Ante's Inferno , livre ebook

Troubador Publishing Ltd - Griselda Heppel

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114 pages

English

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Twelve year-old Ante (Antonia) Alganesh has a problem. It's lunchbreak and Florence's gang are after her. Desperate for a place to hide, she climbs the forbidden staircase to the old organ loft, where a hundred years ago a boy tumbled to his death. No one will think of looking for her there... Except Florence. Petrified, Ante watches her enemy approach, leaning on the rotten hand-rail. She shouts a warning, but it's too late. There's a crash - and a boy appears from nowhere, just as a door opens in the wall behind them. All three find themselves in a tunnel leading to a river bank where people queue to be rowed across by a filthy old ferrymanForced to bury their differences, Ante and Florence accompany the strange boy, Gil, on a journey he should have taken 100 years ago through the Underworld. Making their way past the Shopping Maul and Multivice Complex, attacked by Cerberus, Harpies, Furies and the Minotaur, all this is bad enough: far worse is the doubt gnawing at Ante's heart...Ante's Inferno is a gripping combination of fantasy, Greek mythology and adventure, for children aged 9-12 years old. Author Griselda is inspired by C. S. Lewis and Norton Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth. Ante's Inferno won the Children's award in the People's Book Prize 2013, andthe Silver award in the 9-12 year-old category of the Wishing Shelf Independent Book Awards 2012.

Sujets

Magic realism

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Publié par	Troubador Publishing Ltd
Date de parution	28 août 2018
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781789012538
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	1 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0200€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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Copyright © 2018 Griselda Heppel
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
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Wood engraving for cover by Hilary Paynter
Cover design by Pete Lawrence
ISBN 978 1789012 538
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd
For
Rebecca, Léonie, John and Michael
CONTENTS
Chapter One: Solo
Chapter Two: Breaking Point
Chapter Three: Gil
Chapter Four: The Styx
Chapter Five: Finding Florence
Chapter Six: Two’s Company…
Chapter Seven: The Golden Bough
Chapter Eight: Elysium
Chapter Nine: Penelope’s Gift
Chapter Ten: The Multivice Complex
Chapter Eleven: Chains of Gold
Chapter Twelve: The Loving Dead
Chapter Thirteen: Chiron
Chapter Fourteen: The Fortress of Dis
Chapter Fifteen: The Kindly Ones
Chapter Sixteen: The Burning Path
Chapter Seventeen: Signs on the Wall
Chapter Eighteen: The Labyrinth
Chapter Nineteen: The Fall of Icarus
Chapter Twenty: Shadows Under the Ice
Chapter Twenty-One: The Control Room
Chapter Twenty-Two: The Designs of Evil
Chapter Twenty-Three: Exile
Chapter Twenty-Four: The Waste Land
Chapter Twenty-Five: In the Dugout
Chapter Twenty-Six: Shapes in the Darkness
Chapter Twenty-Seven: ‘I died in Hell – (They called it Passchendaele)’
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Harry
Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Far Shore
Chapter Thirty: The Return
Chapter Thirty-One: Remembrance
CHAPTER ONE
Solo
The grass was wet underfoot. It soaked through Ante’s shoes, chilling her feet till they felt as numb as her fingers, curled around the cold metal trumpet. Wriggling her toes, she fought the impulse to jump up and down. Not a good idea when the breeze was already blowing her black hair in wild, frizzy strands across her face and flapping the hem of her skirt against her knees – her knees ! How many other girls had hems that long? Very few, judging by the groups making their way across the football pitch towards her, interspersed by knots of boys in their grey trousers or shorts.
She grimaced. The uniform had felt wrong from the start, grey pleats and long woollen socks doing nothing either for her solid build or her dark skin. Now it felt even worse as the whole of Northwell School gathered in a semi-circle before her, staring…
She shook herself. Don’t be stupid. People were looking at her because of where she stood, that was all. OK, so some of the younger ones might be whispering and giggling but it wasn’t directed at her. It wasn’t them . Glancing around, she felt a flicker of hope rise in her chest. They weren’t even there. They must have decided to bunk off. Yes ! One thing less to worry about.
A stillness settled on the crowd. Gusts of wind shook raindrops from trees nearby and tugged at red poppies, loosely tucked into button holes. All eyes turned to the headmaster, standing on the other side of the tall stone cross from her, about to begin.
Not all. A movement, there, on the left… no . Not them, it couldn’t be. They should be hiding out in the changing rooms, too cool for this whole Remembrance thing. Not here, calmly threading their way to the front, the others shrinking back to let them through. Ante forced her gaze upwards, above their heads, above everyone, trying to focus on the jumble of roofs and tall chimneys that marked the school buildings in the distance. Anything not to see what was now straight in front of her.
There was no point. The figures were etched on her brain. With her eyes closed she could have picked out Florence’s delicate features, the wave of blonde hair across her forehead; then Shelley’s shining braids, smooth against her perfect black skin; and finally Alex’s pale, pinched face and sharp green eyes. She could even have predicted Alex choosing the moment the Head began to speak to turn to Florence and mouth those horrible words, making Florence crease up with laughter.
Pain shot through her fingers as they tightened round the trumpet. That name again! If Alex had chanted ‘Ante E-le-phantee, Ante E-le-phantee!’ out loud it couldn’t have rung in her ears more than it did now, as she stood like a great clumsy idiot, waiting to sound her trunk, oops, no, very funny, her trumpet – while they waited for her to mess it up.
Don’t look at them. Don’t look at them and everything will be OK. She fixed her attention on the Head’s stern profile, letting his words swirl in her mind before being lost to the wind. ‘First World War…tragic slaughter in the trenches…many old pupils from this school, some barely out of their teens…terrible hardship, as those of you in Year Seven are learning in History…’ History! She’d forgotten her homework on trench warfare, Mr Matthews would go crazy … Her gaze wandered away to encounter – them . They were still staring at her. Three pairs of eyes, blue, brown and green, stared into hers, above smiles playing over pursed lips.
‘John Hawkins, Edward Horrocks, David Lonsdale…’ The names of the fallen blended into one solemn, continuous murmuring. Please, please, let the list go on. On and on forever. Then I don’t have to play. But at last the Head ceased; a brief echo from the crowd, and away in the distance a church clock struck eleven.
Silence. A steady hum of traffic drifted across from the far side of the school buildings. Ante moistened her lips and breathed softly down the mouthpiece, making no sound.
Then Mr Randall caught her eye and she raised the trumpet. All fidgeting in the crowd ceased. People stood still, head bowed and hands by their sides, until the final notes of the Last Post faded on the air.
* * *
‘Well done, Antonia – I mean, Ante. I’m sure your father would’ve been proud of you.’ Mr Randall strode through the crowd making its way back to the classrooms, his eager eyes sending wrinkles all the way up his large forehead, over which grey wisps of hair floated in the wind.
Pride swelled in her chest. ‘Really?’
For that alone it was worth it. The practice, the nerves, the loneliness – not just standing there on her own, but from the beginning of term, joining the school for the last two years instead of in Year Four like everyone else. Her dad would’ve stood at the back, head on one side, not looking at her, not wanting to break her concentration; then at the end there’d be a quick, warm smile from his eyes, a wave and he’d be gone.
‘Definitely. Keep it up and you’ll be the one with your own jazz band one day.’
‘Thanks, Mr Randall!’
‘Next thing we’ll have you playing in is the Christmas concert. Let’s see now – I’ve got a music class in the assembly hall first lesson this afternoon. Come by just before – ten to two, say, and we’ll talk about it.’
She gazed after him, aching to burst into a grin, her insides in turmoil. That rush of feeling, like when the letter first arrived – months ago now – with the news she’d won the music scholarship, when her mother had squealed and hugged her and they’d both danced round the room, that same sensation surged through her again. She was good. She could do this! Northwell School with its odd traditions and uniforms, its cluster of ancient, turreted buildings, parkland and playing fields rolling down to the river – so different from the crumbling concrete and brick walls of St Dunstan’s – the whole place might still feel strange but things would work out. Surely, once she got used to her being there, even Florence would –
‘ Thanks, Mr Randall . Quite the performer, aren’t we?’
Her chest tightened.
Florence came nearer. ‘You just have to be the star, don’t you, Ante? You and no one else.’
How could hissing sound so gentle? She shrank away but immediately straightened; Shelley and Alex had positioned themselves uncomfortably close on her other side.
‘Standing up there, all eyes on you, I bet you think you’re really something.’
Heat swept up Ante’s throat. ‘I – I don’t, I just – look, I didn’t ask to do that. It was Mr Randall. He – made me.’
‘Oh, come on, Ante, we’re not at St Dunstan’s anymore. You can stop pretending.’
Ante stopped dead at the edge of the playground. ‘What do you mean? Pretending what?’
‘No one can make you do something, Ante Alganesh. It’s your choice. Like when you chose to – ’ Florence broke off, biting her lip.
Ante stared at her. ‘Chose to what?’
But Florence shook her head and set off across the playground so fast that Shelley and Alex had to run to keep up.
‘Chose to WHAT?’ Ante didn’t care if people were staring; what was this all about? ‘St Dunstan’s? Florence, you left after the first term!’
The doors to the classroom block swung shut. Ante stared at the empty space. ‘ That term,’ she murmured.
December, six years ago. Frost in rivulets on the pavement and sparkling on car windscreens. Light catching her mother’s hair and separating it into strands of spun copper as she bent to zip up Ante’s anorak before swivelling round to wave goodbye. And Ante, dazzled by bright metal of wheels and handlebars, screwing up her eyes to catch her father’s last smile as he set off, ear flaps of his ridiculous sheepskin cap lifting in the wind, down the road that took him away forever.
CHAPTER TWO
Breaking Point
Oh hell, they’d waited for her.
If staying on aft