The Dark Horde (4 page)

Must be a possum.

Across the flagstone courtyard, a kookaburra in the trees burst into laughter, its song filling the air. Robert turned for a moment to see it launch from its perch and fly away, laughing.

Robert shrugged his shoulders and headed back inside...

Unaware of the dark shapes lurking in the trees behind him.

SUNDAY 9:40
AM

The desk creaked as Burke leant out of the aisle, aiming his peashooter – the cylindrical shell of a pen – at Danny. Danny sat at the front of the classroom gazing out of the window next to him. An easy target made even easier considering the teacher, Mrs Farell, was writing something on the blackboard and had her back to the class.

Pfft! A spitball shot down the aisle and into Danny’s hair. Most of the class saw it, but not Danny who stared out of the window at the gum trees and the school weir beyond.

Burke laughed with his mates, Brad and Martin, at the back of the class.

Their laughter stopped when Mrs Farell turned to face them.

“For today’s class I want you to write a story based on the words I’ve written on the blackboard.”

Brad whispered to Burke. “She didn’t even notice man! Haha!”

Martin held a peashooter of his own in his mouth, giving the appearance of a pen. He read the words “The Colour Crimson” on the blackboard and leaned back on his chair against the wall behind him. “How are we s’posed to write a story on that?”

“Don’t ask
me
, Martin.” Mrs Farell’s horn-rimmed glasses rose over the wrinkle of her nose. “I only give you the clay. It’s up to you to mould it.”

Martin threw up his arms and looked to the others. “Ohhh great.”

Burke loaded another spitball in his lap. “Can you maybe put a few topics up and we can choose?”

“I think that should be plenty.”

“Please, Mrs Farell! Just one more. That one’s really hard.”

She sighed. “Okay. I’ll put up one more theme, but that’s it.”

She turned again to the blackboard as Brad, Burke and Martin all fired spitballs at Danny. One spitball joined the one already stuck in his hair, one stuck to the back of his chair and the other one hit Jessica in the back of the neck. Jessica looked around at the trio, who gestured that they were aiming at Danny. The teacher continued writing on the board, unaware.

Danny looked out of the window, at the slender trunks of trees in the morning sunlight...

As a dark shape moved between them.

He jolted and became conscious of mingled chatter and laughter behind him. It was probably about him so he ignored it. He focused again on the view outside.

In the shade of the gums, away from the other buildings, something ape-like lurked. Something he realised was staring back at him with piercing red eyes. His heart thumped in his ears, his face flushed with fear.

Now he saw that there were many of them, lurking in the trees...

Watching.

He shuddered and looked away at the class. Mrs Farell had just finished writing another line on the blackboard. No one seemed to have noticed the scene outside. Incredulous, he turned back to the window...

They were still there.

“No more questions?” Mrs Farell scanned the room.

No one answered. Many quietly cursed.

“I guess you must all be too eager to
rip
into that story!” She sat at her desk to begin correcting papers from her last class.

Brad, Burke and Martin pretended to start writing, then reloaded their peashooters as soon as the teacher wasn’t looking.

Danny had the instinct to run, but didn’t want to attract attention either. He glanced outside again and at the others in class. He was sure the class should be able to see them outside. There must be twenty or more of those things, crawling in the shadows of the trees!

He turned to Rebecca sitting next to the window behind him.

Rebecca looked up from the single line she had written. “What are you looking at?”

Danny pointed out of the window, unable to form words.

“Turn around, idiot! You’ll get me in trouble!”

He returned to face his desk, speechless.

It was true, no one else could see them. Was he imagining the whole thing? The red eyes regarding him from cover a short distance away, told him otherwise.

“Soon you will be ours,”
resonated a deep voice inside his head.

Then there was a knock at the door. Heads raised to see that it was the principal, Lucas Prescott.

Mrs Farell rose from her seat and walked to open the door.

“Sorry, Wendy. Can I have a quick word with you in private?”

She nodded and turned to her class. “Listen please everyone. I’m going to be out of the room for a couple of minutes. When I come back, I want to see you all writing. If I catch anyone not working, there’ll be trouble.”

The class was silent and Mrs Farell smiled. As soon as she left with Mr Prescott and closed the door, there was a volley of spitballs, mostly at Danny.

Burke decided to go one better and ran down the aisle to whack Danny’s bare legs with a ruler. Danny cried in pain as Burke rushed past him, grabbing Danny’s pencil case on the way. Burke threw Danny’s pencil case to Martin, who stood on a chair to catch it. Brad kept a lookout down the corridor for Mrs Farell’s return. The rest of the class watched.

“Give it back,” came a weak voice.

Martin grinned as he emptied a bottle of correction fluid into the pencil case, holding it up for Danny to see. Martin laughed along with Burke and Brad.

“Oh, don’t do that!”

“What are you going to do about it?” Martin challenged.

“She’s coming!” Brad called.

Burke bolted back to his chair, reaching it just as the classroom door opened. Martin dropped Danny’s pencil case on the floor. Everyone pretended to be writing.

Mrs Farell walked to the front of the desks, a serious look on her face. Mr Prescott stood in the doorway, watching. “Mr Prescott had just informed me that he has spoken to the police about what happened at the Weston farmhouse last night.”

Brad was trying hard not to laugh. Burke tickled his ribs. He lost it.

“Do you think it’s funny, Bradley?”

Red-faced, Bradley managed to contain his laughter. “No, Mrs Farell.”

“Perhaps you won’t find it so funny when you have to be up to do a Banner Road tomorrow morning at six.”

“Shit,” Bradley whispered, not wishing to attract further punishment. Nobody wanted to do a Banner Road. It meant getting up before everyone else to do a five-kilometre run out to Banner Road and back with some of the teachers.

“I don’t want anyone to panic, but something very serious has happened. Last night, Barney and Frank Weston were killed in a fire at their house nearby and we don’t know how it happened yet.”

Stunned silence.

“There’ll be a formal announcement at lunch, but in the meantime, I want you all to be very careful and not go anywhere alone. We are safe and secure here, but this is just a precaution until we know what happened.”

Danny shivered and cast a furtive glance outside.

They were no longer there. Moving shapes were now mere branches in the wind. Nothing even suggested that they had ever been there...

His thoughts were broken by a spitball hitting him in the side of the face.

Laughter followed.

SUNDAY 11:29
AM

As Arthur said the words, he tossed the tennis ball into the air and prepared to bash it with the small cricket bat he held.

Howard was standing about thirty metres away and trying not to think how unco he was going to look in front of his best friend, Arthur.

As the ball came down, Arthur swiped at it, teeth clenched. His bat met no resistance and he spun full circle. He planted the bat to stop himself from falling. The tennis ball bounced to a stop at his feet.

Arthur looked at Howard and smiled. “I was just testing ya. T’see if you were ready.”

Howard smiled back, but said nothing.

Arthur threw up the ball again and this time heard a satisfying ‘thock’ as he connected. The ball went soaring over Howard before he reacted to give chase.

As Howard sprinted, the ball seemed to hang in the air like a comet. His eyes still on it, it began to fall within striking distance, like a meteor hurtling to earth. He put on a final burst of speed before launching himself headlong.

Howard landed hard in full stretch and slid across the grass. He opened his eyes to see the ball lying in his hands.

Howard remained lying on the ground, staring at the ball in his palms, as Arthur ran across the oval to him, his face beaming.

“How’d you catch that? That was unreal!” Arthur said as he pulled Howard to his feet.

“See if you can beat that,” Howard said, feeling suddenly taller and older than his nine year-old friend.

“You’re all dirty now,” Arthur said grinning.

They both laughed.

Howard and Arthur were walking back home now. They crossed the quiet suburban road to Howard’s house and rang the doorbell. Howard’s mother, Julie, answered the door.

“Oh Howard, look at your clothes!”

“Sooorry Muuum.”

“I’ve told you before not to get dirty! You’ve ruined another good pair of pants!”

She began to peel his clothing off. “Go and put some clean clothes on from your room and
don’t get dirty again
.”

Howard now stood in the front doorway in only his underwear. “Mum, can we have some Yogo?”

Julie looked at Arthur for the first time since they returned. Unlike Howard, he was fairly clean. She looked again at Howard.

Howard clasped his hands together in prayer. “Pleeeaaase!”

“Okay, once you go dress yourself, I’ll let you have one Yogo each. But no more, as I have to take Arthur home for lunch soon.”

“Can’t Arthur stay for lunch?”

“No Howard, he can’t! His mother is expecting him home at twelve thirty. So he can only stay for another
half hour
.”

Howard pouted and tried to think of something to say. Arthur scratched his ear and remained silent.

“Go and get changed, Howard. Now, please!”

Howard looked at Arthur. “You want to stay, don’t you Arthur?”

Arthur nodded and opened his mouth before Julie said, “Howard, it’s final! Go change or you won’t be able to have Arthur over at all!”

It didn’t look like Howard could push things any further. He dashed off to his room to change, whilst his mum poured cordial for Arthur.

Howard passed his sister Samantha’s room on the way to his own, noticing that his bossy older sister didn’t seem to be home.

Smiling, he turned to his room...

His smile vanished as he stopped in the doorway to look up at the poster facing his bed.

It was an eerie poster of Long John Silver, the cutlass-wielding pirate, in the light of the full moon, a red parrot leering from his shoulder. Long John Silver’s eyes looked straight at Howard, his weathered features portraying a dark and powerful side. In the background was a dark ocean with the murky profile of an island in the distance. Emblazoned above the picture was the title “
Treasure Island
.”

Howard didn’t like to look for long at the picture, as it gave him the ‘shivers’. The poster was a birthday present from Arthur, and his mum insisted that he put it up on his wall out of respect. If Howard had his way, he’d pull the thing down and hide it away somewhere. When he first got it, he had nightmares about pirates chasing him. Almost a year later, the poster still unsettled him, although he’d never got around to removing it.

He forgot about the poster and began looking for clothes to wear.

A short time later, Howard returned to the lounge where mum sat with Arthur. A cartoon video of
Transformers
was on in the background. Howard had watched it a million times.

Arthur held up one of the two mini-tubs of chocolate-flavoured yogurt. “Here’s your Yogo.”

“Thanks.” Howard turned to his mother as she held up a jug of cola cordial. “Maybe I can go with Arthur and stay at his house?”

She frowned. “Howard, the answer is NO.”

The phone rang.

Julie answered, “Hello?... Amanda! I was just telling the boys that I have to take Arthur home soon.”

Julie frowned. “Why? What’s happened?”

She covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh my God! Amanda!”

Howard and Arthur gathered around Julie, who gasped as Amanda relayed the news.

“If there’s anything I can do to help, you just let me know. I’ll mind the kids here until you get back. In fact, I’m sure they won’t mind if Arthur stays here the night, if that helps.”

Howard smiled broadly as he gave Arthur a big thumbs-up, but Arthur seemed more concerned about what had happened with his mum.

“Sure, that’ll be fine, Amanda. Ah, perhaps you best tell him when you get here. I don’t know how to tell him.” Julie looked at Arthur.

“Okay darling, I better let you go. What a terrible thing to happen. I’m so sorry, I don’t know what to say.”

Julie hung up the phone looking shaken. Holding back tears, she turned to Arthur. “Arthur, you’re going to be staying here for a bit longer. Your mother has to go down to the police station. Something’s happened to your uncle Barney and his son Frank.”