Black Tide by Caroline Clough Page A

could against the door and slowly stood up. Outside, someone was crossing the courtyard carrying a lantern. The light bounced up into the vaulted wooden ceiling of the church and glinted in the eye of whatever was drawing near, dancing off its sharp fangs.
    Hold on a mo – those eyes aren’t moving…
    “Tash,” he called, “is that you?”
    The fanged thing slid slowly along the floor until it reached the vestry door. Then suddenly it reared up to reveal Tash hiding under her wolf coat.
    “It’s me,” she whispered conspiratorially, as if they were being overheard.
    “What are you up to?” Toby asked. “You seem to take great fun from frightening the life out of me. I’m not sure my heart can stand any more scares, thanks.”
    “I’m sorry your heart isn’t strong, but I was thinking the men might be watching here.”
    “No, they’re too busy trying to keep the dogs out. Anyway, where have you been? And why did you lock me out?”
    “I didn’t know they’d put you in here. I always keep the door locked. But you’ll be happy when I tell what I’ve found out. Now let’s go below and eat.”
    “Great,” said Toby, “I’m starving.”
    On reaching the kitchen down in the cave, Tash rummaged through some cupboards and put a large bowl of cereal covered with sweet, sticky condensed milk in front of Toby.
    “There’s no time to cook, but here’s some sugar – it’s good for energy,” she said, tucking into a large mouthful of muesli with dried apricots.
    “Yummy,” said Toby through a mouthful of the sugary goo. “Ok, so where did you go and what have you found out?”
    Tash started to tell Toby about where she had been since leaving him in the tunnel on the ravelin. He interrupted as nicely as he could,
    “I don’t mean to sound rude, Tash, but d’you think you could take off that wolf thing? The smell’s putting me off my food.”
    “Yeah, sure.” Tash pulled off the offending article and threw it over the settee. Then she told Toby about how she had got back into the fort by climbing underneath the main bridge, clinging to the wooden joists. She had waited until the raiders were distracted by him, then had slipped over the side of the bridge and into the fort.
    She’s much braver than me. I bet she thinks I’m a right coward.
    “So what did you find out?” he asked her.
    “I hid in the stores where the men keep guns and ammo. They came in all excited. They’d heard the doghowling and then there was a big commotion. Some of them were saying they want to leave now and go to the other collecting station,” she said, scraping the last of the condensed milk from her bowl.
    “Did they say where that was, or say anything else about the General?” asked Toby.
    “Sounds like he’s a very clever man, and very powerful. He seems to have some sort of hold over them. They’re all scared of him and do as he says: he says to kidnap people, and they do it. They gather their prisoners together at the collecting stations and then take them to the place they call ‘New Caledonia’.”
    “New Caledonia?” Toby tried to put things together. The Captain had mentioned that name. It sounded quite nice, but that must be misleading. What had the Captain said? It was a new world the General had created. How had this General managed to gather so much power so quickly? And could he really be using the people he had kidnapped as slaves, as the Captain had suggested?
    “This all sounds so weird,” he said, scratching the back of his head, which had started to itch where the wound was beginning to heal.
    “No weirder than your dogs taking over Scotland and dominating the world,” Tash countered.
    “Yeah,” replied Toby, “well, they’re not my dogs, but I get your point. Still, these days nothing seems weird. I mean, who would have thought that a single virus would wipe out most of the world’s population? Since then, nothing has made any sense,” he ended lamely, thinking of all the terrible