Wave Magic Extract from chapter 4

After heading to the harbour to find Joe the children made their way back to the woods behind Aunt Alice’s house, searching all the while for the posts marking the entrance to the cove. Freddie was the first to spot it. Here were the silvery trees and the bluebells, just as they were before. They hurried past them and out to the cove, which was glowing with a magical, welcoming light.

They clambered down towards the giant rocks. Close-up they made the children feel like dwarves. The sun was so intense that it didn’t take long for the children’s cheeks and noses to develop a pinkish glow.

‘Phew it’s hot!’ said Mabel, slumping on a rock and pulling off her boots and stockings.

‘Let’s go and paddle in the sea,’ suggested Rose, ‘that will cool us off’. Casting off their boots and stockings as Mabel had done, the other children made their way gingerly over the smaller stones close to the shore. The algae that gave the stones their unusual colour was cool and slippery underfoot. Soon a thin strip of brown sand was all that was between them and the gentle turquoise waves which rippled towards the beach. The water was pleasantly warm, so they waded in to their knees, the girls hoisting up their dresses to protect them from the waves.

They had been paddling in the sea for a short while when all of a sudden, George, (who showing off had waded further than the others) cried out ‘Joe, Rosie, EVERYONE! I’ve found some treasure!’

They turned towards his voice and saw George holding something above his head, something long and narrow and covered in seaweed. He splashed over to them and laid the object on the sand. Then George crouched down and began to tear away rubbery pieces of seaweed that were entwined around it. This revealed a long bronze coloured stick, covered in feint marks as though it had been engraved. At the end of the staff was a sort of three-pronged fork with spikes ending in points like tiny arrowheads.

‘What could it be?’ asked Freddie, ‘a fisherman’s tool?’ ‘It doesn’t look like any fisherman’s tool I’ve ever seen,’ Joe replied firmly, shaking his head. ‘Whatever it is I think it’s beautiful,’ said George, reaching down, and raising the strange stick high in front of him like a soldier brandishing a sword. As he did this, it caught the sun and began to shine with a blinding light that encircled them, getting brighter and brighter until they had to cover their eyes.