Bookweirdest Part 1

Bookweirdest.

Paul Glennon.

Uncle Kit's Dreamworld.

The sound of sparrows arguing outside the window was very familiar. These birds had woken him before. "The Shrubberies," he muttered to himself. He was back in his own room. The idea was comforting. When you've woken up in as many strange places and times as Norman had, waking up in the real world was a relief.

Norman sat up in bed and raised his hand to tap at the window to shoo the birds away, but before his hand fell on the windowpane, he saw the grey sweater he was wearing.

He lowered his hand as it all came back to him. The grey sweater was the one that George Kelmsworth had lent him, the one that he had been wearing when he fell asleep on the steam train. But Norman hadn't been alone on that train. He began to bat the crumpled sheets around him to see if anything else had come through from the other side. Under the covers he found the canvas knapsack. He fished around inside it with one hand and found his blue Rams sweatshirt and ... nothing else. Beginning to worry now, he pulled the sweatshirt out and shook it as if something might be hiding in there. Nothing was.

He wasn't going to panic. Instead, he opened the window and stuck out his head and called out in a loud whisper, "Malcolm? Malcolm, are you there?"

The only reply was a more urgent fluttering and chirping of sparrows evacuating the tree. But that's right-if Malcolm was out there, the sparrows would have fled long ago.

Norman continued his search of the bedroom that had been his for the summer, standing back to see if there was anything on top of the wardrobe, wafting his arm under the bed, rifling through his pile of discarded laundry-all the while whispering the name of the missing stoat.

"Malcolm, where have you got to?" he muttered, frustrated with his furry friend's wanderings. Norman's mother knew a little bit about his own bookweirding travels, but she didn't need to find out who he sometimes brought along on the journey.

They weren't even supposed to be here at the Shrubberies. Comforting as it was for Norman to be back in the real world under the same roof as his family, this was not where he'd meant to wake up at all. He and Malcolm were supposed to have woken up far away from here, in a dark library, in the tower of a Crusader outpost, in the middle of a desert ... in a book.

For most normal twelve-year-old boys, waking up in a book was just a fantasy, but Norman's experience of sleep and waking was anything but normal. Since the day he first ate a page from a book, falling asleep had been ... well, let's say troublesome. That first book was The Brothers of Lochwarren, set in a world called Undergrowth, the place where Malcolm was born to be king. Eating that page had unleashed something called the bookweird, a force Norman only partially understood and could almost never control. The bookweird got you into a book. It had taken him to many strange places, and into the lives of his favourite characters. Without it, he would never have met Malcolm, or George Kelmsworth of the Intrepids adventure series, or the boy monk Jerome, who was the hero of The Secret in the Library. He wouldn't trade those friendships for the world, but the bookweird had its difficulties. It got you into a book, but getting out wasn't always easy. Getting out without making a terrible mess was almost impossible.

The thought of the boy monk Jerome, reminded Norman of the urgency of finding Malcolm and getting out of here. He had made a serious mess of Jerome's book. They needed to get back there to make things right. Compared to the disaster unfolding in The Secret in the Library, Malcolm running loose through the house was a minor setback. n.o.body's life was at stake here. But still, the last thing Norman needed was for his family to find out that he was friends with a talking medieval stoat.

He didn't bother to dress-or rather, to undress and redress. He didn't bother to take off George's grey sweater. There was no point hiding it from anybody anymore. His mother would know by now that he'd disobeyed her and bookweirded off to Kelmsworth Hall.

He tiptoed down the corridor. The house was quiet except for the usual creaks and squeaks of its worn floorboards. If he was lucky, he was the first one awake. (There was a first time for everything.) The library was the obvious place to start. Back home in Undergrowth, Malcolm was stoat royalty. He had a castle and a library of his own, but it was a medieval library with just a few dozen books. For Malcolm, the library at the Shrubberies was a marvel. Norman just had to hope that his father wasn't already in there working. He tried the door handle gingerly. The k.n.o.b barely turned. He leaned into it and pushed harder, but still it stuck. Locked. That was strange. His father never locked the library.

A noise somewhere downstairs startled Norman, interrupting his thoughts. It was the clang of cups or dishes. The kitchen, of course! If there was one thing that Malcolm loved more than books, it was food. Norman descended the stairs warily. He had a picture in his mind of the tiny woodland creature sitting on the kitchen table with his face in a cereal bowl or his whiskers full of jam. Even as he worried about it, Norman couldn't help smiling. Malcolm was an annoying little creature at the best of times, but he was also his best friend in this or any world.

At the bottom of his stairs, Norman paused to listen. There was the ring of a spoon against a porcelain bowl and a low singsong kind of chattering. These didn't sound like stoat noises. They sounded decidedly human and annoyingly familiar. He dared a peek and then took a tentative step into the kitchen. There, sitting at the kitchen table, was his little sister, Dora. She was dressed in her riding clothes, ready for her morning ride, and was singing a song to herself while she scarfed her breakfast-the biggest bowl of ice cream ever consumed by man or child. Norman smirked a little at the thought of what his mother would say when she found out his little sister had been eating ice cream out of a mixing bowl for breakfast.

Dora didn't look up immediately. Norman let her continue to eat and sing blithely away while he began a surrept.i.tious exploration of the kitchen cupboards. He quietly opened doors and examined the cupboard contents as if he were looking for something to eat. What he was hoping to see was Malcolm, sitting there with his head in a granola box or something, but there wasn't even any granola. Something strange must have happened on his parents' last shopping trip. The giant gla.s.s jars that his mother usually filled with granola and muesli were now packed to the brim with several varieties of colourful sugary cereal. They filled nearly every cupboard. Norman checked the pantry next. It too brimmed with jars of the stuff. Maybe they had won a contest for a year's supply or something. It was the sort of thing Dora would enter. There was just one small pile of granola bars left on a high shelf. Norman grabbed two-one for himself and one for his friend.

"Hey!" Dora yelled, so loudly that it made Norman jump. "It's about time you got up."

Norman had a comment about the ice cream on her lips, but he kept it to himself. It would be more fun to wait to hear what his mother had to say.

"Are Mom and Dad awake?" he asked.

Dora just squinted at him as if he had said something incomprehensible. After a moment, she reached up to her ears and pulled out a pair of tiny white earbuds. The wire led to a little pink MP3 player that matched the colour of her ice cream. That was new.

Norman took a good look at her. People said that Dora looked like him, but he didn't see it. She was skinny and pale and had too many freckles, and her hair was blonde whereas his was plain old normal brown. This morning she had on a full riding outfit, from boots to jacket. Even Norman could tell it was expensive. It looked like she had had the best birthday ever, what with the MP3 player and the riding clothes. But the tiara on her head just looked silly.

"Aren't you a little old to be playing princess?" He couldn't resist.

Dora flicked her head to turn her nose up at him. "I'll have you know that this crown belongs to Princess Cara of the Talingi," she huffed. "It was given to me to look after." She adjusted it on her head proudly.

"Whatever," Norman replied. He had no time for Dora's imaginary princess games. He had a medieval stoat to find and a Crusader outpost to stop from burning down.

"Listen," he began, wondering how much was too much to tell Dora, "have you seen any strange animals around the house? Something like a weasel or a ferret?" He left out that he would be wearing a green hunting cloak and would have a sword belted around his waist.

"I've seen lots of strange animals," Dora replied matter-of-factly.

"Like what?" Norman asked eagerly.

"Like you!" She snorted at her own lame joke, put the earbuds back in her ear and resumed her very unhealthy breakfast.

Norman decided that he was asking for that. It was best to leave Dora out of it anyway. He pocketed the granola bars and headed out the back door. He had an idea where Malcolm might be waiting for him.

A movement at the far end of the back garden caught his attention-a shadow of black behind the bright blue stands of delphiniums, an animal movement, large enough to startle him into a defensive crouch. Norman still imagined wolves stalking him sometimes. Being chased by wolves was something that stayed with you for a long time. But this was no wolf. Far too large to be a wolf, it stood above the tallest flowers in the flower bed, its head nibbling an apple from the tree. Chomping away methodically and loudly was the biggest horse Norman had ever seen. It was almost pure black-so black it glistened, its hide as glossy as the big grand piano Norman had used for exactly four very frustrating lessons last year.

He could only shake his head. A horse? His parents had let Dora get a horse? It was probably only on loan from her English friend, Penny, who lived up the valley, but a horse? Not even a pony, but a giant midnight-black stallion. It was the sort of thing a knight should ride, not his snotty little sister. If Dora got a horse, he decided to himself, he was going to ask for a PlayStation.

He hurried through the back garden towards the path. If he was right, Malcolm would be waiting for him at the footbridge. That was where they'd met before. It made sense that he would expect them to rendezvous there again.

Norman sat on the footbridge for a long time, dangling his feet over the edge, watching the water run slowly over the rocks. It gave him time to think about the work they had to do and the dangers they had to face. It was nice to be back in the real world-back in a world without vengeful wolves or desperate poachers, where you weren't kidnapped by power-crazy French knights-but he couldn't stay here. He had to go back, back into the most dangerous book of all, The Secret in the Library. It was the story of the boy Jerome, who had been brought to the Crusader outpost of San Savino as a young child; of his enemy, Black John of Nantes; and his father, Johan of Vilnius, whom everyone presumed dead. It was obvious that Johan and Jerome were supposed to find each other, but now that might not happen. Because of Norman, the book might be wrecked for good. He might never be able to put the plot right. Getting the plot right didn't seem to matter as much anymore. His mother might disagree, but what mattered to Norman was saving Jerome from the fire and the siege.

He could go there himself, he supposed, back to the burning fortress of San Savino, but Malcolm had promised to come with him. Malcolm had his own reason to go to San Savino-a valuable map to save from the flames, the treaty map that proved his claim to the Lochwarren throne-but Norman wanted him there for selfish reasons. Everything seemed more possible when Malcolm was there at his side. The stoat was as brave as he was short, and he was a useful ally in a fight. Norman sat thinking on the bridge long enough to eat both granola bars. He felt a little guilty about the second one, but it wasn't his fault. Malcolm should know better than to wander off and keep him waiting.

The sun drew higher in the sky, and Norman rested his head against the railing of the bridge. The sound of the water was making him sleepy. He closed his eyes and listened to it while the sun warmed him. It was almost musical. It reminded him of something he'd heard before. He could almost hear the song in his head: Something, something the towers of Logarno, Something, something tall ships of Cayturke, Something, something books of Oviedo.

Okay, he was daydreaming now. It was time to face the fact that Malcolm was not going to turn up-not on this bridge, not in the kitchen, not in his clothes hamper. He might never even have made it to the Shrubberies. The bookweird might have stranded him back at Kelmsworth with George. It might have carried him back home to Lochwarren. If the bookweird was really acting up, it might even have taken Malcolm to San Savino alone. It was time to find out. Norman shook his head and jumped up on the bridge. At the sound of his feet on the bridge deck, the music stopped. So much for that daydream.

Norman made his way slowly back to the house. His parents were probably looking for him anyway. He was probably in all sorts of trouble. And at the edge of the garden, he found another reason for them to ground him: the gate was wide open.

"Great," he told himself. "Now the horse has probably escaped too."

"The horse doesn't need a child to open a gate for him."

Norman turned towards the unfamiliar deep voice. There was no one there but the horse himself. He stood motionless in the shade of the apple tree, eyeing Norman with his giant but calm brown eyes.

"Who said that?" Norman asked. He turned around in a circle. Maybe some trick of echo had made it sound like the voice was coming from the horse's direction. n.o.body showed himself.

He gave the horse a long look.

"I hate to ask, just in case this makes me more crazy," he said in a low voice, in the event anybody heard him talking to a horse, "but you didn't just say something, did you?"

The horse took a step out from underneath the apple tree. Up close the animal looked even taller, more majestic. The big black stallion let out a deep sigh from its nostrils. It almost seemed to roll its eyes. It was then that Norman saw it. It was as plain as the nose on his own face. It looked absolutely natural, as if it had always been there. It was the colour of old bone, spiralled and veined with silver. It looked indescribably precious, as only a unicorn's horn could.

"You've got to be kidding me."

The huge black horse-or to call it what it was, the unicorn-placed a stern hoof on the ground and spoke once again in that deep, commanding voice. "I never kid."

"Does my mom know there's a unicorn in the backyard?"

The unicorn never had a chance to answer. Dora had appeared at the kitchen door.

"Are you bothering Raritan?" she asked proprietarily. "He doesn't appreciate stupid questions, you know."

She skipped down the back steps towards the mythical beast beside the flower beds.

Norman opened his mouth to speak, but a retort did not come. This was all too much to think about. Malcolm had disappeared; he could be anywhere. Now a unicorn was sitting in their back garden, and his sister seemed to think this was the most normal thing in the world.

"Do Mom and Dad know about this?" It was all he could think to ask at the moment.

Dora barely looked at Norman. She drew a couple of bright red apples from the inside of her riding jacket and offered them to the creature. "Here are some nice fresh apples. Much better than those nasty crabapples."

Norman couldn't say for sure, but the unicorn seemed to roll its big brown eyes again. He took the apples anyway.

"I can't wait to tell them," Dora continued. She stroked the unicorn's muscled neck as it ate the apples from her hand. "They might call, if their cellphones work there."

"Where's there?" Norman asked. He had a queasy feeling in his stomach. He was certain that there was no cell coverage inside a book.

"Paris, of course. That honeymoon sort of thing." She said it as if he should know all about it. "I don't see why. They've been married for ages." She shrugged, as if it was a mystery but not a very interesting one.

"And they left you here alone?" Norman wondered what he had missed while he was away at Kelmsworth and San Savino. Was he supposed to be babysitting? Mom and Dad sometimes left him in charge when they went to the store for half an hour, but was he really supposed to babysit while they went to Paris? Wouldn't they at least have told him?

While he muddled through this, Dora kept talking-mostly to the unicorn, partly to herself. Norman was slipping back into his usual habit of ignoring her. She disappeared around the other side of the unicorn. The big creature bowed and huffed, lowering his horn to let her touch it.

"He said that Raritan would have to go back but he could come for visits maybe."

"Who said?" Norman asked, suddenly and strongly suspicious. "Who said Raritan could come back?"

Dora reappeared from the other side of the unicorn. "Uncle Kit, of course. Who else?"

Norman could actually feel his jaw drop. It seemed to him that the unicorn snickered as he watched.

"Uncle Kit?" he began slowly, in a low voice. "Uncle Kit is here at the Shrubberies?"

"Of course he's here. He's looking after us while Mom and Dad are in Paris. You'd know that if you didn't sleep all day. Uncle Kit is awesome. You should see if he can bring a unicorn for you. Raritan might let you ride with us."

As if on cue, the unicorn dipped his head again, bowing very low and kneeling on the ground, in a way that was not very natural. Norman watched in dumbstruck awe as his sister leapt onto the back of the kneeling beast and flung her arms around its neck as it rose again to four feet.

"Where to, Acting Princess Dora?" he asked in the deepest of unicorn voices.

"To the flower meadow!" Dora commanded gleefully.

Raritan exhaled once, then leapt into action. Norman had seen thoroughbreds and show jumpers during his time in Dora's horse book, Fortune's Foal, but nothing quite as magnificent as this. The big creature cleared the hedge without as much as two steps of run-up. He was off and onto the wood path before Norman could say anything more. Within moments, the only trace of them was the heavy thumps of hooves along the sandy path to the bridge.

Norman hurried back to the house and tried to tell himself that the rumbling in his belly wasn't panic but hunger. There were scones in the cupboard and eight types of jam in the fridge. The lingonberry jam made him think of Malcolm. The scones reminded him of his dad. If he were here, his dad would be having a coffee right now, the first or second of about six cups he'd have in a day. The smell of coffee would be rea.s.suring right now. There were a few too many people missing from the Shrubberies, and one person he wished was not here at all.

Uncle Kit-or Fuchs, as Norman had known him for so long-was like a signpost for trouble. If Uncle Kit appeared, you knew something had gone wrong or was about to.

Norman piled a dozen scones onto a plate and ascended the stairs to confront his uncle. Either Kit was behind all this or he was letting it happen.

"Fuchs?" he shouted as he came to the top of the stairs. "Or is it Uncle Kit now? What would you like to be called today?"

He stopped at the landing and listened to the silence. "Fuchs? Uncle Kit?" he yelled again. He still wasn't used to the idea of Fuchs being his uncle. He'd known him so long and in so many different disguises. It was actually Kit who had introduced him to the bookweird, long before Norman had understood that Kit was his mother's brother, and that both his mother and his uncle shared his ability to get into books. Kit kept turning up whenever Norman bookweirded. He'd appeared as Malcolm's abbot in The Brothers of Lochwarren. He'd been George Kelmsworth's duplicitous lawyer in Intrepid Amongst the Gypsies. He'd even helped Norman out of a few sc.r.a.pes with the bookweird. Unfortunately, his crazy uncle tended to create more problems with the bookweird than he solved.

Norman stomped down the hall, braver now that he had convinced himself Fuchs wasn't actually here. "Fuchs!" he called, ever louder. "Kit!" And he pounded on each door. The study door was gapped. Norman pushed it open, expecting to see his mother's laptop there on the desk, surrounded by neat stacks of paper. But the desk was empty, as were most of the shelves. Norman put the plate of scones down on the bare desk. He couldn't put his finger on what was missing, but there seemed to be less stuff in the room, as if someone had moved out.

His brain tried to figure out what was missing, but there was just too much going on to think properly. He closed the study door and tried his parents' room. It would be just like Kit to take over the master bedroom. He was about the worst house guest you could imagine. He had taken over George Kelmsworth's entire manor house once. That was the thing about Kit-he didn't care if he messed up a book or even someone's life in a book. He just wanted to be part of things. He thought books were his own private theme park.

Norman half expected the master bedroom to be locked, like the library, but the handle gave way to his pressure and the door opened without a shove.

"Mom? Dad?" he whispered. He still couldn't completely believe that they had left for Paris without telling him, left him in the care of crazy Uncle Kit. Norman had never even met his uncle in real life. His mother ground her teeth if she even heard her brother's name mentioned. Still, Kit wasn't exactly bad. Norman wasn't afraid of him the way he was afraid of wolves or Black John of Nantes. Kit didn't deliberately try to hurt people, but people tended to get hurt anyway when he meddled with the bookweird.

There was no response from the master bedroom, so Norman stepped inside. The bed was made, the furniture arranged and the bedside tables tidy. Norman squinted and tried to figure out if it was "Mom tidy." There was a difference that Norman had never been able to see between his version of tidy and his mom's.

There was no telltale sign of Kit's occupation. He hadn't changed the pictures or redecorated. But then, why would he? This was his house, after all. He lived here most of the time-Norman's family was just staying here for the summer. Norman circled the room, on the lookout now for the removal of his parents' stuff. Dad's gla.s.ses weren't on his side table, but then, he would have taken them to Paris. There were no empty coffee mugs, but he was pretty sure Mom would have cleaned them before leaving. He felt a little guilty sneaking around his parents' room. This was way worse than looking for Christmas presents. You were supposed to try to find your Christmas presents. Were you supposed to try to find your parents if they went missing?

Norman's fingers hesitated on the drawer of his mother's bedside table. The last time he'd spoken to her, she had warned him about the bookweird, hinted that she knew much more about it than he did. She had taken The Secret in the Library away from him and put it into this drawer for safekeeping. The book was special to her, something from her own childhood that she didn't want destroyed. She had made herself clear: he was not to touch The Secret in the Library.

He didn't like disobeying his mother, but she didn't understand. She thought hiding Malcolm's map in Jerome's library would keep Norman from using the bookweird, but she didn't know how important the treaty map was. Malcolm needed it to prove his right to the throne, and Norman would do anything for his friend.

They'd needed the book then-just as he needed it now-to get to San Savino and Jerome, so Malcolm had snuck in through the window during the night to "borrow" it for them. The stoat was supposed to put it back later, but you couldn't always count on Malcolm to do exactly what you told him.

Norman held his breath as he pulled the drawer open.

It was more cluttered than he'd expected. There were tubes of ointment and makeup, an ornate silver jar full of pins, three bookmarks, tons of pens and pencils, some scarves, an old personal CD player and a stack of books on CD, but no actual book. The Secret in the Library wasn't there. Had Malcolm not returned it? Had his mother taken it to Paris for safekeeping? Or had Uncle Kit taken it?

"Snooping around again?"

The voice at the door startled him. Norman shut the drawer guiltily and turned to look.

"I always liked that about you. I enjoy a good snoop myself. Do you want any help?"

The figure in the doorway was strange but familiar. He was taller than Norman remembered, about as tall as his dad, he guessed, but skinnier. He looked younger than when Norman had last seen him. Partly it was the black jeans and T-shirt. Mostly it was because he'd shaved off the ridiculous moustache and muttonchops that he'd worn as George Kelmsworth's lawyer. His red hair was dyed jet black. It hung over his eyes like it had when Norman first met him in the public library back home. The earrings were back too-not the huge ring that was big enough to pa.s.s a pencil through, but a row of tiny silver hoops.

"Fuchs!" Norman half shouted it, surprise and annoyance mixed in his voice.

"Aw, Norms, don't call me that," he said in a voice that was meant to be chummy. "Call me Uncle Kit."

Norman wrinkled his nose. This was typical Kit-pretending they were in this together. Kit was like that weird kid at school who got you in trouble by talking to you in cla.s.s and wondered why you ignored him the next day.

"No? Just Kit, then. Just not Christopher. I never liked that. Call me Kip even, or K-dawg. We'd have to fist b.u.mp on that. What do you say, Norms ... Spiny?" He held out his pale knuckles for a fist b.u.mp, big silver rings flashing on his fingers.

Norman stiffened and clenched a fist. He couldn't have explained why the nickname bothered him. "Only my dad calls me Spiny."

Kit took a second to process the response. He lowered his hand, realizing that the fist b.u.mp was never coming, but the smile never left his face. "Fair enough, Norms," he concluded.