with exactly one spade in her hand wasn’t instantly obvious.
‘So we don’t have one spade each, but someone must keep a lookout anyway.’
‘I’ll do that,’ Linnéa says.
Nobody minds, Ida least of all. She is simply grateful to lose that mind-reading freak.
It’s fair to say that there’s no one Ida detests more. Linnéa gives her a pain, she’s always shouty and annoying. Above all, totally mental. She thinks that she’s so special with her offbeat clothes and make-up and has obviously missed the point that normal people think all weirdos look identical.
As Ida follows the others towards the grave, her hand clutches the wooden handle of the spade. She is last in the line and feels prickly, as if the back of her neck was being tickled by a feather, as she senses the darkness behind her and all that might be hiding in it.
She fixes her eyes on Vanessa’s blonde head. Doesn’t want to look at the gravestones as they walk past. And especially doesn’t want to think about the corpses that are rotting downthere, worms crawling through eye sockets and between ribs. Doesn’t want to think what might have been buried in the grave they are going to dig up. Doesn’t want to think ahead about them digging up a horrid stinking grave at all.
I don’t want to be part of this. I don’t want to be part of this. I don’t want to be part of this.
Ida has always hated the dark. When she was little it could take hours before she went to sleep. She would lie in bed, listening out for the slightest sound, carefully wrapping herself up in the duvet, not daring to have an arm or leg uncovered. Too scared to close her eyes, too scared to get out of bed, too scared to stay put.
Sometimes she would call out for her mum or dad. One of them would turn up in the doorway, sighing, still half asleep and tell her that the dark wasn’t dangerous. That everything was just the same as during the day.
As if daytime life was totally safe and didn’t hold anything frightening. As if it isn’t worse when someone out to do something bad to you can hide away, concealed in the darkness. Like murderers and paedophiles. Rabid fighting dogs and drug addicts.
Erik, Julia and Felicia have never noticed this. Ida has become an expert at pretending to sleep. On taking deep, regular sleepy breaths as she lies with her eyes wide open, scanning the darkness.
She has no intention whatsoever of letting the others in the Circle notice that she is afraid of the dark, but is prepared to bet that Linnéa has been fishing in her mind already and picked it up.
It makes sense. Obviously, Linnéa would use her power to get at Ida.
Vanessa stops so suddenly that Ida nearly walks into her.
They have arrived at the grave.
Everyone holds still for a moment. Ida feels the feather on the back of her neck again. She takes a few steps towards the gravestone so that Vanessa stands between her and the dark.
Minoo opens the sports bag.
‘I did a search online and it seems the coffin should be about two metres below ground,’ Minoo says and grabs a spade.
‘ Two metres ,’ Vanessa groans as she too takes a spade and probes the ground tentatively. ‘Shit. Anna-Karin, since earth is your element, can’t you just say abracadabra and make the soil disappear?’
‘Yours is air, so you might as well blow it away,’ Anna-Karin replies quietly.
Vanessa puts her foot on the spade and lifts a large lump of dry soil with scorched grass on top. Ida shivers despite the warm summer night. In this case, anyway, she is with Nicolaus. It’s all so wrong, for lots of reasons.
Anna-Karin and Minoo push their spades in, too.
Ida swallows hard, reminds herself why she is here and what the book has promised her. She goes next to Minoo and starts digging.
It is much harder work than she had expected. Their spades get in each other’s way all the time. But, just as when she is riding, the physical effort creates a kind of trance. She becomes a digging robot that
‘So we don’t have one spade each, but someone must keep a lookout anyway.’
‘I’ll do that,’ Linnéa says.
Nobody minds, Ida least of all. She is simply grateful to lose that mind-reading freak.
It’s fair to say that there’s no one Ida detests more. Linnéa gives her a pain, she’s always shouty and annoying. Above all, totally mental. She thinks that she’s so special with her offbeat clothes and make-up and has obviously missed the point that normal people think all weirdos look identical.
As Ida follows the others towards the grave, her hand clutches the wooden handle of the spade. She is last in the line and feels prickly, as if the back of her neck was being tickled by a feather, as she senses the darkness behind her and all that might be hiding in it.
She fixes her eyes on Vanessa’s blonde head. Doesn’t want to look at the gravestones as they walk past. And especially doesn’t want to think about the corpses that are rotting downthere, worms crawling through eye sockets and between ribs. Doesn’t want to think what might have been buried in the grave they are going to dig up. Doesn’t want to think ahead about them digging up a horrid stinking grave at all.
I don’t want to be part of this. I don’t want to be part of this. I don’t want to be part of this.
Ida has always hated the dark. When she was little it could take hours before she went to sleep. She would lie in bed, listening out for the slightest sound, carefully wrapping herself up in the duvet, not daring to have an arm or leg uncovered. Too scared to close her eyes, too scared to get out of bed, too scared to stay put.
Sometimes she would call out for her mum or dad. One of them would turn up in the doorway, sighing, still half asleep and tell her that the dark wasn’t dangerous. That everything was just the same as during the day.
As if daytime life was totally safe and didn’t hold anything frightening. As if it isn’t worse when someone out to do something bad to you can hide away, concealed in the darkness. Like murderers and paedophiles. Rabid fighting dogs and drug addicts.
Erik, Julia and Felicia have never noticed this. Ida has become an expert at pretending to sleep. On taking deep, regular sleepy breaths as she lies with her eyes wide open, scanning the darkness.
She has no intention whatsoever of letting the others in the Circle notice that she is afraid of the dark, but is prepared to bet that Linnéa has been fishing in her mind already and picked it up.
It makes sense. Obviously, Linnéa would use her power to get at Ida.
Vanessa stops so suddenly that Ida nearly walks into her.
They have arrived at the grave.
Everyone holds still for a moment. Ida feels the feather on the back of her neck again. She takes a few steps towards the gravestone so that Vanessa stands between her and the dark.
Minoo opens the sports bag.
‘I did a search online and it seems the coffin should be about two metres below ground,’ Minoo says and grabs a spade.
‘ Two metres ,’ Vanessa groans as she too takes a spade and probes the ground tentatively. ‘Shit. Anna-Karin, since earth is your element, can’t you just say abracadabra and make the soil disappear?’
‘Yours is air, so you might as well blow it away,’ Anna-Karin replies quietly.
Vanessa puts her foot on the spade and lifts a large lump of dry soil with scorched grass on top. Ida shivers despite the warm summer night. In this case, anyway, she is with Nicolaus. It’s all so wrong, for lots of reasons.
Anna-Karin and Minoo push their spades in, too.
Ida swallows hard, reminds herself why she is here and what the book has promised her. She goes next to Minoo and starts digging.
It is much harder work than she had expected. Their spades get in each other’s way all the time. But, just as when she is riding, the physical effort creates a kind of trance. She becomes a digging robot that
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