by Cliff McNish
She screamed and, just for a second, let go of Dad’s hand.
That second was all it took.
Immediately, the storm picked her up and yanked her through the eye-door.
The black creature lowered a shoulder to let her pass. It took a last look around the cellar. It sucked the spiders back into its mouth. The last image Rachel saw before she left this world was its huge shadow pass underneath and Dad smash down the main door with the axe, leaping through the air.
He was too late. With a final screech the cellar bricks reformed and the creature pulled the eye-door shut.
Rachel’s dad ran into the cellar, beating his hands against the wall. Pieces of falling furniture crashed against his head. He ignored the pain and heaved the axe into the wall over and over. Eventually, when he had no strength left, he let the axe drop. The only damage to the wall was a few chipped bricks.
He stared furiously at the hand which had lost Rachel’s, kicked the axe across the floor of the cellar, and wept.
3
Between
the Worlds
The moment she was sucked through the eye-door, Rachel found herself plummeting inside a vast, dark pit of emptiness. She covered her face, waiting to be crushed. Instead, she simply fell endlessly in the darkness, tumbling for several minutes, barely able to breathe as a freezing wind tore at her head.
Then, as if a cushion had been placed beneath her, Rachel came to an abrupt stop. Her body hung suspended in space, swaying gently. All around the air was still dark, but now Rachel noticed something even more densely black gripping her arm – the cellar creature. For a moment its triangular eyes, each the size of Rachel’s face, held her in a fierce gaze. Then it pushed away, its immense shapeless body disappearing below.
As soon as the creature released her Rachel fell headlong again.
After several agonizing seconds she forced herself to stop screaming. Without consciously thinking about it she put her arms outward, cupping the darkness. Her spin slowly came under control, until she could tell she now only pointed one way – straight down, feet first. She thrust her shoes flat against the air below. Slow down, she thought, drilling into the air like a skier into a slope. She kept that idea alone in her mind, until the blasting cold air became a gust and the gust merely a light breeze rippling against her head and shoulders.
She concentrated, and said, ‘Now, stop.’
As if the air around her had been waiting to hear this command all along, her body lurched to a dead halt.
Did I do that? Rachel wondered. How could I have done?
She told her body to turn slowly. Instantly it obeyed, revolving in a perfect circle, allowing her to peer around. Rachel gasped, bewildered. She lifted her hand. It stood so close to her face that she could feel her breath on it, but in the darkness it was invisible. Let me see it, she thought. Immediately, her hand gleamed dimly a few inches in front of her eyes. Rachel gazed in wonder, wriggling her fingers. ‘The rest,’ she said out loud, and her whole body lit up dully. Brighter, Rachel thought, and her body became a torch in the utter blackness around. ‘Light up everything,’ Rachel shouted. She expected the space around her to burst into bright colours. Instead, all remained dark except for millions of dust motes shining close to her body, streaming upwards with the breeze.
She trembled. How could these incredible things be happening? She felt an exhilarating strength inside her, of powers strange and unrevealed, waiting to be used. What could it mean?
Rachel studied her surroundings. She hung inside a dark, fathomless silence. There were no walls or ceilings, no way to tell how far she had fallen or how far away the ground might be. Moist air from below streamed gently through her hair. Eric was nowhere to be seen. She tried calling – the breeze took her faint voice up and away. There were no other sounds.
Rachel’s lip swelled where the claws had struck her in the cellar. A small drop of blood trickled down her chin and rolled off the end. Squinting, she could just make it out for a few seconds as it rapidly fell away.
There had to be a way to find Eric . . .
‘Where is he?’ she asked the darkness and immediately, below her feet, she saw a twisting blue dot. She knew that colour – Eric’s jumper. ‘Bring him to me!’ she ordered – but this time her command was not obeyed. The blue colour merely dwindled, falling further away every second. The creature must be out there somewhere, Rachel knew, perhaps fixing its triangular eyes on Eric. Did he have her skills, or was he just tumbling over and over, terrified?
Fighting her fear to go downwards at all, towards the creature, Rachel knotted up all her courage and told herself to dive towards the faraway blue. Her stomach twisted. The next moment the wind whipped her head back and Rachel hurtled down. Faster, she told herself, and her body obeyed, the warm wind turning to frost against her face.
*
Ahead the blue shape loomed closer. Rachel swooped, using her arms like wings, and fell alongside Eric. She caught his spinning body and brought them both to a stop. Eric was unconscious. The fall, or fear of falling, or the wind driving out his breath, had made him faint. For a long time she hugged Eric until he awakened, and then she let him cry deeply into her shoulder, soothing him. For several minutes he lay cradled in her arms, while she murmured gentle words and sounds, allowing him to recover. At last he turned his face sheepishly towards her. A trail of sick hung from his mouth, plastering his neck.
He stared at her. ‘You’re . . . shining, Rachel. What’s – happening?’
Rachel raised her eyebrows. ‘I don’t know, but while you’ve been out cold I’ve been experimenting. Watch this.’ She focused her mind, turning her hair red, then yellow, then back to black.
‘H-how’d you do that?’ Eric stammered.
‘Not sure,’ Rachel said nervously. ‘But I haven’t found much I can’t do.’ She made her lips glint gold.
Eric blinked several times. ‘Can I do it?’
‘Try,’ said Rachel. ‘Just tell part of you to light up.’
Eric screwed up his eyes in concentration. His lips did not glow. He tried several more times, without effect. Eventually he gave up. ‘What’s going on?’ he asked seriously. ‘We’re heading for the thing that dragged us in, aren’t we?’
‘No. We’re just hovering here.’ Rachel gingerly licked her sore lip. ‘I suppose we should try to go down, though. We can’t hang around here forever.’
‘Don’t go down, you idiot,’ Eric said. ‘Fly up, Rachel! Take us back to the cellar.’
Of course! Why hadn’t she thought of that? Rachel clutched Eric and imagined them both cruising into Dad’s arms. Nothing happened. She tried shoving herself up only a few feet. Still nothing.
‘Great,’ Eric moaned. ‘I suppose that thing wants us to hang around.’ He peered mournfully below. ‘Did you see it? I know it was big.’
Rachel told him what happened in the cellar, missing out the part about the snake-hairs and spiders.
After a long silence Eric said, ‘If it followed you down here, it’s probably waiting at the bottom.’
‘Maybe.’
‘Definitely.’
‘Mm.’
With no way to fly upward, Rachel allowed them to slowly descend. For a few minutes they both stared anxiously into the gloom, expecting the black claws to reach out of the dark.
‘Hold on!’ blurted Eric at last. He pointed to a weak spot of light below. ‘There’s something down there. It’s coming towards us. Look!’
Rachel gazed in the direction of his finger, where a tiny grey patch, growing rapidly wider, formed beneath them.
Eric said, ‘The thing’s black, isn’t it?’
Rachel nodded. ‘With green eyes.’
‘Maybe it’s not black now.’
‘It could be someone else dragged here with us.’
‘Too big for that,’ Eric said, matter-of-factly.
Rachel saw he was right. The grey object drew closer, spreading out to cover the whole space below. It was n
ot another child. It was vast and featureless.
‘It looks soft,’ Rachel said. ‘Don’t you think so?’
Eric began kicking the air. ‘We’re going to hit it. That thing’s down there! Stop us moving!’
Rachel tried to do so, but they just continued to drift towards the greyness. At last they fell so slowly that a feather would have passed them. A chill touched Rachel’s skin, followed by a freezing gust of wind. The surrounding air was not only colder, but studded with points of winking light.
‘They look like stars,’ whispered Eric, gazing around. ‘I’m sure they are. It must be night-time. We must be . . . we must be outside.’
No sooner had he said it than they landed, softly, on a blanket of snow.
A huge full moon, five times the size of Earth’s moon, blazed coldly in the sky. Rachel looked intently for signs of danger. Strange, twisted trees encircled them. Each tree was covered in thick snow, making the branches appear to bow in welcome. The snow was grey, not white. Rachel held out her hands in astonishment to catch the wispy flakes falling from the sky. They dissolved, smearing a dark wetness across her fingers. All around the same grey-coloured snow smothered the ground.
Eric said, ‘Blimey. Where on earth are we?’
‘You are not on Earth at all,’ said a voice behind them.
The children jumped. Kneeling in the snow and smiling at them was the woman from the dream. She had luminous green eyes, spangled with purple and sapphire streaks. Straight black hair cascaded over her shoulders, and around her graceful neck she wore an elaborate diamond necklace shaped like a snake. The snake had two large ruby-red eyes, and Rachel saw them blink.
Next to her sat a hunched, squat creature who looked like an ancient dwarf.
‘Who . . . who are you?’ Rachel asked the woman.
‘My name is Dragwena,’ the Witch replied. She indicated the man. ‘And this is Morpeth, my servant. Welcome to the world of Ithrea, Rachel.’
Rachel blinked. ‘How do you know my name?’
‘Oh, I know many things,’ said Dragwena. ‘For instance, Eric is afraid of me. Why do you think that is?’
Rachel felt Eric hiding behind her legs.
‘I don’t like this,’ he whispered. ‘Something’s wrong. Don’t trust her.’
Rachel shushed him, but also felt wary. Could this really be the same woman from the dream? She noticed that the dwarf-man shivered in his snow boots, while the barefooted Dragwena seemed at ease, unaffected by the cold.
‘We fell down a dark tunnel,’ Rachel said. ‘A creature with black claws—’
‘It’s gone,’ said Dragwena. ‘I scared it off.’
‘But how could you have done?’ Rachel protested. ‘I mean, it was huge, and—’
‘Forget the black claws,’ said Dragwena. ‘Put these on.’
Morpeth offered Rachel and Eric warm coats, gloves and scarves. Rachel studied the clothes, knowing they had not been in the dwarf’s hands a moment earlier. The clothes fitted both children perfectly. Rachel placed a fur-lined scarf around her neck. As soon as it touched her skin she felt the scarf tuck itself warmly around her shoulders.
She shivered, wondering what might happen next. Was this a magic world? Could she use the powers she had discovered between the worlds here? Who was this woman? She glanced at Eric nestled against her hip, and saw fear in his eyes.
‘We need to get back home,’ Rachel said firmly.
‘Never mind that,’ said Dragwena. She glanced at Eric. ‘What are your favourite sweets?’
‘I don’t like sweets,’ he said suspiciously.
Dragwena smiled. ‘Really?’
‘Well . . .’ His expression became confused. ‘Jelly beans, maybe.’
Rachel’s mind lurched. She knew Eric never ate jelly beans.
‘I thought so,’ said Dragwena. ‘Look in your pockets.’
‘Wait a minute,’ Rachel complained. ‘We want to go home. We’re not hungry. Oh!—’
A green jelly bean crept from a pocket in Eric’s new coat. It crawled across his sleeve and leapt onto the ground. Another blue bean followed. Within moments they scrabbled from the coats of both children, wriggling across the snow, trying to escape.
Dragwena’s eyes sparkled. ‘Don’t let them get away!’
Eric, without understanding why, immediately found himself racing after the beans, stuffing them into his mouth.
Morpeth, standing close, groaned inwardly. He saw that the jelly beans were really armoured spiders, rushing to find their way back to Dragwena’s mouth. The Witch had done what he expected, placing a spell on the children for her own enjoyment – and to test Rachel.
Eric grew increasingly frenzied in his efforts to find and eat the jelly beans. A spider with four serrated teeth crawled inside his mouth. He chewed it ravenously while searching the snow for others that might have crept away.
Rachel was just as fascinated by the jelly beans as Eric. She held one close to her lips. It wriggled its little body, longing for her to bite into the juicy head, but the expression of disgust on Morpeth’s face made Rachel hesitate. Even so, she had an aching desire to eat the sweet. Rachel kept looking at the unhappy Morpeth, and at the woman, shaking with laughter, and at the jelly bean, begging to be eaten. At last, with an enormous effort, she flicked the bean into the air. It landed on the woman’s dress and rushed towards her lips.
Dragwena plucked the sweet from her chin and held it towards Rachel. ‘Don’t you want to eat one?’ she asked. ‘They’re delicious.’
‘No,’ Rachel murmured uncertainly. ‘I mean, yes, I’d like to eat them. I mean, I don’t like jelly beans . . . I mean—’ She looked at Eric, busy scoffing the beans near her feet. ‘I mean—’ She tried to think of anything except the sweets. ‘What we want is to go back home.’ Eric ignored her. ‘That’s right, isn’t it? We want to go back home now.’
‘Oh, shut up Rachel,’ Eric said, juice dribbling from his mouth. ‘Don’t listen to her, Dragwena.’ He stuck out his tongue. ‘Rachel’s talking rubbish, as usual.’
Rachel stared in disbelief at Eric. A few moments ago he had been frightened of the woman. What had happened to change his mind? She gazed nervously at Dragwena and the dwarf, sensing a huge threat. Should she try to escape? But that would mean leaving Eric behind . . .
The Witch slowly uncoiled from her kneeling position. She stretched her limbs like a cat, pushing out her arms and legs until she stood over seven feet tall. Pressing her toes into the snow she floated, a few inches above the ground, towards Rachel.
‘Let’s take a good look at you,’ Dragwena said. She traced a complex pattern with her fingers on Rachel’s nose and eyelids. ‘Mm. You are an intriguing child. I see now you are what I was expecting. More than I expected. Answer a question: Eric came through the wall first. How did you both arrive together?’
Rachel was seized by caution, but felt compelled to answer truthfully. ‘I just flew to him. It was easy.’
Dragwena laughed. ‘What else did you do easily?’
Rachel told her everything that had happened between the worlds. She could not stop herself. Every minute detail of the journey poured out.
At last Dragwena seemed satisfied. ‘What came to you so effortlessly, no child has ever done before, Rachel. None. And thousands arrived before you. Thousands of useless children. Follow me.’
Again Rachel could not stop herself. She reached forward to accept Dragwena’s frozen outstretched hands. Deep in her mind Rachel’s instinct told her to resist, stay close to Eric and get them both away. Instead, she found herself linking arms casually with Dragwena. Morpeth took Eric’s small hand and all four together followed a path in the snow as if they had journeyed as friends along it many times before.
The black horses and carriage awaited. Inside, Eric sat next to Morpeth, no longer complaining, hands neatly folded on his knees. Morpeth stared blankly ahead. Rachel hardly noticed either of them. Instead, she inched closer to Dragwena, completely fascinated by her l
ooks and voice and gestures. Rachel forgot about wanting to get back home. She forgot about home altogether. She could not take her eyes off the Witch.
Dragwena caught a few flakes of snow falling through the open carriage window.
‘Shall we fly?’
Rachel nodded eagerly.
The Witch whispered to the great black horses. Instantly, their hooves reared into the air, heading towards the Palace.
4
Arrival
at the Palace
Rachel remembered nothing about the long cold flight in the carriage. During the journey the Witch held her tightly, firing questions. Rachel told Dragwena all about herself, secrets even her best friends did not know. She spoke about her school, her parents, her favourite colours. She told the woman about everything she loved and hated. Dragwena seemed especially interested in what she hated.
When the Witch had discovered all she wished to know, the snake-necklace slithered from her throat. It entwined Rachel’s neck, rocking her head gently backwards and forwards until she fell into a deep trance – a state from which only the Witch could awaken her.
As Rachel slumbered the Witch fought to contain her excitement. This girl-child was even stronger than she had expected. She had learnt how to fly between the worlds. She had resisted the sweets, even when specially urged to eat one.
I wonder, Dragwena thought, if this girl is the one I have waited so long for? She sighed. How many other girls had been so promising at first, only to prove too feeble to master the difficult spells of Witchcraft? Perhaps, after all, Rachel was just another weak child . . .
The Witch brought the carriage to the ground, opened the windows and called softly to her wolves. Within moments they loped alongside, nipping the forelegs of the horses, sharing her enjoyment of the evening.
Dragwena relaxed, dropping the pretty-woman face. Her ear stubs collapsed inside her skull. Her face flushed blood-red and her eyelids stretched sideways, meeting at the back of her head, mastering every detail of the world with perfect clarity.