planks had actually curled back on themselves here and were like sleigh runners. However, once over this patch they returned to normal undulations caused simply by dampness and swift drying. The reason for the bad weather appeared to be a series of skylights that had been left open. Now they let in the elements: the wind and the rain, the heat of the summer sun, and any birds who cared to venture in from the outside world.
‘Hey, guys – how do you like my skateboard park?’
Chloe looked up and her face broke into a smile. It was Jordy. Somehow he’d found a skateboard and was using the undulations to practise his moves. Even Alex, who often found the sporty side of Jordy a bit hard to take, had to grin at his step-brother’s antics.
The three of them hugged and slapped each other on the back, then Jordy suggested they go to his camp in the forest of tall clocks. When they got there they found he had made himself very comfortable, using a dust cover over four of the clocks to make himself a tent. He couldn’t stop talking at first, running over all that had happened to him since he’d been alone. The other two gave him their accounts and he seemed a little disappointed to find that Chloe and Alex’s adventures matched his own, if not surpassed them.
‘So, you got a camping stove?’ marvelled Jordy, giving Alex due praise. ‘Can we get a cup of tea?’
‘We could if we had some tea,’ Alex replied.
‘Never mind. Perhaps we can send Nelson out looking for some, eh, Nelson?’ Jordy fondled the cat’s nape. ‘Good old Nelson. Kept me company, he did.’
‘He did us too!’ cried Alex. ‘He must have been going back and forth between the three of us.’ He went on, ‘Nelson brought me a pigeon, and a rat. I stripped and gutted them and cooked them up. They tasted good.’
‘You ate a rat?’ said Jordy, studying Alex now as if for the first time since they had been reunited. ‘What’s all that gear for?’
‘What gear?’
‘The kit. The big coat. The boots. The hat. The mask.’
‘Oh, these.’ Alex laughed carelessly. ‘I just took a fancy to them.’
Chloe caught Jordy’s eye and the older brother stopped asking questions about the way Alex dressed.
‘So, my little brother’s becoming self-sufficient in his old age,’ said Jordy after a while. ‘How did all this come about?’
‘I just woke up one morning – and there I was.’
Jordy for some reason felt a little uncomfortable probing his step-brother like this. He was afraid he was going to find out something he didn’t particularly like, though there was no real evidence that he would. But for one thing he was a little disturbed to find such a change in Alex in so short a time. It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with the way Alex was behaving. It was just that it was wrong for Alex. Indeed, his step-brother seemed just as shy and quiet as he always had been: still the reserved young man. But now there was a strong quiet confidence in him that shook Jordy a little. A determination about him that seemed to have come from nowhere. And the clothes he wore were a little eccentric, even for the attic. Chloe had immediately shed her layers once out of the stormy section of the attic, but Alex continued to keep his on, as if they were now part of his make-up, part of him.
‘I learned to navigate the attic,’ he told the other two brightly, ‘from the bortrekker. The guy you met by the trapdoor.’
‘He was some character, wasn’t he?’ Alex said, agreeing with Jordy. ‘I really liked him.’
Jordy was even more put out now. Alex was encroaching on his territory. Jordy was the adventurer, the orienteering expert. Alex was supposed to be interested in engines and science and all that sort of nerdy stuff. It was a bit annoying to find his little brother copying him. Unfortunately he said as much, and had to witness another new side to Alex, as his young step-brother gave him a withering look. He muttered something about Alex copying him.
‘Copying? I’m not copying you. You don’t own the rights to map-reading, do you? What did you ever invent that anyone would want to copy?’
‘Now you listen here—’ began Jordy angrily, but Chloe interrupted.
‘Please, boys – we’ve only just met up again.’
Jordy’s eyes were still smarting, but he managed to blink, and soon had his