Tales of the Peculiar (Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children #0.5) - Ransom Riggs Page 0,28

It began with that old, terrible pressure within him, which in a matter of moments became unbearable. It felt as if his body were having an earthquake.

The glue that covered him cracked and fell away. Sand began to pour from his skin. The tar that had stopped up his armpits disintegrated, and ropes of seaweed shot out of him at an incredible rate. In less than a minute, it had nearly filled the room he was in, and he knew he had to get out of his house or it would be destroyed. He ran outside—and into a driving rainstorm.

He fell down in the middle of the street, sand and seaweed gushing out of him. People who saw him ran away screaming. His wooden feet blew off, and from their stumps rushed endless lengths of grass. His body began to grow, the rain and the grass mixing with the sand to form earth, layers and layers of which wrapped around him like skin upon skin. Soon he was as wide as the street and as tall as his house.

A mob formed and attacked him. Zheng struggled to stand on his grassy stumps and then to run. He fell, crushing a house under his weight. He stood again and lumbered on, laboring up a hill with thundering steps that punched holes in the street.

The mob chased him, joined by soldiers who fired arrows at his back. From his wounds gushed liquid gold, which only encouraged more people to join the attack. All the while, Zheng was steadily growing, and soon he was twice the width of his street and three times the height of his house. His form was fast becoming inhuman, his arms and legs disappearing within the giant, earthen ball that was his midsection.

He made it to the top of the street on tiny, waddling stumps. A moment later they were swallowed up, and with nothing left to steady him, his round form began to roll down the other side—slowly at first, then faster and faster. He became unstoppable, flattening houses and wagons and people as he went, growing larger all the while.

He careened into the harbor, hurtled down a splintering dock, and then splashed into the sea, making a wave so big that all the boats around him swamped. Submerged and drifting, he began to grow faster than ever, his grass and earth and sand and seaweed spreading over the water to form a small island. The transformation was so all-consuming that he did not notice the approach of several of the emperor’s warships. He felt it, though, when they began to fire their cannons into him.

The pain was incredible. His blood made the sea shine golden in the sun. He thought his life was about to end—until he heard a familiar voice.

It was his father, calling his name.

Cocobolo plowed into their midst with a great rumble. The wake he made knocked over the emperor’s warships like they were toys. Zheng felt something link with him beneath the surface of the water, and then his father was pulling him out to sea. Once they were away from danger and all was quiet, his father used bent coconut palms to catapult earth into the holes that had been shot through Zheng.

“Thank you,” Zheng said, his voice a loud rumble that came from he knew not where. “I don’t deserve your kindness.”

“Of course you do,” replied his father.

“You were keeping watch,” said Zheng.

“Yes,” said his father.

“For all these years?”

“Yes,” he said again. “I had a feeling you’d need my help one day.”

“But I was so cruel to you.”

His father was quiet for a moment. Then he said: “You’re my son.”

Zheng’s bleeding had stopped, but now he felt a worse pain: incredible shame. Zheng was well acquainted with shame, but this type was new. He was ashamed by the kindness he’d been shown. He was ashamed at how he’d treated his poor father. But he was ashamed, most of all, of how ashamed he’d been of himself, and of what he’d let that turn him into.

“I’m sorry, Father.” Zheng wept. “I’m so very sorry.”

Even as he cried, Zheng could feel himself growing, his sand and grass and earth creeping outward, his seaweed thickening into a forest of submarine kelp. The coral reef that encircled his father linked itself to the one beginning to form around Zheng, and with a gentle tug, the elder Cocobolo led the younger still farther out to sea.

“There’s a wonderful spot near Madagascar where we can relax