Neither Dead Nor Alive (6 page)

After a while – quite a long while – Fiona calms down. Then I ask her the big question, “How do we get back?”

“Get back?” She's not with it.

“Yip. Job's done. Bull's sacrificed. Curse is lifted. So how d`we get back to today time?”

“We just do.”

“How?”

“You tell me. You've done it twice already.”

“That was an accident. I just came out. Like I went in. Don't know how. You PLANNED this one. So how d` we get back?”

“We just wait till the effect wears off.”

Then I remember we ate extra berries. “What if it takes days `n' days?”

“What if?”

I've another idea and my heart drops into my stomach at the thought. “Maybe we overdosed. What if we never get back? That book you had said some people never got back.”

“I don't know that I want to get back.”

I go ballistic. “Not get back! We can't stay here. There's nothing here but monsters. No decent houses... no TV… no football... no…”

She cuts me short. “Don't you care?”

“Care? Course I care. Job's done. Now let's get back.”

“Don't you care about Aidan?”

“Aidan? Yes. We saved him from the dogs, like you said. Now he's sorted out, like the bull and Fergus.”

“You nerd. You don't care about him. You just think he's a… a…”

“Dead kid from long ago. He's lucky he's dead now. You said he'd be at peace, remember?”

“He was real a moment ago. Now he's dead.”

For a moment I think she's going to cry again, but she stays cool.

“Look,” she says, “we've got to get it together. Gawawl might be around somewhere.”

“And we can't get back to today time.”

“Well, that's not my fault.”

“You might've thought of a way to do it.”

“Why don't you think for yourself sometimes?”

“You've got all the books. Besides, it was you who said to eat extra berries. Never thought it might make us stay here for good, did you?”

I'm really angry with her now. But she just goes quiet.

“I don't care any more.”

“No. You just want to curl up and blubber over a dead guy from the Bronze Age.”

“You rat. You rotten rat.”

I'm sorry I said that, but I don't know how to say I'm sorry. So I change the subject.

“What're we gonna do with this?” I kick the cauldron.

“Doesn't matter.”

“Can we take it into today time with us?”

“Why not?” Then she has another thought. “No. We musn't. It's Gawawl's now. We've sacrificed the bull. Gawawl can have the cauldron. It's better that way.”

“How?”

“Because if he doesn't get it he'll come looking for it.”

“So what? I can handle him.” I'm feeling cool again. Besides, I need a bit of a boost. I'm still sorry at what I said about Aidan. “Come on, Gawawl,” I challenge. “I'm waiting.”

I'm certain he won't come. It's all over. He's toast, like Aidan and Fergus.

But he's not.

And he does come.

Fiona screams. She can't speak. She's pointing at the ford. The tide's just started to come in. You can see the edge of the water nibbling at the mud on the bank.

There's four or five Firbogs wading across the water up to their knees. Gawawl's in front. I recognise him by that gross tooth. Then the others, red-haired, shaggy, with long arms and enormous chests. Some of them are carrying sticks or stone clubs. I can smell their stink from here.

Fiona finds her voice. “The dirk, Steve.”

I reach for it, and my heart drops into my guts. It's gone.

“Quick, Steve.” Fiona's still calm.

“It's not there.”

“What d'you mean ‘not there'?”

“Must've dropped it when we crossed the ford. I'd a job with that cauldron.”

“You idiot. You stupid idiot.”

“Well you just left me with the cauldron.”

“Make it with your watch stra…“ her voice tails off. “I'd forgotten you had to lose that, too.”

She's clenching and unclenching her fists. “Give them the cauldron. That's what they've come for.”

I just stand there.

“Look.” She grabs the cauldron and tries to lift it on to its side, but it's too heavy for her. “Help me.”

Between us we tip it over on its side.

“Now push,” she says.

It rolls off down the hill and picks up speed. It leaps from rock to rock till it hits the water in an explosion of spray. Gawawl tries to grab it, but it's just wide of his reach. At first it floats but it
has hit the water side on and starts to fill up. For a moment it swirls round and round. Then it sinks.

The Firbogs flounder over to where it went down. They grope with their long arms and stick their heads under water. Gawawl gets a hold on it and hauls it to the surface. He empties it out and drags it back to the bank, though he doesn't seem to have the sense to float it like I did. He puts it on a rock above high tide and wedges it with a stone so it won't roll off.

Then he turns and stares across the water at us. He waves an arm about and calls his mates round him. Then they start to wade across again.

The tide race is getting faster now, flowing like a river from the sea into the loch. They're still only about knee deep, but suddenly Gawawl stops. He seems to panic. He's floundering about and trying to get out of the water as if it's boiling. They all scramble back to dry land as fast as they can.

I'm wondering – were there crocodiles in Scotland in the Bronze Age?

Back on the mainland the Firbogs gather on the bank. They whoop and scream at us. Gawawl beats the cauldron like a drum. But they won't go anywhere near the water, though it's still quite shallow.

Fiona's got the explanation – as usual: “They can't cross running water. Remember – in MacPhee's book.”

We stare them out and after a while they slope off, dragging the cauldron with them.

We sit down on the big flat stone at the top of the island. Fiona says it's holy and we should he safe here. Anyway, Gawawl can't cross the ford till the next low tide and that's tomorrow morning. It's getting dark now, but it's still very warm. She says it was hotter in the Bronze Age; so we won't be cold during the night.

I'm shattered. For a long time I'm too excited to go to sleep but at last I drift off, and I dream that Fiona's on her knees beside me on the big stone and she's chanting softly, “The Morrigan. The Morrigan.”

I wake up chittering.

Whatever Fiona says
about the weather in the Bronze Age, it's Baltic now. It must be early morning. There's dew on the grass round us and my
clothes are damp.

Fiona's still sleeping.

I look straight down the hill to the ford where Gawawl had to turn back. There's the bridge. Away to the right there's an avenue of trees and a big house; the swish hotel, I suppose.

Then I notice I'm not lying on the holy stone any more. It's just moss and heather.

I give Fiona a shake. “We're back in today.”

“Oh.”

“Sorry what I said about Aidan.”

“That's OK. Where are we?”

“Eriska island.”

“Oh, yes.”

“So we go home now and I gotta explain to Mum.”

Suddenly we're on a different planet.

“Yeah. My dad'll be worried stupid. Steve...”

“Uh-uh.”

“Promise me one thing.”

‘‘Uh-uh.”

“Don't tell Mark.”

“What about?”

“You know, Aidan. Don't ever tease me about him, please.”

“Better make up a cover story,” I suggest.

“How you saved me from Gawawl,” she laughs.

“How you sacrificed the bull.”

“Better get home.” She stands up and dusts herself down. “Your mum was dead worried the other day.”

“And your dad.”

We trudge across the bridge. Below us the tide is racing in again, with flurries of foam on the crests of little wavelets.
Can evil spirits cross running water by a bridge?
I wonder.

Fiona reads my thoughts: “Not in Tam o' Shanter.”

We're on the other side now anyway, but we're in today time; so it doesn't matter. At least I think so.

Fiona has other ideas.

“Look,” she says, “there's something we've got to talk about.”

“What?”

She twirls her ponytail.

“Member what I told you about Gawawl being immortal? You remember, in Downey's barn, when I gave you the dirk.”

“You mean he's in today time too?”

“That's right.”

I've had time to think about this since she mentioned it before.

“Why's nobody ever seen
him then?”

“Sometimes they have. Remember what MacPhee‘s book says. A hundred years ago people must've seen him often.”

“But not now?”

“Maybe even now. I don't know. There's a lot of local folk, like Mrs. Naysmith, won't walk past Cnoc an Oir after dark. But I do know this: Gawawl keeps the cauldron hidden in there. So long as he's got it – and nobody disturbs him – he sleeps under the hill, at least most of the time.”

“So?”

“You musn't tell anybody it's there.”

“They'd not believe us anyway.”

“Steve, do you know what archaeology is?”

I know the word.
“
Yes
.
When we did that project on the Trojan War an archaeologist found the ruins of Troy; so they knew it was true.”

“Correct,” she says. “Archaeologists dig into tombs and ruins and look for ancient things. What if they thought a golden cauldron from the Bronze Age might be under your dead dinosaur?”

“They'd dig it up.”

“Right first time. And Gawawl, he'd waken up and come out to get it back, wouldn't he? Do you want him to waken up in today time?”

I decide the last thing I want is Gawawl on the loose in today time, so I'm not going to tell anybody about the cauldron. But what AM I gonna say to Mum … and Mark? Fiona says it doesn't really matter, so long as we don't breathe a word about the cauldron.

We're coming up to our house now and we agree we'll go in. Then my mum can phone Fiona's dad and let him know she's OK. It's early. There'll be nobody up yet.

At the garden gate we both stop.

“Remember,” she whispers, “no cauldron.”

I hear myself saying, “Aidan was a king.”

She
squeezes my elbow.

“By the way,” she says in a different voice, “I think your dad'll be here.”

Dad! That'll be great. We can go karting at Ledaig tomorrow – after I've had a good sleep.

Mum's at the window. She's not dressed, but she looks like she's been up all night.

She opens the door and rushes out to meet us.

On the ridge of the roof croaks … a raven.