about cows being harmless, suddenly she didn’t believe a word of it. And what had hit her ear? ‘Donald!’
The creature was lowering its massive head. It was concentrating every inch of its enormous being on something behind the camellias. It was pacing.
‘Sh…Shanni…’It was a terrified whisper, and to the creature it seemed like a starter’s gun. The creature heaved itself forward.
‘Donald!’ she screamed, and she launched herself blindly out of the darkness, lashing out at the shape in front of her.
Afterwards she couldn’t believe she’d done it. The creature was launching itself at the sound of Donald’s quavering voice. Shanni hit it side on, walloping into it with such force that it was shifted off course.
‘Get inside,’ she screamed. ‘Run. Donald, run.’
‘Pierce!’ the child screamed. ‘Pierce.’
Good call, she thought, but she wasn’t actually thinking all that clearly.
The creature was swinging aside, snorting, rearing back…
Dear God…
What did bullfighters do?
They ran. If they had any sense, they ran.
But the creature had a one-track mind. It was swinging back to face Donald again.
Donald was trying to scramble onto the veranda, but the veranda was almost three feet above the garden and the steps were too far away. He’d never pull himself up.
It was moving again. ‘No!’ She launched herself forward again, screaming, smashing her fist into the side of the creature’s head.
It flung round so fast she couldn’t move to avoid it.
‘Pierce!’ Donald screamed again.
It had horns. She grabbed a horn and clung. Stupidly. Crazily.
It swung so wildly she let go, tossed aside, landing in a limp heap four feet from the creature’s head.
It backed to see what was attacking it, finally deflected from Donald.
She rolled sideways, trying to find her feet.
It was moving. It was moving…
‘No!’ She pushed herself fiercely sideways, rolling into the undergrowth. Oh, God…
A horn hit her shoulder with a sickening thud. She felt a crash and a fierce jabbing pain but she kept rolling. ‘No!’
But suddenly there was another player.
‘Get. Get, get, get.’ It was a man’s fierce shout. Pierce. He was launching himself down from the veranda, yelling at the top of his lungs. His yells were filling the night.
She was flinching for the next impact, but it didn’t come.
‘Get, get, get!’
She rolled again, deeper into shadow, and dared to look out. The creature was staring in at her, hitting the ground with its hoof, gathering momentum for another rush. But Pierce was beside it, silhouetted against the moon, swinging something that looked like a rifle.
Shoot it, she thought, but she was too dazed to think more.
‘Move, move, move!’ Pierce’s yells could have woken the dead. He was powering into the creature’s path, putting himself between Shanni and everything else, lashing out like his rifle was a scythe.
The creature swung to face him.
‘Get, get, get!’ Pierce was giving it no time to think. He was right in its face, swinging his weapon, smashing forward. He was yelling, hitting, pushing…
The creature backed. Backed some more.
Pierce was following it, right on top of it, giving it no quarter.
Back. Back out of the garden. Back…
The creature turned, confused, beaten, lumbering towards the gate. And as it did Shanni saw…a dangly bit underneath.
As if she’d needed confirmation.
It was through the gate now. The great wooden gate swung closed with a crash. The rifle was tossed aside.
‘Donald, are you okay? Donald…’ Pierce was striding through the garden, hauling himself up on the veranda, tugging Donald into his arms. ‘What the hell…?’
‘Shanni,’ Donald quavered.
‘Are you okay?’ She could see their shapes on the veranda, huddled together.
‘Yes.’ It was a whisper. ‘It hit Shanni. She’s down there.’
‘Shanni?’ He put Donald away at arm’s length. ‘Where?’
‘It was trying to hit her. I…I think it did.’
‘Stay there, mate. Don’t move.’ He was jumping down from the veranda, crashing through the undergrowth, searching in the direction the bull had been aiming for. ‘Shanni. Shanni, where are you? Shanni…’ His voice cracked in desperation.
She had to speak. ‘I’m here,’ she managed, but she had to try again because her voice didn’t quite work. ‘H… here.’
Then, as he swore and swore again, as he dived beneath the undergrowth, as he knelt beside her and swore even more, as he put his hand on her shoulder and felt the warm stickiness of blood and stopped swearing-stopped even breathing-she asked the question she most wanted to know.
‘Why don’t you use test tubes?’
They were all in the kitchen. Everyone. Wendy was sitting in the rocker by the fire, cradling Bessy. Donald was standing about as close to Wendy as he could get. Abby was at Donald’s feet, hugging his legs. Bryce had decreed everyone needed cocoa and was making it. Very slowly. His hands were shaking.
Shanni was doing a lot of shaking herself.
Pierce had ripped her windcheater even more than the bull had. He’d exposed a long, shallow graze that ran from her underarm almost to her throat. He had a bowl of soapy water and he was washing it and swearing under his breath.
‘Not in front of the children,’ she whispered.
‘I locked that gate,’ he muttered, towelling her shoulder with care. ‘It was padlocked. I’m not a fool. The chain’s been cut.’
‘Clever bull.’
‘The bull’s sausages,’ he told her. Then he shook his head. ‘No. I don’t know what’s going on, but Clyde’s normally even sookier than the cows he services. There’s things going on I don’t understand.’ He was inspecting her wound, his face grim. ‘I don’t think this needs stitching, but maybe we need to get you checked out.’
‘You’re thinking of leaving the kids while we go to the nearest hospital?’
‘If we need to…’
‘We don’t need.’
‘But-’
‘Just put a bandage on it,’ she said. ‘Bandages will make me better.’ She looked down into Abby’s huge eyes. ‘Don’t bandages make things better?’
‘And jelly beans,’ Abby said. ‘There’s bandages in the bathroom.’ She hugged Donald’s legs a bit more and then rose stoutly to her feet, almost offering herself as personal sacrifice. ‘I’ll get them. But I don’t know about jelly beans.’
It was a big deal for Abby, going through the house by herself, Shanni thought. These kids…
They were the bravest kids. She could see exactly why Pierce didn’t want them separated.
‘Do we have jelly beans?’ she demanded.
‘No,’ Pierce said ruefully. ‘Omission on my part.’
‘No jelly beans?’ She was watching Donald. ‘What sort of a dad is this who doesn’t supply jelly beans?’
‘He’s okay,’ Donald said diffidently.
‘Yes, but he needs help.’ She swallowed. Her shoulder was, in truth, really painful, but this was no time for
