The Puzzle Ring (19 page)

For Hannah's birthday, Lady Wintersloe invited all of her friends over for dinner. She had given Hannah an antique topaz ring, which glowed golden on her finger like captured sunlight.

‘It comes from the Cairngorm Mountains, not far from here,' Lady Wintersloe said.

‘Cairngorms drive away darkness and evil,' Linnet said. ‘It'll help keep you safe and well, my chick.'

Roz lifted up her eyes in silent exasperation. She was irritated by what she called superstitious nonsense, though she was too polite to let Linnet see.

Roz had given Hannah a new winter coat, for her old raincoat was far too thin for the Scottish winter, and a book on the human body which showed all the nerves and muscles and bones. Hannah, who had wanted an electric guitar, took this as a sign her mother thought she was
spending too much time reading fairy stories. She tried to look grateful, and thought she could always lend it to Max. He would adore it.

Linnet had made Hannah a new strap for her guitar, embroidering it beautifully with flowers and leaves and thistledown heads. She pointed her gnarled finger at one flower after another, saying, ‘Elderflowers, for protection from evil; and rue, the herb of grace; and carnations, to keep you safe; and thistledown, to help lighten your load.'

Rather oddly, Linnet had also given Hannah an old walking-stick. It had a most beautiful handle made from deer antler, and the wood glowed a soft golden colour with a mottled effect that made it look like snakeskin.

‘Why, that's my father's old stick,' Lady Wintersloe said in surprise. ‘I haven't seen it for a while.'

‘Hannah is spending so much time out tramping the hills with Donovan that I thought she needed a good stick,' Linnet said.

Lady Wintersloe nodded her neat white head. ‘Of course. I remember her father always liked that stick. Don't go losing it, Hannah, it's very old and very precious.'

Linnet winked one cloudy green eye. ‘It's made of rowan,' she said. ‘Cut from the tree outside my kitchen door. If you're ever in any trouble, twist the handle three times.' No one but Hannah seemed to hear her. Sometimes it was as if Linnet had the ability to speak straight into Hannah's mind with no one else the wiser. Or perhaps Hannah's hearing was growing sharper due to all the time she spent with the hag-stone pressed up against her ear.

Max bought her a new guitar songbook, Scarlett gave her some shiny lip gloss (which Hannah thought might have been
an unsubtle hint), and Donovan gave her an encyclopedia of witches and fairies which she found absolutely fascinating and much easier to read than most of her father's heavy tomes.

Linnet had cooked a feast of all Hannah's favourite foods and, after dinner, the four friends lay in front of the fire and talked.

‘The twenty-first of the twelfth,' Max said, poking a twig into the fire and watching its tip turn translucent gold. ‘Cool birth date.'

‘Yeah. The same forwards as backwards. It's called a palindrome. That's why Dad called me Hannah. It's a palindrome too. See?' She wrote her name on a piece of scrap paper.

The others at once began to write their own names backwards.

‘I'm Xam!' Max shouted. ‘How cool is that? Xam! Bam! Pow!'

‘I'm N-A-V-O-N-O-D,' Donovan spelt out. ‘That doesn't mean anything.'

‘You're N-O-D if we just call you Don,' Max said. ‘We could call you Noddy.'

‘No thanks,' he replied.

‘Let's try yours,' Max said to Scarlett. He wrote it out carefully and at once began to laugh. ‘Ttelracs. That is so weird. It sounds like some kind of computer virus.'

‘It does not!' Scarlett flushed red with annoyance.

They wrote the names of everyone they knew backwards, shrieking with laughter at the results. Then, as the fire began to die down and shadows bent over the library, the talk turned back to their birth dates.

‘Did you know that means we four kids were all born within four days and four kilometres of each other?' Donovan said dreamily. He had his chin propped in his hand and was staring into the fire as if he saw strange and beautiful things there.

Hannah nodded, thinking of Lady Wintersloe and her belief that one of these three was really the child of true blood, heir to the realm under the hill. ‘Yes. Belle told me. It's an amazing coincidence, isn't it? I didn't realise that all our birthdays were quite so close, though. Were we really born within four days of each other?'

‘It's my birthday tomorrow. The twenty-second of December. Then Max was born on the twenty-third, and Scarlett a day later, on Christmas Eve.'

‘That is so weird,' Hannah said. ‘And only four kilometres apart?'

‘Well, you were born here, weren't you?' Scarlett said. ‘Lady Wintersloe has often told us the story.'

‘I was?'

‘You came early, and so fast your dad only had time to bring the car round,' Max said. The twig he was poking in the fire suddenly flared into life, and he yelped and dropped it, sucking his finger where he'd burnt it.

‘You were born in the front hall,' Donovan said. ‘Your mum didn't even have time to get into the car.'

‘Linnet delivered you,' Scarlett said.

Hannah scowled and looked away. Why had she never heard this story?

‘You never heard any of that?' Max was flabbergasted.

‘Mum doesn't like to talk about my dad. You know.'

The other three nodded.

‘Linnet delivered me too,' Max said. At Hannah's exclamation, he went on, ‘Yeah, it's true. I was born here too. My mum's car broke down out on the road, and she came looking for shelter. It was snowing like anything, and the house was all lit up because everyone was still sitting around waiting to see if your dad came home, and Mum went into labour right here on your doorstep.'

‘And you were born here and never left,' Scarlett said.

‘Where was I then? I was only two days old,' Hannah said.

‘I guess you must've still been here then,' Max said. ‘I know your mum packed you up and left, once they declared your dad dead or gone, or whatever they do, but that must've been later.'

‘You'd have been here together as babies,' Scarlett said. ‘You probably had baths together.'

‘Ewwww!' Hannah and Max said together.

‘So what about you?' Hannah asked Scarlett. ‘Where were you born?'

‘Oh, nothing so dramatic,' Scarlett said rather peevishly. ‘I was born at home, at the shop. Mum doesn't like hospitals. She had me in the bath. Disgusting. It was on Christmas Eve. Don't you think that's so inconsiderate? To have me in the bath, on Christmas Eve? I never get as many pressies, and I have to think about it every time I go to the bathroom.'

‘Well, we were all born at Christmas time too,' Max pointed out.

‘Yes, but
I
was born on Christmas
Eve
!' Scarlett said. ‘Anyway, I've always wondered . . .'

‘What?' Hannah asked.

‘Well, it's just seems so odd. I can't imagine really giving birth to someone in a bath. And I'm so much older than
the boys. Six years between me and Cooper. And they're all brown-haired and brown-eyed and I'm so fair.' She twirled her blonde ponytail. ‘
And
Mum always says what a great Christmas pressie I was, because she'd never thought she could have babies.'

‘So?' Max demanded.

‘Well, I always wondered if I was, you know, adopted.'

There was a little silence. ‘Could be, I guess,' Donovan said cautiously. ‘But wouldn't they tell you?'

‘Not necessarily.' Scarlett heaved a dramatic sigh. ‘I've heard of people who only found out they were adopted when their parents died and left them out of their will.'

Max gave a little snort of derision. ‘Well, your parents spoil you rotten so I can't see that happening.'

Scarlett tossed her head.

‘Four of us, born within four days and four kilometres of each other . . . it feels somehow fateful.' Hannah stared around at her friends, all rosy in the soft flicker of the fire.

‘Statistically speaking, there were probably a hundred kids born in this area during that period,' Max said.

‘But so close?' Donovan asked. ‘I've got to admit, it feels a bit eerie.'

‘And you were born the same day my father disappeared.' Hannah stared at Donovan, who turned his head so she could not see his face. ‘Tomorrow.'

There was a short silence. Somehow Hannah found the courage to say, ‘It was the curse, you know, that made him disappear. The Curse of Wintersloe Castle.'

No one said a word.

‘He was trying to break it. He was trying to find the broken
bits of the puzzle ring. He said he found one part, but I don't know what he did with it. I've searched everywhere.'

Donovan gazed at her with serious, blue-grey eyes. ‘What do you mean,
he said
?'

‘I found his notebook, hidden in the little tower room, you know, the one with the weathervane on top. It's been locked up since the day he disappeared, but I found the key. The room is filled with books on curses and fairies and time travel. He's made a real study of it. He was determined to break the curse.'

‘So he really believed in it?' Max was torn between scorn and scepticism.

Hannah ignored him. ‘There's this one book of his which says there are places where the membrane between the worlds is thin, and different worlds and different times meet. Wouldn't it be amazing to think it was true? Just imagine if you could travel back in time!'

‘It's impossible,' Max said. ‘You just can't do it. Yesterday is gone forever. A minute ago is gone forever.'

‘But you're thinking of time as if it was a river, all running in one direction,' Hannah said. ‘You're meant to be the scientist, you should know that it's not like that at all.'

Max went red. ‘Well, that may be so, but you still can't turn time back.'

‘I didn't say it was easy,' Hannah said. ‘I just said it was possible . . . theoretically speaking.'

‘Well, maybe theoretically,' Max said. ‘But what use is that?'

‘I've been thinking about what the sundial in the rose garden means. It says,
Now Is Yesterday's Tomorrow
. I thought it meant we have to do what we want
now
, else the moment is gone.'

‘Seize the day,' Scarlett said. Everyone looked at her in surprise and she made a face. ‘My English teacher says it all the time.'

‘Exactly,' Hannah said. ‘But I think it means more than that. I think it means time is all around us, all time. Yesterday and tomorrow and now.'

There was a long silence.

‘So what would you do if you could go back in time?' Donovan asked.

‘I'd try and break the curse, of course. I'd find the lost quarters of the puzzle ring and put it back together again. I think that's what my dad was trying to do.'

‘You think your dad went back in time?' Max was openly sceptical now.

‘Maybe. I mean, if it's true that Fairknowe Hill is a gateway to other worlds and other times, who knows, maybe he worked out the secret. Maybe he went back in time and got trapped there. And that's why he disappeared.'

‘Delusional,' Max said in a friendly way. ‘It must be the colour of her hair. Heats the brains up, you know.'

‘Do you really think that's what happened to your dad?' Scarlett wanted to know.

Hannah moved restlessly. ‘I don't know. Maybe. But just imagine going back in time. What an adventure!'

‘You'd probably catch the plague,' Max said caustically. ‘They'd nail the door shut so you couldn't get out and then, when you were dead, bring round the plague cart.' He pretended to ring a bell, intoning mournfully, ‘Bring out the dead! Bring out the dead!'

‘I'd risk it, if it meant finding the puzzle ring,' Hannah said fiercely. ‘It's all right for you lot, your family isn't cursed!'

‘I'm the one with three little brothers,' Scarlett pointed out. ‘Believe me, I feel cursed!'

Everyone laughed.

‘But let's say you did manage to travel back in time—theoretically speaking—how would you manage?' Donovan asked. ‘I mean, Max is right, there was the plague and all sorts of other horrible diseases. And people used to carry knives and swords everywhere, and stab each other at dinner. And you wouldn't have any money. They didn't have pounds back then.'

‘And what would you wear?' Scarlett demanded. ‘Everyone wore long gowns and corsets and ruffs and things. And how would you get around? No buses or cars or trains back then.'

‘You could pretend to be a leper,' Max suggested. ‘You could wear a long robe with a hood, and carry one of those clapper things, and go about begging. Though they might stone you, of course, or lock you up in a leper hospital.'

‘I'd be a travelling minstrel,' Hannah said. ‘I'd take my guitar and I'd wander the roads and play and sing.'

‘A thirteen year old girl on her own? Sounds dangerous to me,' Donovan said.

‘You could dress up like a boy,' Scarlett said. ‘Sing love serenades to Mary, Queen of Scots, and all her ladies-in-waiting. Maybe she'd fall in love with you. She was always falling in love with people.'

‘Anyway, I'm going to give it a go,' Hannah said determinedly. ‘Tomorrow night. It's Midwinter's Eve, the night of the winter solstice, which means it's a thin time. I'm going to pack up some food and my guitar and go and have a midnight feast at the fairy hill.'

‘You're joking.' Scarlett's blue eyes were round. ‘It'll be freezing! And spooky!'

‘I'll wrap up warm,' Hannah said.

‘Do you really mean it?' Donovan said in a low, serious voice. ‘But what if it's true? What if you find yourself back in the past?'

‘Well, then I'll find the lost quarters of the puzzle ring and come home again.'