The Summer Fair Where EVERYBODY Came

Part One. The Banner

The first sign that something was different about our Summer Fair was the sign.

It was painted on a bedsheet and hung across the school gate. Mr Harris had finished it in the dark, and the paint was still a bit shiny. It said:

WELCOME TO THE SUMMER FAIR! ALL STAFF WILL BE RUNNING STALLS. PLEASE DO NOT ASK QUESTIONS.

Underneath, in tiny writing, someone had added: (ESPECIALLY NOT ABOUT THE BOAT.)

Alex Bailey noticed the boat first. It was in the car park, parked across four spaces, with its little flag flapping, although there was no wind at all. It was the boat-bus. It had a real anchor on the front, and a sign in the window that said BACK SOON, KNOCK.

The boat-bus was not the only strange thing. There was a green cart full of pots of flowers, and the flowers were all looking at the sun. There was a small shed on wheels, and the wheels were glowing.

"Felix," said Alex. "Everyone has come."

Felix Bailey asked the right question, which is the thing Felix does. "Who is everyone?"

Alex and Felix are twins, so they have a system. Alex notices things and Felix asks about them. Then they swap.

They found Mr Harris on a stepladder, hanging the last corner of the bedsheet. His glasses were on his forehead. His clipboard was in his collar.

"Mr Harris," said Felix, "who is coming to the fair?"

"Everybody!" said Mr Harris. His voice came out very high. "Marvellous. Everybody. Everyone who has ever helped us said yes. Perfectly under control." He wobbled on the ladder. "Please do not ask about the boat."

Together they said, "We need Maya."

Part Two. The First Four

Maya Singh was behind the compost bin, as she had been since six o'clock. Kenji Mori and Ollie Grant were on their upside-down buckets, Dot from Reception was sitting on the lid, and Willow was lying on the warm wall, looking at everybody as if she had seen it all before.

Maya was holding her notebook very tightly. On the page, she had written the numbers one to twelve down the side.

"Mr Harris has asked every grown-up we have met," she said. "I have counted, and it is twelve lots of them. If something goes wrong today, we need to know who can do what. So I have made a list."

Dot put up her hand. "What if nothing goes wrong?"

"Dot," said Maya, "that has never once happened."

"I will read it in three goes," said Maya, "because twelve at once is too many to hold. Here is the first go. Kenji, you read the bold bits."

Kenji pushed up his sleeves. Maya read:

"Number one. Mr Thorley, the caretaker. He is Thor."

"Hammer," said Kenji, "red beard, goats that he says are a van."

"Very strong," said Ollie.

"And," said Maya, "MUST NOT BE STARTLED."

"Why?" said Dot.

"Boom," said everyone but Dot, all together. It was a very good boom.

"Number two. Mr Shah, the music teacher. He is Shiva."

"Calm is a kind of strong," said Felix. "He said it to me once."

"He drank the green soup so nobody else had to," said Kenji. "His wife is Mrs Rao in the office, and his son is Ganesh Rao, a few classes above us. Ganesh clears the way."

"Number three. Mr Jackson, the librarian. He is Anubis. He finds the lost."

"He found the whole class under the school once," said Ollie, "and I was one of them."

"Number four. Two sisters." Maya turned the page. "Mrs Felicity and Ms Fortune. They are Felicitas and Fortuna."

"Luck you keep," said Alex, "and luck you spin."

Maya nodded, and underlined the sentence. She did it only once. She does not believe in too much underlining.

"That's four," she said. "The next four are for after the gate opens. Brains need a break."

Ollie looked at the bedsheet banner through the gap in the hedge. "That's a lot of gods," he said.

"I know," said Maya. "That's what worries me."

Part Three. The Balloon

The gate opened at eleven o'clock, and the crowd came in like water.

There were mums and dads and grandmas, and Mr Pickering the lollipop man, who said it was his day off and he was still holding a lollipop. Mrs Tibbs, our class teacher, wore an enormous sunhat. Gideon Fox from the top class stood by himself at the gate, looking cross, because he was too big for the fair and had come anyway.

Elfine and Marion ran the facts stall, behind a banner that said FACTS, FIVE FOR ONE PENCE. Marion held a clicker and counted everybody through the gate.

"Four hundred and twelve so far," said Marion.

"Fact," said Elfine, pushing up her glasses. "That is more people than have ever been on this field at once. It is just a fact. It depends what they do."

The fair did strange things on its own. A tombola ticket read itself aloud. A horseshoe on the hoopla stall glowed so brightly that Mr Heston had to put a bucket over it.

"Too many gods in one place," said Maya quietly. "It's like twelve radios playing at once. They bump."

That's when it happened. A helium balloon floated gently over the hedge, and it drifted down, and it bumped into the back of Mr Thorley's neck.

It popped.

There was a small, flat BOOM. A thin crack of lightning ran up the lollipop man's lollipop. Mr Thorley leaped straight up, and landed a long way from where he had started, with his hammer in both hands.

"WHO," he said, "WHO IS... Oh."

He looked at the little children, who were all staring at him. He put down the hammer. His beard had gone slightly pink, and sparks were fizzing from the ends.

"I am so sorry," he said. "It was only a balloon. Er. The goats are fine."

Mr Shah was beside him in a moment, with his hands held out, palms down, and he said gently, "Slow, my friend. In for four, and out for four." The sparks went out. It took six breaths.

"Hmm," said Maya, and wrote MUST NOT BE STARTLED again, three times. She underlined it. This time she did it twice.

Part Four. The Stalls

Alex held the pencil. Felix held Maya's notebook, because they always share jobs, and we all walked up and down the stalls while Maya read out her second go in a whisper.

"Number five. The Dinner Men. There are seven of them, and they arrive by boat. Mr Ebbie is the one you knock for."

Mr Ebbie's stall was a table of fish pies. A sign said PLEASE KNOCK ON THE COUNTER. Felix knocked three times, and then he waited. After a while, Mr Ebbie's whole face lit up like a lamp.

"Ah!" said Mr Ebbie. "A customer who knocks and waits! The pie is free, because you are worth waiting for."

Felix looked at his pie. "I'm supposed to pay," he said.

"Pay with a smile," said Mr Ebbie, and Felix did, which was an easy sort of pay.

"Number six," said Maya. "Mr Locke. He is Loki."

Mr Locke was at the cake stall, tying a long green ribbon in a bow round every single cake. He was very good at it. He was humming. When he saw us, he waved a ribbon.

"Hello, my favourites," he said.

Alex noticed his hands. They moved so fast that the ribbons seemed to tie themselves. Everything he touched was a bow or a knot. That is the thing about Mr Locke, Alex thought. He is tidy in a very tangly way.

"He took the lion's mane once," whispered Maya. "Then he said sorry, and he meant it, and he plaited tinsel along the edge so it would be better. I still watch him. But kindly."

"Number seven. Mrs Ibbs is Thoth. She keeps the Record of the school. And gave us an extra Thursday."

Mrs Ibbs stood on one leg behind the Count the Jelly Beans jar. She said the answer, 1,204, before anyone had started. Then she won it, and said, "Sorry. Habit."

"Number eight. Miss Persey. She is Persephone. She goes below in the autumn, and the flowers wait for her."

Miss Persey's flowers opened when you said please. She gave one to every child. Beside her, in a woolly hat in the middle of summer, stood Mr Haydes the boiler man, holding a lemonade as if it were a very small, very important crown.

"That's Hades," whispered Maya, "and he's having a lovely time. Everyone is lovely today. That's what worries me."

Part Five. The Purple Curtain

At two o'clock, there was a clanging of a cowbell, and Mr Harris stood on a hay bale.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said. "A surprise, from our supply teacher, Mr Locke, as a gift to the little ones."

On the far side of the field, there was a big purple curtain, which had been there all morning. Mr Locke stood in front of it with his hands behind his back. He looked nervous, and he looked happy, and he looked as if he had been practising.

Mr Thorley said, in a very low voice, "Locke."

"I know," said Mr Locke.

"What is behind the curtain?"

"A surprise. For the little ones. It's safe. I promise it's safe."

Mr Thorley said, "Last time you said that, you took a lion's mane."

Mr Locke said, "I fixed that. It was better with tinsel."

Mr Thorley shut his mouth. His eyebrows said, "It was." His whole face said, "Still."

"This time I've done it properly," said Mr Locke. "I asked Mr Harris, and I wrote it all down. I made it for the children. Not for a joke." He looked at the ground. "I wanted to do one thing at this school that was only kind."

Mr Thorley sighed. He sat down on a hay bale and put his hammer across his knees. "If this goes wrong," he said, "I shan't say a word. I'll just be holding my hammer."

Mr Locke pulled the curtain.

It was the BIGGEST BOUNCY CASTLE we had ever seen. It was as big as a house, purple and green and gold, with a turret on every corner and a flag on the top. It sparkled. Little stars drifted slowly through the plastic, as if it were full of night.

The sign on the front said:

MR LOCKE'S MAGIC BOUNCY CASTLE. GRAVITY HAS BEEN ADJUSTED. IT LISTENS TO FEELINGS. ENJOY.

"What does 'listens to feelings' mean?" said Felix.

"The more you laugh," said Mr Locke, "the higher you bounce. Only a tiny bit. It's the soft sort of magic. Just a metre."

"What about a really big feeling?" said Alex.

Mr Locke thought about it. "Then it's a really big bounce," he said. "I'd imagine."

Maya wrote it down. Alex saw her write BIG FEELING = BIG BOUNCE, and underline it, and put a small question mark next to it, as if it were looking at her.

Part Six. The Last Four

We lined up in the queue, and Maya read us her third and last go, in a whisper that went from one end of the line to the other.

"Number nine. Mr Hermes, the postman. Walks backwards. Delivers anything."

"Number ten," said Kenji, who had learned this one. "Mr Heston, Making Club. He is Hephaestus. Talos the bronze giant is asleep in the shed, and DON'T TOUCH WITHOUT ASKING."

"Number eleven," said Ollie. "Mr Pann. He's Pan. Panic is catching."

"But so is calm," said Dot, who had been told this one in the play.

"Number twelve." Maya paused. "Mr Hanu. PE. Hanuman. He has a whistle with a picture of his friends on it. The best thing to say to him is 'I know you can.'"

"That's all twelve," said Maya. She closed the notebook. "Now I know who can do what. Please let me not need it."

We climbed in.

It was marvellous inside. The floor was soft as a cloud, the walls were made of purple light, and the stars floated all round us. We kicked off our shoes. Ollie was first, and went up like a rocket. Kenji went up after him. Alex and Felix went up together, holding hands, and every time they landed the castle gave a happy little boing.

Willow did not bounce. Alex had carried her in, because the noise outside was too loud for a cat who likes quiet. She sat very neatly in the middle of the floor on a cushion, with her paws together, watching everything.

Outside, the gods were laughing at their stalls. Mr Thorley had a hot dog. Mr Hermes was polishing his heels. The sun was warm. A hundred people were smiling.

"Look at me!" shouted Ollie. "It's the best day of my whole entire life!"

He laughed so hard that he went up past the top of the turrets, and came down very slowly, like a feather. We all laughed. We all went higher. Maya laughed too, though she said she was only checking.

That's when the castle began to rise.

Part Seven. Up

At first it was slow. We did not notice. Our bounces got a bit higher, and our landings a bit softer, and the grass got a bit further away.

Then Maya stopped laughing.

"Everyone," she said. "Stop. Look down."

We looked. The grass was a long way below. The stalls looked like toys. The faces turned up at us were small and pale, and Mr Harris's clipboard was a speck.

The whole castle, with thirty-one of us inside, was floating UP.

Down below, Mr Hermes shouted, "LOCKE! What did you do?"

Mr Locke's face had gone completely white. He said, in a thin, high voice, "It's meant to go up a metre! I only gave it one tiny spell." He waved his arms. A shower of green sparks, a flash of orange. A small puff of smoke. "It's tangled. There's so much magic on this field that it's like threads in a drawer. I should have asked before. I should have asked everybody."

"Locke," said Mr Thorley, very quietly, and he stood up.

From the castle, a small voice said, "I want my mum."

Someone sobbed. Someone else sobbed. Then every little voice in the castle went up in a wail, and the castle jerked.

"Big feeling," said Alex, in a very small voice, "big bounce."

The castle shot up twice as fast.

Part Eight. The Gods Try

Mr Hanu was first. He leaped from the ground in one huge golden bound, caught the side of the castle with both hands, and pulled.

The castle shot up faster than ever.

"It went the wrong way!" shouted Mr Hanu, and fell back down in a heap on the tombola.

Mr Hermes flew up on his heels, and tied a rope round the lowest turret, and tugged with all his strength, and the rope snapped like cotton. Mr Heston threw a chain from the ground. It snapped too. Mr Shah began to dance very slowly in the middle of the field, with his eyes closed, and the castle drifted a little slower, but only a little, because thirty-one children were still too scared.

Mr Thorley raised his hammer high in the air, and bellowed, "I'LL BRING IT DOWN WITH THUNDER!"

Everybody on the ground and everybody in the castle yelled together, "NO!"

Mr Thorley stopped. He looked at his hammer. He looked up at the castle, and then, very slowly, at his own hands.

"Ah," he said. "Yes. Thunder would make it worse. Wouldn't it." He put the hammer on the ground. His hands were shaking.

"Nobody can go in," said Mr Jackson, with his nose in the air. "Nobody can pull. Anything strong makes it worse."

Mrs Ibbs wrote something in her notebook, crossed it out, and wrote something else. She looked up. "It needs someone small," she said. "Someone calm. Someone who is on the inside."

Everyone looked up at the castle. A few of them looked at the same two small shapes, in the biggest turret, holding hands.

"Thirty-one," said Marion. "I counted them in. I will count them out."

Part Nine. Above the School

The castle was higher than the school roof. Then it was higher than the trees. A cold wind blew across the turrets, and the flag on top snapped and tugged.

It was the scariest we had ever been.

Inside, it was louder than a playground. A boy in a sheep costume was crying with his mouth wide open. Three flower girls were sobbing in a heap. Gideon Fox, who had climbed in at the last minute with his arms folded, was crying the loudest of anyone.

"I'm one of the big kids," said Gideon, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "I shouldn't be crying."

"Everyone cries," said Felix.

"I am NOT crying," said Gideon, crying.

Alex tried first. He knelt down by the boy in the sheep costume and said, in his clearest voice, "Breathe in, and count to three! One! Two! Three!"

Nobody heard him. It was too loud. The boy only sobbed louder, and the castle bumped up another turret-length.

Felix tried next. He took a deep breath and shouted, "DON'T BE SCARED!"

That was the worst thing he could have said. Every child in the castle looked at him as if he had said "THE FLOOR IS LAVA."

The castle jumped.

"That did not work," said Felix, in a small voice.

"No," said Alex.

"We have to do something different," said Felix.

They held hands. They closed their eyes. In the middle of all that crying, Felix said, very quietly, "Alex. When I'm scared, I don't want someone shouting. I want somebody to be next to me."

Alex opened his eyes.

"Then we'll whisper," said Alex.

Part Ten. The Whisper

It is hard to be loud and scared when someone is whispering to you. That is a secret. You have to lean in to hear.

Alex knelt beside the boy in the sheep costume, and he whispered, "Hello. I'm Alex. Breathe with me. In, one, two, three."

The boy leaned in. Alex whispered, "Out, one, two, three."

"I'm scared," whispered the boy.

"Me too," whispered Alex. "But look. If we breathe, it gets smaller. It's a sort of magic that's only ours. Stop. Breathe. I am safe."

The boy breathed. It was wobbly. It was only a little bit like breathing. But after a moment, he was just crying, and not crying and screaming.

Across the castle, Felix knelt by the flower girls, who were still in a heap. He did not shout. He whispered, "I'll tell you a secret. I'm scared too. So what do you say to yourself, when you're scared?"

One flower girl sniffed. "Nothing."

"Would you like a thing to say?"

She nodded.

"I can be scared and brave at the same time," whispered Felix.

The flower girl said it, in a very small voice. Her sister said it. Their friend said it. It was the first time anybody in the castle had said anything which was not a cry.

Ollie wiped his nose. "I can do hard things," he said, and he looked cross at himself for sounding wobbly. Kenji said it as well, and put an arm round him.

Alex and Felix moved round the castle in opposite directions, one whisper at a time. They did not shout. They did not need to. The whispers went from child to child, like a spark going along a string.

The castle slowed. It did not stop.

Part Eleven. The Brave Thing

At the very top of the castle, in the highest turret, there was a gap in the wall where the plastic had come unstitched. Through it, we could see the clouds. And leaning out of the gap, with her arms wrapped round the flagpole, was the smallest child in the castle.

She was shaking so hard that the flag shook with her. She would not let go. She was not crying any more; she was too scared. She was only holding on and staring at the clouds.

"I'll go," said Alex.

"It's too wobbly," said Felix. "The wall is too thin."

Nobody could get there without making the wall tear.

Willow got up from her cushion.

Willow does not like heights. She does not like wind. She does not like crowds or noise, and she had been in all three since breakfast. But she looked at the little girl, and she looked at the long, thin edge of the wall where the plastic had come unstitched, and she stepped up onto it. She walked all the way along it, one paw at a time, with her tail up like a flag. The wind pulled her fur. The clouds were below her. She did not look down.

She reached the little girl. She sat. She leaned against the girl's side, and she purred.

It was the loudest purr we have ever heard, and it was the only sound in the turret. The girl's arms came loose from the flagpole. She put one hand on the cat. Then the other. Then she was holding Willow, with her face in her fur, and she was breathing, slowly, in and out.

We held our breath. Nobody moved.

And the castle stopped rising.

It hung there in the sky, quite still, above the clouds, with the sun on its stars, and a bird came and sat on a turret and looked at us.

Part Twelve. The Quiet

It was the quietest we have ever been.

The wind had dropped. We could see the whole school underneath, small as a drawing, and a silver line which was the sea.

Nobody cried. We sat down together on the floor of the castle, thirty-one children and a cat, holding hands in a ring, breathing together.

"Is anyone coming to get us?" whispered the boy in the sheep costume.

"They'll find a way," said Felix.

"How do you know?"

"Because," said Alex, "they always do. And because we're not alone."

Dot, who had been silent for a long time, looked round the ring. She was the smallest after the girl by the flagpole. She had her arms wrapped round her knees.

"I'll say it," said Dot. "I'll say mine. But everybody else says theirs first."

So we did.

We passed it round the ring, like passing a parcel, without anyone telling us how.

Ollie said, "I am a seed. The dark is where I grow."

Felix said, "I can be scared and brave at the same time."

Kenji said, "I can do hard things."

Gideon Fox wiped his face, and sat up straight. "I can say sorry, make it right, and keep going. I did it. I said it to Mr Heston. It wasn't even hard, in the end."

Maya said, "Different is clever."

Alex said, "Stop. Breathe. I am safe."

The smallest girl, with Willow in her lap, whispered to Dot, "I know you can."

And Dot said, in her wobbly, tiny voice, "I am not alone."

We said it all together once more, very softly. Down below, nobody heard it. But something heard it, because the stars on the castle walls got brighter, one by one, like a lamp being turned up.

Part Thirteen. The Message

The castle had stopped rising, and it was staying in the sky.

"Why isn't it coming down?" said Kenji. "We're calm. We're all calm."

"The calm stopped it going up," said Maya. "But Mr Locke's spell is still snagged. It's tangled in all the other gods' magic. Calm cannot untie a knot."

Alex held the pencil tight, and thought, and then he turned to Felix.

"Who is the best in the world at knots?" said Alex.

Felix thought of green ribbons on cakes. He thought of every spoon in the dinner hall, with a little bow. "Mr Locke."

"He does tangles," said Alex. "That's his gift. He's been tying things in bows all day. He didn't know it, but he was practising."

Maya got out her pencil. "We need to tell him. But how?"

A sound came from underneath. It was a soft little tinkle, like a bicycle bell. A pair of small gold wings flicked in the sun, and Mr Hermes was hovering by the open turret, walking backwards on the air.

"Message?" said Mr Hermes.

Maya wrote a note, in her neatest handwriting. It said:

Mr Locke. The spell is tangled at the top, at the flag. You know knots better than anyone. Please untie it. We know you can. Love, Alex, Felix and Maya.

Mr Hermes read it. His eyebrows went up. "I like this one," he said. "Straight to him." He winked at Willow, tucked the note in his belt, and went down so fast that he left a streak of light.

Part Fourteen. Locke Goes Up

From the castle, we saw the whole thing, as small as a puppet show.

Mr Hermes landed in front of Mr Locke. He gave him the note. Mr Locke read it, and went very white, and sat down on a hay bale.

Mr Thorley walked over. He stood in front of Mr Locke, with the hammer hanging at his side.

"Locke," he said.

"I know," said Mr Locke. "Last time I said it was safe. It wasn't. I shan't say it this time." He swallowed. "I'm not good at heights. I'm not good at being the one who has to put it right. I'll probably get it wrong. But I'll try. And I'll tell the truth about how it's going."

Mr Thorley said nothing. He looked at Mr Locke for a very long time.

Then he held out his hand and pulled him up off the hay bale.

"Go on, then," said Mr Thorley. "I'll be here."

Mr Locke took a breath. He shut his eyes. His shoulders shrank, and feathers spread along his arms, long, grey-green, sharp. In the old stories, said Maya in a quiet voice, he had a cloak of falcon feathers that he borrowed from a goddess, and sometimes he did not need the cloak. Now he was a long-winged bird with bright green eyes, and he leaped into the air and came up towards us, rocking in the wind.

He landed on the top of the highest turret, beside Willow and the smallest girl. His claws gripped the flagpole.

He looked at us. The falcon-Locke said, in a rough, wind-whipped voice, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Let me make it right."

"I know you can," said Felix.

"I know you can," said Alex.

At the very top, around the flag, there was a mess of gold thread, tangled like a ball of wool that a cat had got into. And caught in the tangle were a dozen other threads: orange and silver, blue and white, green, each one a different god's.

Mr Locke put his beak into the knot. He began to untie it.

Part Fifteen. The Knot

It took longer than a school assembly.

Mr Locke worked on the knots with his beak and claws. One was tight as a drum. One came undone with a ping. One was so small that he had to peer at it with one eye shut, and Maya held her breath beside him.

The wind came back. The flag snapped. Once, the whole tangle slid down the flagpole, and he nearly fell.

"Go slowly," said the smallest girl suddenly, from the next turret.

"That's right," said Mr Locke, between his teeth. "Slowly. Slowly."

The last knot was the biggest. It had blue and white in it. It had thunder in it. Locke pulled, and the thread shot out of his beak with a crack like a branch.

Down below, in the field, Mr Thorley was holding his hat. The crack went through the air, and Mr Thorley's whole body jumped. There was a flat, small BOOM from his chest. The castle gave a shudder.

Everyone held their breath.

"Slow," said Mr Shah, softly, to Mr Thorley, from the ground. "In for four, out for four."

Mr Thorley breathed. In the castle, thirty-one children and a cat breathed with him, in time.

The tangle was gone. Gold thread floated away on the wind like a trail of dandelion seeds. And the stars on the castle walls went out, one by one, as gently as stars at dawn.

The castle gave a long, happy sigh.

It began to sink.

Part Sixteen. Down

Down we went, past the cloud, past the hill, past the roof of the school, with a feeling like a lift going down. The ground came up to meet us. It was not fast. The faces got bigger, and the grass got closer.

At last, the castle touched down in the middle of the field with a soft flump.

For a long moment, nobody moved.

Then Mr Harris, who had been holding his breath since two o'clock, said, "Everyone out. Gently."

We stepped out onto the grass. The castle gave a long, sad pffff and slowly folded into a puddle of purple plastic. Every grown-up in the school ran over at once, all at once, to hug their children. Mrs Tibbs hugged us both. Marion clicked her clicker thirty-one times and let out a very long sigh.

The smallest girl would not let go of Willow until her mum came, and then she said "Thank you" to the cat, very seriously, and the cat blinked.

In the middle of it all, a tired man in a green jumper sat on the grass with his knees up. He had changed back from a falcon, and his hair was full of feathers. Mr Thorley stood in front of him.

"Locke," said Mr Thorley.

Mr Locke looked up. His green eyes were wet. "I'm sorry," he said. "I got it wrong again."

"You said sorry," said Mr Thorley. "You meant it. And you didn't run away. That's what matters. Everyone gets it wrong sometimes, brother."

He put down his hammer and put both arms round Mr Locke.

"Even you?" said Mr Locke, into his shoulder.

"I once ate a whole ox," said Mr Thorley, "and dressed as a bride. I know a great deal about getting it wrong."

Everyone laughed, even Mr Locke, who was laughing and crying at the same time. Ollie said, "Can we go again?" and every single adult said "NO."

Part Seventeen. More Powerful

When the field was tidy, the gods gathered by the gate, and Mr Hermes stepped forward, with his hands behind his back.

"We've been alive a very long time," he said. "Thunder, wings, hammers, music, we have all those, and they all have their jobs. Today they were no use at all, because the thing that was needed was something we couldn't do from the ground. It needed someone small and calm and on the inside."

Mr Shah said, "It needed whispering."

Mr Locke said, in a husky voice, "It needed someone to say they were sorry, and then stay."

Mr Thorley looked at all of us. He cleared his throat. It rumbled like a distant lorry. He said:

"YOU ARE ALL MORE POWERFUL THAN WE ARE."

Alex said, "Even more than Thor?"

"Even more than Thor," said Mr Thorley, "on a good day."

Then he looked at us, and his big face went soft and shy, and he said, "Today, you were."

Dot put up her hand. She was holding a flower from Miss Persey, and a sticker from Mr Hot, and she had a smudge of fish pie on her chin.

"Does that mean," said Dot, "that we can be like gods?"

Mr Hermes looked at all of us. He smiled the biggest smile we had ever seen.

"Today," he said, "you were."

Part Eighteen. The Feather

The sun went down, and the fair went quiet. The stalls were folded. The boat-bus's engine started with a sound like seven men arguing about a boat. Mr Ebbie leaned out of the window and knocked on the air.

"GOODBYE!" he shouted. "WE'LL BE BACK FOR LUNCH ON TUESDAY! KNOCK LOUDER NEXT TIME!"

The boat-bus rolled round the corner of the school to put itself to bed. Everyone else went home in the golden light, in twos and threes, humming.

We sat on the wall by the gate, the six of us and a cat. Maya looked at her notebook, where every one of the twelve had a small tick beside it.

"I think that was all of them," said Maya.

"Almost," said Alex.

Maya looked up. "Why almost?"

"I noticed something," said Alex. "On the banner."

We turned round.

On the top of the bedsheet, above the words WELCOME TO THE SUMMER FAIR, sat an owl. It was the biggest owl we had ever seen. Its eyes were grey and round, and it was looking at us, very steadily, like somebody reading.

It blinked, one eye and then the other. It dipped its head. Then it opened its wings and glided down in a silent circle and dropped a single grey feather into Maya's notebook.

The feather landed on the page, just under the number twelve. Where it touched the paper, neat grey writing appeared by itself, as if it were being written.

It said: 13. Ask me anything.

The owl hooted once and flew away into the dusk.

Nobody said anything. Willow lifted her head. Dot said, "It knew our names."

Maya had gone completely still. She slowly closed the notebook, with the feather inside.

And at exactly the same time, they said, "Monday."

The End.