by Helen Harper
When the pavement and then the road broke apart from the force of the trees’ roots, I could understand why. So many trees were growing at such a rate that the ground started to shake.
There was a tremendous roaring sound. At first, I couldn’t work out what it was but when tiles dropped from the roof of one of the terraced houses near Rubus’s lair, I finally realised. Right in front of my eyes, an oak burst through the house towards the sky. From deep within the house, we could hear terrified screams.
I stopped gaping and started moving, pushing open the car door and sprinting for the house. At the rate that tree was going, whoever was inside was likely to become part of the root system.
Within moments, Morgan was next to me. We flung ourselves at the house, yanking open the door. What greeted us, however, wasn’t a neat hallway. All we could see was the continually expanding tree trunk straining against the walls. I could make out plaster cracking and warping. We had only moments before the entire structure collapsed and all that remained was tree.
I jumped back and peered upwards. The tree was slanting to the right. To the left, there was a window on the first floor. Suddenly it swung open and the terrified face of a young woman appeared.
‘Help!’ she shrieked. ‘Help me!’ Her wide eyes frantically searched the street before alighting on us. She waved her hands desperately. ‘I can’t open the bedroom door! My children are in the other room! I can’t… I can’t…’ She gulped in air, her anxiety taking over.
‘We’re on our way,’ I yelled. ‘Stay calm!’
Easy for me to say. Now we could hear screams from the streets nearby, though they were barely audible over the noise of the rupturing roads and pavements.
‘Give me a boost,’ I said to Morgan. ‘I’ll get inside and see what I can do.’
He nodded and formed a foothold with his palms. I hopped onto his hands, threw myself upwards and managed to grab the edge of the window frame.
Gasbudlikins. However much I wished it were different, I didn’t have sufficient strength in my arms. My legs writhed in the air as I did everything I could to avoid losing my grip. It was only when I braced my toes against the wall of the house that I managed to haul myself upwards so I could squeeze through the window.
The woman, still in full-blown panic mode, had abandoned her post and returned to her bedroom door, yanking at it to try and open it. From deep within the house, I could hear children crying. I dusted myself off and gritted my teeth.
‘How many children are there?’
The woman didn’t answer. She was too focused on frantically trying to tug the door open.
I placed a firm hand on her arm. ‘How many people are in the house?’
Morgan was clearly rubbing off on me because something about my stern, school-mistress tone finally got through to the woman. Although she kept her hands on the door handle, she stopped flailing and answered. ‘Two. Two children. Bertie – he’s only three. And Jess. She’s…’ The woman choked. ‘She’s just a baby.’
‘Where are they?’
‘Their bedroom. It’s only a few metres away at the opposite end of the house. I can’t get to them.’ Her voice rose again. ‘I can’t get to them! I can’t…!’
‘Hush. They’re crying so that means they’re still alive. I’ve got this. It’s only a tree. This will be a piece of cake.’
I’d barely finished speaking when there was a tremendous crunch. The wood panels on the door bulged and splintered. I pulled the woman back just in time before a branch shot out and pinned her to the far wall. She screamed again. Her shrieks were rather off-key – and off-putting.
I vaulted over the branch and grabbed her. If she hadn’t been so surprised, she’d have put up more of a fight. As it was, I managed to get her to the window.
‘Morgan!’ I yelled. ‘Incoming!’
I shoved the woman out. I heard an oomph and glanced down. Morgan had caught her – but he was now sprawled on his back with the woman on top of him. From the way she was moving, she was fine. From the glower on Morgan’s face as he gazed up at me, so was he. I flashed him a grin and a tiny wave, then scooted for the door.
I tried the same as the panicking mother had done, tugging on the door handle with all my might. The door frame was already buckling but, even with the shattered wood through which the branch had sprung, there was no way in this godforsaken demesne I was going to manage to open it.
I cocked my head and listened. Fortunately the tree seemed to have stopped its growth – at least for now. The children were still crying. After listening to their mother, I could see where they got it from.
‘Well, Madrona,’ I muttered to myself, ‘the doors are blocked. There’s no way through. You’re just going to have to find another way.’
Unwilling to let loose any magic without rooting it in anything real first, I stepped back and gazed upwards. From this angle, I could see the massive hole in the roof that the tree had created. If I couldn’t go down and I couldn’t go across, I’d darn well have to go up.
Without wasting any more time, I grabbed the dressing table and hauled it over before leaping onto it. If I jumped, maybe I could launch myself upwards to grab the side of the tree and get onto the roof.
The building was rattling now. Whether the tree had stopped growing or not, I suspected that the entire structure was not long for this world. I had to move – and move fast.
I used the dressing table as a launch pad and sprang upwards. All I succeeded in doing was plastering myself against the wall. My fingers barely scraped against the now-visible roof timbers. That wasn’t any good. I got back to my feet, clambered on the dressing table again and readjusted my thinking. Snapping my fingers, I realised I had it.
I sprang up again, this time using the protruding branch as a sort of trampoline. The tree was healthy and young, so there was enough give on the branch when I landed on it to shoot me upwards an extra foot. It did the trick.
Letting out a loud, ululating, Tarzan bellow, I swung my legs up and hooked them onto one of the slanting cross beams in the roof. It was a tight squeeze but there was enough of a gap so I could push myself out onto the roof. After the claustrophobic, tree-filled house, it was a blessed relief to be outdoors again – though I couldn’t take the time to savour it.
I edged forward, intending to circle round the tree to reach the other side of the house. As soon as I moved, however, my foot slipped on one of the moss-covered tiles and I went flying.
My hands scrabbled at the air and my life flashed in front of my eyes. Fortunately, at the last minute the tree itself saved me. While I swung out with nothing but air between me and the hard pavement below, one of the slimmer branches snagged on my baggy T-shirt and held me back. It stopped me falling. Gasbudlikins. That was close.
I swayed to my right, hoping to use the same branch to get back to relative safety. I could already hear the fabric of my T-shirt ripping; I didn’t have long. With one deep breath – and just as the T-shirt gave way – I threw myself forward and wrapped my arms round the tree trunk to avoid falling again. Done.
I shimmied around until I was on the section of the roof where I needed to be. There was another loud creak; I could swear the building was swaying. As this was a terraced house, I prayed that it wouldn’t take down a dozen other houses with it when it fell. This was not the time for dominoes.
‘Morgan!’ I yelled.
His voice drifted back up to me. ‘Are you alright?’
‘I’m fine! You need to get the neighbours out. This building is about to collapse!’
I heard a moan from the mother but I didn’t have time to worry about her. Morgan could do the evacuations and tea and sympathy; the Madhatter would do the action.
I pivoted slightly. Unfortunately, the gap in the roof here was considerably smaller. Without a decent diet, I doubted it would be as easy to squeeze down on this side as it had been to squeeze up on the other side. I pursed my lips. The next house along had a skylight; that would have to do. With any luck,
the adjacent wall had been destroyed and, once I was back inside, I could get through.
Reaching for a branch to keep my balance, I shuffled over to the skylight. It was firmly closed. I’d have to smash it to get in. Cursing the human who invented double glazing, I angled my heel downwards and slammed it onto the glass. It cracked and a spider’s web of tiny fissures appeared. I was going to need more than that.
Raising my knee, I kicked the glass again. This time, my entire leg went through, shards scraping through my jeans and piercing my flesh. I ignored the pain and the blood and set about clearing away as much of the glass as I could before lowering myself inside.
‘Maddy!’ I heard Morgan shout. ‘You need to…’ The rest of his words were swallowed up by the sound of approaching sirens. You had to feel for the fire brigade, I thought. They’d probably only just finished putting out the fires caused by the crazed rain from earlier; now they had trees with minds of their own to worry about. I bet all those burly firemen wished they had someone like me to help them out.
The neighbours’ house was in an equally sorry state. Branches from next door had punched through the walls. I darted over to the most damaged part and started yanking at the crumbling plaster to create a large enough gap to squeeze through. When there was enough space I dived through headfirst, hitting a small cot and knocking it over as I landed.
Gasbudlikins. Heart thumping, I leapt to my feet. The room was covered in fallen debris and it was almost impossible to see a thing. It would be ridiculous if I’d fought my way in here to rescue babies and then hurt those very babies because of my own actions. I ducked under another low-lying branch that was poking through the wall and heaved away the cot. No baby.
‘Bertie!’ I shrieked, my voice now reaching the same pitch as their mother’s. ‘Jess!’
There was no longer any crying. The house felt as if it were alive, breathing and creaking and moaning in the final gasps of its life, but of the children there was no sound. Was I in the wrong room? Were they hiding? Was…?
‘Maddy! Get the hell out of there! The whole place is about to collapse!’
I frowned and craned my neck round. There, outside the open window, was Morgan. ‘The children…’
‘They’re safe. They’re out.’ He outstretched his hand towards me. ‘Come on!’
I squinted. ‘Are you hovering in mid-air? Can we actually fly after all?’
He rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. I’m on a ladder in the garden. One of the neighbours gave it to me.’
I got up to my feet, turned slowly and put my hands on my hips. ‘You got a ladder.’
‘Yes.’
‘From a neighbour.’
He glared at me impatiently. ‘Yes! Come on. We have to get out of here.’
I sniffed. ‘I’ve been clambering around the roof, risking my neck, possibly kicking a kid out of its bed, and you calmly got a ladder and put it in the back garden?’
‘Can we talk about this later?’
I tossed my head. ‘I’d like to talk about it now.’
There was a loud rumble. I let out a small yelp and threw myself at Morgan. His arm wrapped round my waist and, flipping me over his shoulder fireman-style, he pulled me through the window and down the ladder.
We only just made it to the ground in time. A moment later, the house collapsed in on itself as if it were a punctured balloon.
Morgan ran, taking us both a safe distance away from the cloud of dust and debris. He carried me to other side of the street, which was now a mess of gnarled roots and fallen bricks. Blue lights from the fire engine flickered outside several houses as more residents were rescued. Then something hit Morgan and I was squashed between him and the wall.
‘Thank you! Thank you! You saved my children!’
‘You’re very welcome,’ I said, my voice muffled somewhere around Morgan’s arse.
He dropped me gently to the ground. I brushed myself down and turned. By the time I’d done so, Bertie and Jess’s mum was hugging Morgan tightly. She was no longer crying or shrieking or screaming, she was wrapping herself round him in abject gratitude.
‘If it wasn’t for you,’ she gasped, ‘they’d be dead.’
She pulled back and several other humans approached. ‘Well done, mate,’ said a burly man with a beard and what appeared to be dinosaur pyjamas. ‘I don’t know what shit is going down here but you’re a hero. Well done.’
I folded my arms and glared. I’d entered the damned house. I’d clambered across the roof. I’d almost killed myself in the process. Morgan had borrowed a ladder, wandered up a few rungs and somehow become the arsebadgering superhero. Honestly. This was idiotic.
‘Yeah,’ I said with full-blown sarcasm. ‘Go you.’
Several of the neighbours shook their heads. ‘We’ve had enough. We’re packing our things and getting out of here. The army has set up a boundary around the city. We’re heading that way if anyone wants a lift.’
There were nods and murmurs and plans were made. After a few more handshakes with Morgan the wondrous saviour, people started to disperse.
Only when we were alone again did I speak. ‘Maybe we should stop worrying about Rubus,’ I said. ‘It seems as if the apocalypse is already starting, regardless of the sphere.’
Morgan threw me a long, baleful look. ‘It’s only happening in Manchester,’ he said grimly. ‘Where the greatest concentration of faeries is. What happens if all this,’ he waved a hand at the devastated street, ‘starts happening in other places too?’
I considered. ‘Well,’ I said cheerfully, ‘you’ll be busy. You are, after all, the hero of this piece.’
He smirked. ‘Jealous?’
‘No.’
‘You look jealous.’
‘I’m not…’ Fortunately, I was prevented from having to defend myself. Further down, where Rubus’s lair was situated, a small group was emerging. I spotted Rubus, Julie, Finn, Lunaria and various others.
My mouth flattened. ‘Look who’s decided to come out.’
Morgan turned, his expression shuttering. Without another word, he strode towards his errant brother. I caught up, keeping pace with him. At least Julie looked okay. That was something. It was a damned shame that Rubus hadn’t had a tree slam him into a wall, though.
We drew up to Rubus and his crowd, maintaining a decent distance between us in case he decided to try anything. He looked relaxed, one eyebrow quirked as he gazed up and down the street. ‘Have you been making a mess, Morganus?’ he enquired.
Morgan growled. ‘This is merely a taste of what will happen if you use the sphere, Rubus. People almost died on this very street. Goodness only knows what’s happening across the rest of the city.’
Rubus clapped his hands to his cheeks in mock dismay. ‘Goodness only knows indeed!’
‘Our magic has done this,’ I said, adding weight to Morgan’s words in a bid to prove to Rubus’s minions that his lack of concern was criminal. ‘This is our fault. We can’t cast any more spells. Not if we want all this to stop happening.’
I spotted several pale faces but it was clear who was in charge. No one else spoke; there wasn’t so much as a murmur from the assembly.
Rubus shook his head sadly. ‘Madrona, Madrona, Madrona. Listen to yourself. You were so much more fun when you let your true self come to the fore. Heroism doesn’t suit you.’
Maybe not, but altruism was something that Rubus would never understand. I exhaled and met his eyes. ‘It’s not about heroism, it’s about self-preservation. You lot were lucky that a damned oak tree didn’t suddenly sprout underneath your feet. You’re lucky that the fire rain didn’t set your hair alight.’ I tilted my head. ‘You weren’t quite so lucky with those rats though, were you?’
Rubus was unable to repress a shudder. ‘Nasty creatures. It’s fortunate they didn’t do more damage.’ His mouth turned down. ‘This is why we Fey need to exit this demesne tout suite. We need to save ourselves. Give me the sphere, Maddy,’ he said. ‘Put aside a
ll this painful conscience stuff. It’ll only ever make you miserable.’
‘She doesn’t have the sphere,’ Morgan broke in. ‘And the sphere is separate to this other business. We must agree to avoid using more magic so that what’s in the atmosphere now can disperse safely.’
Rubus didn’t answer for a moment. I couldn’t read his expression. Frankly, it could have gone either way. Then he shrugged. ‘I told the glamorous Julie here that I’d make sure none of my lot use magic unless it’s an emergency. I can be magnanimous. If it comes to the sphere and me, however, all bets are off. And I’m only laying off spells because I don’t want anyone to be hurt.’
‘You mean you don’t want to be hurt,’ I snapped.
He tutted. ‘Oh, Maddy. So much anger. This side of you really isn’t fun at all.’ He lunged forward without warning, one hand swiping at my face. Morgan leapt in front to block him. Rubus pulled back and laughed. ‘Of course,’ he added, ‘I don’t need magic to hurt you. I can do that without any spells.’
Julie took a step towards us. ‘Darling,’ she drawled, ‘you need to relax.’ She waved an airy hand. ‘I recommend gin. It works wonders.’ She blew a kiss towards Rubus and then, with Finn flanking her, joined us. It was a miracle that the large Redcap restrained himself; after all, Rubus had killed his brother in cold blood. I had to give him kudos for self-control.
Rubus clasped his heart and kept his eyes on Julie. ‘Bye, darling.’
She smiled. ‘Bye.’
I sneaked a quick peek at Lunaria. She looked even more wan and miserable than she was earlier. Poor thing. It seemed that all of us, in our own ways, were trying our best to succeed and none of us were managing it. Apart from Julie – but she had a good century and a half’s experience on the rest of us.
‘Julie!’ Rubus called. ‘Don’t forget what I told you!’
Her expression dropped for the briefest second and I realised that I was wrong: she was holding on to a mask like the rest of us.
I bit back the temptation to ask Julie what he meant; I wouldn’t give Rubus the satisfaction. I kept walking. We’d done all we could for now.