Spellfall Read Online Free PDF Page B

“Going somewhere?”
    “None of your business.” She glanced at her wrist, and realized she’d forgotten her watch. “Does Dad know you’ve been out all night?”
    Tim’s eyes narrowed. His hand shot out and seized her shoulder. “No, he don’t. And don’t you go whining to him about it or you’ll live to regret it.”
    Natalie stiffened. “Let go! Anyway, I thought you didn’t care what he thought?”
    “Don’t wind me up, you half-blind little runt. Keep your mouth shut, d’you hear?”
    “I’ll keep mine shut if you do.”
    Tim stared at her. For a moment she thought she’d gone too far, and her heart hammered. Then his lips twitched and he released her. “So. My little Sis has got secrets of her own, has she?” He watched, smiling, as Natalie hopped down the path still trying to tie her lace. “Where you off to, then?”
    “Nowhere.”
    “Maybe I’ll follow you and see.”
    That was the last thing she needed. “I’m going to walk Bilbo with Jo, if you must know,” she told him, raising her chin.
    Tim shook his head and slid his key into the lock. “At this time in the morning? You’re quite crazy, the pair of you – it isn’t even light yet. I’m off to bed. Mind you don’t fall in the river like your mother did.”
    Natalie’s heart twisted. But before she could think of a suitable reply, the door closed and she heard the chain rattle as Tim locked up. She clenched her fists, tears in her eyes. Sometimes she hated him so much she wanted to scream.
    As she hurried to the corner, worried Jo would think she wasn’t coming, an engine spluttered to life further up the street. Milkman, she thought vaguely, forgetting he didn’t deliver on Sundays.
    *
    Ringed by the silver cones of the perimeter lights and filled with drifting mist, the supermarket car park was spooky. Shivering, the two friends broke into a run. Jo carried both pairs of skates round her neck, swinging from their laces, while Bilbo bounded ahead, yellow ears flopping and tongue hanging out. Without vehicles to fill it, the car park seemed a lot larger than it had yesterday and Natalie began to wonder if they had missed the recycling area completely. By the time the metal bins suddenly loomed ahead, dark and dripping with moisture, she was tense enough to scream.
    “Steady on, Nat! It’s only your spell bank.” But Jo’s breath was coming faster too. “Which one is it, then? This one?” She gave the side of the bottle bin a thump, which caused a resounding clang that must have echoed halfway across town. Bilbo began to bark.
    Natalie glanced nervously over her shoulder. “Shh!” She blinked at the collection of bins, trying to remember. They looked different in the fog. She crouched by the one next to the bottle bank, wiped the moisture from its side and looked for the silver graffiti. Gone. A battered Council sign said PAPER AND CARDBOARD ONLY. She sighed, feeling stupid. “I thought it was this one. But it was smaller with a higher opening and it definitely didn’t say paper.”
    “Well, it isn’t here now. Or maybe I just can’t see it?” Jo squinted at the empty space between the bottle bin and the one Natalie had just examined.
    Her stomach twisted. People had been teasing her all her life about her bad eyesight, but Jo never had before. “Stop it,” she whispered. “That’s not funny.”
    Jo’s grin faded. “Oh, Nat... I didn’t mean it like that, silly. I believe you. I expect they took it away last night to empty it.”
    “On a Saturday?”
    “Maybe it was full. We can come back and look for it tomorrow.” She perched on the kerb and began to change into her skates. “Here, put yours on.”
    Natalie glanced round again. If anything, the fog was getting thicker. The car park was eerily quiet. No traffic on the ring road, not even an owl hooting from the river meadows. No sign of dawn.
    “I’m not sure this is such a good idea,” she said with a shiver. “Maybe we should go home now? I