Soul Splinter by Abi Elphinstone Read Free Book Online Page A

‘
Alfie’s left – I’m not leaving her too.
’ And, after a prolonged goodbye to Hermit, Siddy had crept out into the corridor of rocks after Moll and Oak.
    In front of Moll, Oak peered out at the beach. A wind rose up, stirring the surface of the sea, as if it could sense the gypsies huddled inside the rocks, and large clouds shifted across the moon. The darkness thickened.
    ‘Now,’ Oak whispered.
    Moll followed Oak out on to the beach and the sea sucked back, leaving the sand a polished black beneath the glimpses of moonlight. Moll shrank deeper inside her coat. It was one thing crouching between the corridors of rocks, but out here in the open, where the owls had been just the day before, things felt very different . . . Even the sand seemed to close round her feet as she ran, warning her to stay inside the cove.
    Moll stuck close to Oak, darting after him as he ran past the washed-up timber to where the path up the cliffs began. Thighs burning, Moll ploughed up the incline with Gryff beside her. She glanced back at Siddy whose eyes were flitting about the path.
    ‘Good job I didn’t bring Hermit,’ he panted. ‘This climb would’ve killed him.’
    Moll kept running through the bracken and gorse, sweat beading on her forehead, but she was glad of Siddy’s voice, his jokes a mask for the fear she knew he felt deep down. At last, the path met the top of the cliffs and they stood on the grass, hands on knees, breathing hard. But Gryff remained alert, eyes scanning the heath that spread out before them into several miles of scrubland, heather and gorse.
    Moll looked wistfully towards the dark shape of the forest beyond the heath and briefly wondered if Alfie had gone back there now Skull was gone.
    The clouds withdrew for a moment and, as the moonlight shone down on to the heath, Moll gasped. It was a wasteland – giant bogs spilling out over peat, dead gorse and tree stumps. ‘When we were up here last, the heath was full of heather and trees . . .’ She clutched her talisman.
    ‘The thresholds,’ Oak told her. ‘The Shadowmasks’ magic is seeping in fast.’ He straightened up and whistled through his teeth. Moments later, Patch, Oak’s piebald cob, cantered through the night towards them. The cob slowed before Oak and nuzzled into his overcoat. Oak lifted the halter from his shoulder and slipped it on, then he handed another halter to Moll. ‘To tie up the cobs at the other end.’
    Moll clicked her tongue against her teeth twice, then whistled hard. Jinx took longer to come than Patch, but she was used to Moll’s call and eventually the palomino trotted towards them through the dark. She neighed softly as she approached, but Moll put a finger to her lips, then stroked her white mane.
    Oak hoisted himself on to Patch. ‘Siddy, you ride up behind Moll.’ He looked down at Gryff. The wildcat’s striped coat was almost lost in the darkness, but his eyes glowed green. ‘And Gryff,’ he smiled. ‘You’d outrun us all if it came to it.’
    Oak turned to Moll and Siddy who were mounted on Jinx. ‘We’ll ride fast – along the path that lines the coast, past the fields the farmer grazes his animals on – then we’ll come to Inchgrundle. It shouldn’t take more than an hour to reach the harbour wall.’ He nodded back down the cliff. ‘If anything happens to me, ride back to the cove as fast as you can. I don’t want you in The Crumpled Way without me.’
    Siddy gulped and clutched Moll’s waist harder.
    ‘You can hold the rope from Jinx’s halter if it’ll make you feel any better, Sid,’ Moll said.
    Siddy gripped it hard.
    ‘But there’s not much point because Jinx only listens to my legs when we’re galloping.’
    Siddy groaned as Moll urged Jinx on. Then they were off, racing across the heath behind Oak and Patch, bounding over clumps of dead bracken and swerving round marshes. A nightjar shot out from a gorse bush, its cry rolling in the air around them. Jinx shied, Siddy moaned,