Wildfire

by Lene Kaaberbøl

  “I want to go home,” she said. “Please, let me go home.”

  I just stood there, fidgeting and guilty. I had a strange feeling that it was my fault, that I must have pushed Kahla somehow even though I hadn’t touched her, and that was why she’d fallen into the pond. I could remember only too well what I’d felt the moment she reappeared in the water and I realized that she wasn’t drowning or seriously injured.

  Triumphant.

  I’d relished the moment. So much so that I had to chew the inside of my cheek to stop myself from laughing out loud.

  But as I looked at her now, the joke was over.

  “Are you OK?” I whispered when Aunt Isa went to the kitchen to fetch more tea.

  She looked at me. She had blue and purple rims under her eyes and she was so pale that her dark skin looked almost grey.

  “I c-can’t handle cold,” she said miserably. “It m-makes me ill.”

  She didn’t accuse me again of making her fall in. She didn’t even mention it. And she was no longer scowling at me, but that only made me feel worse.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I… I hope you don’t get ill.”

  Aunt Isa returned with more tea.

  “Drink this,” she said, and thrust a full mug into Kahla’s hand where the empty one had been.

  “I can’t drink any more,” Kahla protested. “My tummy’s squelching.” But she took the mug all the same and folded both hands around it to warm them up. “I just want to go home, please!”

  Aunt Isa studied her with a furrowed brow.

  “Yes,” she said eventually. “That’s probably the best thing for it.” Then she turned to me.

  “Clara, listen to me. I have to walk Kahla home. It means I need to leave you on your own for an hour or two. I’ll be as quick as I can, but it’s some distance, even using the wildways.”

  I nodded. “That’s OK.”

  “It’ll have to be,” Aunt Isa said. “Lock the door after me. Do not go outside. And don’t let anyone in. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’ll be careful.”

  I meant it when I said it. But things don’t always go as planned.

  Time passed. I tried reading a book, but after a while I realized that I was just turning the pages without following the story. Why wasn’t Aunt Isa back yet? Surely an hour must have passed by now?

  My panic increased as it grew steadily darker outside.

  “Everything will be all right,” I said to myself. So loud that Bumble cocked his head and looked at me as if trying to work out what those strange human noises meant. I was glad that he was here. Had I been able to, I would have brought Star into the living room as well.

  Suddenly Bumble jumped up from his place on the sofa and planted both front paws on the windowsill. He raised his hackles and let out a low, dangerous growl.

  “What is it, Bumble?”

  Had I ever heard him growl before? I didn’t think so. It was a deep, ominous sound that made him seem like a completely different animal from the tail-wagging cuddly teddy bear that I knew.

  Then Star neighed. No. She wasn’t neighing – she was screaming. Shrill and frightened. And when I pushed Bumble aside and looked towards the stable, I saw long, yellow flames lick the stable door.

  Petrified, I stared at them for a few seconds. What could I do? My mobile didn’t work and anyway the nearest fire station was an hour away, at least. Star couldn’t wait that long.

  Bumble started barking. I raced to the back of the house, jumped into my boots, unlocked the door and ran into the yard.

  I could see now that someone had built a small fire against the stable door. I kicked the burning branches and scattered them, and most of the flames went out. The fire hadn’t properly got hold of the door itself, the scorched planks were only smouldering, but I pulled and yanked at the door until I lifted it out of its hinges, then dragged it to the middle of the yard, where the embers wouldn’t reach the thatched roof if they flared up again. Star was still whinnying heartbreakingly inside the stable and one of the goats clattered out through the doorway and started running down the gravel road.

  I let it run. Bumble was standing next to me, bristling and staring fixedly at the stable. His growling made his body vibrate so much that I could feel it against my leg.

  Somebody did that, I thought. Somebody built a fire against the door and set it alight. On purpose.

  Why? Why would anyone want to burn down the stable?

  To make me leave the house.

  The answer popped into my brain the very same second I spotted her.

  Chimera.

  She was sitting on the roof of the stable, crouching like a bird on a perch. Her wings lay folded flat against her back. Her yellow eyes glared at me. Had she been sitting there the whole time or had she only just appeared?

  She’s a wildwitch, I thought. She’d been there the whole time, only I hadn’t been able to see her.

  She spread her wings. It was as if they blacked out the whole sky. Then she launched herself from the roof and swooped down towards me. I turned around to flee, but didn’t manage even two steps towards the house before she caught me.

  CHAPTER 11

  Blood and Red Rainbows

  I’ve never tried being a baby rabbit caught by a bird of prey, but I think I now know how it feels. The weight of Chimera knocked me over, I fell flat on my face and couldn’t breathe. Her wings shut out any light, blinding me, and her talons cut into my body like knives. Bumble’s furious snarling turned into a howl of pain and then he, too, was silenced.

  I don’t believe I was even capable of thought. I can’t remember that I had anything in my head but terror and the taste of blood.

  I couldn’t resist her. I couldn’t raise my arms or my legs, I couldn’t even try to wriggle free of her clutches. She pulled my arms behind my back and tied them with something that cut into my wrists. Then she yanked my head back and put something just as cold and sharp around my neck. It burned against my skin and made it harder to breathe.

  “Cold iron,” she hissed close to my ear. “So don’t even try.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about. Try what? And why iron? It felt more like wire.

  “Get up.”

  I wasn’t sure that I could. I was still trying to suck in air in pathetic little mouthfuls and one of my legs felt strangely anaesthetized.

  Chimera didn’t care. She yanked my neck, which made everything go black, and, if I wanted to carry on breathing, I would have to stand up. I succeeded on my second attempt, but when I put my weight on the numb leg, I felt a burning and pricking sensation.

  The first thing I saw was Bumble.

  He lay very still, reduced to a pile of fur and bones that seemed too small to be big, bear-like Bumble.

  “Bumble!” I tried to reach him, but another yank stopped me. One end of the chain was attached to the iron collar around my neck and Chimera was holding the other in her hand as if it were a leash and I were a dog. “What have you done to him?”

  She didn’t bother replying. She just tugged the leash again so I stumbled and nearly fell over.

  “Get a move on, witch child,” she said. “We haven’t got all day.”

  So I was forced to hobble after her whether I wanted to or not. Across the yard, down the gravel road, through the gate with the white stones. Without knowing what had happened to Bumble, without knowing whether he was dead or alive.

  Fog enveloped us the moment we passed the white stones. It was a strange fog, not at all damp and clammy like ordinary mist, but dry like smoke – and just as dense.

  Witch’s fog. The fog of the wildways. I knew that now.

  Chimera was in a rush. All her movements were urgent and she pulled and yanked me whenever she thought I wasn’t moving fast enough, which was pretty much most of the time.

  Even so, my brain was slowly starting to function again. I didn’t know where we were going, but it didn’t take a genius to work out that the further awa
y we got, the smaller were the chances of Aunt Isa being able to find me again. I reckoned that explained why Chimera was in such a hurry. She was scared of Aunt Isa. And that made me a little braver in the midst of all the misery.

  But what could I do? My hands were tied behind my back, I had an iron collar around my neck and she was bigger and stronger and ten times more… ten times witchier than me. I slowed down deliberately even though it meant more hard tugs to my poor neck, but it didn’t make much difference to our progress. We continued to move further and further away from Aunt Isa’s, and this wasn’t a place where I could snap branches or throw breadcrumbs to leave a trail. There was nothing here but fog.

  Self-defence for wildwitches, lesson one. Had I learned anything at all while I’d been with Aunt Isa?

  One thing. There was only one thing I was good at. That is, if I could pull it off.

  I closed my eyes. I listened with that strange inner sense that Aunt Isa had assured me I had. This place wasn’t teeming with life as the forest had been. There were no beetles or worms or birds or ants. There were only the wildways and Chimera and me. I could sense her very clearly; a mixture of hot and cold, a strange, red rainbow, and I could smell wet feathers and blood.

  “Go away,” I whispered.

  She actually stopped for a moment. She came closer to me.

  “What?” she said. “What are you doing, you witch brat?”

  Then I screamed. I summoned up all the strength I had inside me and screamed at the top of my voice, the same scream that had caused the whole forest to stampede.

  GO AWAY.

  She started screaming, too. A shrill cry of anger, thin and piercing like a bird of prey’s. She flapped her wings and a hard edge of feathers hit my face and blinded me for a brief moment. But I didn’t need to be able to see in order to shout.

  GOAWAYGOAWAYGOAWAY…

  “Blood of Viridian!” she hissed. No, more than hissed – she spat the words like a curse. She backed away, one step at a time. It seemed that she couldn’t bear to be near me. She yanked the chain one last time, so forcefully that it felt as if my head were going to be ripped off, but when that failed to make me stop, she dropped the chain as if it were red hot.

  “I’ll get you next time…”

  Only her words lingered in the air. Chimera herself was no longer there.

  I kept shouting GOAWAY long after I knew that she’d gone. Long after I could sense that I was on my own. Alone in the fog of the wildways. I didn’t stop until I was absolutely sure I couldn’t smell blood or sense the slightest trace of red rainbows.

  My neck and my throat hurt. My hands felt cold and dead. One of my knees was almost refusing to carry me. But that wasn’t the worst.

  The most difficult thing about the wildways is navigating them.

  That was what Aunt Isa had said. And I believed her. The fog that had swallowed up Chimera now closed around me like a sack. I didn’t know what direction I should start walking in. There were no directions.

  How on earth would I find my way home?

  CHAPTER 12

  Purring Cats

  “Think, Clara, think.”

  I spoke the words slowly and out loud because it was important. There was absolutely no point in walking without knowing where I was going. My knee hurt like crazy and I didn’t know how many steps I could take on it before it would refuse to carry me any further.

  At home – I mean, back home in the normal world where I’d lived until a couple of weeks ago – Mum and I had agreed that if anything happened that I couldn’t handle, all I had to do was call her and she would come and get me. But I had no mobile here and no way of contacting Mum.

  What was here apart from fog?

  There was silence. All I could hear was a faint whooshing sound that could easily have been the blood in my ears. There were no smells now except my own smell of sweat and fear. It was neither hot nor cold, dry nor damp. There was nothing.

  It reminded me of something.

  I remembered how Aunt Isa had made me close my eyes and pinch my nose while she covered my ears. How she had taken away all my senses, one by one, until only my wildsense remained.

  It was all I had now.

  I probably didn’t need to close my eyes, but I did it anyway. I stood very still in the wildfog and tried to listen. Something must live in this wasteland – apart from Chimera, that was.

  I strained as hard as I could to hear, I extended my wildsense into the fog, exploring and searching. If I’d had any other option, I probably wouldn’t even have tried. But there was no plan B, so I carried on even though I was so tired I was swaying with exhaustion and hot tears were streaming down my face. I kept trying. And at last…

  Here.

  Very, very faintly. A little warmth, a little distant voice. Here I am.

  Was that Aunt Isa looking for me? I didn’t recognize the sound or whatever you would call it, but at least it wasn’t Chimera and, as long as it wasn’t her, it could be anyone else, for all I cared.

  I started walking while continuing to listen out for the faint calling. My knee hurt and there was still no trail or path to follow, only fog. But my sense of the calling voice grew stronger and stronger.

  It was soon after that my knee refused to carry on. It buckled under me and I collapsed, unable, because of the chain, to brace my fall with my hands. The fall itself didn’t really hurt because there was neither grass nor stone nor soil under my feet; all I landed on was a kind of firmer fog. But I couldn’t get back up again.

  Find me, I prayed in silence. Please find me. I can’t go on.

  Out of the fog a creature appeared. I could see that it wasn’t human, but it wasn’t until it got very close that I recognized it.

  It was the cat.

  I wanted to shout GOAWAY at it, too, but I couldn’t. I was spent. I just lay there with my hands chained behind my back and a knee that refused to obey me. The cat could do whatever it wanted, I was helpless.

  It was just as big as I remembered. As big as a dog or a small panther. Black as night and bushy with wet pearls of dew in its fur. It no longer smelled strongly of seaweed, there was just a faint hint of salt water. But its eyes were still as yellow. It opened its mouth in a pink yawn that revealed glistening teeth and stretched out lazily. It strolled towards me, languid and relaxed, as if it knew that I couldn’t do anything, couldn’t fight back, couldn’t escape.

  Mine, it said, sounding contented, just like in my nightmares. Mine.

  Then it lay down next to me, very close.

  And began to purr.

  At first I didn’t understand what it was doing. For several minutes I expected it to sink its claws into me or bite my neck.

  It didn’t. It lay purring against my stomach, and its body heat spread to me as if someone had lit a campfire. And slowly I realized that it didn’t want to hurt me. At least, not now. I had no idea why it was suddenly helping me rather than hunting me, nor was I sure I could trust that things would stay that way. But right here and right now it looked after me as if I were a kitten and it my mum.

  “Who are you?” I whispered.

  But it made no reply. It merely purred a little louder.

  And this was how Aunt Isa found us at last.

  CHAPTER 13

  The Coven Gathers

  Aunt Isa’s living room seemed smaller than usual. That was because it was full of wildwitches. Aunt Isa had told me who they were and introduced us, but the names floated around my head and refused to settle and attach themselves to anyone in particular. The elderly gentleman with the beard and tweed jacket was Mr Malkin, I believed, and I was fairly certain that the nice lady with the round, ruddy cheeks and the chalk-white hair was Mrs Pommerans. But what on earth was the name of the young woman with the green-and-black-striped hair? The one who looked like a Goth with black eye make-up and safety pins in her ears, and trousers with so many holes that her knees stuck out through the fabric. An all-white ferret had draped itself around her neck an
d was watching the rest of us with blood-red eyes.

  Then there was Kahla and her dad, whom everybody called Master Millaconda. He seemed to be just as sensitive to the cold as Kahla because he hadn’t taken off his long brown camel-hair coat even though the fire was roaring in the stove and the windows had steamed up with condensation from the heat of the visitors.

  They had been out looking for me. It was a humbling thought and I knew I ought to be grateful, but right now I just wanted them all to go home so the house could return to normal and I could be alone with Aunt Isa and Bumble, who was lying on a quilt in front of the stove, still weak and confused after Chimera’s attack. But alive, luckily.

  I was so tired. Aunt Isa had sung wildsongs for me and stroked my neck, my knee and my wrists, but everything was still aching and swollen. My mind, too, felt achy and swollen, as if I’d sprained something in my head when I shouted GOAWAY at Chimera. I could do with another helping of my aunt’s magic. And I had so many questions.

  One of them was about the big, black creature stretched out on the sofa, lying along my leg and resting its wide head on my lap. Mine it purred at regular intervals even though it was quite obviously more than half asleep. Mine, mine, mine. The tip of its tail flipped from side to side in lazy, contented jerks. I didn’t know what to make of it. Aunt Isa said that the cat had most likely saved my life by staying with me and emitting its big, black, furry distress signal. And yet it was the same cat that had scratched me and licked my blood and given me Cat Scratch Disease. What was going on? I really wanted to ask Aunt Isa about that.

  The strange wildwitches, however, showed no signs of leaving. Quite the contrary. They had only just begun their meeting. And the main topic on the agenda – well, it was me. Me and Chimera.