The chickens woke her, like they always did. Mischievous, rowdy and named after legendary highwaymen, they squawked and screeched from sunrise until someone got up to scatter their grain. Moll opened her eyes a fraction; a ribbon of light seeped in through her shutters and her ears were filled with the sounds of morning: the sing-song of a cuckoo, the whistle of the kettle, Mooshie’s impatient barks.
‘Siddy, if you think for one minute it’s fine to prod Rocky Jo with a twig, you’ll feel my hand! He’s a cockerel, not a highwayman!’
Children squealed and laughed. Everyone knew that Siddy had it in for the chickens and the cockerel, ever since Rocky Jo had eaten his pet earthworm, Porridge. Moll rubbed her eyes and sat up. She thought of Oak, of what he would have said if he was still in her wagon on a sunny morning like this: ‘Best thing about this life is you wake up in the morning and you’re free. You’ve only got one door and there’s only one way to walk: outside.’ She smiled and then she checked herself as she remembered what had happened in the Deepwood. Skull’s gang were after her and Gryff – and Oak knew something about it.
Moll splashed her face with water from the pail that Mooshie always left by her bedside, then she searched her wagon floor for the most purposeful dress she could find: the light blue summer frock with large pockets hanging from the sides. That would do. Wriggling it on, she pulled open a wardrobe door, hurling aside the jumpers, skirts, dresses and newly-ironed pinafores and stuffed her catapult and a handful of stones into her pockets. She paused for a moment; she wasn’t overly keen on catapulting Oak, but if that’s what it might take to get the truth then there wasn’t a lot she could do about it.
She flung open the wagon door, her hair matted and wild, like a crow’s nest plonked on top of her head, and marched out on to the steps.
‘Still here then.’ A hunched old woman was sitting on Moll’s steps. She pulled a red shawl lined with fake gold pennies around her and the jewels on her crinkled fingers flashed in the sunlight. ‘Well, that’s something, isn’t it?’
‘Mmmmmn.’
Cinderella Bull was the camp’s only fortune-teller – the Dukkerer, they all called her – and it was she who guarded The Chest of No Opening at Any Time or Your Life Won’t Be Worth Living and the crystal ball. So, by and large, it was worth listening to her, even if you didn’t agree with what she said.
Moll scanned the camp for Oak. Chickens darted across the clearing and barefoot children swarmed round the fire like puppies, their skin stained by smoke and dirt. Among them, women in brightly-coloured skirts and headscarves, some wrapped up like turbans, some knotted under chins, stoked the fire and separated strings of sausages for the spitting pans. Their faces were lined and pitted by years of open-air living, but their fingers and necks flashed with sparkling jewels: amber, jet, coral and gold. And set back from the fire, before a canvas tent, sat a cluster of men in flat caps and once-good overcoats, drinking tea from tin cups.
Cinderella Bull looked up at Moll with gargoyled features. ‘If you’re looking for Oak, you won’t find him. He left early to chop logs for the feast tonight.’
‘Chop logs!’ Moll smouldered away on the wagon steps like an angry lump of coal, but there was no use arguing with a feast night and all its traditions. Moll knew that. And they’d been talking about this one for months. Wisdom, Mooshie and Oak’s eldest son, was getting married to Ivy, and the Jumping of the Broomstick ceremony was tonight. Everyone would be there.
Moll’s eyes ran over the ring of bowtop wagons: maroon ones with gold-leaf swirls and green ones, like her own, with bright yellow wisps and rearing cobs. Hanging from the front of each one were the camp’s good luck omens: lemon peel, horseshoe nails, fragments of mirror, fox teeth . . . She looked around for Gryff, but she didn’t expect to see him here. He always hung back from the clatter of the camp.
Thrusting a hand into her pocket, Moll seized her catapult and leapt off the steps. But, before she could dart off, Cinderella Bull clutched her by the arm.
The fortune-teller’s hands were haggard like ancient bark and, as she ran a wrinkled finger over the lines that scored Moll’s wrist, she whispered, ‘The bracelets of life . . . And your life’s going to change now, Moll. You know that, don’t you?’ Moll frowned past the sun into the fortune-teller’s face, and whipped her hand away.
The week before Cinderella Bull had told Moll her Line of Life had a split at the end, meaning she was prone to outbursts of insanity, and that her short, square nails indicated that she had a fighting temper.
‘I need to find Oak,’ Moll said. ‘There’s important stuff he’s not telling me.’ She paused. ‘I saw Skull last night in the Deepwood – and he was chanting for me and Gryff to come close.’
As Moll had half suspected, Cinderella Bull already knew. She nodded gravely, then rummaged in her pinafore pocket and drew out her talisman, a leather pouch of salt. She scattered it round Moll’s feet. ‘For protection,’ she murmured. ‘Skull’s growing in strength now, mark my words. We’ll need every charm we’ve got to keep you safe.’
Moll stormed out of the circle of salt, breathing hard. ‘Someone needs to tell me what’s going on!’
But Cinderella Bull only shook her head. ‘It should be Oak who tells you, Moll. He’s the head of the camp.’
‘But Oak’s out chopping logs!’
‘He’ll be back soon. He wanted a moment away from the clearing before he spoke to you – to think things through. But Mooshie’s here. You could—’
Just at that moment there was a high-pitched shriek – like the screech of a desperate chicken – but Moll knew this was no chicken. She scoured the clearing. At the far end of the camp, beyond the fire, women clustered outside a tent, weaving hawthorn into ribbed baskets. And charging past them, sending pots of porridge and cups of tea flying, came Mooshie. Having noticed Moll, she was thundering towards her, bursting out of her clothes with fury, like some sort of overpacked suitcase with legs. Her skirt shook, her ruffled petticoats wavered, her headscarf flapped. Moll gulped.
Brandishing a tea towel, she marched towards Moll. ‘MOLLY PECKSNIFF!’ she roared. ‘What the devil do you think you were doing last night?’
All thoughts about Skull’s chant abandoned, Moll skirted behind Cinderella Bull and crawled beneath her wagon.
Mooshie’s smoke-yellowed face glowered beneath her blue headscarf. She pushed past Cinderella Bull. ‘When I get hold of you . . .’ She struck the side of the wagon with her tea towel. ‘Oooooooh, you make me so cross, Molly!’ Two lace-up boots stepped up right in front of Moll’s nose. ‘What in heaven’s name were you doing last night? Come out of there AT ONCE!’
Moll curled up tight. It was one thing to cross Oak, but crossing Mooshie was another story . . . ‘I sleepwalked over the boundary,’ she ventured. Moll’s eyes widened as she realised the enormity of her lie and she swallowed, wriggling further away from Mooshie’s boots.
‘Jinx is back in the camp, safely tethered beside the cobs, and you expect me to believe you sleepwalked into Skull’s camp to get her back?’ Mooshie cried shrilly.
Moll ground her teeth together; it was too late to back down now. ‘I’ve been doing lots of – um – astral-travelling recently.’
Silence.
Moll picked at her fingers, barely understanding what she was saying: ‘Astral-travelling is when we dream and our souls break free at night and go on a journey. Cinderella Bull told me about it.’
Cinderella Bull cleared her throat. ‘That’s a lovely story, Moll; never let it tumble out of your mouth again.’
There was a thwack outside; Cinderella Bull had been got by the tea towel.
Moll tried to feel her way into her story. If Mooshie hadn’t been on the loose with a tea towel, she might have almost enjoyed its twists and turns. ‘Just last week I went to the northern wilderness on a donkey and last night—’
There was a yank to Moll’s foot as Mooshie dragged her out from beneath the wagon. Moll wriggled into a tiny ball and winced. Thwack, thwack, thwack went the tea towel.
‘I’ve got the breakfast to clear away, the chickens to feed and the laundry to wash and you think I have time to listen to your stories about donkeys in the wilderness?’
Moll looked up at the tanned grooves of Mooshie’s face and suddenly Mooshie’s features softened and she knelt down by Moll, hugging her close. ‘Oh, Moll! We could’ve lost you!’
And that was the way it was with Mooshie. You got used to it.
Moll leant back against her wagon wheel and Mooshie sat beside her, wiping her eyes with her pinafore.
‘I’m sorry I snapped my promise,’ Moll said. ‘I know it was a big’un and not one for snapping. But—’
Mooshie straightened her headscarf and rearranged her numerous petticoats over her knees. ‘You break promises, Moll, not snap them.’
Moll shrugged. ‘Trouble is, the other children are happy just playing around the camp.’
She pointed across the clearing to where a handful of youngsters had gathered beneath a Sacred Oak tree. A boy of Moll’s age, with sticking out ears and tufts of dark, curly hair poking out beneath a flat cap, was hoisting a girl with auburn ringlets up on to the rope swing. Moll sighed as she watched Florence shriek when Siddy jiggled her about. She’d never fit in like they all did. With Siddy, maybe, but Siddy was different. He had never called her an outsider. Not once. And he didn’t care about getting drenched in mud and bruised by falling from trees. She watched as Florence and another girl swung back and forth. They would care about mud and stuff. Moll was sure of it. ‘See, Moosh? They’re all fine mucking about on rope swings and fishing for minnows in the stream. I need more . . .’
Mooshie folded the tea towel on her lap. ‘You’d like spending time with them all if you just tried.’ She smoothed Moll’s hair down, but Moll only scowled. ‘Might be nice if you and Siddy showed the others your tree fort.’
Moll looked appalled. ‘No. That would be horrible.’ She huffed. ‘I’ve got to see and do everything, Moosh. I’ve been running everywhere these past weeks just so I can fit all the stuff I want to do into one measle-puckered day. It’s tiring but I can’t stop. And when someone gets me angry – like Skull when he stole Jinx – then—’
Mooshie put a finger to her lips. ‘Sometimes you’ve got to wait while your anger cools, Moll. Wait and then think and then – if you’re really sure the anger’s cooled and you’re thinking straight – you can act. Bad decisions are made when we’re angry.’
Moll plucked at the grass that had grown up over her wagon wheel. ‘Most of my bad decisions happen when I’m hungry.’
‘And I suppose you were just hungry last night when you crossed the boundary?’
Moll shuddered as she thought back to last night’s supper of nettle soup. She’d barely eaten any of it. ‘I was starving.’
‘An imp, that’s what you are, Miss Pecksniff.’ Mooshie lifted a handkerchief from her pinafore, spat on it, then rubbed at the muddy mark on Moll’s shin. ‘Small and meddling, with a will of iron.’
Moll made a face. ‘What’s an imp then?’
‘A sprite.’
‘What’s a sprite?’
Mooshie rolled her eyes and gave up.
Moll was silent for several seconds and then she said quietly, ‘I know Oak will have told you what I saw last night . . .’
Mooshie stiffened but said nothing.
Moll went on. ‘Skull’s chant – it was sucking me and Gryff in. I could feel it when he crushed the wax figure. He’s after me – us – isn’t he?’ She hugged her knees up to her chin. ‘Why?’
Mooshie ran her hand over the initials Moll and Siddy had carved into the wagon’s side a few years before. ‘Oh, Moll, you’re too young for all this. Far too young.’
Moll unfurled her body and sprang forward. ‘I’m not too young, Moosh! I’m old enough to have thieved Jinx back and escaped Skull’s camp! You have to tell me what’s going on. Last night I was just thieving back a cob, then suddenly I find out I’m wanted by Skull’s gang!’ Her cheeks were flushed and she was breathing fast. Mooshie tried to clasp her hands, but Moll shuffled backwards. ‘I want to know the truth – straight and proper. Because you and Oak know things you’re not telling me.’ She narrowed cold green eyes. ‘And, if no one tells me what’s going on, I’m going to catapult the whole camp before breakfast.’
Mooshie took a deep breath and looked her straight in the eye. And, for some strange reason, Moll felt like Mooshie was seeing her for the very first time.
‘Last night,’ Mooshie bit her lip, ‘you saw Skull performing a Dream Snatch.’
Moll shivered. ‘What – what’s a Dream Snatch?’
‘It’s a witch doctor’s deadliest curse. When they—’ she paused and fiddled with her rings, ‘—want someone, they form the victim’s figure out of wax. They curse it, then crush it, then they mutter a chant – the Dream Snatch.’
Moll’s eyes widened. ‘And what happens to the victim?’
‘The chant seeps into their mind and the more afeared they are, the stronger it grows. It feeds on fear. In your case, Skull’s Dream Snatch steals into your sleep, turning your dreams to nightmares, making the fears you have in the daytime a hundred times worse in the darkness.’ Mooshie’s voice was low and guarded. ‘He is trying to control you, Moll, trying to summon you from our camp.’
The colour drained from Moll’s face. ‘My sleepwalking – finding myself alone in the forest in the middle of the night . . .’
Mooshie nodded. ‘Skull’s been calling for you your whole life – only he’s not just calling you to his camp. He’s—’ Mooshie looked out towards the fire in the middle of the clearing, ‘—he’s calling for your death.’ Moll’s eyes widened and Mooshie leant in closer. ‘Years ago Skull used his powers to such an extent that it left him weakened, but, now time has passed, his Dream Snatch is gathering strength and that’s why the nightmare drags you closer and closer to the river boundary each time.’ She paused. ‘You say Gryff felt the chant in Skull’s clearing too?’ Moll nodded. ‘Then the Dream Snatch is reaching its full strength. We feared this would come.’
‘But Skull doesn’t even know who I am,’ Moll said. ‘How can he be calling me?’
‘Before last night, Skull didn’t know who you are; he probably didn’t even know you camped in the Ancientwood. But he’ll know now his boy’s seen Gryff, you can be sure of that . . . Because you and Gryff are part of something Skull wants to destroy and for his whole life he’s been trying to find you. Dragging Jinx away from our camp might’ve been coincidence – another theft to force our camp from the forest . . .’ Mooshie paused. ‘Or it might’ve been Skull’s Dream Snatch, spreading over everything you hold dear.’
Moll’s stomach twisted into a knot. ‘This Dream Snatch . . . I’ve seen it before. It’s like I said last night to Oak. It isn’t a nightmare, is it? It’s a memory.’
Mooshie fiddled with the hem of her pinafore, avoiding Moll’s eyes.
Moll stiffened. Something painful was happening inside her mind: a terrible memory, locked so deep inside her she thought she’d never find it, was sloping towards her.
It was a dark night, the forest muffled by snow, and she was hiding in the undergrowth by the river, not far from the drum and the rattle and the figures. Skull’s mask was there, floating before her.
She gasped.
‘I – I’m by the river and – and I’m not alone with the cloaked figures. There’s more to my nightmare than what I’ve seen before! There are other people with me only I can’t see their faces.’
Mooshie shifted on the grass but said nothing.
Moll felt the memory fading. ‘What happened? What am I remembering?’
Mooshie shook her head. ‘You’ve no idea who you are, Moll.’
‘Who am I then?’ Moll whispered. ‘And what does Gryff have to do with it all?’ Her voice crumbled into a shiver.
But this time Mooshie shook her head. ‘Oak needs to tell you, Moll – he’s the head of the camp.’
She tried to gather Moll into her arms, the way she did almost every time the nightmare came for her. But Moll scrambled away.
She stared straight ahead, a knot of fear fixing inside her. Things had been difficult before. But now they were a whole lot worse: she was more of an outsider than ever. And worse than that, somewhere not so far away, Skull was hatching a plan to kill her.