William and the Giant Journey

By Vanessa J Williams

William, an 8-yr old boy, lives with his granny in a cottage in the hills. He is beginning to suspect that she is preparing him, with her Special Sandwiches and Special Mixture, for an amazing adventure. The story opens as a storm is brewing, and things start happening that are just the beginning of a marvellous series of events and a journey that will take him to the Edge of the World. ages 8+

• Language: English
• Publisher: Vanessa J Williams
• Release date: Apr 7, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476405841

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William and the Giant Journey

Vanessa J Williams

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © Vanessa J Williams 2012

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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Chapter One

The Special Sandwiches

It was going to be specially windy on the hill today, thought William, looking out of his bedroom window. It was always windy up there anyway, even when the trees in Granny’s garden were as still as stones. This morning he could see them dipping and waving as if they were under rough water.

‘Don’t forget your scarf, William!’ Called Granny from the kitchen, where she was making William’s sandwiches. She always made William’s sandwiches, even though he could easily have made them himself, a thing he often told Granny; but she wouldn’t have it.

‘A boy like you needs Special Things in his sandwiches,’ she would say, winking her little black eyes.

‘But you could tell me what to put in, Granny.’

‘Oh no, boys can’t make sandwiches like I can,’ and Granny would take down little pots and jars and sprinkle things and spread things; but William didn’t really mind because Granny’s sandwiches were always so delicious.

Sometimes they tasted like chocolate and fudge and sometimes like fresh cream cheese. And once, the most delicious of all, so delicious that William’s mouth watered whenever he thought of it, they had tasted of coconut and apricot and marzipan and - and – no, he couldn’t describe it, even to himself.

But that had been an Extra Special Sandwich because Granny wouldn’t make it again the next day. She had chuckled and shaken her head.

‘That was a Twenty-Ninth of February Sandwich. You’ll have to wait for another one like that!’

And in a way, he had been quite relieved, because he had felt so strange – sort of whizzy and poppy and fizzy, and had been quite tired out.

Granny spent a long time making her sandwich fillings. She was a tiny woman, round and smiley like the wobbly toy William used to have before, when he lived in London; and her face was wrinkled and brown from being out in the wind and sun, where she was most of the day, collecting her herbs.

She usually did her cooking at night, when William was in bed, but sometimes he crept down and then he would see her, in her massive flowery apron that reached nearly down to the floor, bending over a pot on the stove, surrounded by steam. She would look up, and her eyes would flash and twinkle and she would draw William a mug of steaming liquid from her pot that might taste of cranberries or fluffy white marshmallows.

William pulled his big brown scarf out of the cupboard and wound it round his neck four times. That still left a lot hanging down the front and he had to skip so as not to trip over it. He skipped to the kitchen where Granny had left his sandwiches and then to the front door where he had put his school books, and shouting goodbye, he looked up at the clock on the wall to see if he had enough time to go round the Long Way.

The Long Way meant that instead of walking up the hill and then following the path round by the trees and down past the pond and then across the flat bit till the path dropped down once more towards the village, he could climb the hill that loomed over one side of the flat bit and go through the boulders to the tor.

He had sometimes found fossils in the rocks up there; beautiful, delicate fossils set in lumps of stone that were whitey and greyish, and which Granny said were of sea creatures from millions of years ago when this part of the country had been under the sea.

William tried to imagine as he walked along how the rippling grass, the bowed trees, and all these rocks and sky could have been under the sea once; he tried to imagine the deep dark water pressing down and the enormous ugly fish wandering silently about. He looked into the sky and thought of Angel Fish and Bloaters and John Dory swimming above his head. But of course there wouldn’t have been any of those millions of years ago, only trilobites and ammonites.

By this time, William had reached the pond and he stood looking down at the greenish water, wondering which way to go. The wind pushed at his back and flung the scarf, which he had thrown over his shoulder for the twentieth time, across his face, nearly knocking off his glasses.

Although it wasn’t really very far now, William always had to think hard whether he had enough time to go to the tor, because when he got there, although he never meant to, he always stayed too long, and was often late for school.

But William wanted to go to his secret stream. He wanted to see if the stone was still in place that he had put there yesterday. He was trying to divert the stream at the moment, to see if it would find its own way back on course, and he was doing it slowly, one rock at a time.

As he toiled up the hill he was glad the wind was behind him, as