Clara Mandrake's Monster Read online

  Clara Mandrake's Monster

  Ibrahim S. Amin

  Copyright © 2017 Ibrahim S. Amin

  All rights reserved.

  Ebook formatting by www.ebooklaunch.com

  For Kath

  Contents

  Part 1: The Wardrobe

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Part 2: Orphans' Road

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Part 3: Pink and Black

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Part 1

  The Wardrobe

  1

  Clara Mandrake knew she was doomed. The nightmare tore open, spat her back into the cocoon beneath her blanket. Torments melted at the corners of her mind. But the monster was still there. Its presence, its weight, throbbed in the darkness beyond the quilt.

  Dreaming. She was still dreaming. One of those dreams that tries to trick you with its layers. If she just pinched herself… Pain burst between her fingernails and spread across the back of her hand. Breath froze in Clara's throat. Her heartbeat thudded. Its iambs shook her body and spoke the truth.

  *No* *Dream* *No* *Dream* *No* *Dream*

  She grabbed fistfuls of fabric and scrunched them to her. Held them so hard it hurt.

  *Yes* *Hide* *Yes* *Hide* *Yes* *Hide*

  But Clara couldn't. She had to know. Had to see. She tensed her limbs, inhaled. Her heart thumped faster and louder.

  *You'll* *DIE!* *You'll* *DIE!* *You'll* *DIE!*

  She sat up and tugged the blanket down into a coil at her chin. Blackness smothered the room and stole each shape. The moon tried to save her. Silver squeezed through cracks in the shutters, but it drowned and Clara was all alone.

  No. Not alone.

  She felt it first, was already turning towards the far corner even before wood creaked and a hinge groaned. The wardrobe. It was in the wardrobe.

  It was in the wardrobe and it was coming to get her.

  She screamed. Her jaw shuddered and her whole skull was breaking apart. Opening like a nightmare. Like a wardrobe. Like her ribcage when the monster's claws found her in the dark.

  A door flew open and bashed the wall. She shrieked again, clutched the cloth at her throat — half-strangled herself but couldn't stop. The monster loomed over her. A shapeless mass, darker than the darkness. It reached out.

  "Clara!"

  A hand gripped her shoulder.

  "Clara, what's wrong?"

  "Mum!"

  Shadows shifted. Perception and understanding rattled around her brain. The monster wasn't here yet! There was still time!

  "It's in the wardrobe!"

  "Wh-"

  Clara tossed the blanket away and leapt out of bed. She dragged her mother a couple of paces, before Ella Mandrake cried out and planted her feet.

  "Run! There's a… a… monster."

  The last word tumbled out, and she realised how stupid it sounded. But… Clara peered into the corner, at the wooden thing that took shape in the gloom, and her heart hammered again.

  "A monster?" Ella pulled out of Clara's grasp and sighed. "You just had a bad dream."

  "No! It's in there! I heard it move!"

  Her mother turned, and Clara waited for her to sense it too. For her to feel the malevolence lurking behind that door. Then they'd run, escape. Raise the alarm so their neighbours could come with spears and axes and torches and hounds and-

  "A rat."

  "Huh?"

  Ella stepped towards the wardrobe. Clara grabbed at her.

  "No!"

  Her mum sighed again.

  "I'll light the candle and show you," Ella said.

  "But…"

  Clara bit her lip. Warmth flooded her face. The sensation from before, that dread, now tottered between certainty and embarrassment. She'd felt something. Hadn't she? Or was she just a stupid little girl who'd let nightmares and shadows frighten her?

  Ella went to the bedside table and took out the tinderbox. Clara didn't stop her. She watched the wardrobe, brow knitted. The first click of steel and stone made her gasp and feel twice as foolish. But the flame soothed her. A golden glow drove away the blackness.

  Her mother lifted the saucer. A mote of fire flickered and the shadows danced. The light advanced. It washed the wardrobe and worked its way into every curl and crevice. Ella reached for the handle. Clara's breath caught.

  The door opened. Darkness parted.

  "See? There's nothing in here."

  "Oh…"

  Ella closed the wardrobe, crossed the room, and set the saucer down on the bedside table.

  "Try to get back to sleep."

  She smiled and stroked her daughter's arm, but Clara knew what she was thinking. Ten years old and still afraid of the dark… A silly, cowardly girl. Clara Mandrake couldn't look her mother in the eye. Ella's lips hovered over the candle flame, then rose without extinguishing it. Clara's face burned. The scared little girl needs her light…

  She climbed into bed.

  "Goodnight," her mum said.

  "Goodnight."

  The door closed. Clara stared at the closet and felt nothing. No presence. No horror. Her head slumped onto the pillow.

  She shut her eyes.

  Floorboards creaked under the bed. Her eyes flicked open, and didn't close for a long, long time.

  ***

  Fahmaia Hashad — mawlana of the Kharji people, favourite of Allat the One Goddess, spiritual guide to the great warlord Barzik Khan and all his warriors — scratched her nose. She scratched it again. Then a third time. After that she sighed and decided she couldn't blame an itch.

  The mawlana withdrew her hand from her face. She frowned at it. Her markings were as sluggish as her spirit this morning. Calligraphic script oozed across her flesh like half-slumbering serpents. A bad sign, when even miracles succumbed to lethargy.

  Fahmaia leaned forward without uncrossing her legs, stretched out, and wafted a tendril of incense smoke towards herself. Cinnamon wrinkled her nostrils. The aroma warmed her sinuses and she envisioned its heat as a golden glow. Aureate light passed into her lungs, diffused throughout her veins.

  Her muscles tensed then loosened. She inhaled and exhaled. Her eyes closed. Prayers flitted across her lips, faster and faster till the words blurred in her ears and gained clarity in her thoughts.

  But the trance wouldn't come. Darkness occupied the inside of her eyelids, and refused to yield the visions she sought. Allat had nothing for her. The One Goddess was silent, and the mawlana scoured her recent memories for signs of sin. She couldn't think of anything. No folly, no thoughtless impiety which might explain why the prayer trance eluded her. Hubris? Had she become too confident in her abilities?

  She found her hand creeping towards her nose again, restrained it, and recited the opening verse of a different prayer.

  "Should we announce ourselves?" A man's voice, outside the tent.

  "She might be busy." A woman's, with the same whisper that turned her words into blades instead of muffling them.

  "We could leave it here."

  "Will that offend her?"

  "I don't-"

  Fahmaia Hashad scowled and wondered how she was supposed to pray with all that babble going on out there. Her lips twitched into a smile. She was looking for excuses again. The man and woman were blameless, whoever they were.

  "Come i
n!" she said.

  The whispers stopped. Feet shuffled and cloth rustled around limbs she assumed were performing frantic gesticulations. Then a hand parted the canvass opening. A shape appeared beside it. Leather capped a stump. Fingers and forearm fumbled at the gap, and another hand joined them. Fahmaia half-expected a multi-armed absurdity to flop into the tent.

  A man and woman entered instead, after a moment's entanglement in the doorway. She held a baby to her chest. He rubbed the side of his face with the stump. Both of them bowed so strenuously Fahmaia feared they might prostrate themselves as though she were some pagan idol or false living goddess. The movement thrilled the baby, who laughed and clapped.

  "Please, sit."

  She gestured at some of the cushions and wished she hadn't made such a mess when she'd tried to find a position for her prayers. The man sat. The woman hovered for a moment before she joined him.

  "You won't remember me, mawlana," he said.

  Recognition startled her when it came.

  "Ahmed?" She groped for the family name, worried she'd forgotten it. "Ahmed Al-Shaaf?"

  His face lit up. A broad, almost chubby face. She tried to place it alongside the one from her memories, with its dressed wounds, sunken cheeks, and hollow eyes. The man who'd lain in his sickbed and mourned the loss of his sword hand. They might have been cousins instead of the same person.

  "This is Nazeen, my wife."

  The woman froze, as though they'd caught her in the middle of a misdeed. She didn't meet the mawlana's eyes. But Fahmaia was used to that from people who'd just met her, and couldn't deny that the rest of her visage was far more captivating. Their baby gawped at the markings too. Fahmaia smiled and the child grinned back.

  "What's your daughter's name?"

  Nazeen's gaze darted to her husband, and the mawlana wondered if she'd said the wrong thing and given the impression she was about to accuse the poor woman of blasphemy or heresy. Ahmed nodded.

  "We…" Nazeen looked Fahmaia in the eye for the first time. "We named her after you, mawlana."

  "Oh!"

  Her mind whirled, and came to rest on those same memories from years ago — of Ahmed, as he lay in the infirmary bed. As he tried to shove something under his blanket before she could glimpse it. The corners of her eyes stung.

  "I'm… I'm honoured."

  The words sounded hollow in her ears. Inadequate. But Ahmed's smile broadened and Nazeen found the beginnings of her own.

  "May I… May I hold her?"

  Nazeen hesitated, but only for a second. The elder Fahmaia took her namesake into her arms. The younger Fahmaia grinned, and pawed at the mawlana's face. Her eyes glittered. She slapped and grabbed, marvelled as her hands captured only skin, while ribbons of script flowed beneath them. Her parents gasped. But both Fahmaias laughed and it proved infectious.

  "She already loves Allat's scriptures," Fahmaia Hashad said. "Goddess willing, she'll grow up to be a strong, pious woman."

  The mawlana cradled the child and let her continue her exploration of the text.

  "Where did your path take you, after you left Barzik's warband?"

  "I wandered for a while," Ahmed said. "Then I met Nazeen, and we bought a farm with the Khan's gold."

  Fahmaia nodded. Barzik Khan was generous, especially to maimed soldiers and orphans.

  "Farming's a hard but honest living," she said.

  "Nazeen does all the hard work." He waved his stump. "I just keep my bees. Ah…"

  Ahmed reached into his knapsack and pulled out a jar.

  "Honey."

  Fahmaia thanked him, and was still smiling long after the Al-Shaafs had gone on their way. Contentment warmed her and relaxed her body better than the meditation had. She was about to close her eyes, harness this tranquillity. But the pot was right there…

  She dipped her finger into viscous gold and sucked it with a pang of guilt and glee. The honey was rich and sweet and sticky and gorgeous. She closed her eyes. Remembered. Ahmed, bandages capping his wounded arm. An infidel's blade had hacked his wrist. Taken his hand and, so he thought, his manhood. He tried to hide the dagger when she came to see him. The dagger which would've ended his suffering. But she saw it, and spoke. Without judgement. Without condemnation. Then prayed with him through the night.

  Now this honey existed, something pure and beautiful. And so did that grinning, laughing baby girl. All by the grace and mercy of the One Goddess, who'd helped Fahmaia show him a better path.

  Sweetness tingled on her tongue. Her thoughts deepened and the prayer trance began.

  ***

  Two scents pulled Clara out of her sleep. The first was the smell of burning. But she wasn't on fire, so that was probably fine. One of her eyes opened partway to make sure. A wisp of smoke rose from the candlewick before the air swallowed it. Her mum must've come in and blown out the flame. That brought back the night and a groan. Clara thought about pulling the blanket over her head and staying cocooned for the rest of her life. But the second scent was a savoury aroma. Egg porridge. Stomach and brain argued. Stomach won.

  She swung her legs out of bed. But she pulled them back before her feet touched the floor. It was stupid. So stupid. But… Boards creaked in her brain. Clara leaned over the edge, lowered her head. It was dark under there. One last pool of night.

  Clara rose into a crouch and sprang like a cat. She landed in front of the window, undid the latch, pulled the shutters open. Autumn sunlight bathed the room. She got down on her hands and knees, put her chin almost on the floor, and looked under the bed.

  Nothing.

  Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

  The wardrobe was less ominous now, but she still paused with her hand on its handle. Clara bit the inside of her cheek, told herself to snap out of it. She opened the door. Nothing leapt out, nor dragged her inside to devour her, so she got dressed and continued to hate herself.

  Clara went into the kitchen. A bowl of golden porridge steamed on the table. She sat down, picked up her spoon.

  "Clara!"

  "I…" She braced herself for the lecture. "I'm…"

  "Your hair!"

  "Huh?"

  Ella Mandrake lifted a handful of her daughter's tresses.

  "It's all tangled. You didn't brush it."

  Clara rose. Her mum pushed her back down.

  "I'll do it. Eat your breakfast or you'll be late for school."

  She went off to get the brush. Her daughter thanked the universe. Bleary eyes couldn't deal with scorn or sympathy. She ate. Eggs and oats cooked the inside of her mouth.

  "How did it get like this?" Ella knelt behind Clara's chair. "It's a mess!"

  Clara had no good answer, so she gobbled more porridge. The brush worked at her roots first, pulled her scalp this way and that.

  "Argh!"

  Her mum attacked a cluster of knots and yanked Clara's head backwards. Agony tore through her skull. Porridge splatted under her spoon.

  "Sorry!" Ella said.

  Her vision blurred. She touched the bowl. Wanted to grab it. Spin round. Crash it into the side of her mum's head. Blood and shards would rain on the floor, and-

  Clara's eyes widened. Her mouth gaped. That image hung in front of her, and she could only stare at it until the bowl scorched her fingers and seared it from her brain.

  "Almost done now," Ella said.

  Where had that come from? Her cheeks burned. Would her mother see the guilt there? Know what horrible things her vile, ungrateful daughter had been thinking?

  "There we go. I told you to brush it before bed."

  "Sorry, mum."

  Clara picked up her spoon. She managed to get through the rest of her breakfast, but each mouthful was a slap across her face.

  When it was time to go, she hugged her mother, kissed her. Ella didn't react for a second or two. Her daughter had grown out of morning affection long ago, and that knowledge was another kick in Clara's gut. But Ella recovered from the surprise and hugged her back.

  Clara went out an
d the air cooled her skin. Orange leaves crunched along the path. She needed to sleep better tonight. Things were bad — her mind was bad — when she was this exhausted.

  She stopped at the gateposts. Her fingertip found its usual starting point, a groove in the stone. Clara traced a human figure which a passer-by might've mistaken for a tree. Then her digit jumped to the other image. This one was even less artistic. A series of lines and blobs. But she knew what it was supposed to be, and that made it so. A dragon. A drake.

  Clara sighed. Touching her father's work, feeling things Saqib Mandrake had carved before she was born, was almost like kissing her mother. On a whim, she kissed the stone too. But it was gritty, rotten. She wiped her mouth, spat, and walked away.

  Leaves scattered around her shoes. Each kick arranged them in new patterns, and Clara watched like a woman reading tea leaves. She needed more sleep. She-

  "You look like crap."

  Clara blinked. The world had moved and her brain hadn't noticed. She was already outside her friend's house. Rayya Shimud's eyes sparkled.

  "Feel like it too. Didn't sleep much last night."

  "Poor Clara."

  "Yeah."

  Clara's mouth matched Rayya's smile, and the rest of her face followed before she knew it was happening. Her friend's plait swished back and forth as they walked down the lane, towards the schoolhouse. Rayya ranted about the latest iniquities her parents had inflicted upon her. Clara nodded along and was glad she didn't have to think or say much.

  "…and they let my brother do it, when he was my age. But they won't…"

  Clara yawned.

  ***

  A breeze sliced Silas Renshaw's freshest bruise. The bump throbbed on his cheek and demanded attention, but he didn't rub it. Trainees didn't caress their injuries in public. Not that it mattered this morning. Every eye was on Cryze, who stood midway between the boys' and girls' dormitories like an ebony statue.

  "Good luck."

  "I'll miss you."

  "Congratulations."

  "Can I have your stuff? The stuff you're not taking…"

  They approached her one by one. Friends first, which didn't take long. Quick embraces. Lucy had to jump to kiss her cheek. Then the rest filed past. Cryze nodded and spoke a few words to each well-wisher. She might've been a mistress inspecting the trainees, not a young woman who'd shared their status just a day earlier.