Rocking Horse War (10 page)

“You go home if you like, Pearl, but I think the best way to stay safe in a war between the Swanns and the Horsburghs is to hold the only thing more powerful than they are. So I’m climbing the Keystone Peak.”

The sisters stood at the edge of the cliff and glared at each other.

Emmie had the blonde curls, pink cheeks and wide eyes of all the triplets, but when she closed off the smile, Pearl recognised her own square chin.

Pearl clenched her fists and shoved them in her pockets. “I’m your big sister. I came all this way to save you. You have to do what I say!”

Emmie put her hands on her hips. “I was doing fine on my own, thanks. And what I
have
to do is find the keystone.”

Pearl remembered Ruby sniffling and Jasper gazing at Thomas, and she yelled, “Not one of you pays any attention to me! I don’t know why I’m bothering to rescue you! You’re simply not worth it!”

As Pearl turned away in disgust, she saw, far below, the tiny figures of a horse and rider galloping from the castle towards the mountains.

“Thomas! He’s coming after us!”

Emmie looked down. “He’s riding my horse! How dare he!”

“Surely he won’t risk jumping the horse over that wall.”

But Thomas leapt off the toy horse, twisted his 
staff, and blasted a hole in the wall with a deep clang which they heard echoing from the slopes around.

Pearl frowned at this fast and destructive way of dealing with the barrier. Maybe Thomas hadn’t needed her boost over the wall at all. Perhaps the oath, the handclasp and the thank you had just been a way to get Pearl on his side again. She sighed, remembering how she’d helped him break into the castle then led him to Emmie. She’d made it too easy for him.

Thomas gave quick instructions to the white horse, who trotted off towards the river. Then he began climbing, digging his precious staff viciously into the sparse undergrowth to haul himself up as fast as he could.

“He’s in a bad mood,” said Emmie. “And we have nothing to defend ourselves with. We have to get the keystone.”

She turned her back on the boy below and headed for the steeper slope of the Keystone Peak.

Pearl sighed and followed her little sister. She had always wanted to conquer this mountain, and it was a beautiful day for a climb.

Pearl and Emmie had a lot less breath to chat or argue; they were pushing up an ever steeper slope as fast as their legs could bear.

Even so, Pearl found enough breath to ask, “What does this keystone
do
?”

“From what Thomas told you, and what the Laird told me, I think it links people who can hear the land to the music and power of these mountains.”

“What does it look like?”

“I’ve no idea,” said Emmie cheerfully. “I’ll listen when we get there. I’m sure I’ll find it.”

Pearl had been just as confident she could find Emmie in a silent castle, so it was hard to challenge this vague optimism. Instead she climbed even faster, got ahead of her sister, and concentrated on finding the best way up.

She checked behind and below occasionally, but she couldn’t see Thomas. The lower slopes were hidden from this height; he could be following them, even catching up.

Would he know where they were going? He wasn’t a skilled tracker, but he might have seen them turn away from the pass and begin to climb the Keystone Peak. 

There was no point in worrying about Thomas, Pearl decided. Emmie was determined to reach the summit whether he was following them or not.

They strode round scattered heaps of boulders, the dour grey piles brightened by thin stripes of white quartzite or small lumps of pink granite.

The ascent of the peak was no more difficult, so far, than any of the mountains in the northern range. “I
can
do this on my own,” Pearl murmured, “without Father by my side or Peter’s maps in my head.”

Pearl led Emmie over a lip at the top of the slope, onto the plateau with the jutting peak on its western edge.

The plateau was formed from flat plates of grey stone, lying beside each other like tiles. However, the rocks weren’t level, nor were they fitted neatly together. They were tilted and skewed, as if an ancient mosaic’s smooth pattern had been distorted when the floor underneath subsided.

The slabs didn’t wobble as the girls put their weight on them, but Pearl saw hollow dark space between them as she stepped over the cracks, and wondered how stable they were. She wondered what happened to mountains when they sang. Was it safe to walk on them?

“I can’t go any further, Pearl, I have to sit down.” Emmie flopped onto a grey slab. Pearl knelt down to rub her little sister’s leg muscles so they didn’t seize up.

“Stretch out,” she said. “Just for five minutes. If Thomas has worked out where we’re going, we need to stay well ahead of him.” Emmie lay down on the flat rock. 

Pearl saw a sudden spark of colour by Emmie’s head. She scrambled forward. In the gap between the slabs, flowers were growing: tiny alpine plants with short thick stems, small dark leaves and pinprick bright flowers. The only plants she’d seen thriving on the whole mountain range. In this one little dip, there were four different colours.

“Look, Emmie!” she said in delight. “It’s the narrowest flowerbed I’ve ever seen.”

Emmie rolled over and peered in. “How can they grow so high up?”

“They’re sheltered from the wind, the rain runs off the slabs to water them and the rock holds the heat of the sun. It’s a mountain greenhouse. Perhaps these mountains aren’t finished yet.”

Emmie lay back down. “A greenhouse? Are there any tomatoes growing there? Any bananas or pineapples?”

“Are you really hungry?”

“Famished. Are you sure you don’t have any snacks in your pockets? That pinafore’s usually better than a picnic basket.”

“All I had was a carrot, which I fed to Conker, and a sandwich, which I fed to the swans.”

“Please look again, Pearl. I’m starving.”

So Pearl emptied her pockets. She pulled out an empty matchbox, scraps of paper, chewed pencil stubs, half a ruler, a tartan ribbon, a hoofpick and three different thicknesses of string.

Pearl frowned at the crushed matchbox and the splintered ruler, and felt the bruises from the scree ache all over her body. What else had the rocks broken? She pulled out sharp fragments of 
stripy snail shells and a blue speckled feather now snapped in two.

Emmie was rummaging through the pile.

“You can’t eat any of that,” Pearl pointed out.

“I know, but there might be something useful.”

“It can
all
be useful,” said Pearl, “depending on what you need at the time.”

She added to the pile. A couple of rocks from the riverbank, handkerchiefs, a reed she’d been making into a whistle, the oilcloth which had protected the mirror and a few fingerfuls of fluff.

“That’s it.” She patted the pinafore. “My pockets are empty. No food at all. We’d better get going.” She started to fill her pockets again.

“What’s this?” Emmie untangled a jagged stone from a lacy handkerchief. It was dark grey and shiny, reflecting light from its many irregular surfaces.

Pearl glanced at the stone as she wound the ribbon neatly round her fingers. “I think it’s a flint, so I tried to chip it into an arrowhead. But it’s not very sharp.”

The stone was shaped like a beech leaf, with a blunt point at one end, then it curved outwards and back to a sharper point. The tiny hollows and planes formed by Pearl’s careful chipping made it look like a large smoky gem, cut for a giant’s ring.

“It’s lovely,” said Emmie. “It’s as old as the mountains, but you’ve made it new. It might be useful, but I don’t think it would bring down a deer.” She handed it back, and watched as Pearl put it in a pocket.

Pearl stood up, stretched and turned towards to 
the summit of the Keystone Peak. Emmie stood up too. She groaned.

“We don’t have to climb all the way to the top,” Pearl said gently.

“Yes, we do.” Emmie pointed back the way they had come.

Thomas was clambering onto the plateau.

Pearl seized Emmie’s hand and they ran, away from Thomas and towards the summit.

They were startled by a crash from behind them. Both girls turned to see Thomas strike his staff on a rock and produce another echoing boom.

“Emerald Chayne. I defeated the Laird for you. Now I’ve come to lead you to your destiny. Don’t let your sister take you home to be bored and respectable. Come with me and enjoy your true power.”

Emmie’s voice carried through the clear mountain air. “My destiny is ahead of me, not behind. And it isn’t with you and your grandfather.”

She hauled on Pearl’s hand and they raced over the uneven tiles. Thomas’s voice followed them. “If you come with me now, I won’t harm either of you. But if you defy me, Emmie, I will sweep your sister out of the way to get at you. Do you want to see her fly, like the Grey Men flew?”

Emmie looked up at Pearl, her face filled with doubt for the first time that afternoon.

Pearl looked around quickly. Unless she wanted to jump off the mountain, there were only two ways off the plateau: west, up to the summit; or east, down to the Grey Men’s Grave. Thomas blocked the eastern descent, and Emmie’s keystone, if it existed, might be at the top of the western ascent. So Pearl grinned reassuringly at her sister. “Don’t worry about me. He’s just a big bully. Let’s get your stone.”

She let go of Emmie’s hand so they wouldn’t pull each other off balance as they jumped from slab to slab. Then she led the way swiftly across the narrowing plain of flat rocks, towards the sharp ridge rising to the summit.

The boom Thomas had used to get their attention sounded again, but now Pearl felt the distant noise as well as heard it. He was hurling the same crashing power at them as he’d used to wreck the castle.

Pearl pushed Emmie in front of her, getting between her sister and the next wave of sound. A blast hit Pearl’s shoulder, knocking her down to her knees. She scrambled to her feet and kept running, bruises throbbing.

But it was hard to keep moving fast across 
the tilted tiles while bracing herself for the next painful blow. When she looked back to see when it would come, she saw Thomas sprinting towards them. His next bolt of power would hit her even harder because he’d be much closer.

As he raised his staff, Pearl turned to face him. “Keep going, Emmie. I’ll try to stop him.”

“Don’t be daft. What will you stop him with?”

As Thomas twisted his staff, Emmie slipped in front of Pearl and spread her arms wide.

When the sound reached them, Emmie didn’t flinch from it or grunt with the impact; she curled her arms round the wave of air and seemed to embrace it. Pearl watched in amazement as Thomas sent another boom, and Emmie caught that too.

Thomas lowered his staff and frowned.

“This is easy,” Emmie said. “Perhaps he’s not as clever as he looks. But I wish I had somewhere sensible to store this power. Let’s keep going, Pearl, but if you think he’s going to send another blast, tell me. I want as much of his power as I can hold.”

Pearl and Emmie ran towards the ridge, trying to ignore their tiring legs, checking constantly behind them. Every time Thomas stopped and aimed the staff at them, Emmie faced him with her arms wide.

Thomas must have realised that his sound blasts were no longer harming them, that Emmie even welcomed them, because he stopped attacking and just kept chasing them.

When they were only a hundred yards from 
the start of the ridge, Pearl turned again and saw that Thomas was no longer running. He lifted his staff, planted it in the space between two slabs, and knelt down beside it. Pearl saw his hand curl round the staff, and remembered the rock that had moved in the Grey Men’s Grave.

She called to Emmie, “Faster! I think he’s trying to move the stones.”

Emmie leapt from slab to slab. “This is like the game where bears eat you if you stand on the cracks in the pavement!”

Pearl grunted. “But in Perth the bears are pretend.” She glanced back at the real threat behind them, and saw a ripple of rock start at Thomas’s staff. It moved towards them like a wave. The slabs flicked up and down, like checked squares on a tablecloth being shaken free of crumbs.

“Run, Emmie!”

Pearl glanced back as they ran, and saw the rocks in front of Thomas lift high and crash down. For a heartbeat, she worried about the flowers in between them. Then she concentrated on getting as far away from Thomas as fast as she could.

A moment later, she heard the slabs right behind her shift.

“Keep running, Emmie!”

The stone beneath her boots twisted and she slid backwards. She saw the gaps between the slabs widening, and wondered what the inside of a mountain looked like. Then the rocks ahead rose and fell, like a churning sea of stone, and Emmie was tossed in the air. They reached for each other’s 
hands and Pearl hauled Emmie onto her rocking stone.

The motion swung them round to face Thomas, crouched on the shore of the bucking slabs, shaking with effort, gripping his staff and singing a deep moaning command. Higher and faster waves spread out towards the girls.

Emmie stood in front of Pearl. “Hold me steady, but leave my hands free.”

So Pearl, struggling to keep her own balance, wrapped her arms round her sister’s waist.

Emmie held out her hands, palms down, fingers spread, and she sang. Her notes were pure and strong, her words calm and soothing, her voice clear and convincing, as if she was singing in her mother tongue. Pearl felt her sister’s body shudder against her ribcage as Emmie pushed all the energy she could onto the rock beneath their feet.

The rocking slab slowed, steadied and stopped. It held them still and safe, while the rest of the slabs on the plateau slipped and crashed.

“How did you learn to do that?” Pearl still held her sister tight.

“I didn’t! I’m just making it up.”

“Can you make us a path of stepping stones up to the ridge?”

“No, I’ve used all the power I took from Thomas holding this one.” Emmie’s hands dropped to her sides.

Thomas lifted his head and looked at them, together on one small calm island in a sea of chaos.

Emmie waved at him, wiggling the tips of her fingers.

Thomas waved back. “Well done, Emerald!” he called. “You must have a rare skill to seize and use energy like that. I can’t store any power without my staff. And how clever of you to use
all
that stolen energy to hold your stone steady. But now you haven’t got any power left! What a shame!”

Emmie sagged in Pearl’s arms. “Oh no. We’ve done exactly what he wanted. He wanted me to use up the power he gave me. Sorry.”

“Maybe he
is
as clever as he looks,” muttered Pearl. Then she shouted, “I thought you weren’t like the Laird, Thomas. I thought you never forced the land to move for you. I thought you wanted to heal it not hurt it!”

Thomas looked down at the moving stones, then back up at the girls. “Wars aren’t won by sticking to the rules. And you two aren’t doing
anything
the way we expected. The triplets weren’t meant to run or hide or argue or fight. You’re meant to be on
our
side! You’re making this day very difficult, so I think I’m justified in doing anything to get you back.” He grinned suddenly. “And if you don’t agree, Pearl, if you want to make me feel guilty, then you just stay right there and I’ll come and discuss it with you!”

He stood up, pulled his staff from the ground, and started running towards them. As soon as he lifted the staff, the slabs ahead of him began to settle down, but jolting and jerking stones still surrounded Emmie and Pearl.

“We can’t wait for them all to stop moving; he’ll reach us before then,” decided Pearl. “Run for the summit!” 

So Pearl and Emmie turned, jumped onto the shifting rock behind them and tried to run over the lurching plateau.

The stones slid apart, leaving deep gaps under their feet; the stones crashed together, threatening to crush them between edges and corners. Pearl leapt off each slab not knowing if it would follow her upwards, knocking her feet from under her; she aimed for the next slab not knowing if it would still be there when she landed.

She kept one stone behind Emmie, and watched as her sister, with shorter legs but more grace, timed her leaps well. Soon the slabs were moving less violently, but Pearl knew that if the last ripple was reaching them, so was Thomas.

She looked round. He was much closer now, moving fast on stones that lay flat just as he reached them, and she could see exhilaration on his face. He was getting to fight his war today.

The girls had almost reached the edge of the plateau. The start of the ridge reared up ahead of them.

“Emmie,” Thomas yelled, “Emmie. I still have years’ worth of power in my staff, but you’ve used up your stolen power and you’ve no lore to help you gather more. You’ve nothing left to fight me with.”

The girls leapt off the last shuddering slab onto the sharp ridge.

“I don’t want to hurt you, Emmie, because I need to take you to my grandfather. But I don’t need Pearl. And you have no power left to protect her. Come back here, Emmie!” 

Emmie called, “I won’t turn back now. And I won’t let you hurt my sister.” She nodded at Pearl. “Lead on, big sister. I’ll be right behind you.”

So Pearl started up the ridge to the summit, her little sister a step behind, a shield between her and Thomas.

The ridge hung like a silver shawl on a clothes line, pegged to the corner of the plateau at one end and to the summit of the Keystone at the other; sweeping up in a line to the peak, draping down either side. The ridge was so narrow, Pearl expected it to sway and billow in a breath of wind.

Even if Emmie hadn’t been protecting Pearl’s back, they couldn’t have climbed two abreast, and it was impossible to run. They had to walk carefully, watching their footing with every step. Pearl hoped Thomas would be walking just as slowly; if he moved less cautiously, he could catch up before they reached the summit.

There was no safe path along the ridge. Pearl was climbing along the slanted top edge of layered rock, jamming her feet into corners, using the angle of the rock to stop herself slipping.

“If he makes these rocks move, we’ll have no chance. It’s dangerous enough with everything standing still.”

“He can’t dislodge you without dislodging me too,” murmured Emmie. “We just have to reach the top and get the keystone before he does.”

Pearl looked at the pointed peak ahead. There was nothing there but bare rock. There was nothing under her feet but bare rock. There was nothing around her but air. 

She heard breathing behind her. Emmie’s shallow fast breathing. Was that Thomas’s breathing too, harder, deeper, catching up?

Pearl concentrated on each step, each breath.

Left, right, left, right. In, out, in, out.

She waited fearfully for a punch of sound between her shoulders, or for the stone under her boots to shift and fall.

Left, right; in, out.

She kept going, racing at a snail’s pace to the summit.