by Rachel Tey
“I wonder who won?” Tess whispered to her friends. “How nice if I could take home one of these golden paintbrush trophies!”
Julien smiled. “Well, you just might. What did you paint anyway?”
“Oh, just some door.”
“A door?”
Tess nodded. “Yeah, I must be reading too much historical fiction or something. I somehow felt inspired to paint a really rustic-looking door – you know the kind you might find in a medieval castle.”
Belle was impressed. “That sounds so intriguing, a door! What about you, Julien?”
“Eh,” he said sheepishly, running a hand through his spiky hair. “I’d say something pretty medieval-ish too. I did a dimly lit flight of stairs.”
“Ooh, like steps into a dark dungeon?” It was Tess’s turn to be intrigued.
“Well I painted a vase of roses if anyone’s interested!” Cheesy chuckled. “Belle, is yours something very Middle Ages-y as well?”
Now that he mentioned it, there was indeed an antiquated quality about her “boat in a tunnel” painting. But the blare of the loud hailer cut her off before she could respond.
“In third place, we have … Mr Julien Edgehawk, for his artwork entitled ‘Stairs’!”
A hedgehog standing right in front Julien turned and extended one of his tiny paws for a congratulatory handshake.
“It’s you! Get up there!” Tess exclaimed to Julien, above the sound of loud clapping.
He hastily shook the hedgehog’s paw and proceeded onstage to receive the smallest trophy from a smiling Madame DuPorc.
As he clutched his prize awkwardly, Monsieur DuPorc unveiled the picture: a flight of gray stone steps that descended to an underground-like space. It was very realistically painted and Belle could see why it made it to the top three.
As Julien walked offstage, the mayor went on with the prize-giving ceremony. “Coming in second is … Miss Tess Brown, for her unique piece entitled ‘Door’!”
Cheesy Bear crossed his arms and whistled. “Have I missed something? Is it no longer fashionable to paint still life?”
Tess, meanwhile, let out a yelp and darted up the podium to accept the second tallest trophy. With a swoosh, the cloth covering her painting was removed to reveal an arched doorway flanked by ornate candlelit sconces. Dark and mysterious, it filled Belle with a sense of awe and foreboding. The crowd cheered as Tess bowed and blew a kiss to her friends in the audience.
“And finally, coming in first, is none other than –” Monsieur DuPorc paused to clear his throat, “– Miss Belle Marie, for her sublime work, ‘Boat in a Tunnel’!”
“It’s you! You won!” cried Cheesy, nudging her upstage to claim her grand trophy.
Belle felt as if she were having an out-ofbody experience, watching herself from the outside in. She went through the motions of saying thanks to well-wishers, walking upstage, shaking the mayor’s wife’s hand, and taking the largest golden paintbrush trophy into her hands.
The trophy was heavier than it looked. Gripping it tightly, she held her breath as Monsieur DuPorc uncovered her painting, to the sound of resounding applause.
It was 5pm by the time the crowd dispersed. Carrying their trophies and winning paintings, the children followed Cheesy Bear to a shady spot under a large oak tree. The DuPorcs soon joined the group, bringing with them spare aprons to sit upon.
The mayor was certainly eager to catch up with his friends from Michelmont. After offering his hearty congratulations and exchanging friendly hugs, he was curious as Cheesy had been about their re-appearance. “What brings you three back to Belzerac?” he asked.
He nodded and tapped at his chin while Belle explained their present predicament, but struggled to make sense of it all. It’d been an extraordinary day for him, what with three non-Belzeracians winning an art contest he’d organized specifically for his townsfolk. And now, hearing about why they’d returned, he wished he could be of some help.
Madame DuPorc patted Belle’s shoulder gently. “You poor dear,” she commiserated, “I can’t imagine what it must be like to be away from home this long, and to return and find no sign of your family.”
“It’s actually even more complicated than that,” Tess tried to explain. “The Musicians have showed up in Michelmont, and assumed the identities of school staff.”
“The Musicians from the Sapphire Forest?” The mayor’s wife’s eyes were wide with concern. “How could that be? There’s no way they could’ve followed you.”
Julien shrugged. “Actually they were the ones who suggested we come back here. They seem to believe that their presence – and Belle’s family’s absence – in Michelmont are linked, somehow.”
Cheesy Bear turned to the mayor. “Monsieur DuPorc, have any humans been sighted in Belzerac since Belle and her friends last visited?” he asked.
The pig shook his head. “Only animals around here since they left, so I’m fairly certain Belle’s family isn’t here.”
“What about the Musicians? Spotted any of them lately?” Tess persisted.
“Their cottage is deep in the Sapphire Forest, as you know,” Madame DuPorc replied. “They seldom venture out of the woods into the main town where we are.”
Belle looked at the darkening sky and sighed. “Then I doubt we’ll find any clues this time. The sunset will soon transport Tess, Julien and I back to Michelmont. We’ll just have to wait another week – till next Wednesday’s Tea in Pajamas – to come back and continue our search.”
“Unless we enter the Sapphire Forest before sunset!” Julien cried, to the astonishment of everyone around him. He was having another Eureka moment and relishing it.
“What do you mean?” Cheesy asked.
“I suspect being inside Sapphire Forest somehow makes us immune to the power of sunset,” he explained. “We were able to spend up to a week in Belzerac the last time because we were within the parameters of the woods!”
Monsieur DuPorc appeared convinced of Julien’s theory. “This means you still have time to look for Monsieur L’Arbre today if you get in there now,” he added.
“And if Julien’s right,” his wife went on, “you have two different ways to return home: the main route is outside the Sapphire Forest, with the help of sunset; and the other is via the magic tree.”
“Well, what are you children waiting for?” cried Cheesy. “Hurry into the forest now to find Monsieur L’Arbre! He might just give you all the answers you need!”
“But what about all our ... stuff?” asked Tess, glancing at their trophies and paintings.
“Leave them with us,” Madame DuPorc urged. “Be on your way!”
The Sapphire Forest was less than a mile from where they were, and the three friends could make it in there before sunset if they ran fast. With their artworks safely in the care of the Belzeracians, the children began their dash toward the woods.
As she ran, Belle felt the wind in her hair and the warm grass beneath her bare feet. But remembering that she hadn’t properly said goodbye to her animal friends, she turned to catch a final glimpse of them.
Cheesy was holding Tess’s “Door”, the mayor next to him Julien’s “Stairs”, and his wife clutched Belle’s picture. From the way they were positioned, the three separate pictures seemed to merge into a larger one, as if they were parts of the same scene.
She was eager to point this out to Tess and Julien, scurrying alongside her, but the sun was lowering quickly into the distant horizon.
The entrance of the Sapphire Forest was now well within reach, and all three of them began sprinting. Belle’s observation about the paintings would have to wait till they were safely among the blue trees.
Root Cause
Monsieur L’Arbre was right where they’d last found him: deep within the Sapphire Forest, across a meandering stream, and about a forty-five-minute hike past the Musicians’ cottage situated on the opposite bank.
However, getting there was no mean feat. Julien’s photographic memory and good
direction sense had given the children a head start, but temperatures dipped and nightfall soon blanketed the woods. Cold, barefoot, and without flashlights, the party had trekked single file – their left arms placed on the left shoulder of the person in front – until they arrived at a richly illuminated patch of the forest.
As they approached the immediate radius of Monsieur L’Arbre’s golden aura, Julien was the first to remark that all the colors were looking extra vibrant.
“Your hair is so red,” he said, marveling at Belle’s scarlet curls.
Then turning to Tess, “And your eyes are looking so blue.”
“Why thank you, Julien,” she replied coolly. “And your freckles are extra obvious!”
He put his palms over his cheeks. “Thanks for the acute observation.”
“Oh please,” she grunted. “With a nickname like Julien Hedgehog, nobody notices your freckles anyway.”
“Guys, come on, we have to stay focused,” Belle cut in. She knew her friends were tired and hungry – so was she, not having eaten anything since those two shortbread fingers at teatime – but they had already entered Monsieur L’Arbre’s domain of the woods, and were very close to getting the answers they needed.
They carried on walking in the direction of the light, which grew more brilliant as they drew closer to the magical tree. After a while, Belle observed that her feet no longer made contact with rocky earth and dense undergrowth. The forest floor was completely carpeted with glittering leaves, which bent and crunched under her soles like delicate gold foil.
When they finally saw Monsieur L’Arbre, there was no mistaking him.
It wasn’t the first time the three friends had seen the tree up close. Yet once again, Belle, Tess, and Julien were awed by his grandeur and beauty. He rose to dizzying heights, his enormous canopy held aloft by an immense trunk that was cloaked in a maze of clinging vines.
Standing at the foot of the tree, the children felt diminutive in his towering presence. But even though everything about Monsieur L’Arbre was majestic, he was far from intimidating. Instead, there was a gentleness about him, seen in the elegant movements of his gleaming boughs and sturdy branches – even a playfulness in the way he scattered his golden leaves upon the children, as if happy to see them.
“Good evening, Monsieur L’Arbre,” Belle called out, “nice to see you again.”
Behind her, she overheard Tess muttering, “Feels like déjà vu.”
Although she had to agree this felt all too familiar, Belle resisted the urge to repeat the same steps from the last time, which involved them returning to Michelmont through one of the doorways on his trunk. It had worked – but only to a certain degree – and this time, Belle was determined to find out what went wrong.
“We’d like to thank you for bringing us back home previously,” she continued, “but we’ve returned to ask for your help again. You see, we’re not sure if we made it all the way back home. By that I mean, the place looks a lot like home, but my family’s missing from the house and some of the guys from Belzerac – well, the Musicians – have showed up at our school.”
The tree remained still, as if listening.
“What we’re trying to understand is: did we take the right way back?” She paused to catch her breath. “Monsieur L’Arbre, would you please tell us if there is there another way back?”
It wasn’t the tree who answered, because he never spoke. Instead, Belle heard Julien’s loud whisper from behind her. “This doesn’t just feel like déjà vu. This IS déjà vu.”
She immediately knew what he was referring to. In front of them, the same thing was happening. The tree stiffened, then shook vigorously as the clinging vines peeled away from his colossal trunk to uncover two doors with no knobs. They were the same large, gilded doors from the previous time.
The question was: what would she do differently this time?
“Should we knock on them again?” Tess asked.
“No.” Belle was surprised by the firmness of her reply, but recalling what lay beyond them, she didn’t see the point. The one to the left would open right back into Belzerac’s main town, while the other was the gateway to Michelmont. “Let’s look around to see if we can find a third door, or any other clues.”
“Yep,” Julien agreed. “Monsieur L’Arbre is showing us the same thing as before because the solution must lie somewhere between these two doors, or around, or above, or under, or –”
“Or we can get to work!” Tess sprang into action, combing the area for clues.
Belle, however, stood rooted to the spot. Something about what Julien had said struck her, but she couldn’t quite put a finger on it.
“You OK?” he asked, stopping to check on her after having circled the tree twice. With such a large circumference, it took him about twenty minutes.
“You said the solution lies somewhere between the doors, or around, or above, or under –”
“Uh huh, but there seems to be no third door – none that I can find, anyway.”
“But we haven’t looked under.”
Tess came over to join them. She was slightly out of breath and her hands were stained golden from rummaging through the glittery foliage. “What have I missed?”
Belle’s thoughts were racing. An idea was forming quickly in her mind, and her mouth was struggling to find the words. “Guys, remember our paintings?”
“What about them? That reminds me, it’s a pity we had to leave them with Cheesy and the DuPorcs. I was proud of my ‘Door’!” Tess grumbled.
“And I, my ‘Stairs’,” Julien concurred. “I thought Belle’s ‘Boat in a Tunnel’ was impressive and wish I could’ve admired it awhile longer.”
Belle was grateful for the compliment, but that wasn’t what she was getting at about the paintings.
“That’s not it. There’s something I need to tell you both. As we were racing into the Sapphire Forest before the sun set, I turned to say goodbye to Cheesy and folks, and saw that they were holding our artworks.”
Tess lifted an eyebrow. “So?”
“From that distance, and in the way they were positioned, I saw that the individual pictures were –”
“– parts of a larger painting?” Julien cried, finishing her sentence.
Belled nodded. “Yes! And I think that’s our clue. Maybe if we dug underground, we might find a door, then a flight of stairs leading down to a tunnel.”
Julien’s eyes lit up with excitement. “And a boat there that takes us out of Belzerac!”
“That sounds like a looong way back to Michelmont which, last time I checked, isn’t subterranean,” Tess said, looking hesitant. “But maybe it’s worth a try.”
“Problem is,” Julien sighed, “we don’t even have a shovel. Monsieur L’Arbre’s roots look deep.”
Belle scanned the area. “We’ll have to make do with rocks and fallen branches or something.”
“No need for that. I can take you down there.”
The children certainly weren’t expecting company. The female voice carried an accent that seemed to belong to another time period. It was a voice that sounded eerily familiar to Belle.
A statuesque and beautiful lady stepped out from behind a smaller tree. She was dressed in a flowing purple robe and a jeweled crown adorned her long, dark hair.
“Little red-headed girl,” she said, her black eyes on Belle, “we meet again.”
Hole in the Ground
“Stand back, children,” said the mysterious lady.
When she offered to burn a hole through the ground, none of the children protested. After all, it saved them the great effort of digging beneath Monsieur L’Arbre’s colossal roots. Her handheld torch also seemed like a far more effective tool than any of the rocks or branches lying around.
Belle instantly recognized her from that bizarre dream she’d had the night that she returned to Michelmont. The lady looked every bit as “queenly” in that same purple robe and with her jeweled crown, but also possessed a sort of
otherworldly beauty that made her seem ageless.
Belle, Tess, and Julien took cover behind a nearby bush, watching as the elegant stranger lowered her torch to the ground while uttering an indecipherable command. The flames crackled noisily as they made contact with the earth, and before long, a spectacular bonfire erupted. Surging to a great height, the blaze seemed to engulf both the lady and Monsieur L’Arbre, but it soon whittled down to a fiery twister that whirled and bored through the ground, revealing in its wake a deep hole.
Moments later, the lady surfaced through a cloud of ashy mist, unscathed and unfazed. “It’s done,” she said. “Come and see.”
“That was the most mind-blowing thing I’ve ever seen!” Tess cried, as Belle and Julien nodded in amazement.
Excitedly, the children made their way over to where the lady stood waiting.
“Now if that doesn’t look familiar!” Tess exclaimed, pointing at the hole in the ground. It was shaped just like the arched doorway in her painting.
“You’re telling me,” Julien added, observing the unmistakable flight of stone steps that began from Tess’s “Door” and descended into unknown depths. “I wonder where I last saw these ‘Stairs’?”
So Belle was right about their paintings being actual clues, although she had yet to see her “Boat in a Tunnel” materialize. The only way to determine if the scene of her painting lay at the end of the steps was to venture down below.
The lady handed her torch to Julien. “You’ll be needing this. It’s dark down there.”
“Aren’t you coming with us?” he asked, accepting it gratefully.
“Oh no, not just yet. Please go ahead.”
“But how will we return your torch?”
She shook her head. “Never mind that, there’s plenty where I’m from.”
“Just where are you from?” Belle asked, unable to contain her curiosity.
The lady paused, looking thoughtful.
“From your dreams,” came her answer. “But if you insist on returning it, do so in your next one …”
“My name’s Belle.”