Siobhan Curham - Dark of the Moon

I start pacing round the fire. She can’t have cared about me at all. She lied to me. She made me think she was the only person I could count on, and all the time . . . But she could be dead. The enormity of that realisation snuffs out my angry thoughts in an instant. I take one last look at the notebook then drop it on to the fire. A cloud of steam hisses up from it.

‘Grace, honey, are you okay?’ the Flea calls over from the cluster of trees where he’s helping Belle to pack.

‘I’m fine,’ I mumble, sitting back down. I glance back into the case and notice a glint of silver. I look closer. ‘Oh, no!’

‘What is it?’ The Flea starts walking over to me.

A silver chain is draped across Jenna’s nail polish remover. I take it out and hold it up to the firelight. A pendant sways on the end. A pendant engraved with a snake above the letter H – for Hortense.

‘The pendant!’ The Flea exclaims.

I nod numbly.

The Flea frowns and scratches his head. ‘How the heck did it get there? Where did you put it after we found it?’

I think back to when the pendant last appeared, by the HELP sign we’d made on the beach. Right after I’d seen someone trashing the sign. I’d taken it on to the boat – and flung it out to sea. So how had it ended up in Jenna’s case? I remember Hortense whispering to me in the forest and telling me that every time Jenna had hurt me she’d done something to hurt her back. Was this her way of letting me know that she’d wrecked the boat? Had she killed Jenna for me? Then I think of how that one single line in the journal had remained legible. Had Hortense somehow managed to preserve it from water damage – so that I would see it? So that I would discover the truth?

‘Where’s Cruz?’ I say, looking around frantically.

‘He’s right there, by the boat, honey.’The Flea takes hold of my arm. ‘What’s up?’

‘Is everything okay, Grace?’ Belle calls over from the trees.

‘Yes, I’m fine,’ I call back, but my voice is shrill. I turn to the Flea. ‘How’d the necklace get in her case?’ I whisper. ‘I threw it into the sea.’

The Flea frowns. ‘Why’d you do that?’

I start scuffing at the sand with my toe. ‘I – it was making me uneasy, the way it kept turning up all the time.’

The Flea raises his eyebrows. ‘Well, I guess it was washed up on the shore and Jenna took it. You know how mad she got when it went missing the first time.’

I nod and take a deep breath. I want to believe him. I really do. But fear keeps on clawing at my mind.

‘Okay, guys, are you ready?’ Cruz calls as he starts walking over from the boat.

I turn back to the fire and drop the pendant into the flames. I don’t care what Jenna did with Todd! I yell at Hortense inside my head. Just leave me alone. Leave us all alone! I wait for her reply, for her soft sinister voice to echo back at me, but again there’s nothing. All I hear are footsteps on the sand behind me. I turn and see Belle feeling around for my hand. I take hold of hers and grip it tight. Then I take a deep breath and look over at Cruz.

‘Let’s go,’ I say. I don’t care what kind of storms might be lurking out at sea. I have to get off this island. I have to get away from Hortense before she drives me insane.

As the boat pulls away from the shore I start shivering uncontrollably. This is it. If Hortense is going to pull a stunt to get us to stay she’s going to have to do it now. My throat feels so tight I can barely breathe. I close my eyes and think of Mom. Before Dad left and Mom’s life collapsed in on itself like a burst balloon, she was a total yoga nut. One time, when I was freaking out about my mid-term math paper, she taught me how focusing on my breathing could help me stay calm. I imagine her thick southern drawl now, reminding me what to do: ‘ In through the nose, honey, out through the mouth. In through the nose, and out through the mouth .’

I keep on doing this as Dan and Cruz hoist the sail. A sudden breeze causes the faded fabric to billow and the boat picks up speed. It’s not until we’ve been going for a few minutes that I allow myself to look back. The sunrise is making the peak of the volcano glow so red it looks like it’s about to erupt. I look down at the beach. The pale sand is scarred with the scorched remains of our fires and, right in the middle, our HELP sign made of sticks. I think back to when we first arrived, and how beautiful and inviting the island had seemed after the terror of the storm. If only we’d known. I turn away and look out to sea. My heart is thumping like a bass drum. Please, please let us get away , I silently pray. At the other end of the boat, Cruz looks at me and smiles. But his eyes look anxious and I can tell he’s thinking the same as me – is it really going to be this simple?

A sudden breeze spins the sail round and we all duck as it narrowly misses our heads.

‘Shit!’ Cruz grabs hold of the sail and tries to steer the boat back on course, but the wind is too strong.

‘What is it? What’s happening?’ Belle asks.

‘It’s just getting a little breezy. No need to worry,’ the Flea says, but his voice is tight.

‘Help me,’ Cruz calls.

All of us, apart from Belle, grab hold of the sail, but even four of us aren’t strong enough to beat the force of the wind.

I look up at the sky, expecting to see storm clouds building, but it’s vivid blue.

‘At least we’re not being blown back to the island,’ the

Flea says.

Cruz frowns as he continues to battle with the sail. ‘We’re not getting away from it either, though.’

We’re speeding parallel to the island now, past the beach and the cove and on past a craggy wall of rainforest. It goes on and on. The island is way bigger than I’d imagined.

We all lean our weight into the sail, but it’s no good. The wind is like a force field locking it into place. Then it suddenly changes direction. The sail swings round until the boat is facing the island.

‘Oh no,’ the Flea says.

‘What is it?’ Belle asks.

‘Nothing,’ the Flea and I chorus, exchanging worried glances.

‘Come on!’ Cruz yells and once again we try shifting the sail.

‘Why’s it so windy? Is there a storm coming?’ Belle looks around blindly.

‘No, honey, it’s just a bit breezy now we’re further out,’ the Flea says. He turns to me and mouths the words, ‘What the hell?’

I shrug. Fear takes root in the pit of my stomach.

The boat is cutting across the water like a speedboat now as it’s sucked back in toward the island. But this time, there’s no wide beach to land on. All I can see is a forbidding wall of rainforest.

‘Shit. You think there’s gonna be rocks up ahead?’ Dan asks Cruz.

‘I don’t know,’ Cruz replies.

‘What are we going to do?’ the Flea says.

‘Will someone please tell me what’s going on?’ Belle sounds close to tears. I go sit down next to her.

‘The wind is blowing us back inland,’ I tell her.

‘Back to the beach?’ Belle’s eyes dart from side to side. She looks terrified.

‘No, we’ve come round to the other side of the island.’

‘Hey, take a look at that,’ Dan shouts, pointing straight ahead. He’s pointing to a small chink in the wall of green. As we get closer, the chink gets a little bigger.

‘It’s an inlet,’ Cruz cries.‘Okay, we have to try and steer the boat toward it.’

But we don’t have to steer at all. The boat is drawn to the narrow gap like a pea being sucked up by a straw. We all sigh with relief as we sail past jagged outcrops of rocks and into the opening.