended.’ She gathered him into a tight hug. ‘If your father was here, he’d make the best cake in the world, and then he’d say “tamas and jeeth”, which he still thinks is hilarious, and then he’d chase you up and down the stairs until you were too excited to sleep for a week. Despite all that, I miss him, and I know you miss him too. Am I right?’
Jack nodded. She let him go, but only so she could hold him at arm’s length and try to meet his eyes.
‘You’ve been very quiet since we moved here. Even quieter than usual. Don’t be afraid to talk about stuff,’ she said. ‘You can tell me anything, you know.’
Jack nodded again, knowing full well that if he told his mother even a small fraction of what he had learned, her mind would probably explode.
‘OK. Thanks, Mum.’
That seemed to satisfy her. She ushered him to the door.
‘When I come back from work,’ she called after him, ‘we’ll do something special.’
‘You’ll buy us a mobile phone each?’ asked Jaide, coming back up the hallway.
‘You know the answer to that. Not yet – and besides, they don’t work in this old house.’
‘But everyone else in school has one. Even Miralda King!’
‘Well, you’re not Miralda King. You’re Jaide Shield and you’re just going to have to wait until you’re a little bit older before having something like that. There’s no way we could afford the bill you two would rack up, texting each other.’
Jaide jumped into bed, making the heavy frame rattle. ‘We could text Dad.’
‘If he ever remembered to switch his phone on . . . which he doesn’t.’
Susan kissed Jaide on the forehead and turned off the main light. ‘You can read for a while, if you want. I’ll send your grandmother up to say goodnight.’
Grandma X poked her head in just as Jack was pulling the covers up to his neck. She was wearing her dirty apron again, only this time it had orange-yellow stains on it as well, the
same colour as curry powder.
‘Goodnight, troubletwisters,’ she said. Bewilderingly, she had the Compendium under her arm. Jaide bent down and looked under her bed, but there was nothing there. ‘Sleep well, and dream sensible dreams.’
‘Grandma,’ said Jaide before she could leave, ‘did the whalers bring The Evil to Portland, or was it here all along?’
Grandma X stopped in the doorway. ‘What makes you ask that?’
‘We saw an old photo in the Compendium.’
She nodded, but her face was shadowed so they couldn’t see her expression. ‘Well, you know that Portland is one of those places where the boundary between our world and The Evil’s is particularly thin, so –’
‘Yes, but was it humans who made it thin, or was it always like that?’
‘That is a very good question, Jaide. One we will discuss at length when the time is right.’
Then she was gone, boots tramping smartly up the stairs and through the doorway that led to the Blue Room, where the Compendium was stored for safe keeping.
‘She always says that,’ muttered Jaide. ‘It’s not very helpful.’
‘Neither was the Compendium.’
‘It’s just a book. She’s a person, and she’s supposed to be teaching us.’
‘She is teaching us,’ said Jack reasonably. ‘Only not always what we want to learn.’
Jaide grunted and rolled over on to her side, clearly not wanting to talk about it any more. In moments, she was breathing slowly and evenly.
Jack wasn’t feeling anywhere close to sleepy. His mind was snagged on the day he had first learned to shadow-walk, when The Evil had almost caught him.
Your inner nature wishes to join us, it had said, and if you do, you will become something far more powerful than any mere Warden . . .
Picking up the dusty old book from his bedside table – Jeopardy at Jute Junction, which had his father’s name written on the inside sleeve – he opened it and read perfectly well despite the near absence of light.
The book was exciting and drew him in. Almost enough to drive the memories of that horrible whispering voice from of his mind.
