The Power of the Wildening, page 8
‘So there’s no further to go,’ Santoro said.
‘Exactly. Your father stayed with us for some weeks, learnt our ways, finished off his map, but then he said he wanted to go home. Back where he belonged. Back up to your mountain.’
Pibbles beamed proudly at both Dev and Santoro. ‘And yet here you both are, his sons, his strong, brave sons, having made your way through the Wildening!’ He poked Santoro’s armour. ‘Oh, he would be so pleased with who you have become. Thank you, thank you, for allowing me to see what he left to this world.’
He closed the flember book and handed it back to Dev.
‘That’s really nice and all,’ Dev sighed, tucking the book into his backpack. ‘But Santoro’s right. Pajoba doesn’t want us here. Maybe we should just go home.’
‘Nonsense!’ Pibbles pulled up the hood of his cloak. A huge bustling crown of grass, ferns and flowers rode up and wobbled on top of his head. ‘They might be the elders, but I’m the Chief of Pajoba. And I say you’re going to help us find Pockle.’
19
Someone Special
‘They’re Bartle’s lads!’ Pibbles crashed open the huge temple doors and stormed inside. ‘You all must remember Bartle? The outsider! He understood flember as much as any of us, so if they’re anything to do with him then I say they can help!’
Dev and Santoro crept in behind. Boja squeezed in too, clonking his head on the doorway before bumping into Dev, who was stood, completely still, staring up at their surroundings.
Gazing in awe at the inside of Pajoba’s temple.
The temple was a tall, cavernous space, the walls leaning in as they rose to an astonishing height. It looked like there had been other levels once, even staircases between them, but they had mostly crumbled away, leaving only a few struts poking out from the stonework. Long tapestries hung between them, stopping just short of the doorways, which in turn had been half-buried by fallen columns. It felt cold in here. Dev could see his breath curling out in front of him. In the very centre of the temple, however, was a hazy, glowing light, around which the elders and the council were huddled. Bagby and Pena sat amongst them, smearing the tears from their cheeks.
Stinkbag clearly wasn’t concerned about that. He skidded between Pibbles’ legs, raced across the cobbled stone floor, leapt up at Bagby, and toppled him over in a flurry of excited oinks. Bagby shouted out a few noises in despair.
Elder Pinobei leant out from the huddle. ‘I don’t care who they are, Pibbles, they’re outsiders! Outsiders bring trouble with them.’
‘Mum, please!’ Pena tugged on her robes. ‘They helped us!’
Pibbles strode purposefully towards the elders. ‘I may spend my days working on the breakfast menus, because I love it, and I really do love it, but my duty is the safety of this citadel, and everyone inside it. THAT one,’ he swung a pointed finger towards a rather nervous Dev. ‘He has Nakobe’s totem. He has a book full of Bartle’s work. His brother’s wearing some kind of glowing armour. His BEAR is …’
Boja rubbed his forehead, grumbled, and then farted.
‘Well, I don’t know what his bear is. But my point remains. They already know more about flember than you might like to admit. So they can help us find Pockle!’
Elder Pinobei muttered curses under her breath, but Elder Knuttle leant in towards her. ‘If what Bagby and Pena say is true, Elder Nakobe did entrust the boy with her totem.’ He shrugged. ‘She must have seen something special in him.’
‘Well, what, exactly,’ Elder Pinobei snapped, ‘would you have him do?’
‘Dev’s going to perform a Flemble Ceremony!’ Pibbles said with a cheer, hustling the council members on to their feet. As they stepped back, Dev saw they had been gathered around a large circular grate in the stone floor. It was scattered with dried flowers. A gently glowing smoke trailed out. One council member had been sitting beside it, breathing deeply, their glazed eyes staring off into space. Another member now led them carefully away.
‘As you can see, we were performing the ceremony before you came in,’ Elder Pinobei’s voice began to rise in annoyance. ‘We followed the Flember Stream as far as we could. There’s no sign of Pockle. Nothing!’
A very cold feeling prickled across Dev’s skin. ‘Wait, what is a Flemble Ceremony?’
‘It is how we connect to the Flember Stream.’ Pibbles beckoned Dev to sit down, not beside the grate, but on top of it.
The smoke wafted up and around him.
It felt warm.
It felt healing.
‘And sometimes, when we do connect,’ Pibbles continued, ‘we can see further than we might ever have thought possible. We can see what else is happening across the island.’
‘Just like the Oracle,’ Dev gasped.
Elders Pinobei and Knuttle glanced at each other.
‘He knows the Oracle,’ Elder Knuttle whispered.
‘He knows a lot!’ Pibbles said. ‘I told you!’
‘Dev can summon too!’ Pena added proudly. ‘We saw it in the meadow! He got it first time! Then again, with the silverfish, they led us right here!’
Pibbles clapped his hands together in delight. ‘There you go, there you GO! The more I learn about this lad, the more I know he’s our best chance of finding Pockle.’
Dev clutched Nakobe’s totem tightly. He could feel the rest of the council watching him, and it was making him nervous.
‘What … what do I do?’ he asked.
‘Well, you already know from your map that our temples lie along the Flember Stream.’ Pibbles fussed around adding some more dried flowers around Dev’s legs. ‘Our temple isn’t quite close enough to reach it, but we can still reap its rewards. We get the smoke, the vapour. Like sitting by a fire and basking in its heat. We experience the Flember Stream not by its flember, but by the trace it leaves behind.’
Dev peered between the holes in the grate. The faintest of glows shimmered up through the darkness, a glow he could only just see if he really, really squinted.
‘That’s the Flember Stream?’ he asked.
‘Yes it is,’ Pibbles replied. ‘Now close your eyes, clear your mind, and let it lead you towards Pockle.’
20
The Flemble Ceremony
Dev shot one last glance to a rather bemused Santoro and Boja, then did as he was told. He closed his eyes. His body started to relax. His hearing sharpened. He could hear the tentative shuffling of the council behind him. An annoyed huff of air through Elder Pinobei’s flaring nostrils. An occasional slight cough echoing around the temple.
And then the sounds faded away. His head started to feel a bit woozy. His thoughts became confused. Foggy. His body, too, felt a lot lighter, almost as if he might be floating above the ground.
His pulse slowed.
His own breathing echoed loudly inside his ears.
Everything became calm.
Everything became peaceful.
Then there came a new sound. It was very quiet, as if it were far, far in the distance. A bird, chirping. A few birds chirping. But he wasn’t just hearing the birds. It was almost as if he could feel the noises they were making. As if he just knew, somewhere, that these birds were chirping.
It felt a little unsettling.
Then he felt another sound. Rumbling. Hooves! It sounded like … like wilderbuffalo cantering across a plain. Water. Trickling water. Somewhere further south. Then laughter. It came from the east. Somehow, somewhere, he could feel someone was laughing at their own joke. Someone he didn’t know. Somewhere he’d never been. But prickling through every inch of his body, of his flember, he could just feel it.
And then it occurred to Dev just what was happening. I’m connecting to the island, he thought. Just like the Oracle. Just like Nakobe. I’m listening to its flember. I’m feeling … everything that’s happening!
More talking. The buzzing of bees. The almighty crash of a tree toppling to the ground.
The doompf-doompf-doompf of a heart. Dev could feel it all. And as it grew in volume, small glimmers of light started to dance behind Dev’s eyelids. Tiny, faint sparks. Each one pulsing to a different sound. They merged, then blinked out of existence completely, before more plink-plink-plinked to fill the space.
And now I can see it, too.
A voice crept in through the glimmering blur of lights. ‘Can you see her?’ Pibbles whispered. ‘Dev, look for Pockle. Look for her flember.’
Dev tried moving the lights around. Passing them from one side of his vision to the other, as if he was wading across the island itself. Feeling every sound. Searching every nook and crevice of the island. Trying to find any sign of Pockle, wherever the Skraw might have taken her.
And then, all of a sudden, he could feel nothing at all.
He had crossed what seemed to be a boundary, beyond which the glimmers of flember blinked away. He could feel no sound here. No noise. Just a great long stretch of darkness, with the thinnest of glowing lines running through it.
Dev suddenly felt quite alone. He felt cold.
Then the line ran out.
A few solitary lights glowed at its end. They hovered in a circle, shimmering like stars in an empty night sky. Dev tried to focus on them, tried to get as close as he possibly could.
‘Pockle,’ Dev whispered. ‘Pockle, are you there?’
‘Found me!’ Pockle’s voice giggled back.
Suddenly, another light blinked amongst them. A red light. This one glowed brighter then the others, and as soon as it appeared, it started racing through Dev’s mind. Down, across the darkness, cutting a swathe through the lights below. Travelling so fast he could barely keep up with it. It was determined. It felt … hungry.
Instantly Dev felt himself being dragged away, away from the lights, away from all the sounds, the feelings, and back into the cold main hall of the temple. He let out a loud ‘GASPPP!’ as he jolted awake. His heart pounded. His skin was clammy. Pibbles grabbed his shoulders, trying to hold onto him, but Dev wouldn’t keep still.
‘I found Pockle! She’s OK,’ Dev muttered. ‘But it’s coming! It’s COMING!’
‘What’s coming Dev? What is it?”
Dev span around and stared Pibbles right in the eye.
‘THE SKRAW!’ he cried. ‘THE SKRAW IS COMING HERE!’
21
Return of the Skraw
‘Bring it on.’ Santoro grinned, pulling out his sword. His armour started to light up with flember. ‘Whatever the Skraw is, this time we’ll be ready for it!’
‘Skraw! Again they talk of the SKRAW!’ Elder Pinobei threw her hands up in dismay. ‘There is no Skraw! This boy has seen nothing!’
Dev was already on his feet, standing by the open doors of the temple. He stared into the soft pink hues of the early morning sky. Then he saw it. The ragged shape of the Skraw plummeting through the clouds. Its wings tucked into its body as it crashed beyond the trees. Its jarring, rattling music echoed across Pajoba. A cry went up. The sound of wailing. Of crashing. Of things being torn apart.
‘Whatever it is,’ Pibbles scowled from beside him. ‘It made the wrong decision interrupting our BREAKFAST!’ He swung around to the other elders. ‘Protect the temple,’ he barked. ‘Protect the Flember Stream!’
‘Now hang on …’ Elder Knuttle protested.
Pibbles wasn’t listening. He marched through the open doors, nodding to Dev as he passed.
‘You say you’ve seen the Skraw before,’ he said. ‘Well then I could do with your help.’
Dev looked back to Santoro, who angrily swung his sword towards a rather alarmed-looking Boja. ‘You’re not going out there!’ Santoro growled. ‘You saw what happened last time that … that thing turned up. What if Boja gets all angry again?’
‘HELLO?’ Boja boomed, unaware his voice was coming out as loud as it was.
Dev thought for a moment, carefully considering his options. ‘Boja has mud in his ears, so he shouldn’t be able to hear the music,’ he said. ‘You’ll be safer in here with him. You all will. You can protect him, protect his flember. I … well, maybe I can help catch the Skraw!’
‘Catch it HOW?’ Santoro called out, but the temple doors were already closing. Pibbles was already gone.
And Dev was racing after him.
‘The Skraw tries to take flember!’ Dev puffed, following Pibbles as they headed towards the music. ‘It can’t hold it, but it tries. It has these … these tendrils which sink into the ground. We’ll have to be careful. It’s really powerful.’
‘I’ve heard of the Skraw.’ Pibbles frowned. ‘But there’s only one of it, and there are many of us.’
He lifted his totem above his head. It started to glow and, as it did, Dev noticed movement around them. Shadows slipped out from the trees, from the ground, blurring through the rustling ferns. Dev squinted. They were people! People running alongside them. They looked strong and determined. They wore outfits made of woven green leather, strapped by vines and decorated with long grass. They moved silently. Gracefully. Quickly. Flanking Dev and Pibbles. Each holding out a small, glowing totem of their own.
‘Soldiers of the flember!’ Pibbles beamed proudly. ‘They’re some way off becoming elders, but they’re learning. They’ve studied flember for years. Even your dad trained with them for a …’
His voice faltered. They had reached the main streets of Pajoba, and everything ahead of them was carnage. The Skraw had landed in a nest of three-tiered huts and torn a devastating gash through the length of them. It crouched in the remains of the ground floor, its torn cloak of leaves spinning around, its long beak snapping at anyone who came too close. All those who had been enjoying breakfast formed a mob, clutching whatever they could find as weapons. Chairs. Branches. Legs of ham.
‘I didn’t imagine the Skraw would look like this,’ Pibbles gasped, as Dev stepped up behind him.
The Skraw lurched forwards, its thick black claws tearing up the ground. The mob swayed back. This close, the music was almost deafening. ‘BE CAREFUL!’ Pibbles yelled, gesturing the flember soldiers forwards. ‘The Skraw will try to take your flember, so use everything around you!’
The soldiers charged, their glowing totems seemingly lifting the ground from beneath their feet. Grass billowed up like a wave. It carried them through the crowd, as vines swung down from the trees and lifted them higher, before peppering them down upon the Skraw.
The Skraw, however, stood fast. Bright red flember crackled round its body like a shell, whipping the soldiers away, while its tendrils sank into the blossoming surroundings. And swiftly those surroundings started to die. The grass crinkled, the trees wilted, the leaves fell. The flember soldiers had little to grip on to.
‘This is what I saw before!’ Dev shouted to Pibbles. ‘You can’t use flember against the Skraw!’
The crowd started to back away. The dying patches of ground had panicked them. Some started to flee. The soldiers battled on, but the Skraw was too frenzied, too wild, to let any of them get close.
‘Then what …?’ A rather pale Pibbles stared at the Skraw. ‘What are we supposed to do?’
‘I need chickens!’ Dev replied. He turned Pibbles to face him, and then spoke slowly and carefully. ‘Pibbles, I can trap the Skraw. But I’m going to need chickens.’
22
Chickens!
‘Chickens. Yes, of course,’ Pibbles muttered. ‘Your father’s ideas could be a little random, too. But, somehow, they always seemed to work out.’ He led Dev to the house of a woman named Larago, the best chicken wrangler in Pajoba. She, however, was just as terrified as everyone else, and was currently sitting on her own roof, hiding behind a stack of barrels. Her chickens had once been in a line of stacked cages outside, but the commotion and panic had crushed the wood and netting and set them all free. Now the chickens wandered aimlessly across the street: squawking, and flapping, and laying the occasional egg.
‘Hang on,’ Pibbles finally said. ‘Why do you need chickens?’
‘I’m a bit of an inventor.’ Dev beamed. He picked up a few bits of broken cage, bending and twisting and shaping the pieces around each other. ‘It’s how I solve things. How I fix things.’ He borrowed a couple of barrels, strung them on top, then found a length of netting hanging between Larago’s house and the next, plucked off the jackfruit jerky that had been drying upon it, and strapped it all together.
‘So if we can’t use flember to bring the Skraw down, then I’ll use my own ideas.’
Dev hauled the Double-Barrelled Chicken Cannon up on to his shoulder, and flexed his fingers around the triggers. ‘HEY, SKRAW!’ he shouted over the deafening music. ‘TELL US WHERE POCKLE IS!’
The Skraw, who had only just disentangled itself from a destroyed canopy, swung around towards Dev. A red glow burned inside its eyes.
Dev held his nerve, digging his heels into the ground.
‘I’m not afraid of you,’ he growled.
His confidence shattered, however, as soon as the Skraw started galloping towards him. In panic he pulled both triggers. With a loud BU-KAWK, and a huge explosion of feathers, a chicken rocketed out from each barrel, the net billowing out behind them.
Only for the Skraw to duck underneath it.
‘Oh but I planned for this.’ Dev grinned. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a fistful of chicken seed he’d scooped from the cages. ‘WHAT ARE THEIR NAMES?’
