2

Thump! A loud noise at Billy’s window had him sitting bolt upright, his eyes staring and heart pounding. It was the dead of the night and he could see the silhouette of a figure crouched outside on his windowsill! It moved across the curtains, casting shadows on his bedroom wall. Billy rubbed at his sleep-filled eyes, and when he looked back the figure had gone.

He sighed with relief – but now the shadows in his room deepened and stretched, and the walls appeared to close in around him. He could hear a soft, menacing hissing, as if a huge python was close by. The air turned cold and Billy’s heart began to pound. He felt his duvet move, and something clammy grabbed his ankle.

‘Get off!’ he screamed, kicking out with his other foot and striking something hard. There was a hiss of frustration and a dark shape scuttled across the floor. It disappeared into the deep shadows in the corner of the room.

‘Dad!’ Billy yelled. ‘Help!’

He turned on his bedside light, just as his dad came hurrying in.

‘What’s wrong?’ his dad asked dopily, still half-asleep.

‘Something in my room,’ panted Billy, pointing to the corner. ‘It grabbed me. Tried to pull me out of bed.’

‘Oh, Billy,’ sighed his dad. He went over to the corner, lifted a cardboard box of old toys out of the way and peered down the side of the wardrobe. ‘Do you mean a rat or something?’ he asked, grabbing a coat hanger and tentatively poking about.

‘No, bigger than that,’ said Billy.

‘There’s nothing here, Billy, nothing at all. Come and look.’

Billy climbed warily out of bed and edged towards the corner of his room. His dad was right.

‘You were having a nightmare, that’s all,’ said Dad. ‘OK?’

‘OK,’ said Billy, feeling confused and a little embarrassed for having caused such a fuss.

His mum came into the room, hair in a tangle and carrying a mug of warm cocoa. ‘There’s nothing to be frightened of, Billy,’ she said, sitting on the edge of his bed. ‘Come and drink this, it’ll calm you down.’

Billy got back into bed and took the mug.

‘What an imagination you have,’ said his mum, with a smile.

Billy nodded, none too sure. He glanced at the window. Of course there was nothing there. Had he been asleep or awake? It was hard to tell – with his mum and dad in the room everything seemed perfectly normal. But the figure on the sill had looked scarily real.

With a sigh Billy finished the drink and lay back on his pillow.

‘Feeling better now?’ asked Mum, straightening his duvet and giving him a kiss on the cheek.

Billy nodded.

‘Good. Snuggle down and get some sleep or you’ll be too tired for school in the morning.’ She turned off the light and shuffled back to bed, but Billy’s dad hovered in the doorway.

‘I’ve got something for you,’ he whispered mysteriously once she was gone, and disappeared into the spare room. Billy could hear him rummaging about in a cupboard. When he came back he was holding something in his hand. ‘This might help,’ he said with a smile of encouragement, and handed Billy something flat and round.

‘It’s a clock!’ said Billy.

‘A pocket watch,’ said Dad.

Billy held it up and turned it round, so it caught the light. The watch had a white face with large numbers covered by a shiny dome of glass. In the middle, a semi-circular window showed an enamelled night sky. The back was engraved with the picture of a sword and a bronze sun, and it looked ancient – much older than the rest of the watch. It had a small button on one side. Billy pressed it and the back popped off.

Inside it was very plain, just a cover plate with a series of screws, but the reverse of the watch’s back was as elaborately engraved as the outside, and showed the sun on a heraldic shield.

‘Wow! It’s awesome,’ said Billy, clipping the back on again. It felt smooth and good to hold, but he wasn’t sure why his dad had given it to him.

‘It’s a talisman – a sort of good-luck charm,’ said Dad. ‘Your grandad was given it when he went travelling as a young man.’

‘Given it?’ Billy asked, wondering who would give away such a wonderful thing.

‘Well, he bought it, actually,’ said Dad. ‘From a wizened old mystic selling trinkets in an eastern bazaar. He said the sword was the symbol of an ancient order of knights, and that anyone who owned it would be protected.’

‘Yeah, right. I bet he was just a con artist with a sack full of identical watches,’ said Billy with a grin.

‘That’s what I thought,’ said Dad. ‘But your grandad insisted it helped him through a very dark time.’

‘What sort of dark time?’ asked Billy, intrigued.

‘He wouldn’t say,’ said Dad, staring into space as he recalled things from a long time ago. ‘He passed the watch on to me when I was having trouble with bullies at school.’

‘I didn’t know you were bullied,’ said Billy in surprise.

‘It’s not something I like to talk about,’ said Dad. ‘But it was pretty serious stuff.’

‘Did it work – did the watch protect you?’

‘You bet,’ said Dad, with a satisfied grin on his face.

Billy was itching to know more, but just then his mum called from the next room, ‘Come on, Ted. Let Billy get some sleep. He’s got school in the morning.’

‘I’d better go!’ said Dad.

Billy didn’t know whether his dad had made the whole story up, just to make him feel better, but the watch was really cool so he put it on his bedside table and settled back under his duvet.

‘Thanks, Dad,’ he said. ‘Night.’

‘Goodnight, Billy,’ said Dad, and tousled Billy’s hair. ‘Just remember, we’re all frightened of something, but no fear is too big to overcome.’

‘Goodnight,’ mumbled Billy, as his dad turned off the light and went back to bed himself.

Billy turned on his side and closed his eyes, but try as he might he couldn’t get back to sleep. His brain was too busy thinking. If he’d dreamed up the creature in his room, how come he could still feel where he’d been grabbed? He pulled up his pyjama leg and held his foot in the glow of his night light. There was a definite reddening of the skin where he’d been gripped.

‘Knew it,’ said Billy to himself. Then a frantic barking outside had him out of bed and scurrying across to the window.

He pulled back the corner of his curtain and looked out into the night. The narrow road was lit by pale orange street lamps and appeared deserted. Across the way in Mr Taylor’s builder’s yard though, his guard dog, Janus, was kicking up a stink, barking and scratching at the gap between the tall gates.

From the corner of his eye, almost invisible in the soft shadows, Billy saw a movement. Was it the silhouette of a figure? It was difficult to make out …

Easier to see was the pale, wild-haired creature at its feet! It was larger than a child, but smaller than a full-grown man, and the sight of it made the hairs on the back of Billy’s neck stand up. It was a creature straight out of his nightmares, and of all the things that haunted his dark dreams it was these creeping, crawling things that terrified him the most.

‘That’s it! That’s what grabbed me,’ gasped Billy, his heart thumping wildly as the shapes silently disappeared into the alley that ran between the houses. The moment they had gone, Janus stopped barking.

Still jittery, Billy climbed back into bed. He didn’t know what to think. He couldn’t talk to anybody about his fears. His mates would just take the mickey. Billy being scared of the dark at his age – what a wuss! And every time he had a nightmare, his parents said it was just his imagination, or asked if he was worried about something at school. But it was none of that. What he saw was real, he was sure it was.

Billy reached out from under the covers and took Grandad’s pocket watch from his bedside table. It felt good in the palm of his hand, like a smooth, round pebble. He screwed his eyes tight shut and hoped his dad was right and that it would protect him from the terrors of the night.