The Beast of Hushing Wood Read online

  ABOUT THE BOOK

  Ziggy Truegood lives in a tiny town deep in Hushing Wood, where strange things are happening. The townspeople are fighting, Ziggy feels like something is hunting her, and her beloved woods have become dark and hostile. When exotic Raffi and his grandfather arrive in town, Ziggy finds herself strangely drawn to them. But are they there to save Ziggy, or are they the hunters?

  Thought-provoking and engaging, Hushing Wood is a lovely blend of action, fable and magic realism.

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  1 THE SLEEPOVER

  2 MYSTIC, THE WOODS AND ME

  3 STRANGE HAPPENINGS

  4 THE DANCE

  5 THE STRANGE BOY

  6 THE GOLDEN EAGLE

  7 BIG BOBBY LITTLE’S PAPER TOWN

  8 SPYING

  9 THE TRAP

  10 BLOOD OF THE BEAST

  11 MAGIC IN HUSHING WOOD

  12 THE TRICKSTER IS HERE

  13 A WARNING

  14 HUNT FOR THE SILVER FOX

  15 IT IS THE JINN

  16 CHILD OF LIGHT

  17 CLIMB THE MOUNTAIN

  18 THE DRAWING

  19 THE HIDDEN ROOM

  20 CRY FOR HELP

  21 THE ANCIENT TREE

  22 THE JINN

  23 OTHER REALMS

  24 THE BLACK CLOUD

  25 THE CHILD OF THE JINN

  26 TAKE A STEP SIDEWAYS

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  For my first publisher at

  Penguin, Julie Watts,

  and

  To those who feel they don’t belong,

  I wrote this book for you.

  ‘Ziggy, Ziggy Truegood. Come to me,’ the river sings.

  I fight to stay afloat, I gulp for air, but the water drags me down, and sharp claws tear at my skin.

  Red bubbles fizz around me. It is blood, my blood.

  From the riverbank I hear a cry.

  And then darkness.

  I wake up with a start, hot and feverish, sheets twisted around me.

  It’s been the same dream every night for the past month. And in it, on my twelfth birthday, I drown.

  ‘What was that?’ Petal whispers, her head twisting in the direction of the woods, her eyes big and round like an owl’s.

  We hear another high-pitched squeal.

  ‘It’s just a night bird with its prey,’ I tell her. I know all the sounds of Hushing Wood. I’ve walked, played, slept amongst the trees since I was small. They’re the first thing I see outside my bedroom window when I wake up, and the last thing I hear when I go to sleep. They are my woods and I love them.

  Petal’s still not convinced. ‘Ziggy, can we please sleep inside? It’s scary being so close to the forest.’ She brings her sleeping bag up around her ears.

  ‘It’s the first warm night we’ve had this spring and I don’t want to waste it inside,’ I say stubbornly. I look up at the sky studded with stars. It’s so big and I am a tiny speck of plankton floating in a huge black ocean.

  My name is Ziggy Truegood. It should be Ziggy Archer because that’s Papa’s family name. But when Momma got married she kept her own name. Truegood. When I was little I decided I wanted the same name as Momma and Grandpa. It just felt right. And I try to be true and good. Although it doesn’t always work out that way.

  ‘Look!’ I cry suddenly. A shooting star, bigger and brighter than any I’ve ever seen, slices the sky in two. My heart trembles with excitement. Even the trees have gone quiet, as if they’re bowing in awe.

  ‘Wow!’ says Petal, and for a moment I know that we both share the wonder.

  I put my hand on my chest. For some reason, the words Grandpa Truegood said to me on Sunday drift into my head. We were sitting in the garden and I was staring at the grass, wishing that we were anywhere but there.

  ‘Don’t look at the ground, Ziggy. Look up,’ he said, lifting my chin. His eyes were unusually bright and clear. ‘The sky is your teacher. All that . . .’ he gestured grandly at the sky, ‘. . . is in there.’ And he tapped my chest.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ I replied.

  ‘You will.’

  And then his eyes had clouded over and the moment was gone.

  Petal grabs a handful of caramel-coated peanuts and her crunching brings me back to the present. The sky is dark again and the usual sounds of the woods have returned. I hear them purr. I hear the trees stretch their long roots like knobbly grey fingers. And I hear the rocks quivering in their cool earthy beds.

  I lie my head down on the grass, listening to the rustle of beetles and worms tunnelling underground. ‘There’s a whole orchestra playing music down there,’ I say.

  Petal laughs and bends down low to my ear. ‘You are crazy, Zigs. Guess that’s why I love you.’ Her breath is all maple-syrup sweetness.

  I give her a shove. ‘I remember the first day at school when we met. You looked like a frightened baby owl with your big eyes and halo of hair like soft red down all fluffed up around your face.’

  Petal laughs. ‘Well, I thought you were a brave heroine from a storybook,’ she says. ‘The way you stood up to that bully Harry Arnold, and he was so much bigger than you too.’ Petal waves her arm and the fine hairs on her arms shine in the moonlight like feathers.

  I smile and watch her. Often people remind me of animals. When I get to know them, it’s like their real self appears. Grandpa Truegood is a bear, Petal is an owl, and my other best friend, Big Bobby Little, is a gentle elephant. Momma makes me think of a shy woods deer. My teenage brothers, Pete and Jake – just thinking about them makes my heart hurt – are like tiger cubs, and Papa is an elusive wildebeest. Each and every townsperson reminds me of an animal, some mean and some nice.

  Strangely, I don’t know what I am. Sometimes I think I see a glimpse of something in the mirror or a window, but it’s just the light playing tricks. I hope I’m something true, something good. I like to think I am.

  Petal flops down next to me and sighs deeply. I know she wants to go inside. Petal and me are best friends but we’re different in so many ways.

  Well . . . I guess you could say I’m the different one. Different to everyone else in town. I love the woods. I wear pants, not dresses – I mean, who can climb trees or run along shadowy trails or crawl into burrows wearing a dress? I’d also love to leave Dell Hollow. Like Papa did. If I said this aloud to Petal, she would totally freak out. She loves our town, our life. Like everyone else in Dell Hollow, she has no desire to know what is out there, beyond Hushing Wood.

  The sound of a plate smashing in the kitchen makes me look across to the house.

  ‘Darn,’ I hear Momma say as she bends down to pick up the pieces.

  I remember not long ago when Momma and Papa were like a beautiful teapot filled with warm chamomile tea. Now there are too many missing pieces to glue back together. I guess that’s what happens when someone from the outside like Papa marries someone from the inside like Momma.

  Papa left Dell Hollow four weeks ago. Momma says it’s not because she and Papa don’t love each other any more. She says it’s much bigger than that and I wouldn’t understand because I’m just a child. But sometimes I think children are smarter than adults.

  Petal reaches out for my hand. Her touch is light, like a wing brushing my skin. She wriggles across on her bottom in her sleeping bag to be close. Then she looks down at her hands. I wait.

  ‘You could’ve gone with Pete and Jake when your papa left. Why didn’t you?’ she says at last. Petal’s never asked me this before – I think she was afraid I might choose to leave.

  I glance at the house. ‘Someone has to look after Momma,’ I say. ‘She’ll never leave Dell Hollow, even though she promised Papa she w
ould one day. And . . .’ I put my arm around her shoulder, ‘because then we couldn’t be best friends any more.’

  Petal smiles sadly. ‘I hope you never leave, Zigs. I hope your dad comes home and everything goes back to how it used to be.’

  So do I.

  I sigh and watch my mother. Before Papa left, before Grandpa Truegood stopped living with us, before the nightmares, that’s how I long for it to be.

  But I know it will never happen.

  I know, because I am going to drown on my twelfth birthday.

  If Papa’s car hadn’t broken down while he was driving across the country, I would never have been born. Momma was working at the bakery and Papa limped his car down into Dell Hollow. While he was waiting for it to be fixed, they fell in love over a cinnamon bun and a bottomless cup of coffee.

  Our town sits in a valley in the Gold Leaf Mountains. Surrounding us are the woods, which turn a flaming red in autumn. From up on the hill all you can see of Dell Hollow is the white church steeple rising above the trees. On top of the steeple sits a golden rooster with an emerald eye. Papa said it was this rooster that led him here.

  Dell Hollow started out as a goldmining town. People came from all over to fossick for gold. When it ran out, they left. Then emeralds were discovered. But they’re all gone now too. The townspeople rely on their farms and trading amongst themselves. It’s enough to keep Dell Hollow from becoming a ghost town.

  Papa lived here for fifteen years and was the town dentist, but he was never really accepted. And that made me, Jake and Pete kind of like outsiders too. Even as a little kid I could tell people thought we were different. I wasn’t often invited to birthday parties or to family picnics by Green Lake. Papa talked about leaving, or even just going on holiday, but it never happened – Momma always had an excuse, something always came up. They seemed happy and they had each other, and I thought that was enough.

  But it wasn’t.

  Since Papa left, things have gotten worse. The other day when I came through the door of the butcher shop, Mr Arnold – who used to smile and give me leftovers for Mystic – just looked over my shoulder as if I wasn’t there. The kids at school are over it now, but for a while it was like I had a horrible disease. Only Big Bobby Little and Petal stuck by me. Even Miss Cubby, my teacher, looks more stressed lately – she’s an outsider too. Sometimes I wonder, is that why Papa left? Did he feel like something wasn’t right? He always complained about the townspeople’s small minds and how they’re scared of the unknown. He said it made him feel claustrophobic. But was there something more?

  And then there’s the woods. They feel different lately. There’s a hum that was never there before.

  I look at our house. Momma’s wavy brown hair is tied into a loose ponytail. She almost looks like a girl. And as if she feels me staring, she looks up and waves through the kitchen window. I smile and wave back.

  I stroke the groove between Mystic’s eyes. Mystic is my dog. He’s part wolf, part something else. My index finger fits perfectly, as if my finger and his furrow were made for each other. He stands up, his nose in the air, nostrils twitching, picking up the scent of something. The hackles on his back rise like the peak of a wave and he growls. Surprised, I loop my fingers through his collar so he doesn’t run off. Because he’s a dog, Mystic knows the woods a hundred times better than I do. He can hear, smell and feel the woods with his animal heart. And he’s never growled at them like this before.

  A tendril of wind blows past and I can smell something wild and beastly. I double my scarf around me as I feel a cold shiver.

  ‘If Mystic’s growling, there must be something out there,’ Petal whispers. ‘I don’t know about you, but I am definitely sleeping inside.’

  This time, I don’t argue with her. We gather up the midnight snacks, fold the blanket, and drag our sleeping bags towards the house. As I turn to shut the back door, I look across to the edge of the woods.

  By the trunk of the sycamore tree something is moving.

  My breath catches. I take a step back.

  The woods have always been my friend. If you were in an aeroplane, looking out the window, I imagine you would see that they are in the shape of a giant sleeping cat, curled around the township of Dell Hollow, protecting it. Rising above the town are the mountains, and extending along the valley is farmland. After that, there are the plains. But no other towns. Not as far as you can see.

  Sometimes I am sure I can hear the trees in our woods purr. Sometimes I hear the whisper of them stretching away to the horizon. At night, even without a flashlight, when the woods are blanketed in thick darkness, I know my way. I know by how the trail feels under my feet – soft with leaf litter, pebbly, dry or mushy with rain. Or by the smell – mouldy, dank, minty, crisp. I see the trails as vines, twisting and threading through the sleeping cat’s fur. And each has its own glimmer. Look at me, the woods whisper. Look what I have to show you. And then I look, and there might be a moth basking under a full moon, moving its wings to the earth’s silent heartbeat.

  Never have I felt unwelcome in the woods before.

  But now, for the first time, as I watch the dark shifting shadow, I have an inkling of how the townspeople feel, how Petal feels, about the woods. Afraid.

  ‘What’s wrong, Ziggy?’

  I jump at the sound of Momma’s voice. The shadow melts back into the trees. ‘Ah . . . nothing,’ I say, shutting the door firmly behind me. I follow her into the living room, where Petal and Mystic are already playing on the floor.

  Momma smiles. ‘Want me to make you both a mug of hot cocoa?’

  ‘That would be lovely, Mrs Truegood,’ Petal says. ‘I’m going to talk Ziggy into wearing a dress to the school dance tomorrow night.’

  ‘Good luck,’ says Momma with a little laugh.

  We go down the hall to my room with our sleeping bags and snacks and the first thing I do is pull down the blind. I’ve always loved my bedroom, how the big floor-to-ceiling window looks right out onto the woods. But tonight, for the very first time, I shut the woods out.

  Petal slips off her shoes and jumps on my bed. She pulls the gold-red tips of her ponytail forward and brushes them lightly over her cheek as she thinks. ‘So . . . Ziggy, what are you wearing to the dance?’

  ‘My blue top and yellow striped pants. I haven’t decided which scarf to wear yet,’ I say, standing on tiptoe and pushing my sleeping bag into its spot on the top shelf of my closet. I’m not tall enough and it keeps falling out.

  ‘Don’t you want to dress up . . . for the boys?’ The corner of her mouth twitches in the way I know too well.

  ‘Whatever you’re about to say, Petal, don’t.’

  I see her take a breath, and before she can get the words out I throw her on the bed and pin her down with my legs on either side of her body. I cover her mouth with my hand. She giggles and squirms. She’s bigger, but I’m stronger.

  ‘But maa dress ess perfec fer oo.’

  Her muffled words slip between my fingers.

  ‘I’ll let you up if you quit this conversation,’ I say. ‘You know it’s no use. I’ve never worn a dress in my life and I never will.’

  She tries to speak again but I interrupt her.

  ‘No, not even when I get married,’ I say.

  ‘Aw righ. Aw righ,’ she cries and I roll off her.

  ‘What about for your birthday then, Zigs? Please. For me?’

  The pit of my stomach drops. I feel sick.

  Her laughter fades. ‘Are you okay?’ She peers at me, concerned. Then she rolls her eyes. ‘It’s that stupid dream, isn’t it?’

  I cross my arms over my chest as if I can keep the anger from rising inside. Be true and be good, Ziggy, I tell myself. It’s no use.

  ‘Petal, I keep telling you, it’s not just a dream,’ I say crossly. ‘When you have the same nightmare for four weeks, that’s called a premonition.’ I’m almost shouting now.

  ‘I think you should see Dr Mendel,’ she says, shrugging.
r />   ‘I’m not seeing any doctor!’

  ‘Well, at least you should tell your mom.’

  I shake my head. Momma hasn’t been the same since Papa left and I’m not going to worry her. Besides, she wouldn’t believe me either. People in Dell Hollow do not believe in ghosts or premonitions or magic or anything supernatural. The only other person I’ve told is Big Bobby Little. There are lots of people who talk too much. They don’t notice things that happen around them because they’re too interested in themselves. That’s not Big Bobby though. When he was a baby, something went wrong with his voice box. Because he can’t talk, he watches, and he sees things other people don’t see. He knows there are strange things happening in our town.

  The nightmares began as daydreams. I’d hear water rushing inside my head and everything around me would fade and then I’d see – no, more like feel – a huge creature grabbing me. I would start to sweat and panic and want to run.

  Then I began to have the dreams at night. But this time the creature was a huge silver beast with flashing claws pushing me down under the rushing water.

  ‘Let’s say your nightmare is a premonition,’ says Petal. ‘How do you know you’re going to drown? You always wake up before the end.’

  It’s true. I do wake up before I actually drown. But everyone knows you can’t die in a dream. You just wake up. Maybe that’s what dying is, anyway.

  ‘Big Bobby Little and I will protect you,’ Petal says.

  I say nothing. I hear rain ticking against the window and the wind rattling the glass.

  ‘We won’t let you go anywhere near Green Lake or Fiddlers Stream on your birthday. We won’t even let you have a bath,’ she says, smiling again.

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it any more, Petal,’ I say. I look down at Mystic curled up on the rug, his body twitching inside a doggy dream. Who will love him when I’m gone?

  We finish our hot cocoa and midnight snacks. While Petal writes in her diary, I pick up the white jade bottle that Grandpa Truegood gave me when I was little. I like to hold it when I’m worried. There’s a perfect miniature painting on the inside of the bottle, done with an L-shaped brush made from tiny mouse hairs. The painting is a girl standing on a mountain path in a long green gown with a pink sash. Her hair hangs down her back in a black ponytail like an exclamation mark. Above her is a pagoda with clouds swirling around its roof. I nestle it into one palm and cover it with my other hand until it grows warm, almost like it’s a heart I’m gently holding.