Stormbringers Read online

  The children were singing like a thousand-strong choir, spilling down the steps of the harbour, some of them jumping off the wet steps and laughing as they went ankle deep into the silt, picking their way through the thick wet weeds where the shells crunched under their feet, walking hand in hand, scores of them, hundreds of them, side by side, winding their way around the grounded ships and old wrecks, to the mouth of the harbour where the sea still retreated before them, further and further out towards the horizon, far quicker than they could walk, as it built a bridge of land for them, just for them, all the way to Palestine.

  ‘I think we should go,’ Luca decided, his heart racing. ‘Go with them now. I think it’s a true miracle. Johann said that the sea would part for us and it has done so.’

  Luca went to the head of the harbour steps, Brother Peter beside him. ‘D’you think this is true?’ Luca shouted, his brown eyes bright with excitement.

  ‘A miracle,’ the older man confirmed. ‘A miracle, and that I should see it! Praise be to God!’

  ‘What are you doing?’ Ishraq demanded, alarmed. ‘What d’you think you’re doing?’

  ‘I have to see,’ Luca spoke over his shoulder, his eyes fixed on the disappearing sea. ‘I have to see the new land. Johann is leading the children to Jerusalem. I have to see this.’

  Freize, on the grounded boat, trying to steady the horses, suddenly let out a sharp yelp of pain. The pocket of his jacket was jumping and squirming. His fingers were bloody from where he had reached inside. He tried again and pulled out the small ginger kitten. She was a little ball of spitting terror, her fur on end, her eyes madly green. She struggled wildly in his grip, he let her drop to the deck and she bounded away, agile as a monkey, up the straining mooring rope to the quayside, racing for the inn. But she didn’t go in the open door, she swarmed up the vine that grew by the door and scrambled onto the tiled roof. She did not stop there but went higher, up to the very smoke vent, and balanced on top of the highest point on the quayside, her claws scrabbling on the terracotta tiles, as she clung to the roof, yowling with terror.

  ‘No!’ Freize suddenly shouted, his voice loud and frightened over the singing of the children. He vaulted over the side of the boat, dropping heavily into the sludge of the harbour floor. He struggled round the grounded boat to the lowest of the wet harbour steps, slipping on the seaweed and grabbing a mooring ring to stop himself from falling. He crawled, his feet slipping and sliding, to the top of the steps where Luca, almost in a trance, was starting to walk down, his face radiant. Freize barrelled into him, grabbed him round the waist pushing him back to the quayside, and thrust him bodily towards the inn.

  ‘I want to see . . .’ Luca struggled against him. ‘Freize – let me go! I’m going! I’m walking!’

  ‘It’s not safe! It’s not safe!’ Freize babbled. ‘The kitten knows. The horses know. God help us all. Something terrible is going to happen. Get into the inn, get into the attic, get onto the roof if you can. Like the kitten! See the kitten! The sea is going to turn on us.’

  ‘It’s parting,’ Brother Peter argued, standing his ground. ‘You can see. Johann said that it would part for him and he would walk to Jerusalem. He’s going, the children are going; we’re going with him.’

  ‘No, you’re not!’ Freize pushed Luca roughly towards the inn, slapping him on his shoulders in frustration. ‘Take Isolde!’ he shouted into Luca’s bright face, shaking his shoulders. ‘Take Ishraq! Or they’ll drown before your eyes. You don’t want that, do you? You don’t want to see the waters come back and sweep Isolde away?’

  Luca woke as if from a dream. ‘What? You think the sea will come back?’

  ‘I’m sure of it!’ Freize shouted. ‘Get them to safety. Get them out of here! Save the girls! Look at the kitten!’

  Luca shot one horrified look at the kitten which was still clinging to the topmost point of the roof, spitting with fear, and then grabbed Isolde’s hand and Ishraq’s arm and hurried them both into the inn. Isolde would have held back but Ishraq was as frightened as Freize, and dragged her onwards. ‘Come on!’ she said. ‘If it’s a miracle, then the sea will stay dry. We can follow later. Let’s get inside, let’s get up to our bedroom. We can look from the window. Come on, Isolde!’

  Freize saw they were on their way to safety and turned back and ran down the stone steps to the damp floor of the harbour, his boots churning in the deep mud. ‘Come back!’ he shouted to the children. ‘Come back. The sea will turn! That’s not the way!’

  They were singing so loudly, in such happy triumph, that they did not even hear him. ‘Come back!’ Freize yelled. He started to run after them, slipping on the silt and the weeds, splashing doggedly through the puddles of seawater in his big boots. The slowest children at the back turned when they heard him and paused when they saw him coming, waving his arms and shouting.

  ‘Go back!’ Freize commanded them. ‘Go back to the village!’

  They hesitated, uncertain what they should do.

  ‘Go back, go back,’ Freize said urgently. ‘The sea will turn, it will wash into the harbour again.’

  Their blank faces showed that they could not understand him, their whole conviction, their whole crusade, was pressing them onwards. Johann had promised them this miracle and they believed that it was happening then and there. All their friends, all their fellow pilgrims were convinced, they were singing as they walked, further and further towards the harbour mouth where the receding sea shone white as it rushed away southwards. They all wanted to go together. They could see their road unfolding before them.

  ‘Sweetmeats,’ Freize said desperately. ‘Go to the inn, they are giving away free sweets.’

  Half a dozen children turned, and started to go back to the quayside.

  ‘Hurry!’ Freize shouted. ‘Hurry or they’ll be all gone. Run as fast as you can!’

  He caught another half-dozen children and told them the same thing. They turned to go back and so did their friends who were a little before them.

  Freize battled his way, pushing through the children to the front of the crowd. ‘Johann!’ he shouted. ‘You are mistaken!’

  The boy’s face was bright with conviction, his eyes fixed on the sea that still receded steadily, invitingly, before him. The harbour mouth was dry, and yet still the sea drained away and the tawny mud unrolled before them like a Berber rug, like a dry smooth road all the way to his destination. ‘God has made the way dry for me,’ he said simply. ‘You can walk with me. Tomorrow morning we will walk into Palestine and dine on milk and honey. I see it, though you do not see it yet. I am walking dry-shod, as I said we would.’

  ‘Please,’ Freize shouted. ‘Walk tomorrow. When it has had time to dry out properly. Don’t go now. I’m afraid the waters will come . . .’

  ‘You are afraid,’ Johann said gently. ‘You doubted from the beginning, and now you are afraid, as you will always be afraid. You go back. I shall go on.’

  Freize looked back to the quayside. A scuffle caught his eye. The little girl that he had first met with the bleeding feet was trying to get back to the quayside. Two boys had hold of her and were dragging her onward, trying to catch up with Johann. ‘You let her go!’ Freize called to them.

  They held her tightly, pulling her onwards. Freize turned and ran back for her, burst through the two of them, pulled her away. ‘I want to go back to shore!’ she gasped. ‘I’m frightened of the sea.’

  ‘I’ll take you,’ he said.

  Mutely, she lifted up her arms to him. Freize bent down and swung her up onto his shoulders, and turned to run clumsily back to the quayside, ploughing through the mud which sucked wetly at his feet, calling to the children to follow him as he ran.

  He could hear the church bell of Piccolo starting to toll loudly, as the villagers poured out of their homes down to the quayside, the fishermen aghast at the state of the harbour and the loss of their ships. People were staring in wonderment at the anchors and chains lying alongside the beached craft, at the