The Book of Storms (23 page)

Ahead of him, Tom laughed. “Oh, quit, Danny,” he said. “D'you really think you can make swallows stop flying?”

The swallows swooped and chattered, racing as close to the boys' faces as they dared. One grazed Danny's eyebrow with its wing tip.

He didn't want to speak again. It was terrible when Tom mocked him. Please, he begged the birds silently. Please stop. Just show him.

“Show who?” said a swallow.

He couldn't tell which swallow; they were both still spinning through the air too quickly for his eyes to follow. But the voice was definitely a swallow's, and it had heard him. He hadn't spoken out loud, though. Unless he was going mad.

“Can you hear me when I
think
?” he said inside his head, to the swallows.

One came full tilt toward him, flapped its wings rapidly, and came to perch on his shoulder. “Ha!” Danny said to Tom, and pointed at the swallow.

Tom stared, rubbed his eyes, and looked again. “Oh, this is ridiculous,” he muttered. “My head's spinning. It's the shock … those dogs.…”

“Not when you
think
, silly,” said the swallow. “But I can certainly hear you
talk
. Most birds wouldn't believe that sort of thing if it slapped them round the beak, but we swallows—well, there are so many things in the skies, who are we to discount one more, however unlikely it seems?”

Danny could only just see the tiny bird out of the farthest corner of his eye. It weighed nothing at all, and its claws clung to his sweater like burrs.

“Have you ever sat on a person's shoulder before?” he asked it, again without using his voice.

“Not once,” said the swallow. “But you're not an ordinary person, are you? You can't be.”

“Yeah, I am,” said Danny. “I'm about as ordinary as people get. Or I was, anyway. I don't think I ever will be again, no matter what happens.”

So it did work! He could talk without talking out loud, just like they did. If only he'd known that before, he could have said far more to Mitz and Shimny, without having to worry about anyone else overhearing.

“Where are you going?” the swallow asked.

“To find you, actually,” said Danny.

“To find me? Why me?”

“Well, all of you, really,” said Danny. “But just you, if you can help me. I need to call up a storm.”

“Lawks!” said the swallow, losing its balance and falling halfway down Danny's chest, wings spluttering against him. It regained its composure and shot off into the air.

Danny watched it go. Had he offended it? No—it had gone to find the other swallow. They came back to him together and landed, one on his head, one on his shoulder. He couldn't tell which was which.

Tom took a pace toward him and then stopped dead. Suddenly, Danny didn't dare look at him.

“I'm Paras,” said the swallow on his shoulder. “And this is my sister, Siravina. Now tell her what you just said to me.”

It felt very strange, talking to a creature that was sitting on top of your head.

“Hi, Siravina,” said Danny. “I need to call up a storm. I've … sort of … been told that you might know where it went?”

“Where it went?” echoed Siravina. She had a slightly smoother voice than Paras, liquid honey to his dark molasses. “You want to call up a particular storm, then?”

“Yeah. Is it possible?”

“Is it?” Paras echoed. Siravina was silent.

Tom called out, “Oi,
bird boy
, you going to stand there all day?” with a tightness that made Danny try to pretend he hadn't heard. See? he wanted to say. I'm standing on a grassy path with a swallow on my head, and it's asking me about storms.
It
believes me! But there was a thin anger in Tom's voice that Danny didn't quite understand.

“What's your problem?” he shouted back. “Can't you see they're
talking
to me?”

“They're
sitting
on you,” Tom corrected him. “It's probably 'cos you're covered in squashed flies from all this stupid messing about.”

“She's talking,” said Danny. “I can tell you what she's saying if you like. I can just repeat it. Then you'll know.”

Tom looked suddenly exhausted. “Oh, sure,” he said. “They're talking. I can see that. Anyone could see that. Look … can we just go and sit in the barn for a while? I think we should have a rest.”

“You go,” said Danny. “I need …
I
need to talk to the swallows.”

Tom hesitated. It was clear that he wanted to say something scornful, but instead he gave a tired snort that didn't really say anything at all, then turned on his heel and trudged down to the barn, climbing in through a hole in the planking and leaving Apple to graze on the thick grass outside.

Danny tried not to look triumphant. For some reason, proving himself right didn't feel quite as good as he'd thought it would.

“Why would a human,” asked Siravina, “want to call up a storm? Storms are dangerous things. And more to the point,
how
could you?”

“I … I don't exactly know,” said Danny. “But my parents were lost in a storm—and only that storm knows what happened to them. And I've found all sorts of things—a taro, a book called the Book of Storms. I've even found out the song of the storms, I think. So I must be able to call one up somehow, mustn't I?”

“You have the Book of Storms?”

Both swallows spoke at the same time. Siravina's claws dug into Danny's scalp. Suddenly they had stopped breathing; they began to have a heaviness about them that weighed down on Danny's head.

“Well, yeah,” he said. “It doesn't say much, though, really. I mean, not for me. It's just got the story of yesterday and today in it, all the stuff that's happened since then, and a bit about Sammael. And then at the end it tells me to ask swallows—it says you know all about how to find a certain storm. I mean, I can tell you loads about the one I want. I can even show you a picture from it. You'll have to look out while I get my bag off my back, though.”

Paras dug his feet into Danny's sweater as he lifted the strap of his schoolbag carefully over the bird and swung the bag around in front of him, trying to keep his head steady. There probably wasn't any need—Siravina was holding on so tightly that she wouldn't have fallen even if Danny had started turning cartwheels, but Danny was anxious not to unsettle either bird.

He crouched down to unzip his bag and carefully pull out the Book of Storms. As soon as he had it in his hands he wanted to sit down and reread the whole story again. Perhaps there was a clue in it somewhere that would tell him whether he had any hope of finding his parents. Perhaps the book would have updated itself, to include what the swallows had just said. And then the book would have a bit in it about him reading the book, as if he were both over and underneath the pages. If it was still writing itself, when would it ever stop? When he found his parents? When he, somehow, one day, no longer had the stick anymore? Or would it just go on writing his whole life, as long as he had it?

Not that the rest of his life was going to be quite so much of an adventure, of course—he planned to spend a lot of it at home. If he could.

He opened the book to the title page. The swallows craned their tiny black heads to see the picture of the storm.

“Can't make it out,” muttered Siravina. “Impossible to see, this close up.”

It wasn't until she had taken off and flown a good distance away, then swooped down again from quite a height, that she saw the picture clearly enough.

“Do you know it?” asked Danny.

“Well, yes, of course,” said Siravina. “I know every inch of the sky. That storm was the night before last, and it came through this way, certainly. But it's died out now, of course. It's long gone.”

Danny's fingers tightened on the Book of Storms. “It can't be gone,” he said. “I have to call it back.”

“That's impossible,” said Siravina, “Once a particular storm is spent, it can't gather again. The energy has gone into other things. All that's left is the taro. Storms exist for the moment. Didn't the Book of Storms tell you that?”

“No,” said Danny slowly. He closed the book and ran his hand over the snakeskin cover. Did it shiver beneath his fingertips?

“Are you sad?” asked Paras. “Siravina can be a bit blunt sometimes. But she knows a lot.”

“No,” said Danny. “I was just following the clues. If there isn't anything I can do, I suppose I'll just never find them again.”

He had to bite savagely on his lip to stop it trembling, but it wasn't tears of sadness that threatened to fall. It was some kind of boiling rage. His hands began to shake.

“Tell me how they went,” said Siravina abruptly. “You mentioned Sammael.”

“They just went,” said Danny. “In the middle of the night. I woke up and they'd gone, and I didn't think that was too strange, because they always go to look at storms, but in the morning they weren't back. They always come back. And then I found this notebook, and this old guy, and he told me that Sammael had done something to the storm to make it, I dunno, take them somehow—that sounds stupid, I know. But it's the only thing that makes any sense. They wouldn't have stayed away unless something … I don't know … I dunno what I thought, really.”

Siravina fluttered down to perch on the Book of Storms. She looked at Danny, her tiny black eyes as shiny as beetles' backs.

“It sounds reasonable to me. There are all sorts of ways of hiding people in weather. Perhaps Paras and I
can
help you—we'll fly out and ask the winds what they've seen. We'll see what we can bring back to you.”

It was a faint hope, but it breathed inside Danny as if he'd inhaled mint, clearing a path through his despair.

“Will it take long?” he asked. “Shall we wait here?”

“Best thing,” said Siravina, “is to go to the top of Sentry Hill. That way, if we do find there's something left of that storm for you to call back, you'll be able to see it coming. Sentry Hill's the tallest point for miles around.”

“It'll be dark by the time we get up there,” said Danny. “I won't see it coming once it's night.”

“Of course you will,” said Siravina. “Nights are never dark, once you open your eyes properly. And anyway, there'll be plenty of moonlight. Come, let's go!”

The tiny bird launched herself into the breeze, disappearing from sight within seconds. Danny didn't feel Paras go, but he heard a flutter of beating wings and saw the swallow's movement, sprinting off after his sister. Strange, intense little birds. How could they be so accepting? It had taken Danny nearly two days to accept that Sammael existed and storms were more than just the sum of their parts, and that even the birds could talk in their own language—but the swallows had just agreed that even things which seemed impossible were quite likely to be possible in the end and had made no fuss about it.

He'd miss that when he was back home again. But other things would make up for it.

*   *   *

After the swallows had flown off, Danny put the Book of Storms back into his schoolbag and went down to the barn to find Tom.

Apple was grazing rapidly, tearing up the grass outside the barn in thick tufts. She ate with the fury of a half-starved lion, turning her rump on Danny and Shimny as they approached. The piebald stayed well clear, aiming for a patch of grass ten feet away. Danny tied her reins up into a fat knot so she wouldn't tread on them. She needed to eat, although he was anxious to get going.

“Tom!” he called into the barn, peering through the broken door at the dark mountains of moldy hay.

There was no answer. Cautiously, he picked his way through the strewn hay and let his eyes adjust to the gloom inside the barn, casting around for the shape of his cousin. Tom was lying in a huddle on a huge, stinking bale of hay. He seemed to be shivering, although the air was hot and damp.

“Tom?” Danny said again, but the shivering bundle didn't answer. He must have fallen asleep. Danny edged his way forward, unsure of whether to wake him. Perhaps he was really ill, with some kind of blood poisoning from the dog bites, or water disease from the river.

Every nerve in Danny strained to go find Sentry Hill. He could just leave Tom sleeping, then come back to him later, after he had found the storm. Tom wouldn't mind, would he? He'd never wanted to come with Danny anyway. He'd be happy if he was left to sleep.

Danny shook his head rapidly, trying to dislodge the thought. He'd been lost and scared, and Tom had come with him and kept him safe. What kind of a person would he be if he left Tom now, shivering in a barn? If all this came to nothing, if he never found his parents again, then Tom and Aunt Kathleen and Sophie would be the only family he had.

He sat a short distance away and tried to squash the nerves that were crawling up into his stomach. His cheeks burned and his head ached. If only Mitz were still around, he could have left her on guard, nestling warmly in Tom's arms to quiet his shivers. But Mitz was gone, and that was Danny's fault too. If only she hadn't gone. If only they weren't here. If only he could make his brain silent, just for a few minutes.

He leaned his head back against the rotting hay and closed his eyes.

*   *   *

“If you want to understand me,” Sammael asked Danny, “how would you prefer to do it? To picture me as a man? Or would it help if I were, say, a great crested newt? It's all one to me.”

Danny looked up into Sammael's black eyes and wished he weren't so short. He knew that if he were taller, he'd be more decisive. It would make sense for the devil to be a man—that's what he usually was. But a man with cloven hooves, horns, a tail. And red. So somewhat similar to a goat, but red. Was a great crested newt really much different from that?