Within an hour, darkness spread throughout the woods. The sky off to her left lit up with a shimmering dark red-orange sunset. She whined past a mouthful of bird meat, annoyed at herself for having gone south instead of east. How long had she spent heading in the wrong direction? Mother wanted her to go east to find Dad. She shouldn’t have ever seen the city behind the green wall. Only because she’d spent at least a whole day going south did she find it. South. The wrong direction.
South led toward the Tree Walkers.
Angry tears fell from her eyes, but she kept on walking and eating. In addition to wasting so much time, she’d kicked a hornet nest. Not only would the Tree Walkers be after her, the people in that city would probably chase her too. She only hoped ‘Kaya’ wasn’t a dark magic spell intended to hurt her. Why that weird man kept yelling it, she couldn’t understand.
Maybe it’s a different language. A few of the books have funny words, too. Dad called it Spanish. Maybe ‘kaya’ means thief. Or maybe that’s what they call these birds. She got heartsick all over again remembering when he’d told her what the ‘Spanish’ words meant. His voice echoed in her thoughts even as the shadows thickened around her.
I’m bad. I did bad. I should have camped by now. It’s too dark… but at least I have food.
Out of energy, she staggered along at a forced walk, unable to will herself to move fast at all. She looked around, searching for a place to hide since she couldn’t run far enough (especially in the dark) to feel safe. She followed the terrain down a modest hill, trying to put earth between her and any pursuers. A short way down, a massive fallen tree lay half-buried in the hillside next to a great bundle of exposed roots. She headed closer, almost cheering when she discovered a large, hollowed-out space beneath it.
Wisp crawled into the tangle of roots, tucking herself into the deepest spot she could find. Out of breath, but hopeful nothing could find her in there, she finally allowed herself to breathe. Once her heart slowed from slamming to pounding, she pulled the rifle off her shoulder to rest across her legs and shrugged her arms out from the backpack. She hunkered down and feasted on the still-warm bird, savoring smaller bites she could taste while trying to catch her breath. Her exhausted legs ached, and her head swam from fatigue and worry.
Despite the wonderful food, scared, angry tears kept flowing. Her wrong turn may have given her a once-in-a-lifetime meal, but it had not helped her find Dad. She could be lost for all she knew, having wasted so much time going the wrong way. It might be too late for her to find him at all. What if the monster had already devoured him as she continued to devour this bird?
“Did I do bad?” she whispered. Unable to resist the magnificent feast she’d stolen, she snarled and sank her teeth into the bird flesh again, tearing away a huge chunk. While struggling to chew such a mouthful, she listened for the voice she dreaded so much.
Mother didn’t say a word.
Gradually, Wisp relaxed. Hope returned. Mother had not given up on her. She could still find Dad.
And she had a… whatever this bird was called.
A broad grin spread across Wisp’s face.
The Forest Comes Alive
-14-
Wisp popped awake and found herself inside her Haven. Though safe, it appeared much roomier than she remembered, almost big enough for her to stand up in. Confused, she looked down at her dingy, threadbare dress, then peered out at the cabin. It, too, had grown in size, vast and dark. She grasped one of the bars on the door and pushed. At finding it locked, she slumped with a sigh of relief.
The second she realized she had to be dreaming since she had not been six years old in a long time, a powerful wind swirled up around her. Books flew from shelves; Dad’s workbench fell over, and her Haven shuddered. She clung to the bars, shouting pleas to Mother, asking her to stop the storm. With a loud pank, the lock snapped; the gale yanked the Haven’s door open and swept her out of her safe place. Wisp landed on her chest, sliding across the room faster than she could run. Screaming, she raised her arms to shield her face from the wall rushing toward her.
Her body crashed into the wood, but it gave way as easily as if she’d flown into a cobweb. The cabin vanished, leaving her tumbling over the forest floor, down a long hill of leaves and vines. She skidded to a stop, face down in a thick patch of underbrush. Dizzy, she lifted her head from the dirt, spat a mouthful of plant matter aside, and pulled herself up to kneel. The old dress remained, as did her six-year-old self.
This is a dream.
She got to her feet and looked around at the huge trees.
A ghostly version of her own voice echoed. “What was it like before the dragons?”
“The Earth is gone,” said Dad from everywhere at once.
“How can the Earth be gone? We are still here. It’s a plammit, right?”
“Planet,” said Dad. “And yes, the stone and dirt remain, but the Earth that once was is no more. For many years, even longer than I’ve been alive, it smoldered like the ashes in the fireplace.” A soft, repetitive crunching surrounded her; she imagined him jabbing a stick at the embers back home, filling the blackness of the flue with a thousand-thousand flying sparks. “But life has a way. Mother Nature decided to try again, and breathed upon the Earth, creating the Endless Forest.”
“Dad?” asked Wisp, in her twelve-year-old voice, turning in place. Her voice echoed over and over in the forest. “Where are you?”
“The Endless Forest. That’s where we live.” Six-year-old Wisp’s ghostly voice seemed to come from everywhere.
“Very good,” said Dad.
The pride in his words pulled at her heart. He loved whenever she learned things. How would he react to her failure now? When she finally had to use everything he’d taught her, she couldn’t find him.
Wisp covered her face in her hands, and bawled like the tiny child she dreamed herself to be.
“To your Haven!” whisper-shouted Dad.
Her sobs cut off to silence. She whipped her head up and spun around, searching the moonlit woods. Snaps and crunches closed in on her from one side, but her Haven was too far away to save her. Wisp ran, as she always did whenever this nightmare happened. At first, the memory of a happy moment had confused her, but the truth of the dream had finally shown itself. The Tree Walkers would not let her sleep easy that night.
Little Wisp darted back from the writhing patches of vines and leaves swelling up from the forest floor, growing toward her. Roots emerged from the earth and knotted together into the shapes of bodies. Monsters of leaf and bark, with glowing eyes of emerald green, rose from the mulch behind her. Reaching arms and grasping vines nipped at her trailing hair.
Unable to help herself, she peeked back over her shoulder. A rolling wall of vegetation with many eyes and arms, taller than her cabin, thundered across the forest coming for her. She screamed, leaning into her stride, heedless of sharp rocks or hard roots at her feet. Time lost meaning as she focused only on getting away from the Tree Walkers. Fallen logs, standing pines, a small creek, and the rotting hulks of old machines abandoned to the forest streaked by in the night.
Eventually, as always happened in this nightmare, a thin root shot up from the ground and wrapped around her ankle, tripping her flat on her chest. Her fingers clawed into the dirt, a desperate, but pointless struggle to get away. She didn’t even feel the thorns biting her skin and coating her foot in blood. Wisp sat up, reaching for the root that had caught her, but before she could touch it, the great tidal wave of angry forest fell upon her.
She crossed her arms over her face and shrieked.
Wisp snapped awake, breathing hard and covered in sweat.
Usually, whenever that dream tormented her, she’d scream until Dad came to check on her, but a tiny slice of her mind understood she lay out in the open woods without her Haven, and resisted the urge to cry out. Stunned, she huddled in a shivering ball, cowering away from the darkness and wavering blurs surrounding her. Wisp floated within a fog of confusion
from her abrupt return to consciousness mixed with the deathly fear of the nightmare. For a while, she couldn’t tell real apart from dream, and trembled in silence.
Her fingers curled, brushing her bare stomach. The touch broke the spell, snapping her out of the haze. She looked down at herself, curled up against a wall of rotting wood, her feet half-buried in soil. The dress hadn’t been real. She brushed a hand down the chest of her pink shirt. Grains of dirt dusted her legs, dark against the skin showing through the seams in her leather skirt. She gazed at her pale legs, hearing Dad’s voice in her mind explain how he’d made it in separate panels so it wouldn’t hamper her stride. Had he stitched all the tough leather armor scraps into a solid skirt, she’d barely have been able to walk―and forget running.
The bird remained on its stick beside her, where she’d jammed one end into the dirt. She’d managed to eat about a third of it. It would last her at least another whole day, more if she could control herself and not gorge until her belly hurt. Looking at it brought her mind back to the here and now. She had to find Dad. Mother trusted her with this task, gave her permission to leave the cabin.
Wisp did not want to disappoint Mother.
Snap.
The breath stalled in her throat.
Another faint snap came from farther away, along with the rustle of leaves.
She leaned her weight forward onto her left hand, edging her head closer to the shell of roots that fell like a curtain over the hollow she’d crawled into. Wisp stretched forward, shifting onto all fours, and peered out into the forest. The stars gave off enough light to make out the shapes of nearby trees. In a few places where the canopy opened up, the Moon created brighter spots like giant versions of Dad’s light-maker shining down from the sky. Tiny yellow lights winked in and out among the trees from a scattering of firebugs. The forest around her had grown thick with shadows, all too dark to see into, and all of them moved.
Crunch.
Wisp shifted her eyes to the right, keeping her head motionless. At the edge of the darkness perhaps twenty feet away, a mound of plant matter glided out from behind a pine trunk, at least as tall as Dad, probably bigger. The creature pivoted toward her, revealing a black nothingness where a person’s face would be, a hollow void with two huge, blank round eyes that gleamed in the moonlight.
Tree Walker!
The bad water almost shot straight out of her.
Such fear crashed into her that her mind shut down. Unable to think or move, she dangled by her grip on the roots, barely breathing. Several more mounds moved in the distance, brief gleams flashing from their mound-shaped bodies whenever a leaf caught the moon. The nearest Tree Walker flowed along the ground making little noise, like a liquid mass of vegetation. Wisp caught signs of motion, spotting other mounds creeping forward in a line, keeping even with each other. The creatures advanced in a wave, only for some reason, they didn’t swell up to ten feet tall and join together to form an inescapable barrier.
They didn’t see me. She shuddered, figuring these small mounds were like the forest’s eyes, peeking over the blanket, trying to stay hidden until it spotted a child to take. Then, they would rise and swell into the thunderous wall of roots and vines her nightmare had tormented her with for years. This must be how they hunt, like Dad taught her―quiet and careful so the boar or deer didn’t spook and run.
Wisp eased back into the shadowy space under the fallen tree. She sat and squeezed herself against the dirt wall. Bits of soil fell on her from above; roots jutted out on either side of her head. She pulled the rifle into her lap and closed her hand around the grip.
Snaps and rustling continued getting closer.
Stop shaking. Her body refused to obey that command; instead, her trembling got worse. The heavy rifle across her lap didn’t offer much reassurance. Dad’s voice repeated itself over and over in her head, warning her that shooting Tree Walkers wouldn’t hurt them. Bullets didn’t do much to bushes. The monsters appeared to be searching for something, and the more she dwelled on the fear they might find her, the angrier the bird meat in her gut became.
Wisp clamped both hands over her mouth to make sure she didn’t sniffle or whimper. Her right ankle burned from imagined thorns squeezing around her leg. The nightmare always ended the same way―her being captured. By Mother’s favor, she always woke up before it showed her what the Tree Walkers would do to her. As soon as the torrent of plants fell on top of her, she’d always sit up screaming, back in her Haven.
Only now, she did not find herself within a nightmare. The Tree Walkers―real, not a dream―crept within twenty feet of where she hunkered beneath a rotting log. Though the curtain of roots in front of her somewhat resembled the bars of her Haven, they hadn’t been charged with Dad’s magic. The Tree Walkers could send their vines right past them and get her. She missed her Haven so much. It could stop them.
Snaps and crunches came closer.
Sudden inspiration, likely from Mother, gave her an idea.
Wisp set the rifle down beside her, then covered it and the bird meat with her blanket. She lay sideways, as low to the ground as possible, and jammed her feet into the loose dirt up to the shins before scooping more soil on top of her legs. Last, she stuck her front half under the blanket to hide her bright pink shirt, and rested her cheek against the rifle, both arms stretched out over her head to lessen the ‘person-ness’ of her shape.
As much as she could, she tried to stop shaking. She had no other choice. The guns wouldn’t do anything against the Tree Walkers. Running wouldn’t help. The nightmare she’d had over and over for years made sure she understood what would happen if she attempted to flee. Had Mother given her that knowing?
Without her Haven, she could only hide and hope.
Tickles up and down her legs and back made it even harder to sit still. Bugs, likely wood lice, crawled up under her shirt onto her neck, exploring this new, warm, change to their home. She kept her head down, cheek resting on the rifle, nose away from the forest. Wisp wanted so badly to look, to watch in case they spotted her, but didn’t dare pull the blanket away. Besides, if they saw a human face, they’d definitely catch her. A blanket-covered lump might be mistaken for pale wood.
She closed her eyes to keep the wood lice from crawling into them, though one bug kept trying to explore her nostril. Another unfortunate one paid the price for walking over her lips, becoming a quick snack.
Slow crunching got nearer and nearer, then stopped. Dread finally managed to stall her trembles. The Tree Walker had to be close enough to stick with a spear. Strange whistles and clicks broke the stillness. Seconds later, similar noises responded in kind, quieter, farther away.
They talk, but not like people… She swallowed hard. Mother, please protect me.
The Tree Walker nearest her emitted a noise like an owl followed by a trilling whistle of a smaller bird. Wisp held her breath, ignoring the desperate need to scratch and swat at the wood lice creeping all over her. She cringed a little, and almost lost control when a bug tried to crawl into her ear. Another crept under her skirt, tickling the back of her thigh. Between that and the one in her ear, it took all her concentration to keep still and not swat them away.
Crunching and rustling passed overhead. Dirt rained down on her as the old tree trunk shifted. She stifled an ‘eep,’ not wanting to make a sound with a Tree Walker climbing on her hiding place. A soft clonk made her jump; probably one of the thicker branches in the creature’s body banging against the dead tree.
She kept herself still and quiet, having reached a point of being too terrified to tremble.
Gradually, the rustling and snapping of the searching Tree Walkers faded to silence. The occasional whistle or owl noise continued, growing more and more distant.
Thank you, Mother!
Wisp cried silent tears of gratitude.
She waited until she could no longer hear the Tree Walkers speaking to each other before pushing herself up to sit and swatting at all the bugs, shaking her
head hard to fling the one away from her ear. After scratching all the itches, she settled back down under the blanket, lying flat with her back to the dirt. To be comfortable, she’d have to curl up on her side as she did in the Haven. Stretching herself straight didn’t feel natural, but it concealed her shape more against the ground. Not that she had any expectation of falling asleep again after coming so close to Tree Walkers, but she couldn’t go anywhere yet.
Not until the daylight chased the monsters back underground.
Expedition
-15-
An hour or so before midday, Wisp came to a stop, pulled a canteen from its pouch, and opened it.
She’d broken camp at the first sign of daylight, getting underway while the forest remained mostly dark. At least with the bird-on-a-stick, she didn’t have to forage or cook. Walking toward the sunrise for hours had to have brought her closer to Dad, but with the sun pretty much directly overhead, she’d begun to question her sense of direction.
After drinking her fill, she recapped the canteen and stuffed it back on her belt. Deciding against a longer break, she continued onward at an unhurried pace while nibbling on the bird. Every direction looked the same. Trees, bushes, plants, moss, and here and there, rocks. An area off to the left reminded her of a place she’d walked through a day or two ago, but she questioned if her eyes played tricks. She couldn’t possibly have been going around in circles since Mother guided her to Dad. It had to be a coincidence. Trees didn’t look that different from each other, so it had to be a trick.
“I’m lost, aren’t I?”
Wisp sighed in defeat. She stopped again to let out the bad water, and used the time that took to consider what she should do. Maybe she should go back to the cabin in case Dad beat the monster and went home? Maybe he’d already been eaten?
The Forest Beyond the Earth Page 12