‘What is this place?’ Sam mumbled. He wasn’t sure quite what he’d been expecting, but doubted that he would ever have had the imagination to dream up somewhere like this. Everything had that well used and lived-in aura to it, as though the village had been around for an incredibly long time. It reeked of history.
Turning to what was now his left, he let his eyes follow the track out into the open countryside. Although it had been dark when he’d arrived and he hadn’t exactly been in a condition to take much note of his surroundings, Sam had an idea that was the direction he’d been brought from. If he wanted to reach the cliffs, then it was the way he needed to go.
But as he turned to his right, the cherry-tree thoroughfare and the buildings continued for some distance. Wondering what else he might find, his inquisitiveness got the better of him. And as nobody appeared to be out yet at that early hour, it was an ideal opportunity for him to investigate. He began along the thoroughfare and it wasn’t long before he saw what appeared to be a roundabout planted right in the middle of it.
As Sam came closer, he found it wasn’t a roundabout at all, but a circular pool some forty feet in diameter, its circumference formed by a small brick wall. The interior of the pool had several patches of damp mud in it, but otherwise was bone dry, although Sam could see from the bands of discoloration around the edges that it must have once been topped up.
And on an island in the center there were three stone tiers, each with numerous fountains and waterwheels on them, in between which were life-sized metal sculptures of people. The arms and heads of these sculptures were articulated, and it was evident from the levers connected to the waterwheels that at one time the flow of water must have animated them.
The most impressive figure lorded it over all the others on the uppermost tier. Looking like Old Father Time with his long beard and flowing robes, he was in the act of swinging a hefty hammer at a bell, although the two would never now meet. The old man’s arms were welded in place by rust, so he was frozen in that attitude forever more, the bell never to be struck.
Sam’s gaze remained on this figure because there was something so forsaken about it. Long ago, so much effort had clearly gone into making the sculpture and, indeed, the whole water monument, but it had all since just been allowed to fall into disuse. He wondered why.
Eating the last of his bacon roll by the empty pool, he glanced farther up the track. A large house caught his eye because every one of its windows was shuttered and it had an air of abandonment about it, whereas all the other buildings were so obviously inhabited. And behind this house, in the fields higher on the valley side, he saw several dozen wind vanes, their white blades rotating slowly in the morning breeze. The incongruous mix of old and new made Sam wonder who had been responsible for this technology. Certainly no one he’d met so far would appear to be capable of it.
As he looked back at the thoroughfare, across from the shuttered house and made hazy by the warming air he glimpsed what could have been a church from its spire.
‘Right. That’s enough,’ Sam decided. ‘The cliffs.’
He did an about turn and quickly retraced his steps to the Dormitories, then kept going. But when the last of the buildings on the edge of the village were behind him and he was moving deeper into the countryside, he heard someone shouting his name. His heart sank.
‘Sam! Hello!’ the baritone voice called.
Sam spun around to see who was there. It was a stockily-built man. ‘Randall,’ he mouthed, remembering him from the Straw Hat. The man had just stepped from the Dormitories and was waving.
Sam returned the wave, then Randall gestured in a friendly way for him to come back.
But Sam pointed at the horizon and gave a shrug. He couldn’t think what else to do in the circumstances. He really didn’t want to speak to anyone in case they tried to dissuade him from returning to the cliffs. He was tired of hearing the stock response that ‘Nobody goes back’ whenever he mentioned his intentions. So, putting his head down, he hurried on, not daring to look around.
‘Sam?’ the man yelled. From the intonation Randall was a little hurt.
Sam gave it a moment, then took off at a run. His new boots pounded the track as he put on a turn of speed that would have been impossible before his transformation. Faster and faster he ran, the muscles in his legs working effortlessly, his lungs drawing down the clean country air. It was as though an unfamiliar and potent energy was flowing through him.
As the Straw Hat finally came into view in the distance, he checked to see if Randall was following. But there was no sign of the man, so he slowed to a brisk walk. He noticed that he was barely out of breath from his mad dash. The location of the Straw Hat gave him a rough idea of his bearings and the direction he should be heading, so he parted company with the track, cutting his own path through the high grass.
After a while Sam could glimpse the white line of the cliffs up ahead – he just hoped he would hit them roughly where he’d come through or otherwise he might be wandering along them for hours. As he climbed farther and farther up the incline, Sam took a moment to look at the village he’d left behind, but he could hardly see it now because he was too far over.
Deer were grazing in the meadows around him as a balmy wind swept the slopes, whisking clouds of seeds into flight like an invasion of tiny paratroopers. The sun was fully up now and Sam put his head back, losing himself in the sky of the clearest blue which was only interrupted by a bird flapping languidly across it. There was such beauty and calm all around that he almost forgot what he’d come here to do, but then he heard the rapid beat of hooves. It was Simon on his horse, galloping hell for leather in his direction.
Just leave me alone! More than a little frustrated, Sam immediately ducked down. However, as he continued to watch, there was little doubt that he’d been spotted by the man on horseback. There wasn’t anything for it but to stand up and wait for the sad captain to arrive, as Tom had called him.
‘Morning,’ Simon said cheerfully, as he finally came alongside the boy, but he was wearing his usual frown. ‘You weren’t trying to hide from me, were you, old chap?’ he laughed, looking wryly at Sam.
‘No, of course not,’ Sam lied. ‘I was just having a rest.’
‘Well, glad you’re back on your feet again,’ Simon said. ‘Saw you all the way over here on your tod, and wondered if everything was all right.’ He threw a glance at the cliffs, still some distance away, and raised an eyebrow quizzically. ‘You certainly looked like a man on a mission. Where were you heading?’
Sam was about to answer, but then stopped himself. Even though his instinct was that Simon was someone he could trust, he decided to keep his guard up.
‘You want to see where you crossed through, don’t you?’ Simon said. Sam nodded, trying to mask his surprise at this.
‘Perfectly understandable,’ the man declared, as he slid from the saddle and then reached into his jacket for a couple of sugar lumps which he fed to his horse. Simon indicated the cliffs. ‘They run for miles, you know, right around the valley. Each day I try to cover as much of them as I can.’
‘Why?’ Sam asked.
‘Like to keep an eye on things. Newcomers cross over once in a blue moon, just like you did, and they might need help.’ As Simon tugged the end of his mustache, it was evident there was more that he wanted to say, but was holding back. ‘I can take you to the stretch of cliff where Damaris found you, if it’s any help.’
‘Yes, please,’ Sam replied eagerly.
Climbing back onto his horse, Simon extended a hand to the boy. ‘Come along. Hop on.’
They dismounted as they reached the cliffs, then Sam walked along the path beside the expanse of white rock, while Simon followed behind with his horse. Sam was peering up at the chalky face, when Simon spoke, pointing ahead. ‘We’re nearly at the pond where Damaris and her friends have their picnics.’
‘I think it’s just past there,’ Sam said, trying to remember what happened that da
y.
They hadn’t gone very far when they came upon what appeared to be debris from a wrecked building, and a modern one at that. At the base of the cliff, spines of carbon-stained metal girders spiked up like a whale’s skeleton, while on the ground between them globular lumps of something translucent reflected the sunlight.
Sam threaded his way between the girders, then squatted down by one of the translucent swells, which had thousands of bubbles trapped in it. ‘It’s glass, isn’t it?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ Simon said. He scuffed at the ground with his boot to reveal another large pool of it where he was standing. ‘It was molten and glowing red hot when it came through. Splashed all over the show.’
Sam straightened up to touch one of the heat-warped beams. There was something unnerving about the wreckage – here in this tranquil corner of the valley, the instant of some horrific and extremely violent event had been preserved, a snapshot of a terrible accident. From the way the debris was distributed across the ground, it appeared that an explosion from the direction of the cliff had caused it. But as Sam scanned the unbroken chalk face, this didn’t make any sense.
Simon could see what the boy was puzzling over. ‘A newcomer brought this lot through,’ he told him.
Sam had moved closer to the cliff face and was craning his neck to see to the top. ‘So it fell down on top of him?’
‘No, it all came through at the same time as him,’ Simon answered. He frowned even more than usual as if it was an effort to recall the event. ‘It was ... yes, one evening … the first we knew about it, flames were reaching right up into the sky. You could see them for miles around and everyone came from the village to look. The fire was so fierce it raged for a full day afterwards.’
As he began along the track again, Simon seemed to have said all he intended on the matter. ‘The newcomer? What happened to him?’ Sam asked, as he caught up with Simon.
‘He was burned to a crisp.’
‘But he lived?’
Simon shrugged as if the question was unnecessary. ‘Why wouldn’t he? Although he was in a fine old mess when we could get close enough to hike him out. We stretchered him down to the village to recover.’
They hadn’t gone very far when Sam noticed something else in the meadow to the right of the path. It was impossible to tell what it was at first because of the profuse growth of vine covering it, but it was large with an unmistakably regular shape.
Sam headed straight for it. ‘No! It’s a tank!’ he exclaimed, as he pulled aside a section of the vine to expose a battered gun turret. The vehicle was lying on its side, and he could clearly see the torn metal where the shells had penetrated the armor. ‘Was there a battle here?’
Simon was strangely silent for a moment. ‘Not here, no.’
Moving to the front of the vehicle, Sam parted the vine to reveal a damaged tank track, which had spooled out over the ground.
‘Do you mind if we move along?’ Simon requested in a quiet voice.
Sam didn’t think anything of this as he reached out and ran his fingers over a patch of dull khaki paint that had survived on the very front of the hull. At his touch, a scallop-sized chunk of rusted metal dropped out.
‘Did someone …?’ Sam had turned to look at Simon, but he didn’t need to finish the question. The expression on the man’s face said it all. This was how he’d died.
Sam simply turned from the tank and joined Simon on the path again. He realized why Damaris had warned him about broaching the subject of death. How do you talk to a man about the way his life ended? What’s the etiquette for that?
Although more objects caught his eye, Sam didn’t again deviate from the path or ask about them. He spotted what were unmistakably aircraft seats. The whole unit of them – four in a row – were almost upright, but the ground had been gouged on the side nearest to the cliff, suggesting they’d struck it with huge force and then had slid along before coming to a stop. Although the seats appeared to be relatively modern, the material covering them had rotted away.
And then there was a pile of carved masonry, which Sam guessed was from a church because there were shards of brightly colored stained glass mixed in with it.
They climbed the mound of loose stone which encircled the pond and Sam looked out over the water to the weeping willow on the other side. It was only a week since he’d last been there, meeting Tom and Vek for the first time, but it already felt like years ago. He and Simon passed around the pond and descended to the path again.
‘I remember this. We’re close,’ Sam announced, as they reached the half-buried lifebelt. Then he came to a sudden halt. ‘What …!’ he exclaimed.
A sprig of ivy that he’d inadvertently carried through with him had taken root and sprouted numerous tendrils, forming a thick mat on the ground at the base of the cliff. Sam turned to study the view down the valley. ‘I’m sure this is the place.’ He indicated the ivy to Simon. ‘And I think this is here because of me … but how can there be so much of it now?’
‘All life flourishes here,’ Simon answered, ‘though plants don’t become immortal. Well, we haven’t found one yet that is.’
But Sam wasn’t listening as he stepped right up to the cliff face to examine the area above the ivy. Simon had taken the weight off his feet while his horse found some grass to occupy itself.
‘There’s nothing here. I can’t find … I can’t see any opening,’ Sam said, becoming upset as he pressed against the chalky surface, desperately attempting to find a way in. ‘Must be the wrong place.’
Something snapped in his head and he became frantic, ramming his shoulder against the unyielding barrier.
Then he began to kick and hit the cliff. ‘I have to go home!’ he cried, punching it repeatedly as if he could fight his way through. His fists were leaving blood on the rough white surface.
‘Hey, hey, hey,’ Simon said, rushing over and grabbing hold of Sam’s wrists to stop him from hurting himself further. ‘You mustn’t do that.’
Sam was beside himself, tears streaming down his face. ‘But I can’t stay here. My mum and dad …’
‘Come and sit down a minute, old man.’ Sam refused to move as Simon tried to lead him away. ‘I know how you feel.’ Sam heard the quaver in the man’s voice, and did what he’d asked.
‘I’m sorry,’ Sam said barely audibly, as they sat together on the grass, their backs to the cliff. Sam’s shoulders were still heaving from the occasional sob.
‘Don’t you worry about that.’ Simon was looking at him with concern. He tugged a handkerchief from his trouser pocket. ‘Here, let me see to those,’ he said, then began to wipe the blood from Sam’s knuckles, although the cuts and bruises had already healed.
Putting his handkerchief away, Simon cleared his throat. ‘Why I keep riding around the cliffs is …’ He lowered his eyes. ‘I haven’t spoken to anyone about this in donkey’s years … it’s because one day I hope my family might make it through … my wife and my two little girls. You see, it was during the war and an incendiary landed on my home and …’ he petered off.
After a moment he brought his attention back on Sam again, giving him a brief and wholly unconvincing smile. ‘I know this is tough for you, but it’s the same for all of us – just that most of the people have been here for so blessedly long … so many millennia, they’ve forgotten what they left behind. I haven’t. And I don’t want to.’
‘So no one’s ever gone back?’ Sam asked. ‘Really?’
Simon took a deep breath. ‘As they say, once in the valley, always in the valley. And they do mean always. A few of us would give anything to go home again, but it’s just not possible.’
He waved a hand at the incline before them, with its patches of crimson poppies. ‘Maybe you should just be grateful you’ve been granted a second chance. A new life. Nearly everyone down there seems to be.’
‘But I’m not. What about my mum and dad – they don’t know where I am?’ Sam said, still very upset. ‘I don’t understan
d why I’m stuck here.’
‘I honestly couldn’t tell you why. Curtis tried to explain it to me once but it was all double Dutch to me,’ Simon answered, getting up and going to his horse and returning with his flask. ‘For better or worse, we’re stranded in this envelope as he used to call to it.’
‘Envelope?’ Sam repeated, trying to understand.
‘We’re inside some form of field. Even if you go all the way down to the sea where the cliffs end, there’s a point past which you can’t pass. It’s the oddest thing, like …’ Simon paused, seeking the right words to help him describe it. ‘… like a glass wall.’
He undid the top of his flask. ‘Reckon you could do with a nip of this, for medicinal purposes, but go easy on it this time.’ He tipped some of the whisky mac from the flask into a small metal cup.
Sam took a breath to try to calm himself. ‘Thank you,’ he said, then reached for the cup.
With the sound of a tiny pop!, the brown fluid splashed them both.
The cup had been there one second, the next it had gone.
Simon tumbled back on the grass, dropping his flask. ‘Good heavens!’ he spluttered.
Sam immediately remembered the teaspoon at the Straw Hat, although his recollection of it was vague like an event from a dream.
He was staring uncomprehendingly at his hand. ‘How … what is this?’
Simon didn’t reply. Wiping some drops from his face, he gathered himself together, then retrieved his flask. And Sam noticed that he didn’t go to any effort to look for the cup. Simon just seemed to accept that it had gone.
‘Is this normal here? Is it?’ Sam pressed him, his confusion turning to vexation.
‘Um … it’s not unknown,’ Simon answered evasively.
‘The same thing happened at the Straw Hat with Randall, too. What is it?’ Sam asked.
But just as Baby Pain and Randall had, Simon was studiously avoiding his gaze.