The Quest of the Warrior Sheep Read online

  • ONE OXFORD. HUGE. WHITE WOOL. BROWN FACE AND LEGS

  • ONE LINCOLN LONGWOOL. BIG. LONG, CURLY FLEECE

  • ONE JACOB. DAINTY. WHITE WITH BLACK SPOTS. CUTE HORNS

  • ONE WELSH BALWEN. SKINNY.

  BROWN WITH WHITE FACE AND FEET AND SMALL HORNS.

  SMALL REWARD (GRAN’S LIFE SAVINGS) FOR INFORMATION

  LEADING TO SAFE RETURN.

  CONTACT EPPINGHAM FARM.

  He wasn’t sure that he should have put in the bit about Life Savings without asking first but Gran was pleased and perked up again.

  ‘That’s a good idea,’ she said. ‘I’d better find out how much I’ve got and have it ready. Now where’s my laptop?’

  ‘You left it in the barn playing music to the hens,’ Tod reminded her.

  ‘Did I? Never mind. I’ll phone customer services. What’s my memorable word, can you remember?’

  ‘Something to do with feet, I think,’ said Tod.

  ‘Ah yes,’ said Gran. ‘Socks. That’s it.’

  She found the number for Boyd’s Bank and tapped it into the phone.

  ‘Would you like your tea first?’ Tod gave the teabags a stir.

  Gran glanced at the mug. ‘Not yet, dear. Give them another minute or two.’

  Her call was answered, she repeated her memorable word and listened for a few minutes. Then Tod saw her tremble and she had to sit down.

  ‘You must have the wrong account,’ she said into the phone. ‘Ida J. White. I haven’t taken out any money since Christmas . . . I see – well no, I don’t see, actually, but . . . Yes. Yes, I will. Thank you . . .’

  ‘What’s wrong, Gran?’

  ‘It’s my money, dear,’ she said. ‘Apparently I did have six hundred and eighty two pounds. Then yesterday, every last penny was transferred to another account.’

  ‘Why’s that so bad?’

  ‘Because I haven’t got another account,’ said Gran. ‘And now it seems I haven’t got any money either.’

  5

  Aries Calling

  Gran and Tod were too shocked to think of anything but the missing money. They didn’t hear the yellow sports car return or see the bobbing lights as the men with head torches crawled along the lane beside the sheep’s paddock, fingertip-searching for their lost mobile phone.

  The little beams of light bounced up and down and for the second time that night they were mistaken for aliens’ eyes. Tony Catchpole was driving his tractor home from the Friendly Ferret pub. Perched beside him was Organic TV’s Nisha Patel, clutching a daffodil that Tony had plucked for her from the roadside.

  They’d had a very pleasant dinner. Tony had apologised again and again for the sludge, then knocked his beer over, spilling some into Nisha’s lap. He had gone redder than ever. Nisha had laughed and said it didn’t matter. She was still smiling now. She’d never been taken out for the evening on a tractor before. Then suddenly it lurched and stopped.

  ‘D’you see that?’ asked Tony.

  Nisha peered eagerly into the darkness and saw . . . darkness.

  ‘Dancing lights,’ breathed Tony. ‘They’ve gone now.’

  Tony was torn. He would have charged off after the lights but he could hardly ask Nisha to come with him. Not in her high-heeled shoes and not after the sludge and the beer. She was, he thought, as beautiful as any UFO.

  ‘I didn’t see anything,’ said Nisha, ‘and I ought to be getting back to London now.’

  ‘Yes, of course, I’ll drive you to the launch pad – I mean the railway station,’ babbled Tony, and he drove on, putting thoughts of aliens with glowing eyes out of his mind.

  A few seconds later, a yellow car shot across the road in front of him and disappeared into the night.

  There was an icy atmosphere in the car. Neil was driving too fast and tapping numbers into his mobile phone at the same time.

  ‘You shouldn’t be doing that,’ said Luke, hanging on to his seat. ‘Not while you’re driving. Who are you calling?’

  ‘My poor old mum, of course.’

  There was no reply and Neil angrily threw down his phone.

  ‘Still in the bath?’ enquired Luke.

  ‘Bath? Oh yeah. Still in the bath,’ said Neil tersely.

  ‘She’ll be so wrinkly by now,’ observed Luke. He became thoughtful, then, after a few seconds, grabbed Neil’s arm, causing a near miss with a signpost.

  ‘Hey!’ he cried. ‘Are we stupid or what? Why don’t we try ringing my phone? If anyone’s found it, they’ll answer.’

  The car screeched to a halt.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Neil. ‘And if it’s that kid and the bossy old fossil with the mop, well, we know where they live, don’t we . . .?’

  There was an edge to his voice that Luke didn’t like.

  Neil snatched up his phone. ‘Remind me of the number,’ he said sharply.

  *

  Oxo had felt nothing like it since the day he’d tried to eat an electric fence. His teeth were vibrating.

  The Warriors had finally chomped their fill of cauliflower and were heading across the field back to the road. Oxo was carrying the Baaton in his mouth. But after only a few steps, it had started making a noise and now his whole head was jangling.

  ‘Don’t swallow it!’ cried Wills, rushing to Oxo’s side. ‘Spit it out!’

  Spitting things out didn’t come naturally to Oxo and for a few more seconds he stood there with his teeth rattling and his eyes rolling, unable to move. Finally, he coughed and spat and the Baaton landed stickily on the grass. Oxo backed away rapidly and so did all the others. The Baaton lay there, vibrating and making a loud noise, its little blue square suddenly bright.

  To Wills, the noise sounded like the first few bars of Farmageddon, the recent hit by Chickenslayer. Ida liked Chickenslayer and played them loud in the farmhouse kitchen when she was doing the ironing. If, after all, Wills thought, they were listening to a ring tone on a mobile phone, he might be able to switch it to answer. He put out his small hoof but Sal shoved him aside.

  ‘Aries is calling!’ she cried. ‘Don’t interrupt.’ Wills backed away reluctantly and joined the rest in staring at the vibrating, glowing, noisy Baaton.

  Inside the yellow car, Neil peered at the display panel on his own phone. He thrust it in front of Luke.

  ‘That’s definitely your number, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, it’s ringing but there’s nobody answering. Who else but the old fossil and the kid could have found it?’ He began to chew his fingernails. ‘You don’t reckon they’ve already taken it to the police, do you?’ He chewed harder. ‘Or what if they’ve sussed what’s on it and are planning to blackmail us two and . . .’ He stopped in mid-sentence and corrected himself. ‘Us two and my poor old mum.’

  Luke didn’t think anyone would be heartless enough to blackmail an old lady with bad feet.

  ‘We’ve got to get back to London,’ said Neil, switching his phone off. He slammed the car into gear and drove off. Fast.

  *

  At the edge of the field, the Baaton fell silent. Links, who had soon got over his fright, carried on nodding to the music even after it had stopped.

  ‘Cool . . .’ he said, his long curls flopping rhythmically against his eyes. ‘The Golden Horn Dude got some bangin’ jams, innit . . .’

  ‘Not jams!’ cried Sal, who didn’t know what jams were. ‘Lord Aries was begging us to hurry!’

  She snaffled up the Baaton and charged into the night. And into a painfully thick hawthorn hedge. The other Warriors, except Wills, piled up behind her.

  ‘Is this the North already?’ asked Jaycey at the rear, through a mouthful of Links’ hindquarters.

  ‘Uh, no,’ said Wills, still standing a little away. ‘But there’s something here that might help us.’ The moon had come from behind a cloud and lit up the wording on the side of a large lorry parked in the field.

  ‘Eppingham Veg,’ he read aloud. ‘Feeding London.’ He did a quick calculation in hi
s head. ‘London’s north of here,’ he explained. ‘Not nearly far enough north but this could save us a day’s walking.’

  He was trampled in the rush. The back of the lorry was open and its ramp had been left down. The sheep scrambled up. Once inside, they began burrowing their way into a pile of cabbages until they were hidden from sight.

  ‘Yummy . . . pudding time,’ chomped Oxo.

  Sal began humming verse 222 of the Songs of the Fleece. It didn’t exactly blend with the rap Links was singing but neither minded. Jaycey checked her hoof paint and wondered if London sheep would think her pretty. Wills began to plan what they would do once they got to the big city.

  Nisha Patel was already on her way back to London. She dozed in her train, daffodil in hand, smiling about the sludge and the beer and wondering if there really were such things as UFOs.

  Luke’s journey to the capital wasn’t as comfortable as Nisha’s. Neil was driving too fast as usual. Luke hung on to the edge of his seat, hoping that Neil’s poor old mum had got out of her bath. If not, she would be like a prune by now.

  *

  And in the farmhouse kitchen, Gran had drunk her cup of strong tea and got over the shock of her missing money.

  ‘It’s no good trying to deal with this on the phone,’ she declared. ‘We must go to London and have it out face to face with Boyd’s Bank.’ She turned to Tod as if launching a battle campaign.

  ‘Oil the trikes, dear. We leave at dawn.’

  6

  Dogs Must Be Carried

  The Warriors hadn’t slept much, despite Sal droning out another fifty verses of the Songs of the Fleece. Links ignored her and composed a rap about vegetables:

  ‘Now we’s in a lorry and we’s got the power,

  Cos, man, we is like, full of sweet cauliflower . . .’

  Then at dawn, the ramp had been slammed shut and they’d been thrown from side to side as the lorry travelled fast for some time. They’d bumped painfully into the sides of the vehicle and each other, and cabbages had bounced off their bodies and heads.

  Now the lorry had slowed down again, stopping and starting as it crawled along the road. Cracks of bright daylight were showing around the edges of the side shutters. Traffic noise surrounded them. Wills judged that they had reached London. Once the back of the lorry was opened again, they would be clearly visible because, thanks to Oxo, there weren’t many cabbages left. They must be ready to run.

  Wills’ knowledge of London wasn’t great, but he’d heard Tod and Ida talk about a thing called The Tube and another thing called The Eye. Apparently, The Eye went round in a circle and could see everything. And The Tube went underground and squeezed millions of humans through itself.

  The most famous thing about The Tube was its Map, and Wills knew the Warriors needed a map to find their way north. Turning right at the sunset worked only once a day. He tried to explain to the others.

  ‘When we get out,’ he said, ‘we’re looking for a sign.’

  ‘Aries will guide us,’ said Sal confidently.

  ‘Not if he’s ruckin’ with the Lambad dude,’ pointed out Links. ‘The Eppingham Posse gotta be streety on its own, innit.’

  ‘What’s the grazing like in London?’ asked Oxo anxiously. ‘Is there any?’

  ‘Will the shops be open?’ wondered Jaycey. ‘Can we buy a handbag for the Baaton?’

  ‘Don’t be silly, dear.’ said Sal. ‘Sheep don’t have any money.’

  ‘No,’ said Oxo, ‘we baater.’ He began to chortle. ‘Get it? Baa-ter. Baa-ter.’

  ‘The sign we’re looking for,’ said Wills firmly, ‘is a big red circle with a blue line across it. That means The Tube. With its famous Map. Have we all got that?’

  The lorry swung right and then stopped. The traffic noise had faded. The engine went quiet.

  ‘I think we’re here,’ whispered Wills. He picked up the Baaton. ‘Geck reggy.’

  ‘If we had a handbag,’ said Jaycey, with the slightest hint of a sulk, ‘we wouldn’t have to speak with our mouth full.’

  Then there was a scraping of bolts and the ramp crashed down.

  ‘Mump!’ cried Wills.

  And he jumped from the lorry and ran. The other Warriors followed, leaping over and past a shocked driver. A couple of lonely cabbages bounced out behind them.

  The sheep were in a market. Gorgeous vegetables and fruit and flowers were piled high on every side.

  ‘Breakfast?’ suggested Oxo hopefully, but Links butted him hard to keep him moving.

  ‘Run, man,’ he ordered, ‘or we’s all Sunday lunch.’

  But the humans who worked in the market didn’t seem interested in them.

  ‘Clear off, you scruffy woolbags!’ they shouted.

  Jaycey, who was used to being ahhed over, was really miffed.

  ‘It’s because I haven’t got a handbag,’ she said. ‘Everyone else has got one, look.’

  It was true enough. They were out in the street now and each member of the human flock marching past them was carrying a bag of some kind or other.

  Suddenly, the traffic stopped. There was a highpitched peeping noise and a green light, shaped like a walking man, flashed on a post. The human flock streamed across the road towards a sign with a red circle and a blue line.

  ‘The Tube!’ cried Wills, dropping the Baaton in his excitement. ‘They’re going down The Tube.’ He grabbed the Baaton between his teeth again. ‘Mome om!’ The green man turned red while they were crossing and the waiting cars hooted impatiently. Oxo wanted to go head to head with them but, once again, Links butted him onwards.

  ‘Save it for the Lambad dude,’ he advised.

  The entrance to The Tube was like a great shed. The human flock was now being sucked through it and down into a distant cavern.

  The Rare Breeds struggled to stop themselves being carried along too, Sal holding the Baaton while Wills searched for The Map. At last he found it, but it wasn’t at all what he’d been expecting; just a vast tangle of different coloured lines, with no mention of the North. Then he read a name he recognised. A name he’d heard in the farmhouse kitchen.

  ‘King’s Cross!’ he shouted.

  ‘So’m I,’ replied Oxo, as humans continually bumped into him.

  ‘Go with the flow,’ directed Wills. And the Warriors allowed themselves to be swept along. Unfortunately, they soon interrupted the flow as there was a line of barriers right across the shed and they didn’t have tickets to get through them.

  ‘Use the luggage gate,’ shouted the impatient commuters piling up behind. So the sheep struggled to one side. The man at the luggage gate opened it and nodded them through.

  ‘Ramming them in this morning,’ he said to his colleague. ‘Ramming them in . . . Get it?’

  The human flock marched on, sweeping the Warriors along with it again.

  ‘Ohmygrass!’ Jaycey’s legs turned to jelly and she wobbled and almost fainted. For real this time. Ahead of them were rows of steps. Moving steps. Some were coming up, coughing humans out at the top, and some were going down, carrying humans away to . . . she couldn’t see where. The Warriors stood trembling with fear.

  ‘Isn’t there another way, dear?’ asked Sal.

  Wills didn’t know. He saw a small sign at the top of the moving staircases.

  He read it aloud, then wished he hadn’t.

  DOGS MUST BE CARRIED ON THE ESCALATOR.

  ‘Ohmygrass!’ Jaycey’s legs finally gave way under her.

  The last thing a sheep wants to carry is a dog. But looking around, Wills saw no dogs at all. Nobody was carrying one.

  ‘I think we can ignore the dogs.’ he said. ‘But we have to go down.’

  ‘Onwards then,’ said Oxo bravely, and he galloped towards the nearest downward-moving staircase.

  ‘Charge . . .!’

  His front hooves scrabbled frantically on the metal step as they were carried away, leaving his back legs at the top. And those back legs, when they did follow, came too fast and he turned
a spectacular somersault before tumbling down the stairs. Humans standing below looked up, saw a bouncing sheep and ran, taking the last few steps three at a time. Oxo fetched up in a heap at the bottom. He grinned dazedly at the other Warriors, gathered anxiously at the top.

  ‘Easy,’ he called.

  The others copied the humans instead, stepping cautiously on to the stairs and standing still for the downward journey.

  ‘Well, if you want to do it the boring way,’ said Oxo when they joined him. ‘Where now?’

  There were tunnels in all directions, leading away from the cavern they now found themselves in. They could hear deep rumblings and feel gusts of hot air.

  ‘Is that you, Sal?’ enquired Oxo. ‘Too many cabbages?’

  But Sal knew it wasn’t her digestion. The wind grew hotter, the rumblings louder. She dropped the Baaton.

  ‘Lambad,’ she breathed fearfully. ‘Lambad the Bad must be here . . .’

  ‘Actually,’ said Wills, studying the sign above one of the tunnels, ‘I think this is the Victoria Line. And that’s what we want.’

  He led the way into the tunnel. They trotted quickly through and emerged on to a narrow platform with a dark hole at either end. This, Wills thought, with a mixture of fear and excitement, must be The Tube itself. A loud voice boomed somewhere above them.

  ‘Mind the gap!’ it commanded. ‘Mind the gap!’

  Jaycey, who was now carrying the Baaton, jumped.

  ‘Ohmymaaaa!’ she gurgled.

  ‘Spit it out!’ said Wills hastily.

  She did and all the others gathered protectively around it.

  ‘You need some help?’

  The voice was human, though it sounded strange to the sheep’s ears, and the hand placed on Jaycey’s neck was gentle.

  ‘Steady, gal,’ said the voice reassuringly. ‘Say, how cute is this, Billie-Jo? Sheep with a mobile phone.’

  Jaycey panicked and tried to mouth the Baaton up again but she was clumsy in her haste and it slid across the platform.

  The female human called Billie-Jo stooped quickly and picked it up before it fell over the edge.

  ‘You’ve got a problem with that, I think,’ she said kindly to Jaycey. ‘Give me the map, honey.’