They told me their adventures, and I told them mine. They said that Phyto was very happy in Osage.
And time passed.
We grow up, all of us, and begin to see how adults think, to understand them. That is sad. It was good to be a child.
Schools came through and teachers stayed, though I wanted to wait for Anarcadia, my love from inside. I left messages and gifts in our ghost cave and they always disappeared, but nothing was ever left behind.
Why didn't I go back inside? Because I am an outsider. I need the sea, sand, sun. I can't live without those.
Lillah came back as if time had not passed and I had not become a man. No one can believe it. She is thin and pale but she has a burning fire in her eyes. She knows things, she has learnt so much. She will find us dull and empty after all she has done.
I want to make her proud. Do some good work. They have already agreed I should help the market holder between Ombu and Laburnum, and I will make it a place all of Botanica thinks about. Anarcadia will join me, and our children will walk the Tree, and life will go around and around and around.
ANGRY ROBOT
A member of the Osprey Group
Midland House, West Way
Botley, Oxford
OX2 0HP
UK
www.angryrobotbooks.com
Ghosts
An Angry Robot paperback original 2010
1
Copyright © Kaaron Warren 2010
Kaaron Warren asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
EBook ISBN: 978 0 85766 044 2
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This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Walking the Tree Page 44