And he missed Bertram.
And he was afraid for Odd.
There was so much fear and pain.
The girl begged him to help, but what could he do? The creature that had killed Bertram was not something that could be beaten. Piglet knew that.
Then the girl had asked him to protect Mirabelle. And he thought about Mirabelle, and how much her voice meant to him. How much having her near meant to him. And he thought about the creature and how it wanted to hurt her. How it wanted to hurt all of them.
And for the first time in his life Piglet knew rage.
And now here he is, facing the creature, facing the people from the village.
He hears the creature scream. He likes the sound because he hears fear in it. He sees the people look at him, the terror in their eyes, and he pities them. Even the ones who fire their weapons at him.
And Piglet explodes.
He explodes into dozens of shining golden lights, and each light flies through the night air and finds its mark.
Each light finds a person.
Each light is Piglet.
And as each light enters a person, they know Piglet and he knows them.
He knows Mr and Mrs Smith. Knows how Mr Smith goes to bed late each night and weeps in front of the fire over his two sons because the tears always come at night and he is afraid of his wife seeing them. Mr Smith wants to be strong for her. He wants to protect her. But Piglet knows Mrs Smith now too. He knows how much she loves her husband, and how seeing his tears won’t hurt her but will help her in some way, because then they can share the pain, carry the burden together.
Piglet knows Alfie Parkin too. Knows how freakish and ugly Alfie feels. How every week Alfie goes into the bakery to buy a pastry from Amy Nicholson because he likes Amy and thinks she has a nice smile. He knows too how ashamed Alfie feels when he leaves the bakery, because even though talking with Amy makes him feel lighter, he always remembers who he is when he leaves, how useless he feels, how ugly. And he goes home and throws another pastry in the bin.
And Piglet knows Amy too. He knows that she likes Alfie Parkin. She likes Alfie Parkin a lot. But Alfie will only chat to her for a few moments, and then it is as if a cloud passes over his face, and he remembers something terrible. Then Alfie leaves the shop. And Amy feels that there is something between them, an unbridgeable chasm that will always be there, and she doesn’t know how to cross it.
And Piglet knows Mr Teasdale and how he likes his collection of clocks and how his cat means the world to him, and how he is afraid and nervous all the time, and how he hides this by pretending to be constantly angry. He knows Constable Griggs and how much his job and honour mean to him. He knows the Bennetts and the Carswells . . . He knows so many of them.
He knows the Fletchers now too. He knows of the terrible oppressive weight of the loss of James and how it has come between them, how they can’t talk about it. He knows that Freddie desperately wants to reach out to his father, but doesn’t know how. He knows that Freddie’s father is afraid of expressing love for his one remaining son because he has already lost one, and to tell another he loves him would be to risk too much, so Mr Fletcher has gathered around him a hard carapace to protect himself, and yet that carapace also hurts. He knows how much Mr Fletcher’s wife wants to reach her husband too, but for all her gifts she doesn’t know how.
But Piglet watches them now. Because now they know each other, and he sees Freddie move towards his father. His father is crying, and Freddie hugs his father, and very soon the whole Fletcher family is embracing, and they weep with each other, and Piglet weeps with them, but his weeping is tinged with joy.
This is what Piglet sees as he passes through the minds of the people of Rookhaven.
And as they pass through his.
And as their minds touch they all know each other. They know each other’s frailties, their weaknesses, their fears, and in this way they are all revealed to each other. And the hatred the Malice has sown in all their hearts melts away.
Piglet leaves them now. But he carries a part of each of them with him. He knows each part is a gift.
And the people of the village are themselves again.
And thanks to Piglet they are free.
Mirabelle
Mirabelle watched as the dozens of golden lights into which Piglet had transformed left their hosts and floated up into the air to form a fine golden mist, pulsing with splashes of rainbow colour. The mist then glided back in through the front door of the house to return to Piglet’s room. She felt relief flood through her, knowing that Piglet was safe.
Most of the people had collapsed to their knees. She saw the Fletchers holding each other, saw the dazed looks on everyone’s faces. Some people were crying.
The Malice screamed at them.
‘Get up! Get up, you fools!’
But no one was listening to it. Some people staggered up and helped their friends. Not one of them paid it any heed.
Odd nudged Enoch. ‘Piglet is dangerous, eh?’
Surprisingly, Enoch allowed himself a ghost of a smile.
‘It worked,’ gasped Jem, running up to Mirabelle.
‘How did you know?’ asked Mirabelle.
Jem shook her head. ‘I didn’t. It was a guess. I knew what he could do. Tom told me, and
