The Dark Ground

by Gillian Cross

  I will do anything to stop that, he thought. Anything.

  Lifting up his arms, he stretched them toward her. The reflection moved to match, and he understood that he was seeing not Lorn but himself, reaching out and up.

  A pale shape separated itself from the great mass above him, moving out and down to meet his hand. As it came through the air, he saw that it was a hand, too. It was grotesquely large—big enough to crush him to a pulp—but it was still a hand, just like the one that he was holding up. He went to meet it, reaching up toward the vast, outstretched fingers.

  "Robert! No!"

  Cam’s shriek reached him, even in the silence. When he looked around, he saw that she was distraught. Zak was holding her around the waist to keep her from running across to him.

  "Don’t do it! Robert! Don’t!"

  As she yelled, the great hand above Robert moved down so close that he could feel the heat coming off it and see the ridged patterns of the skin. He reached up, deliberately, and touched it, fingertip to fingertip.

  I will do anything . . . .

  Immediately the world around him began to contract. Looking back, he saw Cam and Zak shriveling, like snails drawing back into their shells, like balloons collapsing, like buildings dwindling into nothing as an airplane suddenly tilts upward off the ground and climbs into the sky. They were shrinking away from him, disappearing into nothing, vanishing . . . .

  A wind roared into him, blowing up through his bones to howl in the empty spaces of his heart.

  Cam . . . Zak—

  Cam, Zak, Lorn, Dess, BandoTinaAnnetPerdewLornAbShangLorn—

  Forlorn, perdu desolate abandoned where who lost

  Lost

  Lost

  Lost . . .

  THE WIND BLEW HIM APART, EXPLODING HIM OUTWARD, straining at every limb and ligament. He was pulled thin and wide, stretched taut enough to reach around the world, from one hemisphere to another.

  It was gone, it was gone. Cam and Zak had shrunk away beyond recall, beyond seeing, and it was all over it was finished and gone but he didn’t want . . . it was too soon . . . he wasn’t ready . . . and he didn’t want . . . he didn’t want—

  AND THEN HE WAS FALLING, CRUMPLING DOWN AND DOWN and down to the ground, and Emma was bending over him and shouting into his face.

  "Rob! What’s the matter? What’s happening? Rob!"

  And he was falling—

  30

  IN THE CAVERN, LORN SLEPT LATE, DREAMING IN ZAK’S PLACE by the tunnel mouth.

  She stood in darkness, desperately braiding a multi-stranded rope with sluggish, aching fingers. Every twist of the fibers sapped her energy; every turn drained life away from her. But she kept braiding, watching the rope snake away from her, out through the tunnel and down into the ravine.

  Hoarfrost was gathering along her knuckles, and icicles were forming under her nails. With every movement, the cold bit deeper, and the pain increased. But she went on lifting and twisting and pulling and lifting and twisting . . . .

  She knew, without turning to look, that the others were clustered close behind her in the darkness, feeding the threads into her hands. And at every moment, at every movement, her brain cried out, I can’t . . . they have to understand I can’t . . . . But the words stayed unspoken and the rope fed out through her hands, inch by inch, creeping on and on into the cold.

  I can’t, I can’t . . . .

  She woke suddenly, rigid and sweating, with the dim shape of the cavern roof above her, ringed by familiar, anxious faces looking down. Bando and Perdew. Annet and Dess. Ab and Shang and Tina . . .

  It was then, in that last second of her sleep—when she came out of the dream with her eyes open but her fingers still moving to the pattern of the braid—that she felt something tug at her hands. Her fingers tightened around the rope, feeling it taut.

  As though someone had taken hold of the other end at last.

  31

  WHEN ROBERT CAME TO, HIS ARM WAS LOOPED OVER Emma’s shoulders and she was pulling him toward the side gate, half carrying and half dragging him. The shoes were heavy on his feet, and the cloth of his trousers rubbed at the insides of his knees.

  Emma was scolding him under her breath. "What’s up with you? We’re going to be so late for school. If you hadn’t messed around with the marigolds—Rob, are you all right?"

  No, he wanted to say. No, I have lost everything. I’m different now, and I shall never see them again. But words were beyond him. His body was weak and shaking, and his mind was sick with the memory of Cam and Zak, shrinking away from him. Sick with the knowledge that if he called to them now, they wouldn’t hear anything except a distant, thunderous rumble.

  "Rob!" Emma put her head close, whispering in his ear.

  And if they spoke, he would not hear their voices either. They were too faint and shrill for his ears to register. He would never hear any of them again.

  "Rob, I can’t go on taking your weight like this. Try to stand up."

  By the time Emma got through to him, they had reached the back door, and she was trying to support him with one hand and find her key with the other. Robert rolled away from her arm and propped himself against the wall.

  There was a small, pink flower crushed against the front of his jacket. He picked it off and looked at it stupidly, struggling to see what he had seen before. When Emma opened the door, he stumbled into the kitchen and slumped down in the nearest chair.

  "What on earth is the matter?" Emma said. "Are you ill?"

  Robert didn’t know what to say. He was aching and exhausted and stunned with shock and grief. Was that ill? He looked at Emma blankly across the kitchen table.

  "Oh, for goodness’ sake!" she said. "Have a cup of coffee and pull yourself together!"

  She got up to put the coffeepot on, and Robert laid his head down on the table. Just for a rest. While he was waiting.

  WHEN HE WOKE UP, HE WAS STILL IN THE KITCHEN, AND Emma was sitting on the other side of the table, staring at him.

  "About time," she said.

  Robert rubbed his eyes and looked at the clock. He had been asleep for two and a half hours. Had Emma been sitting there all the time, waiting for him to wake up?

  "Sorry." He rubbed his eyes again. "Did I miss the coffee?"

  She made some more, and they sat facing each other. Each one waiting for the other to begin.

  "Well?" Emma said at last.

  Robert put his mug down on the table. "What did you see?" he said carefully. "When I—when we were outside? Tell me what happened."

  Emma looked down. "I came through the gate and saw that someone had vandalized all the marigolds and I thought—well, it just had to be you. With the Herb Robert being there as well. That’s why I shouted. And then you went all . . . strange." She lifted her head and met his eyes, edgy and aggressive. "What was going on? Was it supposed to be some kind of joke?"

  He could hear the fear in her voice. She was offering him a way to cover up, to reassure her that nothing weird had happened after all. All he had to do was bat it back at her. The trouble with you is, you’ve got no sense of humor. If you’d seen your face—

  It would be easy to say that. To let her duck out of the extraordinary, inconceivable evidence of her own eyes. You’re such a sucker . . . . Once the words were out, she would be able to believe that she "knew" what had "really" happened. And by tomorrow he would be starting to believe the same thing himself.

  And it would all be over.

  If that was what he wanted.

  But it was real . . . .

  He looked at her, willing her to talk about the strange, unsettling thing she had seen—so that he would know it was all right to tell her the rest. But she didn’t give way. She looked back warily, waiting for him to speak.

  It has to be now.

  Robert took a deep breath. "I wasn’t joking," he said evenly. "And I didn’t 'vandalize' your flowers. I picked them because I needed to attract your attention. And it took me all night to do it.
With two other people to help me."

  Emma was very still. Robert picked the small pink flower off his knee, where it had fallen while he was asleep. He laid it on the table, smoothing the petals with one finger.

  "Tell me what you really saw," he said.

  Emma stared down at the flower. He couldn’t believe she was going to tell him. He couldn’t imagine her saying anything like that. But he went on waiting, and after a long pause she began to talk. Speaking in a low voice, very quickly, so that he had to concentrate to catch the words.

  "I came out and saw the mess on the concrete. I was mad, because I knew it was you. So I started to shout—" She broke off short and slid her hand toward the flower on the table. Almost touching it.

  "And then?" Robert said.

  "Then you came through the gate, with that stupid, blank expression you’ve had ever since—"

  "Since we came back from vacation?"

  Emma nodded angrily. "It’s been like talking to a brick wall. And seeing you like that then was the last straw. So I just opened my mouth and yelled. And—"

  She broke off again. This time Robert didn’t prompt her. He just waited and, after a moment or two, she slid her hand another inch and touched the pink flower. She went on talking, without looking up.

  "When you saw the flowers—the big marigold and this little one—you just ignored me. Completely. As if you couldn’t even hear my voice. You squatted down, quite slowly, and reached your hand out to touch the flower, the way I’m touching it now. And—"

  Her voice shook, and Robert thought she was going to faint. He reached out and put his hand on top of hers. "Go on," he said.

  "You’ll think I’m crazy—"

  "Go on!"

  It came all in a rush. As though she had to get the words out while she dared to do it. "There was a little . . . a little thing by the flower. When you touched the flower, you touched the thing as well, and it started to grow and it all happened very fast, but—It was you. And for a second, just for a second—" She looked up and met his eyes, struggling to finish.

  "For a second there were two of us?" Robert said.

  Emma nodded. And then shook her head fiercely. "But there can’t have been. That’s not how things are."

  "Maybe they can be like that," Robert said carefully. "I hope so. Otherwise I’ve been raving mad for the last three months."

  Emma hesitated for a moment, like someone standing on the brink of a precipice. Then she said, "And if you’re not crazy?"

  Robert leaned forward, with his elbows on the table, and began to tell her everything, right from the beginning.

  WHEN HE HAD FINISHED, EMMA SAT BACK IN HER CHAIR AND folded her arms. She looked at him for a long time without speaking. Then she said, "Do you mean it? It’s all real?"

  "Yes," Robert said. "It’s real."

  "But how—? Why—?"

  Robert shook his head. In his mind, Zak’s eyes flashed blue and challenging, and the big unanswered questions screamed down toward him, too big to understand. But he wasn’t ready to think about them. Not yet.

  "So—what are you going to do?" Emma said.

  Lie down and sleep, Robert wanted to say. He knew there were things to do, but he was so tired that he could hardly think. He shrugged again.

  Emma looked impatient. "For goodness’ sake! You can’t just sit around. We’ve got to do something. To help the others survive."

  She jumped up and began to pull things out of the cupboard and the fridge, piling them onto the table. Sugar. Rice. Currants. A package of bacon and a box of cookies. Pasta and a box of matches.

  "We can stock them up for the winter!" she said excitedly.

  Robert looked down at the heap on the table and thought, She is too different. She can’t understand.

  "Well? Say something!" Emma was starting to look frustrated. "What’s the problem? We can take them food and blankets—well, maybe not blankets, but you know what I mean—and something to help them heat the cavern and—we’ve got so much! It’s easy for us to help."

  Robert didn’t know where to start. She had it all wrong. There was no room for all those supplies in the small, moist space inside the cavern. The matches and the sugar would get damp. The rice and pasta were useless without a pot to boil them in. The bacon would go bad long before it was finished, and the smell would attract hordes of predators.

  She is too different.

  Emma was watching his expression. "We’ve got to do something," she said. "If it really is real. We can’t just let them die."

  Robert looked at Emma’s eager, impatient face and thought what an effort it would take to explain everything to her. Then he stared down at the things on the table, trying to figure out how they could be made useful.

  Because he did understand—because he was different but not different—he saw what a huge undertaking it would be. How much time and effort and perseverance it would need. The thought of it was like a great weight. Why me? But he knew the answer already.

  Because he was different but not different, he was the only one who could do it properly.

  And he’d promised. I’ll do whatever it takes, he’d said.

  He looked back at Emma’s expectant face and began the long, slow process of explaining things that seemed too obvious to need explaining.

  "We can’t save them with one giant food parcel. That would be easy for us, but it would just make things worse for them. What they need is a little at a time. Food and wood and something to keep them warm." What would do that? Dry cotton batting, maybe. Constantly replaced. "We’d have to go every few days or so."

  He expected Emma to argue, but she didn’t. She hesitated for a second and then nodded. "We could do that. It would take a bit more effort, but we could do it."

  "All through the winter?" Robert said. Watching her face.

  She didn’t waver. "I don’t see why not."

  Robert went on relentlessly. "And what then? Do we give up after one winter? Or do we carry on for two? Or three? What if we want to go away to college?" He saw her eyes change as she took in the size of the commitment, but he didn’t stop. "Think about it properly. We can’t change our minds when it gets difficult or when we get bored. It’s not a game, Emma. It’s real. It’s about people’s lives. Ours as well as theirs."

  That did get through. For a moment he thought she was going to back out and leave him to do it all on his own.

  Then she reached for the packet of currants.

  "How many of these shall we take today?" she said.

  32

  THEY WENT OUT AN HOUR BEFORE THE PARK CLOSED, CARRYING one little bag of food and a small piece of dry cotton batting. As they came out of the front garden, Robert stopped for a moment to pick two marigold leaves. He laid them on the ground by the end of the wall, one on top of the other, with a few fragments of bread and cheese hidden between them. Supplies for the journey back.

  He hoped that Cam and Zak would find them before the birds did.

  Then he and Emma went across the road and into the park. It took them a couple of minutes to walk through the tall trees by the gate. They stepped over the little stream and followed the path by the cypress hedge, along the side of the grass.

  At the far end of the park, the hedge changed to a mixture of holly and hawthorn and beech. They found a way through and stepped over the ditch, into the small, brambly wood.

  "Where now?" Emma said.

  For a moment, Robert’s brain struggled to translate this into that. Then he looked along the ditch and saw a dead, dry stalk of cow parsley, bent over at the base. It would have bridged the ditch, except that it was broken in the middle.

  The pain hit him, just as he knew it would. Sharp as the stab of a knife.

  Lost—

  "There," he said.

  There were dozens of little holes all along the hedge bank. When they came to the right place, he sniffed at the air, catching a faint, frail smell of wood smoke (Or did he imagine it?). Then he crouched down and tried
to think small, to remember the exact shape of the ground outside the tunnel entrance.

  When he was sure, he knelt in front of the hole, and Emma came and knelt down beside him, with the little bag in her hand.

  "What now?" she said. "Do we just leave it all on the ground?"

  Robert shook his head. "Something else will get it if we do. I want to make sure."

  He looked into the hedge for a dead, beech twig. There was a long, straight one off to the right, just above his head, and he reached up and snapped it off, between his finger and thumb. Taking out the food and the cotton batting, he laid them on the ground in front of the hole.

  Then, very slowly and carefully, he pushed each thing gently into the hole, using the beech twig he had picked.

  When everything was in, he broke the stick into small pieces—as small as he could manage with his big fingers—and stacked them up by the tunnel entrance. Then he stood up.

  "That’s it," he said. "Until next week."

  Emma looked down at the little stack of wood. "We’ll never see them. Will we?"

  "No," Robert said. "We won’t see them. We’re too big."

  "Do you think they’ll ever—I mean—" Emma struggled with the words. "If you’ve made it back home, does that mean they might—?"

  The flash of hope was so painful that Robert didn’t think he could bear it. Lorn . . . He closed his eyes and blanked out his mind, thinking of Nate beside the brazier. What had he said? We don’t remember. We look forward.

  For the first time, it seemed like a tempting option.

  Emma patted his hand and stood up. "Come on," she said. Her voice was gentler than he’d ever heard it. "Let’s go back home." She jumped over the ditch and set out toward the break in the hedge.

  As Robert followed her, the broken cow parsley stalk caught at the bottom of his jeans. Bending down to flick it off, he realized suddenly that there was one more thing he could do to be useful. Now that he was big enough.