you have hatched...
Phelim, who is fourteen, comes in through the front door of his flat to be greeted by his older sister with an onslaught of high-pitched yelling.
He's been gone for weeks, she says, and she came home to find the place a mess, the door open, things stolen, a good mind to turn him over to the police... and on, and on.
Hopeless boy, failure of a boy, and on, and on.
Phelim manages to get a word in edgeways to ask about his father. Where is he? What happened? Why did he leave?
He was a bad man, full of stories, a drunkard. That's what happens to drunkards - she spits - they live in a fantasy world where they try and tell you that a little man lives under the stove. Bloody thing is broken now, how did you break it?
Phelim keeps asking until his sister tells him smugly that she threw him out on the streets, and the best place for him, let him make his own way.
Phelim has to get away, he can't hear any more. He runs outside, and her yelling follows him, booming out onto the estate from the stairwell. Other people yell for her to shut up.
Phelim runs to a little patch of grass, plucks a stem of it, puts it between his fingers and blows. Blows hard, to make a high-pitched whistle that all but drowns out the yelling. Then he watches.
A horse appears. A white horse. A beautiful white horse, with its feet on backwards. Not the horseshoes, but the actual feet.
The sister shuts up. She stares. What's that thing doing here? Is that yours?
It's a present. For you. Phelim attempts a smile.
She comes down the stairs to look at it. 'It's a horse - what am I supposed to do with a horse? Where are we going to keep it?'
There's a local stable, he explains. I'll look after it. Do you want a go?
She can't resist. He helps her up. She looks a bit unsafe. Shouldn't there be a saddle? - she asks.
Oh no, he says. This horse is trained to ride without one. Just grip tight, hang onto the mane. There, see? Phelim whispers something to the ushtey.
She's about to protest that she doesn't feel very safe, and this was a stupid idea, and he can't keep the horse... when Phelim slaps the ushtey on the rump, hard. Off it goes, a full gallop, with the sister screaming and clinging on for dear life.
Phelim watches it go. He knows it will go to the sea. He knows it won't stop there. He knows it won't stop until it has reached the farthest shore, because he told it to. He used the last of his magic.
And now... everything is very quiet.
A girl jogs up to him, Alexia (she's fourteen too). She asks him: 'Did I just see an ushtey ride by carrying some screaming woman?'
Phelim grins and nods. 'That was my sister. Come on, I'll show you where I live.'
