Stephen Irwin - The Darkening

‘I’m not going home,’ she said flatly.

‘You don’t know what you’re getting into.’

‘So, tell me. Spiders took my sister two nights ago and now she’s dead. Whatever got her wanted to kill me. They said the man on the TV news did it, but I don’t think it was him. Not really.’ She seemed to remember something. ‘I know it tried to get me the other day on the path. And it would have, if you hadn’t. .’

Her voice trailed off. She looked at the ground and then stuck out her right hand.

‘I’m Hannah Gerlic. Thank you for saving me the other day.’

For the third time in two minutes, Nicholas was amazed by this tiny person. He took her hand.

‘I’m Nicholas Close.’

‘Were you there by accident or on purpose?’ Hannah asked. The civility that had been in her voice was gone. This was short, sharp interrogation. He no longer felt the need to lie.

‘You found a bird. A dead bird,’ he said.

‘I thought I found a unicorn,’ she corrected. ‘But then it turned out to be a bird.’

Nicholas stared away into the gloom of green and brown.

Hannah watched him.

‘Mr Close?’

He nodded to himself. ‘What a fucking bitch,’ he said.

Hannah blushed. ‘You shouldn’t swear.’

‘People swear, Hannah, get over it.’ He stood and brushed clean his knees. ‘I found a bird just like you did when I was a kid. And she nearly got me. She got my best friend instead. You said spiders?’

She nodded. ‘They came for me, but I wouldn’t let them in the room. They got Miriam though.’

Nicholas stared at the girl. What sort of a kid sees what she’s seen and then comes after it?

‘You’re some kind of a freak, are you?’ he asked.

She stared at him coolly with those dark eyes. ‘You’re rude. I don’t think I like you.’

‘Yeah, that’s going around.’ Nicholas picked up the shotgun. ‘Go home, Hannah.’

He began climbing back up the slope. Hannah quickly stuffed the pungent wet things back into her pack and hurried after him.

Nicholas looked down at her. This kid was brave.

Like Tristram.

‘This old woman. She kills children.’

‘I know. It got my sister, remember ?’

‘It’s a she. And she’s. .’ He shrugged. ‘She’s been around a long time. She’s dangerous, Hannah. You really gotta go home.’

‘I have to go home.’

‘Yep,’ he agreed, relieved to be finally getting through to her.

‘Yes.’

But she kept following him. Then the penny dropped.

‘Are you correcting me?’ he asked.

‘Yes. You don’t speak well,’ Hannah replied, shouldering her backpack. ‘I don’t want to go home. But since I don’t have anything to burn her with any more-’

‘Good.’

‘-I’ll help you.’

She struggled to keep up with him. Trickles of blood ran down her thin legs from cuts on her knees and shins. He checked his watch. It was nearly three. If he took her back, it would be after four by the time he returned, leaving less than ninety minutes of light — if you could call this murky gloom light. He stopped and took her by the shoulders and knelt to look her straight in the eye.

‘She cuts their throats, Hannah. I don’t know if I can protect you. She’s probably expecting me. I have a shot, but I don’t honestly like my chances. I can’t be responsible for you, too. You should go home, and put your energy into convincing your parents to move somewhere safe and dull. Suggest Canberra.’

He rose, turned and started walking again.

A moment later, he heard her footsteps behind him.

A quarter of an hour later, the water pipe loomed above them like a glacial wave of rust red. Nicholas realised the steel flanks were the exact colour of dried and crusted blood. Rainwater flowed out of the twin tunnels below the pipe; the forest floor was still weeping out the heavy rainfall. They had followed the creek up the gully to the pipe, but it had been Hannah who’d pointed at the water.

‘Look.’

Small creatures floundered in the cold, tea-coloured stream. Spiders. Spindly, fat-bodied orb weavers; squat jumpers; spiny, coal-black widows; platforms; broad huntsmen; chunky imperials — all scrambled to escape the cold, mumbling waters, clutching at twigs or knotted in groups to crawl over each other. Some floated with their crablike bellies in the air, curled like dead fists, drowned.

‘This could be bad,’ said Nicholas.

It was.

The tunnels under the water pipe were so thick with web that there were no circles of light at their far ends. The mass of silk was so dense that it overflowed the pipe and the water carried it like an obscene caul some three metres downstream. Thousands of spiders made the silk shimmer darkly.

Hannah turned away and vomited up her lunch.

Nicholas watched, not sure whether to help her or leave her. He shifted awkwardly. ‘You all right?’

She nodded and wiped her mouth.

‘I think she knows we’re coming,’ he said.

Hannah dragged her eyes to the tunnels. ‘You went through there?’ she whispered.

‘It wasn’t as. . bad as this.’

She looked at him, as if appraising him afresh.

Nicholas checked his watch and a fresh ripple of fear fluttered up his spine. The day was vanishing fast. He’d planned to repeat his trick, throwing another bug bomb into the pipe and this time lighting the gas. But the web plugged the tunnels so solidly that he wouldn’t be able to get the can more than an arm’s length in.

‘We need a ladder. We need two ladders,’ he mumbled. He looked over at Hannah. She was frowning, deep in thought.

‘What?’ he asked.

‘How does she get through?’

Nicholas shook his head. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘How does Quill get through?’ asked Hannah. ‘You said she makes herself look like a girl and works in the shops on Myrtle Street. If her cottage is on the other side, she must come through somehow, right? Unless she can fly.’ She looked at him, clearly worried. ‘Can she fly?’

Nicholas shook his head. He felt a fool. Of course Quill would have another way through.

‘There must be a break in the pipe.’

Hannah shrugged as if that was obvious.

If there was a break in the pipe, it could be anywhere half a kilometre in either direction. It might take hours to find, and, knowing Quill, it would be disguised. Nicholas checked his watch again. It was three thirty. The temperature was already starting to fall.

‘I don’t know where to start,’ he said hopelessly. ‘Hacking our way through this bush is going to take hours-’

‘Lift me up.’

‘What?’

‘Lift me up,’ repeated Hannah. ‘I can walk along the top and look from up there. And I can go fast. My balance is good, see?’ She stood on one foot.

Any other time, Nicholas would have said they should turn back, that it wasn’t worth risking her neck. But he was sure that if he didn’t deal with Quill before nightfall, he would be the next to die. And if he didn’t kill Quill, she would kill again. And again, and again.

‘All right. I’ll get down, you stand on my shoulders, then I’ll grab your feet and push up. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

He knelt. She put her hands on the flanks of the pipe and carefully stepped up onto one shoulder, then the other. When she was ready, he slowly stood, and realised for the thousandth time that he really should exercise more — his thighs burned.

‘Yeah?’

‘Go!’

He grabbed both her feet and lifted. Hannah sprawled over the top of the pipe and swung her legs clear. She stood. ‘I’m up!’ She grinned and looked around. ‘Which way?’

Logic wasn’t going to help here. Nicholas tried to clear his mind, to forget the ticking clock, and found himself pointing.