The Night Gardener (37 page)

A furious howling swept down the drive, nearly knocking him over.

“He’s too fast,” Kip said, gasping. “We’ll never outrun him.”

“We don’t need to.” Alistair veered off the driveway onto the lawn. He let go of Kip, who collapsed to the grass. “I’ll meet you at the woods,” he said and dropped to his knees. Kip watched him disappear behind a nearby hill. Once in the shadows, he was completely hidden from view.

The sky overhead was lit by a harvest moon, which shone bright over the lawn. Kip lay flat on the ground, marshaling his wits. He tried to remember the hours they had spent playing on the lawn.
It’s just like hide-and-go-seek
, he told himself. Only he knew it wasn’t. This
time, getting caught didn’t make you “it”—getting caught made you dead. He closed his eyes, wishing desperately that he had something to hold. Wishing that he had Courage.

Kip heard a howling behind him. He peered over the top of the hill. The Gardener stood in front of the house, searching the grounds. Kip pressed his body to the grass, making himself as flat as possible. Slowly he raised up on one elbow and pulled his body a few inches forward. He did this over and over again until he was one hill closer to his destination.

The crawling hurt—not just his bad leg, but his whole body. He thought of Molly and the Windsors. If he didn’t reach the woods, they were lost. Kip kept an ear to the air, trying to tell the Night Gardener’s location by the sound of the wind.

A shadow slid over his body, and he felt a shiver in the air. He looked up to see the Gardener beside him, his lightless eyes scanning the tree line. Kip stared up at him, afraid to move, afraid to breathe—

Pok!

A rock struck the Night Gardener’s back. He snarled, turning away from Kip.

“Over here!” shouted a voice. Alistair appeared from behind a nearby hill. He blew a raspberry and then disappeared into the grass. The Gardener stormed after him, a cyclone of leaves in his wake.

Kip could hear the Gardener searching the lawn where Alistair had been. He grabbed a rock next to him, pulled himself upright, and threw the rock as hard as he could—

Pok!

It was a perfect shot. The Night Gardener’s hat tumbled from his head. Kip let out a triumphant laugh and then dropped down. By the time the Gardener reached the spot, Kip was already gone.

Pok!

Pok!

Pok!

Pok!

The two boys slowly worked their way along the lawn, throwing rocks as they went. The Gardener raced from hill to hill, enraged, confused. Kip grinned, feeling a thrill that was altogether new to him. He and Alistair were working as a team—doing something that neither of them could have accomplished alone.

Kip saw a row of moonlit trees just ahead. Somehow, impossibly, he had made it! He heard a snarling sound as a gust of wind knocked him backward. He rolled over to see the Gardener racing toward him, his clothes tattered, a halo of angry leaves swirling around him. “Alistair?” Kip called, trying and failing to pick himself up.

Kip saw movement from the corner of his eye. “Run!” Alistair shouted, grabbing hold of his arm. Kip felt his body jerk across the ground as the two of them staggered into the woods.

ind slithered in a circle around the house, sending leaves high into the air. Fig and Stubbs’s horse had run off in the storm, but Galileo was still there, waiting for instructions. “As loyal as you are stubborn,” Molly said, patting his flank. The horse gave a nervous snort, raking the gravel with his hoof.

Molly went back inside to fetch Penny. The girl was not injured, but she was frightened, and she gripped Molly tightly about the neck. Molly lifted her over the side of the wagon. “Watch your feet,” she said, setting the girl onto the wooden bed.

Penny scrambled to her knees and gripped Molly’s hand. “Will Kip and Alistair be safe from the night man?”

Molly stared into her face, wishing she knew how to answer. She wanted to tell her a story to make her feel better, to make her brave. But there were some things that stories couldn’t do. “The truth is, Miss Penny, I dinna know.” She patted the girl’s hand. “But I wouldn’t worry just yet. Brothers are sneaky.”

Penny nodded sagely. “That’s true.”

An angry gust of air swept past Molly and struck the wagon, nearly toppling Galileo. “Easy, boy,” Molly said, grabbing his tackle. She pulled the hair from her eyes, looking toward the woods. Kip was out there somewhere. And so was the Night Gardener. For a moment, she almost thought she could hear his shouts echoing on the wind. She hoped desperately that she was wrong.

“I have you, my love. Just a few more steps …” Master Windsor appeared in the doorway, holding Constance in his arms. The woman was clinging to his neck, her head on his chest. Her eyes were open and her body heaved with shallow, pained breaths. “I have you,” Bertrand whispered. “I have you.”

Molly pushed aside the canisters of oil to make room in the bed of the wagon. “Sorry, mum. It’s hardly a coach and four.” Master Windsor laid his wife down as one might lay a paper boat on the water.

Molly shut the gate. “We’ll get ’em both to safety, sir, and then wait by the road for Kip and Alistair.” She indicated for him to climb aboard.

Bertrand nodded, but he did not move. His eyes were fixed on the woods—a black mass crested by moonlight. “That
thing
is after them …,” he said.

“They’ll be fine,” she said as much to herself as to Bertrand. “Kip’s outrun the Gardener before. He knows a special place where the monster canna follow.”

“But they might not
reach
the safe place,” Bertrand snapped. “Your brother’s lame. Alistair is just a boy …” He ran a shaking hand
through his hair, no doubt imagining his only son alone in the darkness. Or was he imagining his parents on a night like this all those years before?

A hollow roar shook the valley. “It’s no use thinkin’ about it, sir. Kip and Alistair bought us some time, and we best take it. They’re on their own now.”

Bertrand fixed his eyes on her. “But what if we could
help
them? You said the only way to stop this Night Gardener is to kill the tree …”

Molly shook her head. “I don’t know for sure.”

Bertrand reached over the side and seized one of the oil canisters from the bed. “So let’s kill the tree and find out.”

p that way!” Kip called, pointing toward a patch of light in the distance. He and Alistair raced through the moonlit woods, black branches all around them. They were running toward the ancient garden at the edge of the island—the place the Night Gardener could not reach. “If we can just make it to that patch o’ light, we’ll be safe.”

“We’ll make it.” Alistair adjusted his grip around Kip’s side, putting more of Kip’s weight onto his own body. Kip glanced up at the boy, whose face was set with determination.

The Gardener’s howl rang out behind them, and wind struck Kip’s back, knocking him to the ground. Kip cried out as pain wrenched through his side. Branches rattled as the Night Gardener appeared to burst from the shadows behind them. He was not walking slowly as he usually did—he was running, his face lit white by the moon.

“Come on!” Alistair grabbed Kip, pulling him up from the ground. They staggered over rocks and roots. So long as they could still see the glowing light, they had a hope of survival. Kip thought of his sister
back at the house. She and the others should be on the wagon by now—almost safe. Kip doubled his speed, his eyes fixed on the shining garden—now less than a hundred feet away.

The wind stopped around them, and Kip could tell their pursuer had slowed his pace. He glanced back to see the Gardener standing with both hands outstretched. The man uttered a low, inhuman moan as he worked the air like a weaver at his loom.

“Why’d he stop?” Alistair said, gasping for breath.

The Night Gardener’s call grew louder. A chill slid up Kip’s spine as he felt the wind change, coming alive. Cold mist lifted from the ground, shivering the treetops as it rose higher and higher into the air.

Kip peered up through the moonlit branches. “The sky,” he said. “It’s changin’ …”

The mist swirled and condensed above the treetops, forming an impenetrable fog that blocked out the stars and covered the moon. Kip looked back at the Night Gardener. In the fading light, he caught a final image of the man’s face, contorted in a tight smile—

And then the woods went dark.

“We gotta keep movin’—now!” Kip grabbed Alistair’s arm, but when he turned towards the garden, he saw nothing but a wall of darkness.

“Which way?” Alistair said, panicked.

Kip scanned the shadows, looking for light to guide them, looking for safety.

The moon had been blotted out.

And with it, their only hope.

olly was wary of Master Windsor’s idea—many people had tried to cut the tree down, and none had succeeded before the Night Gardener could stop them. But she and Master Windsor had something faster than an axe or a saw—thanks to Kip, they had enough oil to set the world ablaze.