Prince of the Wind Read online

  ‘Q?’ goes Usherwood, like she’d never even heard of him … or as if her mind had been miles away. ‘Yes, he certainly is.’

  So I was right — that was why he hadn’t come himself.

  ‘With the new game … the last one, huh?’ I persevered.

  She nodded briefly, her eyes on the road ahead. ‘Yes.’

  I gave an inward sigh. She sure was hard work! Still, I figured it was only polite to keep trying. ‘And Hannah,’ I tried again. ‘How’s old Hannah?’

  Usherwood’s lips tightened slightly. ‘She is well.’

  I opened my mouth to ask after Tiger Lily, but then I noticed the tiny frown on Usherwood’s smooth forehead, and thought better of it. She seemed to have a lot on her mind — or maybe she had her nose out of joint about having to trail all the way to Redcliff and back.

  As for me … I’d hardly slept the night before, and there was something soothing and hypnotic about the hum of the tyres on the tarmac, and the endless ribbon of road unravelling in front of us. I snuggled deeper into the soft leather, rested my head back and closed my eyes. It was a new experience to let my thoughts drift into dreams knowing that when I woke up, they’d all be coming true.

  When at last I surfaced from sleep it was completely dark — way too dark to see where we were. At some stage Ms Usherwood must have turned on the car radio; some kind of fuddy-duddy classical music was playing softly. I wondered how much further there was to go — by now we must be nearly there! I opened my mouth to ask, but the question turned into a ginormous yawn.

  Just as I was in the middle of it, staring blearily through the windscreen at the pale wash of the headlights in the rushing darkness, I saw something that made me sit bolt upright and snap my mouth shut so quick I nearly dislocated my jaw. We were almost there! The headlights picked out a sign up ahead — the same one I’d shone my torch on in the pouring rain the first time I’d been to Quested Court; the same one I’d roared past with Q the second time, hardly even noticing it. Winterton 5, Hamley 45 — and an arrow pointing off to the left, in the direction of Quested Court.

  And Usherwood had zoomed right past it without even slowing down!

  ‘Hey!’ I yelped. ‘You’ve missed the turnoff!’

  But she didn’t even so much as touch the brake; just slid me a sidelong glance and a small smile. ‘Oh, you’re awake. Good sleep, Adam?’

  ‘Ms Usherwood …’

  ‘Don’t you think you might consider calling me Veronica, Adam?’

  Veronica? Was she crazy? Why would I want to do that? But, ‘Yeah, whatever,’ I gabbled. ‘The thing is, Ms … Vermrrrr …’ — I couldn’t bring myself to say it — ‘you’ve gone right past!’

  ‘Past what?’ She looked over at me with a slight frown.

  ‘Past the road to Quested Court! I saw the sign way back there!’

  ‘We’re not going to Quested Court, Adam,’ she said, in the same kind of slow, extra-patient voice the school careers dude had used to explain about my learning problem. ‘Not tonight.’

  ‘But … what’s the point of stopping off somewhere tonight when we’re so close? And Q —’ suddenly I felt the prickle of tears at the back of my eyes — ‘Q and Hannah — they’ll be expecting me!’

  At last the car slowed, pulling over onto the hard shoulder and coming to a standstill. I peered over my shoulder to check there was nothing coming up behind, so it was safe to turn. We’d gone way past the sign; I couldn’t even see it back there in the darkness. ‘It’s all clear,’ I told her. ‘Right back as far as I can see.’

  But instead of flipping a U-turn she switched the engine off. The music droned softly on in the sudden silence. The car was dark, but not too dark for me to see her face. It had a strange expression on it. For a crazy second I wondered if she was kidnapping me … or planning to murder me, there in the middle of nowhere. But then she spoke … and what she said was worse than murder. Way worse.

  ‘Adam … what did Mr Smigielski tell you, back at Highgate?’

  ‘That — that I was coming to Winterton, of course,’ I stammered, ‘and that —’ I felt myself flush in the darkness, shy to be saying the words out loud for the first time, ‘that Q was … adopting me.’

  Her next words were very, very gentle — and so kind she didn’t sound like Usherwood at all. ‘Oh, Adam. Was that what Mr Smigielski said … or what you heard?

  ‘It isn’t Q who’s adopting you.

  ‘It’s me.’

  A room of my own

  For what seemed an eternity I sat there paralysed, hearing her words echo over and over in my mind: ‘It’s me … me … me … me … me …’ But it was as if they were in some weird language I didn’t understand.

  From somewhere far away came the tiny, metallic ticking of the engine cooling in the night air.

  Then at last the meaning of what she’d said slammed into my gut like a fist.

  Blindly, desperately, I fumbled for the door handle; grabbed it and yanked it open. Stumbled out of the car, tripping over my own feet and crashing to my knees in the rough grass by the side of the road. I crawled frantically away from the car in the direction of the signboard, the direction of Q …

  Struggled to my feet, ran a few staggering steps … then slowed and stopped.

  Finally, standing there in the darkness, I realised the truth. It wasn’t Q. It never had been. There was no point running to Q. He didn’t want me. He never had.

  ‘Adam.’ Usherwood’s voice came from behind me, near the car. ‘Adam — I’m sorry. I know how you feel about Q. He’s an exceptional man. But he lives in a world of his own — you know that. He has a brilliant mind; but like most geniuses, when it comes to responsibility, to practical things …’

  Awkwardly, as if I was in a dream, I shambled round to face her. She’d left the car lights on. They stretched away into the distance, lighting up the road ahead until at last they were lost in the darkness.

  Usherwood was standing between me and the car, slim and straight, silhouetted against the glare of the headlights.

  ‘Why?’ I croaked. And then again, louder: ‘Why? Just tell me that. I don’t understand. Why would you want to adopt me … you, of all people?’

  I couldn’t see her face. After a long pause she answered me, her voice flat and unemotional. ‘Is it so strange that I might want a child?’ The words reminded me of Mr Smigielski’s, what seemed like a lifetime ago. I am constantly astonished by how many people long for a child.

  But Usherwood?

  ‘Let’s just say it has to do with something that lies in the past, Adam. Something that happened a long, long time ago. We’ll leave it at that — for the moment at least.’

  Staring at her, trying to make sense of her words, I realised I was shivering in my thin shirt.

  ‘You’re cold. Get in the car again; we’ll go home and get you settled in. Things will look better in the morning. Apart from anything else …’ I thought I could hear a hint of a wry smile in her voice, ‘we’ll be paying a visit to your precious Q. I’ve persuaded him to hold a small pre-release press conference for the new game … but I’ll tell you more about that tomorrow.’

  We drove the rest of the way in silence. I was numb with disbelief. It felt like my brain had completely stopped working … and deep down I was in no hurry for it to start again. The prospect of spending the next few years at Rippingale Hall had been bad enough; but the thought of a future stretching endlessly ahead under Usherwood’s icy scrutiny was almost worse.

  Less than five minutes later we pulled into a narrow driveway and stopped outside a tumbledown cottage. Someone — Usherwood, presumably — had left a light on downstairs, and it shone through the window onto an overgrown garden. ‘I thought you lived at Quested Court,’ I muttered, opening my door and clambering reluctantly out.

  ‘I did, until a few days ago.’ She didn’t say so, but that stark statement made it obvious that Usherwood had moved because … well, because of me. I guessed you couldn’t really shif
t a lanky thirteen-year-old into your employer’s house, even if it was one the size of Quested Court. But …

  ‘Does he know — about me, I mean?’

  ‘Adam,’ said Usherwood with exaggerated patience, ‘Q has been working twenty hours a day for the past few months. He barely knows his own name at present. Yes, I told him what I was planning, and yes, I told him I was moving out — but for all the attention he paid, I might as well have told the cat. Frankly, I doubt he’s even noticed my absence. Now: would you like some supper?’

  I shook my head. I’d had nothing to eat since sharing Cam’s lunch at school, but I felt as if I’d never be hungry again. All I wanted was to be alone — and think.

  She unlocked the front door and led the way into a small hallway. Doors led off to the left and right, but Usherwood ignored them, heading straight upstairs. ‘This will be your bedroom,’ she announced, opening a door on the landing. ‘There’s only one bathroom, I’m afraid. My room is there —’ she indicated a door further along the passage — ‘and there’s a lounge and kitchen downstairs. Breakfast will be at eight sharp. Sleep well.’

  Automatically I pushed the door open and went in. The first flicker of feeling made its way through my numbness, a tiny glimmer of light in the dark. A room of my own. I fumbled for the light switch and turned it on.

  The small room was bright and cheerful, and everything in it was squeaky-new. I glanced round, taking in the single bed with its squashy-looking patchwork cover and fat feather pillow, a wooden desk, a bookcase crammed with an assortment of kids’ books.

  I tossed my bag onto the bed, walked over to the window and pulled the curtain open. It looked out over the back garden — a patch of lawn surrounded by overgrown flowerbeds, with a dark hedgerow on the far side. Beyond that was the black emptiness of fields. Somewhere far away I heard the hoarse bleat of a sheep calling to its lamb. Apart from that, there was silence.

  It was all way weird. Why would Usherwood want a kid — especially a kid like me? I didn’t know much about mothers, but it seemed to me that Ms Usherwood had about as much maternal instinct as a rattlesnake. ‘Is it so strange that I might want a child?’, she’d asked. The short answer to that was: ‘Yes.’

  Usherwood didn’t like me — I was under no illusions about that. Yet right from the beginning there’d been something about the way she’d looked at me — as if I was a complicated sum, and she was trying to figure me out.

  I shrugged. The bottom line was, I didn’t like her either, and I didn’t trust her one bit. I was more and more certain it had been Usherwood who’d snooped in my room at Quested Court that night long ago — though what she’d been looking for, I couldn’t begin to imagine.

  Frowning at the empty doorway, I noticed the key in the lock — and at long last I managed a wry grin. What the heck — for the first time in my life I had a room of my own, and it was cool. I was better off than I would have been at Rippingale Hall, that was for sure. No matter how closely old Usherwood watched me, I’d watch her closer still. After all, I’d had thirteen years of intensive training from the best possible teacher: Matron.

  I padded across the floor and turned the key. Then I stripped to my boxers, tucked my shawl into bed, slid in beside it and snuggled down, my fingers feeling for the familiar contours of my ring.

  I turned off the bedside light, slipped my thumb into my mouth, and reached for my shawl. The warmth and silence of the snug little room wrapped themselves round me like a cocoon. Staring up at the silvery wash of moonlight on the sloping ceiling, a thought drifted into my mind: I could get used to this …

  But I didn’t get the chance.

  The final game

  I was woken by the racket of a zillion birds chirruping and squabbling outside the window. Cautiously, I unlocked the door and peeked out. All clear. I hopped into the shower, tugged my comb through my hair and threw on the jeans and T-shirt Q had given me, trying to forget it was Usherwood who’d actually chosen them.

  I had no idea what the time was, but the shadows in the garden were long, and there was dew sparkling on the grass. Feeling shy and awkward, a twist of nerves tugging at my gut, I tiptoed downstairs.

  One of the doors was open a crack, and I could hear a radio playing quietly behind it, tuned to some kind of news programme.

  Hesitantly, I pushed the door open. Usherwood was sitting at a kitchen table set for two, drinking coffee. She looked at her watch. ‘Five minutes late,’ she remarked. ‘Sit down and help yourself to muesli and a slice of toast — and hurry up. We need to be off in twenty minutes — the press is arriving at ten o’clock, and there’s a great deal to do before then. There’ll be television coverage too, on the evening news.’

  I slid onto the empty chair and reached for the cereal packet, wondering how much it was polite to take. I was starving. ‘What’s happening, exactly?’ I risked asking.

  ‘Today is the final deadline for the pilot copy of the last game in the Karazan series,’ Usherwood rattled off, very much in business mode. ‘I’m assuming Q has finally finished it — he swore he was on track when I last saw him. Among other things, we’ll be announcing the title, which until now has been strictly embargoed.’ She shot me a glance. ‘Top secret, in your terms, Adam. In addition, there’ll be a set-up of a group of children loading the game for the very first time — the opening screen, and a glimpse of the video prelims. All fairly standard marketing procedure — but in the case of this particular game, the level of public interest will be huge.’

  She was firing on all cylinders, that much was clear. Most of what she was going on about went straight over my head — but one thing did stick. ‘A group of children?’ I asked, through a mouthful of what tasted like horse food. ‘What children?’

  ‘Don’t talk with your mouth full, Adam. I would expect better manners of someone with an orphanage upbringing. Never mind — I’ll soon get you into shape. Once the launch is over we’ll get that skin seen to — I have an excellent specialist. It’s all about toxins. Yes, that’s a top priority — along with a decent haircut and intensive remedial tuition throughout the holidays. A learning disability is sheer self-indulgence, in my view.’ She frowned at me. ‘You should drink a minimum of eight glasses of water a day, you know. And now, if you will excuse me, I have a number of matters to attend to before we leave. Kindly clear the table and load your plate into the dishwasher when you’ve finished, and meet me outside in —’ she consulted her watch — ‘fifteen minutes — by which time I expect you to have made your bed and tidied your room. And bring down the car keys — they’re on my dressing table.’

  I swallowed, feeling the mouthful of oats and bran grinding its slow way down my throat like sandpaper. ‘Ms … Vrrrmph,’ I tried again, hoping the bits still stuck between my teeth didn’t count as a full mouth, ‘what children?’

  She paused for a moment on her way to the door, glancing back impatiently over her shoulder. ‘The others, of course: Richard, James, Kenta and Genevieve.’

  I gobbled the rest of my breakfast and stashed the plate and spoon in the dishwasher, then raced upstairs and made my bed. There was nothing in my room to tidy, but I put my shawl and penny whistle into my backpack along with a sweatshirt, and slung it over my shoulder. Then, warily, I padded down the passage to Usherwood’s room. The door was ajar. I knocked softly before easing it open, though I could hear her rattling round downstairs.

  Although I’d been told to come, I had an uncomfortable feeling of trespassing. I headed straight over to what I guessed must be the dresser — a dark wood chest of drawers with a mirror over it — and scanned the surface for the keys. It was cluttered with stuff — a hairbrush, a perfume bottle I guessed was responsible for the faint musky fragrance that hung in the air, a jumble of bottles and jars. I grinned to myself, remembering that comment about my table manners. Matron would have had something to say about the dusting of powder covering the polished surface, never mind the mess. Cleanser, toner, moisturiser, concealing cream … Sh
oot, I thought, it’s good to be a guy … Then I spotted the keys behind a pink bottle of something called ‘foundation’ and was out of there, closing the door thankfully behind me.

  The little black sports car drew up outside Quested Court in a spray of gravel; Usherwood leapt out and bustled up the steps and through the big arched door without a backward glance.

  I unfolded myself from the passenger seat and followed, more hesitantly. The first time I’d been here I’d felt like an interloper; the second time, like a guest of honour. This time I didn’t have a clue how to feel, what was expected of me, or where I fitted in.

  I paused outside the door, which had swung almost closed. Raised my hand to the big brass knocker, wondering if I should knock or march straight in like Usherwood had done.

  Before I could make up my mind the door was flung open and there was Q. His few wispy tendrils of gingery hair sprung up from his freckled head like corkscrews, and his glasses sat askew on his knobbly nose. He was even thinner than I remembered, and more like a scarecrow than ever. He was wearing corduroy trousers, a striped pyjama top, and a tie with an egg stain on it. A battered sheepskin slipper was on one foot, and a sock with a hole in the toe on the other.

  He was more excited than I’d ever seen him. ‘Adam!’ he cried, holding out his arms. ‘My dear, dear boy! What’s all this Usherwood is telling me — and never a word to anyone! All most odd … but just imagine — it’s finished! Yes, in the early hours of this morning — my magnus opus — my greatest game yet! And do you know, my boy, it virtually wrote itself? Yes, finished at last … and you dear children here to help celebrate! Come in, come in … come and join us for some supper before Usherwood’s press vultures descend!’

  ‘Not supper, Q — breakfast.’ There was Hannah, her face set in a severe frown. I grinned at her, my heart lifting. She was only five years old, but sometimes you’d have thought old Hannah was the first female dictator of the world. ‘You come back into the dining room right now and eat something! You’ve buttered your bacon and put tomato sauce on your toast — and you’ve poured coffee on your cereal again!’ Suddenly her eyes widened in alarm. ‘Look out, everyone!’ she squawked. Something small and furry and fast as a rocket shot out from nowhere, zipped between my legs, and zoomed through the library door, followed seconds later by a super-charged cream-coloured streak that disappeared after it like a heat-seeking missile. ‘That’s Bluebell and Tiger Lily, playing tag again,’ Hannah announced disapprovingly. ‘I wouldn’t play if I was Bluebell, ’cos Tiger Lily never lets her win.’