The Secret Kingdom Read online

  Something touched Zobayda’s upturned hand: a light droplet, and then, another. She opened her eyes. Rain fell on her head and slid down her cheeks. It splashed her blue robe and trickled into her shoes. She threw back her head and let the rain splatter into her mouth. ‘Timoken!’ she gurgled. ‘You are a magician.’

  Laughter came flying out of the whirling figure. ‘Save the water, Zobayda. I can’t keep spinning forever.’

  Zobayda emptied the goatskin bag, scattering its contents on the sand. She opened the bag as wide as she could and let the rain tumble into it. When it was half full, she called to her brother, ‘Stop, Timoken, before you turn into a pillar. We have enough water for days and days. Besides, I am getting very wet.’

  Timoken sank to the ground. The rain thinned and pattered, and then it stopped. Timoken lay staring up at the blue sky. ‘I burst the clouds,’ he said, laughing delightedly.

  Zobayda tied their belongings in a long crimson robe that their mother had packed. She put the parcel on her head and balanced it with her hand. ‘You can carry the water,’ she told Timoken.

  The goatskin bag was now very heavy. Timoken tried carrying it on his head but the water slopped about uncomfortably. He would have to use his arms. Once again they headed north. After a while, a range of mountains appeared, a wavering line of blue on the far horizon.

  The rain had woken hundreds of creatures that had been sleeping beneath the dry sand. Lizards scurried over the children’s feet, snakes slithered around boulders, and insects of every size and colour appeared in the sky. They flew in a haze around the children’s heads, buzzing and clicking. The desert was no longer dead.

  Small, mouse-like creatures popped their heads out of the sand. They watched the children, their black eyes round with astonishment. One of them squeaked and Timoken had a feeling that he understood the creature. He stopped, put down the water bag and stared at the furry head.

  ‘Timoken, come on!’ called his sister. ‘Those ratty things are not going to tell you anything.’

  On the contrary, thought Timoken. He smiled at the creature and its expression seemed to soften. It pulled itself right out of the sand and, sitting on its hind legs, it said, ‘Safe journey!’ Or did it?

  ‘Thank you,’ said Timoken.

  ‘Timoken!’ Zobayda was now a good way ahead of her brother. But what was the use of hurrying, when you didn’t know where you were going? There might be more to be gained by talking to someone – or something – that knew the desert.

  Timoken knelt beside the creature. It gazed at him in a friendly way. Its companions were emerging from the sand. They turned their heads to look at Timoken, and sniffed the air with interest.

  Timoken cleared his throat and asked, ‘What are you?’ He was surprised to hear his words emerge from his throat in a series of soft squeaks.

  ‘We are us,’ said the creature.

  There was no doubt about what it had said. Timoken could understand its language.

  ‘Other things call us sand-rats,’ the creature went on.

  ‘Sand-rats,’ Timoken repeated. ‘I am human. My name is Timoken.’ He pointed at Zobayda, resolutely ploughing ahead. ‘And that is my sister.’

  The sand-rat looked at Zobayda. ‘She goes the wrong way,’ it said. ‘Do not follow.’

  Timoken frowned. ‘The wrong way? How can you tell?’

  ‘There are bad spirits that way,’ squeaked the sand-rat. ‘Viridees.’

  ‘VIRIDEES!’ echoed the other sand-rats, and suddenly they were gone. All that remained were several small mounds of sand.

  ‘Stop, Zobayda!’ called Timoken. ‘You are going the wrong way.’

  ‘How do you know?’ she called back.

  ‘The sand-rat told me.’

  Zobayda stopped. She turned and stared at her brother. ‘That can’t be true.’

  ‘It is, Zobayda.’

  Timoken’s sister walked towards him slowly. ‘You mean you could understand their language?’

  Timoken nodded. ‘And I could speak it. They told me that there are bad spirits the way you were going. They called them viridees.’

  He watched the disbelief on his sister’s face turn to astonishment. ‘You really can talk to animals,’ she said, her eyes wide with awe. ‘What else can you do, Timoken?’

  ‘Who knows?’ Timoken grinned. He picked up the goatskin bag and balanced it firmly on his head. ‘Let’s go east,’ he said, with confidence.

  Zobayda saw a pale semi-circle beginning to rise above the eastern dunes. She fell into step beside her brother, and together they walked towards the moon.

  The light had almost left the sky when they saw the thing – a dark shape on the horizon, it wavered and grew in size as it approached them. Zobayda’s instinct was to turn and run, but Timoken clutched her hand, saying, ‘It will catch us, and then we will be too tired to fight. Besides …’

  ‘Besides?’ asked Zobayda.

  ‘We do not know what it is.’

  They stood and waited, while the thing drew nearer. Now they could make out the huge teeth, bulging eyes and great galloping feet. It began to make a noise, a long, snorting bellow, like a creature from the underworld.

  Zobayda crumpled to her knees, crying, ‘We should have run!’

  Chapter Three

  Sandstorm

  It was a camel, an animal that Timoken had seen painted on the walls of the palace courtyard, but never in the flesh. The huge animal appeared to be angry. It was making straight for the children, its head tossing from side to side and its deafening bellows increasing as it approached. Long strands of spittle hung from its lower jaw – and those teeth! Those feet!

  ‘Get up, Zobayda!’ hissed Timoken. ‘Or you’ll be trampled. We have to face this creature.’ He lowered the water-bag to the ground and grabbed his sister’s hand, pulling her to her feet.

  The camel slowed its pace. It gave a throaty bleat and stepped towards the children. Zobayda peeped from behind her hand and shivered.

  ‘Good day!’ Timoken’s greeting emerged as a soft version of the camel’s bleat.

  The camel blinked. ‘Gabar!’ it snorted.

  ‘Gabar,’ Timoken repeated. Possibly the camel’s name, he thought.

  The camel blinked again, its long, curling eyelashes fluttering like birds’ wings.

  Zobayda forced herself to look up at the camel’s face. Compared to a horse, this creature was ugly.

  Timoken noticed that an odd sort of saddle rested on the camel’s hump. It was made of intricately carved wood and looked like a shallow cradle. Inside the cradle there were brightly coloured cushions braided in gold and silver. The camel’s harness was made of plaited leather joined with rings of gold and hung with tiny bells, and its saddle was weighted by heavy bags. So where was the camel’s wealthy owner?

  ‘Where is your master?’ Timoken asked the camel.

  The animal remained silent.

  ‘Is he dead?’ asked Timoken.

  The camel turned its head so that one eye looked at the boy suspiciously. Timoken felt uncomfortable. If a sand-rat could understand him, why not a camel?

  ‘Perhaps we could ride it,’ Zobayda suggested. ‘It has fine feet for walking over the sand.’

  How could they climb up to the camel’s lofty hump? The animal was obviously in no mood to help them. It gave a long bleat and walked around the children, heading west, away from the moon.

  But the moon had vanished and a dark cloud was beginning to fill the sky: a cloud that grew every second, a cloud that filled their ears with its roar and sent a torrent of sand bowling towards them across the desert.

  ‘A sandstorm!’ cried Zobayda. ‘Timoken, run!’

  They ran in the camel’s wake. It was galloping again, and bellowing fearfully. It had obviously been running from the sandstorm until the children had, momentarily, held it up.

  The great cloud of sand was almost upon them when the camel suddenly stopped. ‘Behind me!’ it snorted.

  Timoken grabbed
his sister’s hand and they stumbled to the camel. By the time they reached him, the air was thick with sand. They threw themselves on to the ground behind the great creature, and he sank to his knees. Flying sand thundered about them, stinging their eyes, filling their noses and coating their hair.

  Timoken could feel his sister struggling with her bundle of clothes. Something cool and soft touched his face, and then covered his head. The web, he thought.

  Holding the web before her, Zobayda stood up and faced the storm. The sand rushed past the web, never touching her. Slowly, she pulled one end of the web over the camel’s head, tying a corner to his harness. Only then did she duck down, bringing the other end of the web over herself and her brother.

  ‘That was brave,’ Timoken whispered, still hardly daring to open his mouth.

  ‘I had to cover the camel’s face,’ she said, ‘or he would have drowned in sand.’

  Timoken looked up at the glittering threads above him. The sand was bouncing harmlessly off the web, as though the flimsy strands of silk were made of steel. ‘We’re safe,’ he thought drowsily. A moment before he fell asleep he remembered that the camel had spoken.

  ‘The camel spoke,’ he told his sister, ‘and I understood him.’

  Zobayda smiled. ‘He’s not suspicious of us any more.’

  All three slept. The windblown sand stormed over their heads, and the moon spider’s web kept them safe and warm.

  In the morning, when the children lifted the edge of the web, they saw that they were, in fact, in a hole. They were surrounded by a wall of sand. Timoken stood up. His head came to just above the top of the wall.

  ‘We’d have been buried alive,’ said Zobayda, ‘without this.’ She gathered up the web, untying the corner from the camel’s harness.

  The camel got to his feet, grumbling and bellowing. Sand flew off his back as he shook his great head. The children worried that he would not be able to get out of the hole. But the camel set his great feet against the sloping side and climbed out with ease.

  ‘Now us,’ said Timoken.

  The children began to crawl their way upwards, pushing the goatskin bag and the parcel of clothes before them. The wall crumbled beneath their hands and feet as they clawed and slid in the soft sand. And all the while the camel watched their progress with a superior expression; once or twice he almost seemed to smile.

  It was a long time before the children finally stumbled out, dragging their possessions with them. They lay on their backs and closed their eyes against the bright sunlight, their limbs aching from the climb.

  The camel suddenly gave a long, loud bellow. Timoken answered with a small sound of his own.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Zobayda asked.

  ‘He says we must move quickly,’ Timoken told her, ‘but I said we needed more time.’

  The camel bellowed again, and kicked up a cloud of sand. ‘No time,’ he said. ‘Must go. Quick!’

  ‘All right, all right,’ moaned Timoken, getting to his feet. ‘But we need a drink, and so do you, I’m sure.’

  The camel blinked. ‘Water? Where?’

  Timoken carefully undid the goatskin bag. Water had seeped from the top, but there was still enough to drink, for all three of them – depending on how much a camel needed.

  Before they could stop him, the camel plunged his head into the bag and began gulping up the water in great, long draughts. A few more gulps and all the water would be gone. Timoken seized the camel’s harness and tried to drag his head away. ‘Stop!’ he bellowed. ‘You’ll empty the bag, and we need a drink, too.’

  ‘Got to fill up,’ gurgled the camel.

  ‘We saved your life with our magic web,’ Timoken protested. ‘This is a fine way to repay us.’

  The camel stepped away from the bag. He rolled his great eyes and shook his head, jingling the bells on his harness. ‘Drink, magic children,’ he said in an awestruck bleat.

  Zobayda laughed. She could not understand the rumbling camel language, but she had a good idea what was going on.

  When the children had sipped the few mouthfuls of water that were left, Timoken tied the handles of the empty bag and slung it over his shoulder. The sun was rising fast, the heat burning their faces. He would have to bring on another rainstorm before long, but the camel was anxious to move, and how much easier it would be to travel on his back, rather than ploughing over the sand or flying through the hot air. Besides, the animal seemed to know where he was going.

  ‘Could we … ride on you?’ Timoken asked in what he thought was a polite sort of bleat.

  ‘Naturally,’ said the camel.

  Timoken stared up at the camel’s hump, so far above him. ‘But how …?’

  The camel sank to his knees and grunted, ‘How do you think?’

  The saddle looked safe and comfortable. The children climbed up and sat cross-legged among the cushions. Timoken took the reins that lay across the pommel at the front of the saddle. He gave them a little shake and the bells on the harness gave a silvery chime.

  The camel got to his feet.

  ‘Where are we going?’ asked Timoken.

  ‘No idea,’ came the rumbling reply.

  ‘I thought you knew,’ muttered Timoken as the camel set off. Soon he was galloping. Zobayda wrapped her arms around her brother’s waist, while Timoken held the pommel tightly. The wooden saddle swung and bounced beneath them, and the shiny cushions slid this way and that.

  After a while, a curious conversation between the boy and the camel began. Timoken learned that Gabar was indeed the camel’s name. His master had been a wealthy merchant, crossing the desert to barter fine silk from the north for gold and jewels from the south.

  ‘What happened?’ asked Timoken, his voice wobbling from the jolting of the camel’s great strides.

  ‘Viridees!’

  That name again. ‘What are viridees?’

  A low rumble came from Gabar’s throat. ‘Killers! Evil ones! They told master to catch children. He said no. So they sent jackals to pull him off my back. They blew their foul breath in his face, and I was afraid. I ran. I am ashamed. But I knew he would die.’ Gabar groaned.

  Timoken patted Gabar’s shaggy neck. ‘You are not to blame.’

  ‘Next time I will not run away,’ said Gabar. ‘I was afraid when I met you, but you are my master now, and I will not let you die.’

  ‘We have no intention of dying,’ said Timoken. ‘I can perform enchantments, and my sister has magic in her fingers.’

  ‘That is why they want you,’ grunted Gabar.

  ‘The viridees want us?’ said Timoken.

  ‘Both of you,’ said Gabar. ‘They search the desert. They sent the sandstorm. They killed my master. They will do anything to find you.’

  Timoken shuddered. He thought, If the viridees want us, it is not only for what we can do, but for what we have: the moon spider’s web.

  Zobayda asked why Timoken and the camel had been bleating and grunting at each other. Timoken repeated what Gabar told him about the viridees.

  ‘They want the web, Zobayda,’ said Timoken.

  ‘And the Alixir,’ Zobayda reminded him. ‘Who would not want to live forever?’

  Chapter Four

  Voices in the Cave

  Gabar carried the children to a range of mountains in the northern desert. Zobayda and Timoken were asleep, when the camel began to bellow and stamp his feet. They woke up with a start, rubbing their eyes and stretching their aching legs.

  ‘Time to rest,’ grunted Gabar. He sank to his knees and the saddle tilted violently.

  Luckily, Zobayda had wound a long scarf around herself and her brother and had tied the ends of the scarf to the saddle, so they would not fall out. Before they could climb down she had to untie the knots, but her fingers were stiff with cold and she could not loosen them.

  ‘Help me, Timoken,’ she demanded, ‘or we’ll be tied to this camel forever.’

  Timoken was staring at the sky. Never had he seen so many st
ars. Their cold light fell across the desert, making the sand glitter like ice. Shivering, he helped his sister with the knots so they could climb off the camel’s back.

  Gabar had remembered a cave where his master used to rest. Here it was, tucked into the mountainside, a few steps up from the sand. The children clambered into the cave. Away from the chilly air, their shivering gradually subsided. Zobayda decided to unpack some of their food, but it was so dark she could not even see her own hands. Groping in her bundle she found a candle, but there was no fire to light it.

  ‘You can bring rain, perhaps you can make fire,’ Zobayda said to her brother.

  Timoken flexed his fingers. Making fire seemed a step too far. ‘It was your hand that touched my crown and made it fit,’ he said. ‘And your hand that saved us from the giant bird.’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t think –’

  ‘Try.’

  ‘Very well.’ Zobayda balanced the candle on the floor of the cave. She cupped the tip of the candle in her two hands and whispered to herself. Or was she speaking to the candle? Whatever the words she used, the thin string in the lump of wax refused to respond.

  ‘My fingers are too cold,’ said Zobayda.

  ‘Don’t give up,’ urged Timoken.

  His sister bent her head. A flutter of sound came from her, a quiet song. Her cupped fingers began to glow. ‘Oh!’ She lifted her hands and revealed a tiny flame.

  ‘You did it!’ cried Timoken.

  Zobayda seemed surprised by what she had done. As the flame grew, it filled the cave with light, and she could see her ring, sparkling as never before. She was certain the little face smiled at her.

  ‘It was the ring,’ she told Timoken, ‘not my fingers.’

  Gabar’s master had left piles of brushwood at the back of the cave, ready for his next visit. Timoken quickly gathered some up and lit a fire with the candle. Warmth spread through the children’s bodies. Sitting close to the fire they ate all the dried meat they had left. Now there were only millet cakes and beans. They wondered how long these would have to last.

  There was a bag of grain behind the brushwood. For the camel, guessed Timoken. He carried it out to Gabar, sitting alone in the cold desert.