Jamie Buxton - Sun Thief

Ahead of me the pyramids loom above the rooftops. They’ve never seemed so big and black and jagged. The ghouls are gathering – I know they are – and I can’t see Imi anywhere.

My steps slow. I am awed by the grandeur of everything around me. I’m sure I can hear dark things calling me in whispers. Dread seeps through cracked walls. I stare into a doorway under a wide porch and am backing away from it when something clutches my ankle . . .

I stumble and fall backwards, too shocked to make a sound. A hand flutters over my mouth. I screw my eyes shut, feel breath on my face . . .

‘ Sssss! ’ the ghoul hisses. ‘ Shhh .’

Then: ‘Open your eyes. It’s me!’

I open my eyes. Yes, it’s Imi, but she looks terrified.

‘Shh! People. Here!’

When you’re well-behaved like Imi, getting caught is unimaginably bad – even worse than ghosts – but I’m so relieved to see her that I stop being scared for a moment. Her beautiful new tunic, once so white it glowed, is filthy now, but I don’t care.

Then I hear the voices too. They’re coming from both ends of the street so we’re trapped. Some families hire guards to watch over the graves. If it’s them, we’re in trouble. I look for places to hide. The porches are wide open to the street. It’ll have to be inside one of the houses of the dead.

The nearest door is twice my height and set with copper panels. It scrapes open just enough for us to slip in. Half the roof has fallen in so I can just make out a broken chair, a bed, furniture, musical instruments, smashed jars. There are shelves all the way round stacked with mummies – people on the left, cats and other animals on the right. They’re lying this way and that, like there’s been an earthquake, and the floor is crunchy with shattered tiles. The air is musty and musky.

Imi starts to whimper. ‘I don’t like it, I don’t like it.’

I almost snap, IT’S YOUR FAULT, but control myself.

The voices outside are getting closer. Greetings are called. I lift Imi on to a shelf, clear a space, then slide her behind a family of mummified cats.

They’re right outside now. I dive behind a mummy lying on the bottom shelf, but it’s so light it falls to the floor. Something quick and dark scrabbles away.

‘What was that?’ A startled voice comes from right outside the door. There’s no time to pull the mummy back on to the shelf, so I roll off and pull it on top of me. It’s big enough to hide me, but I’m breathing in mummy scent and mummy dust. I’m breathing in . . . someone dead.

‘It came from in there.’ A second voice, cold and sneering.

They heard me. They’re coming in.

I hear a third voice: ‘What? In here?’ I think I’ve heard it before, but I can’t quite remember when. It sounds slow and rather stupid.

Three voices then: one cold and sneery, one worried and jittery, and one slow and stupid.

‘What do you think it is?’ Worried and Jittery asks.

‘Only one way to find out,’ Cold and Sneery answers.

‘What?’ Slow and Stupid joins in.

‘Go and look,’ Cold and Sneery snaps.

‘Why is it always me?’ Slow and Stupid grumbles.

Where have I heard him before?

‘Because you’re so brave,’ Cold and Sneery sneers coldly.

The door scrapes across the floor. I hope and hope and hope it’s too dark for them to see our footprints in the dust.

‘Anything?’ Worried and Jittery sounds, well, worried and jittery.

‘Can’t see,’ Slow and Stupid says. ‘It’s dark and I don’t like it. It’s full of . . .’

‘You’re not scared, are you?’ Cold and Sneery interrupts. ‘Just get a move on.’

Footsteps shuffle across the floor. Something skitters away in the darkness. Slow and Stupid shrieks out a sound like WHUFFLE! which brings the others running. I pull my mummy as close to me as possible and then it starts to move, with a scraping and a scratching, as if the body inside is trying to get out.

A scream gathers in my chest.

‘What?’ says Worried and Jittery. ‘What’s going on?’

‘Something’s moving. It ran across the floor!’

‘It’s just a rat! Come out, you idiot!’ Cold and Sneery laughs.

The mummy shifts. Squeaks. Then I realise it’s not a dead person trying to get out of the mummy, it’s rats – a disturbed family of rats. I feel around until I find the rat hole. The last thing I want is baby rats crawling out all over me and the first thing I want is for those men to go away.

But they stay. Of course they stay. They go back outside, stand under the big covered porch, and they start to talk.

Cold and Sneery starts off with, ‘Well? I told you it was a good place to meet in secret. I’d have thought you were used to tombs by now.’

‘Not with bodies in, I’m not,’ Slow and Stupid says. ‘Not like Jatty.’

‘Oh, I forgot. You just dig the tombs and leave the hard work to everyone else. And don’t use names, you idiot,’ Cold and Sneery says.

‘It’s hard work digging tombs,’ Slow and Stupid says.

‘Not as hard as breaking in and finding out that they haven’t mummified the body properly and the first thing you touch is an oozing grave shroud,’ Worried and Jittery answers.

‘Enough with the hard-luck stories,’ Cold and Sneery says. ‘What have you got to report?’

‘We think we’ve found him,’ Worried and Jittery answers, talking fast. ‘He’s staying nearby. Bek’s description matches: big, ugly, moon-faced, scary bloke. Keeps himself to himself.’

‘What did I say about names? Oh, never mind. Where exactly is he staying?’

I’ve got a pain starting in the arm that’s trapped under my body and I think the baby rats have found the hand that’s blocking the hole in the mummy’s side because I can feel their warm noses and itchy whiskers against it. But when I hear the answer, I forget all discomfort.

‘An inn. This side of town. Got an old shrine round the back.’

‘And you’ve checked this out?’

‘I did,’ says Slow and Stupid. ‘He came into town by the north road and I followed him. Had a drink at the inn and took a room.’

‘You did?’

‘No, he did. Think I’m stupid?’

‘Yes. Did he recognise you?’

‘No. I saw him on a job years ago. He never noticed me then and he didn’t notice me now.’

I remember where I heard the voice before. He was one of the men at the inn yesterday. Without a doubt, the Quiet Gentleman is the ugly, moon-faced, scary bloke.

The man with the cold voice is talking again, sounding excited. ‘That double-crossing rat. The first thing we have to do is search his room. He won’t have got rid of it. Trust me. And if he’s hidden it we can make him talk. No, I’ve got a better idea. We’ll wait and see whether he’s moving on or staying put, and then we’ll . . .’

At last they start walking away and their voices grow fainter before they fade to nothing.

I push the mummy off me and stand up. It’s darker outside now and almost pitch-black inside. I can’t see the shelf Imi’s on and whichever way I turn it’s just going to be mummies everywhere.

‘Imi,’ I whisper. ‘Imi.’

No answer. I force myself to think. The door must be ahead of me so Imi’s to my left. I feel for the shelf I left her on, scattering mummified cats and birds and not caring how many rat families I’m disturbing. My fingers touch something warm.

‘Imi?’ I whisper again.

‘Yes?’

‘You all right?’

‘I was asleep. The cats were trying to talk to me, but I couldn’t understand what they were saying because they were talking cat language.’ I feel her sit up. ‘Can we go home now?’