“Rhys, time to get up.” Lou shook him gently until he opened his eyes and peered at her.
“Eh?” He mumbled.
“Time to wake up, you need breakfast and you need to go to school.” Lou smiled at him. “You fell asleep in your clothes and I didn’t want to disturb you so you need to have a wash and get your uniform on. I’ll put the blanket away for you.” She pulled the blanket off him and Rhys shivered at the sudden cold. “Get sorted quickly and I’ll make you a warm juice to go with your cereal. It’s frosty outside.”
Rhys mumbled incoherently as he crawled out of bed and dragged his clothes off for a wash. He rubbed a wet flannel over the bits he knew his mum would expect to be washed as fast as he could and he pulled clean uniform from his wardrobe and put it on, but he wasn’t looking forward to going to school that morning. Still fretting over what the Darkling had said about using the stone and the harm it might do to him, Rhys got dressed and headed downstairs for his breakfast of cereal and hot blackcurrant squash. With barely a grunt he pulled on his new coat and gloves, collected his bag and set off for school.
All that day he found it hard to concentrate and Mrs Hartshorn had to speak to him on several occasions and tell him to pay attention more than once. He made silly thoughtless mistakes in his maths test and felt useless by the end of the day and he walked home on his own, refusing all company, even Craig who was annoyed with him for the second day in a row and by the time he reached home again he was even more confused than ever as well as anticipating more questions from his mum. She was sure to ask him what was wrong again and until he sorted this thing out with the Darkling it wouldn’t stop.
She didn’t ask at all that evening but Rhys kept catching her looking at him with that worried look and it only made him more angry and sullen. He stared at the TV all evening and only did the washing up grudgingly. He retreated to soak in a hot bath as soon as he could and then flung himself into bed.
“What do I do now?” he moaned into his pillow.
“You do what you know to be right and you do the best you can.”
“Darkling?” Rhys’ head lifted from his pillow and there were tears streaming down his face.
“Yes, it is me.” The Darkling was perched on the rail that ran round his bed to stop him falling out. Its feet curled round the metal bar like a bird on a branch and its head was tipped to one side in a pose that, despite his angry mood, Rhys found familiar and comforting.
“I don’t know what to do.” Rhys said quietly. “I don’t want to be turned into some sort of monster but I don’t want to let you down either. That magic stuff is scary, it really frightens me and I don’t like the way it feels.” He sat up and pulled the duvet up to his chest.
“Then only try the stone when you are in the place you believe the nexus to be.” The Darkling spoke softly and gently. “I have no wish to see you transformed but I need to find the nexus and it can only be found by someone of your world. I could find the nexus in my world with no difficulty, but here I cannot. You have to belong here to find it.”
“Why me?” Rhys asked, still curious even though he was still very much afraid. “Why did you choose me?”
“I don’t know.” The Darkling replied. “All I know is that where most of your people do not see us or dismiss us as dreams and shadows, you see us for what and who we are and so we are able to ask you for your help. But we can only ask, we can only plead with you and you can refuse if you need to. We can make no demands on you.”
“I’ll try.” Rhys agreed, feeling it was the right thing to say and the right thing to do. “I’ll go to the tree in the church and I’ll take the stone and see what happens. I might be able to do that at the weekend. If it’s not that one then I’m going to have to find a way to get to the other one and that’s going to be really hard.”
“You will do what you are able and that is all we can ask of you.” The Darkling folded its arms across its chest. “Now sleep, you are tired and I will return to my people. Call me if you need me. But I will come to you again in a few days whether you call me or not. That way you have no need to use the stone unless it is an emergency.”
“That’s a good idea.” Rhys began to brighten a little. “You go and I’ll get some sleep.” The Darkling vanished and Rhys turned out his light and was asleep in a few moments.
The next day was a Wednesday and Rhys was in school again but he was happier and more alert and Mrs Hartshorn didn’t have to tell him off, not even once. At the end of the day the whole class were sitting in their places with their book bags in front of them and their coats on ready to go home.
Mrs Hartshorn walked round the class leaving a short letter on each book bag.
“If you want to come on Friday we’ll need those slips back. I know it is short notice but it’s an unexpected opportunity we’ve been offered and we’d like you to be able to take advantage of it. It’s only permission for you to be out of school for the afternoon on Friday and we’ll be walking into town and taking a tour of the church and church yard with a visiting archaeologist who has invited year five and year six. We’re very lucky that Mr Buchanan knows him and has been able to arrange this for us. So, slips back tomorrow please with the signature of a parent or guardian and we can all go and learn lots about our oldest local church.”
Rhys and Craig ran almost all the way home, bursting through their front doors at almost the same time and both gasping like fish out of water. Rhys pulled his new coat off, dropping his gloves from the pocket on to the living room floor, and he hung it up.
“Gloves.” Lou looked at them and he picked them up. “Now get your breath back and then you can tell me.” She smiled at him as he flopped into the chair he always used and he leaned on his knees with his head forward until his lungs started to stop feeling like they’d never work again.
“I need to go to town on Friday, can I go please Mum?” He managed after a few moments.
“No, it’s a school day.” Lou frowned. It wasn’t like Rhys to want to skip school. He did have mornings where he didn’t want to get up, like any other child she imagined, but once he got going he seemed to enjoy it.
“No, it’s with school, we’re going out on a trip but you need to sign a permission form.” Rhys reached into his bag for the slip of paper and panicked for a moment when he couldn’t find it. “It’s not here!” He wailed.
“Give me the bag.” Lou reached over and took his bag from him and proceeded to methodically empty it and eventually found the slip tucked in between the pages of his reading book. “This slip?” She asked, waving it in front of his nose.
“Yes!” He cried. “That slip, I’ll find a pen.” He shot off into the kitchen where Lou kept a jam jar stuffed with pens and pencils, and strangely a single swan feather cut into a quill that had never been used but Lou loved it so it lived there. He came back clutching a pen and Lou gladly signed and dated the form for him.
“What are you doing at the church then?” She asked.
“Dunno.” Rhys was half way across the room. “Some old bloke with a long name is going to tell us stuff I think but it’ll be fun getting out of school for the afternoon.” He turned to look at her over his shoulder. “I’m going to get changed.”
“OK.” She nodded to him as he disappeared round the door and she listened to him thump his way up the stairs sounding like someone twice his size if not more. “When do you learn to walk quietly?” She muttered and she turned on the TV to catch the news headlines before Rhys came back downstairs.
Tags: 2009, darkling, Nano, NaNoWriMo, November, portal series, rhys