Marcus Sedgwick - The Book of Dead Days

Valerian turned to face him.

“You!” he threw back. “You! What right have you to tell me to do anything?”

“Valerian! No, no, no! You must not kill Boy! You must not.”

Willow ran to Boy and they clung to each other, cowering in the maelstrom that filled the room. Other, less precise clocks all around the house chimed midnight.

“You cannot kill him,” Kepler repeated.

“And why not?” sneered Valerian. “He is mine, he has always been mine, and I will do with him as I like!”

“Yes, he is yours,” Kepler pleaded.

“He is my slave, and-”

“No, Valerian! No! He is your son.” Kepler took a step toward Valerian.

“Don’t be-”

“He is your son!” Kepler shouted, raising a fist toward Valerian.

Valerian staggered back.

“I saw it in the book! It is the truth. Think about his age, Valerian. His age!”

Boy struggled to get to his feet. He turned to Valerian.

Valerian stared deep into his eyes. He felt Valerian coming for him, as so often before, through his eyes, feeling for his soul, but this time it was different. He was not controlling, not manipulating, but feeling, sensing.

Boy felt his master’s mind walk through his, as if for the first time really seeing what was there, finally understanding Boy’s life. The years on his own, living off his wits on the harsh City streets. Being found by Valerian, hoping for so much but getting so little.

Valerian found that his own pain was nothing compared with Boy’s.

He pulled away and stepped back, but still he looked deep into Boy’s eyes. As he did, he grew pale, and the darkness began to surround him.

He stepped backward toward the swirling pit, and backward once more, and fell into the dark, already a dead man.

He spoke one more word.

“Boy!”

Boy stood, numb.

The hole, the light, the wind disappeared faster than they had come, and Boy stared into space. All that remained was a faint wisp of yellow smoke that hung in the air, and a pungent smell that vexed their nostrils.

Valerian was gone.

Willow rushed to Boy and held him while he screamed and screamed.

Eventually his screams subsided and became cries and then the cries became tears. He sank down on the floor, staring at Willow beside him.

“He went. He changed his mind. He let me live.”

“Don’t talk,” said Willow. “Not now.”

“There’s so much I don’t know. My father… my father?”

He turned to Kepler, who stood looking down at him, a strange expression on his face.

“Was he-was he really my father?” Boy said.

Kepler looked hard at Boy. Long seconds passed.

“Was he my father? Tell me!”

“Of course he wasn’t,” Kepler snapped. “I said that to make you live. I knew it was the only thing I could say that might save you.”

“No!” cried Boy. “No! You’re lying now! You said I was his son.”

“There are things you don’t know about yet, Boy,” said Kepler, “that happened long ago. I was simply using those things to save your life.” He turned to the door.

“No!” cried Boy, “Wait…”

“You’re alive, aren’t you, Boy? Just be grateful for that.” Kepler stooped and picked up the book from the floor where Willow had dropped it.

“I’ll see you’re all right,” said Kepler. “Both of you. Now that Valerian’s gone.”

He walked out through the shattered doorway.

Boy collapsed into Willow’s arms, and began to sob once more. Around them lay the devastation of what had once been the heart of Valerian’s world. From the streets below came the noise of happy, drunken people, and from the skies overhead came the rush and bang of fireworks.

Boy’s tears flowed freely down his face, Willow holding him all the while. He thought about what he’d heard, what he’d seen, but couldn’t begin to understand. He pushed the thoughts away. There would be time enough to think, later.

And there was something else. Someone else.

As if only now noticing her, Boy felt Willow’s arms around him. He lifted his head, and looked up at her face, and at last he saw the love that was waiting for him there.

A new year had dawned, with a new, and different future, one that Boy had not foreseen. He sensed that the path ahead was obscured by many, many questions, but one thing, at least, was clear.

Boy and Willow would walk that path together.

End of Book One

Marcus Sedgwick’s Floodland was hailed as a “dazzling debut” and won the Branford Boase Award for a best first novel. Witch Hill was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Young Adult Novel. Sedgwick’s most recent book, The Dark Horse, was short-listed for the Guardian Award for Children’s Fiction and for the Carnegie Medal. Marcus Sedgwick has worked in children’s publishing in England for ten years; before that, he was a bookseller. In addition to writing, he does stone carvings, etchings and woodcuts. He lives in Sussex and has a young daughter, Alice.